How to Scale Your Business Without Burnout

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In this episode of the Real Estate Pros podcast, host Kristen interviews attorney and real estate investor Bethany LaFlam. Bethany shares her unique journey into real estate, her approach to helping clients through her law firm, and her passion for creating a supportive community through the Conscious Capital Collective. They discuss the challenges of hustle culture, the signs of burnout, and the importance of redefining success. Bethany emphasizes the power of leveraging other people’s resources and building a supportive network to achieve personal and professional goals.

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Bethany LaFlam (00:00)
burnout can look a lot of different ways for a lot of different people, but for me, it was, I am busy all the time, I’m working all the time, and I’m towards what?

I don’t know, because I’m just tired all the time. And so I think burnout can look a lot of ways, but it really is going to probably boil down for most of us to just exhaustion and lack of fulfillment on things that maybe used to be joyful for us before.

Kristen Knapp (01:55)
Welcome back to the Real Estate Pros podcast. I’m Kristen and I’m here with Bethany LaFlam Bethany is a powerhouse attorney, real estate investor, and bestselling author of The Power of OPE. She helped entrepreneurs scale their wealth and freedom through strategic leverage, not burnout, and leads to a global movement to build aligned, extraordinary lives. Thanks for being here, Bethany.

Bethany LaFlam (02:17)
Thanks for having me.

Kristen Knapp (02:18)
Well, I think you have such a great message and a great outlook on the investing building world. How did you get into real estate to begin with?

Bethany LaFlam (02:26)
It was actually almost an accident. I had been practicing law for years on it, working mostly with operating companies. We did some securities work for tech companies and aerospace and all the things, not real estate. And I got really burned out and I left that for a while to set up a fund, which failed miserably. And while I was licking my wounds and trying to figure out what my next move was, I met a ⁓ guy named Mauricio who was running a

securities law firms specifically focused on real estate investors and he needed some help. He had been sick.

And he, I needed something to do for a little while and figure out what I was going to do next. So I helped him for a little while running his firm. And that was all based on real estate investors. So I got to learn sort of a new area because it was Social Security’s work. And I realized that it wasn’t actually the law I hated. It was what I had been doing before, because I really loved the client base and this like mom and pop, know, Main Street builder ⁓ ecosystem.

that he was working with on the real estate side and realized that I really loved helping these people. And so I was sort of reignited in my passion for working and it all was coming down to real estate. And then I also learned a lot about real estate investing as I looked at these thousands of deals and realized that this is an asset class that I actually really align with for investing purposes as well. So was sort of just all the things happening at one time.

Kristen Knapp (03:56)
Yeah, so what makes you really unique in your law firm is you also invest, so you understand kind of both sides of it. Yeah, so talk a little bit about your law firms and kind of how you help people.

Bethany LaFlam (04:03)
Yes, I do.

So Premier Law Group was the ⁓ law firm that I started out with, now he’s my former partner, I actually bought him out of it. So I was like, I’ll help you for a little while and then I bought him out and he retired. So ⁓ now I’m running the whole thing and that is specifically geared towards helping real estate investors.

Compliantly raise capital for passive investors so they can grow their portfolio. So it’s very very niche, right? And my background though is much broader than that. I have a background in mergers and acquisitions like buying and selling businesses and working with operating companies. And we’ve been getting a lot of requests lately, especially as deal volume slows down a little bit in the real estate market of, can you help us with the rest of our business? Can you help us with our contracts or these other things? So I just recently launched Catalyst Legal Partners for that specific reason to help these main street

builders grow their wealth grow their businesses and learn how to scale without burning out and doing everything themselves.

Kristen Knapp (05:47)
Yeah, absolutely, and you deliver all this information in a very approachable way.

Bethany LaFlam (05:53)
I try to, yeah.

Kristen Knapp (05:55)
Yeah, and then tell, so that kind of leads into the other arm of your business, which is Conscious Capital Collective, which has a similar mission.

Bethany LaFlam (06:04)
Yeah, that is my passion. And that is really sort of the container for all the things. sort of the top of the pyramid of all the things that I’m passionate about and trying to build, the Conscious Capital Collective is the container for all of it where, you I always tell people when you’re creating wealth, there’s really only three elements. And that is mindset, education, and access to opportunities. And if you have the right mindset, you’ll find that there’s education and access to opportunities all around you. But Conscious Capital Collective was created to deliver all

three of those things to a community of people that are like-minded and trying to grow at the same time and really just dispel that myth that everything has to be a grind and hustle culture is a thing you have to be and breathe and do and that it has to suck all the time. I just think it doesn’t have to suck all the time.

