Everyone You Meet is Fighting a Battle You Know Nothing About

The pale face stared at me, accentuated by the moonlight.?

Only it wasn’t the cheeky grin I had come to expect from my three-year-old daughter. Something was wrong.

“Sophie, are you okay?” I stammered.

Without a response, I continued urgently, “Sophie, talk to me!”?

After what felt like a lifetime but was probably 10 seconds, she let out a peculiar sound, a labored inhale.

“Talk to me! Are you okay?”

Without a response, I scooped her up and ran into the other bedroom, where my wife, Jenn, was sleeping with our son, Henry.?

(In the two months since Henry was born, we’d often played man-to-man defense. Jenn and I found this had given us the greatest probability of a decent night’s rest and was somewhat effective at reducing the greatly amplified chaos. If you’re a parent, you’ll understand the stress that comes from a newborn who needs to always be latched to his mum and a highly energetic toddler, threatened by the new addition, who pushes every button and tests every boundary.)

Earlier that night, I had inadvertently fallen asleep next to Sophie, weary from my 100th consecutive rendition of Twinkle Twinkle Little Star. Too effective, the lullaby had managed to knock us both out.

In the other room, and exhausted from what had been a difficult few months, Jenn was in a deep sleep – impervious to the midnight madness. As I yelled, while clutching Sophie in my arms, Jenn’s eyes opened and she knew instantly that something was wrong.

Frantic, the two of us did what we instinctively thought was best, as we inspected our daughter for any visible damage and tried to get her talking so we could understand what was going on.

Shortly after, her breathing returned to normal, but it quickly turned to screams, probably from being spooked by our reaction. (I would later receive very solid advice – thank you Lauren – on the importance of remaining outwardly calm in these parenting situations so as not to exacerbate the situation.)

Thankfully, the screaming subsided, and Sophie’s tired eyes closed once more.

Jenn called the hospital while I kept an eye out for any signs that things had regressed.

The rest of the night was one of the worst night’s sleep we could imagine. Despite assurances from the hospital that everything was fine but to take her for a precautionary appointment the next day, we were on edge.

At 6am, my alarm went off and Sophie was still in a deep sleep. Jenn awoke shortly after and said that when Sophie rose, she would take the kids to the doctor to see what was wrong. (Thankfully, the doctor cleared her of any serious issues, and she seemed to be in surprisingly good spirits, aside from a ferocious cough.)

That gave me one-hour to get organized and in the right headspace for a three-hour business coaching call I was facilitating for clients around the world.

As I looked over my laptop, past the balcony that jutted out of our Gold Coast apartment, to the Superbank – a surfing mecca that was living up to its name – all I could ponder was what other crazy things were happening that remain confined in apartments like this one. Some people were galloping out to catch the best waves of their lives, while others were tethered to any number of uncertain scenarios that would never seep past their walls.

Anticipating uncertainty is important, yet extraordinarily difficult to do. The whole Sophie situation had really rattled me, and I found it immensely difficult to get into gear to lead a group who were depending on me.?

At 7am, I logged into Zoom and did my best to bring the energy that I am always so committed to delivering. I knew going in that it would be the hardest session I’d ever done but hoped that wouldn’t be too obvious.

When the session ended, I slumped into my chair – it was about as devoid of energy as I’d been in my entire life. This was also on the tail-end of two months with a newborn and a toddler, the fun that accompanies an international flight (we couldn’t get a direct flight from Los Angeles to Brisbane, so had to go through Sydney, which totaled 24 hours in transit), time zone changes, living out of a suitcase, staying in unfamiliar places, and working from a tiny laptop rather than my usual office setup.

Despite the challenge, I remained extremely grateful to be in a position to travel from our LA home to Australia where I grew up and where my parents, brother and sister, and their respective families live. In fact, it was our first trip there in two-and-a-half years.

But what I’ve realized is that parenting is tough work at the best of times – and on a bad day it tests every bit of patience and resilience you have. The most well-conceived plans can be derailed in an instant and any commitment you have to a high-performance life will be forcibly abandoned intermittently.

If you’ve committed to a high performance life – which I’m sure you have since you’re reading this newsletter – the lofty expectations we set can sometimes make the derailment so much worse.

The Stoics do a great job at practicing worst case scenarios, something I thought I had been doing, but the Sophie situation proved otherwise. Seneca writes:

“It is precisely in times of immunity from care that the soul should toughen itself beforehand for occasions of greater stress, and it is while Fortune is kind that it should fortify itself against her violence. In days of peace the soldier performs maneuvers, throws up earthworks with no enemy in sight, and wearies himself by gratuitous toil, in order that he may be equal to unavoidable toil.”

