Hey , hey , mamas , welcome back to Conquering Chaos . A mom's guide to self-care insanity . I'm your host , sydney Crow , and today we have Coach Ellen . Well , I'm so excited that Coach Ellen is here today , you guys . She is a former research scientist , turned the number one burnout and stress management coach on Google and the creator of the Burnout Proof Members Club and the Burnout Proof Business Signature Course . She is on a mission to help high achievers work less and live more , and her work supports hundreds of Enneagram Type 3 women every year , and she's been featured in Fast Company and on stage in LinkedIn .
Speaker 2Welcome Ellen . Thank you so much . I'm so pumped to be here and obviously I nerd out about burnout , so I'm very excited to talk about it with you all .
Speaker 1Well , I feel like it is just like serendipitous that our paths have crossed because , as we were talking before the show , this is geared more towards moms , but a lot of moms experience burnout , which is , you know , there's this notion that we have to have do be an all be at all , and I think that that's a great thing in theory , but the way that we are working ourselves ragged to achieve that all in this , like social media , everybody's got the picture perfect window out there to achieve it all is really detrimental to parenting and motherhood as a whole . So why don't you fill the listeners in a little bit about who you are and what you're all about and how this you know how you can help moms with all of this , because I feel like there is a reason you were brought into my life .
Speaker 2Yeah , and you know , I feel like there's a reason why I ended up doing this work , because I'm sure a lot of the people who are listening can resonate with the fact that you I always say that we build the habits and behaviors that lead us toward burnout , starting in high school , like , if I throw it back , like people are like , how did you get to doing this work ? And I'm like , well , let me throw it back to high school because I have been an over like an overscheduled , busy , borderline , overwhelmed human basically my entire life . Life . Like when in high school I was doing like 80 bajillion extracurriculars , taking like all of the like , all the classes , working , playing soccer . I was busy and that was because that was like how I validated myself , like I felt good about myself and how I was operating by like all the things that were on my plate and all the things that I was accomplishing and how people responded to not only just like accomplishments but like my schedule , like hearing people say like how , how do you do it all ? I got like some sick twisted satisfaction out of that and that was literally a pattern that I brought into college . Like I remember vividly fall of my senior year of college I was working for four or as working 20 hours a week in a lab . I had four 400 level classes that I was taking . I was I'm a TA for a class and I was an assistant soccer coach and , lo and behold , my relationship ended that fall because I think he was just like , like you have no capacity for me . And that was just how I operated on and on and on until I got to graduate school and then I burned out .
Speaker 2In graduate school . It was the first time my capacity couldn't handle everything that I was asking of it and it was through finding and realizing that I was burned out that I started to learn things and really started to find things that I loved learning about . I was able to use I'm a scientist by training . I was able to use my degree in like this completely different way to take the things that are actually like scientifically proven but you would never know , because science does not write for lay people to understand Like they are literally evidence-based and scientifically proven to help us stress management and to help us better , you know , regulate our cortisol and all of these different things . And I wanted to take those tools and actually apply them in my own life and present them to people . No-transcript could have both , and I never realized that I could have both . More than that , it was just constantly about pouring myself into all of the stuff that I was doing . And so , like , how I support people now is I really feel like one of the biggest ways I support them is I wrap words around burnout and I wrap definitions around burnout that are so recognizable for , like , how we live our life and how these things show up in our lives .
Speaker 2Like , yeah , we could say like burnout is exhaustion , but let's be honest , we're all exhausted all the time . So , like , what is it tangibly actually look like when you are physically burned out ? But what about the emotional sides of burnout as well ? People don't even realize their emotional sides of burnout . Yeah , cool , emotional exhaustion , but what is that ? What does that even look like ? Like , what does that mean on a day-to-day basis ? How does that show up ? And so I love to not only wrap words around burnout , show people this is literally what it looks like and how it shows up in your life , but also to give them really , really tangible tactical things that they can do that are actually , like , not crazy overwhelming . They're very , very small lifestyle changes that we can make that , over the course of time , correct us and move us away from living a lifestyle of burnout and more toward our lifestyle . What I like to say is burnout proof .
