The Holiday Pressure Trap

00:00 The pressure to have an amazing holiday can actually be the thing that ruins it. And when holidays are things you save up for and look forward to, then that's just madness. Roll theme. Welcome to the Johnny Jensen Show, where modern dads discover how to create the true riches, relationships and results they deserve. Get your high value man blueprint and join our community at highvalue manproject.com. Let's go. Hello, men. I am back. Yes, I've been on holiday vacation for all our stateside listeners.

00:42 My name is Johnny Jensen. I'm the head coach and founder at the High Value Man Project. And this is the Johnny Jensen show. Welcome to our regular listeners, subscribers, and to everyone new or to people who aren't subscribed, then it's great to have you here. Please go and subscribe to the podcast right now, right at the top of this show. Before we do anything, make sure that you are connected up. Hit the button, make sure you get the latest episodes. And this episode, off the back of returning from 10 day, actually 12 days away, but 10 days actually there on vacation on holiday. And it was bloody brilliant. And it being bloody brilliant is not an accident.

01:26 Have I always had good holidays? I think since I've been single, I basically have. And that in itself is one of the pressures, one of the challenges that I felt this episode was important to cover. You know, it's the summer right now. We've had a glorious summer and people can go away for all kinds of destinations, all kinds of lengths of time, all kinds of experiences. Getting it right is key. And putting too much pressure on it is a mistake that men can often make, right? And when we make mistakes, particularly in our families, in our relationships, you know, this, this, this trip, you know, sometimes depending on your finances, it can be the thing that you've worked hard for.

02:10 Like, or, you know, most of us in the High Value Man project are business owning dads, but there are some of us who are employed or in senior positions inside of companies. So the amount of holiday time we get is limited, which also puts pressure on. It has to be good. It has to be epic. It has to be memorable. And there's a, you know, when that pressure is put in place, what can come with that is an expectation or a need for it to be a particular way. And when it doesn't work out that way, that's where arguments come from. And I can remember, you know, in my own experience, having rows with my ex-wife on a holiday, you know, having a row with a girlfriend on a holiday.

02:57 And it's like, it's embarrassing, to be quite honest, looking back on that and thinking, could I have done that different? Did it really matter? What was the impact of me being like that? And anger in itself, if you listen to any of the episodes on anger, anger is something or frustration and anger is something that is about us. The pressure, the expectation, the frustration. It's something within us that comes out in a moment. We have to be responsible for the thing. We have to be responsible for seeing what is that underlying

03:36 ick, the reason that we're ready to snap and the reason that we're ready to get going on something. It's always in us. And holidays are a key one about this. You've worked hard, you've paid for it. Everybody should be having a good time. And all of a sudden there's something wrong. Well, I'm not here to preach about it. Like I said, I've got it wrong in the past. But I do want to share some of the holiday that we just had. And I don't know. I used to riff quite a lot of the podcasts. And today's episode is probably one of those. I've put some little section headers to see how we get on. But more than anything, I just wanted to share our holiday, really, and share my approach to having good times, which guess what?

04:20 No surprise. I learnt them off my family. Having incredible trips, holidays with my dad. And that was something he always did well. My dad likes a holiday. Throwing money at it, going away and having a good time. But my family in Chicago, you know, those road trips when we went on competition with the Chicago Junior Guards and like what it is to have 10 days away with a whole bunch of people and the experiences you can share and the fun that you can have. It's often better, more memorable when it's more organic. and that's some of the stuff that I'm going to share.

05:02 The High Value Man Project is a community. It's a collective. We're predominantly midlife dads, men who are wanting to create the life that we desire, as successful and happy at home as we are at work. And being that kind of man, leading in your own life, being the man and dad that you want to be, takes something. It takes a higher level of values and understanding, a willingness to have ant or to be, do and have more. And when you can see life like that, when you can master your relationships like that, when you can show up for people yourself first and foremost, but then others in that way, life gets better.

05:46 It's like the opposite of what normal people normally do. And that's why it's so beautiful, so simple. It's not something you have to study or hustle or tip your life upside down. It's something you become. And when you've understood the 3XC formula and the fire code and you're applying it on a day-to-day basis, you get to experience life as it should be. If that sounds interesting to you, go and get your high-value man lifestyle score. It takes a couple of minutes. You get a completely personalized response back based on your answers. And you get that at highvalumanproject.com forward slash score. You will find out about how to

06:26 participate one-on-one or how to join forge. So holidays. You know, I'm a single dad and I'm in an incredible long-term relationship, but I have my kids still, right? Couldn't get rid of them. Of course not. Truth is I fought tooth and nail to have my time with them. And but that does bring some financial challenges. You know, the business high value man project is growing and is successful, but it's not quite where I want or need it to be. So finances do play a factor in holidays. And, you know, for a lot of the men inside High Value Man Project, money isn't necessarily a challenge, but it has been for all of us at some point in time.

