Imagine a life where stress no longer dictates your every move and burnout is a distant memory. That’s what we aim to uncover in today's episode, drawing wisdom from the influential book "Burnout: The Secret to Unlocking the Stress Cycle" by Emily and Amelia Nagoski. I’ll be sharing my own journey through the emotional, physical, and mental labyrinth of burnout, shedding light on how recognizing and managing it can transform your well-being. Together, we’ll dissect the very essence of burnout, its components, and its staggering impact on our lives, all while arming ourselves with the Nagoski sisters' invaluable insights.
We tackle the top 10 stressors that fuel burnout, from the relentless pressures of work to the often-overwhelming personal expectations we set for ourselves. Distinguishing between stressors and our physiological responses, we emphasize the crucial role of completing the stress cycle to stave off long-term burnout. Physical activities like walking and dancing emerge as powerful tools to help discharge pent-up stress energy. Moreover, we delve into the concept of "Human Giver Syndrome," exploring how the compulsion to prioritize others' happiness can leave us neglecting our own needs.
Rest and self-compassion are explored as we delve into the science behind why our bodies require around 42% of time dedicated to rest. We'll debunk the myths that rest equates to laziness and instead, argue that true resilience stems from kindness and proper recovery. By incorporating practices of gratitude and self-kindness into our daily lives, we can shift our approach to stress, fostering a more resilient and authentic existence. Join us as we redefine wellness, moving fluidly between life's adversities and moments of peace, and discover how collective care can be the key to overcoming burnout.
The 2 practices we review in this episode:
Gratitude For how Things Happen. "At the end of each day, think of some event or circumstance for which you feel grateful, and write about it: 1. Give the event or circumstance a title, like “Finished Writing Chapter 8” or “Made It Through That Meeting Without Crying or Yelling.” 2. Write down what happened, including details about what anyone involved, including you, did or said. 3. Describe how it made you feel at the time, and how you feel now, as you think about it. 4. Explain how the event or circumstance came to be. What was the cause? What confluence of circumstances came together to create this moment? If, as you write, you feel yourself being drawn into negative, critical thoughts and feelings, gently set them to one side and return your attention to the thing you’re being grateful for.”
Breathing Exercise "A simple, practical exercise is to breathe in to a slow count of five, hold that breath for five, then exhale for a slow count of ten, and pause for another count of five. Do that three times—just one minute and fifteen seconds of breathing—and see how you feel.”
We share plenty of quotes from both Amelia and Emily. Here's the final one I'll share:
“The cure for burnout is not ‘self-care’; it is all of us caring for one another. So we’ll say it one more time: Trust your body, Be kind to your
Imagine a life where stress no longer dictates your every move and burnout is a distant memory. That’s what we aim to uncover in today's episode, drawing wisdom from the influential book "Burnout: The Secret to Unlocking the Stress Cycle" by Emily and Amelia Nagoski. I’ll be sharing my own journey through the emotional, physical, and mental labyrinth of burnout, shedding light on how recognizing and managing it can transform your well-being. Together, we’ll dissect the very essence of burnout, its components, and its staggering impact on our lives, all while arming ourselves with the Nagoski sisters' invaluable insights.
We tackle the top 10 stressors that fuel burnout, from the relentless pressures of work to the often-overwhelming personal expectations we set for ourselves. Distinguishing between stressors and our physiological responses, we emphasize the crucial role of completing the stress cycle to stave off long-term burnout. Physical activities like walking and dancing emerge as powerful tools to help discharge pent-up stress energy. Moreover, we delve into the concept of "Human Giver Syndrome," exploring how the compulsion to prioritize others' happiness can leave us neglecting our own needs.
Rest and self-compassion are explored as we delve into the science behind why our bodies require around 42% of time dedicated to rest. We'll debunk the myths that rest equates to laziness and instead, argue that true resilience stems from kindness and proper recovery. By incorporating practices of gratitude and self-kindness into our daily lives, we can shift our approach to stress, fostering a more resilient and authentic existence. Join us as we redefine wellness, moving fluidly between life's adversities and moments of peace, and discover how collective care can be the key to overcoming burnout.
