10 How to Love Your Life as a Leader

✨ How to Reclaim Pleasure and Presence in Your Daily Life | Learn to Love Your Life Again

Are you constantly in motion—checking every box, showing up for everyone—but still feel strangely disconnected from yourself? If you're a high-achieving woman who’s tired of living in overdrive, this episode is for you.

In today’s conversation, we explore how to reclaim pleasure and presence in your everyday life—so you can stop surviving and start truly living. You'll learn:

✅ Why so many women feel numb, overextended, or emotionally disconnected
✅ What’s really standing between you and a life you actually enjoy
✅ Simple, powerful practices to return to your senses and your joy
✅ How to rewire your nervous system to receive pleasure without guilt
✅ What it really means to love your life—on your terms

Pleasure and presence aren’t luxuries. They’re lifelines. And it’s safe to feel good again.

🎧 Tune in to reconnect with your body, your joy, and the beautiful life that’s already here waiting for you.

Run until 18 September

Joyfully Unstoppable—helping women reconnect with what matters most.

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Transcript

2:10

Welcome to Joyfully Unstoppable, the podcast for women who are ready to lead boldly, live lightly, and reclaim their joy. Whether you're leading a team, a classroom, a boardroom, or your own big, beautiful life, I'm so glad you're with us. I'm your host, Becky Ham leadership coach, speaker and founder of Women Lead Well, after years of high level leadership, I discovered that success. Doesn't have to come at the cost of your peace, your values, or your wellbeing. Each week, we'll explore what it means to lead with clarity, confidence, and authenticity. Even in a world that tells you how to hustle harder, and prove your worth, you carry a lot. Let's help it feel lighter. Hello, friends. I hope you're having a great week. I am starting today with a question. What if your presence and your pleasure. Weren't indulgences to be earned. What if they're actually essential to sustainable, authentic leadership and a meaningful life in a world that often demands more than we can reasonably give many women drift into survival mode. We numb out, we power through, we keep performing, and we forget what it feels like to be fully in our lives. Not just functioning, but truly. Being, reclaiming presence and pleasure isn't about abandoning your responsibilities, it's about returning to yourself. So let's talk about it. Let's talk about why so many of us feel disconnected and how to come back home to our joy ourselves and the richness of right now. I wanna start by talking about the hidden cost of disconnection. Why so many of us feel numb, drained, detached. And I'll lead with another question. How many of you have been living in overdrive for years? It probably started before the pandemic, but then the changes of the pandemic, financial political pressures of the last few years and the chaos and uncertainty of the world we live in. I mean, it's overwhelming and it can feel like we have to over-function. I. Just to keep up joy. It ain't even on the radar anymore. When you add to that, the fact that that many women have been trained, both explicitly and implicitly, that our value comes from what we do, how much we give, how well we perform, then of course we're gonna put our energy into performing rather than showing up with our true presence. Over time, that creates a subtle but powerful disconnection between our mind, our body, and our spirit. And now I wanna be clear about this, that disconnection doesn't mean you're doing anything wrong. It's a predictable outcome of a culture that teaches women to over function and under feel. You've probably internalized messages, like, if I'm not producing, I'm not valuable. If I enjoy myself too much, I must be slacking. If I stop moving, everything's gonna fall apart, or my personal favorite, my needs can wait. Others come first. When those beliefs become your operating system, pleasure starts to feel risky. Stillness feels unproductive. Being fully present feels like a waste of time because there's always more to do and hey, guess what? Yes, there's always more to do. Before long you're living your life in fast forward, disconnected from your body and depleted in your spirit. But here's the thing, when we numb ourselves to difficulties, to avoid the uncomfortable moments, we also numb ourselves to delight. When we prioritize control over curiosity, we lose the capacity to be surprised by beauty. We start surviving instead of thriving. And by now, you might be wondering why I'm talking about either of these things on a leadership podcast, and I'll tell you why. It's because they are both keys to joyful, sustainable, and authentic leadership presence is how we show up in a space. Are we performing? Which is inherently inauthentic, or are we showing up as our true authentic selves? We hear a lot about executive presence, and we think it means we have to act a certain way to be seen as a serious leader. I would offer, there are plenty of executives