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- [00:00]
A
Welcome to a special series on the Boss Babe podcast. I'm Natalie Ellis and I'm joined this week by two women I deeply respect and admire, Alexi Panos and Emily Gallagher. For a raw and honest five part series we're calling Red Flags. Every Boss Babe needs to know we are dropping one episode every single day for the next five days. And each one is going to shine a light on the patterns that so many high achieving women have normalized until their bodies raised relationships or businesses start sending signals that something is off. These are the red flags that high performers tend to override. We keep pushing, performing and producing, telling ourselves it's just a busy season when really we have disconnected from our own truth, intuition and vitality. This series is here to interrupt that cycle, not in a shame based way, but with clarity, compassion, and the kind of perspective that makes you stop and ask, do I actually want to to keep doing it this way? So in each episode, we're not just naming the red flag, we are breaking down the symptoms. We are sharing our own lived experiences, as uncomfortable and vulnerable as that can be, and offering really implementable tools to start shifting the pattern right now. We are also inviting you into a masterclass where we're gonna take this even deeper. Because the truth is, awareness is just the beginning, but embodiment is the goal. Today we're starting with a really big one, the overwhelm loop. If you have ever been called high capacity while secretly living in a state overthinking urgency and anxiety, I think this episode is really gonna hit home for you. Let's get into it. I'm so excited that we're doing this because, yeah, think about 2018. We did that podcast series together and I feel like that's when all of us were in that full hustle mode, which I look back and I'm so grateful to that version of myself. But seeing, oh my goodness, the difference of just like all of our lives and should we start there of where we all were? I can go first. Maybe we'll talk about where we all were and the journeys looked like. But for me, that was seven years ago, which is so interesting. I feel like I was in the thick of the business, really taking off and it was happening. I describe it as like a magic carpet ride. It was just happening so fast. We moved into a wework office.
- [02:15]
B
Yes.
- [02:16]
A
Alexi, we obviously shared office. It was like two doors down. Yeah. And it was just every opportunity I was saying yes to, every idea I was saying yes to. But I remember even then, and I think I felt really good, but I was struggling so much with my schedule. Skin had really bad hormonal acne. My hormones were fully out of whack. I was like biohacking within an inch of my life. I was up at like 6am every day before I had kids. I'm like, why was I doing that? Right?
- [02:42]
B
Like missed opportunity.
- [02:44]
A
Working out, working and just this endless cycle. And it was beautiful and like, look what it's produced. But it's just so interesting being seven years out now, how much life has changed. We're all in Austin now and my nervous system is completely different. I mean, I haven't had a hormonal issue and I mean five, five years maybe.
- [03:04]
C
Yeah.
- [03:04]
B
Which is insane.
- [03:05]
A
Crazy. It's just a completely different. Like I look at that person, I'm like, oh, that's so like she was really like for it. Yeah. Trying so hard, but my God, had no idea that that was really going on in her system.
- [03:18]
C
Yeah.
- [03:19]
B
Well, that's the thing. I think we were all in such a, an energized time. Like we were so excited about our businesses and what we were creating and how we were serving. And I had just had Kingston. And so for me, I was starting to really make that shift of, oh, I can't do things the used to do them. And I used to work like 18 hour days and just like all ends of the night and the morning and the weekends just filling all my time with work because I was so excited about it. But coming from such a dysregulated place without knowing I was dysregulated.
- [03:48]
C
Right.
- [03:48]
B
Like I was just ignoring every signal my body was sending me that, hey, you're pretty close to burnout. You should probably slow down, you should probably rethink this. And it wasn't really until it hit me in a hard way where I was like, oh, I gotta do something different.
- [04:01]
C
Yeah, for sure. That for me was like at the precipice of the time where like my full grind mode was kind of. I was definitely getting the signs and I was getting the disillusionment and the disenchantment with like the old way.
- [04:13]
B
Yeah.
- [04:13]
C
And was kind of trying to grasp for the next thing. Okay, so what's the next thing? Grasping. Grasping, grasping. Like because there's got to be. I wasn't fully in again like now what we're saying or even aware. Like I think that's such a big thing when you're in it. You're just not even aware that you're being run in that way. So it's still very much in that pattern of grasping for the safety of the next business or the next thing that was going to take all my energy and attention. But I was just thinking that when I was about to drive here of just, wow, all of us are so fundamentally different. I'm like, I feel like an entirely different woman night and day than that girl, like, that sweet, beautiful woman that I was, but just so different in, like, such deep ways. It's just so profound and expansive to be sitting in that, like, contrast and to be able to see that. Because, yeah, we were. And we were all in la, Right. We're in la or in that we're surrounded by that peak kind of vortex of, you know, you are what you produce, you are who you know you are. Like, the, you know, the success that you have, it was very externally validated, and you get caught into that as well. What?
- [05:09]
B
And that's the thing too, I think, that created this subtle and subliminal, I gotta keep up, I gotta stay relevant.
- [05:16]
C
Not there yet.