07:05 I've done the newspaper sun holiday vouchers. We've been to a caravan park. You know, we've had all ends of the holiday spectrum. And you can and should have just as much fun wherever you are, whatever you're doing. Now, of course, it does depend slightly depending on the age of your kids. But I think, not much as I think, but I know, you know, personally, I know it and I believe it that you can have it too. We create it as an attitude within our family of embracing where we're at, of having a laugh, of taking it all in our stride.

07:43 So letting it be easy is really what I'm getting at there. You know, getting, and this is a dad I know, he likes to have his holidays infinitely planned out. Like months before he's gone, he's telling me, I've put this, we're doing this excursion, we're hiking up this hill, we're doing this. And I'm going, seriously, dude, that's a lot of planning. You know, are you going to be able to relax? Are you going to just chill? So I guess there's a part of it where you, you know, you, you pick the flavor that works for you. But does it work for all of your family? Do the kids want to have that much stuff lined up? Does your missus?

08:20 Like, and even for yourself, if you're 100 mile an hour kind of guy, what's it like to simply switch off? You know, to leave some gap time in the holiday. And of course, people go on all inclusives, and that's literally like, I'm just going to eat, drink, and do nothing. Okay, great. The money side of it, as I mentioned, you know, it's important to be clear on what your holiday is going to cost you. Over and over again, I've heard holidays become a pinch point, like around finances. Everything ends up being more than it should have been. It's gone on the credit card.

08:59 You use the holiday as a reason to really fix the marriage. Like we're going to go, everything will be all right. We're going to go away. We're going to have a good time. Everything will be fine. Like we're going to like just as soon as we get on holiday, everything will be fine. And then you throw a load of money at it. And what you come back really is with sunburn, credit card bill, and things sort of worse than when you left. Maybe still the same, maybe the same, but for some people, even worse. Because the whole experience was you being confronted with all the things that each other does that does your head in, right?

09:37 It can't be that way. If you're approaching a holiday and there's been some frustration and tensions in your relationship, then it's important that you address that like before you go. Even if you just call time out, you call like a truce, you know, the ability to say, I know things are a bit. a bit tough but can we just park all that can we just really focus on on on the what we do best you know the reasons we like having fun together the reasons we fell in love like let's let's not be frustrated about all the little things that we've got going on you

10:14 know and it might be before you go that there's an opportunity to say look if there's something you need me to know before we go if there's something that that you know you'd like to ask of me before we go then then then let's do that let's get it out there right now and i know you know and if you can't use that as a reason to dump a load of crap on her but hopefully it opens up a space where you can say right we're not going to do this and we're just going to put a lid on that for the time that we're being being away i guess in no particular order because this is the look the order that i've done it in okay next up for me is i've got two kids and most of my holidays when i go away with the kids are just me and them so they've got to an age now where taking a

10:54 friend is is incredible it's like literally the secret weapon it's the it's the ultimate hack and it's not going to be easy if you're going on some mega bucks holiday to get a friend to come along but our trip away in the summer we most commonly go down to france to lay canasey my brother lives there and in the summer they go to to his wife's family in in cypress so that leaves the house empty it's got a pool it's got a hot tub the view is incredible like the whole thing is perfect which also means it's relatively affordable so we can say to a friend would you like to come and

11:35 if you can find a way for your kids to take a friend oh my gosh it is if you think oh why would i want to have more kids with me it's it's literally the opposite of that they entertain themselves they keep each other occupied they and if they're old enough are you lucky enough they'll even help out so you've got more hands to to to you know to to do the washing up to do the cooking to do if you're if you're you know at a home or yourself catering is a game changer quite honestly and my kids and i are are very close you know one of the

12:11 i think people people fear like the drive down there but actually the drive down for me is is always pleasurable it's about an eight hour drive down uh 10 hours with a couple of stops and i mean i love driving especially in europe like driving in england or driving in is awful that's a whole episode in itself probably one to do with glenn on the wrap up but you know on the in europe it's just there's like these rules around motorway etiquette and it's just brilliant they just they just drive up behind you and they're not going to slow down and they're flashing their lights and your only objective the only job is to get out the way and

12:51 people know that so you can quickly move to one side move back into the other lane the one thing you can't do is sit in the bloody fast lane because you will get someone right up your backside flashing their lights it's almost like they're going to ram you off the road but they but they don't right so i and because there's music now and and and podcasts and and gone are the days of trying to find a mixtape that someone's you know that's been copied 26 times and is hissing in the background you know even cds you remember the times of having like a box a booklet thing with 30 cds in

