Delta just cares about its customers so darned much and wanted to fly them when they were interested in travel again so the airline ‘stretched’ and pushed themselves too darned hard. Now they need to give themselves a break, not hold themselves to the same standard of flying so many trips, in order to sort things out.
Here Bastian is just like the job candidate who answers the question, “what’s your greatest weakness?” with “I work too hard, and don’t focus enough on outside interests.”