Finding Peak w/ Ryan Hanley
Why Your Passion is Destroying Your Life (And How to Fix It)
19 Mar 2026
Transcript generated automatically by AI and may contain errors.
Chapter 1: What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
Our workplace is the modern battlefield and we are switched on and in fight or flight, 14, 15 hours a day, day after day after day after day. It is a wear and tear on our body and on our mind, on our emotions. That's where burnout happens. That's where you lose sight of what you're doing it for.
Today's guest is Dr. Guy Winch, internationally renowned psychologist, best-selling author, and the leading advocate for what he terms emotional hygiene. I had Dr. Guy on the show because I wanted to discuss his most recent book, Mind Over Grind.
This book speaks directly to a problem that I know I personally have dealt with my entire life, which is overworking, over-prioritizing work, a lack of harmony between my work life and my personal life. I can even look as silly as trying to fit every second of the day that I'm not doing something mandated by my personal life, fitting in work into it.
I convince myself, as so many of us do, that this is somehow getting ahead, and it's not. And this discussion, is gonna give you a superpower to be an absolute monster in your work. But it's gonna make you question some of the traditional mindsets around getting things done. But before we get to Dr. Guy, I just wanna say,
we have so many new listeners subscribing to the show i absolutely love you for being here uh the show is growing like crazy and if you're not subscribed please do whether it's apple spotify wherever you listen to podcasts or if you're watching this on the youtube channel subscribe and leave a comment
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Chapter 2: Why can passion and drive be psychological risk factors?
And a lot of times the guests or myself will go back into the comments and answer your questions. So make sure if you're not subscribed on YouTube and you want to interact with these amazing guests that we have on the show, that you're subscribed there. that you're leaving a comment, that you're liking the show. It means a lot to me. It means a lot to our guests.
And it helps this show, Finding Peak, reach more amazing audience members like yourself. I love you guys for being here. Let's get on to Dr. Guy Winch. Guy, it's great to have you on the show today, man. Thank you for taking the time. Thank you for having me.
So you said something in the green room and I was debating in my head whether I wanted to wait later or get at this right away, but I tend to like to not bury the lead. You said that passion and drive are risk factors.
And I immediately, you know, kind of not push back, but said, I've literally I've done 500 episodes of the show, I've never heard anyone position passion and drive as potential risk. So let's kind of break this concept down. And then we'll weave our way through how we get there. So look, the risk factors psychologically, because what it puts you at risk for are a number of things.
Number one, overworking. And really not having very clear boundaries about when are you actually overworking too much?
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Chapter 3: What is the 'scurvy' of modern entrepreneurs and how can it be avoided?
When are you actually going into the red? Because the thing about passion and drive is it obscures that a bit. You're all excited about things. You're animated. It's like good stuff. It's all good stuff. You know, so then there can never be too much good stuff. There can be too much good stuff.
Because what my research has found is that when you are too passionate and you are actually at risk of self-neglect, There's the famous story from Sam Altman, the founder of OpenAI, that in his previous startup, he developed scurvy.
Scurvy is something sailors would get in the 1800s because they were at sea for two, three months and didn't have vitamin C. Flintstones vitamin would have saved him from scurvy, and I'm sure he could have afforded a Flintstones vitamin. He was just so passionate and focused. that malnutrition happened. And it's just an example, but there are many ways in which we start to neglect.
We push off doctor's appointments, our self-care goes down the drain, and we are so focused, we're so prioritized, that everything else in our life starts to get very, very marginalized. And fine for a week, fine for a month, but that's not how passionate, driven people are. They're at it for months and years. And then you wake up one day, and your relationship is,
in a really bad state and you barely know what's happening in your kids' lives and your physical, your mental state can be problematic. There are all these things in your house you haven't fixed because you haven't had the time. So overworking is one big risk factor. But what the other risk factor is, is that you start to lose parts of yourself because you don't have time to
for some of the people that used to be in your life that used to be important people for you and some of the interests you had and some of the activities you used to pursue and some of the other passions and hobbies that you used to have. And the thing that's important about those are they're not just pastimes.
They give oxygen to different parts of your identity and your personality that don't get oxygen in the work that you're doing.
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Chapter 4: Why do people feel depressed after achieving significant goals?
You know, we don't bring our whole selves to work. We bring a very specific part of ourselves to work. So those friends that were the ones that you could be really goofy and silly and have fun with and just laugh with and be, you know, just carefree with, you don't see them anymore and you've lost that connection.
part of yourself and that part of yourself that used to be just creative or like music or like to create music or like to be in the garage and make stuff, like, you don't have time for that anymore. So that whole creative part, that whole making part gets lopped off, you know, in my book, I call it like amputating parts of your personality one by one. And that's another huge risk factor.
But again, you're excited, you're passionate, you're driven, you're going after it. So you don't notice until you become this really narrow person. And so anyway, there are others, but those are big risk factors because they have a really big impact on us. And I didn't know I was showing up for a therapy session. I'll be honest with you, I feel like you're speaking directly to me.
And this has been something that I have fought with my entire life. And it's fun. So I'm 45 years old. And, you know, I'm listening to you talk and I'm thinking about myself and the times when I was I'll say I don't like to use the word balance.
I like to use the word harmony because I feel like it's constantly moving, you know, when, hey, they're like you said, there will be a week where in a healthy, a passionate scenario, you do need to press hard. And maybe you do say to your spouse, look, honey, I'm going to be I got to do a couple late nights this week, but that's it.
