Blueprint for a Balanced Life with Dr. James Bryant

Dr. James Bryant joins me on today’s episode of the podcast to outline his model for Building a Balanced Life. James works mostly with Engineers but his system is just as applicable to Entrepreneurs and leaders!

Here’s a glance at what you’ll learn from our discussion in this episode:

• What you can do to focus more on what matters
• How to visualize a balanced life
• Developing a plan for a balanced life
• How to execute the plan

We chat a lot about the implementation of it, as that’s where so many fall short!

You can find the resources and access to Dr James Bryant on his website at https://betteryou4u.com

If you’re ready to transform your entrepreneurial frustrations into freedoms by cutting through the chaos and using frameworks that help you run an even better business and enjoy an even better life, simply go to:   www.Mohr.Coach

Take the free assessment on the top right-hand side of my website and we’ll set up a time to chat!

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Transcript

James Bryant  00:00

This the engineer's blueprint for balanced life. Step one is really focus on what matters most. Step two is you want to be able to visualize the balanced life that you want. Step three, of course, we're engineers. So we have to design a plan. So you design a plan. And step four is execute that plan. You know, one of the things that in my podcast with and I talk about a lot is that, you know, many people know what to do, fewer people know how to do it. And there's a select few that actually follow through and does it right. And that's really where I want to get people to his being part of that select few that's going to follow through and achieve the balanced life that they want.

Pete Mohr  00:47

Hey, it's Pete, and welcome to another edition of the simplifying entrepreneurship podcast. It's the series designed to provide the tips and tools that will help you cut through the chaos and create the clarity that will transform your business and life as a leader. After all, you lead your business and it shouldn't be leading you. And today, I had the opportunity to chat with Dr. James Bryant and he's going to talk to us a little bit about something that he came up with called the engineer's blueprint for a balanced life. But as we had chatted, and James is a friend of mine and a fellow business Made Simple coach, this blueprint applies to entrepreneurs and to pretty much everybody. Really just a wonderful chat here today about creating a balanced life in the workplace and at home. I hope you enjoy it with Dr. James Bryant. Dr. James Bryan, it is a pleasure to have you here on the simplifying entrepreneurship podcast today.

James Bryant  01:44

Thank you so much for allowing me to come and speak to your audience. This is a great opportunity for me. Thank

Pete Mohr  01:50

you. Yeah, absolutely. Man, I always enjoy having our conversations whenever we have a chance to chat about stuff, love your takes on things. And, you know, I downloaded today your engineers blueprint for a balanced life. And, you know, one of the things we talked just before getting on here is that it's not just for engineers, right, James, it's for everybody. And the idea of having a blueprint for a balanced life is good for every entrepreneur, every leader. And of course, for engineers, too.

James Bryant  02:17

That is absolutely the case. I think it's really what problem are we trying to solve? Is the work life balance problem. And for me, in my particular market, it's engineers for you. It may be entrepreneurs. So it's the same blueprint, it's the same steps that can be applied to different target markets.

Pete Mohr  02:36

Yeah, James, why don't you kind of outline the four steps? And we'll dig into them a little bit?

James Bryant  02:40

Well, you know, it's the engineers blueprint for balanced life. Step one is really focused on what matters most. Step two is you want to be able to visualize the balanced life that you want. Step three, of course, we're engineers, so we have to design a plan. So you design a plan. And step four is execute that plan. You know, one of the things that in my podcast with and I talk about a lot is that, you know, many people know what to do, fewer people know how to do it. And there's a select few that actually follow through and does it right. And that's really where I want to get people to, is being part of that select few that's going to follow through and achieve the balanced life that they want.

Pete Mohr  03:24

I love that. And I think it's about implementation. And that's that follow through part, right? For those of you are watching on video, we have lots of books behind me. And there's lots of videos, there's lots of podcasts like this out here, all the stuff, there's information is out there, it's a matter of how can we help them do it so that then they can achieve that balanced life that they're looking for? Right?

James Bryant  03:43

Yeah, I mean, we've gone through the information age, to more of an explanation age where you know, people are really trying to explain what the information is. But now it's time to actually implement it and do it. I know, one of the things that I've been putting into practice in my own life is choosing an implementation day, right? We read tons of books, right? We're coming across tons of materials and saying, hey, here are all the different things that are great. And we're posting stuff on social media. But we have to take pause sometimes to be able to integrate those things and implement those things in our own lives. It's almost

Pete Mohr  04:20

that we have to stop for those of us who are learners, you know, never ending learners and always trying to absorb all this stuff. It's almost that you have to actually stop learning for a bit so that you can actually do it, right.

