Dana Earhart on CEO Energy: Why Joy Is Fuel, Not the Reward | Paper Napkin Wisdom

think about, wow, what did change for me with that time? And is this something I want to start? adopting every week? Is it something I want to start bringing in more than once a week?

And it gets you thinking about how can you create this on a daily or weekly basis? Hi, I'm Govind Jayaraman and this is Paper Napkin Wisdom, episode 367. Every week on the show, we sit down with entrepreneurs, leaders, and difference makers who have a powerful idea and made it small enough to fit on a napkin, but big enough to change the way we think, lead, and live. And today's conversation may land in a place that you already know.

Because if you've built something real, you probably know what it feels like. to keep going long after your energy has started asking for something different. So you know what it's like to love the business, love the work, love the people you serve, and still feel that quiet pull that says there has to be another way to lead this. So today I'm joined by Dana Earhart.

Dana is a business co-goat strategist and a leadership mentor who helps service-based CEOs and founders grow their company without losing themselves inside of their business that they worked so hard to build. And the wisdom she brings to the napkin is simple, powerful, and maybe a little uncomfortable if you've been living by the old rules of hustle and grind. In the center of her napkin are the words CEO energy, and around that are three other words, anticipation, presence, and afterglow.

And beneath it all is the line that really stayed with me, joys your fuel, not your reward. And that one line and the way she uses it may change the way you look at your calendar because for so many leaders treat joy as something they get later. After the quarter closes, after the team is fixed, after the next milestone, after the businesses finally give them permission to breathe, but what Dana invites us to consider is very different. What if the joy is not the thing waiting for you at the end?

What if joy is the thing that helps you lead better right now? What if the next level of your leadership is not found in more control, hours, or pressure? What if it begins with learning how to lead your own energy? So as you listen today, pay attention to where this conversation finds you.

Maybe it finds you tired or in motion. Maybe it finds you still trying to earn the life your business was supposed to create, and maybe... Somewhere in Dana's flywheel, you'll hear the invitation to start small. One hour, one moment of joy, one choice that reminds you that your life is not the leftover part of your business.

It might be the source of your energy and that's something your business has been waiting for. So let's dive into my conversation with Dana. Dana Earhart, welcome to Paper Napkin Wisdom. I'm excited to have you here today.

Thank you. I'm honored to be here and excited for our conversation. So you have a famous last name and I asked you about it because I know people who pronounce your last name Earhart and Earhart and it turns out you are related in a distant way. I think we're about fourth cousin to Amelia Earhart, the pilot.

So that is my claim to fame. a great claim to fame in addition to the fact that you pronounce the name differently, which is, you know, claiming the name in a whole different way. I think in a way that Amelia, your fourth cousin, would be very proud, I think. uh So you shared a really interesting, uh speaking of flywheels and speaking about airplanes, you shared an interesting paper napkin and in the center of the napkin is a flywheel.

So for those of you just listening, picture a wheel and in the middle it says CEO Energy and around the outside, 12 o'clock it says anticipation and about four o'clock you say presence and about eight o'clock you say afterglow and there are arrows all the way around. On top of this circle you have halted by grind fueled by joy and a reminder at the bottom that joy is your fuel not your reward. Why did you share that with me? It's something I hold uh sacred for myself and being on the journey I've been on.

uh And it is something that I think becomes so integral in what I work with clients on. Because I think so many of us, we love what we do. We're very passionate about what we do. We have servant hearts and it's really easy to get pulled into the hustle and grind mentality uh when you're excited about things.

And if we're not careful and if we're not good at pacing ourselves along the way, even though we love what we do, we start feeling the stress, the exhaustion, the frustration, the burnout. And it's not that we need a vacation from our life or our business, yet it's missing a spark that was there in the beginning. And it is something I believe that can be adjusted and fixed so easily. ah And that's why for me, I feel like a lot of people put focus on time management, know, manage your time, manage your team, manage your leadership, manage your systems.

And as the leader, as the owner of organizations, we can forget to manage and lead, not just manage. I think lead our own energy. And that's what this flywheel was all about, is making sure that we are not living for that vacation, that big milestone, that we're enjoying the journey. Yeah, I really like that.

