The Leadership Rx for Women Physicians
The Leadership Rx for Women Physicians
The Hidden Costs of Saying Yes: What Every Woman Physician Should Know
Welcome back to The Leadership Rx for Women Physicians! In this episode, Dr. Asha Padmanabhan takes a deeper dive into the often-overlooked costs of saying yes too often. Spoiler alert: it’s not just about being busy.
Dr. Padmanabhan shares relatable stories and insights that uncover the ripple effects of overcommitting—on your emotional health, relationships, career, and overall well-being.
If you’ve ever felt drained, stretched too thin, or stuck in a cycle of over-giving, this episode is for you. Discover the five biggest costs of saying yes and how learning to say no can help you reclaim your time and energy.
What You’ll Learn in This Episode:
- The emotional toll of constantly saying yes and how it leads to burnout.
- How overcommitting compromises your relationships at home and at work.
- Why saying yes to everything can actually make you less effective professionally.
- The hidden costs of neglecting self-care and personal well-being.
- How saying yes to low-impact tasks stalls your career growth.
Key Moments in the Episode:
- [0:00] Introduction: Recap of Episode 1 and today’s topic.
- [2:00] Dr. Padmanabhan’s story about overcommitting and feeling drained.
- [4:30] The cost of emotional burnout and why it’s about more than working hard.
- [6:00] How saying yes too often impacts personal and professional relationships.
- [8:00] The irony of decreased professional effectiveness due to overcommitting.
- [9:30] Why neglecting self-care affects your ability to show up for others.
- [11:00] Career stagnation: The hidden price of low-impact commitments.
- [13:00] Closing thoughts and invitation to the webinar.
Related Resources:
🎙️ Listen to the previous episode: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-leadership-rx-for-women-physicians/id1531236342?i=1000682459253
📅 Register for the free webinar, Mastering the Art of Saying No – How to Set Boundaries Without Guilt:
https://asha-padmanabhan.mykajabi.com/mastering-the-art-of-saying-no-LRX
In this live session, Dr. Padmanabhan will share actionable strategies to help you set boundaries confidently, guilt-free.
Connect with Dr. Asha Padmanabhan:
🌐 Website: www.theleadershiprx.com
📝 Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/asha.padmanabhan.9
📸 Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/asha.md/
💼 LinkedIn: http://linkedin.com/in/ashapadmanabhan
Subscribe to my email newsletter for more actionable tips, click here
https://asha-padmanabhan.mykajabi.com/newsletter
✨ If this episode resonated with you, be sure to subscribe, rate ⭐️, and leave a review ✍🏼. Your support helps us bring these conversations to more women physicians.
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Asha:Hello and welcome back to the Leadership Prescription Podcast for Women Physicians. I'm Dr. Asha Padmanabhan. I'm your host. I'm a Board Certified Anesthesiologist and a Master Certified Physician Coach. I coach women physicians in essential career and leadership skills so you too can have a fulfilling career with the work life balance that you want. In our last episode, we talked about why it's so hard for women physicians to say no. We dove into the fears, the expectations, and the internal pressures that keep us over committed. If you missed that episode, be sure to check it out after this one. So today we're going to take the conversation one step further. We're talking about the real costs of you saying yes too often. And spoiler alert, it's not just about being busy. It's about the ripple effects that over committing can have on your emotional health, your relationships, your career, and even your sense of self. If you're tired of feeling drained, resentful, or stretched too thin, This episode is for you. And if this resonates, stick around because I'll also share details about my upcoming free webinar, Mastering the Art of Saying No, How to Set Boundaries Without Guilt, where I'll dive deeper into how you can break free from this cycle. So, what are the real costs of saying yes too often? I remember sitting in yet another committee meeting. It was late in the evening because when else do physicians have time to meet unless after a full clinical day. I was exhausted, I was emotionally drained, and I was unhappy. I'd had a difficult clinical day with some challenging cases in the operating room. All I wanted to do was go home, climb under the covers, and push the world away. But I knew that wasn't possible. I had this meeting to attend, and I had to participate and be fully present because the policy change being proposed would affect my department, and I had to prepare my arguments against that. And after the meeting, I knew I had to go home, check on my kids homework, make sure they'd eaten, and everything was put away. And I remember thinking, is this it? This career that I had worked so hard for? And at times, I didn't even feel like I wanted it anymore. I felt like I wanted to quit. I was torn in so many different directions, wanting to be the best clinician for my patients, wanting to do justice to the leadership role I was in, and also wanting to be an exemplary mom and parent. And I felt like I was failing on all counts. At that moment, I could care less about the implications of the policy change or the impacts it would have