James Bryant  04:31

Yeah. And that's really a big part of learning for me is doing it. You know, I learned through doing and absorbing a lot of information. But when you begin to put it into practice, that's when you really codify it within yourself, right? It becomes part of who you are. It's no different than any other habit that we have. Now I can read and look at videos about exercise all day, but until I actually go out and implement and do it, it's not good. attribute to my health, I'm not going to build strength. And the same is true for any plan that you develop. And that's one of the things, that's why we made execution of the plan. The fourth step in the blueprint for a balanced life, because if you don't execute the plan, then the plan is just squiggly lines on paper, or text or on paper. And I think you deserve I think your listeners deserve I think engineers deserve, everybody deserves the ability to actually execute their plan so that they can achieve their dreams achieve the balanced life that they're looking for, or whatever the actual focus of the plan is,

Pete Mohr  05:36

you know, when you started off, you were talking about number one, the focus on what matters most to you. And I know that you've gone through in your life, some major changes in your weight, for example, right? So obviously, you went through, you built a focus around the fact that you wanted to lose a lot of weight, and you've done that successfully. Right, you visualize that happening, and you moved through that stuff, and implement it and continue it. Right. So that's part of it.

James Bryant  06:00

That's absolute true. So when we talk about focusing on what matters most, you know, we take clients through I take clients through a process, you know, we're starting this process, you know, by saying what really matters most to you. And so you know, a person will list the things that matter most to them. And then I asked them to do is look at your calendar, ask your friends, then let's see how reality stacks up to what you say matters most. So in this example, you know, in the past, I will say I wanted to be healthy, or I wanted to live, you know, I wanted to be healthy, I wanted to make sure I'm around for the kids and know that was quote unquote, important to me. But if you were to look at how I use my time, you know, four years ago, yeah, most of that time would be binge watching television, eating chips, while I'm doing that, maybe going for a walk here and there. But my workout routine was sporadic. In my diet, or healthy diet was non existent. Yeah. But I was expecting something different. That's like insanity, because I wasn't changing anything. So I started to focus in on what matters most. So if being healthy matters most to me, then I have to begin to put those things in place that will help me achieve that goal.

Pete Mohr  07:13

Yeah, you know, from an entrepreneurial side of things, I always say that, you know, we are business owners, so that we can have our businesses give us the life that we want. And it's that same sort of thing, you know, just to be mired down in your business with overwhelm, and frustration and everything to earn your salary. Well, really, that's not the goal, the goal is more about can my business, give me what I want out of life. But in order to start that process, you got to understand what you actually want out of life, what you want for your relationships, your time commitment, your spirituality, let's say your health, all of those different things that are the buckets of light, I call them the buckets of life, the different buckets of life, and what you want out of your business and your mission and purpose. So once you've crafted that, then you move into what you want out of the visualized your balanced life. So tell us a little bit about what balance means,

James Bryant  08:02

what balance means different things for different people. And it also changes depending on what stage of life that you're in, you get to define what balance means for you, you get to define what success means for you. For me, a balanced life is being able to provide for my family, and being able to have time to be present fully present. With my family, we have two boys, they're 12 and 14, and just really being an active dad, and really being you know, there for my wife and the kids. And so that's what and also making a contribution to our community through church activities. So those are like the three pillars of balance for me. And kind of what understates that or what helps support that is the whole focus on self care, and making sure that I'm able to care for myself so that I can have the energy and the resources to be able to do the things that I want to do. Because if I don't take care of me, I'm not going to be 100% at my job, I'm not going to be 100% for my clients, and I'm not going to be 100% for my family. And it's just going to have a cascading effect on the impact that I can have in life.

Pete Mohr  09:16

Yeah, I love that. And, you know, brings me back to a memory of saying, and it kind of goes like this. The man who has his health has 1000 dreams. And the man who does not has but one

James Bryant  09:29

of his dream is to be health is That's right. Yeah. And I know,

Pete Mohr  09:33

you know, like, we certainly have people in our family in that spot and have been over the last few years. And they only wish for one thing to be healthy again, right? But when you have your health and when you are having that balance of health and all these other things along with it, you have 1000 dreams and that's the really interesting thing when you begin to visualize what that looks like. And then you start building the plan, right design a plan for your balanced life is number three. So tell us a little bit about With that,

