Protect Your Spark: Creating Without Overgiving

Have you ever felt like your creativity started to feel like a performance instead of a passion?

In this episode of Shift Happens with Shay, we’re exploring what it means to protect your spark—your joy, your energy, your sacred creative rhythm—in a world that constantly asks for more.

Whether you’re a healer, a feeler, a creator, or a woman who simply gives a lot… this is your reminder that your energy is a sacred resource, and you’re allowed to pause, protect, and pour back into you first.

🎙 In this soul-nourishing episode:

• How to know when your spark is dimming
• Signs you’re overgiving emotionally or creatively
• Ways to honor your natural rhythm without guilt
• Affirmations and journal prompts to reconnect with your joy

Let this be your permission slip to create from fullness, not pressure—and to reclaim your magic on your own terms. ✨

Continue the conversation with Shay on her Instagram, Facebook page, Youtube, website, and linkedIn! You can also email Shay at shay@shifthappenswithshay.com if you are looking for insight about your life, send your stories, or request topics you would like to address.

Please note this podcast is not a substitution for therapy, if you require assistance with exploring trauma, deeper relationship issues, or more please reach out to establish care.

Transcript

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Hey there and welcome to Shift Happens with Shay. I'm Shay, your host and licensed marriage and family therapist. This podcast is where we dive into all the shift life throws our way, whether it's relationships, mental health, personal growth, or just figuring out this crazy journey of adulting here. We're all about honest conversation, real stories, and a whole lot of laughs as we tackle life's challenges together. This is your space to grow, explore, and feel seen. So grab a cozy spot, maybe a cup of coffee or wine, and let's get ready to shift through it all. Thanks for tuning in, and remember, no matter what life brings us, we're in this together. Hi everyone. Welcome back to another session with muah so this week. I'm excited. I'm always excited every time I'm talking to you guys to be quite honest because hey. It's like we're all getting cozy on the couch with our tea or coffee or wine. However you're feeling whenever you're listening to this, and we're just going to get into some deep, playful, validating, soul nurturing, grounded conversation. What your favorite licensed marriage and family therapist. Right. Okay. So today we're talking about protecting your spark. Have you ever felt like your creativity started to feel more like a chore than joy, like you were pouring from an empty cup just to stay visible or valuable. Well, today we're gonna talk about it. Protecting that beautiful spark of yours, your joy, your creative energy, your emotional bandwidth. And remember we talked a lot about that in previous sessions about emotional labor and how important it is for us to preserve that. And when I say preserve, I mean more that you're not doing all the work in this connection and vulnerability with everybody else, and nobody's giving enough. So this is definitely, again, kind of going off of that one, but deeper into creativity. Because if you're someone who gives a lot to others, this is for you my love. This is definitely for you. So, Shea, tell me, girl, how am I? How is over giving dimming my spark? Well, overgiving doesn't always look like caretaking. And if you were here for my re-parenting episode, we talked a little bit about caretaking, and if I did not mention in that, I'm telling you right now, caretaking is one of our protective strategies for when we pretty much had to take care of ourselves. I know that can sound like hyper independence. But this is more when you take on that nurturing role because no one gave it to you. And there's a lot of longing in this one. This is the person that typically feels very lonely. Not that any of all the other one protective strategies, like you feel lonely there too. But this one is definitely engaged in loneliness, longing, needing that security. Overgiving doesn't always look like that you're caretaking or that I'm just caring for others. Like I just love to be motherly and naturally to everybody else, but it can look like posting when you're not inspired. Oh my goodness. Can I tell you how that feels over here on this side? Because. Being out here and being a therapist and I love talking to people and being in the room and holding space for others, but this content stuff on the other side. It can be draining and definitely not inspiring, but that's overgiving because I'm over here trying to make sure that you guys are getting what you need from me. Getting that psychoeducation, getting that relatability, having that connection with a provider who is trained in this stuff, or just a provider and seeing the humanness, you know? So I definitely get that, if you relate to that. Saying yes to projects out of guilt. How many of us can relate to that? Yes, I can do that. Yes, I can do that. Oh, yeah, no worries. I can take that tool off your plate. Yeah I can do that. Because you feel saying no would be rude. It's not polite, it's not right. Or maybe you'll