Balance & Beyond
Balance and Beyond is the podcast for ambitious women refusing to accept burnout as the price of success. Here, we’re committed to empowering you with the tools and strategies you need to achieve true balance, where your career, relationships and health all thrive and where you have the power to define success on your own terms.
Balance & Beyond
Debunking the 5 Biggest Myths About Burnout (and why a holiday won't fix it!)
Burnout is not the price of ambition. On Balance and Beyond, we challenge the notion that achieving success means accepting exhaustion and guilt as constants in your life. Burnout doesn't discriminate; it affects high achievers, including ambitious women and perfectionists, who often feel pressured to shoulder burdens alone. We spotlight the necessity of seeking help and breaking free from toxic patterns that accelerate burnout. This episode sheds light on why it's crucial to recognise that burnout isn't a badge of honor but a signal to reevaluate how you're living and working.
Join us as we redefine burnout management beyond the outdated notion that more vacations or better time management are the solutions. Instead, we emphasise the importance of understanding and addressing the emotional roots of stress. Through personal stories and the concept of the "three D's of change"—divorce, disease, and death—we illustrate how crucial life events can serve as wake-up calls to confront burnout. We explore how personal patterns and belief systems, rather than just long hours, drive burnout and empower you to identify what you can control. Together, we'll debunk myths, challenge misconceptions, and equip you with insights to reclaim balance and thrive in both your professional and personal life.
To view the Transcript from this week's episode, visit our Balance & Beyond Podcast webpage: https://www.balanceinstitute.com/podcast/2025/84
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Thanks again for tuning in, and we'll see you next time on the Balance & Beyond Podcast!
Welcome to Balance and Beyond, the podcast for ambitious women who refuse to accept burnout as the price of success. Here we're committed to empowering you with the tools and strategies you need to achieve true balance, where your career, relationships and health all thrive and where you have the power to define success on your terms. I honor the space you've created for yourself today, so let's take a breath and dive right in. There is so much stuff about burnout out there at the moment. It is rife, is increasing, and so on today's episode, we are going to cut through all the fluff and I'm going to be debunking five of the biggest myths about burnout. These are bumping into me all the time I hear them on my phone and we need to put them to rest, because it's the only way that we're going to help women get out of burnout. And first, up the other side, most women assume that burnout is inevitable and it's the price that we pay for being ambitious. Out is inevitable and it's the price that we pay for being ambitious, for having a family, for wanting to have it all. I've had women on the phone to me and I am not joking when I say this who are literally looking forward to hitting burnout and having to go to hospital because at least then everyone might leave them alone and they might get some rest. People almost looking forward to getting sick because it gives them excuse to not have to work or to put everything down. And I've had women saying to me yeah, we've got a bet going in my firm, a group of lawyers said this to me and yeah, we're curious which one of us is going to burn out first. I'm going for two and a half years, my colleague's going for three years and other colleagues going for 12 months. So there seems to be this assumption that when you are ambitious, when you do want to have a career, especially when you add in a family that you don't have a choice, that this burnout is going to happen to you. It's just a matter of when and it's just a matter of how bad it's going to be. We need to put that to bed, because just because it's common doesn't mean that it's normal.
Jo:Burnout is not inevitable. People, I want to shake everybody and say come on, this is nuts. We have normalized exhaustion, we have normalized feeling guilty, we have normalized running on empty. And because it seems to be everywhere, we've just assumed well, and because it seems to be everywhere. We've just assumed well, it's the price I pay. I know that's where I was. I assumed that because everyone I spoke to felt the way I did. I assumed, because I didn't see a pathway out, that I just had to suck it up and that's what happened. Interestingly, I didn't actually realize that I was in burnout because I assumed burnout was the hospitalization, was the divorce or the you know, my body completely breaks down and I can't get out of bed. But that's probably only 1% or 2% of burnout cases.
Jo:There are so many women living with various degrees of overwhelm, of exhaustion, of all kinds of health issues, and they just assume that it's part of life. So, first and foremost, we have to debunk this myth that it's inevitable that you don't have a choice and that you are going to fall victim to burnout at some point in your life. So, if nothing else, if you take nothing else away from this podcast, know that it doesn't have to be this way. I know the data's not on our side. I saw a report recently that spoke about 75% of female professionals are feeling burnt out most of the time. There's stats everywhere, from everyone, and the numbers are usually in excess of 50%, I think the challenge can be.
Jo:The word burnout itself can be nebulous. Yes, you know, it's this sort of constant state of fatigue and feeling literally like you know there's. You are a burnt match. But that feels different to everyone. Everyone's experience of burnout can be different, and no surprise. Women like us tend to compare ourselves all the time. So we say, well, I'm not as bad as so-and-so, I'm not as bad as so-and-so who wound up in the hospital If they kept going past where I am now. Well, therefore, I must have to keep going. Which brings us on to point number two.
