007| Burnout: What it is, what it isn’t, and how to stop it as a female leader

Burnout. You’ve most likely heard the term before - right now, it’s everywhere. Burnout is not just about being exhausted, overextended or needing to take more time off.; it goes so much deeper than any of that.

It’s connected to resentment, a lack of agency, and a lack of recognition of the work you do. It’s being required to sacrifice the things that are important to you and the values you hold closest because you believe there’s no other way to get what you really want from life.

The first time I faced burnout was in my twenties. It happened again in my forties. There will not be a third time. In this episode, I share my experience of two very different but equally devastating burnouts and what I learned from each of them.

In this episode, I discuss

• What burnout really is (and what it isn’t) 
• Why burnout is an especially big deal for women in leadership 
• The connection between burnout and trauma
• My personal experience with burnout and the 3 crucial things I’m STILL doing to fix it

This episode at a glance:

[02:03] Three Lies and a Truth About Burnout. 

[02:56] Burnout affects women more than men. We’re dealing with pay gaps and promotion blocks, and we often carry a larger portion of the mental load of home and life. And we tend to avoid the conversations that might make this better.

[15:22] Keeping your burnout a secret because you’re embarrassed about “not handling things” is the worst thing you can do. That’s when you need to cultivate connection the most.

[17:10] My second experience of burnout, in my forties - this time while running my own business. 

[19:09] The connection between burnout and trauma. 

[22:51] The three things I’m doing to make sure I avoid round 3 of burnout. 

Disclaimer:
In this episode, I share my personal experience with burnout. But… I'm a business strategist and executive leadership coach, not a mental health professional. This is not mental health advice. Please consult your preferred mental health professional for additional support.  

Resources and links mentioned in this episode

• The 2018 Montreal University study "Gendered Pathways to Burnout: Results from the SALVEO Study," by Nancy Beauregard et al.
• The movie that made me realize life was imitating art a little too closely - “Swimming with Sharks”

You might also like

• Episode 04: “How Perfectionism is Killing Your Business” (And How to Fight Back.)
• Read Greg McKeown’s “Essentialism.”

More about the “My Good Woman” podcast

My Good Woman is a podcast for new and future female leaders, hosted by me, Dawn Andrews. I’m a happily married hockey mom, proud female leader, and founder and CEO of Free Range Thinking, where we turn founders into confident CEOs with strategic consulting and leadership training.

Grab a seat at the table wit

Want to increase revenue and impact? Listen to “My Good Woman” for insights on business strategy and female leadership to scale your business. Each episode offers advice on effective communication, team building, and management. Learn to master routines and systems to boost productivity and prevent burnout. Our delegation tips and business consulting will advance your executive leadership skills and presence.

Transcript

My Good Woman 
Ep. 07| Burnout: What it really is, what it definitely isn’t and how to stop it in its tracks

Dawn Andrews [00:00:00] 

Hello, my good woman. Today, I want to squeeze the bejesus out of you. These are turbulent times. If you are a leader, a human being with an ounce of empathy and compassion in your heart, you might be on overload, pasting a zoom, friendly smile on your face while behind the scenes you're fighting off burnout. You may be investing your effort in supporting, mentoring and helping others. And you feel like you must hold it together all the time to be effective, especially when women are criticized for being too emotional when it comes to leadership. So how do you prevent burnout and live to fight another day? I have been there. I have thoughts. Let's get into it.  

Dawn Andrews [00:00:42] 

Hello, friends. Welcome to My Good Woman, the podcast for New and Future Female Leaders. I'm your host, Dawn Andrews, a happily married hockey mom and the founder and CEO of Free Range Thinking Business Strategy Consulting. Grab a seat at the table with me each week for candid conversations with culture shifting, glass ceiling busting, trailblazing women leading impactful enterprises. We discuss what makes them tick, how they get it all done, and actionable strategies to help you lead with confidence and grow the visibility, reach and revenue of your business. We're classy, ladies, but we don't bleep the swear words. Listener discretion is advised. 

Dawn Andrews [00:01:45] 

Burn out. You've heard the term before. You might be feeling it right now, but do you know what it really means? In today's episode, we'll be discussing burnout in detail. We'll talk about what people get wrong about burnout, the connection between burnout and trauma. Why it's an especially big deal for women in leadership, and I'll share ways to fix it. Using real life examples from my life and from my practice. The personal stories and insights I'll be revealing today may help you distinguish what you're struggling with so that you can get the support that you need.  