be shut down from other offers and opportunities and also people pleasing in your creative work. This goes back to still saying yes to projects here. Instead of talking about what you love and what you wanna do and share with the world or your loved ones and whatnot. You just go with the trend. And I understand that that's hard depending on what you do. But if it doesn't align with you, it feels more like a burden. It leads to more burnout. And then creativity again, leads to not feeling like joy. That is a chore, my love. I mentioned before, we're gonna talk about creative energy has felt when it felt sacred versus when it feels stretched and going into this. Like I said, kinda like with this, I love what I do as a therapist. I love doing couples therapy. I love relational therapy. I love connecting with my women. I love sitting across from y'all, my young girls that are looking for some guidance. I love it. Because like when I'm in the room, the sparks are going. The sparks are flying. I'm off the script as a therapist clearly, because I don't know what you're coming in to talk about, and that space and that energy that I have for each of you is very sacred. I'm planning out this time to give pieces of myself in there with you as you're giving pieces with me, but sometimes we can also feel stretched because though I love being in the room with people. Content creating is not really the same thing when you're over here being a therapist and you wanna put your all into other things well, you wanna give, just like I'm doing on this podcast. And as you've noticed, I think you can tell I felt a bit stretched. Also going through my own mental health. Not mental health actually been much better on that, but more of my health issues. Like I've mentioned, I have Hashimoto, so. Thyroid. I'm on the pill for life now. But no, I don't need therapy. I have a life coach, my spiritual coach, she's, she'd be there for me. It's okay guys, I think you guys can tell I'm stretch when content is not coming out back to back, or you don't really hear from me as much. You don't see me as much, whether that's on Instagram, LinkedIn, or maybe even loved ones not hearing from you on the phone or calling. That's when I am feeling stretched and what used to be fun and I'm enjoying it. Like my podcast, I love doing this, but that biweekly almost felt like another client. And I guess essentially that's what I set this up as, that we are doing sessions, so it's like another client I need to show up for, but then it became like my job, not something fun and that I usually would love to do with passion. That made it just more, just another chore, another TA task on the checklist. And I never want you guys to feel like that to me. Just like I wouldn't want that to feel to many people that I see in person or virtual. That's just one thing about it. Right now I'm feeling a little bit more creative. I'm getting a spark back after some breaks, and hopefully we can get back to our biweekly frequency and not this monthly thing I'm doing, but that's what it can look like. That's just for me. Your designed to guide not grind. Your insight is valuable, but only when you're nourished, please take that into consideration. I take that for myself. I'm here to guide. I'm not here to be a part of the hustle, trend and movement. I've never been a hustler in that aspect. I've had to hustle in school because you trying to get your degree. Isn't that what we came here to do? If I finish this really quickly, then I can go ahead and do everything else I wanna do, like play games. But here in this work. Same goes for you. We're here to guide. We don't wanna be part of the hustle mentality. You don't wanna be burnt out. We still wanna be a part of soft living because we enjoy it. We're soft girlies here. Be a part of our femininity, and then engage in our masculinity healthily. Not in a toxic way that overworking, that over grind is toxic. Masculinity, that whole thought that you need to do more than others because, or else you won't be noticed or seen, but that's, you overgiving you and your cup is empty, boo. But here are some signs. You're overgiving, you dread doing what you once loved. Mm-hmm. You feel invisible even though you're showing up. I think it is. It is almost like a almost like a depersonalization. Like you just don't feel like you're there. Like, who is this person? That's like a shell of me here. Nobody sees who I am, even though I'm here. Nobody sees me. And you're more tired after creating than energized. When you are working on something you love your projects, whatnot, hobbies, you should feel energized and excited for the next step and the next creative brainstorm that comes your way instead of dreading that, there's another project that requires your attention. You're overgiving my love, and that is dimming your spark. Let's reclaim ourselves as always, I'm always a big fan and a big advocator that you never had, you never did not have any of these skills, these traits, any of this, like they were always within you. It is a natural flow. It is your own magic. So when you honor your natural flow, you protect your magic. Think about it. Let's sit for a second. What's your natural rhythm for creating, connecting and expressing? Think about