In this week’s episode of Lessons from a Quitter, I share Week 3 of my Burnout Breakthrough Accelerator. This session focuses on one of the biggest obstacles to rest and balance: guilt. We explore how guilt—often rooted in cultural, societal, or workplace expectations—keeps us trapped in burnout, pushing us to overwork, people-please, and ignore our own needs. I walk through how guilt feeds into shame, why it’s used as a tool of control, and how to separate cultural norms from your own values. You’ll learn practical strategies to redefine your beliefs and finally let go of unnecessary guilt.
Ep. 375: Burnout Breakthrough Week 3
Ep. 375
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Burnout Breakthrough Week 3
[00:00:00] Hello my friends, and welcome to another episode. I'm so excited to have you Here we are in the process of. Going through my Burnout breakthrough accelerator that I originally put on for my students in the Quitter Club, my paid membership, I figured I would bring it to the podcast. If you are listening to this episode, then you have missed a couple.
You can go back and listen to those. But we will continue every week to play one of the classes that will teach you a pillar of, getting out of burnout, right? A skill that you need in order to take back your life and have a little bit more time and joy and control. We'll go through all six weeks and you don't have to master all of them, you don't have to know all of them, you don't have to apply all of them, but you can pick up one or two skills that will help alleviate a lot of the pressure that we all tend to put on ourselves.
So I hope you enjoy this. We're gonna jump in and continue with our burnout Breakthrough [00:01:00] Accelerator.
Hello my friends. Welcome to week three of our burnout Breakthrough Accelerator. Uh, I'm so excited to have you guys here. We're gonna jump right in if you have missed the first two weeks. No worries. Also, all of these, uh, lessons are good lessons independently. You can just jump in. There's no like.
You don't need to, you know, beat yourself up for being behind or starting at the beginning. Like you could just do it from wherever you jump in and then you can go back and watch the replays or listen to the call recording. I think that's it. And then I already said I put the worksheet, if you wanna, worksheet that goes along with what the questions I ask in, in the class.
You can get that in, um, the community. I drop it in there after each call. Okay. So week three. I decided this week, I kind of shifted things around because I knew that the question that was gonna come up as we go into the, like even with the, what we've done in the [00:02:00] last two weeks, which is like changing our impossible standards and ruthlessly kind of.
You know, culling our to-do list and purging all of the things that we need to do. That the number one thing that's gonna come up for you is gonna be guilt, the guilt of not doing all of these things that you think you should be doing or that people have told you you should be doing. And as we go into the next couple of weeks, and it's sort of more of that, of things to say no to, of putting up boundaries of, um, finding time for.
Even joy, the stuff that you want to do. What stops a lot of us is the feeling of guilt. Just as a quick aside, like I, I posted on social media that I just made, like the random decision that I'm not gonna work Fridays and Mondays, and I, I'll do a podcast episode about it, about how it came about, but this was, this last weekend was like the first weekend I decided not to do it.
It was so fascinating watching [00:03:00] my brain. It was so interesting. Like I teach all this stuff. I've done it for years. I've settled my nervous system to a certain extent, I have a lot of the thoughts that I need to kind of get myself and I just watched my brain constantly be like, okay, but let's just do a little bit.
Let's just get started. We're kind of, in momentum if we stop now, we're gonna lose it. We're not gonna wanna do it next week or whatever. It was like just this, almost like pleading of like, okay, but just organize the house then so that at least you kind of did some, this is useful, you know?
And I was just watching like the I, the guilt I was starting to lay on myself about like. Well, you're sort of wasting this time or you're not really doing something that you sh that would make it worthwhile. And so it was fascinating for me to watch, like, it sounds like this beautiful thing.
Like of course we'd love to have more days off, but when we immediately start ruining it with to-dos and then with feeling guilt and thinking we should do more, it's why so many of us. Don't even get to enjoy our vacations or [00:04:00] our weekends or our nights off, because there's the constant pressure of like, even if you're physically forcing yourself to not do anything, like you're telling yourself you're gonna rest, if you can't shut off that guilt that your brain is laying on you, it's gonna be extremely hard to enjoy it.
So today the topic is gonna be letting go of that guilt. Okay. So. The thing is, is that for a lot of us, like what I want you to understand is that shame is a very, very effective tool at controlling people. Okay? It's like one of the best tools to get people to do what you want them to do without having to physically force them.
And so for a society, it's a very powerful tool. Tool to get. Hoards and hoards of people to act the way you want them to act. Right? And guilt is kind of the gateway drug to [00:05:00] shame. So guilt might be, oh, I feel bad because I didn't do X, Y, and Z. And then that translates to, I am bad. Because I don't do X, Y, and Z, right?
I feel bad that I didn't organize the house. I am a bad mom because my house never is picked up and people are gonna come in and think I'm a mess. Do you see how like it sort of leaves, it might start a little innocuous, like, oh, I really feel bad. I should have gone and had lunch with my mom when she wanted it to.
I'm a bad daughter, right? And when I feel like I'm a bad daughter or I feel like I'm a bad mother or a bad employee, or a bad. Whatever, then I will fall in line. I will get myself to act accordingly to like, okay, I should answer my mom's calls every time. I should do the thing that she says, I should show up at work early.
I should stay late. I should, you know, all this stuff. 'cause I'm outrunning this thought. I don't wanna feel like a bad daughter. I don't wanna feel like a bad mom. I don't wanna feel like a bad employee. So I'm gonna get myself in gear to [00:06:00] do the things I need to do in order to not feel like that. Okay. And so.
One of the things that we're gonna work on is just really trying to deal with the guilt before it even gets to shame. I mean, a lot of it's already become a shame, but we'll work on that as well. But I want you to see that shame is a tool that has been used by religion, by the patriarchy, by capitalism, right, by our culture, to keep us all in control of what culture says is appropriate or what culture wants us to do now.
The way I want you to think about it is like there are a set of cultural norms, cultural things that culture deems right or wrong, okay? But there's also your values, okay? There's also what you deem right and wrong, and that's what we really wanna focus in on, is like, what do I deem is correct or incorrect in this situation?
Because I think we lose that a lot of times. 'cause we just go with what culture says. And when you [00:07:00] get more focused on what you think, then that is the only time that you are, you will. Create enough power for yourself to go against what culture thinks, which is really difficult 'cause everybody else is going along with it.
So you're going against the grain, which is just notoriously hard for humans. Like we are tribal beings. There's a lot to be said about cultural norms and wanting to fit in and being in community. But there's also a lot to be said, to be able to be your own individual person and understand what it is you want for your life.
So that's what we're gonna sort of talk about is how do you differentiate between the two? And I want you to understand before we get into this, it's very kind of obvious when you look at history or you look at other cultures that all of our values are completely made up. They're. Literally just made up.
And that's not to say that that's right or wrong, and they constantly evolve, but it is clear to see, like you may look at another culture and let's say in another culture they might have some kind of value. They might say like, okay showing your hair as a [00:08:00] woman is bad. Right.
