#31: Millennial Women Are Drowning in Self-Optimization: Here's What I'm Doing About It

Have you ever felt like your entire life became one giant self-improvement project?

In this solo episode, Stacey explores what happens when high-achieving women become trapped in a constant cycle of optimization — always trying to become healthier, calmer, more productive, more healed, more emotionally regulated, more “their best selves.”

From self-help books to wellness culture to nervous system work to productivity routines… when does trying to improve yourself quietly become exhausting?

Stacey shares:

•  the pressure millennial women feel to “have it all” 
•  why so many high-achieving women struggle to relax 
•  the connection between perfectionism and nervous system overwhelm 
•  how endless self-help can disconnect us from our actual lives 
•  why silence feels uncomfortable now 
•  the surprising ways clutter and unfinished tasks affect anxiety 
•  and the shift she’s making toward what she calls “returning to real life” 

This episode is for the women who are tired of treating themselves like projects.

And maybe… just need a little more quiet.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Have you ever seen one of those videos with a woman who is walking on her desk treadmill while she's wearing her red light mask, while she's carrying a dumbbell in one hand and a protein shake in the other, listening to a podcast on her AirPods while she writes in her journal a letter from her future self. Ridiculous, yes, but it's not far off from where a lot of us are. I want to talk about high-achieving women today, about optimization culture, and what happens when an entire generation of women become convinced that every part of themselves needs to be improved all of the time. Welcome to the Next Phase Podcast, the show for millennial moms who want to stop fixing themselves and start listening to themselves. I'm your host, Stacey Hudson, and honestly, if I do my job well today, by the end of this episode, you're going to want to turn me off and not listen to another podcast for a little while. Because if you are the woman I think you are, you probably don't need more input right now. You probably need a little quiet. Are you ready? Let's talk about it. Hi everybody, it's Stacy here with a solo episode. I want to talk today about high-achieving women, my favorite topic, and how we are trapped in this cycle of trying to optimize ourselves all of the time. And I think typically this starts early, like elementary aged early. At least that was the case for me. Back in 1992, I received the Perfect Attendance Award from Lake Louise Elementary. And I will never forget the principal calling me up on stage and everybody applauding for me just for showing up. And I remember being a little confused because it never occurred to me that I wouldn't show up every day. It was just the way my brain worked. But what new realization came out of that was that if you do what is expected of you, you get rewarded. And you also get a pretty amazing dopamine hit, right? The whole school applauding for me, just for showing up, was one of the biggest motivators in my life to continue to be a high achiever. So from there, it was honor roll and high honor roll and senior board and top 25 GPA and all of the accolades and achievements that I could get. And when I graduated and got a job, I showed up every day, just like in Lake Louise Elementary School. I was a go-getter. And when I became a mother, I approached it the same way I approached everything else: like something to study, something to succeed in. So monessori, gentle parenting, positive discipline. And then I read all of the self-help books. I became a badass. I washed my face. The universe had my back. I went keto. I started fasting like a girl. I ate all the protein. I was a really good girl. And I know a lot of you can relate to that. And honestly, that way of living worked well for me for a long time. I mean, it wasn't to say that I was not an anxious girl, because I was. I was on edge, very controlling, and wanted everything to be perfect all the time. But it worked. And I think the reason that it worked was I was young. In my teens, 20s, and 30s, I could keep up with that pace of push, push, push, constantly optimize. But somewhere in my late 30s, it stopped working. And I started feeling exhausted and really anxious, like to the point where I was having panic attacks and in the fetal position on the ground in the kitchen type of anxiety. And I remember thinking, why are all of my efforts that have always worked for me in the past no longer working? This self-help optimization formula that I thought I had perfected was suddenly not effective. And what do I do now if the formula doesn't work? And so I came up with this brilliant idea. I just need to double my efforts. I need to not only optimize my mindset and my parenting and my nutrition, but I also need to optimize my mental health. Yes, I need to optimize my mental health and then I will feel better. And I know that a lot of you understand this because when you're used to getting rewarded for doing more, doing even more feels like the answer. And I think a lot of millennial women were raised on this message that we could have it all. We could build our careers, we could raise our families, we could optimize our health, stay attractive, stay fit, stay grateful, stay emotionally aware, stay connected. And it all sounds really empowering, but somewhere along the way, you can do anything. Like, can we all picture our little 90s selves hearing, you can do anything became you should do everything. And now we're completely exhausted from doing everything. So to show you an example of what this looks like in our current information age, I want you to do a little visualization with me. I want you to imagine that you are going on a walk. And you bring your AirPods because, of course, you want to learn something while you're walking. You want to optimize your time. And so you've got something queued up before your foot even hits the pavement, and you start walking, and then all of a sudden, your favorite fitness guru comes up beside you. She's in a matching set with a weighted