Some stories serve us… until they don’t

This is something I keep coming back to when I think about personal growth.

We all have stories.

We have beliefs about money. Work. Success. Relationships. Family. Responsibility. What it means to be strong. What it means to provide.

And sometimes those stories are not necessarily bad.

Sometimes they helped us get somewhere.

Hustle helped me.

There was a time when working harder made sense. I was building. I was trying to create something. I was learning entrepreneurship. I was proving to myself that I could make something happen.

So I am not interested in sitting here today and pretending that version of me was stupid or wrong.

He was doing what he knew how to do.

But my life changed.

My responsibilities changed.

I changed.

And eventually the story needed to change with me.

Something can have served you once and still be something you need to let go of today.

At some point, something had to give

There came a point in time for me where that hustle-and-grind story was no longer serving me.

And I knew because other things in my life started falling apart.

It was affecting my marriage.

It was affecting my relationship with my kids.

And ultimately, it started affecting my health.

Fortunately, I was able to recognize it before things became much worse.

But I still had to acknowledge what was happening.

The thing I thought I was doing for my family was beginning to take me away from my family.

And that’s a hard thing to admit.

Because I believed I was providing.

I believed I was doing what I was supposed to do.

Work.

Make money.

Build.

Keep going.

But if the thing I am doing to provide is negatively affecting my relationship with my wife, my kids, and my own health… then at some point I have to stop and ask:

What exactly am I providing?

Something will eventually ask for your attention.

The question is whether you are willing to listen before it has to become even louder.

I had connected hustle with being a man

This is where it got deeper for me.

Hustle was not just a work habit anymore.

It was part of my identity.

I had so much pride in being that version of myself.

I was the guy who worked.

I hustled.

I figured things out.

I provided.

Somewhere along the way, I had connected those things with what I thought I was supposed to do because I was a man.

I’m a man.

I’m supposed to provide.

Providing means working.

Therefore, the more I work, the better I am doing my job.

But is that actually true?

Is that the only way a man provides?

Is money the only thing my children need from me?

Is financial security the only thing my wife needs from me?

What about presence?

What about emotional availability?

What about being healthy enough to enjoy the life we are building?

What about actually being there?

Maybe providing is not only about how much you can give financially. Maybe providing also means having enough of yourself left to give your presence.

And this is where the work gets uncomfortable

Because now I am not just changing my work schedule.

I am questioning who I think I am.

That is different.

If being the hustler became part of my identity, then slowing down can almost feel like losing part of myself.

If being needed made me feel important, delegating can feel uncomfortable.

If working constantly made me feel like a good provider, resting can create guilt.

If I built pride around how much I could carry, asking for help may feel completely opposite to the person I have spent years becoming.

So there came a point where I had to let that version of myself die.

And when I say die, I am talking about identity.

The story.

The version of myself that I believed I had to keep being.

Some people may describe that as an ego death.

I see it as realizing:

I don’t have to keep being this person simply because I was proud of being him before.

You can appreciate the old version without continuing to live like them

I think this distinction is really important.

I don’t hate the version of myself who hustled.

I’m grateful for him.

He got me through some things.

He learned.

He built.

He made things happen.

He helped create opportunities that did not exist before.

But he does not have to run my life forever.

And maybe there is an old version of you that deserves the same conversation.

Maybe instead of saying, “That version of me was wrong,” you can say:

“Thank you.”

“That got me here.”

“I needed you then.”

“But I need something different now.”

There can be grief in becoming someone new

We don’t talk about this part enough.

Sometimes changing feels good.

And sometimes changing hurts.

Because even if an old identity is no longer serving us, it was still ours.

We may have spent ten, twenty, thirty years building it.

Other people may know us through it.

We may have received praise because of it.

So when we let that version go, there can be grief.

Who am I if I am not constantly working?

Who am I if I am not the one holding everything together?

Who am I if I stop proving myself through exhaustion?

Those are big questions.

And maybe we don’t have to rush to answer them.

Maybe there is a period where we simply acknowledge:

That part of me mattered.

And I am still allowed to change.

Grieving an old identity does not mean you made the wrong decision by leaving it behind. Sometimes grief is simply part of acknowledging that the old version mattered.

Then you have to fill that space with a new story

Letting go is only one part of the work.

Because if hustle is no longer the story, what is?

If I no longer believe that being a good provider means working constantly, then I have to decide what providing means to me now.

Maybe it still includes working hard.

Of course it does.

I still believe in discipline.

I still believe in effort.

I still want to build things.

I still want to create financial security.

But now the story can be bigger.

Providing can also mean protecting time with my family.

Being present with my wife.

Being present with my kids.

Taking care of my health.

Creating systems so everything does not depend on me.

Building a business that supports my life instead of requiring my entire life in return.

Are you still operating like you’re in an old season?

This is another question I’ve had to think about.

Sometimes our life changes before our behavior does.

Maybe at one point you genuinely needed to take every client.