You don't have that value likely, and so you, it might be hard to understand like, why would it be bad to show my hair? Right. But in that culture, it's so steeped that it's like this is that people feel shame if somebody sees them with, you know, their hair showing, it might be that, um. Maybe in your culture, we all grew up before it might have been like sex before marriage is bad, right?
You, you're a whore, you're slut, you're, whatever it is. And we would create these, this kind of cult purity culture that led to a lot of problems. And we've seen that, like for a lot of us, like we've sort of shifted our mindset on that, right? There's not really this idea of like, you wait until you get married, no one's getting married at 18 anymore.
Another value used to be like, yeah, you were, people were called spinsters if they didn't get married by 25. That's absurd to a lot of us at this point. Right. And it's also like crazy that we would think that like women didn't have value after 25. Like it's such an absurd value, but that was a value, right?
For a very long time. Obviously I could go on and on. Like, you know, [00:09:00] child abuse used to be good, used to be seen as good. Like maybe they didn't call it abuse, but there's a lot of like, you know, spare the rod, spoil the child. There was a lot of ideas that like children should be beat in order to fall in line that is no longer luckily a value that we all hold.
We can go on and on. If you look at like. Racism, sexism. There's just tons and tons of things that we used to think were morally acceptable or good, and they're not. I say all these to say, those might be very obvious outlier, kind of like, you can tell, like of course that's not true, but it's the same with very minute, like examples of values or, or certain things that.
Certain things that maybe we even kind of understand intellectually that is outdated. That's not really a value we wanna hold, but we've internalized it. So we may not think that, women are spinsters if they don't get married by 25, but we [00:10:00] sure as hell do still have the belief that like.
Women's entire worth is in how they can serve other people. We don't explicitly say it, but like that's really the crux of all a patriarchy. And so, so many women are raised to just be these people pleasing, like, selfless people that just give and give and give to everybody around them. And so, so many of us fall in line with that value, even though like we can see that it's problematic, like we can understand right, that it is a problematic thing and yet.
It sort of becomes an adopted belief for us. And so one of the things we're gonna try to do right now is like, question every belief to really understand, is this something I wanna keep holding onto? Is this something I want for my future? So a lot of the beliefs that we talk about with respect to like burnout come from beliefs of like capitalism and hustle culture and, you know, religion.
Uh, again, like controlling people. It is a lot of like, how [00:11:00] hard you work, like work hard, play hard, and all of these beliefs that like hard work is akin to godliness and is like people that work hard are be better or, people that are lazy are, you know, we have so many like terrible things about how people are constantly trying to take advantage of the system and they're just lazy and they want a handout and all this stuff.
And those negative these negative beliefs around if somebody rests or someone. God forbid is sick or is it has a disability or can't produce in a certain way that our only value is in how much we produce. So of course, a lot of us have internalized that. My value is in how much I produce, and I only get to feel good about myself if I'm productive.
And I only get to feel good about myself if I've done the most I can do, and I've used every moment to whatever, blah, blah, blah. You get it. And so in order to. Change those beliefs. We have to question them and we have to decide whether we're gonna allow [00:12:00] that guilt to continue with us. Okay. And so I'm gonna give you like a little, um, kind of framework that will help you evaluate that.
Okay? So. Had written down, sorry. Like a lot of the values, I'm just gonna go through 'em. You know, like the, you should give 110%, you should give it your all, like when they say jump, I say how high? All of that stuff. Like even if we don't consciously believe it, it has just been ingrained from us, from like school, from when we were children.
And so we have all adopted kind of these beliefs, especially in corporate America. We also have, a lot of us have adopted beliefs of like, you should never. Be a burden in some way. It's like you shouldn't make waves. You shouldn't ask questions. You shouldn't make mistakes. You shouldn't be a burden on people.
You shouldn't ma like inconvenience anyone. Why, like when are we gonna question like, why is that? Why is it that I cannot take up any space and I should never bother anybody [00:13:00] and nobody should ever need to help me, and I should never need help, right? Why? Why did that become the value? And so. We wanna start thinking about like, what are the values that I want to create for myself?
What are the values that I want to live by in my life if I don't wanna live by these, right? Maybe it's that I deserve rest all the time, like every single day my body needs rest. That's how bodies work, right? I'm always learning, which means that I'm always allowed to ask for help or clarification or whatnot, right?
I never have to do it alone. I'm supposed to be in a community, right? My needs matter. I'm not responsible for other people's emotions or other people's lives. Like you get it? There's so many other beautiful values that we can all have, but we have to be conscious of them, and we have to constantly work towards rejecting what we've already kind of been instilled with.
So how I want you to do that is that the next time you're feeling guilty, what I want you to ask yourself is like, where does this belief come from?, What do I think I should be doing right now? Okay. [00:14:00] So as an example, when I took Friday off and my belief was like, I should go through my to-do list for the house, or I should finish up what I was working on.
My, like when I think about like, what do I think I should be doing? I should be finishing work, I should be putting in more time. Where does that belief come from? Why do I believe that? Like, who benefits from that? For me, it might be like, well, capitalism benefits from constantly keeping us productive.
Right? Do, and then I want you to just ask like, does that belief align with who I wanna be, who I wanna become? Because it's gonna feel like shit to go against it for a while, it's gonna feel, it doesn't feel great. It's gonna feel like, ugh I'm, kind of, pushing against. What feels like a rock wall.
Like it's not an easy, like you're pushing a boulder up a hill, right? So it takes work, but you sort of ask yourself like, where did this come from? I'm gonna give you a really quick example of this that you can do kind of in a fast way. The way I like to ask myself. [00:15:00] Now, sometimes I do do this like more in depth and I ask like, where did this come from?
Who does this benefit? Just so I can get an understanding of like, what even is the belief that I have. But oftentimes I just ask myself like. , What part of this does society say is wrong? Okay. And then do I think it's wrong? Do I want to think it's wrong? Like, just those two questions.
So I'm gonna give you an example because I do think guilt. Is not a bad emotion. It's actually a, a great emotion in helping you live towards the values that you want to live with in your life and helping you be a part of a community. I think that we do need community norms. Um, I don't think everyone could just do whatever the hell they want whenever they want, because it, it breaks down the fabric of a community, but you have to sort of ask like, what is the role I wanna play in this community?
How do I want to be in this? And so, for instance, for me. Let's say I hit my child. Okay. If I get really [00:16:00] angry and I lose my temper and I happen to hit my kid. Okay. What part of this does society say is that? Well, society has sort of agreed that like children don't have the cognitive abilities to understand what they're doing, and so they don't deserve to be like physically punished.
When they are sort of learning by making mistakes, right? And so hitting children, especially when like our strength and size is so much bigger than them, is not an appropriate response from an adult who should be able to manage their own emotions. Okay? So that is society's belief. That is also my belief.