Jo:Myth number two, let's call it, and that is that only the weak succumb to burnout, that if you burn out, there is shame attached to that, that you couldn't hack it, that you didn't work hard enough, that you didn't push through and grind and that something made you collapse. I'm here to tell you that I have seen hundreds upon hundreds of high achievers and there is nothing weak about any single one of them. Burnout doesn't discriminate. It doesn't care if you are weak or strong, it doesn't care how single you are, it doesn't care whether you're a parent or not. It just cares about are you following these patterns Are you following? Do you have this conditioning? Do you have this conditioning, do you have this belief system? And then that's it. You know it can become this part of life that unfortunately, as we know, is all too common.
Jo:Interestingly, those who push themselves really, really hard, who have this belief of I don't want to be weak, I have to push, I have to be strong, they actually end up succumbing to burnout faster, because part of the burnout curve I talk about is that you know, perfectionists, those who are people pleasers, and a lot of women in general. We've been brought up to believe that we can do everything ourselves. I'm pretty sure that was one of my first full sentences. I do it myself. I know many women who relate to this sort of fierce independence that we have. But when things start to take a turn, it becomes increasingly difficult for us to say, oh, I need a little help with this. But then there's so much shame because we should be able to figure it out and if we have to ask for help, then we must be weak and there's something wrong with us, because if we could just toughen it up and be better organized and be better planned, then we wouldn't be feeling this way. So when we have this stigma that only the weak are the ones who are afflicted, who succumb to this, it further reinforces the pattern of not wanting to ask for help because you somehow think it's weak.
Jo:I want to bust this myth that anyone can be susceptible to burnout. It is not a sign of weakness. In fact, waking up and realizing that you don't want to feel this way anymore takes a lot of courage. It can be easier to stay on the treadmill and try to be more efficient in how fast you're running. Get on that hamster wheel right. How can I be more efficient at going round and round? Let me go round and round faster and I can beat the other person and go around faster on this wheel.
Jo:It takes a special kind of person who is willing to say you know what? I don't have to be feeling like this. I feel like crap. What if there's another way to feel? That takes courage, it takes conviction and it takes compassion to put up your hand and say there has to be another way. I don't know where it is and I don't know what it is, but something inside me says I've got to do this. So if you are someone who is in the process of putting up your hand or Googling, you know signs of burnout. Well then, know that that takes a huge amount of strength, and anyone that you go to for help, for support, whether it's a friend, a colleague, a coach, a psychologist, wherever you go, you need to make sure that they honor you in making that decision, in you putting down all that conditioning and saying I'm not prepared to live this way anymore. So hopefully we've turned this one on its head and you can now see that escaping this paradigm that so many women are trapped in it takes courage and it is an escape button that you will never, ever, ever regret taking.
Jo:The third myth that just does my head in is that I hear women say to me Jo, I just need some time management strategies. I'm burnt out, but I know I must be able to be better organized. Is there a better way for me to manage my calendar? You know you seem to be able to fit a lot in your day. How do you do it? I want some efficiency tips, because if I can somehow squeeze even more in my day than I already am, that somehow, magically, is going to stop me feeling burnier. I'm laughing because it's nothing to do with time management.
Jo:Of course, I teach people in my programs how to manage their time, but what has to shift is your identity, about the value you put on time, about your worth as a unit of time, about you prioritizing output over outcomes, about you prioritizing output over outcomes. So, if you are sitting in this paradigm of Googling how to be more efficient and let me color code my calendar and, I know, let me get an AI app that helps me be even more productive yes, they can be great things on balance in terms of okay, well, how can I be more efficient? But if you are trapped in this cycle of procrastination, of overwhelm, of overthinking, of not having any boundaries, time management ain't going to work for you. It's going to buy you five minutes here and five minutes there, but, to be honest, what I see in women who are burnt out is women are inherently organized.
Jo:We're juggling lots of different things. We've got notes from kids at school and we've got this spot on the weekend, and we've got this birthday party and we've got this thing due for our boss. So we're holding all the things. Yes, we've got 40 million tabs open. However, what actually is the challenge is our inability to focus. We can't focus on one thing because all of these things are screaming at us. The 40 million tabs are open and they're all asking us to deal with them right here and right now.
Jo:So we become incredibly scattered. We become almost addicted to dopamine and constant task switching. But we tell ourselves that, well, I don't have a choice. Have you seen my list? I've got to get through it all and we've got to do it. And we've got to talk faster. And we've got to do it. And we've got to talk faster and faster. And I used to be like that. I know I'm Australian, we tend to talk fast, but I'm also naturally a fast talker. However, learning to slow down as a way to speed up I know we've heard it a million and one times, but I never actually really understood what that meant.