Dawn Andrews [00:02:16] 

Before we break it down, I want to tell you to take care of yourself and offer an important disclaimer. I'm a business strategist and an executive leadership coach. I am not a mental health professional. This is not mental health advice. This is me sharing my real stories and struggles of personally facing and overcoming burnout. So please consult your preferred mental health professional for additional support. 

Dawn Andrews [00:02:41] 

Now, let me ask you. How often have you felt exhausted, overextended, even overwhelmed? For me, it is more times in my life than I can count or even keep track of. But the first time I really faced burnout, I was in my twenties. The second time I really faced burnout, I was in my forties. There will not be a third time. A little later, I'll share with you how I expect to avoid it and what you can do to in the meantime. How about we play a little game together? We'll call it Three Lies and a Truth About Burnout. Welcome to Three Lies and a Truth About Burnout. I'm your host, Don Andrews. I'm about to share with you four statements. One of these is true. Pick which one? Number one, burnout isn't real. Number two, more sleep. A mental health day or a vacation can fix burnout. Number three, if you have burnout, you don't know how to handle stress and you should keep it a secret. Number four, burnout affects more women than men. Make your selections, please. Okay. Okay. Thank you for indulging my game show host fantasies. There's something really silly about being able to do that voice. All kidding aside, I would imagine it's fairly obvious which of these statements are lies or myths and which one is the truth. But let's just get right to it. The truth is, burnout affects more women than men by a significant degree. I mean, the pay gap alone, that's enough to make a woman burnout when it comes to work. In 2020, women made about $0.83 for every dollar a man made. Women carry more responsibilities and burdens at home, which are unpaid and often unrecognized. We are less likely to be promoted inside an organization which adds to our frustrations, and we are less likely to be taken seriously as leaders of our own organizations. There's a significant gap in the amount of mentorship and opportunities that female founders receive and the amount of money they are able to fundraise. 

Dawn Andrews [00:04:50] 

Underlying all of this is the vicious swirl of feeling we are not worthy, which is constantly reaffirmed by all the examples I just mentioned. When you top all of this off with our tendency to avoid having direct conversations that might make some of this better, it is not surprising at all that women suffer burnout more frequently than men. And the most sobering study was conducted in 2018 by Montreal University researchers. They followed 2000 workers, both men and women, for four years, detailing their emotional exhaustion, cynicism and professional effectiveness. The results were published in the Annals of Work, Exposure and Health, and it revealed that women were more vulnerable to burnout than men because women tended to have less authority, were less likely to call the shots, which can lead to increased frustration and stress and diminished well-being. The good news is that 47% of women started a business in the last year, compared to 44% of men. And 62% of women business owners are between the ages of 40 and 59 years old. And what I like about that statistic in particular is that that age range is an incredibly stressful period of time for women. It's a sandwich age range. Women have aging parents who they want to feel compelled to or have no choice but to take care of. And they may have children who aren't yet out of the house for college. The good news is that being a business owner puts us in the driver's seat, gives us more flexibility, and gives us a shot at beginning to manage some of the main causes of burnout. The challenge is that though we may have removed the things employers do that contribute to burnout, we are left to deal with ourselves. And all my friends, I have stories to tell you. In the spirit of helping us recover from burnout. Let's define what it actually is and how we make things worse for ourselves. In 2019, the World Health Organization classified burnout as an official medical disorder, and I can't believe it took them so frickin long. Burnout is a psychological term, referring to general exhaustion and a lack of interest or motivation regarding one's work. It's usually caused by frustration, as we've talked about before, or by gaps in expectations, by stress related to achievement and not being able to attain it. It's also the result of staying in an extended fight or flight response. It's usually related to forces outside oneself, and it can contribute to anxiety, depression and a whole host of other symptoms. 

Dawn Andrews [00:07:22] 

