Feeling stuck in your relationship after years together? Relationship Reset is your go-to podcast for busy, high-achieving couples ready to break free from autopilot and rebuild a thriving partnership. Join relationship expert Katie Rössler, LPC for practical tools, real-life stories, and actionable advice to reignite passion, rebuild trust, and reconnect on a deeper level. Whether you’re navigating communication breakdowns, struggling with intimacy, or just feel disconnected, this podcast is here to help you transform your relationship—and create the love you’ve always envisioned.
Perfect for couples who want to reignite their spark and reconnect with purpose. It’s never too late to hit reset.
In this episode, Katie talks about the challenge of juggling everything as a high achiever and the importance of recognizing which balls in life are glass and which are rubber.
High achievers often see everything as essential and critical, but this mindset can lead to burnout and exhaustion. Katie shares a helpful analogy of juggling glass and rubber balls and encourages listeners to reflect on which things in their lives are truly important and which can be delegated or left to bounce.
We need the reminder that we ourselves are made of glass, and it is important that we take care of our health and energy. Our core relationships are also glass and if neglected can lead to major long-term impacts.
Enjoy today's episode as we uncover what is really important for us to create balance in our lives.
Welcome to the Balance Code Podcast , a place where you have permission to step outside the hamster wheel of day-to-day life and learn tools to create more balance . My name is Katie Russell . I'm a licensed therapist and burnout and hidden grief specialist . I support ambitious , goal-driven people who are ready to get off the one-way train , to burnout and start to enjoy life again to the fullest . Oh and , by the way , I'm a mom of three , an ex-pat living in Germany who is still learning the language , and an entrepreneur Living . My Balance Code is what keeps me able to work in incredible ways without burning out . So let's find your Balance Code .
Speaker 1
In this episode , we're going to be talking about juggling all the things as high achievers , gold star earners and you might go well , I don't really know if I identify myself that way , katie . Okay , here's the deal . Do you like being really good at the things you do or take pride in like I really put a lot of effort into it ? It's important you need to do well , yes , okay , then I would categorize you as a high achiever and a desire of gold stars . You can name yourself how you want . I have had clients in the past . Go well , I don't really know if I would say high achiever . And as we get into the details and they're like well , yeah , like I want to be the best and I want to do well , and I'm like uh-huh , okay . So , yes , high achiever , it's okay if you don't identify yourself this way . I want to talk to you about juggling , okay . So I learned this concept from Jen Hatmaker , who learned it from many other speakers , and it is an analogy that you can find that's been used by many people , but I love it . I'm going to share it with you .
Speaker 1
I want you to imagine that you are juggling a bunch of balls . Some of those balls are rubber and some of them are glass . Now the rubber balls , when you drop , will continue to bounce right . They may not bounce in the way you would like to . They may bounce to a person . You don't necessarily want to be juggling them , or will not juggle it as well as you can , but they will continue bouncing . They will continue on . You don't have to be the juggler of it for them to be taken care of . And then you have glass balls . These are the balls that , if they drop , will break . They will cause damage that will be so challenging to repair . Now I want you to think about your life and I want you to think about all the things you're juggling . Which balls are glass and which balls are rubber ? Here's the problem . Those of us who are high achieving , who say yes to a lot of things , who are good at a lot of things , will often see almost all of the balls as glass . We struggle to see what is rubber , or we've convinced ourselves that the rubber balls are glass because we are the ones who are the best at juggling them . We can do it the fastest . We know the right way to do it .
Speaker 1
I had a friend recently share with me that she had an employee of her team out sick . Instead of giving the other team members the work to spread throughout them , she just went ahead and did it as the head of this team . She was like , oh my gosh , it was so fast and easy and I got all this done . But then when it came time to do my work the stuff I needed to get done like my actual job description I was so worn out and exhausted , I had so little energy for it and I just felt burnout by the end of the week . She and I talked about that that , yes , even though we're good at something , we can get it done fast . It's way easier than passing it off to someone else . It still drains our battery , our energy to do that and it impacts our ability to do the other things that are actually important .
Speaker 1
Those are not glass balls . The things that you are good at and you can get done quickly do not mean they are glass balls . They're rubber . They can be done by someone else , but it's really hard in the moment to make a call like that .
Speaker 1
So go back , reflect . Which balls in your life are glass ? I'm going to give you a hint . You yourself are made of glass . If you drop you , if you dropped your energy , if you hurt your health , if you did things like continue to push that dig deep button over and over and over , you will burn out . It will impact those around you . It will impact your overall health in the long term . Whether you think so or not , we are not Superman or superwoman .