vest, and she's holding a 20-pound dumbbell in one hand, and she says, Walking is great, but it is not enough. You need progressive overload. If you're not strength training three to four times a week, you are losing muscle. Your body composition after 40 is mostly muscle maintenance. And then suddenly, on the other side of you, that well-known wellness coach slides in with a bowl of Greek yogurt in one hand and a beef stick in the other, and she says, I really hate to tell you this, but you're probably only eating half the protein your body needs. It should be the focus of every meal. You should aim for at least 30 grams per meal. Also, are you taking magnesium? Because you should be. Then, out of nowhere, your functional medicine doc joins the walk. She's holding a clipboard. Have you had your hormones tested recently? Your cortisol might be spiking. Your gut health may be impacting everything. We should probably run a full panel. And you're like, okay, okay, cortisol protein, clipboard, got it. Then that productivity expert comes power walking up beside you with her color-coded markers and a giant Stanley cup, and she says, Your problem is your systems. The key lies in your morning routine. Here's what you do. Time block your entire day and wake up when everybody else is still asleep. Have you tried habit stacking? And then the parenting expert arrives. Your kids are probably dysregulated because they need more connection, more magnesium bass, less screens, more emotional validation. And now you're walking faster because it feels like if you don't keep up, you're going to fall behind. You just need to keep walking, keep working, make a few tweaks, you'll get there. You will figure this out. You will complete yourself. So you think, okay, I'm a little activated right now. I just need to take it down a notch. I'm gonna put on my meditation app. You don't chase, but you attract. Focus on becoming the version of you who already has it. Really feel what she is feeling. Become her. And you're like, okay, chase, attract magnesium screens, emotional validation, pop! Your airpod flies out of your ear as you step over a rock. And we all know what happens when your airpod flies out of your ear, right? It just bounces once and then it disappears forever, never to be seen again. I don't know why they designed it that way, but they did. And so you're freaking out because you actually only had one AirPod to begin with. Now you have no AirPods, and you stop in your tracks to find the damn thing so that you can keep optimizing while you're walking. So you retrace your steps, you're kicking leaves, you're looking in your hair, you're shaking your bra, and you're like, where the heck did this thing go? And after a minute, you just give up because you know it's gone. And now you're walking in silence. And your first thought is, what a wasted opportunity. I am not learning anything right now. I'm not optimizing anything. What a waste of time. And you can feel this itch to reach for your phone, to put something back in your ear, to get back on track. This is what happens to women who are very good at following instructions in a world that won't stop giving them. We have so much information coming at us all the time: podcasts, books, boot camps, workshops, courses, experts, programs. It is never ending. And I have been there, I have done all of it, and I always felt like I was just one lesson or tool away from finally completing myself, from finally figuring it out. But that's the trap. You're never actually finished. So, what would happen if you just kept walking after the AirPod popped out of your ear? Quiet, no input. You could just hear your surrounding environment, and you're walking over rocks, over dirt, and you're starting to let your thoughts form, and you're starting to decide what is for you and what isn't for you. And then you're coming up with new ideas of your own, and your shoulders drop, and your breath slows down, and your body feels calmer and safer, and nobody is telling you to do anything. You're just walking. When I finally started doing this more, started making quiet a priority in my life, I started to realize that I had no effing idea how to relax. I didn't know how to do it. I did not know how to just be. I was really, really bad at it. And I started to look around for people in my environment who were better at it than me. And the first person that came to mind was Sally. Sally is my best friend. I've known her since junior high. And we also went to college together. She also was a high achiever. She was brilliant at math, great grades, went on to get her master's, like smart, smart girl, and motivated girl. But the difference between me and Sally was that she was good at turning it off. Like she knew when she needed to go and when she needed to stop. And I'll never forget seeing her on the dorm room bed playing Sudoku and always wondering like, what does Sudoku do for her? And 17 years later, I am finally getting it. The downtime is important. The pleasure, the space between all of the achievements. Like, have you ever sat down to relax? Like on your couch or on your bed, the rare moment for people like us. And you're like, okay, this feels good. It's been a long day. And then you hear the garage door open and you almost like catapult out of wherever you were sitting, because God forbid you just sit and relax. Like somebody coming in, your husband, your kids seeing you relax is unacceptable. And now you must do something or just look busy. We are wound up so tight. And we are successful because we work so damn hard. And all of that achieving got us really far in life. But what happens when you reach a certain point in your life and your body is starting to say that you can't keep operating at this speed? What happens when your hormones start changing and don't allow you to do all of those things all the time and be at dial 10 24-7? What happens when you don't know how to turn it off? I saw this really funny post the other day, and I feel like this is important to share here. And one side was a picture of a woman at, I think, you know, 28 or so. And after a night of drinking with her friends, going out, and she's got like a yoga mat slung