For some people, it may take a long time to reach a state of burnout, and for others, a very short time. It has a lot to do with how you personally operate. So how do you operate? Take a moment right now and think about the conditions that create your best work. What is your operating system? What drives you to achieve and how do you get things done? Everyone has a unique operating system and mine is driven by fear. I'm not proud of it. I'd like to think I'm more awesome than that. But here we are. I am motivated and driven by deadlines from other people. I don't want to disappoint people. I want to deliver. And I want to deliver well. And I want to deliver excellence. Back in the day and middle school, high school. Even into college. Fear of not doing a good enough job would cause me to procrastinate on every assignment and deadline. And then fear of disappointing people would cause me to haul ass and get everything done within the 24 to 48 hour period before the due date. More assignments than I would like to admit, were literally crafted in the 24 hours prior to turning them into a professor with fingers crossed, hoping they were good enough. And unfortunately they usually were, which just reinforced the behavior. That was my induction onto the path to burnout. Over time, I became addicted to working like everything was an emergency and that came along with the bonus of overcommitting to things. I wanted people to find be irreplaceable. I didn't want to lose an opportunity. So I would say yes to too many things. And overcommitting is not quite the same thing as burnout, but it's certainly a contributing factor. Every single time I have burned out, all of the conditions we've mentioned before were present. The overcommitting and emergency work style. Being concerned about what other people would think. Wanting to be irreplaceable. And ultimately feeling frustrated and resentful. I want you to imagine yourself in your twenties, excited about getting out there and building your career. The first time I experienced burnout, I was in my late twenties working for a top entertainment agency as a motion picture literary assistant, which is an entry level but very demanding position. The pay was crap, the environment was highly competitive because it was an entree into a career in the entertainment industry. The competition for those assistant jobs was fierce, and more than anything, I wanted to make a big impression.  

Dawn Andrews [00:09:52] 

In my limited professional experience at the time, and with the skill set that I had, all I could think to do was to be available all the time. My average workweek was about 50 to 70 hours long in the office. A typical workday would start at 630 in the morning when I got up dressed and quickly hopped in the car. I needed to get out the door by seven to be there by 745. I needed 15 minutes before the agent that I worked for arrived so that I could prepare his desk. A protein shake in the upper left hand corner fanned out industry trades, the Hollywood Reporter in the right hand corner, and all of the important scripts and messages in the center of the desk. We would spend the entire day on phone calls. I rarely had time to use the restroom. Lunch was always at my desk, and throughout the day, a high level of excellence was demanded and mistakes were not tolerated. In fact, they were usually met by yelling and screaming a thrown coffee cup or stapler or a public berating in front of the other assistants. The executive would leave the office at six and I would stay until seven or 730, rolling his calls. Then I would hop in my car and be home with L.A. traffic by eight or 830 with a stack of scripts in my hand and notes to get done before the next morning. My boyfriend at the time, who's now my husband, would see how miserable I was and urged me daily to leave the job. That was my typical day for nearly a year. And over that time, I became exhausted, overwhelmed, horribly dehydrated. My ability to receive criticism went down considerably. I would sometimes cry at the drop of a hat. I had difficulty focusing. My adrenal system was on fight or flight overload because I never knew what I was going to experience next or when I was going to get in trouble for something I didn't see coming. I was always at the ready to handle any situation. Scourge. Okay. Quick. Detour. Prior to. Working at. The agency. I was obsessed with independent films. It was a big heyday in that time period in the world, like around the late nineties. One of my favorite independent films at the time was called Swimming with Sharks. And if any of you all have seen it, please. Demi and right, girl. I know your pain.  

Dawn Andrews [00:12:01] 

It was a funny, dark comedy. Again, an independent film about a young Hollywood executive who becomes an assistant to a big time movie producer who is the worst boss imaginable. Abusive, abrasive, cruel. But then things turn around when the young executive kidnaps his boss and visits all of his cruelties back on him after working at the agency. I watched it again and realized that it wasn't a dark comedy. It was a documentary. And that's when I started to become incredibly depressed in that job. Okay. At this point, I need all my high energy auntie types out there to just take a breath. You might be saying to yourself at this point, Well, good God. Woman No wonder you were burned out. Why on earth would you stay in that role? That's Crazytown. So just everybody take a breath. I realize I should have gone to H.R. far sooner than I did. And before you judge, here's what I'd like you to consider and perhaps recognize in yourself. Have you ever wanted to achieve something so badly that you lost perspective on what it was costing you to achieve it? As a woman in my late twenties joining a new industry, that job meant everything to me. I had a vision for my future, and this was the pathway for me to get access to that future. At least that was my perception at the time. I didn't want to complain or appear weak or admit that I might not be up to the task. There were another 10 to 15 kids lined up for my exact job right behind me that had advanced degrees MBAs from Harvard, Princeton, Stanford. And they were willing to do whatever it took to succeed. My competitive nature got the best of my common sense at the expense of my well being. So let me ask, do you feel that way about yourself running the business you're running right now? If you're feeling burned out, that may be what's happening to you as you lead your business. And before we can do anything to make it better, we need to recognize it. I frequently have conversations with female leaders about losing themselves in the pursuit of their goals or in the growth of their companies. And I'm hoping that if you're burned out, you're also recognizing some of the signs that may be triggering it in your world right now. So are you curious about how things turned out at the agency? 