And then if you're if you're healthy, you can down throttle and get back into rhythm. And that's a harmony.
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Chapter 5: How can you protect your personal time from work encroachment?
Balance, I feel like, denotes 50-50, regardless if it does actually or not, and that is very tough to do. So my point is, I've done a lot of soul-searching, and I am so prone to overwork, to literally slot work into every aspect, every moment that isn't a mandated thing of the day. And I don't feel happier.
I don't know that happy is necessarily the goal, but I don't even feel like I'm more connected to my mission or my purpose when I do that. It's like I'm just filling a void. What is that? I mean, I'm literally like a case study for what you just said, honestly. Ryan, I'm a case study for what I just said. That's why I wrote the book in part, because I was going through all of it.
And to be very honest with you, I'm even embarrassed to say it, were there nights where I'm working on the book at 10 o'clock at night and it's about the chapter about overworking and I'm like, This is a little hypocritical, what you're doing right now. You know, yeah, you know, like, yes, but here's the thing. I'm all for success and I'm all for passion and I'm all for drive.
You can do it in a healthy way. you can do it in a way that you can still give oxygen to those parts of yourself, of your life that you need to. In the book, I have, for example, this whole method of assessment that you can catch yourself before you go too far down that slope so you can make the corrections in time. I'm not for no stress. I'm very realistic. I'm also a driven person.
Chapter 6: What is the difference between automatic coping and intentional problem-solving?
I also tend to overwork. And I also used to feel like, okay, well, if there's nothing in the calendar... It would be a waste not to get further ahead in something. Why wouldn't I fill that gap with work? I mean, that was my philosophy and how I did things.
I've learned over the years, and I've learned in working with people, and I've learned especially in doing this research and thinking about things, that, like you said, that extra hour is not going to move me forward. But if I actually devote it to something more important, it will move me forward. My whole... you know, message is you will get further if you take enough time.
And it can be the minimal viable amount of time to do the things that actually make the life part of work life worth it, you know, meaningful, nourished. And it doesn't take a ton. For example, if you're a musician, I used to work with somebody who was a musician. He goes, I don't have time for music. And I'm like, well, that's bullshit. Am I allowed to say bullshit on the podcast?
It's a podcast. Anyway, okay. Yeah, this is an adult show. You're good. Okay, very good.
Chapter 7: How does action create passion instead of the other way around?
So that's bullshit. Here's why it's bullshit. Because you don't need to join the Philharmonic. You were in an orchestra when you were in college. Terrific. Half an hour. Pick up the violin for half an hour. It will make you feel like a musician to play for half an hour. You don't have half an hour a week. Yes, you do. Yes, you do, especially if it's important. Do you know what I mean?
In other words, I'm for in a very, very realistic way, finding ways to be a whole person. And that will make you so much better at what you do. Yeah, my entire life has been a case study for what you just said. I had a startup from 2020 to 2024. And I was so... Those are fun years for a startup. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I launched my company seven days before the zombie apocalypse hit New York State.
So that was super fun.
Chapter 8: What mental health crisis is Gen Z facing and why?
But we survived and we were able to sell and I was able to exit. During that time, I was, I knew exactly what I needed to do as the founder and I did it. And it was done because I had built a great team around me. There literally wasn't more to do. So I was forced to do things like, you know, I love to play golf, I find it very therapeutic.
Really, I just love to hit golf balls, I just like going to the range. And I can, you know, 45 minutes or an hour on the range is like therapy to me, I come back, I feel great, I feel refreshed, my mind is open, all this kind of stuff.
And I was, you know, doing that regularly, I was working out regularly, I was seeing my friends more, I was, you know, all this stuff, I had this really nice harmony to my life, because, but In other parts where I didn't have this structured framework for what my responsibility, my value to add was. Oh, my gosh. Work leaks into, like I said, every moment of every day.
And like I had a moment one time and the audience might be able to relate to this, but I'm now divorced. But my wife at the time. In order to wedge every second of work opportunity in, I had like morphed from my office that I had built in the basement, my nice office that I built in the basement, morphed it up into the into the dining room.
And like I owned half the kitchen table with my like work set up so that every I didn't the time it took to walk downstairs was removed and everything. I was so unhappy in that time because I felt like this need to fill every moment. So I guess like taking those two scenarios, why would I feel so comfortable in the first one going and hitting golf balls and not even thinking twice?
Where in the second scenario, if there's a 10-minute segment and I can't get a few emails out or, you know, something put down on a page, I feel like I've wasted the day. Because look, and this is a very important thing. When you hit, I have a personal trainer. When I started working on this book, I like made sure every appointment, three, four times a week, every appointment is in the schedule.
You're hitting golf balls. You're not doing it randomly because you've got to schedule it. You've got to find the slot and reserve the slot, right? And same with golf. You're scheduling when you're going to be there. It's in your schedule. Our brain takes schedule super seriously. If it's scheduled, apparently I must need to do that at that time, is how our brain thinks.
And so when you're hitting golf balls, it's actually less likely to bombard you with worries about work because it's your task now. And also the really satisfying thwack of hitting, you know, the golf ball who doesn't enjoy it. But when you were at home, and this is not just you, this is everyone, no one does what I'm about to say now.
people should actually do no one puts in their evening an hour of quality time with kids talk to wife have date night if it's date night then we just do it on thursdays but we don't have to say date night or here's an even better one um rest recharge spend half an hour doing something i enjoy You don't put that in your calendar. And so when there's a void in the calendar, Well, it's free time.
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