Naptime with Kevin and Courtney #1

We talk honestly about what it takes to run family businesses while staying connected as a couple and as parents. We share the wake-up calls that pushed us from chasing work-life balance to building work-life harmony through boundaries, perspective, and better habits. 
• why “harmony” beats “balance” when you’re building a career and a family 
• the moment work comes home and how we try to stop it 
• how kids change our perspective on success, failure, and stress 
• burnout as a season rather than a permanent identity 
• why constant connectivity makes modern work feel heavier 
• the comparison trap of social media and “grass is greener” thinking 
• ambition as both a strength and a weakness, learning when to push or pause 
• our reaction to the viral claim that real freedom means never having to work 
• what partnership looks like when both people want purpose and meaningful work 

Transcript

Welcome And Why He’s Here

Courtney 0:00

Hello. Welcome to the Most Days Podcast. I am very excited that my husband agreed to be my very first guest. Husband. Thank you for being with us. Absolutely. Me and the millions of listeners.

Kevin 0:12

It's been a dream of mine for a long time to be on a podcast with my wife.

Courtney 0:15

Yeah. Well, we've been on podcasts together, but usually, like I said, you're

Choosing Harmony Over Balance

Courtney 0:19

in charge. So one big theme that I want to talk about in most days is how to have work-life harmony. I think the word balance is overused when it comes to parenting and spousing and also owning a business or being a leader in a business. And I think there's a lot of pressure on us to find work-life balance when I think that harmony is a much better way to describe the end goal. I think that your work and your life can can build each other up rather than detract from each other. So we are married. We've worked together longer than we've been married. We've worked together for 12 years now, and we've been married for four.

Kevin 1:04

I think it's more than 12 now, isn't it?

Courtney 1:06

2014.

unknown 1:08

Yeah.

Kevin 1:08

That's 12.

Courtney 1:09

I do the math. He does, he's the looks, and I'm the spreadsheets.

Kevin 1:13

I thought it was longer than I thought it was longer than 2014, though.

Courtney 1:17

Well, we moved to Fountain Hills. We moved the office to Fountain Hills in 2014. So that's what I count. Okay. Before that, you just apparently stared at me at the shop.

Kevin 1:26

Guilty.

Courtney 1:27

So it took us a while to get together. We have uh worked together for a really long time. And so we I think struggle a little less with the dynamic that some couples might have if they get together and then start a business together. I think we're lucky that we started we ran a business together and then we got together. But that being said, we're not perfect. And so I want to hear from you. And it's gonna be hard, but I want to hear from you. If there was one thing about our dynamic as it relates to work, you're not allowed to bring in other things, but as it relates to work, is there one thing about our dynamic that you would change that you would improve?

Kevin 2:04

It's hard to say overall. Like there's there's moments where yeah, like there's moments where like I feel like we need to improve. And I'm gonna use

When Work Follows You Home

Kevin 2:14

the word balance because it just feels like it's harmony. Um where we need to improve the harmony. That word just sounds very soft to me.

Courtney 2:20

Well, that's my word, so okay.

Kevin 2:21

Yeah. But for us, sometimes it there's moments where when work's really tough and life's tough, we like work comes home like a lot with us, and uh that just seems sometimes to create a lot of overwhelmed like we don't get that moment to just sort of like leave work at work and just be with our kids or focus on all of the other parts of our life outside of work. Um but it's not forever. Like it's not always. So hmm. We do a pretty good job.

Courtney 2:51

I think we do a great job.

Kevin 2:52

I think we do a great job.

Courtney 2:53

Like we've had our lows.