Dawn Andrews [00:14:20] 

Obviously, I quit that job on what is now referred to as Freedom Tuesday, and it was a drama. I got a call from my old boss from a job I worked at in New York. I picked up the phone while I was crying under my desk after a stapler was hooked at my head at high speed. It was not a proud moment. My old boss invited me to lunch at the Cheesecake Factory in Beverly Hills, and as I filled my stomach, he offered me a new position with him at another entertainment company. I quit as soon as I got back from lunch. In fact, I believe that day I was one of four assistants that quit and that was a frequent occurrence in that environment. I always thought I was going to be the exception. But now I understand that the culture that the leaders had created there was one that was meant to cause burnout. I also recognize my part in the whole problem, which was believing that I wasn't worthy enough to be treated better than I was treated there. As women, if we hope to avoid burnout in the future, we need to take very seriously the excavation of our past histories and what leaves us feeling unworthy and begin to heal it immediately. Remember a game show three lies in a truth. We've already revealed the truth. Women suffer from burnout more than men. So let's reveal lie number one about burnout. Burnout isn't real a lie. Oh, my friends. It most certainly is. But not for the reason you think. It's not just about a lack of sleep or working too hard or being overextended. Burnout is connected to resentment, to a lack of agency, a lack of recognition to being required to sacrifice the things that are important to you, or believing that you have to sacrifice what's important to you in order to achieve and do well in the job you have. Burnout is very real. And all of those conditions were present and true when I was working at the agency. It was a transactional relationship between leadership and the team that worked with them as assistants. We weren't seen as human beings. We were seen as dispensable robots that needed to function and get things done with perfection, without emotion, and continued to do that at an unsustainable pace. And we're here to take care of you today to protect you, the leader of your business, from burnout. So are you treating yourself as the leader of your company in a transactional way? Are you expecting yourself to keep those 50 to 70 hour workweeks to continue showing up without recognition, without the opportunity to take a break, sacrificing the things that you say are most important to you? I get it. Things are really busy. It's your business and you're really trying to make it happen and you don't know if there's anybody else that can do it. But consider your role in creating your own burnout. Which brings me to lie or myth number two more sleep. A mental health day or a vacation will fix burnout. Lie. No amount of sleep will make up for a lack of appreciation, acknowledgment or satisfaction with what you're doing. No amount of sleep and this is tough when you're running your own thing. It's rare that your team is going to turn around and say,. 

Dawn Andrews [00:17:25] 

Woo hoo! Great job. It is lonely at the top and there aren't a lot of people to share those accomplishments with or those challenges. Your spouse, your partner, even other senior leadership may not fully understand the extent to which you have sacrificed, the skills you've had to learn, the dedication and sleepless nights required in order to bring your business to its current state. It's a horrible feeling when you've built something, when you believe in it and it's going reasonably well, it's stable, and yet you feel so uninspired and so burnt out that you want to quit and burn the thing to the ground. I have absolutely been there and it is heartbreaking to feel like you're watching your dreams die because you don't have the stamina and enthusiasm to keep them going. Please remember that everything that I'm sharing with you today comes out of my personal experience. I'm even getting a little like you can probably hear it in my voice. I'm getting a little misty just thinking about it because I feel that pain. And if you're there, I just want to hug you right now. That's why I said I wanted to hug the bejesus out of you. But here's what I do know. It's that when you're burnt out and you're in that place of wanting to burn it all down and you feel like your dreams are dying, it's a moment of gestation. You've gone into the cocoon. And it's the moment of building and beginning. What's next? Because what's dying is not your dream. What's dying? Is that the way that you've been doing things? The way that you've been operating is no longer working and won't get you to the next level. Which brings me to lie or myth number three. That if you're burnout, you don't know how to handle stress and you should keep it a secret. Ly. Oh, my God. Do not do that. That is the worst course of action. And I can tell you this because I have done that, too. This is the time when you are feeling like this to cultivate connection for a couple of reasons. One, because you need the support. And two, because you need the feedback. You can't just keep yelling into the chasm, waiting for the echo back. You need somebody to echo back to you. Reach out to your posse. Call your best friends. Get into a mentorship or mastermind group. Lean on other female leaders to support you. Share with them what's going on. And let them critically analyze how you might be able to let some things go and regain your balance. Truly, just sharing your stories can reframe your perspective and kill the myopathy that has you burned out. Just like I did when I was working at the agency, I believed that there was no other way for me to succeed and build a career in entertainment if I didn't follow that path. And yet that path was where? In me out. It was making me depressed and anxious. 

