Katie: Welcome back to the podcast!

Are you multi-passionate like me? You're interested in a lot of things and maybe have a lot of skill sets. There are some great strengths to that, but it can also lead us down that burnout train. So today, I've got Catherine Castillo, and we're going into the discussion about being multi-passionate: what this means, what it looks like, how it can manifest itself in good ways and bad ways.

Welcome to the Balance Code Podcast, a place for high achievers to step outside the hamster wheel of day-to-day life and start learning tools for more balance. I'm your host, Katie Rustler, and I will be guiding you on this journey of discovering your balance code.

Catherine, thank you so much for being on the podcast!

Catherine: Happy to be here, Katie. Thank you for having me.

Katie: So, share a little bit about yourself. I know you're multi-passionate; that's how we got to this discussion topic. Tell us a little bit about your background, where you are in the world, and the type of work that you do.

Catherine: Sure. Usually, I start my podcast by explaining my names because I go by different names. So, at work, they call me Catherine. I go by the name Catherine. In college, when I was in pre-nursing, they called me Ann, and my family and closest friends call me Kate. So, by then, you could already get that I'm pretty much compartmentalized, and I can actually connect that to being multi-passionate, but that discussion is for later on.

So, I was born and raised in the Philippines. My family immigrated to the US sixteen years ago. Fast forward to now, I'm in Sweden. I moved here during the pandemic, and it's already been over four years. I am now a bonus mom of three as well. So, a lot of things happened in between, but just to give you an idea of my professional background... So, as of today, I am a certified rescue diver. I also do search and recovery. I am a licensed nurse, but not here in Europe, of course. And I've done a couple of things. I'm even taking my Pole Fitness instructorship program right now, so I'm just pacing it a bit because it's something that I want to keep more like a project.

So, I'm not sure if you're familiar with Pole Fitness, but that is like a sport. I used to do piano. I've been in music school for over a decade. While I was doing that, I was also in regular schooling, you know, like from preschool to grade school. I started playing the piano when I was five and got into performing arts. So, you can already hear by now that I like a multitude of things along the way.

Recently, well, at the start of the year, actually, it was like a project—being a debut author. Not because I...not for profit, but because my partner and I celebrated our first-year anniversary, and I was thinking, "What would be the best gift for him?" He's actually an author; he's authored, like, ten books. I was like, "What about I take a stab at it?" Because he says, like, "Well, I can actually write. I can communicate my thoughts, feelings, and I like creating thesis documents, paperwork, agreements. So, why not make a book?" So, what I did was I created a book of poems for him. That was the start.

Yeah, I mean, this is... Oh, by the way, my work... So, I do have three ventures I work with. My partners in Asia, it's called Machine Venture, Supertap, and Mike We Are. And then right now, I'm overseeing an expansion into the Nordics and the US for Quarter Tall. It's an IT, on-demand...what do you call this? Like an IT... Well, basically, if I have to classify it, it's an IT consulting and services company, but we provide it, like, on-demand.

So, other than me... Okay. Oh, and that's nice to meet you. Goodbye.

Katie: Oh my gosh, Catherine! Okay, so tell me, it sounds like from the beginning, even in childhood, you were interested in a lot of different things. You didn't hold back from trying.

Catherine: Yes and yes. I do have parents, so to speak. My parents gave me a piano, like, you know, a piano for a five-year-old. And I had a sister then, and they also gave her a piano. And I was like, "Okay, I play." And then I started playing, just following the notes, and I'm like, "Not enough. This is not enough." So, what I actually did was to get her piano, and I was able to play with her piano and just connect the pianos. And I thought about it, like, "Okay, maybe by then, I already had this sense of feeling to go above and beyond, so to speak. So, it's like myself is my competition—my good competition, so to speak. So, it's not just, like, I get into it; I really want to excel in the things that I deliberately decide on doing. And I also think of, you know, one hobby... What example I picked in, like, my first hobby, and then there's a second hobby. How can my first hobby benefit from my second, vice versa? So, it kind of lives in symbiosis, so to speak. So, it's not like they're competing. Does that make sense?"

Katie: Yeah, they build up. I can justify it. Exactly.

So, how would you define multi-passionate? I get an idea by everything you share, but how would you define, like, a multi-passionate person?

Catherine: So, first off, "multi-passionate"... I've heard this word, but actually, whenever I think about myself, I think of myself, maybe, because along the lines in the professional route, I use the word "multi-hyphenate," but it could go both ways, right? So, for me... I'm not sure if you've heard about Emma Gannon's book. It's called The Multi-Hyphen Method, but basically, that book, if you summarize it, it's basically just allowing yourself the freedom to explore and cultivate different skills and passions, no matter how varied they seem. So, you could definitely, like, from how you hear me, I've done different things, but I could definitely give you the reason why I've done A, B, and so on and so forth, and how it led me to help and supplement the work—my professional background, rather. So, it's not just taking a stab in the dark, so to speak. So, I deliberately have... I do have reasons for doing and involving myself in these activities.