Kristen Knapp (06:52)
Yeah,

go into that a little bit more. I do feel like hustle culture is very glamorized. you know, people brag about how hard or long they’re working. Talk a little bit more about that.

Bethany LaFlam (07:00)
Yeah, yeah.

And I used be guilty too, by the way. And then I burned out and was like, ooh, okay. I was that one that like, was the first one to show up and the last one to leave and look how hard I’m working and look, that must mean I’m important and don’t you know what I do and I only sleep this many hours and ugh, it’s boring, first of all. It’s not sustainable and it’s not glamorous or sexy, actually. I realize that I don’t want to be known as the person who works the hardest. I would rather someone look at me and go, my gosh, she makes it look so easy. She’s enjoying her life and she’s successful and like her kid.

Kristen Knapp (07:16)
Yeah.

Is that it?

Bethany LaFlam (07:32)
knows her and loves her and like, you know, I want to be the person that makes it look easy. And it’s not easy, but it can be joyful.

Right? It can be fun. And I realized that I made a lot of mistakes because of this sort of glamorized hustle culture. And I was like, there’s gotta be a better way. There is no way that the purpose of life is to grind it out until you die. And there’s definitely no way that we are killing ourselves to create this legacy for the people we’re ignoring to do it. There’s just no way that’s the meaning of life. And so I really, created this community to help more people get there.

without making the same mistakes that I made. They can make fresh new ones, that’s fine, but just don’t make the same ones that I made, you know?

Kristen Knapp (08:16)
Yeah, and I feel like burnout is a word that people throw around a lot. Maybe people don’t actually know what it means. What are some of the indicators that maybe you’re burnt out?

Bethany LaFlam (08:27)
But I think a lot of it, it starts with you’re feeling like you’re not getting fulfillment out of the things that either you’re used to or you think you should. And that’s think you should part is a tricky one. ⁓ I think it’s you’re putting off things that you know you probably need to do and you just can’t want to anymore. It’s like my daughter when she was really little, she coined the phrase, mama, I can’t want to. And now I use it all the time. Like just can’t want to anymore.

And it starts off as maybe some fatigue and then it can turn into resentment. And then, you know, I don’t know about you or your listeners, but I’m not my best self when I’m feeling burnt out either. I’m not showing up as well for the other people in my life that need me. And so I realized that

burnout can look a lot of different ways for a lot of different people, but for me, it was, I am busy all the time, I’m working all the time, and I’m towards what?

I don’t know, because I’m just tired all the time. And so I think burnout can look a lot of ways, but it really is going to probably boil down for most of us to just exhaustion and lack of fulfillment on things that maybe used to be joyful for us before.

Kristen Knapp (10:08)
Yeah,

absolutely. And what would you say to someone who feels like they need to work that hard and if they weren’t to work that hard, they wouldn’t be successful.

Bethany LaFlam (10:17)
well I was that person and I think the first thing is is to give yourself permission. The phrase that kind of worked for me is I get to.

Because prior to that I was like, who the hell do I think I am that I get to like rest on my laurels or only do things I like to do? Like what am I, you know, a princess? Like I get to only do what I want to do? And the answer is yeah, you do because you just get to because you said so. And I had a coach, best investment ever. I had a coach and one of the things that she worked with me on is she asked me, what does your daughter have to do or be for you to love her?

or to be valuable. And I was like, well, she doesn’t have to do anything. I just love her and she is valuable. And she said, okay, why can you not give yourself that same grace? Like, you’re valuable because you’re you. You’re valuable because you’ve shown up. You don’t have to necessarily work harder than everyone else just to be valuable. I tied all my value into like what I could do for other people and how hard I worked and toiled and how busy I was and all the things. I thought that was my value.

And if I stopped doing that, then I wouldn’t be valuable to people. once I was able to let go of that, and then I realized the world didn’t stop spinning and I still got paid and all the things, right? And it’s baby steps, because you can’t do that all at once, because it’s very scary. Once I did that and sort of practiced and exercised that muscle and noticed the little wins, then I just started to build on that. And it grows exponentially once you learn that that actually works, right? So asking for help.

letting yourself do just the things that are in your lane. And so I define your lane as three things. The first thing is, what are you amazing at? You’re better than anybody in the world, maybe in your business, but maybe in the world. What are you amazing at? What do people ask you for advice for all the time? What do people pay you to do? Just your superpower.