I want that to be my belief, like of course it's all made up. I could choose not to. I can choose to decide. Like, no, I think kids need physical punishment because they don't understand enough and they need to learn. That's. Fine. That could be your belief. That could be anybody's belief. I personally, for my life, want to believe that I am emotionally regulated enough to not get to the point where I have to hit my child and that I can use other tactics to get them to understand.
Okay, [00:17:00] so if That's not to say I'm gonna be perfect all the time. It's not to say I'm not gonna do things against my own values, I always will. Not in this situation, but I'm just saying like there's always gonna be times where I want to act a certain way and I don't act that way. So that's where guilt is actually a really good thing.
I should feel guilty. I want to feel guilty because it helps me correct for the next time. Right? It helps me hopefully reflect and be like, what the hell happened? Why did I lose it? And hopefully it can even help me to repair and go and apologize and tell my child that like, that's not how I wanna act. I shouldn't have done that.
I got upset because of X, Y, and Z, but like, I'm not gonna do that again or whatnot. That's a beautiful example of guilt working the way it should work, right? Now in another situation, let's say like a good example of this is that society might. Create a rule that says jaywalking is wrong, right? Jaywalking is bad.
You can get a ticket if you jaywalk. Okay? Now, the reason for that rule is to probably save pedestrians [00:18:00] lives and to like, not cause traffic accidents and stuff. So society has decided that like if we live in cities and there's kind of a lot happening, it is just we need everybody to comply with the fact that you cannot just cross at any point in the middle of the street if you want.
Okay. Totally fine rule. I, it's not like a personal value of mine that I think I'm doing something wrong. If I cross the street right, I likely won't feel guilty if I cross the street that doesn't have a light up, right? If I don't cause an accident, maybe I would feel guilty if I crossed an accident, but I think on the most part I'm just like, yeah.
Okay. I get why society wants this, but like I don't really care. Like I need to get to the other side, so I'm just gonna cross the street. I'm not gonna feel guilty. So you sort of wanna think about it in this way, like what is society saying is wrong and do I think it's wrong to do this right? Even if I understand why society is saying this.
And so I want you to like ask yourself that question all the time. [00:19:00] Ruthlessly, whenever in the beginning you're gonna feel guilty. Most of us feel guilty all the time. I used to have a girlfriend that used to introduce me and say, this is goalie. She'll do anything you want. 'cause she feels guilty all the time.
Not the best way to be known as, but here we are, my friends. So like for an example, let's say your mom, like we were just talking about, your mom calls and wants you to come over for lunch. And you don't wanna go, right? Society might tell you, and your culture might tell you, right? Your society, the culture you grew up up in, might tell you that you should always say yes, you should always be available for your mother or for your family, right?
It's your duty as a child, daughter, son, to be there for them when they wanna see you. Okay? You have to ask yourself, is that what I want? Is that the belief I want? Or am I allowed to think like, no, I'm allowed to have my own needs as well. I would love to be able to see my family and decide when my needs matter a little more.
Like that's how I wanna live my life. I'm no [00:20:00] longer gonna feel guilty. Like I get that they're upset and we're gonna work on this next week. I get that they're gonna have negative emotions. This is the part that I think is hard, is that. We wanna not feel guilty, but we want other people to also not be upset or not be mad or not have emotions.
And you don't control that. You will never control how they feel. So like your mom is allowed to be upset, she's an adult. She can handle her own emotions. You don't need to manipulate that. You don't need to control it. It's not your duty to do that. It's one of the reasons why so many people are so burned out is because they're trying to control everybody else's emotions.
And that's just a recipe for disaster. So you have to let them have their emotion and know that you still didn't do anything wrong under your value system, that you're allowed to have your own needs matter, right? You're allowed to, you're. Decide what you want. Let's say another example is like, this is what I always hear.
Actually, this one, [00:21:00] like I feel like I coach all the time. People don't say it in this way, but like they'll say like, well, my boss expects me to work late at night or to answer my emails. Okay, okay. That's what society has said, like that's what your boss think. That you should give 110%. You should give everything.
What do you wanna do? Like you also get a choice in this, right? So if you give into that and think like, yeah, it means they hate me or that I'm not as good of an employee, or yeah, like there might be consequences. Maybe I this ist a place for me to work. Instead of like taking in that stock. A lot of times we just give in because it's like, well, this is what they expect, this is what they want.
What do you want? You get to decide like, well, they don't own my own whole life. My value is that my job is a transactional relationship and they pay me for the hours that I work, and that's it. And again, it's okay if they're gonna be [00:22:00] upset, and it's okay if this doesn't even work out because then I don't need to work here.
But I don't need to feel guilty for not working at seven, at eight, at nine o'clock at night. I don't need to feel guilty for not responding to their emails. They'll get my email the next day when I'm paid to be at work. I'm not paid to be at work right now. You get it? So the whole question that I want you to start asking yourself when you say like, oh, but I feel guilty if I don't, pick up the house every day, or I feel guilty if I don't put my kids in a bunch of camps.
Or take them to a, you know, drive them around to a bunch of like sporting events or, okay, ask yourself why. Like, what, who benefited from that? Why does society create this value? And do you wanna keep that value? Is that a value of yours? Is that a value of the person that you wanna become? If it's not, then you have nothing to feel guilty about.
It's just simply a mismatch of value systems, and that's okay. We all get to have different values. Like going back to the [00:23:00] example like again, this is, I, I just create this like stark example just so you can see it. 'cause I think it's harder when it's on like a nuanced example for you when it's close to you.
But like if I don't believe that I need to cover my hair, somebody else might think I might be in a society or around people that might think it is wrong for me to show my hair. I don't have to feel guilty about that though. I don't have to change their beliefs. I don't have to get them to see that it's okay for me to show my hair, but I also don't have to feel guilty about it.
I also get to decide like, no, that's not the value I hold. I'm okay with it and I get to live my life based on my values. Right. Okay. I think you get the point. Any questions? I'm gonna read this. Comment first. Kind of like how Gen Z right now does not value the same work ethics as millennials. They actually value self-care and balance more than impressing their employer.
So overworking themselves and sacrificing too much of themselves or li or their lives. I started off being mostly offended by [00:24:00] that view, but as time has passed, I'm kind of leaning way more to on that side of the fence. They have a point that is the perfect example. I love this example because I love, here's one of the things I actually love about social media.
There's a lot of things to, um, hate about it, and I think we talk a lot about all of the bad things. But one of the really good things about social media is this, that sort of fringe ideas or values or things like over time when you get exposed to it or you see other people do it, it starts helping you kind of change your own values.
It starts helping you see like, huh. Maybe they, they're onto something which is sort of like, this is a tale as old as time. This is how all of society has always ran, is that every generation moves our cultural norms. A little further. I don't wanna say like, in a certain direction, but like, it changes them.
So, you know, people that had cultural values in the fifties do not have the same values that people in the [00:25:00] seventies who were in the nineties, who it's always that way. Right. Which is fantastic because it also does help our values evolve towards the kind of society we wanna live in. And so this, a perfect example of this is that this always happens.