who are crushing it with informality, goofiness, and not one shred of a stereotypical executive presence. What they have in spades is authenticity. Your presence will always be more important than your performance and friend. I'm here to tell you the same is true of pleasure. We have internalized these myths that work has to be hard to be meaningful. And if we're having fun, we must be slacking off. We protect time for pleasure, but if we do it, we're slacker. We must lack a work ethic. Now, that's a myth. It's a popular myth, but it is a myth all the same, and it is antithetical to joyful and sustainable leadership. We're humans. Humans like to enjoy themselves. Enjoyment is a core part of the human experience. That means there has to be a way to find enjoyment in leadership, and when you're able to tap into that enjoyment, the pleasure that comes from leading well. You will find a more sustainable leadership style. And if you can enjoy leading, you'll be better able to find ways for your team to enjoy their work, which boosts morale, productivity, and outcomes. All that is to say that presence and pleasure aren't just nice to haves. They are the keys to wholeness and effectiveness. And the good news is you can start reclaiming them right here, right now. So how do you reclaim pleasure in your daily life? I'm so glad you asked. Pleasure isn't about indulgence or excess. I mean, it could be, but that's not what we're talking about here. Pleasure is about feeling connected, alive, and attuned to what makes life worth living. It's the humanness of you. It's that deep breath that grounds you. The feeling of the sun on your skin. It's the music that stirs your soul, moves you to tears. You don't need a week long retreat or cleared calendar to experience pleasure, although again, please have those things. I want them for you too, but you just need permission and you just need a little practice. One of the simplest ways to reconnect with pleasure is to return to your senses. So often we live in our heads, right? Planning, analyzing, solving. I do it too. I'm not immune, but your body is where presence lives. When you notice what you see, what you hear, smell, taste, and touch, you begin to inhabit your life again. So start small. Feel the warmth of your coffee mug in the morning. Listen to the rain outside your window. Savor the texture of ripe fruit. These moments aren't trivial, they're transformative. They remind your nervous system that it's safe to slow down, that it's safe to enjoy. It's safe to just be. Another powerful practice is to begin noticing what feels good, right? Our brains are wired to scan for danger or problems. That's our survival instinct. But you can retrain your awareness at the end of each day. Ask yourself, what delighted me today? What felt light, what made me smile? Even briefly, when you start naming these moments, you'll start seeing more of them. And I wanna encourage you to really do this. DM me your insights. What delighted you, what made you smile? I'm at, AT Women Lead Well on Instagram. I'm at At Women Lead Well on all the social platforms. You can find me anywhere. I would love to learn what lights you up. It also helps to expand your definition of pleasure. It's not limited to spa days or bubble baths, although those are lovely. Pleasure can be quiet and simple. It might be a deep stretch after a long meeting, a meaningful conversation with a friend, moving your body to your favorite song, reading something that stirs your heart, walking barefoot on grass. Pleasure is anything that reconnects you to your humanity. One of the biggest barriers to pleasure is this belief that it has to be earned. I mentioned this myth a few minutes ago that you only get to rest or enjoy after everything else is done. But that is a lie that keeps us depleted. You do not have to deserve pleasure. You do not have to earn joy. It belongs to you because you're alive. Because you are a human. And enjoyment and joy is part of the human experience. It just is. So try this, pause for five seconds. We're gonna do it right now, and let yourself feel something good. The breath in your lungs, the stillness in the room. The possibility of reclaiming your own aliveness, even these micro moments of pleasure can reset your body and your spirit. So I'm gonna give you the five seconds right here on the podcast. Five seconds of dead hair. Ah, here we go. The more you practice pleasure in small everyday ways. The more your life begins to feel like your own. Again, it's important and you can do it. So that was pleasure. Now let's talk about how you can return to presence when life pulls you away. Presence is simply the act of being where you are, not where you were, not where you're going, just here, but there are plenty of times when being present can feel elusive, even unsafe. We're used to anticipating needs, managing outcomes, staying 10 steps ahead, right? I mean, this is our life presence asks us to soften, to notice, to receive. The good news is that you don't have to meditate for an hour or become an monk to access presence. Although, again, go right ahead. If