Katie: And it's so interesting, 'cause I feel like in today's educational system and even past generations, it was all about "Pick that one thing, learn how to do that, and that's your calling, and that's it." But so many of us are realizing that we have so many interests, and we have so many desires. And in my own life, my mother went back to do law school when I was doing high school. We graduated a week apart from each other. So, I saw someone go, "Hey, I have this dream, I'm gonna go and live it later in life." And for me, that was a big opening of, like, "You can do multiple things. You don't have to stay in one lane." But I find the people around me, and I'm sure you have this experience, struggle to stay on board with it, right? Like, "You're changing again? What are you doing now? What are you interested in? What are you learning?" Like, it's hard for them to follow when you're a multi-passionate person.

And to feel supported... Do you find that struggle, too, with people around you kind of going, like, "What is this now?"

Catherine: Especially when you introduce yourself. Like, sometimes I feel... And so, I moved here, right? So, I moved to Europe, and I'm not sure if you know the difference between American culture and, you know, living here in Europe. In the US, people live to work. There's this hustle mindset. You literally spend your hours just, you know, from 8 to 5. You do one thing, and you get home, you go to sleep, and then basically, that's it. Here, people work to live. So, it's another way, right? So, wherein, okay, you work a certain number of hours, and then you spend some time with your family, so on and so forth.

But each time I happen to introduce myself, and I tell them, "Well, you know what? I'm running three ventures. I'm also a licensed nurse, and I love diving," and, you know, "and during my free time, I'm a bonus mom of three. I mix cocktails, and I do pole fitness classes," like, "What are you...?" Like, "How...?" I mean, "Did you know what "And the end of the next question is, "How do you do it? And why are you even doing it?" And so, you have explained that well, "This is my makeup," and, you know, "You kind of have to like for reason." So, yes, I would have to agree with you that it is not a struggle to keep up, but rather just to stick to... Well, it's not a problem for me to stick to who I am as a person. I'm... I genuinely, I have accepted, you know, this is my makeup, like for the longest time. But just to explain why, at why, then, you know, that's definitely the how.

Katie: I love that you added like the first question, "How do you? How do you do it?" And you... You said it, "I struggle with the answer, too, 'cause it's like I don't... I just do 'cause it's me." And this is... This is... It feels normal. It feels like it's... Nature isn't something new I had to bring on. I did all sorts of different activities throughout my childhood. Yeah. So, I really, as you were sharing, I was like, "Yeah, yeah," and you just kind of go like, "This is just how it's always been. This has been normal." But what it... Let's go into, you know, being multi-passionate, having a lot of different interests, learning, doing different hobbies, but also business-wise, doing different things. What are some of the consequences, the negative side, we need to be more aware of as multi-passionate individuals, right?

Catherine: Sometimes, I would have to admit that I get a... get ahead of myself sometimes, like since I've been doing this. So, you know, how confidence works, right? When you do, when you've done this a couple more, like a couple of times, and then from days to weeks to months to years, and you've seen yourself... Even if you win it, you'd succeed. Even if you failed, you'd get up. So, your confidence builds, it builds, like it naturally builds because you have experience to back it up. Just like going to work or, you know, assuming a work role. So, sometimes being a multi-hyphenate or a multi-passionate, rather, is like, "Oh, I wanna do this. I wanna do that," and just because I think I can do it. And then I look, "Hey, everyone is given 24 hours." Then you would have to prioritize, right? Then you really have to think, "Why aren't you doing it?" And so, sometimes it's like, "You've..." I forget to ask myself, "Why am I even doing it?" Just, it's not enough to want it, right? It's... Let me... It's not enough to want it, because at the end of the day, we... we are given 24 hours. All of us are given 24 hours, and we also have to self-care, right? And self-care is different from... You know, of course, it gives us this sense of fulfillment when we do these activities, or when we engage ourselves in things that we love, but self-care is quite different. And so, I think to answer your question, on top of mind is like, "Sometimes we just get ahead of ourselves. We are just so confident that we can do it, but sometimes it's not about the confidence of doing it, but rather thinking, you know, thinking, like thinking and up to ask yourself why we are doing it because at the end of the day, we end up burning out ourselves, right?" So, 

Katie: yeah, totally. I... I'm not a... A mentor once told me, "Katie, you just need an idea parking lot." And it's just like a little piece of paper, a note on your phone, where it's like, "Here's my parking lot for all the ideas that I think I need to do right now, because it sounds amazing, it would be awesome, and of course, I could do it, but it doesn't need to get done right now." And then you can come back to it later with all of a sudden, you magically have all this time to do it. And I was like, "This is a great idea." And I do find a lot of the things on the... In the parking lot, stay there because later, I'm like, "Oh, not as interested as I once was, right?" 