As soon as somebody has like an, you know, starts embodying a different set of values than the generation before, there's always backlash. There's always like, Ugh, these kids are so lazy. These kids don't wanna work. These kids, nobody has any work ethic anymore, blah, blah, blah. And so many of us. Really wanna hold on.
'cause we think the way we did it was right. And it's not to say that there isn't some value in that. Sure. There's value in being like having the work ethic of like a millennials, but then that's why so many millennials are burned out, right? So it's like this generation is like, yeah, we don't want that.
And we're not gonna give into this bullshit standard. Right? The same thing we were talking about like the whole like sex before marriage or that kind of stuff, like sexual promiscuity, right? There was like a generation before that was like, no, this is the way it has to be. You can't have sex before you get married.
Of course, they [00:26:00] railed against like people having kind of sexual liberation and women basically taking control of their own bodies and all this stuff. But we can see like as we moved on, like, well, thank God that a new generation came in and was like, this is insane. Why are we living like this? Why are we accepting women to these like standards?
Right? So yes, it's exactly like what is happening. And I love being on TikTok and seeing more people talk about like resting and not giving more than what they're paid for and, uh, taking their lunch breaks and doing all these things. And it's funny how these are like very radical ideas. And it's truly just like allowing themselves to just like be humans.
But I think that there, that is exactly. The point of this is that there are things that you're gonna hold onto because you were programmed with it, even if you don't consciously believe it, even if you don't. Culturally, like I think a lot of us, like with our prefrontal cortex, like with our conscious mind, we are like, yeah, I think you know, women.[00:27:00]
Should be able to do whatever they want with their time and their life and their money, and I think women should. Don't need a man and whatever. You can have all of these beliefs that you probably deeply believe, but then you still likely have a lot of beliefs from patriarchy. Right? Because it's just is, it's in the like air that we breathe.
Like there's so many messaging. There's so much messaging. And so there's still so many women who still think that like the number one goal in their life should be to get married and to have someone basically pick them and to be this like, you know, because it is just how we've sort of been culturally raised to believe that that is like.
The pinnacle of a woman's life or whatnot, or that you still have to like work twice as hard as everybody else and constantly be of service to people. And if you're not of service to people, then how are you it really valuable? Like even though you may not consciously believe that, that thought, it becomes so ingrained in you that like when you are not of value to people, you start feeling guilty.
And so you wanna just like find where that guilt comes up. I actually think guilt, while we all hate feeling it, I think is a really beautiful, um. [00:28:00] Signal a really beautiful arrow as to like a belief system that you have. And so it'll help you see uncover. What do, why do I feel like what I'm, that I should be doing something else?
What is it that I think I should be doing? Where did that belief come from? And I think it can help you open your eyes to a lot of what is driving your behavior that you may not even be conscious of, that you may not even understand. And so I think your guilt is a really good thing to pay attention to.
Like, why do I feel guilty about this when I, you know, like I, for me, it's like this week, like of course I believe that I should be able to take the time off that I want, or that if I can get my work done in three days, like why do I care that I'm not doing it for five days, I don't work for someone else or whatnot.
But I know deep down there's just these belief systems that were so instilled in me that I still have to chip away at that I still have to work at. Okay, so that's the assignment today.
But I want you to just think of it in this way. I want you to go about your life, and I want you to, like, when you feel guilty, just ask yourself, what does society [00:29:00] say is wrong here? And do I think it's wrong? And if you don't, then I want you to like actively work on letting go of that guilt of understanding that guilt is someone else's, that other people can still be upset and think that it's wrong that you're doing, but like you can feel really proud of like creating your own values, creating your own morals that you wanna live by, creating a life that you want.
I can't emphasize this enough. You cannot have the life you want and make everybody else happy at the same time. You cannot have a life that you love that nobody else has a thought about. If you wanna rest more, there's gonna be people that judge you. If you want to take more time off, there's gonna be people that judge you, you know, if you want to.
Whatever. It's gonna be like, it's under understanding that like, I just need to be on board. Other people can have the thoughts they want. Suggestions for letting go, just practicing new thoughts or other things? Great question. I think that in the beginning it's gonna be hard to let [00:30:00] go and that's okay.
So a lot of what happened for me, like this week, this weekend when I was look like watching this guilt come up, what I mean by letting it go is that I, I don't try to change, I don't change what I'm doing. So like when I told myself I'm not gonna work, and then I started feeling guilty, I didn't allow the guilt to like drive me into action.
So I would let it just be there. I'd be like, ah it's gonna feel like shit in the beginning. Resting feels like crap. That's why we don't do it because it, it feels like so terrible to you 'cause your brain is screaming the whole time. But I just forced myself to just do it. I'm like, no, we've decided that we're gonna lay here and read a book for an hour.
So that's what we're gonna do. Even if it's like I'm distracted half the time and I can't really get into it 'cause I'm getting my nervous system like used to feeling safe like nothing happened. It was fine. We read for an hour. And you know, the house didn't collapse. And so the next week when I do it, it becomes easier and it becomes easier and it becomes easier.
So part of letting go is just like doing the thing that you said you were gonna do, even if you have this feeling of guilt. 'cause I think a lot of times what [00:31:00] happens right now is like, uhoh, I feel guilty. This means I should change something. Like, I have this feeling, this means I should change my behavior and we change our behavior.
And so the first step might just be, don't change the behavior. Just let the feeling be there, right? Let the feeling come up. Let it and then the more you do practice that thought of like, I'm allowed to rest. I'm allowed to take the day off. I'm allowed to let my house be a mess. I'm allowed to not play with my kids when I'm tired and I don't wanna play.
Practicing that thought will start creating that belief. So it'll start help like to, to dissipate the guilt. You might feel guilty in the beginning still, but you're gonna keep practicing that thought so that it becomes more automatic. Like the next time you, wanna rest and you're feeling guilty, it's like you, you go to this ladder of thought and it starts helping you feel more calm.
So I would suggest going at it that way in the beginning and see you can also process the guilt. Like where does guilt. Reside [00:32:00] in my body. How does it feel? How long does it take to dissipate? , Does it go and come back? Get to know it so you're not afraid of it as much.
And I think that can also help it, you process it faster.
Any other questions before we jump off?
No problem. Um, I hope this helped. Okay. Lizzie's saying this is really helpful, particularly relevant and timely. Thank you. No problem. I actually think it's probably relevant and timely for all of us because I think that so many of us live our lives driven by guilt. Half the things we do is simply because we feel guilty not doing it.
We feel guilty 'cause like my friend invited me so I should go, . I think understanding this tool, and again, that doesn't mean sometimes you are gonna give into it because it's like, Hey, it makes my mom happy and that's okay. And , I wanna make my, it's not to say that you have to be a hundred percent of the time, like I only do what I wanna do.
Like part of building community is gonna be like. I have the energy now, so I'm gonna do it. It's simply that I have that control, that there's times where I can say like, no, [00:33:00] now I don't want to. So it's like, let's practice one time saying no and see how that feels. Says, thank you timely as I started a new job and trying to stick to boundaries.