But the second one that we often ignore as entrepreneurs is also what lights you up. Like you jump out of bed in the morning and you’re like, my God, I can’t believe people pay me to this. I can’t believe this is my job. I can’t believe this is my life. I’m so excited I get to do this. But then the third one is it also has to move you closer to your goals, which means you need to know what those are. So if you figure out your lane and then you start to narrow down your tasks to only things in that lane,

you’re gonna find that you’re working not as hard and you’re getting further and probably making more money and you’re gonna be happier and more pleasant to be around. And so I started practicing those things and realizing this is actually kind of awesome and sometimes do I still work 100 hours a week? Yep, I sure do. But if it’s in my lane, I’m not really mad about it.

Kristen Knapp (12:57)
Yeah, absolutely. think that’s a bunch of really, really good advice and really powerful things for people to think about. For someone in burnout, what would be step number one?

Bethany LaFlam (13:09)
One is to identify, you know what success looks like? What does your ideal, amazing, perfect life look like? What does it feel like, taste like, smell like? What is it? Will you know success when you get there? Because otherwise you’re working super hard and you’re not even gonna know when you’re there. Or you get to some there that you think and you look out and you’re like, I don’t even like this view. So you’ve got to identify what success looks like. What does that mean for you? One, and then two, when you’re feeling burned out, one it’s probably because you’re

working on a bunch of stuff that doesn’t move you closer to the goal or that you don’t love. But do a time and energy audit. What are you spending your time on? Where are the leaks? How much time are you spending on things that don’t fit within your lane? And then start to look at who could be doing that then. If not, can you delegate it? Can you automate it? Can you get rid of it? You know, a time and energy audit is a hugely powerful thing that most of your listeners are like, yeah, well, don’t have time to do that right now. I’m busy working. Right? I was the same way. But the reason you’re so busy working and you don’t have time to do it is because you didn’t do it.

Kristen Knapp (14:08)
Yeah, that kind of goes into, I mean, strategic leveraging can really free up a lot of time for yourself and, you know, make yourself not burn out as quickly. That goes directly into kind of your wealth operating system you’ve coined. OPE, I would love for you to talk about that.

Bethany LaFlam (14:59)
Yeah, OPE is other people’s everything. And you know, most of your listeners probably heard of OPM, other people’s money. ⁓ It’s been around for a while, but I know it became popular with Rich Dad, Poor Dad.

Robert Kiyosaki’s little purple book that a lot of investors have read. And I’ve actually made a fair amount of money helping clients make money leveraging other people’s money, right? But I realized that’s a really good way to scale. And I think actually it’s necessary for most people to scale is to figure out how to leverage other people’s money, but it’s not enough, right? Because people are still burning out. They’re still having issues. They’re still finding themselves doing way more than they should do. They’re just doing it with other people’s money now. And so I started thinking about like, okay, what is

that look like, what else then? And I just kinda started playing with words, like other people’s what, you know? And writing stories around words that I came up with, and it kinda became a game with people that knew me, how about this word? And they would throw a word and I would write a story and it became a chapter and then it became a whole book. And now it’s kinda become the operating system that I teach that platform from because I found it to be so powerful for me. And before people get all up in arms, like must be nice, I can’t afford to hire people right now.

It doesn’t necessarily mean you have to hire people. Other people’s everything could be other people’s technology. It could be ideas. It could be their expertise, their mentorship. It could be a million different things, their mindset when you’re not really feeling it. As long as you’re not adopting other people’s junk that you don’t want, other people’s goals for yourself, other people’s crappy mindset or attitude, baggage, you’ve got to learn how to offload those things. So it doesn’t necessarily mean spend a bunch of money that you don’t want.

have to get people to do stuff. And again, it’s baby steps. It’s hard for entrepreneurs to let go of control. I recognize that. And it sometimes takes some practice. And then you see the little micro wins. And then you can build on that from there.

Kristen Knapp (16:57)
And how, what are your best tips for someone to even grow their network and to have access to people like that?

Bethany LaFlam (17:04)
Well, one of the ways is join communities that align with what it is you’re trying to do. It’s one of the reasons why I built this community because it’s a community I wish I had when I was growing. And it might not be for everybody, so find the one that has your people in it.

and look around and be selective, right? Because when I say other people, I don’t mean all people, right? I mean, a lot of us have had this experience where you put your dreams out to somebody and then they’re just like, what? That doesn’t make sense. Be reasonable, be rational. Those aren’t your people. They might be your family, they might be your close friends, but for this purpose, those aren’t your people for this, right? So I think being selective about who you let in, and it’s a vulnerable place, right? If you’re gonna tell someone what your dreams are and you’re gonna ask someone for help, that’s really-

vulnerable so you better make sure it’s the right people so you get to be super selective and selfish here. We talk about that like it’s a bad thing but this is where you’re selfish. You know, I think it’s really important to be a little selfish here. Give back too, sure, but it’s got to make sense.