- [05:16]
B
I gotta produce, I gotta get ahead. And it's this constant almost competition without feeling like we were competing with each other. But, oh, I'm. I'm falling behind. And so there was this underlying anxiety and overwhelm all the time of, I'm not doing enough. There's gotta be more. There's a new system, there's a new technology, there's this. And I just remember always feeling like I was behind.
- [05:36]
A
Yeah.
- [05:37]
B
Even though I was remarkably ahead of most people in our industry, I always felt behind.
- [05:42]
A
And it's so interesting because, thinking back to that time, and I want to ask you guys some questions too, maybe things I didn't see on the surface back then, but even back then, I had some beautiful friendships in la, but it's so interesting looking back, how many of them were business focused?
- [05:55]
C
Right.
- [05:57]
A
Business masterminding, the collaborations and all amazing things, but it really was so business focused. So for you, Alexi, we didn't really talk about this much in the podcast series back then, but you were very freshly postpartum. I remember that. And you were really the first of any of us to have kids.
- [06:14]
B
Yeah.
- [06:14]
A
How were you feeling in that space?
- [06:17]
B
It's an interesting thing because, again, I felt like I still felt the surge of energy, like I didn't want to pull back from my business, and I found ways to keep it going and be successful in all the things. But there was this pull of, okay, I'm. I'm on track, I'm still building, I'm Growing. I'm doing all the things. But then there was this pull of, like, but I'm supposed to be here, and I just felt this. It wasn't necessarily incongruence, but it was like a split within me where it's like the old version of me was so clear, like, just one foot in front of the other. Lex, keep going. The new me was like, slow down. Like, be with your baby. And I, you know, gave birth at home, did a very holistic way of having my child, did 40 days of no work, nobody coming in. And I just remember going, like, is this what it's supposed to be? Am I supposed to feel like, I have to say, split myself in half? I almost felt like I had to clone myself to be fully present for both. And to be quite honest, I don't think I really nailed that until the twins, because I really tried to still be the same woman that I was while having Kingston, my oldest. Looking back, when I had the twins, I had to slow down because I had them one week before the world shut down from COVID And so everything stopped.
- [07:24]
C
Yeah, Even just, like, flagging of the 40 days. I mean, I know you had a really beautiful. Not having people come in. It's so beautiful. But even that, like, 40 days of not working is a thing. It's like, it should be so much longer, like, in my mind, to be a mom and, like, to stop that. Like, to be able to have so much more space that. That feels.
- [07:40]
B
But in my mind, that wasn't even, like, 40 days was, like, crazy.
- [07:44]
C
That's what I'm saying. It's wild. The. Just, like, the context of that now. Like, it's like a flash in the pan.
- [07:50]
B
Well, then I flash forward to my fourth cash, where I basically, like, took off. You know, I took off. I would do a call here and there, but I was not researching things. I was not on my phone. I was just being with my child at this very fresh postpartum phase. It was so good. But I had to learn the lesson the hard way, because, again, that first. My first baby, I was still trying to be, like, career woman, boss, babe, doing all the things, and mom and wife and homemaker. And I was burning myself out from trying to be so present with both.
- [08:20]
C
It just speaks to again, like, that mindset of, like, I can't stop. I can't, you know, take that amount of space, because it's, like, coming from this identity and this wiring of, like, I got to keep going, because I'm. I'm here to continue creating and, you know, like, making space for this really important thing. I think it's just, again, the different woman that we are now, like, we have such a different vantage point of, like, really getting the textual experience of our life, of, like, what really matters. This work is, like, so crucial for that to really be able to drop into your life, to be able to hold. And it's not about not being able to do the business or not being able to still be successful. Right. But being able to, like, hold more. More holistically.
- [08:55]
B
Totally.
- [08:56]
C
Yeah.
- [08:56]
B
I'm curious, too. Like, when you had Noemi did feel that same. Because I had almost, like, this very naive idea that, like, nothing would change. Right. Like, everything's going to be the same. What do you mean? Of course I'm going to still want to do this at this capacity. And X, Y, and Z. Yeah.
- [09:11]
A
So I have very much had that mindset. I was like, I. And I remember my mindset back then being like, wait, why would work change? I'll just get a nanny. It didn't comprehend in my mind that I might feel different because I was so used to dealing with the logistics. I'm like, well, if I work nine to five, I'll just get a nanny. Nine to five, like, what's the big deal? I didn't think about myself changing, but when I had Noemi, that was my full come to Jesus moment. And it wasn't like one day and I had the realization because I resisted it really hard. I feel like my entire life came crumbling down over the span of 12 months. And it started with just a birth that was incredibly traumatic and was not in any sense what I imagined it would be. And my nervous system was stuck in fight or flight.
- [09:54]
C
Yeah.
- [09:55]
A
And I came home and I had this business where, you know, I had a co founder relying on me. I had a full team. I had thousands of clients. The business was going.
- [10:04]
C
Yeah.
- [10:04]
A
And it felt like I was on this train. I couldn't get off.
- [10:07]
B
Yeah.