You got this, , bring that to coaching. I know that that is very difficult. Actually. I think next week we're doing boundaries, so hopefully that will help as well. All right, my friends, I hope this was helpful and I will see you guys later. No, you are the best. Thank you guys. Bye.
[00:00:00] Hello my friends, and welcome to another episode. I'm so excited to have you Here we are in the process of. Going through my Burnout breakthrough accelerator that I originally put on for my students in the Quitter Club, my paid membership, I figured I would bring it to the podcast. If you are listening to this episode, then you have missed a couple.
You can go back and listen to those. But we will continue every week to play one of the classes that will teach you a pillar of, getting out of burnout, right? A skill that you need in order to take back your life and have a little bit more time and joy and control. We'll go through all six weeks and you don't have to master all of them, you don't have to know all of them, you don't have to apply all of them, but you can pick up one or two skills that will help alleviate a lot of the pressure that we all tend to put on ourselves.
So I hope you enjoy this. We're gonna jump in and continue with our burnout Breakthrough [00:01:00] Accelerator.
Hello my friends. Welcome to week three of our burnout Breakthrough Accelerator. Uh, I'm so excited to have you guys here. We're gonna jump right in if you have missed the first two weeks. No worries. Also, all of these, uh, lessons are good lessons independently. You can just jump in. There's no like.
You don't need to, you know, beat yourself up for being behind or starting at the beginning. Like you could just do it from wherever you jump in and then you can go back and watch the replays or listen to the call recording. I think that's it. And then I already said I put the worksheet, if you wanna, worksheet that goes along with what the questions I ask in, in the class.
You can get that in, um, the community. I drop it in there after each call. Okay. So week three. I decided this week, I kind of shifted things around because I knew that the question that was gonna come up as we go into the, like even with the, what we've done in the [00:02:00] last two weeks, which is like changing our impossible standards and ruthlessly kind of.
You know, culling our to-do list and purging all of the things that we need to do. That the number one thing that's gonna come up for you is gonna be guilt, the guilt of not doing all of these things that you think you should be doing or that people have told you you should be doing. And as we go into the next couple of weeks, and it's sort of more of that, of things to say no to, of putting up boundaries of, um, finding time for.
Even joy, the stuff that you want to do. What stops a lot of us is the feeling of guilt. Just as a quick aside, like I, I posted on social media that I just made, like the random decision that I'm not gonna work Fridays and Mondays, and I, I'll do a podcast episode about it, about how it came about, but this was, this last weekend was like the first weekend I decided not to do it.
It was so fascinating watching [00:03:00] my brain. It was so interesting. Like I teach all this stuff. I've done it for years. I've settled my nervous system to a certain extent, I have a lot of the thoughts that I need to kind of get myself and I just watched my brain constantly be like, okay, but let's just do a little bit.
Let's just get started. We're kind of, in momentum if we stop now, we're gonna lose it. We're not gonna wanna do it next week or whatever. It was like just this, almost like pleading of like, okay, but just organize the house then so that at least you kind of did some, this is useful, you know?
And I was just watching like the I, the guilt I was starting to lay on myself about like. Well, you're sort of wasting this time or you're not really doing something that you sh that would make it worthwhile. And so it was fascinating for me to watch, like, it sounds like this beautiful thing.
Like of course we'd love to have more days off, but when we immediately start ruining it with to-dos and then with feeling guilt and thinking we should do more, it's why so many of us. Don't even get to enjoy our vacations or [00:04:00] our weekends or our nights off, because there's the constant pressure of like, even if you're physically forcing yourself to not do anything, like you're telling yourself you're gonna rest, if you can't shut off that guilt that your brain is laying on you, it's gonna be extremely hard to enjoy it.
So today the topic is gonna be letting go of that guilt. Okay. So. The thing is, is that for a lot of us, like what I want you to understand is that shame is a very, very effective tool at controlling people. Okay? It's like one of the best tools to get people to do what you want them to do without having to physically force them.
And so for a society, it's a very powerful tool. Tool to get. Hoards and hoards of people to act the way you want them to act. Right? And guilt is kind of the gateway drug to [00:05:00] shame. So guilt might be, oh, I feel bad because I didn't do X, Y, and Z. And then that translates to, I am bad. Because I don't do X, Y, and Z, right?
I feel bad that I didn't organize the house. I am a bad mom because my house never is picked up and people are gonna come in and think I'm a mess. Do you see how like it sort of leaves, it might start a little innocuous, like, oh, I really feel bad. I should have gone and had lunch with my mom when she wanted it to.
I'm a bad daughter, right? And when I feel like I'm a bad daughter or I feel like I'm a bad mother or a bad employee, or a bad. Whatever, then I will fall in line. I will get myself to act accordingly to like, okay, I should answer my mom's calls every time. I should do the thing that she says, I should show up at work early.
I should stay late. I should, you know, all this stuff. 'cause I'm outrunning this thought. I don't wanna feel like a bad daughter. I don't wanna feel like a bad mom. I don't wanna feel like a bad employee. So I'm gonna get myself in gear to [00:06:00] do the things I need to do in order to not feel like that. Okay. And so.
One of the things that we're gonna work on is just really trying to deal with the guilt before it even gets to shame. I mean, a lot of it's already become a shame, but we'll work on that as well. But I want you to see that shame is a tool that has been used by religion, by the patriarchy, by capitalism, right, by our culture, to keep us all in control of what culture says is appropriate or what culture wants us to do now.
The way I want you to think about it is like there are a set of cultural norms, cultural things that culture deems right or wrong, okay? But there's also your values, okay? There's also what you deem right and wrong, and that's what we really wanna focus in on, is like, what do I deem is correct or incorrect in this situation?
Because I think we lose that a lot of times. 'cause we just go with what culture says. And when you [00:07:00] get more focused on what you think, then that is the only time that you are, you will. Create enough power for yourself to go against what culture thinks, which is really difficult 'cause everybody else is going along with it.
So you're going against the grain, which is just notoriously hard for humans. Like we are tribal beings. There's a lot to be said about cultural norms and wanting to fit in and being in community. But there's also a lot to be said, to be able to be your own individual person and understand what it is you want for your life.
So that's what we're gonna sort of talk about is how do you differentiate between the two? And I want you to understand before we get into this, it's very kind of obvious when you look at history or you look at other cultures that all of our values are completely made up. They're. Literally just made up.
And that's not to say that that's right or wrong, and they constantly evolve, but it is clear to see, like you may look at another culture and let's say in another culture they might have some kind of value. They might say like, okay showing your hair as a [00:08:00] woman is bad. Right.
You don't have that value likely, and so you, it might be hard to understand like, why would it be bad to show my hair? Right. But in that culture, it's so steeped that it's like this is that people feel shame if somebody sees them with, you know, their hair showing, it might be that, um. Maybe in your culture, we all grew up before it might have been like sex before marriage is bad, right?