Kevin 2:54

Oh, yeah. Yeah, but but that that's to my point. Like, I think it's never, it's never uh nothing's forever. Like there's moments and I think we do a good job at communicating that to each other, or maybe me to you, because I feel like that's usually the case, is like, hey, let's let's just unpack that later. Let's leave that at the office. Like those are big problems. Like they they affect our whole household, our finances, our future, our kids' future. But, you know, there's a lot of problems that aren't solved, you know, at 5 p.m. after a Tuesday at home. So I think we do a pretty good job at keeping that in check, but I feel like if there's any one thing to say that we always got to keep our eyes on it, working on it, it's it's that. It's it's the ability to kind of compartmentalize um or just keep keep the work issues in perspective. I think our kids really helped us with that, you know. Like we used to make bigger mountains out of molehills in our life, and then we had kids and realized none of that stuff really matters uh as much. You know, it really doesn't uh compared to the little lives we have that are napping right now, actually.

Courtney 3:57

So that should probably be known as the I forgot to introduce that this segment, when I have Kevin on, we're gonna call it nap time with Courtney and Kevin because the only reason we're able to do this on a Saturday is because they nap at one o'clock. So when they wake up, the podcast will be over. Do you do you feel like having children puts more pressure though on like the six our success or failure?

Kevin 4:22

No, I I feel the opposite. Really? I I felt the opp I feel the opposite because it was almost like a I don't know, and it seems maybe counterintuitive or strange, but it felt like a safety blanket in a way that like no matter what, we have our kids, and we're gonna do whatever we have to do to keep our kids healthy and safe and you know, have have opportunities in their life. And and it just made life in our in our bubble, in our box so much bigger, you know, and so like the microscope that used to be on our successes and failures

Kids Change The Stakes And You

Kevin 4:52

with work just seemed to it kind of dissolve a little bit. So that made it honestly, I I'm just trying to think. Like, did I ever feel did I feel more pressure? Like there's more pressure in the moment sometimes when it's like, gotta get the kids breakfast made, lunch made, take them to school, get to a meeting and do all this stuff and like a pressure cooker of a day. But in the big picture, I feel like it it does shrink the for me. Does shrink the emphasis and uh, you know, the big picture's like you know, heaviness of work.

Courtney 5:27

It's interesting. I don't know if I agree. I but I don't I don't know if it's more pressure. It well it is, but it's more pressure in how I handle myself. Like before them and even before you, I could just have meltdowns, or I could just spiral, or I could just like, you know, be selfish in focusing on work for weeks at a time and like burning myself out and with the kids and with you, because you know, y'all came pretty close together. I realized like, my my behavior affects the people around me. And that was a really hard realization. And part of my inspiration for starting most days was the realization that I am doing harm to my family if I keep letting myself spiral, letting myself get burned out, letting myself letting the negativity at work, if there was negativity, bring me down when I come home. I mean, I remember you telling me like five, six months ago that I it was like living with someone walking around with a storm around them or something like that. I don't know how you said it, but it hurt. And it was a wake-up call to like, oh, that sounds miserable to be around. And then I don't remember who I was talking to about this, but I had another realization where it was like, we own these family businesses. We're second generation. And I would love more than anything for our kids to want to work in these businesses when they're older. But the way I was a year ago and six months ago, I feel like my kids would have looked at me and been like, why would I want that? She's always complaining. Amazon guy's here. She's always complaining. She's always miserable, she's always stressed out, she's always tired, she's always overwhelmed, burned out. Why would my kids want to be a part of that? Like, why would my kids want to inherit that? They would run from that. And that was a big realization of like, if I want to have something valuable, valuable enough to pass down to my children, I can't let it destroy my my personal life. I can't let it destroy like who I am and make me a bad mom. And so then there's all this pressure to be a good mom instead of being a good boss. And that doesn't work either because at the end of the day, I need to be both. And that's where most days kind of came to fruition. Yeah. Is that the word fruition? Yeah.

Kevin 7:48

That's the word. I think so in our relationship, even before our marriage, I feel like the dynamic use is probably the case in a lot of marriages and stuff, is usually I'm not that this might sound weird and sound, you know, sh chauvinistic or whatever, but like I tend to be more of the role of like kind of the the rock or the balance emotionally that and you know, I'm not saying like I don't lose my mind something.

Courtney 8:15

No, for sure you lose your mind like one tenth of the times that I lose my mind.