The 2 practices we review in this episode:
Gratitude For how Things Happen. "At the end of each day, think of some event or circumstance for which you feel grateful, and write about it: 1. Give the event or circumstance a title, like “Finished Writing Chapter 8” or “Made It Through That Meeting Without Crying or Yelling.” 2. Write down what happened, including details about what anyone involved, including you, did or said. 3. Describe how it made you feel at the time, and how you feel now, as you think about it. 4. Explain how the event or circumstance came to be. What was the cause? What confluence of circumstances came together to create this moment? If, as you write, you feel yourself being drawn into negative, critical thoughts and feelings, gently set them to one side and return your attention to the thing you’re being grateful for.”
Breathing Exercise "A simple, practical exercise is to breathe in to a slow count of five, hold that breath for five, then exhale for a slow count of ten, and pause for another count of five. Do that three times—just one minute and fifteen seconds of breathing—and see how you feel.”
We share plenty of quotes from both Amelia and Emily. Here's the final one I'll share:
“The cure for burnout is not ‘self-care’; it is all of us caring for one another. So we’ll say it one more time: Trust your body, Be kind to your
Welcome to Foundation Fridays. This is an offshoot of Reverse Reset Restore where we drop extra info on you on the last Friday of the month. This is the place where we talk about the books that are reshaping thoughts and belief systems, teaching us and guiding us into a deeper knowing of ourselves, of ourselves. Think of it as the book club for the soul. I'm your host, sally, and I'm creating whole new worlds for myself, one page at a time. Have you ever experienced burnout? Would you even know that's what to call it if it happened to you?
Speaker 1:
Burnout is a state of physical, emotional and mental exhaustion characterized by feelings of fatigue, cynicism and reduced effectiveness. It can significantly impair functioning in both personal and professional life. It can impact your mental health and your physical capabilities. I've had several periods in my life where I burnt right out. Only I didn't realize until the burnout I experienced last year that that was what had been happening to me. I did my usual Sally thing of self-blame and shame for not keeping up or maintaining my juggling act. Last year I crashed and burned because of a looming redundancy and a ridiculous workload during a time of great uncertainty. As it turns out, I can't endlessly maintain a six-person's workload as one person, no matter how awesome I may be.
Speaker 1:
This month's book, burnout the Secret to Unlocking the Stress Cycle, by sisters Emily and Amelia Nagoski helped remind me that I wasn't struggling for no good reason, that I wasn't incompetent or neglectful, that I didn't fail my job because I was trying to do the role of at least six other people. It reminded me that burnout is a very real and serious condition and that it can lead to nowhere good very fast condition, and that it can lead to nowhere good very fast. It gave me hope to help me navigate the complexities of burnout and get me back onto the path of wholeness and wellness, because where I was this time last year, had I not utilized resources such as this book, well, my story might have ended very differently. In today's episode, I'm going to walk you through several key points about the book, including understanding burnout, the three components of burnout, the stress cycle, the human giver syndrome, the mad woman in the attic that's the voice in your head that always delights in hurting you, and the importance of rest. I'll also share the top 10 most common stresses we experience that can lead to burnout, and then we will end the episode with a couple of practical exercises from the book that you can try out at home for yourself Right now.
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Let's take a little look at Emily and Amelia's life before we delve into the key points of our discussion today. Emily and Amelia were born in 1977. They are identical twins whose paths divulged as they got older, at least so they thought. Emily got her PhD in health behavior from the Indiana University School of Public Health and her master's degree in counseling from Indiana University, and Amelia has a master's degree in choral conducting from the University of Connecticut. At a surface level, their careers seem poles apart, but one day the sisters realized their graduate degrees were similar and that they were both about learning how to listen and feel feelings. It was an experience of burnout that Amelia was going through that prompted discussions between her and Emily, leading to an awakening for Amelia about how stress impacts the body and leading eventually to the creation of this book, as Amelia describes it.
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Well, it began with me going to school. While I was getting my Doctor of Musical Arts in conducting, I ended up in the hospital and I had abdominal pain which they diagnosed as stress induced, told me to go home and relax and in fact I had no idea what to do. But luckily I have a sister who has a PhD in health behavior. So when I'm in the hospital, just in pain, laying there, not even really understanding how I got there or why, and I honestly didn't even believe that stress could cause physiological symptoms, and Emily said how did you not know that?