Jo:My journey towards burnout started off like probably many of you listening with how to be better organized, but that is like trying to slap a Band-Aid on a hemorrhaging artery. It's got nothing to do with it. And what I have found, which I find quite fascinating, is it's not really about where you can find more time, it's not that 10 minute block here or that you know. Okay, well, I'm going to squeeze more out of this. It's actually where you're leaking time and this is where your self-sabotage behaviors come in, whether it's your people pleasing, your lack of boundaries, saying yes when you don't want to, and your emotional constipation, as we like to call it here excuse the crass word, but where you are so emotionally blocked, you are so numb you can't actually feel anything that this is what is hijacking your brain and leaking you huge amounts of time. So instead of it being time, it is usually.
Jo:You need to learn to better manage your emotions, because that is what is hijacking your time, and the crazy thing is you don't even realize it. You don't have any idea that this is what's going on, because you've become so numb, so frozen and so immune to what is actually going on in your body, in your brain and in your ecosystem and your nervous system to boot. So you do not need to be better organized. You need to learn to manage your emotions. You need to start putting down time management tools and actually start focusing on what is really going to shift the dial and move you out of burnout. So we've got. It's not inevitable. We're talking about. It is not weak to succumb to burnout. For God's sake. It's not inevitable. We're talking about. It is not weak to succumb to burnout. For God's sake, it's not about the time management strategies. So these are three big myths, but the last two are probably more, let's say, pervasive and probably more deep rooted in our psyche, and they can seem obvious on the surface.
Jo:So the next myth I hear all the time is I just need a holiday, I'm just hanging out for the next break. Let me go sit on the island, I won't take the laptop, I'll leave my phone, I'll take a book and a cocktail and a palm tree, and that's going to make me feel better. Well, I hate to break it to you, but anyone who has tried this approach, this is another band-aid example. Within 30 minutes of being back to work on your holiday, you haven't actually fixed any of the underlying problems that are causing your burnout, and so it's going to be right back to where it was. Now I'm not saying don't take a break. I'm not saying don't rest, have a long weekend, spend the day in bed if you need to, but there's a difference between band-aiding and not actually be willing to look at the things that are causing your burnout, versus putting your hand up and saying all right, I'm actually ready to deal with the root cause now. I actually want to stop this problem in the first place. I'm ready to go to places that might be scary. It takes huge amounts of courage, but this is the only way that we stop women burning out.
Jo:So if you are believing that when you get on holidays, or when you get through the birthday season, or when the kids are back at school or you're through the next quarter, that somehow there's this magical time when it's all going to get easier, I'm afraid you're mistaken. And as someone who burnt out when my kids were quite little, I remember saying well, you know, when Stella sleeps through the night, then then it's going to be much better. And then when we get her onto solids, it'll be better. And then when she goes to daycare, oh, that's gonna, you know, that's gonna be so much better. And then it's like when she gets to school and you get to school and go oh, my God, school is so incompatible with working life it gets worse and think oh, you know, when they get older, when they get more independent, you know, then it'll be much better. Well, I can tell you, I've got a 14 year old girl who's incredibly active and, yeah sure, I can leave her at home occasionally, but do you have any idea how much driving is required? Do you have any idea how? What emotional let's call it support challenges, hormones that you have to deal with? So it never, ever gets easier. It changes, it morphs, but there is never, ever going to be a better time to deal with this.
Jo:What I tend to find is that when it comes to burnout probably I guess my sample size is a bit different, but I would suggest at least half of the women who come to me have hit one of what we call the three D's of change. They've either close to divorce, so their relationship is on the brink of breaking down, whether they're seeing lawyers or getting papers drawn up, usually it's disease that has made them go. Okay, my health is suffering, I cannot continue to go on like this. And the other one is death, whether it's the death of a family member, a parent, a friend of you know, usually also some kind of disease. That's this wake up call to oh my gosh, I can't. Life is short, I cannot keep living like this. So if you're waiting until this, my friend, is your invitation to turn around and say I am going to stop waiting, I am going to ensure that I am ready to deal with the root causes of what really is going on and then, when you've dealt with the root causes, you can actually really enjoy a holiday. Because it comes this supercharged opportunity for you to do more deep work and really restore your nervous system because you've dealt with the root causes. So when you get back to work, you're even more rested, you're well topped up and you're not going to continually get triggered by what is going on. So, fingers crossed, even though this episode is probably dropping sometime in early 2025, holidays might be a distant memory. Do not hang on for the next one. And then, lastly, hang on for the next one and then, lastly, it's going to sound counterintuitive and it's partially true and partially not. So hear me out.