Kevin 8:19

And and so to that point though, I think that like it's just about perspective. And that's what kids have done for for me and I think for you as well. And it's probably important for everybody to kind of think about their family and just even if they don't have kids, like parts of their life that probably they have much larger meaning than their job. You know, because at the end of the day, it's just as a job. You know, it's like, you know, we yes, these are our careers, we, you know, our whole life is wrapped up in these businesses. But it's just money. It's just a job. These are these are not lives are not at stake. We're not at war.

Courtney 8:50

We're not saving babies.

Kevin 8:51

We're

Burnout As A Phase Not Forever

Kevin 8:52

not saving babies. And I think that's, you know, you've you've obviously we've been talking about this a lot, but I know you've been really keen to on people's concept of being burnt out. And I hear it all the time too. You know, I've been I I've burned out, you know, like we've had that feeling numerous times in this career in a number of different ways. But I think for me, what's become apparent become apparent lately is is that it's not permanent, you know, burnout. And and I feel like sometimes that's the perspective for people is that like I'm the only option is to quit.

Courtney 9:21

Right. Or leave. Yeah, or change jobs.

Kevin 9:23

Or I'm I'm I'm burned out, and so I gotta change something drastically to get out of this, or I'm burnt out and this is just the condition I'm in, and it's not gonna change until something large changes. I'm not I'm not advocating that like people shouldn't change to change the situation. They should, but you know, it's kind of like what your dad said in a meeting a couple weeks ago when we were talking about just big picture like work ethic type stuff. And you know, not every day is fun. Not every day is not every job is like the most invigorating fun job. Sometimes you gotta just work, you gotta just buckle down and work. Um, and sometimes you're just gonna get burnt out. Sometimes this stuff sort of sucks. But again, these are jobs. This is uh how you make money, this is just the way our world works. It's not meant to be this extracurricular fun thing all the time, even though I know you know we we both feel that way largely about it most of the time.

Courtney 10:14

So Yeah, I think I look at like the boomers and Gen X and why it seems like they were able to work their 40-year careers, get their retirement, and and for the most part, complain a lot less about burnout than we do. And maybe it's because we're far more connected and we have Instagram and we see, you know, the whole world and they didn't. Maybe they were just as burned out, but I don't think they were because and I'm trying to drill down into this

Always Connected And Boundary Problems

Courtney 10:37

because it's something I want to focus on with most days is helping people avoid this. But I think a lot of it is how connected we are. And, you know, our parents didn't have emails in the middle of the night. Our parents didn't have Slack messages dinging their phone, our parents didn't have email or uh Asana tasks. Asana tasks or Instagram is what I was gonna say, or you know, all these things like I go to work and I feel a certain way, you know, maybe I need to be a better boss or I need to improve this or revenues down, or you know, we didn't make money this year, or we gotta open this shop and like so stressful. And then I open Instagram and it's like, here's all the things you gotta be. You need to be healthier, you need to be a better mom, you need to, here's all another list of reasons why you're failing. And then you open your emails and there's another list of things that you didn't do today, and and that's just constant. And I look at like my dad or my mom and and your parents, and they they work these long careers and then they and then they're done, you know, like it's just a totally different like mindset. They go to work at nine, they come home at five, and and that's it. And then they enjoy their families in the evenings. And we don't, especially us, like I think we're in a pressure cooker because we work together and we own the businesses. So it's like it's even more intense. But I feel like people who are in the corporate world and are feeling burned out, like, don't bring it home then, you know? Like, I don't know, maybe that's just oversimplification of it, but like, can you shut off at five? Can you set the boundaries with your boss and with your colleagues to go home and be home with your kids? There's this like desire, especially with millennials. You know, we hear it about firstborn millennials, especially girls, especially, like needing to please. We we need to please everybody. We want to be there for everybody all the time. We need to save everybody. Like that's a very common feeling. And so we we let work just encroach on our entire life because we need to be the fixer and we need to be the most responsible person. And I don't know how to like fix that in a corporate job. And I want to, I go kind of want to learn so that I can maybe help people on this podcast with that. But boundaries. My the first word that comes to my mind is boundaries. And if anyone can maybe give some advice about boundaries, it's us because we have struggled with that a lot.