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I'm a conductor and a singer. I have learned in my musical training to express my feelings with my body, to use my body as a vehicle for expressing emotion. And it occurred to me that if it was true that I didn't just have those feelings on stage, I had them all the time, my whole life. And if that was true, wow, that was a lot of feelings. So I didn't even want to believe this was true, but once Emily brought me a huge stack of peer-reviewed science, I couldn't deny anymore. Yes, stress manifests in the body and can turn into symptoms of illness.
Speaker 1:
The Nagoski sisters draw on their respective expertise to offer a comprehensive understanding of burnout. In this book, they explain that burnout is not merely a result of overwork, but a consequence of the accumulation of stresses, including societal expectations, discrimination and internalized beliefs. Does any of this sound familiar? You're juggling work deadlines, family responsibilities, social commitments and somehow trying to squeeze in some much-needed me time somewhere in between. So many of us are being pulled in so many different directions all the time. It may be life, but are we really living? That's the question I ask myself a lot and I follow it up. By why can't I be born into wealth? Well, most of us live a life of multi-layered expectations, beliefs and doing, doing, doing. But sometimes all this doing and rushing and pushing and pulling can lead to significant imbalances in our lives. If you've ever felt utterly exhausted, emotionally drained and completely fed up with everything, you might be experiencing burnout.
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Burnout isn't just about feeling tired. It's a state of physical, emotional and mental exhaustion that comes from chronic stress, as Amelia describes it. It's important to know that burnout is not a medical diagnosis. It's not a mental illness. It's a condition related to overwhelming stress. So it's not like it puts you in this different state where you're going to be trapped and you have to have 13 years of therapy and whatever. It just means that you need to be completing your stress response cycles. We're going to go into what it means to complete your stress cycle shortly, but before we do that, let's take a look at the three components of burnout. Number one depersonalization. Number two decreased sense of accomplishment. And number three emotional exhaustion.
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Here's how Emily differentiates the three so, according to the original technical definition from Herbert Friedudenberger in the 1970s, burnout, which originally was inclusive only of the workplace but has expanded now involves depersonalization, where you separate yourself emotionally from your work instead of investing yourself and feeling like it's meaningful. Decreased sense of accomplishment, where you just keep working harder and harder for less and less sense that what you are doing is making any difference. And emotional exhaustion. And while everyone experiences all three of these factors, over the 40 years since this original formulation, it turns out that, broadly speaking, for men, burnout tends to manifest as depersonalization in particular, and for women, burnout tends to manifest as emotional exhaustion. So anyone can experience burnout, but your specific way of experiencing it is probably going to be different depending on who you are.
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Who we are, where we're from, our family background, our heritage and cultural expectations and belief systems all the thousands of dynamics that make us up as an individual means that how we experience stress will differ from those around us, even be different from our families, because who you are is unique. There has never been anyone quite like you, and so your experiences and the way you see the world is yours and yours alone. And the good news is that, as unique as you are, there are strategies you can employ that can work for you and many others as well, and we'll get into those a little bit later. All right, I want to talk about stresses versus stress. No, they are not the same thing. So stress and stressors are distinct entities. The book delves into the concept that, while we are constantly surrounded by stressors potential threats that trigger our body's stress response dealing with stress itself is a separate matter from addressing its causes. Stressors are experiences like illness or moving, getting married or maybe even your commute. Moving away from the book for just a few minutes, I want to give you the top 10 common stressors for most people. Let me know in the comment section if you are listening via something like Podbean or Spotify, or you can head over to the Reverse Reset Restore Facebook page or Instagram page and have a little conversation with me over there as well.
Speaker 1:
Here are the top 10 common stressors. Number one work-related pressure High workload, deadlines, demanding bosses or conflicts with colleagues or customers. Number two financial concerns Debt, job insecurity or struggles to make ends meet. Inflation, food costs being squeezed from every which way and not getting a raise that supports the increasing costs you still have to meet. Number three relationship issues conflicts with partners, family tensions, breakups, makeups, toxic behaviors and red flags waving. Number four health challenges illness, chronic pain or caring for a sick family member. Number five major life changes moving to a new city, starting a new job or experiencing a significant loss. Number six academic pressure exams, academic performance expectations or balancing school work with other responsibilities. Number seven uncertainty about the future. 7. Uncertainty about the future Concerns about career prospects, personal goals or global events. 8. Social pressures Feeling judged or excluded, difficulty making friends or maintaining social relationships. 9. Personal expectations Striving for perfection or fear of failure or self-criticism, being an overthinker or a people pleaser. And number 10, environmental stressors Noise, pollution, overcrowding or living in an unsafe neighborhood.
