The Saintly CEO: How to Deal with Anxiety Like a Saint
+7 Heavenly Hustlers and The Importance of Seeing The Humanity in Your Customers
Haaaaapy Monday!
I’m still riding a high from the Catholic Founders Guild call we had last Friday. We had a really interesting discussion about balancing our ambition for financial success with our faith. Things like how we should spend our money, what is reasonable versus what is luxurious. This included the discussion around what we could do with our money if we achieve great success.
To join future discussions, become a member of the CF Guild today.
Welcome back to The Saintly CEO. We’re back with another tactical way to run your business like a saint. We’ve also got 7 more heavenly hustlers we think you should know.
In Today’s Email:
CF Role Model: How this tech entrepreneur focuses on the humanity of his users
+ 6 more Catholic entrepreneurs (Heavenly Hustlers)
How to Deal with Anxiety Like a Saint
Miscellaneous Resources
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Heavenly Hustlers
Looking to find more Catholics who share your ambition? Each week, we curate a short list to do just that.
Exciting Announcement! As of today, we are excited to announce that we are partnering with Catholic Owned to aid in this curation experience. Catholic Owned has a huge database of Catholic business owners, so we can support each other.
Some of those listed each week were discovered through Catholic Owned.
We encourage you to get listed in Catholic Owned today if you’re not already.
CF Role Model:
🙏 Jamie Baxter is the founder of Exodus 90, an organization many of you are probably familiar with.
Jamie is a great role model because he found a way to make a business out of an ancient Catholic practice: asceticism. It’s amazing to see because now many people will be exposed to this ancient practice. And it’s self-funded. Think of how many other opportunities there are to do this.
Jamie also has an interesting approach to entrepreneurship. He says to build with the humanity of yourself, and the user in mind. Everything in life is human-to-human oriented — keep this present.
He also had deep conviction that they would make an impact in the future. So, early on, when finances were tight. So he kept going and trusting in the Lord. Now look at where they are today.
Other Heavenly Hustlers:
🐝 Lucas & Jessica Moser run MOSERMADE — a sawmill & apiary (honey making operation) in the Blue Ridge Mountains.
🧱 Salvatore Finocchiaro owns NYC Fireplaces & Outdoor Kitchens LLC — you can guess what they do. Check out their work.
👩🍼Hallie Rogers is the founder & CEO of Better Beginnings — helping families welcome new babies in-home (doula, childbirth education, lactation support, etc). Based out of the Minneapolis area.
🌊 Will O’Brien is building autonomous robots for the ocean (above and below) at Ulysses. Check out the episode we dropped with him last week, #14 Should Catholics Try to Become Billionaires?
🔨 Cristian Mendez runs Emanuelz. A construction/project management firm focused on helping Catholic organizations complete their projects (churches, schools, etc.) on time and on budget.
🚀 Thomas Lehrman was a co-founder of GLG and now runs Teamworthy Ventures — a VC fund investing in early & growth stage companies with trustworthy entrepreneurs.
🙋♂️ Nominate a Heavenly Hustler (including yourself) - It takes 1 min.
🔍 To discover more Catholic business owners, go to Catholic Owned today.
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How to Deal With Anxiety Like a Saint
Entrepreneurship is a road of highs and lows. No way around it. Whether you’re just starting off, or doing $50m a year in revenue, anxiety is always there.
While dealing with anxious thoughts of my own, ‘where will the next client come from?’ or ‘how will I deliver all the work I have on my desk right now?’ I listened to an episode of Moneywise. The guest’s company was worth around $50m — an established organization.
He had a personal income of ~$5m last year. Yet, he still had anxiety about how to pay an upcoming tax bill. Hearing this taught me, anxiety never goes away.
Guilt About Anxiety
Often, I feel a sense of guilt for my anxiety. After all, if I trust in the Lord, why should I have anxiety at all?
No one is perfect. The devil knows how to get to us. He tries to drive the wedge of anxiety between the cracks of our imperfection.
A priest once explained anxiety to me this way. Anxiety is temporary atheism. I don’t know about you, but I certainly don’t want to be an atheist ever.
The question is, how do we deal with it?
Here are some of the things I’ve started to do.
Recall God’s Power
Whenever I consciously think of God’s power, I know that I’ll be okay. Subconsciously, I forget and return to trusting in my own power (or lack thereof).
Think About Eternity
The anxiety comes from fear of failure to provide for my family. But even if my business were to fail today. Even if I had to burn through all my savings and 401k, would things be alright? Yes.
The only thing that matters is eternity, and having no money, no house, no possessions does NOT prevent me from possessing eternal life. What a consolation.
Go To Mass
Personally, mass is like the silver bullet for me. When I go to mass, my worry and anxiety is almost always obliterated. Of course, it’s helping me to remember these first two items, but the grace there floods over me. What better remedy than bathing in the grace of the Lord?
Lean On God
When we have this anxiety, it’s common practice to work harder. To lean into our own abilities. Instead, we ought to lean into God’s abilities. Be willing to take an hour out of your day to go to mass. Trust in the Lord that He will continue to walk alongside you.
Build a Prayer Routine
In the first episode of our podcast, Alessandro DiSanto told us how he pursued natural remedies like breathing techniques to reduce his stress levels. And while this would give him temporary relief, it never fully fixed the issue.
The solution was developing a strong plan of life, aka a strong prayer routine each day. If you have this, it will help mitigate the impact anxiety has on you in the long run. Through contemplative prayer, you’ll come closer to God. Through reading scripture, you’ll understand God’s teachings more closely. Through a nightly examen, you’ll face your imperfections and pursue deeper union. (Check out the episode).
What’s really great is that all five of these things are simple enough for anyone to do. Regardless of how deep your faith is.
No matter what challenges and worries you face, know that God is with you. He intentionally puts you in the right place and time. It’s up to us to accept this and embrace it. Just like the cross. How many of us would seek out a cross, the instrument of crucifixion? Once presented with the cross, let’s embrace it as Jesus did.
What do you think? Now it’s your turn. How do you deal with anxiety? Comment below or reply to this email so we can learn from each other.
God Bless & Happy Building
~Silas Mähner
Misc. Resources:
Groups:
Events:
Sign up for the SENT Summit (Sep 8-11, 2025, in Notre Dame, Indiana)
A summer course for Catholic high schoolers to learn entrepreneurship (actually launch a business) taught by the Catholic University of America
Content:
Recent Pod: Listen to the most recent episode of the CF Pod with Will O’Brien | #14 Should Catholics Try to Become Billionaires
The Catholic Gentleman: T.K. Coleman on dealing with our emotions
Moneywise Podcast: “My $70m Exit Collapsed Days Before Signing”
Services:
Hire a Catholic Virtual Assistant through ParacleteVA (email us: dearcfpod@gmail.com)
Marketing strategy and ghostwriting services — Veritas Copy LLC (Lucas just launched his firm — reach out for any of your copywriting needs — he’s solid!)
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How did we do? Reply with 1 (Great 😄), 2 (Mid 🫤), or 3 (Needs Work ☹️)
Would love to hear from everyone what else you’d add to these 5 tips?