Kevin 12:54

Yeah. We step over them constantly.

Courtney 12:56

Yeah.

Kevin 12:57

Um, you know, I I think that I'm gonna give your parents some credit here because I think this is something

Too Many Options And Comparison Anxiety

Kevin 13:01

I've heard them talk about. And because we talk about this with your folks a lot and like generational differences and like how different life was for them raising young kids and starting their careers and blah, blah, blah, blah. And it does seem so true that like one of the biggest differences about our generation and and the previous is the vast amount of options that we have now, right? We have all these options or perceived options. I think it's both. Like, yeah, we've got a lot of options of things we can do, places we can go, ways to entertain ourselves, you know, career paths we can take. But then a lot of them are just perceived, right? Like a lot of them are like how many times I've heard a story from a friend recently, and it's kind of tragic, you know, that had a pretty awesome rock solid career going for almost almost nine years, left it to take a different job in a different career path, and was let go within a few months of that job. And now the family's in a kind of a tough spot to try to get, you know, their legs underneath them. But I think I could see for some people the vast amount of options or just the perceived amount of options or different paths you could have taken in life or like things you could be doing, or you're you're seeing your peers do and you feel like that could be something I could do, that it I think can attribute to that anxiety of like being burnt out. You know, because like if you if you if you're just grateful for the job you've got, if you're like, hey, I'm gonna make this work, I'm I'm gonna work hard. I I'm glad I have a job. This is just a job. Yeah. You know, and uh I'm good at it or I'm not, or like, you know, I'm not saying don't ever look on, you know, onward and like how you propel yourself. But I think like to your point with always paying attention to things like Instagram too, where there's just you know, there's always this voice of like You could do better. You could do better, you could get out of this, you know. This is you could be a self-starter, you could make you could work for yourself. Like I can be a self-employed person and all that stuff.

Courtney 14:58

Quit your corporate job, I'll show you how to make millions online. And granted, they're like trying to scam you into buying their courses and whatnot, but and not that they're all scams. I think there's some valid things out there, but a lot of them are scammy. And there's this idea that you don't have enough. And it's like it's strange to me because I feel like Gen Z has like kind of fought against the consumer culture a little more, maybe than millennials, and they've got their own set of problems with COVID growing up during COVID and stuff. I feel like millennials maybe entering the workforce during the recession and and being told that if we go to college, we will get these jobs, we will make this amount of money, and you know, and then you have kids and then there's this like path laid out for you. I think there's a general need to like consume more and to earn more so that you can consume more. And then you open up Instagram and like, well, so-and-so's making millions of dollars a year by working four hours a week and laying in her hot tub or whatever, you know, like that's what I'm seeing on Instagram now. And it we should be smarter than that, first of all. But I I don't know where I'm going with this, except that I feel like our generation is constantly looking for the grass to be greener and like constantly trying to improve. And that's a good thing, but it comes with a price. Like it comes, there's there needs to be a balance. Our parents' generation tended to stay in the same company their whole life. Maybe they changed jobs once or twice during their careers. We change jobs every, I mean, most people change jobs like every two years. Our our employee retention at our companies is unheard of. Like we keep employees for for like ever. Like no one leaves.

Kevin 16:36

Almost to a fault.

Courtney 16:37

Five, ten. Yeah. Sometimes we like ask them to leave and they they don't want to. But or they come back, you know who you are. But that that's unusual in today's day and age. A lot of my like friends that I went to college with, like they jump, they jump jobs every two years because there's a new title and there's a new position and then just climbing and climbing. And I don't know. I don't know what it is about how we were raised versus how our parents were that kind of instilled that in us, or maybe it is just a symptom of of the very connected world that we live in.