Speaker 2And that helps us to work less and live more and just find more ease and joy and peace and fulfillment in our lives .
Speaker 1Which is like what should be everybody's main goal . Right , like we all want to work less , live more . Like love more , laugh more . You name it right Like it is . That is the end goal . So what would you say ? Your top three tricks or tips are for people so that they can step into that type of lifestyle .
Speaker 2Well , I always say awareness is the first step . So the very , very first step that anybody can take for stepping into this lifestyle is you have to be a very willing to lean into self-awareness and B you've got to make space for self-awareness . So we are , and I have dated people like this . I have been friends with people like this . I have been this person . We are rushing from one thing to the next , the next , the next , the next . There's no space in our lives for us to slow down and actually reflect on . How are we feeling , what are the things that are stressing us out ? What are the things that are actually helping us manage stress ? And if we don't slow down and even ask ourselves a simple question of like , what's working , what's not working , if we can't slow down and ask ourselves those questions , we're never going to be able to make those course corrections . We also might never be able to realize , hey , I'm freaking , burned out and I need to do something different in my life , so I always say .
Speaker 2That's the first step is being able to step into a place of non-judgment and self-compassion and look at your life and say , okay , what is working and what is not working for me ? Because if we can't do that , I offhandedly said in a speaking engagement at one point in time that burnout cannot be overcome without compassion . And I think that is part of what self-awareness and making space for that self-awareness looks like is . It is being able to look at your life and very , very compassionately say you know what ? That was too much and I'm not going to judge myself for not being able to handle it , I'm just going to acknowledge that that did me in and that was a little bit too much and how can I change in the future . So making space for that and that can look like , you know , having conversations with people , it can look like therapy , it can look like journaling , it can look like if you're super type A , which a lot of people that I work with are I literally sit down and I do what I call a weekly review once a week , every week it usually happens on Mondays and I just sit down and I ask myself those questions what worked and what didn't work over the course of the last week and former scientists . I literally treat it like I'm finding data points in my life , like that's the mindset I try to step into . And I love that mindset because you can't argue with data . The data just is the data . So if we can say like this , this schedule last Thursday really , really exhausted me and I had no nothing left at the end of the day to pour into my relationships and my kids , that's just a data point , it's not a point of judgment , and so I would say that's like step one and there's so much rolled into that . There's so much about self-awareness and self-compassion and making space rolled into it . But I think that is one of the most important things to do . And I would say the next most important thing to do , I feel like I want to kind of stick with like two tips because I feel like these are the biggest . The second most important thing to do is to treat your day-to-day life , even your self-care , to some respect have minimums Daily minimums is what I call them and I think that's a really important mindset for us to step into because , again , like high achiever , like if I ask a high achiever , what do you want your morning routine to be . They're going to list off like 20 different things that they want to get , 20 different things that I read did that too .
Speaker 2When I was trying to like redo my routines earlier this year , I realized I had to ask myself the question not of , like , what do I want to do in the morning , but how do I want to feel in the morning . And by asking myself that how do I want to feel ? Question , it ended up not becoming a laundry list of things that I needed to do every single morning . It became I am chasing a feeling , and whatever feeling , whatever things give me that feeling , that's what I'm going to do .
Speaker 2So if I want to feel like energized and revitalized in the morning , I can go for a walk or sit out in you know like very , very crisp spring air that we're having in Seattle right now . Like I can go for a walk or sit out in you know like very , very crisp spring air that we're having in Seattle right now . Like I can sit outside and just enjoy that . Or I can go get a workout . There's multiple ways in which I can give myself that and I just have to check off one of those things . That's kind of what I mean by daily minimums . Instead of turning it into , I have to meditate for 15 minutes and then I have to read for 30 minutes and then I have to journal and then I have to do a 30 , 45 minute workout , all before my kids get up in the morning .
Speaker 1Like that's not practical on a day to day , it might be practical occasionally .
