Stop Being The "Magic Maker": Why Over-Functioning Is Causing Your Holiday Burnout & Resentment

Are you finding it impossible to actually enjoy the holiday season because your brain is stuck in hyper-drive, obsessively managing everyone else's emotions, menus, and memories while you slowly burn out in the background?

This show helps women healers over 50 (nurses, therapists, & caregivers) break free from the exhaustion of over-functioning and rediscover the joy and freedom of a life lived for themselves, not just their patients or families.

Listen to discover exactly why the holidays trigger your "identity compression," and get the exact steps to detach your worth from your productivity so you can finally rest:

• Uncover the neuroscience of "Identity Compression": Learn why your high-achieving nervous system has fused your self-worth with your output, making "sitting still" feel physically unsafe and triggering a cortisol spike even when you are supposed to be relaxing with family.
• Master the "Solar-Sacral" Reset: Learn a specific, 60-second Chakra activity designed to interrupt the "Magic Maker" energy in real-time, allowing you to release the rigid need to control family dynamics and shift from resentment back to inner peace instantly.
• The "Presence over Performance" Shift: Discover how to implement a specific boundary strategy that allows you to offer your family the one thing they actually want—your authentic presence—while preserving your energy for a purposeful, radiant Next Chapter in the New Year.

Over the last 30 years, Dr. Julie Merriman has helped thousands of high-achieving women in healthcare navigate the transition from burnout to radiance, using her unique blend of psychotherapy and energy work.

Dr. Julie shares high-impact episodes blending science, spirituality, and strategy to help you reclaim your energy.

If you’re ready to finally grow and heal, start by listening to Episode #4: Mind Management for Burnout and Compassion Fatigue: A CBT-Inspired Tool for Women Healers Over 50

This podcast supports women healers over 50 navigating burnout, compassion fatigue, and midlife transitions with strategies for nervous system regulation, trauma-informed boundaries, and chakra alignment to heal resentment and self-neglect while cultivating soul joy, radiance, and a purposeful next chapter of freedom and inner peace.

THE DIAGNOSIS: Are you the Martyr who can't say no? Or the Warrior who fights until she collapses? You cannot heal what you cannot name.

👇 Take the 60-Second Quiz to find your Burnout Archetype: [CLICK HERE TO REVEAL YOUR ARCHETYPE]

Join the Rebellion: If this episode woke something up in you, share it with a colleague who needs permission to stop. We rise together.

Reach out to Dr. Julie

Episodes drop every Tuesday at 5am and every Friday at noon.

Special guest episodes drop the 4th Thursday of every month at 7am.