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These top 10 stressors, and all the others not mentioned here are the situations that cause your stress, and stress is the physical and psychological reaction to what is happening around you and to you. As Emily puts it, the main thing people need to begin with is that there is a difference between your stresses, the things that cause your stress, the unmeetable goals and expectations, your family issues and money. Those are your stressors. And then there's your stress, which is the physiological thing that happens in your body in response to any perceived threat, and it's largely the same, no matter what the threat is, and evolutionarily we know the threat response as being the fight, flight or freeze response. So we've got our stressor or stressors, and now we are in the action of stress. Now what? Unfortunately, most of us tend to just build upon our stress like a house of cards or dominoes, until the stress eventually fires back with illness, disease, mental health issues or, as evidenced in this book, burnout. The good news is is that the sisters emphasize ways that we can complete the stress cycle. How do we most effectively do this? By engaging in physical activities that help discharge the accumulated stress energy from the body.
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You've probably watched at least one nature program or wildlife documentary. I love David Attenborough, but I also have this love-hate relationship with these types of programs because I hate seeing the animals get attacked and killed. Yes, I know it's nature and it's the circle of life, kumbaya and all that, but I still find that it's difficult to watch. Heck, I can't even deal with the Lion King or Bambi or, worst of all, talking childhood trauma here, watership Down. But if you have watched any program featuring a wild animal who is under attack and they survive, you might notice the one thing all animals have in common post a close encounter with a predator, they shake Apologies for the Taylor Swift reference, but they shake it off, quite literally shake. What is happening is that this serves as a discharge for the stress of just being through.
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I've been practicing this with somatic exercises, which I'll be sharing in a later episode, but I wanted to say that we too have this ability to release the stress from our bodies. In a similar way, you might want to stick with something a little bit more conventional than shaking it out, and this could include activities such as walking, jogging, swimming, dancing or any form of exercise that gets the body moving and releasing the tension. This seemingly straightforward action holds significant power in helping to disrupt the cycle of stress, and by doing so, individuals can effectively break the cycle of stress and prevent long-term burnout. As the sisters discuss in the book, breaking the daily stress cycle of our modern day lives involves reassuring your body that you are safe, which simply walking away from the stressor may not achieve. They emphasize speaking the body's language and engaging in physical activity, ideally for 20 to 60 minutes daily, which can effectively complete the stress cycle.
Speaker 1:
I think also that we don't complete the stress cycle because we don't have a relationship with our body. I mean, we do. We know that we have one. They exist, we must deal with them, and we often groan about our body or treat it poorly, and that's another part of how we've been conditioned to do so. We celebrate youth and condemn our aging bodies. Sagging breasts and cellulite and wrinkles and graying hair have been treated as something to be reviled, and so the chasm of how we respect our bodies grows deeper. We give away our power about our bodies to social media, to dietitians, to doctors, to lovers and friends and Vogue magazine.
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As Emily says, most of us have spent our whole lives being taught to believe everyone else's opinions about our bodies rather than to believe what our own bodies are trying to tell us. For some of us, it's been so long since we listened to our bodies we hardly know how to start understanding what they're trying to tell us, much less how to trust and believe what they're saying. To make matters worse, the more exhausted we are, the noisier the signal is and the harder it is to hear the message. Our bodies are the sacred vessels in which we are housed. It's time to change the relationship we have with them and learn the language it so desperately wants to speak to us in.
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I want to talk about what the sisters call human giver syndrome. Emily states Human givers must at all times be pretty happy, calm, generous and attentive to the needs of others, which means they must never be ugly, angry, upset, ambitious or attentive to their own needs. I am a human giver. I used to always say no one likes a sad Sally, because no one knew how to deal with her. They wanted the bright, happy, funny, generous giver that I was used to performing as and that they were used to seeing on the stage of their own lives. If I ever allowed sad Sally or angry, mad, ugly or ambitious Sally to show up instead, it was all too apparent that this was not the Sally most people were prepared for or wanted.