it for a little bit. How do I normally express myself? How am I normally connecting? Is it natural for me to be reaching out to a whole bunch of people? Is it natural for me to be out here texting? Is it natural for me to be in conferences or is it natural for me to be on social media? However you connect, however you express, however you create, whether that's crocheting and knitting and all the above. Whatever your medium is, what is the natural rhythm? How do you naturally do that? Then I want you to then go and think about how you give yourself permission to breathe, take breaks without disappearing. That is something I'm working on and I'm human just'cause I'm a therapist and I have all these resources to me and toolbox. I always tell my clients that I'm human too. I went to school, got all of this stuff, have the life experience of being there and guiding you guys, and I still. Mess up here and there. So we have to give ourselves permission to take breaks without disappearing. We're allowed to take a little break here and there, maybe take a day or two off, take a couple of hours to yourself and get right back into it. Let yourself reset. Remember your plans, your purpose, your intention, and then jump back in feeling good. Give ourselves permission to say, not right now without guilt, it's okay. You are not letting down those people. You're not letting down your boss, your partner, your friends, this committee, whoever you are committing to that isn't you. You are not doing a bad thing. You don't need to feel guilty. Say not right now, and that's okay. Right time is when you feel aligned and also give yourself permission to create for yourself first. That's also what it means when you feel aligned, you are creating for you. First. When we were in school and residency, we're taught about visualizing our trigger client. There'll be times where, of course we're human, we'll be triggered. And my trigger client is someone like me. And when I say that, I say another sexual assault survivor. Very hyper independent, having difficulties reconnecting with the body and emotions, and that is dangerous to be vulnerable, but then in relationships, your head over heal and it's just like, what the heck? I have no control over myself. I value the other person's opinion more than mine. Yeah, that's my trigger client and I form my therapeutic modality, who I am as a person based off of that trigger client who is me. I became a therapist for myself first. You are creating for yourself first. So when I'm out here doing these reels, doing this podcast, or even presentations and whatnot, I have to remember I'm doing this for me because it makes me happy. I love sharing these gems with you all. I love hearing your feedback. I love being there for other people. I love supporting other people. I love being a part of the journey. As I tell my clients, I am the passenger. Your car. We are driving. Boo. You are driving it. And I am in the passenger seat. I'm a passenger princess here. But I love being here. I love being your guide and I have to remember that. I love it. So same for you. Reclaim yourself. Reclaim what's yours? Create for yourself first. For me personally, I have to learn to let alignment guide me and not urgency. And a lot of us have to slow down slowness. Doesn't mean I'm falling behind. Doesn't mean you're falling behind. It means we're listening to ourselves. What more beautiful can thing can we do for ourselves? But to sit and listen to ourselves, you need time to tap in. So tap into you so that you can actually protect your magic and then share it with the rest of the world. As a reminder, there's no creativity in burnout, but there's magic in rest, right? Crazy. I don't wanna rest. The world says it's wrong, but the world, the world is wrong. There is magic in your rest. You have power within you, but you need to recuperate. You need to recalibrate. You need to lay down and give yourself a moment. So reflection time. Let's take a moment. Safely.'cause if you're in your car, do not do this. Just talk out loud about your opinions. Do not close your eyes and whatnot. Please pay attention to whatever you're doing. But if you are sitting on the couch walking around your house or in a safe place, I want you to take a moment and ask yourself, where am I giving more than I'm receiving? Where am I giving more than I'm receiving? I feel when we hear this question, a lot of us can think. Of actually plenty of places and people that we're pouring into more than we're pouring into ourselves. And I feel that way. If you are in high leadership, high levels of corporate, whether that's in motherhood, whether that's you taking care of your family, if you don't have children, whether that's your elderly parents or you're always the go-to for your siblings or whatnot, or even your friends, you're the mother of the group, the caretaker. Think about it, like those are just examples. But where in your life right now are you giving more than you're receiving? And hold on to that. That's okay. Don't judge yourself and don't ridicule yourself. That's not what we're here for. We always explore with curiosity. Curiosity is a beautiful thing. So Shea, I thought about it. I'm overgiving in so many other places that have taken from me and