over her shoulder, and she's all bright-eyed and bushy-tailed the next morning, ready to go to yoga. And then the other picture was the same woman at like 39 after staying up until 11 to watch a movie, and she is passed out on the stairs. And I feel like that sums it up right there. Like our tolerance for being on all the time, it just goes down. And I don't think that has to be depressing. I think though that we do have to make some adjustments so that we don't keep going at that same speed because we're gonna be miserable if we do. And so these are the adjustments that I'm making through all of this realization. Number one is less input. I am taking more silent walks, silent drives, silent showers. I literally took the Bluetooth speaker out of my bathroom, so I didn't even have the option to listen to podcasts while I'm in there or audiobooks. I always remember hearing Judy Bloom say once in a masterclass that she never takes headphones on her walks. She always walks in silence. And that's because that's where she gets her best ideas. And I think we can all be really grateful for Judy Bloom's best ideas. I am a creative person. I am a writer. I create this podcast. And when I'm constantly taking in input, I am not creating my own original output as much. We talked about that in the Jess Extrum episode. And so when I started finally quieting the noise, I could start hearing my own ideas and thoughts again. The other thing that really helps here is journaling because it is the only place that does not tell me what to do. It just listens to me. And it's a really good muscle to keep working to listen to yourself. The second thing is what I call doing the work before the woo. I did a whole episode on this. It's episode 28. What if you're doing nervous system work backwards? And essentially, it was this realization I had after I went all in on my mental health and I was trying so hard to regulate my nervous system with all of the tools. I realized it wasn't working because I was living in an environment of total chaos. And I know my ADHD friends will understand this. I had laundry everywhere, goodwill bags in every room. I was always pushing my time up to the very last second. I have half-finished projects in every direction. Like you know, that moment when you walk into a room and you think, oh, I need to take care of that, I need to take care of that. I had those in every room. And let's be honest, I still have a lot of them. This is a work in progress, but it's something that I'm finally aware of. And if we are high-achieving women and we have these big goals to reach in our career and in our health, none of that can happen until our body feels safe. And safety does not come from doing more. It comes from less. It comes from making our lives feel less chaotic. So I have started doing the work before the woo. I'm still doing my morning meditation. I'm still journaling. I'm still doing EFT. But when I'm really stressed, I'm looking around and I'm tackling something in my environment almost as if it is part of all of that nervous system regulation work. I'm setting up the printer that's been sitting in a box for six months so that I have to drive to UPS every time I need to print something. I'm going through the bill pile. I'm folding a load of laundry. I am building in extra time before I have to leave for an appointment or school pickup so that my nervous system doesn't feel like I'm experiencing a fire alarm. The third thing I'm adjusting is really more of a mindset shift. I'm going to do a special shout out to my friends at Golden Women in Business here because they know what I mean when I say this. I need to stop treating myself like a project. That little girl who got that perfect attendance award discovered that if she took parts of herself and made them better, she would get rewarded. And she got that dopamine hit and she wanted more. So academic success turned into health and wellness success, turned into career success and parenting success, and then mental health success. And I was operating like a project to be worked on all of the time. It's not that wanting these things are bad or trying to make ourselves better is bad. Like that's not what I'm saying, but it's this really slippery slope for a certain type of person who doesn't know how to turn it off. It's almost like they should put a warning label on some of this self-help stuff because it's just so easy to get addicted to. Like, warning, not recommended for perfectionists who already believe that rest must be earned. Here's the thing: I don't think you and I are lacking information or advice or the next right guru or person who's going to help fix us. I think we need less of all of that. And I think that is what this next phase has really become for me: a return to real life. Less optimization, more fun, more just because, not because it does anything for me, like Sudoku, right? Less input, more creating, more writing, more art, less fixing, and more listening. I have spent So much time and energy trying to become the better, best version of myself. And I never actually stopped to ask whether I was happy or satisfied with the life that I was already living. I think so many of us overachiever perfectionist girls, we're missing, we're missing it. We're missing the life that we're trying so hard to perfect. And there is something about hitting that midlife mark that makes you rethink all of that. This is not the way I want to keep living my life. I don't need another self-help book for this part to figure this out. I don't need another guru. I just need to return to the life that is in front of me. And if you are anything like me, then maybe that is for you too. But I am just another podcast host, just another voice, telling you what I do. You have to figure out what it is that you need in this phase of life. And I think the only way that you're going to be able to do that is to quiet all of the noise. So go ahead and turn me off. Go on a walk without your AirPods that you lost anyway, and see what comes up. I love having you here. I am so grateful for our time together. And if I didn't just convince you to delete all of your podcast apps, I will see you next time in the next phase.