that's on your heart, presence is available in the most ordinary moments. If you're willing to return to yourself right now, your breath is one of the quickest pathways back to now. When your thoughts are racing or your body feels tight, try this simple reset. Inhale for four counts through your nose. Hold for four, and then exhale for six through your mouth. Do this three or four times, those long exhales signal safety to your nervous system, and that helps you shift from reactivity into grounded awareness. It brings you back into your body, back into presence. You can also practice presence through body check-ins several times a day. Just pause and ask yourself, what sensations am I feeling right now? No need to fix or change anything. Just notice is your jaw clenched? Are your feet grounded? Are you holding your breath? This kind of awareness helps you return to your body, which anchors you in the present moment. Another helpful practice is to slow down your transitions, and this is the one that I need the most. So many of us rush from one task to the next. Without even taking a breath, it's back to back to back meetings, right? But even 30 seconds of intentional pause can change your whole energy between meetings, between checking things off the to-do list. Take a moment to close your eyes, stretch, drink some water. Ask yourself, what do I need right now? The small pauses create space for presence to reenter. You can also anchor yourself in the sacredness of the ordinary. Wash your hands with attention. Listen to the sound of your footsteps. Eat your lunch without scrolling. These may seem like small things, but presence is often found in what we usually overlook. Some of you may know that I attended seminary, Wesley Theological Seminary in Washington dc. I loved it. It has been such an important part of my own personal journey, and it was at seminary that I was introduced to Brother Lawrence, a Carmelite brother in the 16 hundreds who wrote the practice of the presence of God. His purpose was to reflect on how anything we do from big, like preaching in prayer for Brother Lawrence to small. Like washing dishes. Also something Brother Lawrence did at the monastery that these become spiritual encounters when we bring in openness to experiencing God in them. For example, if I approach changing my daughter's diaper as an opportunity to connect with the miracle of the human body and a healthy digestive system, I show up in that space in an entirely different way. You certainly don't have to be religious to get the point. When you slow down enough to really notice your life, all of the layers of it, you begin to inhabit your life more fully, and perhaps most importantly, offer yourself presence first. As women, we're taught to be present for other people, our teams, our families, our communities. I just talked about changing diapers, right? Being present for our children. But the most sustainable leadership comes with self connection. So before you pour into other people, take time to connect inward, check in on your body, budget, on how you're feeling, on what you're wanting. Presence isn't about being perfectly calm or mindful all the time. It is about returning again and again and again to yourself, wherever you are, and know like you're gonna drift. That's human. You just also can always come back. And as we wrap up, I want you to know that you were not meant to live on autopilot. You weren't made to endure your life. You were made to live it. Fully richly honestly. And yeah, joyfully reclaiming pleasure and presence isn't a betrayal of your ambition. It's a restoration of your humanity. It's how you remember what you love. It's how you become a better leader, a better partner friend, and a whole person. Because when you're anchored in your body and connected to the moment. You lead from a place of wisdom instead of weariness. So let me ask you, what is one small pleasure you can welcome today? What's one ordinary moment you can meet with presence? You don't have to wait for the perfect conditions. You can start right now with one breath, one pause. One decision to come home to yourself. You carry a lot, but you don't have to carry it all in a rush. Let's make space for joy again. Let's slow down. Let's feel it. If this episode spoke to you, I would love for you to share it with a friend who's running on empty. We need more women leading from alignment, not adrenaline. And if you're ready to begin your burnout recovery journey, my new program, frantic to Flourishing, is coming later this summer. You can join the wait list and unlock the lowest price it will ever be at at Women Lead well.net/flourishing. Make sure you're on the email list so you don't miss the launch. You can also grab one of our free resources like the Mental Load Reset or the Weekly Reset routine@womenleadwell.net and LinkedIn the show notes below. They're a gentle, powerful way to begin reclaiming your capacity. Remember, joyful, sustainable, and authentic leadership is possible. You deserve to enjoy every minute of it. Until next time, I'm Becky Ham, and this is joyfully, unstoppable.