it feels like my spark is dim. But if I get it back up a little bit, how do I protect it? Or how do I not allow this to happen again? Well, think about your boundaries. You know, I love me some boundaries. Your boundaries are a creative action. They are here to protect all of that for you. Protect your peace, your energy, your space, your mind. Like we said before, saying no is fine. It's okay. Every, no, that doesn't align with you and it doesn't feel like it's in the right space and right time for you is you filling your cup right back up. Because if we are saying yes to every single thing and everything is more urgent than we are, you are continuing to empty your cup. There is nothing to give. So those boundaries are necessary. I've talked about them plenty of times on here. Your time boundary, your emotional boundary, your physical boundary, your mental boundary. These all need to be in there and respect it. And it has to start with the you. You have to respect your boundaries first.'cause if you don't respect it, who will? I'm going to, of course,'cause you know I'm your favorite therapist. I'm gonna sit here, I'm gonna listen to you and I'm gonna respect it, but I'm gonna point it out to you that you're not respecting yourself. That's not right. So here are some rituals, some time and what we can do to refill ourselves. And sometimes that looks like silence. That looks like solitude. And it looks like saying no. It's and maybe that's hard. Like Shay, where am I supposed to get silence? We are always able to get silence. Do you guys shower? It's my favorite place. It is quiet in the shower. Besides the water. I'm not saying you gotta be in darkness. If that's what you prefer, please do, do your thing. But there are places that you can definitely find time for yourself. Always make some time for yourself. Find it any way you can, and no also making something just for you. Because remember, we're bringing this back into creativity. Make something for you, whether, I don't know, a bath bomb or aami, a drawing. Just anything that you love to do, creating music, song, karaoking. Something that fills you back up. Think about that younger you and think about what they enjoyed most. What gave them joy, what's and that warm feeling in their heart and their chest, and oh my gosh, every time I do this, this is so much fun. Find your creative spark. I don't know why I said it like that, but find your creative spark. It's there for you. Think about it, and if you don't have the answer right now, that's okay. That means we are just gonna do a lot of reflection after this episode, after the session, and that's fine. We don't come to therapy to have all the answers. We come to therapy to find the answers within ourselves, with people like me being your guide, so you don't owe constant access to anyone. Nope, you don't. You don't owe it. Everyone doesn't deserve, or should already assume that they can access you at any time, anywhere, any place. There is a criteria. There are rules. There are standards to getting on this expensive vehicle that you are, and everybody don't get a chance to open the door and have the keys. You have the keys. There is a gate here or there's a bouncer because you know you're driving. So there's a bouncer up in here, and you have told that bouncer, everybody don't get to be in here only X, Y, and Z. And even when X, Y, and Z don't work for you no more, you're allowed to change that to A, B, C, Andy. You don't owe nobody access to you. They don't owe, they don't own you. So your creative energy is sacred. You get to choose where it flows. No one else but you. My love. So, you know, I always want us to take home, well, you know, I'm not a big homework person, but I do love me some reflections. General prompts are beautiful things, and I think we should take some of these home with ourselves because I think it's important for us to know where are we being performative, such as what part of my creativity has started to feel performative wearing your creative drive and process. Have it? Has it started to feel fake? Disingenuous. It's lacking that authenticity. So what parts of my creativity have started to feel performative next? Where do I over give out of fear of being forgotten or unseen? Hmm. That's a big one. Where do I overgive out of fear of being forgotten or unseen? And lastly, what does Joy led creating look like and feel like for me? What does Joy led creating look and feel like to me, think about those and I don't know, just think about that question. Just I get like tingly and my arm hands, and it's funny because outside of doing creativity with my words. Like I'm doing right now or expressing myself using my words as expressions. I use my hands. I'm not sure if many of you know, I think I've mentioned it before. I love to create my hands. I love making shower steamers. I love how it feels in my hands. Like when you're getting close to molding, it feels like wet sand. Honestly, I'm not even a beach person, but I love that feeling. It is so exciting and maybe it's because you think about when you're a kid and they have the sandboxes and you are just playing around in there. It just fills me up with joy. I think you can hear it in my voice right now. I love creating with my hands, so