You, you're a whore, you're slut, you're, whatever it is. And we would create these, this kind of cult purity culture that led to a lot of problems. And we've seen that, like for a lot of us, like we've sort of shifted our mindset on that, right? There's not really this idea of like, you wait until you get married, no one's getting married at 18 anymore.
Another value used to be like, yeah, you were, people were called spinsters if they didn't get married by 25. That's absurd to a lot of us at this point. Right. And it's also like crazy that we would think that like women didn't have value after 25. Like it's such an absurd value, but that was a value, right?
For a very long time. Obviously I could go on and on. Like, you know, [00:09:00] child abuse used to be good, used to be seen as good. Like maybe they didn't call it abuse, but there's a lot of like, you know, spare the rod, spoil the child. There was a lot of ideas that like children should be beat in order to fall in line that is no longer luckily a value that we all hold.
We can go on and on. If you look at like. Racism, sexism. There's just tons and tons of things that we used to think were morally acceptable or good, and they're not. I say all these to say, those might be very obvious outlier, kind of like, you can tell, like of course that's not true, but it's the same with very minute, like examples of values or, or certain things that.
Certain things that maybe we even kind of understand intellectually that is outdated. That's not really a value we wanna hold, but we've internalized it. So we may not think that, women are spinsters if they don't get married by 25, but we [00:10:00] sure as hell do still have the belief that like.
Women's entire worth is in how they can serve other people. We don't explicitly say it, but like that's really the crux of all a patriarchy. And so, so many women are raised to just be these people pleasing, like, selfless people that just give and give and give to everybody around them. And so, so many of us fall in line with that value, even though like we can see that it's problematic, like we can understand right, that it is a problematic thing and yet.
It sort of becomes an adopted belief for us. And so one of the things we're gonna try to do right now is like, question every belief to really understand, is this something I wanna keep holding onto? Is this something I want for my future? So a lot of the beliefs that we talk about with respect to like burnout come from beliefs of like capitalism and hustle culture and, you know, religion.
Uh, again, like controlling people. It is a lot of like, how [00:11:00] hard you work, like work hard, play hard, and all of these beliefs that like hard work is akin to godliness and is like people that work hard are be better or, people that are lazy are, you know, we have so many like terrible things about how people are constantly trying to take advantage of the system and they're just lazy and they want a handout and all this stuff.
And those negative these negative beliefs around if somebody rests or someone. God forbid is sick or is it has a disability or can't produce in a certain way that our only value is in how much we produce. So of course, a lot of us have internalized that. My value is in how much I produce, and I only get to feel good about myself if I'm productive.
And I only get to feel good about myself if I've done the most I can do, and I've used every moment to whatever, blah, blah, blah. You get it. And so in order to. Change those beliefs. We have to question them and we have to decide whether we're gonna allow [00:12:00] that guilt to continue with us. Okay. And so I'm gonna give you like a little, um, kind of framework that will help you evaluate that.
Okay? So. Had written down, sorry. Like a lot of the values, I'm just gonna go through 'em. You know, like the, you should give 110%, you should give it your all, like when they say jump, I say how high? All of that stuff. Like even if we don't consciously believe it, it has just been ingrained from us, from like school, from when we were children.
And so we have all adopted kind of these beliefs, especially in corporate America. We also have, a lot of us have adopted beliefs of like, you should never. Be a burden in some way. It's like you shouldn't make waves. You shouldn't ask questions. You shouldn't make mistakes. You shouldn't be a burden on people.
You shouldn't ma like inconvenience anyone. Why, like when are we gonna question like, why is that? Why is it that I cannot take up any space and I should never bother anybody [00:13:00] and nobody should ever need to help me, and I should never need help, right? Why? Why did that become the value? And so. We wanna start thinking about like, what are the values that I want to create for myself?
What are the values that I want to live by in my life if I don't wanna live by these, right? Maybe it's that I deserve rest all the time, like every single day my body needs rest. That's how bodies work, right? I'm always learning, which means that I'm always allowed to ask for help or clarification or whatnot, right?
I never have to do it alone. I'm supposed to be in a community, right? My needs matter. I'm not responsible for other people's emotions or other people's lives. Like you get it? There's so many other beautiful values that we can all have, but we have to be conscious of them, and we have to constantly work towards rejecting what we've already kind of been instilled with.
So how I want you to do that is that the next time you're feeling guilty, what I want you to ask yourself is like, where does this belief come from?, What do I think I should be doing right now? Okay. [00:14:00] So as an example, when I took Friday off and my belief was like, I should go through my to-do list for the house, or I should finish up what I was working on.
My, like when I think about like, what do I think I should be doing? I should be finishing work, I should be putting in more time. Where does that belief come from? Why do I believe that? Like, who benefits from that? For me, it might be like, well, capitalism benefits from constantly keeping us productive.
Right? Do, and then I want you to just ask like, does that belief align with who I wanna be, who I wanna become? Because it's gonna feel like shit to go against it for a while, it's gonna feel, it doesn't feel great. It's gonna feel like, ugh I'm, kind of, pushing against. What feels like a rock wall.
Like it's not an easy, like you're pushing a boulder up a hill, right? So it takes work, but you sort of ask yourself like, where did this come from? I'm gonna give you a really quick example of this that you can do kind of in a fast way. The way I like to ask myself. [00:15:00] Now, sometimes I do do this like more in depth and I ask like, where did this come from?
Who does this benefit? Just so I can get an understanding of like, what even is the belief that I have. But oftentimes I just ask myself like. , What part of this does society say is wrong? Okay. And then do I think it's wrong? Do I want to think it's wrong? Like, just those two questions.
So I'm gonna give you an example because I do think guilt. Is not a bad emotion. It's actually a, a great emotion in helping you live towards the values that you want to live with in your life and helping you be a part of a community. I think that we do need community norms. Um, I don't think everyone could just do whatever the hell they want whenever they want, because it, it breaks down the fabric of a community, but you have to sort of ask like, what is the role I wanna play in this community?
How do I want to be in this? And so, for instance, for me. Let's say I hit my child. Okay. If I get really [00:16:00] angry and I lose my temper and I happen to hit my kid. Okay. What part of this does society say is that? Well, society has sort of agreed that like children don't have the cognitive abilities to understand what they're doing, and so they don't deserve to be like physically punished.
When they are sort of learning by making mistakes, right? And so hitting children, especially when like our strength and size is so much bigger than them, is not an appropriate response from an adult who should be able to manage their own emotions. Okay? So that is society's belief. That is also my belief.
I want that to be my belief, like of course it's all made up. I could choose not to. I can choose to decide. Like, no, I think kids need physical punishment because they don't understand enough and they need to learn. That's. Fine. That could be your belief. That could be anybody's belief. I personally, for my life, want to believe that I am emotionally regulated enough to not get to the point where I have to hit my child and that I can use other tactics to get them to understand.