Speaker 1
The relationships in your life that matter they are glass . You need to take care of them . You need to show those people that they matter . They should not be last on your list . They should not be getting the no's every time you say yes to all the other things . These are essential . What else is glass in your life ? What else , if dropped , would be almost unable to be fixed ? What are those things that are really high priority ? When you sit down and logically think about it , you realize , oh my gosh , these things matter so much , even if I put them last on my list . And then I want you to make a list of the rubber balls , and that list better be long .
Speaker 1
If you find that you have way more in the glass ball list than you do in the rubber list , I'm sorry but you're probably lying to yourself . Your rubber ball list will be long because there's a lot of stuff we put on our plates as high achievers that can be done by others and isn't essential to creating balance in our lives . When I work with my clients on this activity and we look at the rubber balls , they tend to start laughing because they'll tell you but I'm really good at this and I mean I have fun with it and I go that's great . But look at your glass balls and what's being affected because of the rubber balls . I get that you have fun in quotations doing it . I get that it's easy in quotations for you to do it , but it drains the energy from the things that you need to be able to juggle the glass balls in effective ways . We're not talking about if we're good jugglers or not . We're all good jugglers . If you're listening to this , you are an excellent juggler , gold star , great job .
Speaker 1
We're talking about balance , and that means letting go of some things . It means not always saying yes , even if you can do it . It means saying no , even if , all of a sudden , you really do have the time on your calendar . And it means starting to say yes to the glass balls that need to be nurtured , taken care of , loved on you name it so that they are strong , so that your ability to juggle them feels effortless . Okay , here's some tough love . You thought that was tough love ready .
Speaker 1
What's a glass ball that you tend to treat as rubber , maybe even avoid , because you need to work on it , and working on it will mean , maybe , difficult conversations with yourself or with that person . Maybe it will mean healing some things or facing some realities that you're not ready to face . So you're treating that relationship or yourself in certain areas of your life as rubber . The more you do that , the glass starts to show cracks in it , slowly breaking . I've been guilty of this in my own marriage . It is so easy for me to say who were this ? Just going through a season of our relationship where you know what . It's just easier if we have a little less time together in the evenings and I really love my work or really love doing this other thing , and so I'm just gonna go do that and it will be fine , like we'll just get through this season . No , my marriage is a glass ball , and if I continue to avoid difficult conversations , if I don't sit down with my husband and say , hey , I don't feel like we're connecting and we should talk about why , so that we can work on it See , even couples therapists have to do these things too If I continue to avoid those conversations , if I continue to avoid working on that relationship , that glass ball will break .
Speaker 1
What are you avoiding ? And turning into rubber Because you don't wanna face some of the difficulties or the work that will be involved in juggling that ball better ? I feel like we needed to take a collective deep breath on that one . What balls of rubber ? What balls of glass ? What balls are you convincing yourself ? Or glass , just because you're good at it , you can do it , you're fast at it , whatever that might be . What balls are you turning into glass ? Because you wanna avoid the real glass balls ? What balls are you making rubber that actually , if you keep avoiding , will create negative long-term impact and though I brought out my marriage , for many of you that's your own health or your mental health , and you're avoiding and avoiding and avoiding the work , the support you need , the resources you should be using and instead going and doing other things cause those feel so much more important and actually they just come easier to you so that you don't have to juggle taking care of yourself more effectively . So to help you with this , I've created a worksheet where you can fill in those glass and rubber balls and really be able to see okay , what am I convincing myself is rubber but is glass , and what are things that are glass ? I'm convincing myself a rubber . So make sure you look in the show notes to grab that worksheet .
Speaker 1
All of my clients know I give them homework at the end of our sessions , whether it be a video to watch or an assignment to do . I don't believe that therapy or coaching stops in that one hour or 90 minutes or two hours with me . I think it's important that we have accountability and continuing to do the work outside of our calls and sessions , and today you have homework too . What's glass , what's rubber , and how can you start to create better balance with both of them , knowing what is important to you and what you're avoiding ? That can be worked on with some support . All of this helps you to have better balance in your life .
["better Balance In your Life"] . Thank you so much for listening to today's episode . If you have a moment , please leave a rating or review so that others can find this podcast who are looking for support , just like you . Let's connect on Instagram at katiewrestler or at Balance Code Podcast , or check down in the show notes to find ways that we can work together and see other offerings that I have for you at this time and , as always , here's to finding our balance code . ["better Balance In your Life"] .