Speaker 1:
I noticed that if I played my part of human giver was so easily accessible. I was popular, but when I needed attending to or to be on the receiving end of some giving crickets, the exceptions to this experience have been few and far between, and it was this human giver personality that I took on as the acceptable me that created this unhealthy bond between who I am and my fear of rejection for being exactly that. I knew that sad, sometimes even unreasonable or the oft misunderstood emotional Sally was not acceptable to those who needed me to provide their needs and ego with security, love and assurance. So I was taught, both by others and by myself, that to be accepted and not rejected was to not show others my insecurities or fears, or be any type of taker, to make myself less authentic so that I didn't scare others away with my own needs.
Speaker 1:
Many of my relationships have been overwhelmingly me giving and them taking, with me teetering on the edge of will I or won't I be rejected. Yet again, I share this not to host a pity party and not to guilt those in my life who have treated me this way. I'm talking about this because, as this book clearly shows, I am not alone in my position as human giver. I am not alone in the pain that I have lugged around as a consequence, always feeling that I am only acceptable on the condition of me maintaining the role of giver and everyone else being taker. I didn't go too heavily into this in my recent episode Rejection is Not a Reflection but these uneven friendships showed their true colors once I started to put some boundaries into place. Suddenly, the accessible Sally, the giver of all things, was not buying into all the drama or lending an endless shoulder, and since I was no longer useful or attending the needs at the drop of a hat and my own expense, the human takers fell away. How many of us have a similar story? Have you fallen into this trap that you are only worth what you can give? This is part of the human condition, meaning that any of us, regardless of gender, nationality or creed, are susceptible to this.
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As Emily states, human giver syndrome is the contagious belief that you have a moral obligation to give every drop of your humanity in support of others, no matter the cost to you. It thrives in the patriarchy, the way mold thrives in damp basements. Ah, the patriarchy, a conversation that always gets a few heads swiveling around and one that is not shied away from in this book. In fact, emily and Amelia's synopsis throughout this book is that the way women experience burnout is far different to men. And while I've been talking about the human giver in my own personal context and experience, let's shift our focus to patriarchy, blindness number one. In chapter four. The game is rigged. While anyone can be a human giver, historically and societally it is women who are generally going to be the ones suffering under human giver syndrome, going to be the ones suffering under human giver syndrome. Our society has built that narrative.
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At the core of human giver syndrome lies the ingrained belief that certain individuals, typically women, are obligated to sacrifice everything their time, energy and well-being for the sake of others. That's one of the reasons why the idea of self-care does not compute for many women, especially if you are a mom or you're juggling multiple responsibilities to the point you almost feel like you've got multiple personalities. In this framework of human giver syndrome, any act of self-care is viewed as selfish because it prioritizes personal needs over the demands of others. And how dare we? As outlined by the sisters in Patriarchy Blindness number one. This syndrome is the most evident in the persistence of the second shift phenomenon, where women disproportionately bear the burdens of child care and household chores compared to men. Globally, women spend an average of 40 hours per week on these unpaid tasks, while men contribute only around an hour and a half. Even in more gender balanced countries like the United States, the United Kingdom and Canada, women still devote 50% more time to such labor. An example highlighted in the book is that in the United Kingdom in 2016, women spent 26 hours per week on household duties compared to men's 16 hours.
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Moving to the much more grim and darker side of human giver syndrome is a culture where sexual violence is normalized and has been perpetuated. This universal culture stems from the notion that men have entitlement over women's bodies, often justified by a woman's appearance or actions. Historically, this belief was legally sanctioned Women were property or a commodity, where, upon marriage, a woman's possessions, including her body, became the property of her husband. It wasn't until relatively recently in 1991 in the UK and 1993 for all 50 states of the US, and the mid-80s for places like New Zealand and Australia that marital rape was outlawed. If you want to go down a rather disturbing rabbit hole, I've included the link to a Wikipedia page with marital rape laws by country in the show notes rape laws by country in the show notes. But just bear in mind that it is a pretty sobering topic to look at and if you are not ready to be disturbed by the facts, it's probably a good idea to avoid clicking on that link.
Speaker 1:
It now seems as good a time as any to move the conversation right along. Seems as good a time as any to move the conversation right along. It's time to talk rest. Rest is something we tend to give ourselves permission to do at night. It's called sleep, and even then, for most women particularly, sleep is not something that's always easy to come by, and a lack of sleep or poor sleep hygiene can create multiple pathways to disease, illness and burnout. Rest is not just those moments of sleep. It's far more important to build rest into our waking moments as well.