on my department. All I wanted to do was go away somewhere and not have to deal with any of it. So, the first cost of saying yes too often is emotional burnout, that feeling of being so completely drained and overwhelmed that I felt that day. Now burnout doesn't happen overnight. It's the result of constantly giving more than you have to give. Every time I said yes to one more task, every time you say yes to one more task, one more shift. One more favor, you chip away at your emotional reserves, and over time, you are left running on empty. And even the smallest requests can feel like they are big, monumental burdens. So think about the last time you said yes when you really wanted to say no. And maybe it was to help a colleague or take on an extra project. How did you feel afterward? If you are honest, it probably left you feeling more drained than fulfilled. The thing is, burnout isn't just about working hard, it's about feeling like you have no control over your time or energy, like I felt that day. The second cost of saying no Yes, too often is compromised relationships. Every time you say yes to something that doesn't align with your priorities, you're saying no to something else. And all too often, that something else is time with the people you care about most. I've done it so many times. Said yes to that evening meeting or said yes to that weekend work or that weekend Zoom at a time that my kids had another commitment. And so I had to miss. I am sure you can relate. Those missed dance recitals, those missed soccer games, those missed practices. All because we said yes one too many times. And I've heard so many stories from women physicians who miss family dinners. Resentment can build towards colleagues who seem to ask too much, who skip out on their social gatherings, or they're too exhausted to engage with their kids or partner at the end of the day. It's not intentional. We all have the best intention of being the best spouse or parent, but over committing at work can leave little room for connection at home. And, it's not just personal relationships that suffer. When you're stretched too thin, your professional relationships can also take a hit. Or tension can arise when you are too busy to collaborate effectively. Think about a time that that happened to you. Cost No. 3 Decrease Professional Effectiveness Ironically, saying yes to everything can make you less effective at work. When you are spread too thin, your ability to focus and deliver high quality care or work diminishes. Maybe you've experienced this first hand. You agree to take on an extra responsibility, like leading a committee or covering for a colleague, and suddenly you are behind on other tasks you are supposed to do, sometimes critical tasks like patient notes or other stuff that you might need to do, and mistakes might happen, or you start feeling like you are just going through the motions instead of truly engaging with your work. Saying yes to everything doesn't make you a better physician or colleague, it makes you an exhausted one. Cost number four. That is the loss of self care and personal well being. When you are always saying yes to others, your own needs inevitably fall to the bottom of the list. You skip meals, you subsist on coffee, you cancel workouts, you sacrifice sleep. All in the name of getting one more thing done. Sound familiar? Absolutely to me. But here's the thing. Taking care of yourself isn't a luxury, it's a necessity. When you neglect your well being, you're not just hurting yourself, you're also impacting your ability to show up for others. We have all heard that saying, you can't pour from an empty cup, and yet how many times do we try to do that? The fifth cost. Let's talk about it. It's career stagnation. And this might one, this one might be surprising because we all feel like saying yes to everything is the ticket to advancing in our careers. But I'm going to tell you saying yes to everything can actually hinder your professional growth. When you're constantly busy with tasks and responsibilities that don't align with your long term goals, you have less time and less energy. To focus on the opportunities that truly matter. Maybe you're saying yes to committee work that doesn't advance your career while missing out on chances to network, lead, or grow your skills. Your time is your most valuable resource, and saying yes to everything that doesn't align with it might be a way to stall. So just to recap, the five biggest causes or five biggest costs of saying Yes too often. Number one, emotional burnout. Two, compromised relationships. Three, decreased professional effectiveness. Four, loss of self care and personal well being. And five, career stagnation. Do any of these resonate with you? If they do, I want you to know you're not alone. This happened to me and I know from personal experience So, that there is a way to break free from this cycle. In my free webinar, Mastering the Art of Saying No, How to Set Boundaries Without Guilt, I am going to dive deeper into these challenges and give you actionable strategies to help you set boundaries and reclaim your time and energy. I am going to post the link for the webinar in the show notes. Thanks so much for listening and I'll talk to you next time. And if you like this episode, please share, subscribe and review it. Thank you so very much.
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