We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Liesl Drought a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Liesl , looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. If you had a defining moment that you feel really changed the trajectory of your career, we’d love to hear the story and details.

A defining moment of my life was being let go two weeks before my wedding.

I had been journaling about wanting “a job offer I couldn’t refuse.” Man, did I get that!

I was burnout and hated my job but I was still totally devastated when I heard the news.

I had just given a big presentation on Friday. My boss gave me great feedback. They even threw me a bridal shower.

And then on Wednesday, I got the call from HR. It lasted 7 minutes. I remember going into shock. Hardly hearing what they were telling me.

It was horrible. My husband Adam found me in a ball on our bedroom floor afterwards. Losing my job rocked me to my core.

I cried the whole last day of our honeymoon, wishing I didn’t have to go back to reality and the job search.

It all felt so daunting and overwhelming. What was I supposed to do? Why wouldn’t someone tell me the right answer? It felt like the world was wide open and I had no where to go all in the same breath.

But losing my job taught me a few big things:

1. The company will always put themselves first, which means it’s up to you to prioritize what you want and need.

I hadn’t been doing that. I was so focused on being the best for the company that I forgot to ask myself what I wanted. I had never thought to negotiate my salary, benefits or PTO. I always saw my jobs as the best I could get and didn’t focus on wanting more or something different.

2. More is possible for you.

If I would have stayed in the job I hated, I never would have branched out in my career. I started in healthcare and pharmaceuticals and after losing my job, eventually shifted into human resources and then coaching. It’s okay to pivot and move and then pivot again. As long as you keep moving forward, you’ll get to where you need to go.

3. You are so much more than your work.

One of the reasons I was so miserable is that I prioritized work over everything else. I forgot to have fun – do things during the workday and week that felt good to me. Burnout is a habit that your brain has. Burnout is just a sign that things are off-kilter and that’s okay. It’s just a reminder to shift your priorities to what matters most to you.

Now I help people find and love their jobs. I help you heal burnout. I help you find the career path that lights you up.

Liesl , before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?

I’m the Burnout Coach. I’m a double-certified life and career coach and I’m super passionate about helping you find the work that lights you up and giving you the tools so it doesn’t burn you out.

I’m all about doing the minimum next best step. When you’re burnout, your brain is going to be stressed out and overwhelmed. Adding more to your plate never feels good. So I’m passionate about helping you focus on the 1% shifts that will have the biggest impact. If you think about a straight line, if you change the trajectory by even 1%, where the line ends up drastically changes. This is the power of doing the minimum. I help you uncover what that looks like for you and your goals. Then we celebrate your forward progress. Studies show that the more you can focus on your gains (what you’ve already accomplished) instead of on the gap between where you are and where you want to be, the easier and more successful your journey.

My bread and butter is helping you find your path. We can’t get to where we’re going if we don’t know where that is. It can be overwhelming, I know. I changed career paths twice. Which is why my specialty is helping you uncover your own voice – what you want out of your career and life. I teach you how to create safety so you can do the things you want that are outside of your comfort zone. With my background in biology, I love helping you see how your brain is working and how it might be holding you back. Our brains were created to fight change, so of course there’s a part of you that fights growth. We plan for that.

I work with people one-on-one over the phone once a week for six months. I offer free consults where we dive into where you are, where you want to be, what’s holding you back and how I can help.

Learning and unlearning are both critical parts of growth – can you share a story of a time when you had to unlearn a lesson?

I’m a recovering people pleaser.

I was raised to think of others first – which is really a beautiful intention if you think about it. I know so many people are in this boat. Society praises us for working hard, sharing, saying yes, taking care of others, being low maintenance, doing our best and putting others before ourselves. I’m the oldest of three kids and I definitely was all about pleasing my parents and taking care of my siblings.

But it cost me.

I was a yes woman. I’d say yes to almost anything. And it left me ragged and exhausted. I was the go-to person at work which felt good – my ego loved it – but I was burning the candle at both ends. Even when I left the corporate world, my knee-jerk reaction was to serve my clients however they needed. Calls late at night and working on the weekends was how I started. And how I quickly fell into burnout – even in a job I created that I loved. When a friend touted me as selfless one afternoon, I snapped to attention.

I realized I’d been denying myself.

That’s what people-pleasing is. Putting other people ahead of ourselves. We do it with a great intention but it doesn’t serve anybody. By the end of it, I was resentful and I had a hard time knowing what I wanted.

This is where the unraveling started. I realized I was resentful because I had been saying yes too much. And that was in my control.

I decided to practice a new go-to reaction: instead of saying “yes, sure” immediately, I started saying “let me check and get back to you.” It allowed me to pause and ask myself – was this something I really wanted to say yes to?

The next step was giving myself permission to be selfish. I’m a projector in human design which means I need more rest than most people. And I never used to rest. I was a go-go-go, 100 miles a minute kind of girl. When you put those two together, of course it’s no wonder I can burnout so easily.

Now that I know I need rest, I give myself permission to take it. It blows my mind sometimes that a personality test can give us the validation that we need in order to allow ourselves to be more of who we are. But it really works for me.

I’m able to see that being historically busy isn’t good for me. Instead, I need lots of time to unwind and recharge. I can honor that now. I choose not to be busy on purpose. I say my schedule is full even when I have hours available. I’ve been embracing feeling selfish – even though it’s really just taking care of myself.

Inevitably other people don’t always like that I say no. That’s really hard when you’re a people-pleaser. The biggest thing for me has been seeing that I always have a choice and that me saying yes and being resentful feels worse than saying no and knowing the other person doesn’t like that. Resentment ruins relationships so I’ve been committed to honoring what I need first.

It’s a daily practice to be a recovering people-pleaser but I’m happier and more myself now that I’ve let go of that need to do what other people want me to do.

Putting training and knowledge aside, what else do you think really matters in terms of succeeding in your field?

Curiosity is the biggest tool for succeeding as an entrepreneur.

Curiosity helps you connect with your people, wonder about them, ask great questions and therefore have great conversations. In order to really listen to someone else, you have to be curious about them.

Curiosity helps you pivot and shift and learn from the actions you take. Curiosity helps you stop beating yourself up when things don’t go the way you want them to. You’re able to just get curious instead – what did go well? What didn’t? What would you do differently next time? Curiosity also helps you try new things and stay open to multiple options potentially working out.

I think cultivating curiosity is what brought me into entrepreneurship.

I finally asked myself – I wonder what I would like better than the corporate job I have?

Curiosity also helps me sign clients. Instead of thinking I know the answers, I’m genuinely interested in how/why they’re thinking what they are.

Every time I think – I wonder what they really want? I wonder why they’re burnout? I wonder what’s getting in their way?

These questions take us to deep conversations and places I never would have thought of. My client who owns multiple businesses has a dream of selling them off and franchising. I’d never would have known that those were the ultimate goals if I hadn’t asked. Now that changes the trajectory of the work we’re doing together.

Curiosity honestly helps me move forward everyday.

It leaves me wondering, I wonder what I could do today to add more value? I wonder how I can learn from yesterday? I wonder what magic might happen today?

And it keeps me going.

It’s my easy way of connecting with myself, not taking myself too seriously and not getting bogged down by the rougher parts of life.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.lieslcoaching.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/liesldrought/
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/liesl-drought/

Image Credits
Kelsie Lynn Photography