- [10:07]
A
But the anxiety in my body was so big, I couldn't get out of bed. And it was. It's hard because I. I don't want to diminish how amazing it was to have Noemi and the love I felt for her. But at the same time, I have to be honest about. It was the hardest period in my life because, yes, I have this baby that I absolutely adore, but I do not have any clue who I am, what I care about, anything. Because I was so used to running at 100 miles an hour and putting brakes on just my Entire life shut it around me, everything shattered and, and my life's never been the same since. But it was a full 12 months.
- [10:42]
C
Yeah, yeah.
- [10:43]
A
It was not like, oh, I had this realization and then overnight, here we go.
- [10:46]
C
Yes.
- [10:47]
A
Yeah, it was like a full 12 months. And then after that it was a full 12 months of reintegrating everything in. And then I feel like when she was 2, I had the feeling of, I understand who I am, I know what I want, I know what I care about. So. But it did take those full two years to kind of circle round, which is so big.
- [11:05]
B
And that you just mentioned, something that I think is so big for so many female entrepreneurs is the same thing that helps us create our success. That like hustle, push, prove, produce, like all of that energy which builds so much, is also the thing that almost becomes our Achilles heel. Right? It's the thing that becomes the thorn in our side. And it's one of the red flags that from all the women we've worked with, eventually the thing that got them everything they wanted becomes the thing that almost destroys them. And it's the chaos, the anxiety, the overwhelm, the constant feeling like my to do list will never end. And you know, we remind the women we work with, it's like, you're always going to have stuff to do in life. It's not that. It's the fact that your nervous system is actually set to a safety point of chaos, of I need a full plate all the time. Because that's what most female entrepreneurs and male entrepreneurs, that's what we grew up with, with feeling safe is like a lot on our plate, taking it on chaos, not feeling like we can ever settle or rest anywhere. And so when we have a baby and we have this like huge life moment that literally forces us to go, that's not going to work anymore. We have the reckoning. And the reckoning is that ego death, which I know I had. It sounds like you had too, where it's like, who am I now if I can't be productive non stop all the time?
- [12:22]
C
And it's just such an important thing to really recognize that because again, that's what allows us to really see that it's not, it's not getting to the bottom of the list. It's not the next launch. It's not all of these things. It's actually that your system is really looking, it's so familiar with that setting that that's why it takes the time to actually like have that initiation, you know, and we say this right the activation is the invitation. So it's like really seeing the strategy, that mentality that we're holding in our life as the invitation to actually be initiated into this new way. That's why it does take like, it's not, okay, it's done now. I learned the lesson, like we have to actually really. Life gives us that time and space and it doesn't generally also feel that good. Right. Mine was also several years and it was like, when is this going to be like. Because I was still in that old pattern of trying to grasp because my system hadn't recalibrated, looking for the thing I thought was going to solve it, which is so just again, what we're saying. Like when you're a busy, high achieving entrepreneur, think, okay, the next launch, okay, this next, this next piece. But it keeps us in that perpetual chase. And so it does take that time to actually allow ourselves to rewire. I mean, which is such deep. I had, yeah, I had an, like I have a really anxious nervous system. Like, this was my red flag for sure. Constantly, you know, urgent, in a hurry, on time. There was always this like perceived urgency.
- [13:41]
B
And Capricorns and Virgos here, right.
- [13:44]
C
Punctual. But it's like this rushing in my system that always made everything feel really urgent and pressing, you know, and it wasn't even until a few years ago that I realized, oh, like I just, it's actually my system that's like looking and trying to latch on to the thing for like, okay, when, you know, when I lose five kilos, when I get this amount of money in the bank, when I. And that's why it's this perpetual piece, because it's actually just the system, right? That is, wait, am I safe yet? Am I, can I stop yet? And that's why it takes the time.
- [14:12]
B
And that's the thing too. I think a lot of high achieving women I know, this was my story for a long time, is like, well, if I just do more, if I just do more, then I can finally, whatever it is, right? If I just do more. If I just do more, then I can land. And when we think about it from a biological perspective of our nervous system, which again, so many of us have gone so much deeper into this and it's like the holy grail for actually getting to that next phase of our lives. But our nervous system literally needs to build the capacity to, to hold that more. And we're often overriding our body's capacity for more. So we just keep stacking more, more, more and the body's like, wait, I haven't regulated into this baseline of more yet. And so then we send our body into a spiral. We get stuck in these hyper vigilant states. And I was thinking about this on the way over here, like, how much birth has really taught me about capacity, like birthing a baby, right? There's more. It's like fundamentally more. You need more pushing more this, more that, more. We have to birth this child. But it requires relaxation to actually expand our capacity. And when we think about the nervous system and we want to expand our capacity for more money, we want to expand our capacity for more success, more opportunities, whatever it is. The hustler mentality is work harder, go harder, go faster. You know, 2x everything you did last year, but really from a nervous system perspective, it's how can you exhale, expand, soften, widen your perspective so that, that from that place of clarity in the brain, like our brain's actually turned on now because we're not in survival mode now. We're thinking better, better. You know, our choices are better, our conversations are better, our receptivity is better to receive more. And so the big solve, if you're noticing like, oh, I've totally got the anxious thing, I've totally got the overwhelm, I'm totally going non stop, is you've got to actually exhale and learn regulation techniques that when you feel yourself in that pace, which we still all do, like, we still all have that, like, oh, there it is. You have to have tools to help bring yourself down and go, okay, I need to expand, I need to relax, I need to rest, I need to widen so that I can actually be more productive with the right things.