And uh let's sort of back this up because you weren't born with this flywheel in your back pocket, I don't think. It sounds like there's a personal story there. So tell me about how you reached that maybe frustration or burnout that helped you discover this path. Absolutely, you know my 20s I was a hundred percent committed to being the female independent strong female executive climbing the corporate ladder and that's exactly what I did ah And I loved every minute of it.

It had great opportunities to travel the country had clients abroad in London ah Managed a team of over a hundred individuals and it was a really exciting and rewarding time And then I entered my thirties and realized, oh, I kind of do want to have a family and business. How, how is this going to happen? Um, and ultimately I had my son two months before I turned 40 and, uh, 18 months later launched my own business. So I was in the throes of launching this new business with a toddler.

No. Yep. got nothing going on. So might as well just start a business because I just have this, you know, 18 months.

Exactly, exactly. Although, you know, he was a big part of my why in launching my own business because I didn't want to be traveling the country anymore. I wanted to be home with him. And so it was recreating myself uh in this business.

And I was very concerned about becoming a workaholic again in my own business and missing out on those times with my son where I may have physically been with him, but was I present? was I actually in the moment with him. And it started out with something as simple as committing to no less than at least one hour every single week that was a special hour, whether it was an extra date with my son or now date with my boyfriend, with girlfriends, time on the tennis court, one hour at least.

every single week of doing something that brings complete joy to my life um is, I don't even want to say it's a requirement because I actually, it's one of the things I start with when I'm mapping things out on my calendar is to make sure that that time, that personal time is allotted for. Because that's when that anticipation presence after glow comes into play. because I have the anticipation of the event, then it's experiencing that joyful time, and then it's the afterglow after.

And I knew how significant of a change it made in my life, and then to be able to see it when others started implementing it as well, just brought me even more joy as I saw more joy in their life. And the fact is when we're more joyful, When we're feeling more fulfilled, we show up as a stronger leader. We're more present, we're more effective, and ultimately that also creates the growth in the business as well. Yeah, let's, let's, you said something really quickly earlier on about how the doctrine for most of us in, in leadership early on is about managing your time, manage your time.

And you flipped that in a way that I speak about in paper napkin. it came many years ago. uh A great friend of the show's name is Michael Walsh said time and time management is a myth. It's energy management.

Everybody has the same 24 hours in the day. How is it that some people do much more with it than others? And it's because they're managing their energy well. And you're, you even changed it a little bit and said, lead your energy well, right?

So what does it mean? What's the distinction between managing time and leading energy? Great. I often say that unless you have access to the world clock, it is not possible to manage time.

We have no control over that. The 24 hours in a day will pass no matter what we do. What we can lead and control to the best of our ability, minus any health issues, is our energy. And I think the difference between, for me, management often is...

There's a bit of control. There's boundaries, restrictions, control, expectation. Leading starts with vision. Leading starts with, what do I want to celebrate at the end of this day that I created and I accomplished?

And it's about who you are being throughout the day, and that's your energy. It's your thoughts, it's your actions, it's your beliefs, and it's your energy. And energy can also stem from, know, did you take care of yourself? Did you get solid sleep?

Are you hydrated? Are you well-nourished? Have you moved? That's another thing I have been guilty of, and I'm still uh days where if I'm not intentional, I could sit in front of this and do my work for, you know, maybe four, six hours straight and not even get up, uh which is not...

a way to effectively, efficiently lead um our energy because we will get stagnant if we are not moving. uh So I'm not sure if I answered your question directly, but certainly I think there's... sort of indirectly, and I think there's some power there. Managing time is trying to control time.

And like you said, if we don't own the clock, we can't control it. But we can own our own energy. And I think that's a very powerful distinction. In fact, we do own our own energy.

And we do that with something that you said starts with vision, but we don't start with vision by default. Right. We start in other places by default. So it's by design that you start with vision.

And what is the design tool that you use or hack that you use in your day to bring yourself to that place with starting with vision? Cause it feels like it's a daily task. Is it not? Absolutely.

ah And sometimes you may even want to ground yourself and regroup several times throughout the day, uh depending on all the things you're involved in. think setting the tone for energy today starts last night. And ah just this morning I was sharing with a client of the power of taking 10 to 15 minutes at the end of each day. Some people choose to do it at the end of their work day, and I usually do that as well, uh where I'm taking a few minutes to evaluate how did today go?