Okay, [00:17:00] so if That's not to say I'm gonna be perfect all the time. It's not to say I'm not gonna do things against my own values, I always will. Not in this situation, but I'm just saying like there's always gonna be times where I want to act a certain way and I don't act that way. So that's where guilt is actually a really good thing.
I should feel guilty. I want to feel guilty because it helps me correct for the next time. Right? It helps me hopefully reflect and be like, what the hell happened? Why did I lose it? And hopefully it can even help me to repair and go and apologize and tell my child that like, that's not how I wanna act. I shouldn't have done that.
I got upset because of X, Y, and Z, but like, I'm not gonna do that again or whatnot. That's a beautiful example of guilt working the way it should work, right? Now in another situation, let's say like a good example of this is that society might. Create a rule that says jaywalking is wrong, right? Jaywalking is bad.
You can get a ticket if you jaywalk. Okay? Now, the reason for that rule is to probably save pedestrians [00:18:00] lives and to like, not cause traffic accidents and stuff. So society has decided that like if we live in cities and there's kind of a lot happening, it is just we need everybody to comply with the fact that you cannot just cross at any point in the middle of the street if you want.
Okay. Totally fine rule. I, it's not like a personal value of mine that I think I'm doing something wrong. If I cross the street right, I likely won't feel guilty if I cross the street that doesn't have a light up, right? If I don't cause an accident, maybe I would feel guilty if I crossed an accident, but I think on the most part I'm just like, yeah.
Okay. I get why society wants this, but like I don't really care. Like I need to get to the other side, so I'm just gonna cross the street. I'm not gonna feel guilty. So you sort of wanna think about it in this way, like what is society saying is wrong and do I think it's wrong to do this right? Even if I understand why society is saying this.
And so I want you to like ask yourself that question all the time. [00:19:00] Ruthlessly, whenever in the beginning you're gonna feel guilty. Most of us feel guilty all the time. I used to have a girlfriend that used to introduce me and say, this is goalie. She'll do anything you want. 'cause she feels guilty all the time.
Not the best way to be known as, but here we are, my friends. So like for an example, let's say your mom, like we were just talking about, your mom calls and wants you to come over for lunch. And you don't wanna go, right? Society might tell you, and your culture might tell you, right? Your society, the culture you grew up up in, might tell you that you should always say yes, you should always be available for your mother or for your family, right?
It's your duty as a child, daughter, son, to be there for them when they wanna see you. Okay? You have to ask yourself, is that what I want? Is that the belief I want? Or am I allowed to think like, no, I'm allowed to have my own needs as well. I would love to be able to see my family and decide when my needs matter a little more.
Like that's how I wanna live my life. I'm no [00:20:00] longer gonna feel guilty. Like I get that they're upset and we're gonna work on this next week. I get that they're gonna have negative emotions. This is the part that I think is hard, is that. We wanna not feel guilty, but we want other people to also not be upset or not be mad or not have emotions.
And you don't control that. You will never control how they feel. So like your mom is allowed to be upset, she's an adult. She can handle her own emotions. You don't need to manipulate that. You don't need to control it. It's not your duty to do that. It's one of the reasons why so many people are so burned out is because they're trying to control everybody else's emotions.
And that's just a recipe for disaster. So you have to let them have their emotion and know that you still didn't do anything wrong under your value system, that you're allowed to have your own needs matter, right? You're allowed to, you're. Decide what you want. Let's say another example is like, this is what I always hear.
Actually, this one, [00:21:00] like I feel like I coach all the time. People don't say it in this way, but like they'll say like, well, my boss expects me to work late at night or to answer my emails. Okay, okay. That's what society has said, like that's what your boss think. That you should give 110%. You should give everything.
What do you wanna do? Like you also get a choice in this, right? So if you give into that and think like, yeah, it means they hate me or that I'm not as good of an employee, or yeah, like there might be consequences. Maybe I this ist a place for me to work. Instead of like taking in that stock. A lot of times we just give in because it's like, well, this is what they expect, this is what they want.
What do you want? You get to decide like, well, they don't own my own whole life. My value is that my job is a transactional relationship and they pay me for the hours that I work, and that's it. And again, it's okay if they're gonna be [00:22:00] upset, and it's okay if this doesn't even work out because then I don't need to work here.
But I don't need to feel guilty for not working at seven, at eight, at nine o'clock at night. I don't need to feel guilty for not responding to their emails. They'll get my email the next day when I'm paid to be at work. I'm not paid to be at work right now. You get it? So the whole question that I want you to start asking yourself when you say like, oh, but I feel guilty if I don't, pick up the house every day, or I feel guilty if I don't put my kids in a bunch of camps.
Or take them to a, you know, drive them around to a bunch of like sporting events or, okay, ask yourself why. Like, what, who benefited from that? Why does society create this value? And do you wanna keep that value? Is that a value of yours? Is that a value of the person that you wanna become? If it's not, then you have nothing to feel guilty about.
It's just simply a mismatch of value systems, and that's okay. We all get to have different values. Like going back to the [00:23:00] example like again, this is, I, I just create this like stark example just so you can see it. 'cause I think it's harder when it's on like a nuanced example for you when it's close to you.
But like if I don't believe that I need to cover my hair, somebody else might think I might be in a society or around people that might think it is wrong for me to show my hair. I don't have to feel guilty about that though. I don't have to change their beliefs. I don't have to get them to see that it's okay for me to show my hair, but I also don't have to feel guilty about it.
I also get to decide like, no, that's not the value I hold. I'm okay with it and I get to live my life based on my values. Right. Okay. I think you get the point. Any questions? I'm gonna read this. Comment first. Kind of like how Gen Z right now does not value the same work ethics as millennials. They actually value self-care and balance more than impressing their employer.
So overworking themselves and sacrificing too much of themselves or li or their lives. I started off being mostly offended by [00:24:00] that view, but as time has passed, I'm kind of leaning way more to on that side of the fence. They have a point that is the perfect example. I love this example because I love, here's one of the things I actually love about social media.
There's a lot of things to, um, hate about it, and I think we talk a lot about all of the bad things. But one of the really good things about social media is this, that sort of fringe ideas or values or things like over time when you get exposed to it or you see other people do it, it starts helping you kind of change your own values.
It starts helping you see like, huh. Maybe they, they're onto something which is sort of like, this is a tale as old as time. This is how all of society has always ran, is that every generation moves our cultural norms. A little further. I don't wanna say like, in a certain direction, but like, it changes them.
So, you know, people that had cultural values in the fifties do not have the same values that people in the [00:25:00] seventies who were in the nineties, who it's always that way. Right. Which is fantastic because it also does help our values evolve towards the kind of society we wanna live in. And so this, a perfect example of this is that this always happens.
As soon as somebody has like an, you know, starts embodying a different set of values than the generation before, there's always backlash. There's always like, Ugh, these kids are so lazy. These kids don't wanna work. These kids, nobody has any work ethic anymore, blah, blah, blah. And so many of us. Really wanna hold on.