Kristen Knapp (18:05)
Absolutely, you’re doing it for yourself, so you have to be the number one priority. ⁓ Well, I think all this is great mindset work that, I mean, it’s no wonder how you’re able to help people so much throughout your system that you’ve created. Talk a little bit about your own investing, kind of how you’ve been able to scale. I know that you have a really interesting niche. ⁓

Bethany LaFlam (18:07)
Mm-hmm. That’s right.

So my active investing is in boutique resorts. And actually this is one of my favorite OPE stories, which is I worked with my coach and we came up with what success looks like for me and for my life, right? And at the very top of that is self-perpetuating, self-sustaining freedom. And it’s freedom to work with whomever I want, whenever I want, wherever I want, doing only things that I love that are in my lane, right? And one of the things that I love to do is help people.

and creating their wealth and not burning out and keeping safe while they do it because sometimes it can feel scary.

And I want to be able to do that at in-person retreats around the world at properties I own. I got really specific, right? And when I did that, I put the word out to people in my network and I said, you be on the lookout for places where I can host retreats in person and potentially buy a boutique hotel or resort so that I can do that around the world. And I’m just going to buy those all over the places that I want to go so I can get paid to travel the world in my retirement.

And I put that out there and within a day I got a call back from a client and friend of mine who lives in Belize and he’s a real estate agent there. And he said, well, actually I have this off market hotel right now. The seller, it wants to move back, or needs to move back to the United States. He doesn’t really want to sell, it’s not failing. He didn’t do anything wrong. He just has to sell it before he finished his business plan.

So I got an off-market deal that I got a seven-month diligence free look without anybody bidding against me, without any pressure. I got to go meet the staff, I got to meet the seller, and I got to sort of ease into this first deal just because I put it out to my other people in my network.

And I mean, I didn’t mean to buy a hotel right away. You this was a someday I’m going to do that. I’m going to do some retreats first and then I’ll go buy something, you know. But it was just such a good deal that it I’ll say it fell into my lap, but it wasn’t luck. It was just because I put I was very specific and intentional about what I wanted. Then I recognized the opportunity when it came to me because I had been specific and I asked for it.

and it just was there. It’s not always that immediate, but this was a really nice, was a nice little win so I could keep doing this, right? And I found the partners to do it and we raised money and we bought it and I love it. It’s just a little slice of heaven and now I wanna go buy more of them.

Kristen Knapp (20:44)
That’s amazing and I think you’re right about you know people might think someone’s really lucky but they don’t see all the work that happened to get to that point and to identify the opportunity. I feel like a lot of people miss things that kind of get dropped in their lap.

Bethany LaFlam (20:59)
Yeah, or think they don’t get to do that. Like, when I did this, my sister was like, and all encouraging, she wasn’t negative about it. was like, who the hell buys a hotel? Oh my God, you know. And when I was young, if you would have told me I’m gonna buy a hotel, I would have been like, there’s no way. What am I, a Rockefeller? Like, no, I’m not gonna buy a hotel. But I learned all these different ways because of the people in my network of how to do that without having to put millions of dollars of my own money into it.

Kristen Knapp (21:14)
No.

Bethany LaFlam (21:22)
You know, and just learning that. the education was there, right? The opportunity was there. And it’s because of my mindset was there that I was able to recognize it. And it’s really anybody can do it. Anybody could buy a hotel. Do you have to work really hard to get there? Yeah, I sure do. But anybody can do it. I don’t know anything about hospitality. I learned.

Kristen Knapp (21:42)
Absolutely. Well, I think that’s a great story and a good reminder of people that it really is all about mindset. So tell people where to find you and how to get involved with Conscious Capital Collective.

Bethany LaFlam (21:53)
⁓

The easiest place for me is probably on Instagram. So it’s bethany_laflam , L-A-F-L-A-M, because there’s a dropdown that tells you all the places where I am, including the community link and the Conscious Capital Collective is there as well. And drop in all kinds of information about how to invest safely, about how to create wealth, ⁓ all the things.

Kristen Knapp (22:16)
Well,

thank you so much for being here, Bethany.

Bethany LaFlam (22:18)
you for having me, I appreciate you.

Kristen Knapp (22:20)
And thank you everyone for listening. Hope you got a lot of great inspiration for yourself and your business and can avoid some burnout. Thanks to Bethany. Definitely check out Conscious Capital Collective and we will see you back next time. Bye.

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How to Scale Your Business Without Burnout

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