Speaker 2Exactly , exactly I love that you use the word sustainable too , because I feel like I've been trying to like , co-opt the word sustainable back away from like environmental sustainability , which , no , like I'm all for that , but like our lives need to be sustainable .
Speaker 2And for most of us they're not . We have this Pinterest , instagram worthy version of what our daily routines have to look like and what our meals have to look like , and what our workout routines have to look like and what our sleep habits have to look like real talk . I stayed up way too late last night because I got very absorbed into a TV show and I'm moving slowly this morning and I have the ability to do that . I also just didn't get a lot of sleep and whatever . It was imperfect last night , but it's . The idea isn't to show up perfectly every single day . It's to show up sustainably and what whatever sustainably looks like and sometimes sustainably looks like just not being such jerks to ourselves when we show up imperfectly .
Speaker 1Yeah , we're needing to tune out on a show that you're enjoying and just take a break . So kudos to you for doing that , and you would never know , with your energy level , that you're slow moving today .
Speaker 2I think that's because this topic just brings the energy out of me . I'm such a nerd about this topic . I love it so much .
Speaker 1Well , while we're still on this topic , you told me earlier that there are four different types of burnout , and that was new to me . So why don't you run through the listeners on what those four types are ?
Speaker 2Yeah , yeah , and I always throw the caveat out there that , depending upon the burnout coach you talk to , they might not break it down like this , they might not break it down like this , they might not define it in this way . I feel like every burnout coach has like their different ways that they look at this , but this is how I classify it . So burnout has four different types physical , overwhelmed , emotional and boredom burnout . And that last one , I find , catches a lot of people off guard . But the first three actually fit very nicely into like the world health organization definition of like what burnout
is . Fun fact , the world health organization does not think that burnout is a medical diagnosis and the world health organization does not think that burnout is more than just like an occupational phenomenon . So the moms hearing this will probably get a little , a little feisty about this . Yeah , they don't believe that you can burn out other like , you can only burn out at work is what the world health organization thinks , which , yeah , I think we can all call BS on that one . They are wrong .
Speaker 2Yeah , ask anybody that has multiple children . Or like they're just like raising their new baby and they're trying to get through the night . Burnout is real and I'm not . I don't even have kids , I just have enough nephews that I know this . But , like the physical aspect of burnout , what that really looks like is , yeah , it absolutely looks like exhaustion . But how I think of it is it's like such a depth of exhaustion that it feels like no amount of sleep or rest is going to help you recover . I stayed up too late watching a TV show last night . I feel fine because I have gotten enough sleep and enough rest . The other days . This is going to feel like you could get 12 hours of sleep every night over the course of the weekend and still wake up Monday morning and feel like death .
Speaker 2But what this can also look like and I think this is actually one of the biggest ways that shows up for a lot of high achievers because , let's be honest , sometimes we're not very self-aware of our own like energy levels , and one time we may not even know what it feels like to be fully rested , if we're being honest . So how it shows up for a lot of high achievers is sickness , repeated sickness , like you just have like back to back to back to back to back illnesses or you just can't ever recover from that . Like cold that you had a month ago , like that cough just won't go away . I find that it shows up that way a lot for high achievers , yeah . So that's definitely a big way for the physical side . And then the overwhelm side . I kind of think of the overwhelm side , but it's like the productivity side of burnout .
Speaker 2And how overwhelmed burnout can show up is I love this expression you feel like you have too many tabs open in your brain . You're like no , I love how we all know that that's like on our computer , like our computer literally starts running slow when we have too many computer or programs open or tabs open on our computer . Our brain can feel like that as well and you might hear that described as brain fog or you know you could hear it described in a lot of different ways . But the fact of the matter is we know the information's there . We just can't . We can't retrieve it , we can't access it .
Speaker 2Things are moving very , very slowly , but what it can also look like is like analysis , paralysis , like difficulty making decisions , like getting started on projects , handling change , and I think that's a really big hallmark for high achievers , because we are usually very like go-getter , like you need something , you need somebody to get stuff done . Ask a high achiever , they will . They will do the thing Like they've got it . But when we are in overwhelm burnout it's almost like we have like lead feet , like we're just moving slowly . The decisions come more slowly , the creativity comes more slowly , like everything just kind of feels weighed down when we are in overwhelm burnout because things are just aren't clicking the way that they used to .