Ambition In Moderation And Being Present

Courtney 17:06

But I wish I could help people be happy where they are, because your happiness is not in the next job. And it's not living off the grid on a farm making sourdough and like raising chickens. Like, if you can't be happy where you are and you have all of your basic needs met, you know, you're you're you're not ill and you have enough money to pay your bills and like the basics are covered, and you can't be happy there, then I kind of doubt you're gonna find happiness easily anywhere else. It's I I do this all the time. I always tell myself, like, as soon as this project is over, or as soon as like this renovation is finished, then I'll relax, then I'll be happy. And it comes and I feel restless and I feel out of sorts. I feel not myself. I feel like I need something else to fight and to wrestle with. And same happened with having children. Like you think, oh, once pregnancy is done, then I'll be okay. And then then you're like weirdly want to be pregnant again. Like that doesn't make any sense. Like, and so I think there's just this constant, like grass is always greener mentality of, and if we could just learn to be still and be present and be happy where we are. And that's something I'm learning. Like, I like I've said, I'm not an expert, I'm not a guru, but I have some ideas after reading a lot of other people talking about this, other people talking about this this problem, their unhappiness. I think I have some ideas to share.

Kevin 18:28

Well, I think, I mean, you, for example, I think your greatest strength and your greatest weakness is let's just call it ambition. And this the phrase that comes to mind for me is like everything in moderation, including moderation, right? So I've seen you countless times work yourself into a pulp, you know, like you've got this vision or this this drive to do something so bad that you just, you know, work around the clock to get it done and you can't stop thinking about it and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And it just it works against you at some point. It runs you ragged. But on the flip side, that's that's a huge part of what I love about you and why you are successful in a lot of the things that you do. Uh so it's it's a, you know, it's the I guess the million-dollar question is how do you know, how does how do people know when to put on the gas, when to put on the brake? That's you know, probably the hardest thing. When when do I know like if if if the conditions in my life are like something I really need to move on from, or if I need to really like chase that next thing, or if that next career is the right thing? Because sometimes it is. Sometimes there are conditions in your life that are truly contributing to unhappiness, not just jobs, relationships, just headwinds you've got in your life outside of your job, like whatever it can be. So there's times when you need to really push past that and be hungry and be ambitious to go get it and not take compromise. But then there's times when you need to just not, you know, you need to think fast and act slow. Like I think that's that's uh something I've learned a lot like over the years is just trying to be a little bit more self-aware of like not jumping ship too quick on an idea, on a project, on a person, whatever it is.

Courtney 20:11

Um except when your wife wants to start a podcast and then you're like, let's let's do it.

Kevin 20:16

Let's be real. Did I really have a choice?

Courtney 20:18

No, you didn't have a choice.

Kevin 20:21

I did. I did.

Courtney 20:22

I could go somewhere if I needed to always um Okay, I wanna I wanna wrap this one up because I don't want my podcast to be too long because I don't like long podcasts.

The Breadwinner Fantasy And Real Freedom

Courtney 20:32

But I saw a video and I want your response to this, and I wish I could show you the video, but it's on that phone. So I saw a video of a man. He was a an influencer of uh and had millions of followers, like, and he teaches you to get rich. And he said, and he's talking to his wife, they're on a podcast. That's what made me think of you. So him and his wife are on a podcast, and he says that the best, most masculine thing a man can do is you're gonna laugh, make so much money that his wife never has to work. Because not because he wants to control her, but because that's true freedom for his wife to just be whoever she wants to be and never have to work a day in her life. And his wife is on the podcast, right? And she's like tearing up and she says, That is the it's the best gift you've given me. I just get to be free. So I just want to know how you feel about that. What would happen if you told me you don't have to work anymore, babe? I got this.

Kevin 21:23

What a noble idea. Where to start? That's just uh I mean, for some people, maybe that works, but like gosh, I would really love to see her happiness behind the curtains on that. Like, is she really free? Is she really fulfilled in her life?

Courtney 21:37

Does she really feel like she's accomplishing that non-working women can be fulfilled?