Jo:Most women assume that work is the cause of their burnout, that they need to change jobs, that it's the industry, that it's their toxic workplace, that it's the boss, that it's the expectation. So maybe I need a career change, maybe I need to retrain, maybe I need to swap the industry I'm working in, because, no matter which organization I go into, it's going to be this way. This can be somewhat true, but it's a lot false. So let me explain. Work is typically where we spend the most amount of time. You know, 30, 40, 50, heaven knows if you haven't worked with me yet 60, 70, 80 hours a week. And there are some cultures that promote long hours, that promote you know, they might have billables, they might have targets, okay, but I've worked with a lot of women in those environments who were burning out, and when they get the tools they need to learn how to cope, they can actually still thrive in those environments. So there is not a direct correlation between the number of hours that you work or the industry you work in and burnout. What I see is that work is typically the place where most of your patterns play out.
Jo:So, yes, it is the cause. But when I talk to most clients who come my way, I'll say so what's been the pattern? Did you feel like this at your last job? Oh, yeah, yeah, I did. And how about? You know, in the industry you're in prior to that one, did you have this similar problem? Well, it wasn't quite the same, but actually, now you mention it, yeah, I kind of did feel like this. And how about. Oh yeah, when I was a teenager, I also had okay. So the common denominator between all of these workplaces is you.
Jo:So, yes, work can be contributing to your burnout, but the reason it's contributing to your burnout is because you let. It is because of your patterns, is because of your belief system. Now, I'm not suggesting that there aren't women that come and work with me and, shortly after that, do end up deciding that they want a career change, that perhaps the environment that they're in isn't conducive to them being there for themselves. But there's a difference between deciding that you know what you need to find balance to avoid burnout. You're making this choice from a really empowered, strategic place versus people who are going, can't cope. It's the job, it's the industry, hit the eject button, hope to land somewhere else and hope that it's all better, and yet the patterns follow.
Jo:So if you are in a place where you feel like the job is causing you to burn out, I would really encourage you to get curious, to understand how much of it is the job versus how much of it. Is it perhaps your lack of boundaries, your inability to say no, your inability to focus? Are you procrastinating? Are you living off cortisol? Are you doing three people's job and not being compensated for? Are you not being heard? Are you overthinking things? People's job are not being compensated for. Are you not being heard? Are you overthinking things? Are you over preparing things?
Jo:Now, I'm not saying that your work may not have a role to play in this, but, as you gathered from that big, long list that I just gave you, there is a huge amount within your control in any workplace. I've worked with doctors who have to work 12 to 15 hour shifts because that's just the way the hospital system works, and they might want to work less, but they're contractually obligated to work a certain number of hours. So how do you ensure that, if you are in one of those environments, that you have the tools to not burn out? I've had so many women, whether it's in those environments, whether it's in law firms. You know high pressure executive roles and what I love is that they're on the verge of quitting. They're on stress leave.
Jo:I've had people call me from hospital, you know, convinced that they have to leave, that it's the job. Well, they come in and learn how to avoid burning out. They come in and learn the root causes. They take responsibility and accountability for changing the bits that are within their control. And then a large number if they still love what they do because they can finally work that out, they've got the headspace for it end up going back into their workplaces with strong boundaries, with new rules, with conversations, and end up doing amazingly well. They get promoted, they're thriving, they're loving their work.
Jo:So it doesn't have to be that just because you're burnt out and you think work's causing it, you have to quit. You don't have to leave your industry. What you need to do is you need to do, you need to get to the root cause of your burnout so that no matter where you work, no matter what you do, these patterns don't follow you. So there you have it the top five biggest myths about burnout. I hope you've walked away from this episode with an altered perspective. Whether it's now the courage to put up your hand and say I need some help Of course you know where to find us because we can help you. Or maybe it's a different meaning you're putting on that holiday. Maybe it's you know a different way you're going to look at work. Whatever it is, let's bust some myths and let's get to the truth of what really is causing you to feel burnt out. I'll see you next time on Balance and Beyond out. I'll see you next time on Balance and Beyond.
Jo:Thanks for joining us today on the Balance and Beyond podcast. We're so glad you carved out this time for yourself. If you enjoyed this episode, please share it with a friend who might need to hear this today. And if you're feeling extra generous, leaving us a review on your podcast platform of choice would mean the world to us. Leaving us a review on your podcast platform of choice would mean the world to us. If you're keen to dive deeper into our world, visit balanceinstitutecom to discover more about the toolkit that has helped thousands of women avoid burnout and create a life of balance and beyond. Thanks again for tuning in and we'll see you next time on the Balance and Beyond podcast.
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