Speaker 1It's like the world is going by in like fast motion and you're like exactly , exactly .
Speaker 2And it can also look like the inability to turn off , like if we're like kind of dovetailing off a physical , physical burnout , like your head hits the pillow and you are out at night because you are just so exhausted . But when you're in an overwhelmed burnout you might be tired , but when you're in overwhelmed burnout you literally can't fall asleep because your brain's going .
Speaker 1I experienced that .
Speaker 2Exactly . I experienced that probably the most when it comes to overwhelm , burnout , to the point where I literally have a notebook that I'll keep next to my bed on nights , like that Cause . Then I just like brained up into the notebook and there is something about the act of writing something out that , like your brain just like inherently feels like it's way more dealt with . So I'll like whatever crap's really it could be business ideas , like it could be podcast ideas , which always come at the most inconvenient times , right , and I'll just be in bed and I'm like , okay , this , this , this , this , and I just write them all down and then it's easier for me to fall asleep . Fair , yeah . So that's like the overwhelmed side . This might be a weird thing to say , but my favorite one is emotional burnout , and I think it's because that was the one that I was really experiencing when I was in grad school and it's the one that I find is so under the radar for a lot of high achievers . There's a lot of high achievers because we tend to move so quickly . We might not be as in touch with our emotions or as good at managing our emotions , especially our negative emotions , like we don't need positive emotions , those like flow freely but the negative emotions a high achiever might be more inclined to like shove that down or like ignore that , push that off to the side until it's appropriate to deal with it . So high achievers I find especially women experience a lot of emotional burnout and how this one shows up . This is like the fulfillment side of burnout and it can come from so many different places a lack of boundaries , values , disconnect , you know , just a lack of making space to process your negative emotions . But how it usually shows up , like the signs of it . This is so common with a lot of the clients that I see is like emotional reactivity , quick to angers , quick to tears .
Speaker 2I think of a textbook example of I had a client who she was ? I wanted to hug her so bad , I was so sad that it was like a virtual call . She was a nurse practitioner during COVID when we started working together . Mom was on all of these committees , all of this stuff , and she's trying to explain to me what's going on in her life and literally couldn't get through the explanation without breaking down in tears . And that I would say is actually very , very common for a lot of the clients that I work with Like the tears . They'll be telling me a story and then the tears come out of nowhere and they don't even know why they're getting as emotional as they are about it . But the reason why is they have been shoving that down without feeling like they've had a safe space to unburden it for so long . I mean shoot , how many moms do that ? Right , I can't break down right now .
Speaker 1Yeah , you know you'll go have 30 seconds in the bathroom behind a closed door and then you got to put your face back on because you , you know , want to be there for your kids . You know , it's really interesting that you categorize all three of those , because do you find that a lot of them overlap , or is it very like you have a specific type of burnout when you're dealing with it ?
Speaker 2I . I wouldn't say they overlap , but you can have multiple of them simultaneously , which I think is more of kind of what you're getting at . I definitely think you can have multiple simultaneously . When I was in grad school I had those three physical , overwhelming , emotional . But what I usually find is , for there's usually a driver , there's usually one that is kind of the domino that toppled the rest .
Speaker 2So , like when I was in grad school , it was emotional burnout because I was trying to force myself down this career path just didn't jive with me and because of that I tried to get myself in all sorts of different things to like make it better , and I was kind of like masking , I was kind of numbing , but as a result of that I got into overwhelmed burnout and because I was doing so much I then got into physical burnout . So it was like this domino that toppled the rest of them . And usually that's what I find happens . Like you could very easily have a mom that is very emotionally burned out and that becomes physical burnout , because when we're emotionally burned out we numb a lot because we just don't want to like our emotions can feel so overwhelming , we just don't want to deal , and so we numb a lot with various different things and that might lead to overwhelm or physical burnout or both .