- [16:12]
A
Yeah. And I actually really love that we're talking about this because I do feel like there is this wave of a soft CEO era on Instagram that we see, which I love, but it's almost like a masculine, feminine thing. It's one extreme to the other.
- [16:25]
B
Totally.
- [16:25]
A
And I see it and it's like fully switching off and, you know, going away for a few months and like romanticizing your life, which is awesome.
- [16:33]
C
Yeah.
- [16:33]
A
But over, like, you know, the next 60 years, not that sustainable. And it's. How can both things exist at the same time? How can your ambition and how can your drive to contribute to this world, whether that's in your home, with your family, whether that's in your work, in things you're creatively lit up about, how can you still pursue that, but in a way that feels softer? And I think that's like a really important conversation because I know, listen, if I'd heard that conversation when we were recording seven years ago, I'd have been like, no. To me. What would have entered my mind is, oh, if I slow down, I'm going to make less money, I'm going to be less successful, I'm going to fall behind. What's so interesting? And I, I always tell this story not from a place of like, ooh, look at, look at what's possible. So last year was the slowest year I've ever had in terms of the way I approach business. You know, I was fully. I knew I really needed to focus on my nervous system. I knew I really needed to focus on me first.
- [17:29]
B
Yeah.
- [17:30]
A
It's like the first time in my life I ever did it so good. We had our biggest revenue and profit year of our entire company life.
- [17:37]
B
So good. Yes.
- [17:38]
A
And it felt so good.
- [17:40]
C
Yes.
- [17:41]
A
And I almost felt like I needed that proof to know that this works.
- [17:46]
C
Yeah.
- [17:47]
A
Because if it didn't, I'd be like, cool. This is. I'll do this for the next couple years while I'm in this season, but then I'm gonna get back to it.
- [17:54]
C
Yes.
- [17:55]
A
But now I. Now that I've had that proof, I feel like my Capricorn brain needed it to be like, oh, it's not, it's not what they're saying. It actually works.
- [18:04]
B
Yeah.
- [18:04]
A
And that's why I'm so passionate about having these conversations. I think for a lot of the women, listen, what they probably don't realize is their next level isn't living on the other side of another 80 hour week. Yeah, it is, actually. I think when you. I'll speak for my own experience. When I learned to really regulate my nervous system and really drop in, like neck down, God forbid.
- [18:24]
B
Yes.
- [18:25]
A
I was more honest with myself. I was less of a people pleaser. I stopped just saying yes when I meant no. I was a lot more focused. Like, I actually had like life force energy.
- [18:37]
C
You know, when you wake up in.
- [18:38]
A
The morning and you feel really energized like this. And yes, still got toddlers and all of all the things. But I actually felt so lit up from like a cellular level. And that just, I think poured into all areas of my life. My parenting, my marriage, my friendships, my business. But I had been doing it the other way around. I'd been doing it of like, okay, if I'm really crushing it in business and okay, if I'm doing therapy and going on date nights and I'm doing Like the to do list, then I'll have, then I'll have what I want. But it's like came from the inside out always. But I needed the proof. I needed, honestly, I needed the profit proof. I needed the proof in the way my marriage felt. I needed the proof in like the relationship I had with my daughter to see actually worked.
- [19:20]
B
Yeah, but see, you're like us, we're the same. Like, we are such tangible results driven women. And I mean, if you would have told Em and I when we first met that we'd be doing like feminine embodiment work, right? Literally, we would have laughed you off a cliff because there is no way you could have told two hustlers that were like, no, we build businesses, we make money, we make money.
- [19:43]
C
My business was conscious bus.
- [19:44]
B
Like, like, we make money, we make moves, we make an impact. Like, we are here to bite all of the juice out of this lemon, right? But here we are, you know, however many years later and we have the proof. Like we have. The proof is in the pudding that we are actually living lives that feel texturally so different because it's a total, like you said, inside out job. It's a totally different come from. And what's interesting is this whole wave of you, the soft CEO and, and all of that, like part of that, if it's not truly an integrated approach, which some of it might be, but a lot of that, like go and escape, your life is functional. Freeze is actually you're in burnout and you can't do it this way anymore. And your only option, you think is to pull all the way out and like bake sourdough in your house, which.