Dawn Andrews [00:20:13] 

It was standing in the way of me developing a relationship with the man who became my husband. It was costing me way too much. And you started your business because you were excited and inspired. You wanted to make a difference. And you wanted to serve a group of people in a particular way. If you've lost your inspiration, if you're feeling resentful and angry and like your expectations have not been met related to your business and related to leading your business, you've forgotten that you make a difference. You've lost sight of the impact that you're making, either with your team inside your business or for your customers and clients outside your business. Ask for feedback. Ask for testimonials or reviews. This may seem like a business solution to an emotional challenge, but who freaking cares? You need acknowledgment and you may need to let some responsibilities go as well. Lean on your community to help you discern what's going on so you can let some things go and reconnect to what's really important. What are your expectations? What goals are you really trying to meet? Try and close the gap. Understanding my goals and my expectations is what saved my life. The second time I had burnout, I had burnout again. It was 2017. I was in my forties and this time it was happening in my company, the business I was leading. I couldn't blame my burnout on the boss because I was the boss and I couldn't blame it on the environment because I was the one creating the environment. I couldn't blame it on unmet expectations because the expectations were mine. Any resentment I had, I was causing myself. The burnout was almost like watching a big wave headed towards the shore. It slowly moved towards me, unfurling, getting bigger, and then all of a sudden it crashed into me, taking me down in a big sand and water washing machine. At that point, the business had been slow for a while, the overall revenue had dropped. I really felt like I had lost my professional drive. I wasn't connected to my purpose and I wasn't connected to my clients in the way that I had been previously. And the most terrifying part was that I couldn't figure out why. I felt like my work was something I had to do, not something I was pulled or drawn or called to do, which is how I had been previously. I did recognize similarities from the experience I had in my twenties, but this time it was different. This time my health was deeply affected. I had extreme fatigue. And now that we're all familiar with COVID, I think a lot of you would recognize what that feels like, where you're fighting to stay awake, fighting to concentrate, and taking a nap. Any chance you get. Even sleeping 12 hours a night and still not waking up feeling refreshed. I felt apathetic at best. I did not feel confident. I felt detached and withdrawn. And I just felt helpless. I was getting sick all the time. I was having migraine headaches. My hair even started falling out. And as a result of all that, I found myself again depressed and anxious.  

Dawn Andrews [00:23:10] 

Except this time, I was facing the existence of my own business. I couldn't leave this company and go to another one. And this is where I discovered the connection between burnout and trauma. Burnout related trauma comes in two forms the traumatic stories from our past, which can shape our current decisions and actions, and the secondary traumatic stress from the world we're living in, or the type of work that we do. The first form of trauma. Those traumatic voices from our past are what turns into the judging, critical voice in our head that tries to convince us that we're not worthy. The voice that says you need to be well liked, that it's not okay to disappoint anyone, that you must always be perfect and strive for excellence. Those fearful stories cause a fight or flight response. And those were the stories that convinced me I needed to work 70 hours a week. Working late at night. Working too early in the morning. And I did that not only as an employee, but in my own business too. There was nobody making those demands but me. And those expectations were unrealistic and unsustainable. Find and change your stories. Shift your expectations. Stop the burnout. The second form of trauma related to burnout is compassion fatigue. Compassion fatigue is burnout combined with secondary traumatic stress. And we're all suffering from it, every single one of us. Compassion fatigue is vicarious trauma, and it refers to the negative emotions that individuals feel from helping others at work. It's especially prevalent with medical professionals who come through the pandemic. And when I thought about where I spend my time and energy and what I'm doing, I am certainly not saving lives, at least not in the way that doctors, nurses and emergency professionals are. It wasn't until I got into therapy again as a preventative measure that I realized as a service professional, I spend hours and hours each week hearing about the challenges of high level leaders facing really difficult global circumstances. And part of my job is to hold space for their burdens as well as my own. And along with that, there are the challenges that I face in my own life, the challenges that we take on because we're part of a family or a community when friends or family are sick or dealing with very difficult circumstances. And then there's what we face as members of a global community in a very difficult time. We are all facing some compassion fatigue, my personal stories and holding the stories of others without having an adequate way to release them or manage them was the match that lit burnout bom number two. I see the burnout in that moment was a gift. I think sometimes we think about burnout and we make ourselves feel even worse, that we've done something wrong, that we can't handle our business, that we can't handle the stress, that we should be taking better care of ourselves and that other people are somehow managing things better than we are.  