What went well? What did I accomplish that uh moved forward? What is still in progress that will warrant some attention and intention tomorrow? And then ultimately be thinking of what are those top three intentions for tomorrow?

Not the laundry list of a hundred things that need to be done, but what are the top three intentions I have for tomorrow? And usually the first one is about my energy and uh the characteristics or the presence that I want to bring to the day. um And then it's about what areas do I want to be moving the needle forward. And when you start doing that on a daily basis, you will start feeling yourself naturally leading more than reacting.

And this is how the conversation came up this morning with the client of she was feeling like she was in more of a reaction mode, which means you're not leading. You're allowing yourself to be led through emotions and action as opposed to intentionally leading. And so when you can get clear the night before, that means before your feet even hit the floor the next morning, you're very clear on what your objectives are for that day. You were careful also in that evening routine to talk about top three intentions for tomorrow.

And you distinguished intentions from actions, not to-do lists, not that kind of stuff. And really, I think a lot of people go through that list of actions or outcomes or key activities as being a series of expectations they have for the day. You're very clear about the word intentions. Let's talk about that.

What do you mean by intentions? Because I think somewhere out uh there, there's a CEO, there's an entrepreneur, there's a leader, a difference maker out there listening, and they're going, I'm just so overwhelmed with the things I have to do. It's not a kumbaya moment for me to sit there and think about intention. But you're talking about intention being the key to unlocking something much more important.

What do you mean by intention? Absolutely, if we are not careful and I can speak from experience that uh I judged value, judged productivity, I judged accomplishments in essence by how busy I was. I didn't realize it at the time, but when we are working from a to-do list and just checking things off, that is about who we are doing, how we are doing things. It is not about who we are being in the process.

And I think when it comes to leadership, who you are being, how you are empowering your team, how you are mentoring your team, how you're role modeling for your team, ah how you're training your team when they need that guidance, ah how you're holding them accountable, that is all about being this. There's some doing as part of that. However, when you're really thinking about being of service and being an empowered leader who is going to help raise the team. who you're being is far more important than what you are doing.

Yeah, I like that. And I like you talking about raise the team. And I want to come back to that in a second, because I think that's something that people don't really get is the leader's job is to create more leaders, to grow your people in quality and quantity. And we tend to focus just on quality and quantity a lot.

And I want to go back to what you talked about at the beginning, though. And I think this is a really important pre-step. where you talked about creating time blocks for your personal time. And you said start with one hour.

again, someone listening is saying one hour, that's ridiculous. That's not enough. But there's something interesting that happens when you start with one hour, right? And I think that's very strategic that you suggested that.

Let's talk about that. Why create a time block for just one hour? I think for, it really, it all depends where you're starting from. So ah for some clients when they're coming to me feeling very overwhelmed, very overworked, the CEO is working 50 or 60, 70 hours a week, uh nights, weekends, even if the laptop's not in front of them, their mind is thinking about work.

uh The concept of blocking out. four, five, six hours uh in a week creates stress and overwhelm from the moment I suggest it. And so I typically start with one or two hours. So I'll say one hour, bare minimum.

And then that one hour can also turn into one hour a day, not just one hour a week. They can realize that, I do want a three hour, four hour date night with my significant other or whatever that may look like. And so they start building that in and what's fascinating with it. Even in sometimes it's, they're also creating that boundary of I'm not taking the laptop home.

I'm not checking messages on my phone where I'm going into do not disturb by 6 p.m. And it's not being turned on until the next morning. uh When those changes start happening, it's fascinating that they've also become much more intentional when they go back to work.

Because now they've had the reward, they've had that time of joy. And now they want to make sure that they start leading themselves on a daily basis in a way to have more time for joy. And so they naturally becomes part of the progression. to be more intentional.

So one of the things that I think is really powerful about what you're starting with is you're creating an awakening, a remembering of where your energy comes from. And that starts with just an hour, right? I think that's the powerful thing here. And your flywheel is really interesting because what ends up happening is people start to look forward to that.