Speaker 1Okay , interesting
. And then the last one , the last one is boredom burnout .
Speaker 2I highly . I some moms might be dealing with this , but usually I find this is not the biggest one I see with the moms I work with . But boredom burnout , I would say , is kind of a subtype of emotional burnout . There is some overlap between emotional burnout and boredom burnout . There is a lack of fulfillment , a lack of motivation , a lack of engagement . But I think the biggest difference , and the reason why I break it out , is the causality is so different .
Speaker 2Like emotional burnout is there is a fundamental like fulfillment piece that is missing or an emotional management piece that is missing in your life , whereas boredom burnout really fundamentally comes from the fact that when you're in boredom burnout you just feel a lack of novelty , a lack of engagement , a lack of challenge in your life . So , like the day to day , if you are somebody who typically has like , for example , maybe you're on I don't know , maybe you're on maternity leave and you typically have very , very intellectually stimulating work that you were doing day in and day out and you're on maternity leave and you love it and you love your kid and you are , but you're pouring all of your mental energy into this and it doesn't feel as intellectually stimulating as how you usually spend your day , that might actually create a little bit of boredom burnout , because it does take a lot of energy and effort for us to try to get ourselves like excited and engaged in something that's not actually exciting and engaging to us .
Speaker 2I'm literally envisioning my brother and my sister-in-law like when my first nephew was a toddler and kind of hadn't gotten . He's like now into star Wars and all of this stuff and my brother's like living vicariously through his oldest son Cause he gets to play with all of his old toys again . It's hilarious , but like before it was all of kind of these like very , very kiddie toys and songs and whatnot , and that can be hard for somebody who's usually doing things that are very intellectually stimulating . So I think that's more of a thing than maybe I've necessarily seen it in my day-to-day work with moms , but definitely something that can show up for moms , something to just like be aware of .
Speaker 1Yeah , what would you say like the top triggers or the top flags that moms should be looking for when it comes to burnout ? Because , like you said , like we're all , we're all tired . I ask moms how they are on a daily basis . Every single person that I talk to is like , oh , I'm busy , I'm busy , right , like we're all . We're at that level , but there's , there is that difference between being busy and tired versus burnout .
Speaker 1So , what would you say ? Like the top red flags are that somebody should be looking for and being like , hey , maybe I'm maybe this isn't just like you know like I used to be that mom that joked , I was like I need an Ivy drip of coffee . Just put a coffee pot on an Ivy drip and I would do it jokingly . But looking back I was like that was probably like more than exhaustion .
Speaker 1You know , that was like when I was starting to . You know , have my mom rage and be in that stage , so what ? What should moms be looking for ?
Speaker 2That's a really good question and I'm actually going to answer this from the perspective of the thing that I think flies under the radar the most , or the things that I think maybe a mom wouldn't want to admit . Like , like you said , I think a lot of moms are willing to admit that they're busy or they're exhausted or they need an IV drip of coffee . I've used that phrase and I feel like I shouldn't because I'm not a mom , but , like , I've heard that a lot and I think those are things that are moms are willing to admit and it's very easy to them associate those with . Okay , I might be veering toward physical burnout , and burnout is a spectrum , it's not a light switch . So it's like you could be very mildly burned out and that's very fixable , or you could be veering for very severe versions of these burnout , these types of burnout . But like I feel like the overwhelmed side and the physical tide it's easier for us to fess up to . I would actually say the one to keep the biggest lookout for is the emotional side . So , obviously , like you're going to have days that you're going to want a good cry in the bathroom for the 30 seconds you get before your kid starts pounding on the door , absolutely . But I would say the biggest thing I would look out for is like kind of that , like disconnection , and I almost think of when I think of this there are .