- [20:29]
C
If you have left it so long, can actually potentially be the way that it has to go. Like, we also see that when it, when you get to the point where, where it's so bad, like your body is like, this is all I'm actually available for. Because it hasn't. We've ignored so many of the signs that it's like, oh, literally I'm, I'm done right now. I had to swing so far the other way. And we often do see that where it's like the swing. Because if again, if you fully leave it until every. Your life is like, I've got nothing left for you, there has to be almost like this recalibration moment for our body to come back and also to find integration. Like often people swing the pendulum, like become super feminine. I don't want to happen to me. Like, I don't want to like, have responsibility and like, do my business. I want to frolic on the beach, right? But it was like I had to get that also, like in my body and then kind of find integration. It's not saying that has to go that way, but oftentimes sometimes people swing because there's such a deficit in this other way to find their way back. Sometimes it can look like that to actually figure out, oh, okay, that's what that feels like. That's what this, you know, more hyper, you know, we call it masculine but right. Vigilant, controlling drive.
- [21:31]
B
It's really like the wounded, the wounded.
- [21:33]
C
Masculine, controlling way that a lot of women listening to this are probably more practiced in that we have to kind of also flex this muscle to feel like what living like that looks like and then find the balance because it's. And I like that you also brought in not just the dollar amounts because, like, we're also growing our business massively from more ease and more expansion from this place, but also, like you said, like your relationship with Stephen, your relationship, Noemi, like the whole felt experience of your life. And I think when we're in this high achieving drive mentality as women, we can be so sort of focused on that particular area and the outcome that we can miss and forget. Like, the actual, like, what gives your life that feeling, like, is valuable because especially like when we all met in la, like I already said at the beginning, it's so conditioned into like, what makes you successful, what makes your life valuable, that you can so easily forget and just even be able to wake up and feel excited about your life. We've forgotten that that's. That matters. That's what we bring into everything. That's the quality of your life right there.
- [22:32]
B
Well, and like, you spoke to something too, that that was the first time you really focused on yourself. Not like myself as a businesswoman or, you know, like, we used to take all the business classes, like, oh, I'll take a self help business course versus like actually working on myself. We didn't value that for a while, you know, I mean, we did in so many ways. But if you're not focused on the relationship, if you're not focused on your level of joy and aliveness, if you're not really truly dialed in on all these other aspects of your life outside of the business, they become weights and those weights will get heavy over time. And yes, your business might be successful, you might be crushing it with your numbers and your impact and all the things, but your life is going to, to say hey, we've got some checks and balances due now and at some point. And again, that's where a lot of the women that we work with come find us. They're like, I'm at the point where I have all the things, I got the stuff that I thought was going to make me feel better and I feel heavier than I've ever felt. And it's often not because this is hollow, the success of the business is hollow. No, it's because we've ignored our aliveness. We've ignored the woman at the center of that life. And so when we come back and we do the work of really awakening the woman who we all uniquely are and are meant to be in this life life, we feel different about everything our life touches. And I think that's the key piece that we had to get as business women. Like, oh, this matters because I am the center point of everything I touch. And if I want a more successful business, I have to be a more fulfilled woman because that woman is a woman behind everything. The work, the marriage, the kids, the relationships, all of it.
- [24:04]
A
So for someone listening who really resonates with that, can we talk about like the fun functional freeze symptoms? Because I do think that is where a lot of, a lot of people get stuck because they've pushed themselves so far. It's like all or nothing totally. And you're like, I can't keep going like this, so I want to burn it all down or I want to go get a job or I want to like, I just want to bake sourdough all day. Like, yeah, I can't do anything else. And it is functional freeze.
- [24:29]
C
Yeah. Yeah. Well, so we, we say with this one, it's really also the activation is the invitation, like first, like also really realizing and seeing that that is. Is really this initiation, like seeing that these feelings, seeing that all of this is a part of like, it's like that little knock knock, right? To actually not. Cuz so much. Like so often the tendency is, okay, I got to fix this. Okay, I got to fix or push through or fix this thing. And really actually being invited into, okay, this is here. This is what's alive. Like actually really starting to know that that's part of the invitation to cultivate that deeper connection with self. Self. Because it's not that you need to then go and push past it. It's actually really seeing, all right, wow, like I'm, I'm being invited into something here. How can I start really checking in and tuning in and not from this Place of fix and not from this place of trying to get through, but really creating the space to actually ask yourself what you need in that moment and actually start to lean into. Could I give myself even a micro bit of that? Right. Because the more and more we start to do that, then the more and more we can start to cultivate the sense of safety that, oh, things didn't burn down. Like, things didn't, you know, diminish and actually build a practice of really checking in with that. And you may have some other pieces around the.
- [25:41]
B
Yeah. So freezing freeze and functional freeze are really interesting. And it's a fine line sometimes. Right. So when we're so used to go, go, go, go, go, go, go, push, push, push, push. And that's kind of our blueprint. We are technically overriding the body's normality. We're now in a hypervigilant survival state. Will we burn for too long in that state? Which we can burn a long time. Our bodies are very savvy on trying to figure out like, oh, this is where we have to be. Okay, let's do it. Some of us burn for decades in hypervigilance. Yeah, that was me.
- [26:10]
C
That was me.