And that's your anticipation phase, right? The excitement of looking forward to it. Yes. And that gives you energy before it's happened.

So even if you have that one hour, if that's all you can make happen, if you're so overwhelmed, that's all you've got that one hour really builds you a lot of momentum during the course, world doesn't know. Absolutely, if you are starting on Monday knowing that Saturday is going to be the day that you get this hour, that's five days leading up to that, that you get that anticipation. No different than like vacations, but vacations feel bigger. Vacations don't happen every week.

I am wanting to bring it down more granular to showcase that we can do this on a daily basis. We can do this on a weekly basis. um And as you said, it's the five or six days leading up to it. It's the hour you have it.

And then it's several days after that, that you're in that afterglow because you gave yourself that hour. And the hope is that then you're also, by the time this hour is complete, you're already scheduling the next hour. So you start that wonderful cycle all over again with the anticipation. Yeah, it's very powerful.

and you know, again, out there, somebody's thinking big. It's like, I want to, I want a day off. I'm 40 hours, 50 hours, 60 hours, which I'm working a hundred hours a week. I need a day off and I can't even get that.

Yeah. Think big or a day off is not a big deal. Let's be clear. If you're working on what's important as opposed to what's urgent, you can get there, but, start small, start small and give yourself that moment.

Now, There's another really important thing that I think what you're also suggesting is that the ability to be present, can't be a leader. You can't be a leader. You can do leadershipy things, but you can't be a leader without being present, right? Yes, absolutely.

Right, so this practices presence. That's the next step. Anticipation leads to presence. Presence in that moment.

Learning how to be there in that moment, doing it for yourself helps you do it for others. Isn't that right? Correct, you're role modeling it as well. um even if you're not uh sharing with your team and with your colleagues what you're doing in the beginning, they will start to see the difference.

They will feel the energetic difference. And if you're the ultimate leader, you're going to start sharing that concept with your team. you're gonna start encouraging your team to talk to you about what are they doing in their hour or their block of time to experience joy. um And it's not just about the strategy in the office that allows them to become a stronger leader.

It's also what are they doing outside of the office that impacts their leadership in the office. Yeah. And you know, one of the ways, you know, I like this idea of role modeling, but when I talk to other leaders, I say it's, it's sort of role practicing. You practice it in private so you can perform in public.

And when you, the things that you do for yourself are practice in private. Right? So, so presence is a really important part of it. Let's, talk about the afterglow because I think, I think that's something that, um, maybe people don't understand as easily, but what's the, What do you mean by afterglow as part of this flywheel?

Great question. I think the after glow, first of all, it's acknowledging that you have done something new, that you trusted in a process, you challenged yourself to do it, and then you get to really think about, wow, what did change for me with that time? And is this something I want to start? adopting every week?

Is it something I want to start bringing in more than once a week? And it gets you thinking about how can you create this on a daily or weekly basis? And I have many clients who then switch to, know what? I want to start taking Friday afternoons off.

Or I had one colleague who she started taking Wednesdays off because that was going to be a day she could stay at home with her son who wasn't in daycare. where before she couldn't even fathom how do I take an entire day off? And now she's carving out a day every single week. That's four days a month she just gave herself.

So it very much can snowball into really the ultimate vision you have for your life. And underneath everything I do and underneath the flow of this flywheel is to ensure that your always building a business that supports the life you want. Because if you are not careful, you start squeezing in life around the business. And I know that because I lived that when I was in corporate consulting.

And that is probably one of the ultimate foundations of which I've built the business on. And what this CEO energy flywheel is all about. Making sure that I am always connected. to the life I want to be creating on a daily basis, not just once a year when I'm looking at annual goals.

Yeah. And I also think that, you know, this idea of after glow also comes from turning on the lights to the fact that, wait a minute. Um, the clock did keep on ticking. The sun did come up the next day without me.

Maybe I can take care of myself, right? I, maybe I can, survive being away and maybe more importantly, everybody else can survive my absence too. And isn't it true that we can, as leaders talk about empowerment all we want, but the only way to truly empower somebody is to actually empower them by walk, by walking away, right? Isn't, isn't that true also?

ah Very much so, very much so. And it's, I remember a client who said while she was on Zoom with me, she's like, Dana, my team is lining up at the door waiting for me. And they know I'm on a Zoom call with you. And I think it's a reminder that we teach people how to treat us.

