Perfectionism and Overworking: The Silent Saboteurs of Ambitious Women

Unleash your full potential by embracing both your achievements and imperfections. This episode is a deep dive into the psyche of high achievers, especially ambitious women, who constantly chase excellence but often stumble upon the pitfalls of perfectionism and overworking. We dissect what drives them, explore the societal conditioning that influences their risk-taking, and challenge the notion that productivity always equals progress. By learning to celebrate small victories and recognizing the power of feminine energy, we uncover how you can nourish your creativity and intuition while stepping away from the harmful grasp of wounded masculine energy.

Join us as we redefine failure, not as an adversary, but as a powerful learning tool and a stepping stone to success. By prioritizing self-care and rest, setting boundaries, and learning to trust your intuition, you'll find a harmonious balance between high achievement and personal well-being. We also discuss the importance of addressing childhood wounds to avoid self-sabotage and the silent traps that perfectionism sets in our path. With a spotlight on the unique challenges faced by women, we offer insights and strategies to help you break free from these patterns and lead a more empowered, fulfilling life. Remember, you have the power to change, and we're here to support you every step of the way.

Chapters

• 0:00 Perfectionism and Overworking in High Achievers
• 13:56 Embracing Imperfection for Success
• 23:43 Breaking Free From Perfectionism and Overworking

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:00

Hello everyone, welcome back to the podcast. Today we're talking about perfectionism and overworking and how this is the silent saboteur of ambitious women. Okay, so I'm talking to all you high achievers out there. Now. You might be like Kirsty I don't know what a high achiever is. What is a high achiever? How do I identify myself as a high achiever?

Speaker 1: 0:19

Basically, to be a high achiever means you are constantly striving for excellence. You have ambitious goals. You push to reach extraordinary levels of success in various aspects of your life. So you may be doing this in sport, in the gym, in your work, in your career it can be any sort of area of your life. Okay, high achievers are driven, they're focused. They're often like, like powered by the desire to improve, accomplish and make an impact, whether that's on their life or somebody else's.

Speaker 1: 0:51

So when we are looking at, maybe, the characteristics of a high achiever, you may be goal orientated. You might set yourself a task and be like I'm going to fucking smash that. Or you make these really big, specific goals that you can measure and challenge yourself. You might be like self-motivated. You're that person who gets up in the morning. You're like I'm gonna fucking do this right. That's so me. I like wake up in the morning, I get an idea and I'm like fuck it, I'm gonna do it. Like it's literally like me recording this podcast right now. I'm like sat there, I'm like fuck it, I'm just going to do it because I really want to talk about this, especially as we're coming into like 2025. It's good to recognize ourself as high achievers and at the like, the strengths of it, but also the stuff that can really get in the way of it as well. And when becoming this high achiever becomes too much, this is when we need to look at where we need to see our childhood wounds and stop sabotaging ourselves, because it's really easy to do that.

Speaker 1: 1:51

High achievers are also really known for being resilient. They're disciplined. They focus on excellence okay, and something that a high achiever can fall into is they'll achieve something and they'll feel like nothing, or they'll feel quite numb, and then they'll be like right, okay, on to the next thing and they never fully pause and celebrate the thing that they've just achieved. Okay, they are lifelong learners. These are your people like me who love to learn. Okay, and I think all my clients, or my one-to-one clients, are exactly like this they love to learn, they love to improve. They love to invest in personal development, into education or skill building or whatever it is. They just want to be better. They want to be the better version of themselves, right? And not everybody out there wants to be like this. And you know, I kind of surround myself in a group of people now who are these like lifelong learners. They are high achievers, right, and when I come across people who, like, they're so happy in the ignorance bubble, it's so fucking jarring, okay.

Speaker 1: 2:52

So one of the best things about being a high achiever as well, guys, is that you're proactive and problem solving instead of waiting for solutions. You literally will address problems and create the opportunities you need to. You are that person who graphs. You're the person that makes it happen, right? So, yeah, if you're if I'm talking to you like, this is the podcast for you, because being a high achiever means that we do fall into perfectionism, overworking fear of failure, we have difficulty celebrating success and we overmphasize on external success, which often is linked to our self-worth.

Speaker 1: 3:31

Okay, and what it feels like to be a high achiever is that you're always looking ahead to the next milestone or challenge. You have a deep sense of satisfaction when you achieve your goals. But you also may experience frustration when, when things feel slow and you may often take on more responsibility, as you find it hard to say no and you thrive on feedback. Okay, and this is all that external stuff. And I think how we can learn to thrive is, as women, is to understand that productivity doesn't mean progress. Prioritizing rest and self-care is really important, and I feel like the word self-care is lost on meaning on social media because it's like, well, what the fuck is self-care? Everything is self-care, right, but really when you're building in time for relaxation, reflection, this really helps to prevent burnout, where I feel like loads of high achievers end up in this cycle of becoming burnt out because they are working and being this perfectionist, and I've had multiple clients who have been like in this paralysis of like not being able to move forward in their business or with a client or with something, because they've just had this experience where they are like so they just want to get everything so perfect that, like it absolutely slows them down in what they're doing.