Kevin 21:41

I'm not saying that that's the case, but I I just to view man's most masculine role as that simplistic or her version of freedom being that simple that it's just a monetarily form of freedom is just like or just what I didn't like about it is that it implies that work is is prison.

Courtney 21:59

That if You can make it so that your wife doesn't have to work, that you've setting her free implies that working is prison. And I think that mindset is where we have to make changes as a generation right now. Work is not prison. Work is a part of your life. Just like it w how how much flack would you get online if you were like, My children are a prison? Like my family is a prison. Yeah. You know what I mean? Like if we all came out and were like, oh, these kids, they're they're imprisoned to me. In reality, they're far more of a prison than your work is. You can't freaking leave your kids. That's like really frowned upon. Yeah. But you can leave your job. It's not a prison. You go there voluntarily. You are not a slave. You get paid to be there. Parenthood is far more prison. Yeah. Just saying. But I just hate that implication that, like, you know, you've got to be free.

Kevin 22:47

Yeah. Like to not have to worry about money. It yeah, that's nice. Not ever have to worry about money to not to know that that's never going to be a hurdle in your life and to not have to worry about how you're going to pay for things. You know, there's some nice things with that. But uh God, it feels like that's a very short path.

Courtney 23:01

I'd be so bored. Yeah. I mean there's only so many power double-ups I can make.

Kevin 23:06

There's a lot of people that can't work, don't have work. Uh there's a lot of people that don't even have the opportunity. I mean, not in our country necessarily, but like there's a lot of people that like would be are just so grateful to have work. Uh and to think that to to to think that like, God, I I I can't be burdened with a job is just I don't know. Not for me.

Courtney 23:30

I'm a gold.

Kevin 23:31

Now if I'm a gold, I'm a bloody damn gold.

Courtney 23:33

If you're reading Red Rising, we are up here, obviously.

Kevin 23:36

I guess gory dam is what they would say. Gory dam. But uh no, that's just that's laughable. So but I mean that that that kind of mentality. That mentality would be like, yeah, it's clickbaity, you know, million viewer type stuff.

Courtney 23:49

I'm getting a lot of that because I'm getting a lot of stuff about women wanting to quit their jobs. So I'm also getting men saying that women should quit their jobs. And I know the algorithm is feeding me the same clickbaity.

Kevin 23:59

I'll just say this. I know uh some people, like mostly men, on that in that similar place uh in life. They feel that their role is to be the masculine breadwinner and that is the most masculine thing they can do. And they don't come out and say that, but that's like their passion or like, you know, their position in life. That individual isn't as happy as I am, or they could be. And I'm not saying that's the reason why, but that's a hell that's a really heavy burden to carry. And it's it's also like what do you think about your partner that they can't I don't know, it just doesn't feel like you that it's a very I mean I think it just shows how different everyone can be too, because there's definitely people that are in that situation that are happy or men that really feel like that's what fulfills them.

Courtney 24:45

I just am really grateful that we have like a true partnership. I think it's really cool. Oh, me too.

Kevin 24:49

100%. Not only that, but like we just like you said, everyone's different, but we just happen to be the type of people that get fulfillment out of having not not that other people don't have a purpose, but that produce things that that work with people, that collaborate with people. Like uh we're both very people-oriented folks. So like we're we're business or we're product and yeah, like like we love making products, we love improving people's lives, we love like like working with I think the biggest thing that we love customer service. Yeah, and and I love working with our team. And so like like collectively working with a team. And so, you know, I don't know how I would accomplish that if I was not working.

Courtney 25:28

Yeah, you know, so yeah, I think we'll always work. Yeah. So maybe we can help some people along the way love their jobs too. Yeah. Yeah. Well, like I said, I'll wrap this one up.

Final Thoughts And Signing Off

Courtney 25:36

Uh thank you for joining me on my very first podcast. Thank you, listeners for listening. Shh, stop talking. Thank you, listeners for listening to my very first podcast. There will be more, I promise. And thank you for coming on this journey with me.