And that's both in the negative and the positive. And so when you are seeing team members working long hours, what are you doing to teach them that it's okay to work normal hours and go home and enjoy your life outside of the office, knowing that that in the end will make them a healthier, stronger member of your team. And so there's all different ways to role model. for our team what this looks like.

Yeah. You know, even in the way you just talked about that, the thing I wrote down here in my notes is when we build muscle, we go to the gym, when we physically, when we're physically active, it's not in the lifting of the weight that you become stronger. It's in the rest that comes afterward. And that's when the scar tissue heals and you become stronger and we become stronger in this way.

in taking the rest between reps and taking that moment to step away. absolutely, it's the only way to become healthier and stronger and more capable is to take that time between sets and between, you know, between, yeah, so I like to call it rest between reps. One of the things he also talked about was business that supports life as opposed to life that supports or that is squeezed in amongst the leftovers of business time. And, and, you know, mentioned Michael Walsh earlier on and he, he has this really other great thing that he says that entrepreneurs and leaders and CEOs are often looking from three types of freedom, freedom in the business to do work on the things that they want to work on, as opposed to the things they feel like they have to freedom from the business to go and step away and empower their team, have an empowered team that is able to let them step away from the business and freedom because of the business.

freedom that the business is affording uh them a way of life or an income that supports a way of life that they actually need to be able to enjoy and take the vacation time and have a nice dinner and have a staycation and do those kinds of things. This flywheel supports that idea too, doesn't it? Very much so, very much so because it is about, uh know, joy is your fuel. And so if you're really thinking about uh joy as the fuel, not the reward, it's looking for how can you create more moments of joy throughout the year because that will ultimately fuel you.

to be even more committed, more focused, and that word intentional, more intentional with your time, with your energy, with your leadership to ensure in your case, as you were just citing, those three areas of freedom are created. uh And through team, through systems, uh through the vision. I do think there's... room for CEOs to have more clarity in their vision.

I think oftentimes we start, even maybe we start the year with really clear vision. And then if we're not connected to that, if we're not focused on that on a daily basis, we lose the vision. We lose the details of the vision. We lose the feeling of the vision.

And the feeling, I'm gonna tie that back into the flywheel because the energy... that's created through the anticipation, the presence, the afterglow, it's that that will fuel us to be even more intentional in moving the needle forward in our projects, in our goals, so that we can create the ultimate freedom from the business. In the business, from the business, around the business. yeah.

So what's really cool is, you know, in seven habits, they talk about sharpening the saw. And I think people really turn that into working on things. You're saying it's not working on things. It's working away from things that, helps you sharpen the saw.

So what let's talk about the payoff. Well, how did your life change? when you applied these things. I'm going to guess, I'm going to read the Coles notes or between the tea leaves.

And I'm going to guess that you take more than an hour a week today. But yeah. you know, even some mornings when I'm out walking, I might be walking with a friend, I'm out in nature seeing the sunrise. uh It's twofold because of course that movement's good for my body.

It's though meant, it's emotionally the connection with a friend. It's spiritually, it touches all different aspects of joy for me. And that's something I do on a daily basis that some would say, but that was exercise. Well, for me, I get joy.

Some people get joy from going to the gym. mean, and I think that's also the opportunity here is we all experience joy in different ways. So first and foremost, be clear on how you experience joy. Where does joy come from in your life?

Where do you want it to come from in your life? And how can you start incorporating that more often? And I did share earlier of making sure that that those events are going on my calendar first. And so while I am talking about energetic leadership, it also ties into the physical doingness um of our leadership and making sure that I am mapping out on the calendar all of my personal commitments and desires on the calendar first.

And then I move into the CEO role and responsibility. And from there move, there's about seven different layers of how I look at scheduling out my calendar. um And so this did not come naturally. um It did seem foreign.

Sometimes it still feels foreign. Just this past summer, my son is now 14. uh And so his needs of me on a summer break are different. Now I'm Uber mom, taking he and his friends places.