Catherine: Like, mind me asking you, Katie, though, how do you... You just mentioned an idea parking lot. Is it something that's visual? Or is it something that you just write in your notes? Or is it more like a board that you see every day? What? What's it?

Katie: I have notes and on... So, I've created for myself a... A WhatsApp group for myself, just me. And in there, I put the things... You know that, "Hey, this and that, and I want to remember this." And I want it like, "Oh, next time, this is what I want to do." And I have it there so that when those moments are, I have free time, right? But then I breathe in and I go back and look and go, "That's actually a great idea." And there have been some things that it's been good that I've gone back, right? And said, "Actually, and now I can start to implement that in a different way, maybe than what I originally thought." 'Cause sometimes we need some space between the idea of what you wanna do and that excites you and the why, why am I doing this, why right now? And then once you have like... This is now that timing, you're like, "Ah, I see it from a different perspective, and I understand how to make this happen easily with the way I do stop, right?" 

Catherine: And yet also have to consider the resources around you, because I'll give you an example. I moved to Sweden, I'm a... You know, I... I love diving. Diving gives me the sense of being in the present. I tend to overthink of the past and the future. So, I... I engaged myself in activities wherein I would be forced to be at the mercy of something, such as nature, because you know, you know how it is when you're an overthinker, you have to kind of make peace with your control, not issues, but we all have issues. But in my case, it's like I want everything structured, this and that. But if you think about how I'm living my life right now, this is me creating a balance for myself internally, tube, right? But we don't have the... You know, we don't have clear waters here, at least in this area. And so, there are types of hobbies wherein, okay, I might have to park it. But what can be an alternative? In here, there's like lots of trails, lots of nature parks. Then you substitute it, and when you have the time to travel, then you kind of integrate your hobbies again. So, there are factors in place. I feel that you have to consider...

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Katie: And I love that you pointed out that sometimes it's a little bit about a habit, and sometimes it's breaking the habit and doing something different at a different time. Definitely. How do you find that those who are multi-passionate or multi-hyphenated, they are impacted by burnout? Do you find that they sort of push through it more often or avoid it or run towards it even faster? Like, what do you notice?

Catherine: I mean, what I know this is... I mean, this happened to me, right? Like earlier, I just said, like, "Sometimes you just get ahead of ourselves, and that we're just so confident of just doing things without actually putting in some time to think about, 'Why are we doing it?' Like, why do we decide? Why do we decide to do it right now, not tomorrow, not years from now?" So on and so forth. So, I've seen it, and I've... I've seen it, and it burns out. Not just... It just not affects the person who experiences it, but rather, you know, the people around them. And I can attest that, you know, it happens, it happens to the best of us. Even if it's not our intention to be in that state. And so, I think first off, it's like to be aware that it happens is a good step. Second is to have some... Look, we're adults. We're capable of talking to... Chat... CVT or searching for researches and... And going to courses, like, you know, courses, self-development courses, etc. And we... We are capable of finding tools for our own, right? And we try and test, see what works for us. And so, that's actually how I... You know, have I've, um... I'm not saying that I no longer have burnouts. That is... That is not a true story, you know. We're humans, and sometimes we fail in our own goals. But it's... It just helps to be aware and know that there are tools for you to actually help you manage your life. I mean, look, being a multi-passionate or multi-hyphenate... And this is again according to Emma Gannon's book, it's not about spreading yourself thin, but rather, "I'm doing things that make you feel good at the end of the day," right? So, if, like, let's say you've done X, Y, Z things in a day, but at the end of the day, you say, "For... I feel so exhausted," but you don't feel fulfilled, so why do it? Do you know what I mean? It's like, it always, at the end of the day, how do you feel? And that's something that you have to really put into the, you know, um, put in some thought.