13:28 no you just put your phone up hit spotify or whatever and and choose whatever music you want bloody brilliant mix cloud sound cloud and so the drive down is pleasurable and being able to joke and banter with my kids and their friends is is gold you know so so again it's about letting it be easy setting the tone and the intention to having a good laugh cooking you know food of course all inclusive bloody bloody brilliant but but when when i am away and i am cooking i bloody i let it i keep it simple you know

14:08 pretty much we ate we did we did homemade burgers we did chicken sort of like kebab type stuff you know just loads of veg loads of chicken all griddle grill grilled up on the on the barbecue or whatever and then just let it be easy i hear when people go uh self-catering and they talk about oh and a bloody cooking and whatever but no it's like eat together make meals moments make create conversation put rules soft rules if you like but rules in place around phones at the table just have food and meals be real

14:50 quality time for you and your family you know it's very hard and i've said this before in many other ways it's very hard if you've never done this you know if you didn't have conversation between you and your kids as a core element of your family brand when you when they were little you can't get to teenage years and suddenly expect them to start talking to you because if it's not an ingrained habit if it's not part of how your family rolls then they ain't going to suddenly start doing it when they're teenagers that's for sure so that is to a degree on you and if you find yourself in that situation then you're going to have to call

15:29 it out you're going to have to have interventions like you're going to have to create moments like at dinner where you say no we're not doing phones at the table nothing crucifies me more breaks my heart if that's a more appropriate expression than you sat there at a hotel or some sort of restaurant or whatever you look across the way and there's a family of four or a group of six and every bloody one of them is on their mobile phone i just want to go over there and slap them all around the head you absolute cretins the world could end and you've just used this this meal time this opportunity to break bread together you've used it as an opportunity to

16:09 sit there in six individual silos looking at some flipping bit of plastic in your hand rant over but yeah meal times make them special and like a complete reverse of that on holiday is you know just let it flow my kids yeah for sure at some points were probably on their phone more than they needed to be and at some points my boy and his mate were indoors playing Xbox when it was 90 degrees 30 degrees Celsius outside do you know what though they're happy and me I'm sat in the sun drinking a beer having a laugh watching something

16:52 reading something like looking at the view it you know you there's very little to be gained in telling people what they should be doing and i do hear this commonly now about family holidays that were ruined because whichever kid all they wanted to do was go in their room and be on their phone i do think that's a problem i don't think that's an outrageous problem but did it start on holiday you know really where did you lose that battle so have a look at what you can create you know can you play cards can you go to a local bar and listen to some music can you go and sit on a on a different beach can you look at what entertainment is coming up around the town you know

17:38 like what can you do to put your family in a situation where you're going to go out and do something and then the other part the complete opposite of that is if they're happy just let them be okay somewhere in the middle is a magic balance there next up the stuff you didn't do that is very easy and we're talking the kind of about fitness here but it is also about work and like how how much of your time on holiday has to be given to relaxing like is there certain things that you really shouldn't let go and your food and diet and fitness is probably one of them you know for me

18:18 you know you know fitness is is core to who i am and what i what i do and i believe it's core to who we are inside the high value man project so going for a run doing a couple of workouts that's not the same as doing it every day but it was beautiful going for a 10k run along the lake front absolutely mega jumping on some bikes and going for a bike ride even doing a workout you know the the view out of my brother's garage which is the gym is incredible like why wouldn't you want to do that just because you're on holiday if you've got habits and routines that lift you up that are part of your identity that make you feel better then keep them up it says something about you that when you've got standards that when something's important to you that you keep them up

19:10 i'm gonna have to sort this out in the edit but in case i haven't been able to yes my son has just managed to call me again and i have no idea how i think it's when you have them on like on your sos list it literally bypasses everything thank you apple for thinking of our safety the people jo my girlfriend came out for five days in the middle of the of the holiday which is absolutely bloody brilliant now she went away on her own vacation for earlier on in the summer and yes it would be lovely to go and have holidays away together as much as she's incredible with my kids kids and they love her, she loves them. She doesn't need 10 days with my kids. So, you know, it's like this point is about making it work.

19:55 You know, for her to fly out, me drive to Geneva, pick her up and us to have five days together in the middle of the trip was bloody brilliant. And in many ways, it's like the only option. But then you make it an incredible option. You make it brilliant. And just be having quality time together. You know, her being part of all the things that I've just mentioned, but then also her and I going off and doing things together on our own. Your kids are teenagers. That's infinitely possible. But if you're married, if you're on holiday together for the whole time, it's important for you to try and carve out moments that are just yours and hers.