'cause we think the way we did it was right. And it's not to say that there isn't some value in that. Sure. There's value in being like having the work ethic of like a millennials, but then that's why so many millennials are burned out, right? So it's like this generation is like, yeah, we don't want that.
And we're not gonna give into this bullshit standard. Right? The same thing we were talking about like the whole like sex before marriage or that kind of stuff, like sexual promiscuity, right? There was like a generation before that was like, no, this is the way it has to be. You can't have sex before you get married.
Of course, they [00:26:00] railed against like people having kind of sexual liberation and women basically taking control of their own bodies and all this stuff. But we can see like as we moved on, like, well, thank God that a new generation came in and was like, this is insane. Why are we living like this? Why are we accepting women to these like standards?
Right? So yes, it's exactly like what is happening. And I love being on TikTok and seeing more people talk about like resting and not giving more than what they're paid for and, uh, taking their lunch breaks and doing all these things. And it's funny how these are like very radical ideas. And it's truly just like allowing themselves to just like be humans.
But I think that there, that is exactly. The point of this is that there are things that you're gonna hold onto because you were programmed with it, even if you don't consciously believe it, even if you don't. Culturally, like I think a lot of us, like with our prefrontal cortex, like with our conscious mind, we are like, yeah, I think you know, women.[00:27:00]
Should be able to do whatever they want with their time and their life and their money, and I think women should. Don't need a man and whatever. You can have all of these beliefs that you probably deeply believe, but then you still likely have a lot of beliefs from patriarchy. Right? Because it's just is, it's in the like air that we breathe.
Like there's so many messaging. There's so much messaging. And so there's still so many women who still think that like the number one goal in their life should be to get married and to have someone basically pick them and to be this like, you know, because it is just how we've sort of been culturally raised to believe that that is like.
The pinnacle of a woman's life or whatnot, or that you still have to like work twice as hard as everybody else and constantly be of service to people. And if you're not of service to people, then how are you it really valuable? Like even though you may not consciously believe that, that thought, it becomes so ingrained in you that like when you are not of value to people, you start feeling guilty.
And so you wanna just like find where that guilt comes up. I actually think guilt, while we all hate feeling it, I think is a really beautiful, um. [00:28:00] Signal a really beautiful arrow as to like a belief system that you have. And so it'll help you see uncover. What do, why do I feel like what I'm, that I should be doing something else?
What is it that I think I should be doing? Where did that belief come from? And I think it can help you open your eyes to a lot of what is driving your behavior that you may not even be conscious of, that you may not even understand. And so I think your guilt is a really good thing to pay attention to.
Like, why do I feel guilty about this when I, you know, like I, for me, it's like this week, like of course I believe that I should be able to take the time off that I want, or that if I can get my work done in three days, like why do I care that I'm not doing it for five days, I don't work for someone else or whatnot.
But I know deep down there's just these belief systems that were so instilled in me that I still have to chip away at that I still have to work at. Okay, so that's the assignment today.
But I want you to just think of it in this way. I want you to go about your life, and I want you to, like, when you feel guilty, just ask yourself, what does society [00:29:00] say is wrong here? And do I think it's wrong? And if you don't, then I want you to like actively work on letting go of that guilt of understanding that guilt is someone else's, that other people can still be upset and think that it's wrong that you're doing, but like you can feel really proud of like creating your own values, creating your own morals that you wanna live by, creating a life that you want.
I can't emphasize this enough. You cannot have the life you want and make everybody else happy at the same time. You cannot have a life that you love that nobody else has a thought about. If you wanna rest more, there's gonna be people that judge you. If you want to take more time off, there's gonna be people that judge you, you know, if you want to.
Whatever. It's gonna be like, it's under understanding that like, I just need to be on board. Other people can have the thoughts they want. Suggestions for letting go, just practicing new thoughts or other things? Great question. I think that in the beginning it's gonna be hard to let [00:30:00] go and that's okay.
So a lot of what happened for me, like this week, this weekend when I was look like watching this guilt come up, what I mean by letting it go is that I, I don't try to change, I don't change what I'm doing. So like when I told myself I'm not gonna work, and then I started feeling guilty, I didn't allow the guilt to like drive me into action.
So I would let it just be there. I'd be like, ah it's gonna feel like shit in the beginning. Resting feels like crap. That's why we don't do it because it, it feels like so terrible to you 'cause your brain is screaming the whole time. But I just forced myself to just do it. I'm like, no, we've decided that we're gonna lay here and read a book for an hour.
So that's what we're gonna do. Even if it's like I'm distracted half the time and I can't really get into it 'cause I'm getting my nervous system like used to feeling safe like nothing happened. It was fine. We read for an hour. And you know, the house didn't collapse. And so the next week when I do it, it becomes easier and it becomes easier and it becomes easier.
So part of letting go is just like doing the thing that you said you were gonna do, even if you have this feeling of guilt. 'cause I think a lot of times what [00:31:00] happens right now is like, uhoh, I feel guilty. This means I should change something. Like, I have this feeling, this means I should change my behavior and we change our behavior.
And so the first step might just be, don't change the behavior. Just let the feeling be there, right? Let the feeling come up. Let it and then the more you do practice that thought of like, I'm allowed to rest. I'm allowed to take the day off. I'm allowed to let my house be a mess. I'm allowed to not play with my kids when I'm tired and I don't wanna play.
Practicing that thought will start creating that belief. So it'll start help like to, to dissipate the guilt. You might feel guilty in the beginning still, but you're gonna keep practicing that thought so that it becomes more automatic. Like the next time you, wanna rest and you're feeling guilty, it's like you, you go to this ladder of thought and it starts helping you feel more calm.
So I would suggest going at it that way in the beginning and see you can also process the guilt. Like where does guilt. Reside [00:32:00] in my body. How does it feel? How long does it take to dissipate? , Does it go and come back? Get to know it so you're not afraid of it as much.
And I think that can also help it, you process it faster.
Any other questions before we jump off?
No problem. Um, I hope this helped. Okay. Lizzie's saying this is really helpful, particularly relevant and timely. Thank you. No problem. I actually think it's probably relevant and timely for all of us because I think that so many of us live our lives driven by guilt. Half the things we do is simply because we feel guilty not doing it.
We feel guilty 'cause like my friend invited me so I should go, . I think understanding this tool, and again, that doesn't mean sometimes you are gonna give into it because it's like, Hey, it makes my mom happy and that's okay. And , I wanna make my, it's not to say that you have to be a hundred percent of the time, like I only do what I wanna do.
Like part of building community is gonna be like. I have the energy now, so I'm gonna do it. It's simply that I have that control, that there's times where I can say like, no, [00:33:00] now I don't want to. So it's like, let's practice one time saying no and see how that feels. Says, thank you timely as I started a new job and trying to stick to boundaries.
You got this, , bring that to coaching. I know that that is very difficult. Actually. I think next week we're doing boundaries, so hopefully that will help as well. All right, my friends, I hope this was helpful and I will see you guys later. No, you are the best. Thank you guys. Bye.