Dawn Andrews [00:25:55] 

And we just pile on, we suck, and somehow everybody else gets it and they're doing it better than we are. And that's why we feel so exhausted and tired. And in a weird way, that might be true. But hear me out. Looking back on burn out round two for me, what I realized is that the signs that my business needed to change and that I needed to change had been there all along. They had been slowly rolling up on me like that wave that I described, and I had chosen to ignore them and ignore them so vehemently that my body rose up against me to hit the brakes. In 2017, when I began my recovery process with a four day nap, that was the beginning of where I'm sitting now, which is a renaissance in my business. Extraordinary new clients. This podcast Conversations with Exceptional Female Leaders. And none of that would have been possible if I persisted and resisted and continued in the way that I'd been operating before. So how am I avoiding burnout? Round three? There are three things that I'm doing. I look at the conversations I'm avoiding and I have them. I know what my deal breaker non-negotiables are and I build clear boundaries. And here's what I mean when it comes to conversations I'm avoiding that I need to have. I don't find myself a particularly confrontational person, but I've gotten a hell of a lot better at it. If I'm delaying a difficult conversation, that's the first one I need to have because I'm using my psychic and emotional energy to avoid it. My goal is to reduce the amount of time between noticing that a conversation needs to happen and having it. The pain and struggle lies in the space between knowing when you really need to talk to somebody and you start to avoid it because you think it's going to go away. This is also where the seeds of resentment and unmet expectations start to fester into something that can really derail you later. To help myself improve and get better at this, I even devised a brave conversation method that I use every time. I'll share it with you at the end of the podcast. Next, I check in with myself regularly about what my deal breakers or non-negotiables are. I take six weeks off during the year. Non-negotiable. We take vacations. Non-negotiable. I take days off and take a mental health day when I need it. Non-negotiable. I even have a Netflix day during the week if I absolutely need it. Also, non-negotiable. I will always take my kids to school and I will always pick my kids up from school. It is the best part of my day and it is non-negotiable. I will always be available for my kids special events. Non-negotiable. 

Dawn Andrews [00:28:24] 

If I can't design my business to support those, the business needs to be redesigned. And here's my final strategy for keeping that third round of burnout at bay. I know what my boundaries are, and I consider myself worthy and valuable enough to have them and protect them. And my good woman. It has been a journey to get there, but I do know what my boundaries are. My clients know what they are. My family knows what they are. I do not work 70 hours a week. That is not ever happening again. Not even 50 hours a week. My goal is 20. I rarely reach it, but I like the way it makes me think about where I spend my time. And yes, there are times and there will be more times when I push really hard because there's something new or exciting that I want to do in the business. Maybe it requires a little extra time and effort, but if I can't design something well enough to be able to achieve it during regular work hours or let something go to welcome something new in, then it's not happening. I'm not perfect. This is a constant series of adjustments, and maybe all three of these strategies sound a little idealistic. If you're in the early stages of building a business, you may feel that fear that I was talking about at the very beginning of our conversation, where you want to take every job that comes in. You don't want to say no to anything. You don't want to set boundaries because you want to always be available to your clientele. You want to make sure you're worth what you're charging. And at the core of that is the trauma and the stories. It's about your worthiness. And I want to tell you right now, you are worth it. You are valuable. Do not let the trauma of the past get in the way of you setting important boundaries to take care of your well-being. Don't let your stories and your trauma stop you from having conversations to get more help and support. It is not worth it. There is only one of you and we need you. There will not be another round of burnout for me. And I don't want another one for you either, because we are in business to make a difference for others and we have control about how we build our businesses. We have the ability to build them in a way that works for us, that works for our families, that works for the life we want to live. That works for the health and well-being of our bodies and our minds. But we have to believe that we're worth it. And that is part of being an extraordinary female leader. It's a practice, and we get the opportunity to get better at it every day. My good woman. 

Dawn Andrews [00:30:37]

 Thank you for joining me this week to read the complete shownotes and get all the links mentioned in today's episode. Visit MyGoodWoman.com. That's also where you can download My Brave Conversation workbook, which was created with one goal in mind to help female leaders approach difficult or confrontational conversations with grace and directness. Download The Brave Conversation Workbook for free at my good woman.com forward slash brave conversations or find a link in the show notes. And before you go, make sure you subscribe to the podcast so you can receive new episodes right when they're released. Thank you again for joining me. I'm Dawn Andrews and this was my good woman. I'll see you next time.