Speaker 2I think part of the reason why burnout's not a medical diagnosis is there's overlaps with the emotional sides of burnout and things like depression , and I actually almost feel like it could be something that is , you know , veering toward a like postpartum depression kind of thing for somebody who is a new mom . But it's like that . You're disconnected , you're going through the motions , you're there with your kids but you're not really there . That , I think , is probably the biggest thing to look for , because that's a harder hole to dig yourself out of . And I think sometimes we don't want to admit that we're feeling like that . I think there's a shame that sometimes can come with that and that's why I think that's the one we need to be most aware of . I think it's yeah , we're super willing to admit exhaustion , we're super willing to admit overwhelm , but to say that we're like emotionally disconnected or to say that we're like going through the motions when we're with our kids no , no , mom wants to say that Like no person wants to say that about the time they're spending with their loved ones .
Speaker 2But again , that's where we almost kind of come back to the thing we talked about before , of it's about being nonjudgmental , being objective , almost like thinking of it like a data point of oh man , I noticed this in myself today and I'm not going to judge myself for it , I'm not going to shame myself for it , I'm just going to say , okay , this is what it is . I should probably do something to address that sooner rather than later , because that is something that can really really snowball and start to become a burnout hole that's very hard to dig yourself out of , especially when you have all of the responsibilities and obligations that a mom has .
Speaker 1Yeah , yeah , absolutely . That's really powerful . When you're working with a mom . What sort of course of length are you working with them for ? Is it like a 90 day program ? Are you working with them for a year , Like if a mom is feeling like , hey , I'm definitely feeling some of these symptoms ? What does that look like to work with you and kind of deal with with their burnout ?
Speaker 2Yeah , yeah , I would say that for the most part I'm usually in the 90 days to the six months range , but it kind of depends on like some people come to me and they don't want just like a life burnout overhaul , they want like a life and business burnout overhaul . So that's definitely a longer period of time . But the people who are just feeling like that emotional disconnection and that lack of fulfillment usually it's about 90 days to as long as six months . And we're doing a lot of stuff like talking a lot about self-compassion . We're doing a lot of , you know , and I it's still amazes me which I guess it shouldn't , because I used to be like this how many people are so resistant to the idea of self-compassion .
Speaker 2And I like to frame it for a lot of people , and I think this works especially for moms . If you wouldn't say it to your best friend or your kid , you shouldn't say it to yourself . We've got to talk to ourselves the way that we would talk to our best friends or our kids . And I think that's an even more important thing because , again , kids remember . I remember stuff my mom used to say when I was younger , when I was , you know , maybe a teenager , but I even remember stuff when I was a preteen that my mom used to say about herself . I remember how my mom used to talk about her body . I remember how my mom used to talk about her work . You know , 20 , 30 years later , I still remember that stuff .
Speaker 2So we have to think about that . That it's not . It's not about complacency , which I feel like a lot of women are afraid of , like you know . Sometimes it always feels like the world , the world's working against us . I can't be complacent . Yeah , you don't want to be complacent , but not willing to give your , an unwillingness to give yourself compassion is , frankly , going to create emotional burnout anyway , and emotional burnout is going to lead to complacency anyway .
Speaker 2So , like , don't think you're going to get off the hook from becoming complacent purely by , like , not being compassionate towards yourself . We still need to have that compassion . So , like I don't even remember how I got on this tangent , what was your question ?
Speaker 1Just how long they work with you and everything . But it sounds like it's just like , honestly , it's a loop and do you find clients that you know , you kind of do the work with them . Maybe they work with you for 90 days and then they fall back into old .
Speaker 2Oh , that's a really good question . I do find that for a lot of high achievers , burnout is a cycle , but my goal is , like I am not about making my clients dependent on me . I almost try to , and that's why that self-awareness component is so important . I teach every single one of my clients how to build that into their life , because if you have self-awareness , you can self-coach . If you have self-awareness , you can identify okay , these are the things that I'm doing . If you have self-awareness , you can identify okay , these are the things that I'm doing . This is how it's contributing , especially if you can step into that mindset about not being judgmental , not shaming yourself Like you're essentially self-coaching at that point . So I try to teach every single one of my clients do that .
Speaker 2And probably one of the most fundamental things I teach and I highly recommend any mom who is listening , any woman who is listening do this Figuring out what your values are . Any woman who is listening , do this figuring out what your values are . Because actually , I think that's a with a biggest disconnect that happens when it comes to emotional burnout is we don't even know what our values are . So how can we live in accordance with our values , values ? Disconnects are huge when it comes to emotional burnout .
