The Duke of Sussex has received backlash on social media after telling firms that they should “give everyone time to focus on themselves”.
Prince Harry made his first appearance of the year as part of a virtual panel alongside his wife Meghan Markle, friend Serena Williams, and BetterUp CEO Alexi Robichaux.
The 38-year-old explained how he often suffered ‘burnout’ and discussed the importance of ‘taking time for inner work.’
“From an employer perspective, you can’t expect your people to put in the work on themselves when you’re not giving them the time to do that,” Harry expressed.
Speaking about mental health, the father-of-two explained to viewers: “It has to start from yourself, this idea you can find mental fitness from other people.
“As a team you can encourage each other, but it starts at home and it starts internal. The effect that has for yourself and the people around you – (as a business leader) to say, you know what, everyone is going to have today to focus on themselves.”
“As I said at the beginning, everyone has such busy days, if you have 15 minutes of white space,” he continued. “I allot half an hour or 45 minutes in the morning when one kid has gone to school and the other is having a nap, there’s a break in our program.
“It’s like, right, it’s either a workout, take the dog for a walk, get out in nature, maybe meditate.”
Harry also said that “as a father, husband and someone starting a business,” he “knows he needs to meditate every day.”
He went on: “I hope everybody is available to do that but…once you have to show up for other people, the self care is the first thing to drop away.
“As someone starting up a business, as a husband, as a dad – you just don’t have the time to do that. Mental fitness is the pinnacle, it’s what you’re aiming for. The road towards that can be really bumpy… it’s called inner ‘work’ for a reason.
“The outer work begins so much easier when the inner work falls into place.”
However, his advice received backlash on social media, with one Twitter user writing: “Eh! What the hell is he talking about? He’s never done a hard day’s work in his life.”
Another said: “If harry spent less time DISECTING life and just lived it honestly he might succeed…”
A third tweeted: “I know he’s qualified to talk about being mentally unstable because that’s all he does but what does he know about having a job or balance between the two. Exploiting him is not kind.”
Someone else said: “It’s always me-me time with Prince Harry. Real people have to work for a living…”
Another tweeted: “OMG is this a sick joke?.…..Haz doesn’t actually know what the word work means.”
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