So why am I sharing this with you today? After all, I usually do my best to keep private things private.?

I’ll tell you…

There’s a long-time client of mine, Chris, a successful founder based in the US. Now, my clients engage me because they want to level up their influence, income, and impact – so I push them pretty damn hard.

During one of our sessions, Chris was feeling particularly flat. His marriage had been on the rocks for a while, his business partner was dealing with a mid-life crisis, and they had a new flagship product launching the following month that was bringing more stress than usual to his day-to-day.

Sensing his energy was off, I suggested we take a break from new strategies and tactics, and instead focused on his daily routine so we could incorporate more aspects of self-care to get him back in the right headspace.

A few months later, Chris called me and said, “During that session, there’s one thing you did for me that I’ll never forget. You listened. You didn’t add more to my to do list, you simply told me that everything was going to be okay, to be patient, and to focus on the things that bring me joy.”

Good leaders have an intuition for the energy levels of everyone they speak with. Through their adaptability, they ask the right questions and, as a result, guide the conversation where it needs to be. This ensures their clients feel valued, make progress, and find peace.

So next time you’re speaking with someone, and you sense something is off, remind them that you’re there to help – in whatever capacity that looks like. Ask questions to show that you care and, if they’re struggling, avoid anything that can add undue pressure. Introducing more stress or demands can bring them to breaking point, but the right piece of compassion can be something they remember forever.

I’m also sharing this with you because mental health is something we all need to take very seriously. I’m hoping that by sharing some of my own struggles, you will be inspired to do the same.

As a form of epilogue, Sophie got back to full health just over a week later. Baby Henry contracted something called bronchiolitis and required two trips to emergency, but was in good spirits for our flight back to the US.

The stress of our one-month trip – of which I’ve only touched on in this newsletter (there were a number of other things that I won’t share here but may another time) – contributed to it being one of the most difficult moments of my life.

A big part of that, aside from health issues with loved ones, is the enormous expectations I had unknowingly put on myself for the first visit home in two-and-a-half years, a trap that I mentioned earlier.

When you lose, it’s important that you don’t lose the lesson, so here’s what I’ve focused on since being home in Los Angeles:

1. Immediately back to a proven and non-negotiable daily routine.

2. Setting aside one free day every two weeks to do whatever I want. This is booked out in my calendar as a recurring item before anything else.

3. Eating as clean and healthy as is practically possible, which generally comes through disciplined meal prep.?

4. Spending less time on my phone. (I didn’t even put my US SIM card back in for three days because the thought of a month-long communication onslaught was too much to bear.) Previously, I’d been pretty hopeless with things like text messages but I’m comfortable knowing that will only worsen.?

5. Only working on things that give me energy. This is a wonderful lesson that Rob Dyrdek taught me.

6. Batch creating content and expanding the team to help publish it.

7. Having more dedicated personal time with my children together and individually. There’s always more work but my kids will never be this age again, so I’m determined to make the most of it.

That’s me, and you need to do you. I’m only offering that here to give you an insight and, potentially, some inspo.

To clarify, the trip to Australia included some amazing moments that we will cherish forever. Despite being reminded of the impermanence of life on several occasions, I’m so grateful for who we were able to catch up with, what we were able to experience as a family, and for the adversity that gave me a much greater understanding for what parents go through.?

It only took about 72 hours at our LA home before I felt like my old self again – but I’ll never forget the lessons from our month away. The health challenges were difficult, yet there are countless others going through far worse. In our inner circle alone, there are some families going through harrowing ordeals, the likes of which I can barely even fathom.

And while we help out as best we can, just as we are immensely grateful to those who help us out (especially in our hours of need), I’ve learnt that benchmarking your pain is a fool’s errand. In fighting, they say “There’s always someone tougher.” Well, in life, everyone you meet is fighting a battle behind the scenes that you know nothing about.

That’s why it's imperative to be kind, and seldom judge another soul, lest you know the deepest intricacies of what they’ve been through – which is almost impossible to do.?

If someone had met me on the day I mentioned earlier, they would have described a frazzled and impatient man who doesn’t care for others, which is the antithesis of everything I’ve aspired to build in my (almost) 39 years on this planet. Context makes a massive difference.

So be kind to others and, especially, yourself.

And, as always, if I can help, just let me know.

Onward and upward always,

James Whittaker

PS - Leave a comment below if this resonated with you or you've got something to share from your own journey...