Speaker 1:
Let's talk the stats offered in the book. So how much rest is adequate? Science says 42%. That's the percentage of time your body and brain need you to spend resting. It's about 10 hours out of every 24. You are probably thinking that figure seems astronomical and unachievable. After all, how could we possibly make that happen with work, family and life commitments, as the sisters go on to say. It doesn't have to be every day. It can average out over a week or a month or more.
Speaker 1:
We're not saying you should take 42% of your time to rest. We are saying if you don't take the 42%, the 42% will take you. It will grab you by the face, shove you to the ground, put its foot on your chest and declare itself the victor. In other words, dear friends, if we don't make room in our lives for resting, it will be forced upon us in the form of sickness and disease. I know that this has personally happened to me more times than I would like to admit, pushing my body to extreme limits, all for it to push back or slow me down with illness, because that's the only language at that point I will understand. Emily explains it like this have you ever come down with a terrible cold as soon as you finished a huge project? Have you found yourself sleeping 12 or 14 hours every day for the first three days of vacation? Have you, like Amelia, literally ended up in the hospital after a prolonged period of extreme stress? We've established by now that stress is a physiological phenomenon that impacts every system and function in our bodies, including immune functioning, digestive functioning and hormones. Keep all of those in working order. Our biology requires that we spend 42% of our lives maintaining the organism of our physical existence. I'll share an example from the book of what this 42% may look like in a Facebook and Instagram post.
Speaker 1:
The reason rest may be so elusive for us to prioritize is that we've been conditioned to believe. Our worth is in how tough we can be in response to what life throws our way. In New Zealand and Australia, we get taught to harden up, and even slogans like Nike's Just Do it sows us on pushing on or through. As the sisters write Nietzsche, ugg told us what doesn't kill you makes you stronger. You've been hearing this for years in one form or another. But let's be specific. Like, if you're hit by a car and don't die, does the car make you stronger? No. Does injury or disease make you stronger? No. Does suffering alone build character? No, no. These things leave you more vulnerable to further injury. What makes you stronger is whatever happens to you after you survive, the thing that didn't kill you. What makes you stronger is rest.
Speaker 1:
In my experiences of working in the corporate world, rest is frowned upon. Even in the ambulance services and healthcare sectors, there is an expectation to carry on, even when sick. I honestly thought that, having collectively gone through the pandemic, the world might change these expectations and demands, but it seems like we really haven't learned any lessons on the value and importance of rest. We just kind of continue to let the ambulance be at the bottom of the cliff instead of putting in provisions to ensure the clifftop is safe. Rest is a safety provision and one that could be in our control rather than thrust upon us via burnout or disease. This is where we can feel stuck and wanting to fit in with the constructs of giving all to our places of our work, our family dynamics and the other demands in our everyday life that can create discord within us. Amelia and Emily remind us there is another way. All your body requires of you is that you turn toward it with kindness and compassion, with non-judgment and plain vanilla acceptance of all your contradictory emotions, beliefs and longings. For many of us, we are so far removed from ourselves that learning to come to a new relationship with the body we are in is a tough ask, but it's not an impossible one.
Speaker 1:
I want to talk about what the sisters call the mad woman in the attic. I think we all have one, at least I know I do. I'm going to read a big portion from the book directly to explain this mad woman in the attic. This is the tragedy of the mad woman. She whips us and we achieve things, and so we think the whipping is why we achieved things and we'll never achieve anything without the whipping. This is the most common reason we hear when people resist self-compassion they're worried that if they stop beating themselves up they'll lose all motivation. They'll just sit around watching Real Housewives of Anywhere and eating Lucky Charms in a bowl full of Bud Light. This argument doesn't stand up to even the most superficial investigation. Are we really working towards our goals only because we'll torture ourselves if we stop, so that as soon as we put down the whip we'll sink into eternal apathy? Of course not. In fact, it's the opposite. We only whip ourselves because our goals matter so much that we're willing to suffer the self-inflicted pain if that's what it takes, and we believe that because we've always done it that way, it must be why we've accomplished as much as we have.
