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For decades, I have watched founders kill themselves. Giving everything to their companies.

Sometimes it works. Most often it doesn’t.

I know a founder who wanted to sell an organ to keep his company afloat. That same founder later developed shingles from his stress.

I watched founders gain weight and lose energy as their cortisol levels spiked.

I have heard from so many founders who can’t sleep. Either they can’t get to sleep because they work in the evenings. Or, they can’t stay asleep (again, because of cortisol).

I have watched them fight a losing battle. Trying to be productive while sleep-deprived.

I was not immune to this myself. At FreshBooks, I had “freshmares” (FreshBooks nightmares). I would solve business problems in my dreams. I was always thinking about work.

I was physically home with my family. But, I was not mentally home. I was replaying the day. Or preparing for tomorrow. Or just fried.

I made fitness a top priority when I ran my investment bank. I already had a daily yoga practice. In hindsight, yoga kept my stress from boiling over. I added CrossFit 4x/week.

It still wasn’t enough. My first marriage ended while I was running that bank. There were many reasons for this, of course. But my never-ending work and my lack of presence at home were definitely factors.

At our peak, we were doing six deals at a time. I was always on. Going back and forth between Toronto, our San Francisco office, and other cities.

I loved the work. I felt fulfilled. It was stimulating. Rewarding. But, despite yoga and workouts, I lacked any sense of balance or perspective. My company was everything.

I am guessing this resonates with you. You love your company. You get a tremendous sense of fulfillment from it. But, at what cost?

Are you happy? Do you experience joy? Do you give enough time and presence to your other roles (spouse, partner, parent, sibling, child, friend)?

There has to be another way

Last year, I gave a talk at Turing Fest in Edinburgh titled "Limitless Leadership." I studied 11 CEOs who, collectively, built companies worth $11 trillion. I wanted to understand how these leaders sustained and grew for decades, while most founders burn out or plateau.

I looked at Tobi Lutke, Brian Chesky, Elon Musk, and others. All of them had intense periods where work was everything. But, with the exception of Elon, they added practices and boundaries that allowed them to sustain over decades.

Here’s what I realized: These founders didn’t just get lucky with product-market fit. They learned to scale themselves as they scaled their companies. They worked on their health and their companies.

They built systems for energy, clarity, and presence. They made their health a strategic priority, not an aspiration.

This became my new mission: Help founders become limitless. To keep growing faster than their companies. To build big outcomes without burning out.

The Tulum experiment

In November, 19 founders assembled in Tulum for the first Limitless Live event. This was not a typical business event. No slides. No networking sessions.

Instead, we brought these founders back into their bodies. We worked on presence, not productivity. We discussed what actually matters. We shared hard-won lessons about building companies and maintaining sanity.

In our closing circle, the word I heard the most was “transformed”. Everyone felt lighter. More in flow. Inspired to live and lead in a new way.

Every single founder left with clarity on what needed to change. Not just in their businesses, but in how they lived.

The Limitless Framework

The limitless approach is the opposite of hustle culture. It’s not about packing more into every minute or proving you can outwork everyone.

Here’s what limitless founders do:

They prioritize physical, mental, and spiritual health. This gives them more energy, clarity and inspiration. They direct this towards unlocking revenue growth. This creates a virtuous cycle: As you unlock revenue, you unlock energy.

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Most founders do this backwards. They sacrifice health for growth. Then they wonder why they plateau or burn out.

Limitless Circle

After Tulum, the founders told me they felt the shift. But they needed structure and community to sustain it. Otherwise, they’d fall back into old patterns.

So I built Limitless Circle.

Circle is a community of ambitious CEOs who don’t want to choose between living and building. Founders who prioritize health and energy first, then unleash that into their companies.

Founders who want to keep compounding without burning out.

The hustle doesn’t work. It creates short-term velocity and long-term damage. I’ve watched this story play out hundreds of times.

​Limitless is a different path.

If this resonates, check out limitless.ceo and apply to join. I’d love to help you become limitless.

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© 2024 SurePath Capital Partners, Inc, dba 'Mark MacLeod, CEO Coach'