whether that's candles, diffusers, I am loving it. Shower, steamers, bath bombs, coming back like I enjoy. And oh, it's so wonderful. So think about what does Joy led creating look like and feel like to you? Okay. And I always love to give you some affirmations because we deserve'em. And I'm always gonna affirm you. I'm always gonna reassure you that you got this and that you can do this. And nobody can stop your flow, your magic, just who you are. Nobody. And so here are some lovely affirmations from me for your shift. I protect my energy and create from overflow, not obligation. I protect my energy and create from overflow, not obligation. My joy is my compass. My joy is my compass. I release the need to be constantly available in order to be valuable. I release the need to be constantly available in order to be valuable. I hope you're releasing that today because you're valuable already, my dear. You are so worthy. You're so amazing. Anybody would be happy and grateful to have a person like you in their life, but that's it. So with that being said, you don't have to be everything for everyone to be meaningful. You don't have to post every day to be powerful, protect your spark. Because your light is meant to last. It's meant to burn bright, shine bright, and be here for many years to come. Protect that beautiful light within you, that heart, that spark, whatever that flame, however you wanna describe it, what you should do in your journaling. Elaine protected. Protect her. She deserves to be protected. So my loves. I hope you enjoy today's episode or session. I hope you got what you needed from me. I adore you as always, and I'm gonna have some of these prompts up on social media, my ig, and most likely my LinkedIn if these are not already a part of the journal prompts I created. For the week that led up to this. If you don't see it on there, I don't see it on there. I'm gonna post these prompts on there too for you guys as a reminder, and I love to hear some feedback. I love to hear what you found out about yourselves, the insights you developed. I love to just be a part of this journey and hear what you've gotten so far. Okay, so updates. Yes, I will. Be finishing my website, that's gonna be done 100%. That's gonna be done before the end of August. I'm on it. I want you guys to see my own magic because I've been putting it off that for a while, and I am not in a place of scarcity right now. I'm not stretched. My creative juice is flowing and she is going. So I wanna get that out for you guys so that you can see all that. And you can see my beautiful magic with my red diffusers and car diffusers.'cause you know me I'm a girly that loves scent and touch. So diffusers give me that scent that I love, that brings me to pleasant places and shower steamers, and candles. Give me that sense of touch that grounds me and brings me back here with you guys. It's really important for those of us who are sexual assault survivors or those that disconnect and numb ourselves from reality because we are overstimulated and the world has just taken so much of us, it can look like burnout. But yeah, so I'm really excited to put that out there for you guys. And I got something cooking up, looking up. I'm working on me and speaking and doing presentations, so I hope. Soon I will be providing you guys workshops and I would love for you guys to attend or maybe let someone you feel that it would be great for, share that information. I'm looking to do something honestly next month to be quiet. Real with you all and it's gonna be juicy because it is for my black and brown girls. My, I love y'all. I have a special place because of course I am an African American woman myself, going through life and trying to make it through and anytime that I could bring the community together is beautiful. Of course, if you are an ally, cool beans, tell your favorite black person to come through and then of course I will do some more. Open women presentations right now. I do feel I want to get back to my community. And I guess if you were just people who, like I said, if you're an ally, it's really mostly for my black and brown people. If you show up, I am not going to deny you, but hopefully you take some of those teachings and you are standing, besides your black and brown friends. And now hold able to hold more compassion and grace for them as you move forward. But I will talk more about that, of course, in my next episode. I can't wait to let you guys know and I'll talk about it more as it gets closer. And also if you have any ideas that you would like for me to do for future workshops or presentations, whatnot. I would love to hear'em. I'm always happy to speak on things, especially with my own knowledge lived experience. And then I guess whatever you wanna know from a therapist. Point of view. So always happy to do that with you guys. So look out for my website coming soon. Look out for my products dropping soon, and look out for my events coming soon. Shift happens with Shay is coming to you. I mean, I'm already coming to you through here, but you know, in other capacities that I love. So any who. I love you guys. I hope you're doing amazing, keep being you, keep being great, protect that beautiful spark. You are so worthy. Until next time.