James Bryant  10:00

it's really where you're bridging the gap. So, in step one, you focus on what matters most. Step two, you're visualizing what success looks like, you're defining what success looks like. You're saying, This is me having time away from the office, taking a vacation with my family where my phone is disconnected, and I'm fully present, it could be this is you successfully completing or implementing a system in your business that will help free up the time, you need to do the things that you want. So you can approach it from a few different ways. But the third step is okay, now that I know what I want, how can I design a plan that will actually get me there, in understanding that you didn't get in the position that you're in overnight, it wasn't as if you woke up and you were overwhelmed? No, this has been building for a while, whatever it is, it's been building for a while, yeah. And it's gonna take a while for you to actually get on the other side of that. So you design a plan. And it's not that that plan has to address everything right away. But you want to start building momentum and your plan and your activities, so that you can have things that are achievable things that you can be proud of things that will give you joy and excitement, as you begin to accomplish them. And so those are the types of things that we talked about, in terms of designing that plan. And the plan is really bridging the gap between where you are right now in the life that you visualize where you want to be. So the plan really, is to bridge that gap.

Pete Mohr  11:34

And then number four, last but not least, you have to execute it, we kind of talked a little bit about it earlier, but execute the plan and build your balanced life, right,

James Bryant  11:44

you have to execute it, right? If you don't execute, if you don't construct it, then it's just plans on paper. And that's that, you know, that is a really key point is that it's all about implementation. You know, it doesn't matter what your intent is, what matters is what you actually do, you can say you're going to do something, but it's not going to happen until you do it. And so we talked about executing the plan and making sure that you surround yourself with people that will help you do that making sure that you surround yourself with folks that are going to be in your corner, if you need encouragement, if you need someone to really help keep you accountable. If you need a coach, you know, it just depends. Everybody needs something different or a combination of those things. Yeah. So that's where execution comes in. Because if you don't execute, you won't get your dreams.

Pete Mohr  12:34

I love our conversation today. You know, one of the things that I was also thinking about is, you know, a primary we're talking about overwork and frustration. And that's a big piece of the puzzle that I deal with, with the entrepreneurs that I work with. And a primary reason for overwork is because we don't have clarity, clarity on what matters most in our lives. And when we when we come up with that, which is basically what we've been talking about this whole conversation is building the clarity, then you have all of the confidence to move ahead and the momentum to move ahead so that you can build yourself a better life and a better business. And whether you're an engineer or an entrepreneur, whatever this this chat really today has been about building a better life. That's the cool part of it.

James Bryant  13:12

That's absolutely true. And one of the things that I say about clarity, is that you have internal clarity, understanding your why right really understanding why you're doing things, you know, why you're in business, why your company was formed, if it was an engineer, why you got an engineering, whatever it is, but it's also looking for that external clarity and external clarity as being clear on what it is you want. Internal is the why external is the what and you have to have both of those if you can imagine gears that are turning where one is dependent on the other you know as that internal y goes you know clarity goes external goals and you begin to get momentum and you can achieve great things in life.

Pete Mohr  13:55

Love that and I think that's a great spot to end here today. Our time's running short James. So why don't you just tell everybody your website how to get ahold of you and a little bit more there?

James Bryant  14:04

Yeah, you can reach me at better you for you.com all spelled out better you for you comm that will take you to the website. You can see about the coaching programs that we have there as well as information on the podcast I produce which is engineering your success with Dr. James Bryan.

Pete Mohr  14:24

Awesome. been wonderful chatting to you again here James really appreciate it as always looking forward to having another chat again in the near future. So thanks again for being a part of the simplifying entrepreneurship podcast today.

James Bryant  14:36

Thanks for having me, Pete.

Pete Mohr  14:40

Well, thanks so much for spending some time with James and I here today think about how you can apply this idea around James's plan of building a blueprint for a balanced life. Step one, focus on what matters most to you to visualize your balanced life three design a plan for For your balanced life and for execute the plan and build your balanced life. And I think one of the big takeaways here today, as I really listened to the episode is a lot about that implementation part. So many of us go through, we know what we need to do, it's sitting there, we're procrastinating it, whatever the case is, but we haven't actually implemented. And from that perspective, if you're in a situation where you need to have help implementing, that's what James does. And that's what I do as coaches. So if you want to reach out, we're here for you for that sort of thing, as well as we roll through our businesses and struggles and overwhelm and all of that sort of stuff in order to create a better business and a better life. So hopefully, you'll be able to put some of that stuff into action so that you can have that even better life, and even better business. Always remember clarity creates confidence, and confidence ignites momentum. If you like the podcast, share with your friends, invite them to listen, and most of all, would do me a big favor if you would subscribe to it so that you can hear future episodes and maybe even rated if you're on Apple. If you could give us a five star write a little review. If you like the episodes that would be a big help. For more information on my coaching and leadership programs. Visit www.Mohr.coach or you can email me directly at Pete@Mohr.Coach and until then, make it a great day.

16:35

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