20:39 You know, if you've gone on holiday with friends, that's great. If you haven't and the kids aren't old enough for you to go out in the evening on your own, then what kind of, you know, do they have a kids club during the day? Like, like, what can you do to enable you and your wife to go and have a little bit of quality time together during your holiday? You know, quality time is, quality time and date night is one of the measures inside of our accountability tool, which we call the fire code. And it's absolutely essential that the people you love understand and know that dedicated quality time with them, one-on-one, is important to you.

21:24 That's for them is a measure of how, like, like literally, I've just said it, how important they are to you. And when someone feels that you're their world or you create moments where they are your world and amongst all the other people that you have to be responsible for, for that time, they're your world, then the reward is gold. As men, we get to make those choices. We get to lead in that. I was talking with one of the guys the other day, a relatively new guy I'm working with, and he organized date night for him and his wife, and she burst into tears. I mean, it's tragic and hilarious at the same time, but like, it wasn't that he didn't love her.

22:06 He'd just been, he just left it to her. He'd been so busy that he'd left it all to her. So don't do that. Don't leave it all to her. Be the leader in your relationship. Create the space for magic. And, you know, leading on to that, and, you know, again, it's about the point of the family arguments about having arguments is just don't do it. We have it in our ability as men, right? Well, all of us humans do, but in particular, we're talking to men here today. If you're going to be frustrated, fine, but don't take it out on other people. Work it out. What was it? What do you need to let go of? Do you need to go and have a chill for 10 minutes? Do you need to go and enjoy a nice walk somewhere?

22:48 Don't let arguments fester and spoil the holiday. And then, of course, most importantly, is about the laughter and having fun. And a way you can access that powerfully when you're on holiday is really taking moments to sit back, like step back. You know, like in The Matrix where he separates out time when you're, you know, like a helicopter shot, like literally catch yourself, catch the moment and step back virtually from the scene and look at it from a different angle. See yourself and your family laughing and joking.

23:30 See the rewards of your hard work and the ability for you to take them on holiday. Notice the view. Smell the flipping French bakery as you go in there and see all the incredible bread that they do every single day somehow and two-thirds of the population goes and buys their bread fresh. Like soak that up. Try the random crap on the menu. Order the beer that you don't normally order. We were at a music event at the bar by the beach. Every Sunday is live music and people were dancing. Not many people, but people were dancing. And this one woman, she was kind of dancing and she was calling her husband over. Now, they didn't have any kids.

24:14 It was just him and her. And he didn't go and dance with her. And I'm like, dude, you're going to get the reward for dancing now later. And equally, you're going to get shit for not dancing now later. So if I was you, given that the sun and this beautiful evening is the sun's going down, this evening is beautiful and your wife is having a good time and dancing. You need to get up on the dance floor and get over yourself and just embrace the moment because that's how moments are turned into something precious.

24:51 And it is precious moments that turn into memories. When you're looking back at the end of the holiday and you've been conscious about like capturing these moments in your own mind, that energy, that attention to detail rubs off on the people around you. Grabbing your kids and giving them a hug and like, hope you're having a good time. Like doing the same to your missus and telling her you love her and telling you appreciate her. And thanks for this, like for us, for the chance for us to be away together on this great holiday. When that's who you are to the people around you, you'll get the reward back because they'll feel

25:32 they'll feel the peace you've created. They'll feel the energy you've created. They'll feel the attention to detail. Everything we've talked about in this episode, they will feel. So no, it's not just about going away on holiday, letting her sort out all the food, making a million and one plans that you've got to stick to because you're on an itinerary. It's not about how much money you spent or how amazing the place that you are visiting is. It's about creating memories. It's about the being the present and available father, husband, man that the people you love want and need. So I'd love to know what your kind of holiday tips and tricks are, hacks for having a great time.

26:17 If some of this has sounded bloody obvious, then tough, you know, and great at the same time. You know, you probably haven't listened to the end if this is already what you do. But other people struggle to get through a holiday without it turning into a drama. And I don't want that for you. That is not the high value man way. If you think this is a value, then please go and give us a review. I need to crank up the reviews on Spotify. You literally hit the three dots, rate this podcast. Apple has to be done on mobile. Share this with other men in your life. Have this be the difference to their holiday. And go and get your high value man score. It's the pathway into the high value man project, into the work that we do, into creating the life that you desire.

27:02 Highvaluemanproject.com/score score is how you get that. And I look forward to seeing what number comes up for you and the opportunity for us to talk together. Let's go. Thanks for tuning in to the Johnny Jensen show. Be sure to subscribe, leave a review, and share it with fellow dads. Creating the life you deserve starts with you. Get your high value man blueprint and join our community of motivated modern dads at highvalumanproject.com. Let's go.