Speaker 2So I'll do values work with them and I teach them my process for doing values work so that , if you know , values can be dynamic , values can come into and out of our life , though you will probably still have four values that stick with you your entire life . So I teach them how to do it , so they can go back and they can evaluate their values , they can check in with their
values . So I try to set my clients up for , you know , being able to navigate things on their own . But , that being said , I do have a lot of clients who will come back , you know , maybe a year , two years down the road , because maybe they're they're navigating a new season in their life and they're not sure . You know , the things that we talked about before aren't necessarily working now and they just need a little help nudging them in the right direction .
Speaker 1But , generally speaking , that first round we teach them enough tools and enough ways in which to be self-aware about the things that are causing issues for them that they're able to manage it on their own , moving forward , cyclical , with their burnout . And I'm not surprised by it . But it is an interesting fact because , you know , as a self-proclaimed type , a high achiever , like my checklist , I have gone through cycles and I feel like the more I level up , the more I lean into my business , the more I , you know , lean into being with my kids and showing up as the best mom that I can be for them . It's like there's all these , like it's like playing Mario right when it's just like the next level's unlocked and it gets a little bit harder and then there's challenges . So that's really insightful that you feel like it's . It's also cyclical .
Speaker 2And it is for me too , like I've been super transparent about this and I've said new level , new devil so many times over the course of the last eight months . I had just went full-time in my business earlier this year because I am single , I don't have a second income . I was very cautious about going full-time in my business too soon and so I just did , and the reason I did is because doing my business and my day job was just getting too much . This last fall I burned out . I burned out this past fall . I took on too many speaking engagements in too short of a period of time , for whatever reason . My brain was like oh , they're local , it's not going to be that bad , I don't have to fly . And it was bad and like those signs of physical burnout that I listed off earlier . That was me this past fall and it was because I was excited , I had momentum in my business , and that's why I think it is a cycle for high achievers .
Speaker 2I find for most high achievers , the first time they burn out is usually the worst . Usually we learn . If we're self-aware , usually we learn and we can kind of tamper it down the next time it shows up . But it's that enthusiasm , that this is how I find worthiness and validation and this is how I feel enough is by making this contribution and the way in which people respond to the contributions you're making , and that's why I think it's so important to understand your personality type . I love the Enneagram for this , because I think the Enneagram explains for so many people why they drive themselves toward burnout , what habits , behaviors and mindsets are causing them to walk that line .
Speaker 2And yeah , for a lot of high achievers , it's just our passion isn't necessarily a good thing . Like passion can be a problem , actually , when it comes to burnout contrary to what Gary Vee says and other people say , like we've got to be careful with it . But that self awareness , if we have that , we make space for that Like shoot . If you take anything from this podcast , that's it Self-awareness . If you have that and if you can create that , you're going to be able to manage your burnout and even though the first time might suck , you're going to get better at it and better at it and better at it . You're just it's like that path to success . Like it's you swing too far in one direction , you're going to course correct and you're going to swing too far back in the other direction , but slowly but surely you're going to find the yourself to be on .
Speaker 1Yeah , which is really cool , amazing
. Well , did you have any last piece of advice to give the listeners before we sign off today , ellen oh goodness .
Speaker 2I mean I think I think just reiterating the two things that I say the most to all of my clients you cannot overcome burnout without compassion and that self-awareness is the first step . I know I've said those a lot , but honestly , if you only listen to the last five minutes , that's what I want you to take . So those little kernels right there , and just know that it's possible . It is possible to get yourself to that place . You might have to release some mindsets . You might have to release , you know , some of the things that worked before might not work now . And it's about again . It's about just evaluating and being honest with yourself and not shaming or judging yourself for anything that comes out of it .
Speaker 1I love that so much and thank you so much for being here today and thank you , guys , for tuning in to today's episode , where we help you conquer the chaos , one day at a time .