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Diligent practice of self-compassion works.
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It lowers stress hormones and improves mood, and many years of research have confirmed that self-forgiveness is associated with greater physical and mental well-being, All without diminishing your motivation to do the things that matter to you.
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I used to heed the mad woman in my attic, far too often submitting myself to daily self-flagellations because I needed to prove my worth, and so I perpetuated my own suffering under the guise that if I wasn't doing, I wasn't being.
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It's an exhausting way to live and a painful way to live, as the sisters share in the book. When you are cruel to yourself, contemptuous and shaming, you only increase the cruelty in the world. When you are kind and compassionate towards yourself, you increase the kindness and compassion in the world. Being compassionate towards yourself not self-indulgent or self-pitying, but kind is both the least you can do and the single most important thing you can do to make the world a better place. Until you are free, we can't be fully free, which is why all of us together have to collaborate to create freedom for everyone. Our wellness is tied to yours. Once I stopped heeding the madwoman's reasoning and began to come to myself with self-love and forgiveness, I noticed a massive shift in who I wanted to be and how I was responding to things, and how the world was responding to me.
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This is a process and it does take time, but when you can meet yourself with love and self-compassion instead of this relentless pursuit of what you think you need to do and be to be of any worth in the world, the sooner you will meet who you truly are and you will change your life, I promise. Before we close out this episode, I want to share a couple of practical exercises you can try right now alongside me. Let's start with gratitude for how things happen Now. We've talked about gratitude lists before, and I generally start my day, before my feet even hits the floor, with a quick jot down of the things I'm grateful for. This is for less than a minute and literally it's just what comes to my mind, so a lot of the time it's repeats, like I'm grateful for coffee and clouds and waking up. One of the exercises offered in this book is gratitude for how things happen. Here's how it works. As described in the book, a long-term gratitude lifter is gratitude for how things happen. At the end of each day, think of some event or circumstance for which you feel grateful and write about it. Number one give the event or circumstance a title like finished writing chapter eight, or made it through that meeting without crying or yelling. Made it through that meeting without crying or yelling. Number two write down what happened, including details about what anyone involved, including you, did or said. Number three describe how it made you feel at the time and how you feel now as you think about it. And number four explain how the event or the circumstance came to be. What was the cause? What confluence or circumstances came together to create this moment? If, as you write, you feel yourself being drawn into negative, critical thoughts and feelings, gently set them to one side. Return your attention to the thing you're being grateful for. We've also talked about and walked through some breathing exercises in previous episodes. I'm including this one from the book and I've created it in video format that you can follow along with on the Reverse Reset Restore YouTube channel. The link to the video will be in the show notes. I welcome you to stop what you're doing right now and for the next 90 seconds, just breathe. Here's the breathing exercise from the book. A simple, practical exercise is to breathe in to a slow count of five. Hold that breath for five, then exhale for a slow count of ten and pause for another count of five. Do that three times just one minute and 15 seconds of breathing and see how you feel. Let's do it together right now. Breathe in and count five. One, two, three, four, five. Hold for a count of five One, two, three, four, five. Exhale, counting to ten. 5. Exhale, counting to 10. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10. And pause for 5. Two, three, four, five and breathe in for five one, two, three, four, 5. Hold for 5. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5. Exhale 10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, three, two, one and pause for five, four, three, two, one. Last time. Breathe in One, two, three, 4, 5. Hold for 5, 4, 3, 2, 1 and pause for 5, 4, two, one and come back to normal breathing.
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If there is just one takeaway from the book, it's this To be well is not to live in a state of perpetual safety and calm, but to move fluidly from a state of adversity, risk, adventure or excitement back to safety and calm and out again. Stress is not bad for you. Being stuck is bad for you. By learning to complete the stress cycle, we improve not only the quality of our physical well-being and mental health, only the quality of our physical well-being and mental health, we build resilience and learn how to manage our own lives in ways that bring more joy and peace into our existence. If you've been feeling like you are on the verge of burnout, take a page from this book and remember you've got the power to break free from the cycle and thrive.
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One final quote from Emily and Amelia as we close out this Foundation Friday episode the cure for burnout is not self-care. It is all of us caring for one another. So we'll say it one more time Trust your body, be kind to yourself. You are enough just as you are right now. Your joy matters. Please tell everyone you know you.