Katie: So, definitely, it... The couples that I work with, it's interesting to hear them talk about burnout and how they realize that they have gone through, as a couple and individually, burnout more than they realized in the moment because they... They always had different things they had to do, right? Different projects. And, "We got this, and we've got this with the kids." And so, they're always... Had to still get up in the morning and do the thing and move on. And they had the resiliency. And that's... That you're kind of talking about, like, "You gotta have the tools. You gotta know what to do. You gotta take care of yourself," right? Resiliency to bounce back faster then maybe those who don't have those skill sets already built in. And I do think as multi-passionate individuals, we often are really quite resilient because we fail forward, right? Like, mistakes or things... Adele go right as trial and error. Fail forward, and it's like, "Ah, okay, that didn't work." And we let go of it, always meaning that something's wrong with us. There it is. It's like you said, it's mastering something. You don't master something getting it right all the way through. You have to get it wrong. You have to start with the little piano and move to the bigger piano and then, like, not play it correctly and... And... And learn from that. But that resiliency piece is... I have seen is what helps people bounce back from burnout much faster. And it's kind of why they get in the loop of the... "Hip burnout," and then use the tool to get back into, "Okay, I'm good," and the... "Hip burnout," and be used the tool, 'cause as a multi-passionate individual, you're gonna keep doing the things you love. It is very... If I was like, "I'm sorry, pick one thing," you'd be like, "That's funny." Like, "This is why? Why do I have to pick?" Yeah. Why? Why do I have to?

But, and you've said it, when you introduce yourself, it's hard to just say, "I do one thing," 'cause it isn't just one thing, right? So, it... It would be changing who you are if I said, "You can only do one thing." And I mean, like, talk about just like deflating a balloon. Be like, "No." Alright. So, it isn't about doing less, and I think often we think that, like, "I've got too much on my plate." Sometimes it isn't about doing less, but you've said it's about being smart about when you're doing it, how you're doing it, and how you're balancing the self-care in the relationships in your life and that process. And even incorporating the relationships you have into some of those things that you do is really helpful, too, right? In creating that connection.

Catherine: Oh, that's right. And I also wanted to ask, at rather, about failing fast. I have worked in a start-up space for over a decade now, and that has been like a go-to. What it... Move. You have to fail fast because the faster you fail, the more a step closer for you to get it right, if that makes sense. Yeah. And basically, just find out other ways that it won't work. So, the more you engage yourself into this... This pursuit of success by actually failing, you... You acquire more information for yourself, if that... If that makes sense. Yeah. And so, we encourage... Um, we encourage this a lot. Not that, you know, we encourage failure. Not... Not... Not in a very aggressive tone, but rather, "Be kind to yourself when you do, because you actually gain something when you actually do," right? You gain information of what won't work. Um, and then, yeah, there's like a lot of... A lot of, like I think, uh, experience, like with my experience, that resilience really, um... I could say that it is the key. Because, you know, in start-ups, like, it's... It's... It's not a perfect world. You have to wear different hats. You... You have to wear different hats. You have to be agile, and you have to be versatile, so to speak. And so, if you are a multi-passionate person, and people ask you, "So, what is your skill?" I could definitely say it's being... And it's being flexible, not even about a role anymore. It's that skill that I kind of sharpened along the way. Um, and yes, you know, we fail. We fail every now and then, but I think we owe it to ourselves to be kind and talk to ourselves as if we are talking to a younger kid or a younger version of ourselves.

Katie: Since we speak so... Absolutely. And to remember that the whole term "fail" or "failure" is very much in a system that conditioned us to think this is horrible and bad and bad grades and we're in trouble and all of these things. But when it comes to adult life, often failing is the best learning experiences we have. So, being able to be more open to the experience and not run from it, I think, is huge.

Catherine, thank you so much for one, sharing your own personal journey of all the things you do and how you, you know, incorporate them into your life, but also giving us some... Some kind of viewpoint of what we need to be careful about so that we can be mindful about burnout, be mindful of the consequences it can have being multi-passionate in today's world. Um, if people wanna connect with you afterwards, if they've got questions or are just wanna hear more from you, and you mentioned your podcast, where can they connect with you?

Catherine: So, actually, I'm active on LinkedIn. I've been active on LinkedIn these days. So, you can find me there. So, it's www.catherine aise,

Notes: Excellent. I'll add the link to that in the show notes for sure. Is it very much "cat" hmm... What the podcast... Oh, I thought to be okay. Sorry.

Well, then we'll make sure that you've got the link below so that people can connect with you on LinkedIn. And again, Catherine, thank you so much for your time and sharing your wisdom today.

Thank you for having me, Katie.

Katie Dear listener, here's to finding our balance code. Thank you for listening to today's episode. I hope you enjoyed it. Take a moment to leave a rating and a review on your favorite podcast platform. That helps other listeners just like you to find this podcast, too. Want to connect and learn how we can work together? Check out the links in the show notes below. Discovering your balance code doesn't have to be a one-person journey. You can have a team, and I'd love to support you. So, here's to finding our balance code!