As a coach, I have worked with numerous business owners. CEO’s and entrepreneurs who are excelling in their fields, but hopelessly struggling with their health. Autoimmune conditions, gut dysbiosis, insomnia, and an over-reliance on substances to “get through the day” when they are supposed to be… living the dream. Mentally, they tell themselves, “I can handle it,” while they lose sleep, skip meals, postpone therapy for the fifth month in a row, and normalize symptoms that would concern them in anyone else.
For many entrepreneurs or ambitious professionals, the driving force is the desire for freedom. Financial freedom, autonomy, control over their schedule, and building success on their terms. And yet, even when the success is there, this freedom quickly dwindles. Time is spent in doctors’ offices, money is spent on medications, and days off are spent recovering rather than pursuing their personal goals.
Somewhere along the way, many high performers accepted the idea that health and success cannot coexist. They’ve settled on the fact that success must cost you your mental or physical health. This simply isn’t true.
Utah, in particular, offers a fascinating cultural case study. This is a state built on a lot of sugar-fueled ambition. There’s a huge population of small business owners, growing tech start-ups, and competitive/professional mountain sports athletes, and I believe this has a large social impact. The air here carries a certain expectation: build more, train harder, optimize everything. These populations all have something in common… They hustle. As a business owner and outdoor enthusiast myself, I feel this pressure too. I recognize the incessant push to produce, to perform, and to prove myself. I feel the not-so-subtle pressure to keep climbing financially, physically, and socially.
But there’s a cost when hustle becomes identity.
In high-achieving environments like ours, work can slowly shift from meaningful to mechanical. And when work becomes mechanical, it becomes easier to justify self-neglect. We create endless goals and continue to fill our calendars as we lose sight of the necessary processes that keep our bodies and brains successful. Slowly, productivity becomes proof of worth. Rev. Christopher T. Scuderi writes, “Without purpose, work becomes mechanical. With purpose, it becomes meaningful.”
Unfortunately, we've recognized that the very drive that gets you to the top is what can also erode the foundation. In Health and Hustle: Where Success Is Built, Charles writes, “The irony is that business owners understand systems better than almost anyone.” And yet, the one system they often neglect is the one they operate within every day… their own physiology. High performers often track revenue and performance metrics, and they analyze strategy and workflow. However, few are taught how to regulate stress, protect sleep, stabilize energy, and build resilience.
Health and Hustle: Where Success Is Built is a book that challenges the cultural myth that burnout is the price of ambition. As contributors, we came together to put our experience and wisdom all in one place. No one really needed another business book discussing motivation and organization, but we kept seeing the same patterns despite being in different industries and working with diverse populations.
Part of the inspiration for this book came from our personal journey in entrepreneurship. At one point, we have all been successful business owners and health professionals on paper, but exhausted in our lives. After reflecting on our own personal experiences, we began to see this pattern in our clients, too. High performers have been taught how to build revenue, teams, and visibility, but hardly ever taught how to maintain their mental capacity, stress resilience, and physical health.
One of the most powerful aspects of Health and Hustle is not just the message, but the range of voices behind it. We co-authored this book very intentionally because the truth is, sustainable success requires input from mental health professionals, performance experts, clinicians, coaches, and entrepreneurs who have lived in the tension between ambition and depletion. What made this collaboration meaningful was not just professional alignment, but simply proximity. We live here, we raise our families here, and our business has its roots right here in Utah. We have all, in different ways, witnessed the quiet cost of ambition in Utah. Instead of continuing to work in parallel, we chose to work together. None of us alone holds the full picture, so together, we put together a collection of wisdom to strengthen the whole person behind the performance. The goal was not simply to publish a book. It was to spark a broader local conversation and to give language to a tension many people feel but rarely articulate.
As health professionals, we care deeply about the people who make up our community… the founders, parents, athletes, leaders, and neighbors we see every day. We don’t just want to see Utah succeed economically or professionally; we want to see everyone thrive physically, mentally, and emotionally. Our hope is to help build a culture where ambition and health grow side-by-side, strengthening both the individual and the community as a whole.
Truly, Utah’s culture of ambition is something to be proud of. We innovate, we build within our community, and we push limits both in business and in the mountains. However, for sustainable success, ambition cannot come at the price of depletion. We can build companies, train for summits, launch startups, build up our community, and chase our life goals without digging ourselves into physical debt in the process.
That is the conversation we hope to continue.
As health professionals, we care deeply about the people who make up our community. - Rachel Hurmence
The irony is that business owners understand systems better than almost anyone. Yet when it comes to health, many of us turn to quick fixes or arbitrary start dates in the future.
Charles Pigott