- [26:10]
B
And I was like, I remember when I got all my adrenals tested, she's like, your adrenals are like, gone. And I'm like, really? I feel great, you know?
- [26:18]
C
Yeah. You don't actually realize it.
- [26:19]
B
I didn't realize, like, I didn't know that I could feel different. I just, I always felt the buzz and didn't realize that that was my body's like reserve tank. So my body's pulling from my hormones, pulling from my reserve tank, pulling from my adrenals. Go, go, go, go, go. But at some point all the reserves are going to run out. When those reserves run out. Now we enter freeze. If you are a high achieving woman and you've got a lot of responsibility, you can't just freeze and numb out and disconnect. Some people do. If you have the space, you do. Or you just kind of like are walking through life feeling really numb and disconnected. But most high achieving women go into, into a functional freeze state. That's like where your body's pumping the brakes. Like, no, no, stop. You can't. We're gonna die. We actually can't do this anymore. But your mind is going, but I can't stop. But I can't stop. I have to do this. I have to pay the bills. I have to take care of my kids. I have to, I have to, I Have to. I have to. And so we're fighting between these two states. And I remember I was in functional freeze for years.
- [27:15]
C
For years.
- [27:16]
B
Getting out of bed every morning was like, oh, this feels so hard. Like, I feel so heavy. I felt like I was walking through mud every single day and getting the work done show being bright on the calls, but afterwards feeling mentally wiped. And this state is literally your body's last and final state of, hey, we've got to change something or else we're going to pull the plug and we're going to cause, you know, health issues. We're going to cause all these other things because this is not getting your attention. So we got to be louder. And that's when we start to, you know, sometimes it's a health issue, sometimes it's a relationship issue. Like, for me, my marriage almost fell apart. And that was like the red flag for me where I was like, oh, I got to start paying attention now. And that really, really shifted. Okay, something's got to give. And as Em was saying, when we're in a freeze state, freeze is inviting us to really look and look with a wider. A wider view and say, okay, what have I been avoiding? Because clearly we've been avoiding the body sickness, knowing something. Yeah, we have not been listening to the body at all.
- [28:13]
A
Avoidance queen over here.
- [28:15]
C
Yeah, right, sure.
- [28:16]
B
But then where are we avoiding what's actually going on in our life? The little things in our marriage or relationship that haven't been. Been working. The things, you know, maybe we're living in an environment that we're not happy with. Like, we're not listening to the grief that we never felt because that member of our family died. Like, we have been so trained to ignore our humanness for the sake of productivity. That guaranteed 99% of people are ignoring something. And it's big. And when we give space for that, it starts to create space for that to move. And sometimes it's hard, sometimes it's heavy. It usually is. But the minute we allow ourselves. Ourselves to feel what we haven't been feeling, we actually give our body the space and the rest it needs because the body's also been spending all this energy trying to avoid. And so that's a quick way. It's not quick, but it's an easy way. Easy.
- [29:05]
C
It's a practice. So it can be quick in the sense of having it as a practice. But in terms of the actual transition from being on this track that we were all on into, like, the more integrated place, like, that isn't necessarily Quick. And again, it makes sense because for most of us, even the, the numbness or the avoid students, it's not even conscious. That's the thing. It's like you're probably not even sitting here thinking, oh, there's a thing I'm avoiding. And that's why we're talking about these red flags. Right. Because it gives you the insight of, oh, this is how that's showing up as the insight versus an actual conscious experience. Because none of us, I mean, I know specifically more us because we talk about this, but I know you as well. We weren't aware that there was all this, we weren't feeling that there was all of this that we weren't doing. Right.
- [29:46]
B
It took me because we were so well practiced at stuffing things down, down well.
- [29:49]
C
And it was just, that's going to.
- [29:51]
A
Get in the way and have the.
- [29:52]
C
Skill set to actually like really also be with it because it is, it is a process and it can be a lot and it can be uncomfortable. Right. And so. And it's also the gateway, it's the gateway to everything that we're talking about here.
- [30:04]
B
Well, and that's the key piece, I think a lot of people get wrong about nervous system regulation because it's so buzzy right now. Like, oh, nervous system. Yes. It's about relaxation. Yes. It's about learning how to regulate. But the second part is actually learning how to feel the un felt, learning how to feel the experience and the wave of what it means to be human. And a lot of women are not practiced in that. We actually, you know, humans. Yeah. Especially high achieving women. We have a story of like, I don't have time to feel sad. Like, I don't like, no, I'll feel all that later. But that is the access point to all of our aliveness, all of our joy, all of the happiness, all that fulfillment that we're searching for in like the next launch or the, you know, the next big paycheck. It's really, we're searching for more of ourselves. We want to bring more of ourselves online. And how we do that is we have, have to feel more of ourselves. And so that is a journey that again for us was a, a long journey because we didn't know, we didn't know how to do that. But that's what we help women do now is like learning how to come back home to the unique experience of what it means to be them in their body. Not from a conceptual, intellectual standpoint, like, yes, understand your traumas and all the.
- [31:09]
C
Things we did that for 10 years before we got back into our bodies.