Transcript

0:02

Have you ever realized your whole life revolves around helping others? And when someone asks you what you want for Christmas, you honestly don't have an answer. In this episode, we're fixing that. Empowering brilliant women in healthcare over 50 to transform burnout and compassion fatigue into renewed passion. Reigniting your spark to create a life that energizes you every single day. I'm your host, Dr. Jules. Let's get to it. Okay. Three. By the end of this episode, here's three things you're going to know. Number one, the research backed truth about your identity compression, and why your nervous system treats relaxing as a threat during the holidays. And number two, how to use a 62nd chakra activity to reopen your solar plexus and sacral centers so you stop leaking energy to your family. And number three, the exact step purpose reclamation plan to help you. Walk into the new year, building a life, not just a job description. And that's a three step plan, that reclamation plan. Okay, so as I always like to, let's dive into the research and the problem. So my friends, we're gonna start with the science because I know my audience and you are smart, high achieving women. And you want to know why you feel this way? There is a concept in burnout research sus, and it's supported by, studies from mass latch, which I said wrong, figley, and even the a MA, and it's called. Get this identity compression. Here is what happens when you work in high stakes healing professions for decades as we have your nervous system adapts to the environment. Dr. Stephen Po. Hayes, the father, we all know him. The father of polyvagal theory. Tells us that our nervous system's, number one job, y'all can fill in this blank. It's safety for you. Safety has become synonymous with competence and when you are helping, when you are fixing, when you are diagnosing, or when you are managing a crisis, your nervous system knows exactly what to do. You're good at it. It feels competent, therefore it feels safe. But when you turn, when you take that uniform off, step out of that role, or when you step away from the crisis, y'all, and you're just sitting in your living room with a cup of tea, your nervous system loses its anchor. It doesn't know the rules of relaxation, right? It interrupts that stillness at, well, it does interrupt that stillness because it interprets that stillness as being unsafe or unproductive. So what do you do? You look for work. You start cleaning, you start worrying about your adult children. You take on the emotional labor of the holidays. You become the human doing instead of the human being, because doing feels a lot safer to you than being, and this leads to what I call the holiday identity trap. You are so exceptional at helping. That your own needs have become invisible, even to you. You feel trapped, you feel exhausted, and if you're being really honest, you probably feel a little bit of resentment bubbling up under the surface and asking, when is it my turn? Which is a fair question. So let's shift that and let's look at this thing through the lens of energy, because we are whole beings, science and soul, right? When we suffer from this identity compression, two specific chakras take a massive hit. First. Your cellar, plexus chakra. And y'all, this is located right in your upper belly. This is the center of your personal power. This is your identity. Your I am. And when your identity is wrapped up entirely in others, your patients, your kids, your spouse, this center becomes depleted. Essentially, y'all, you're leaking power all day long. The second chakra that is involved is the sacral chakra that's underneath your solar plexus, your lower belly. This is the seat of your creativity, your sexuality, your pleasure, your playfulness, your joy, and when we are in survival mode, or you know, that helper mode, this chakra shuts down. Why? Because play isn't efficient, joy isn't productive. So I want to do an activity with you right now, and if you're driving, just keep your eyes on the road. If you're cleaning, keep on cleaning, walking. This'll work. But if you can in what you're doing, I invite you to find just a moment of stillness. I want you to take your right hand. Place it on your upper belly, your solar plexus, and I want you to take your left hand and place it on your lower belly, that sacral center. Drop your eye or drop your shoulders away from your ears. Unc unclench those jaws. And I want you to take a really good deep breath through your nose and expand that belly against what society's always having to suck it in. I want you to expand it. And feel your belly expanding into your hands, and then you exhale through your mouth. And now I want you to ask your body a question. Don't answer it in your brain where that floating head of competence, stop it. I want you to get into your body. I want you to answer this with your gut and I want you to ask yourself. Who am I beyond who I help? Listen to the silence and ask yourself one more question. What part of me has been waiting for permission to just be this holiday season? Maybe you hear a whisper of the artist. The reader, the sleeper, maybe the walker that whisper that is yours. Spark. That is the part of you that burnout tried to extinguish, but it is still here. This activity, placing your hands on these centers. And asking these questions interrupts the pattern of the nervous system. It tells your body, I see you. You are more than a machine. You are a beautiful, brilliant, competent woman. So how do we take that spark and turn it into a full flipping fire? How do we stop being the magic maker? For everyone else and start making some magic for ourselves. I love using the StoryBrand framework for this. In every great story, there's a hero, a villain, and a guide, and in your life right now, the villain isn't your jaw, it isn't your family. The villain is the earn that internal belief. That purpose equals performance. The belief that you are only worthy if you are sweating. That's the villain. The hero is you, the woman over 50, high achiever, the healer, the one ready for her next chapter. Connecting to that sacred purpose beyond performance. So here is your simple three step Reclamation reconnection plan to defeat the villain this week. Step one, name the constraint. Though you cannot heal what you do not acknowledge, you've gotta name it to change it. I want you to say it out loud today. I feel guilty when I sit down. I don't know what I like to do anymore. Naming it takes the shame away. It frees your system. In step two, you choose a micro purpose. Now this is crucial. Do not try to find your life's purpose. Today. We'll be working on that. Welcome 2026, but today that's too heavy. I want you to find a micro purpose. This one is small. It's nonproductive. It's a thing that exists solely for your joy. Maybe it's buying a sketchbook and drawing for 10 minutes, uh, or get you some finger paints and just make a mess. I love that. Maybe it's walking outside without your phone. Maybe it's reading a trashy romance novel. Hell yeah. It has to be something that serves no one but you. This sends a radical signal of safety to your brain that says I exist outside of my utility. And then step three, you own your new narrative. I want you to write this sentence on a sticky note. Put it on your bathroom mirror. Here it is. I am becoming a woman whose life is bigger than her work. You say that every morning. You say that. Every evening you are rewiring your brain 67 days to rewire. You are telling your solar plexus that you are taking. Your power back. Yeah. You don't have to wait for retirement to find yourself. Oh, my sweet friend. You don't have to wait for the holidays to be over to feel peace. You don't have to wait for'em to be over. The peace is here now. You can start right now by detaching from. You've gotta detach your worth from your work. It's purpose beyond performance. So to summarize what we learned today, first we learned that feeling lost outside of work is biological. It's identity compression. There's research that backs it up. It's not a character flaw. You're not broken, you're still, you. Second, we learned that we can physically reset our sober plexus and our sacral chakras by placing our hands on our bodies and asking, who am I beyond who I help? And third, we learned the StoryBrand. StoryBrand plan, name the constraint. Choose a micro purpose and own the narrative that your life is bigger than your job. Now, here is my request for you. I know you know another woman colleague, a sister, a nurse friend who is drowning in holiday stress right now. She needs to hear this. Please share this episode with her. Tell her I see you and this will help. I hope that you have a beautiful rest of your day and I will see you on Tuesday. If this episode hit home, don't just nod and move on. Give yourself what you actually need. Tap the show notes right now to grab your free Compassion Fatigue Cure Starter Guide, or. The burnout to Radiance Reset. And girl, if you know another woman healer who's running on empty, please share this episode.