And I shifted my work hours and where a lot of days over the summer, I stopped working around three o'clock in the afternoon. And I could tell I was struggling a little bit, almost feeling guilty that I wasn't focused on my business, quote unquote, full time. Nothing was falling apart in my business. This is how I designed my business to have that level of flexibility.

However, it was a moment where I needed to stop and just ground myself and remind myself that this is exactly why I went into business for myself. And this is actually something to be celebrated that I am taking this extra time to be with my son and his friends and remind myself of the joy that I get from that. Because in a couple of years, he'll be driving himself and I won't be able to be in the car with him and his friends. um And so being aware of that then also gave me the fuel of, okay, if you're still feeling like you need more hours at work, then start earlier.

Then adjust your schedule so that you're experiencing more of that joy. And it's not that the joy is the reward, it's just work to ensure that there's room for the joy. And it's the fuel, right? As you talk about.

I love that you're also applying the power of while. You know, the power of while is while you're doing one thing, you can do another thing and another thing and you can layer activities together. know, in the energy bucket model, there are different types of energy bucket. There's physical energy, there's emotional energy, there's spiritual energy, there's professional energy.

And you can work to replenish any one of them doing one thing. For example, running in a treadmill in your basement might replenish physical activity, your physical energy bucket. However, you take that outdoors in a beautiful park with a friend, and now all of a sudden you're replenishing all of your buckets and you're doing that with using the power of wild. I think this is a really powerful model that you have shared with us, Dana.

So thank you for that. And while speaking of gratitude, many years ago, Eleven years ago a great friend of the show John Ruland shared with us a napkin that said what you appreciate appreciates when you appreciate people when you appreciate things when you appreciate your time and your intention it appreciates in value um and And he turned that napkin into a company in a movement that really made a Positive created a lot of positive momentum in the world. Unfortunately, he tragically passed about a year ago and since that time we've been remembering him at the end of every episode and remembering his message and paying it forward and asking our guests to shout out somebody.

ah Is there somebody you'd like to shout out and give them some appreciation today? Absolutely. ah I'd like to shout out Melanie Benson of Amplify Your Authority. She's become a great mentor, colleague, friend of mine, and ultimately she is who connected you and I.

So without her, I would not be here today. So I'm grateful for that. And thank you, Melody. uh I really appreciate you and appreciate Melody and thank you for joining me.

Thank you for having me. What a beautiful conversation and maybe the simplest idea is the one that stays with us the longest. Joy is your fuel, not your award. That's such a powerful reframe because for so many entrepreneurs and leaders quietly, we make a bargain with ourselves.

I'll rest later, I'll enjoy this later, I'll be present later, I'll take care of myself after the next milestone or the next quarter or the next hire or the next launch or the next problem I solve. And then later it keeps on moving. Tomorrow never comes. What Dana reminded us today is that energy is not something we find at the end of the work.

Energy is something we lead. And when we begin to lead our own energy, we may start to notice that the business does not need more of our exhaustion. It needs more of our presence, more of our clarity, more of our joy. Dana's Flywheel gives us a simple way to think about that anticipation, presence, and afterglow.

The anticipation gives us something to look forward to. The presence gives us a chance to actually live the moment we created. The afterglow reminds us that stepping away did not break everything. And maybe over time that starts to change what we believe leadership has to cost.

Because the goal was never to build a business that consumes the life around it. The goal was to build something that supports a life worth being present for. So as you leave this conversation, maybe don't start by changing your whole calendar. Start smaller.

One hour. one block of joy, one moment this week that gets protected before the business takes the rest of the time, then notice what happens. Notice what happens before it, during it, and just after. Because that might be where the flywheel begins spinning for you.

Dana, thank you for bringing this wisdom and your napkin to us and reminding us that joy is not something we win or earn after having given everything away. It's the fuel that helps us lead with more energy, presence, and life. And to everyone listening, here's your challenge. Take out a napkin and write down, joy is my fuel, not my reward.

And ask yourself, where in my calendar have I been treating joy like something I have to earn? And where's one hour that I can protect this week to begin leading my own energy differently? And share it with us on a hashtag, paper napkin wisdom. And as always, remember the best ideas often start small enough to fit on a napkin but are big enough to change your world.

Thanks for listening today. I believe in you. Make it a great day.