- [31:12]
B
Ages, Ages.
- [31:14]
C
Oh, I've done the work. Work like we thought we had done the work. I know, I'm aware of it.
- [31:19]
B
But does our body change?
- [31:20]
C
Does your life feel different?
- [31:21]
B
You know, and that's the thing.
- [31:23]
A
Yeah. And for me, I know too. When we talk about, in this episode, we're really talking about these women who feel like, well, I have just more capacity. And I know for me that was actually a bypass. Because when I talk about the things I was avoiding, like my whole life came crashing down in those 12 months because I stopped avoiding them. And what I realized was, was I would use my capacity as an excuse. So if I was in a hard professional situation and someone had a really big emotional reaction, the thing I would tell myself is, do you know what? I have enough capacity to hold their emotions. I don't need to bring mine into it. I'll just appease. We'll sweep it under the rug. We'll keep moving on. Like I can do my own work separately.
- [32:03]
B
Yeah.
- [32:03]
A
Or there would be, you know, if me and Steven were dealing with something and it felt like things were like the Lord was really uneven. I would tell myself, you know what, you have more capacity, you take it on. It's not a big deal. Like it's going to stress him out more. You take it on. And that excuse showed up in every single area of my life. And I just kept telling myself, well, you have more capacity and so why don't you just take it on like you can do it. But what I didn't realize was all of that was being stuffed somewhere. And for me, it was, it was starting to show up as resentment.
- [32:33]
C
I was going to say, yeah, I was like, how was your, how are your levels of resentment? It was resent.
- [32:37]
A
It was resentment where I thought that I was doing the work, quote, unquote. I'll bring this up with my therapist on Monday. But I wasn't dealing with it because when you are, are leaving things unsaid or when you are operating in a way that feels just. It just doesn't feel right to you.
- [32:52]
C
Yeah.
- [32:53]
A
You are building resentment.
- [32:54]
C
Yeah. It's like abandonment.
- [32:55]
A
And I think that's such a big thing for high performing women who have quote unquote, high capacity. The resent underneath that capacity is real and it will eat you alive.
- [33:04]
C
Oh, yeah.
- [33:05]
B
But again, it comes back to like you had a nervous system pattern. Me too. So relate of if I do it, then I can control it, then I can feel safe. So then we just do it even though we're mad about doing it, even though we're frustrated because we feel like nobody else is doing it. But actually to stop that pattern, we have to heal the pattern in the body that says, I don't feel safe unless I'm doing it, unless I'm in control. And so that was a huge thing that came up in my marriage too, where it's like, I'll just do it because I can, and I can do it faster. I can do it better. Right? That was. Yeah, that was my story. I could do it better.
- [33:36]
C
Cue every woman agreeing with right now.
- [33:39]
B
Totally handled it, but recognizing like, oh, I actually wasn't giving him space to do these things because my need to feel safe and in control was actually trumping unconsciously the ability for him to step in and try anything. And so this is where a lot of women come in and go, I want my man to lead in the relationship. And it's like oftentimes we're not creating any space for that to happen. Then we're mad about it.
- [34:01]
C
Yeah.
- [34:01]
B
So big.
- [34:02]
A
So, okay, for the woman listening who's like nodding along and, and is listening, what's the one thing we can leave them with? Today is just a starting point. Like we're going to be talking to them every single day this week. But the starting point, I feel like this episode hopefully is starting to open the door. Put the door in front of them.
- [34:19]
C
Yeah, yeah. Yes. So. So just kind of looping back on what I shared before. It's realizing again like that even the little nods are feeling called out right now. Those little pieces that they're seeing, the, like where they're getting hooked in. Like we have the saying the activation is the invitation. So instead of trying to push past like the way the symptoms that are showing up in your life right now really starting to kind of go, okay, like this is an invitation. Actually starting to see the beauty of this. You just said, you know, that 12 months that burnt your life down in the 12 months after. But like, I'm sure you wouldn't take that back. Right. For what you have now. Right, exactly. So it's like while it was hell, while it didn't feel like what you wanted to choose, it was your invitation, it was your initiation into this new way. And so starting to really. Because again, we have high performing women want to fix, we want to get through. We've got a problem to solve. We're really patterned in that. So really seeing that what's showing up in your life right now is a beautiful invitation. And so if you can just really soften into seeing that and just giving it a bit of space to, to, to just kind of open to it, like, all right, like here's this anxiety that's really freaking prison. Here's this overwhelm that's really present. Okay, can I give it some space? Can I not make it a problem I'm trying to fix and really see this as a part of the initiation. And we're obviously going to continue to dive into that. But just that alone start. Starts to soften us and gives us a moment to. All right, trying to fix anything. I'm not trying to get anywhere this. There is some beauty and some magic in what's showing up here.