You needed the money.

You needed the opportunity.

You needed momentum.

But maybe that’s not your situation anymore.

Maybe you have more stability today.

Maybe you have a team.

Maybe the business is established.

Maybe you actually have options now.

Yet mentally, you’re still operating like everything will disappear if you stop for one second.

Why?

Is that what your present reality is asking from you?

Or is an older version of you still responding to an older reality?

What are your kids learning from watching you?

This is where the conversation becomes even more important to me as a father.

Because I can tell my kids all kinds of things.

Take care of yourself.

Family matters.

Your health matters.

You don’t have to prove yourself.

But what are they actually watching?

Are they watching me say that family is important while constantly checking my phone?

Are they watching me tell them health matters while I ignore my own?

Are they watching me tell them they are enough while I spend my entire life trying to prove that I am?

That’s uncomfortable.

But I think those are the questions we have to ask ourselves.

Because our kids are learning from how we live, not only from what we say.

And if you’re a leader, your team is watching too

The same thing happens inside our businesses.

Maybe you tell your employees:

“Take time off.”

“Have boundaries.”

“We care about wellbeing.”

Cool.

But then you’re emailing everybody at 11:30 at night.

You’re working through every vacation.

You’re constantly stressed.

Every problem becomes an emergency.

What is the team actually learning?

This is why doing our own work matters so much as business owners and leaders.

Because our personal stories can become workplace culture without us ever intentionally deciding to make them workplace culture.

If everybody on your team copied your relationship with work, would you be proud of the culture that created?

I’m not telling you not to work hard

I want to be really clear about that.

This is not an argument against working hard.

I still work hard.

Entrepreneurship is hard.

Building things requires effort.

Sometimes there are seasons where you’re going to have to put in more hours.

That’s real.

The question is whether you are conscious of the season you are in and the price you are paying.

Is this temporary?

Is this necessary?

Is this aligned with what you’re trying to create?

Or is “busy” simply the only way you know how to live?

Are you working this hard because the business truly needs it?

Or because slowing down brings up something you don’t want to feel?

Those are two very different things.

Entrepreneurship can show us exactly where the work is

Business has taught me a lot about business.

But it has probably taught me even more about myself.

My relationship with money.

My relationship with control.

My relationship with success.

My relationship with failure.

My relationship with rest.

My relationship with what it means to provide.

Entrepreneurship will bring those things up.

The question is what we do when they appear.

Do we immediately react?

Or do we become curious?

Why does this scare me so much?

Why am I having such a hard time letting go?

Why do I feel guilty sitting with my family when there is still work I could be doing?

Why is “enough” always somewhere farther ahead?

What am I actually trying to prove?

And who am I trying to prove it to?

This is where Heal • Create • Inspire becomes real for me

Heal • Create • Inspire is not just language we put on a wall at The Healing Tree Collective.

This is the work.

Heal is turning inward.

Looking at the story.

Asking where it came from.

Asking whether it’s still serving me.

Then comes Create.

Okay.

If I’m not going to live from the old story anymore, what do I want to create instead?

What kind of husband do I want to be?

What kind of father?

What kind of entrepreneur?

What kind of workplace?

What kind of relationship with success?

And then Inspire happens through how we actually live it.

My kids see it.

My wife experiences it.

The people I work with experience it.

Maybe another entrepreneur sees it and questions their own story.

That’s the ripple.

We turn inward. We question the old story. We create another way. And then the people around us get to experience what changed.

Slowing down gives you a chance to hear yourself again

One of the hardest things about entrepreneurship is that there is always something to do.

Always.

Another email.

Another idea.

Another problem.

Another opportunity.

Another dollar you could potentially make.

And if you’re not intentional, you can go years without ever stopping long enough to ask whether you still even want the life you’re working so hard to create.

That’s part of why spaces for reflection matter.

Breathwork is not going to run your company for you.

A sound bath is not going to make your business decisions.

Meditation is not going to magically fix your marriage.

But these practices can create something entrepreneurs don’t always give themselves enough of:

Space.

Space to notice.

Space to feel.

Space to hear a thought you have been outrunning.

Space to ask:

Is this still the life I want to create?

The Healing Tree Collective is a beginner-friendly community wellness studio in Tempe, Arizona where we create opportunities to slow down, reconnect with yourself, explore different practices, and become curious about what is happening beneath the pace of everyday life.

Maybe that version of you already did their job

I think about this a lot now.

Maybe the version of me who hustled and grinded had a job.

And maybe he did it.

He got me here.

He taught me that I could work.

He taught me that I could create.

He helped me survive seasons that required a lot from me.

But maybe I don’t need him running everything anymore.

Maybe now the work is learning something else.

How to be present.

How to create boundaries.

How to build things that don’t completely depend on me.

How to provide without disappearing.

How to succeed without sacrificing everything success was supposed to allow me to enjoy.

That’s a different kind of growth.

And maybe that’s where you are too.