- [35:42]
B
Yeah, that awareness will change your life. It really will. Because again, the high performing woman is always looking for the solution and she's trying to get out of whatever she perceives is in the way of more productivity. Right. And so when we start to see these symptoms of overwhelm anxiety, constantly feeling that push of urgency as, hey, this is actually an invitation to get us more productive. But we have to look at things a little differently. So that's huge. And then a second piece you can add is a quick regulation tool. So anything when you're feeling that up energy, that mobilization, we want to bring the energy down and down, regulate. So this could be havening. Havening is like rubbing your hands together and just bringing that warmth to your body and just giving your body like, it's okay, I am safe, I am here. I can slow down, I can take a breath. You could go for a walk, you can take a shower. Everybody's got different techniques, techniques. Trust yourself. You can't get it wrong. As long as you feel like, wow, that's what we're looking for. And the pause is enough. So, you know, I hear women out there already going, I don't have time for a walk. I don't have time for this. The pause is enough. If you take a double inhale, extended exhale that took three seconds, that pause is enough to interrupt the pattern of the body, that it's okay to stay in the survival loop. When we interrupt, we say it's not okay. I'm actually aware of the survival loop and I'm coming out of it right now and I'm going to take a moment. Then you can go right back to writing those emails, right back to planning the launch. But give your body the pause. That's how we start to break the cycle.
- [37:07]
C
And for anyone that's Just saying like, oh my God, that sounds so simple. It's not going to work. It's not going to move any dial. Like all of this is also like a practice. Like the more consistently that we notice that we're like again that we're being invited into a moment like that the dysregulation isn't that I need to spend another half an hour at my desk because I've got to get this done before the thing. Like when we start to notice that that's our pattern again, when we stop and realize, oh, this isn't that I just have get this task done. This is an invitation to me, for me to notice that I'm disregulated, that I'm going into my pattern of, you know, whatever my pattern is. Okay. Because the more and more and more that we do that as a practice, the more and more and more the pattern slowly starts to fade and that we have more capacity for actually bringing our best self to everything. So whilst it may sound, you know, again, especially because everything right now is about the nervous system and somatics and embodiment, it's becoming such a buzz that it can be easy to kind of just discount anything that we're saying. But these simple ends, obviously deeper work to it. But just these small pieces, if you make them a commitment and a practice, it will fundamentally change your experience of your life. Guarantee.
- [38:07]
A
Yeah. And I, and I think with high performing women especially, we're used to things being intense, we're used to things being hard.
- [38:14]
B
Should it be harder?
- [38:15]
A
Yeah, exactly. Maybe that's also the invitation of it actually probably isn't as hard. I mean, I know for me the biggest breakthrough I had, and there was all the deep work and all the stuff, but the biggest breakthrough I had was I just stopped fighting it.
- [38:28]
C
Yeah.
- [38:28]
A
And that was it.
- [38:30]
C
Exactly.
- [38:30]
A
That was the thing that got me to walk through the door and I was like, oh, shit, now the work begins. But that was the hardest thing I had to do, was stop fighting it. And so sometimes when I used to be being hard, maybe it actually is us being used to it, not because it needs to be that way.
- [38:45]
C
Well, and also because a lot of this work is also inviting us into a new way to woman, essentially. And so when we're trying to come out at this new way from the old way, that's a part of the breakdown. It's a part of actually what we're being initiated into is this newer way which can be fuller, can be easier, can be more spacious, can be all of these pieces. But the invitation and the initiation into that is that we can't get there from how we've done everything before. Right. Trying to fix, trying to get through, trying to bring the old approach into the new way of being. So that's why like even just approaching this from, okay, I'm not trying to like get through or do this thing, it's like, ah, part of the initiation is cultivating a different way of approaching.
- [39:24]
B
Yeah. And being everything that's showing up.
- [39:27]
A
If today's episode really hit close to home, if you find yourself nodding, recognizing patterns or just feeling seen, then you're going to want to join us for something we have created specifically for you. It is called Soft Success and It is the 60 minute masterclass we are hosting for high achieving women who are ready to lead live and succeed in a completely different way. One that is rooted in nervous system safety, alignment and actual joy, not performance and pressure. We're going walk you through the deeper frameworks behind everything we've talked about in this series so you can stop operating from survival and start building success that actually feels good in your body. So it's happening live and you can register right now at boss.comforward/softsuccess. Come join us. I promise you will never want to build the old way again. We'll see you there. Wait, wait, wait. Before you go, I would love to send you my 7 figure CEO operating system completely free as a gift. All you've got to do is leave us a review on this podcast because it really supports the growth of this show. This is my digital masterclass where I'll show you what my freedom based daily, weekly and monthly schedule looks like as an eight figure CEO mama and high performer. And I'll walk you through step by step how to create this video yourself. It includes a full video training from me and a plug and play spreadsheet to literally create your own operating system. It's one of our best trainings and it's worth $1,997. But I will unlock access for you for free when you leave us a review. I know, wild right? All you have to do is leave your review on the podcast, take a screenshot of it and then head over to bossbab.comreview to upload it and then you'll get instant access to the seven figure CEO operator system. Again, head over to bossbab.comreview to upload your screenshot and get access. We are so, so grateful for all of your support and can't wait to hear how the podcast has supported you.