Speaker 1: 4:55

You know, other things that we can do as high as high achievers is to celebrate our wins, to focus on the inner growth. Okay, because our professional, professional success is our outer world. We need to look at our inner world, okay, because our professional, professional success is our outer world. We need to look at our inner world, okay, and often I see a lot of high achievers will go from education to this qualification, to this job, to whatever, effortlessly because it's what they're really determined to do. But really what they're doing is going around in circles because they're chasing the next thing that's going to make them happy but that's not going to make them happy in the end. Why? Because they don't even have time to pause to celebrate the small wins or, if they do the, the celebration is really, really short-lived.

Speaker 1: 5:33

Okay, I think, set in realistic standards, done is better than perfect. I fucking hate that saying obviously, true, high achiever, but being done is better than perfect. Okay, if there's something stopping you, like getting you into like a paralysis, then you need to be to be focusing on getting it done rather than perfect. And learning to delegate oh my god, like, learning to get to delegate is so, so important for high achievers. Why? Because we just think that we can do it all ourself and then we end up sabotaging ourself.

Speaker 1: 6:05

Okay, so the perfectionism and overworking cycle. Let's give this a moment because I want to ask you this how many times have you held back from launching something, sending that email, posting on social media because you know, or applying for that job because you didn't fit 100% of the criteria you know, or you didn't submit a piece of work at school because it wasn't perfect? Like this feeds into every area of your life. Okay, perfectionism and overworking often go hand in hand. So perfectionism feeds overworking. You get so focused on getting every single detail right that it takes twice as long for you to finish something, or you never finish them at all. You may have multiple things that are going on in your life where you're like I'll start this, I'll start this, I'll start this, and then you don't ever finish anything because that is your way of avoiding any sort of like failure. But it doesn't have to be failure. It could just be like you avoid a painting because you don't want to ruin it, because it's so good so far, like it can really really get into every nook and cranny of your life.

Speaker 1: 7:11

Okay, this is why it's so important to bring this to the surface now. Overworking fuels perfectionism. So you have this cycle where perfectionism feeds overworking, overworking fuels perfectionism. You tell yourself. If you could just work harder, you can work longer, you can work more intense, then you can control the outcome and avoid failure, rejection, negative criticism but really this is the bullshit that we are fed by the patriarchy. This is a man's way of doing things. This is really masculine and aggressive energy. Well, women, well women, we can sustain that. Men and women have different nervous systems for a reason because we have different evolutional jobs. Okay, men go out hunter-gatherer. They are meant to be in fight or flight way more than women are.

Speaker 1: 7:57

Okay, so when we're thinking about this cycle, it creates exhaustion, fatigue, burnout and resentment as well. And if you are a projector in human design, this is a surefire way to become a burnt out bit of projector, which is the least appealing thing ever, and I always used to be like oh why do I get so resentful when I work hard and hard, harder and harder, and it's just like it's never enough. Nothing is ever enough. Even when you hit a milestone. The satisfaction just comes and goes and then you're already chasing the next goal, and this has been me through my entire life and this has been many of my clients through their lives as well.

Speaker 1: 8:36

And why ambitious women fall into this trap is societal expectations. Like we just said, it is this thing where we are conditioned to prove our worth, whether it's being the best student, the best employee or being a flawless business owner, whatever it is, we are completely told all the time that we need to prove our worth as women. There are childhood patterns as well. This is really important. So I learned a long time ago that the reason why I had a really big perfection tendency was because I, like my parent, would shout all the time as a kid and I would walk around on eggshells and I learned the safest thing for me is to be perfect, because if, if I'm perfect, then nobody shouts, that's literally. It can be something so fucking simple, guys. It doesn't have to be a big, massive trauma. It can just be something that overwhelms you in the moment. That is what trauma is okay. And it can be a big event or small little events, obviously being shouted at. As a child, that would scare me. So what would I do? I would literally just learn how to self-soothe. And I thought that if I tried harder, if I prioritised self, the my parents' needs over my own, and this was reinforced by the fact that every time I achieved something, I was shown love, appreciation. I was, I had approval, so this reinforced that.

Speaker 1: 10:02

Okay, the more you achieve, the better that you do, the more recognition that you get. This is where you're hearing that, oh, you're a good girl, well done you've. You've done amazing. And you know, you may have had a parent who would say that to you and then, like, go and brag about everything to your friend, to her friends, but maybe not say everything directly to your face. So you may have this internalized belief as well that you're only valuable when you're achieving. It's this invisible pressure, this mindset becomes especially dangerous to high achievers, entrepreneurs, those people who are really chasing big corporate jobs. Because when your business or your career becomes an extension of your identity, every failure, every mistake, everything feels so fucking personal. Okay, becomes so fucking personal, okay, becomes so fucking personal. So the cost of perfectionism and overworking the emotional cost you're just not doing enough, you're not being enough.

Speaker 1: 11:05

There's this feeling of like always going into that negative self-talk of like oh, why can't you just do this, why can't you just do that? Even when you're sitting down and you're resting, you're like I'm going to take the day to rest. You're, you're sat there and your brain is like why aren't you doing anything? You know, you can almost be at war with yourself and you may have massive resentment towards others who don't seem to be working as hard. And you could have levels of jealousy as well. Now, you know, I talk about jealousy a lot because it's one of the traits that I have, which I've learned to like, accept as part of my shadow, like it's something that I am, and what I've done is when I was younger, like I used to be really spiteful with my jealousy, but now I'm a lot more, like I can acknowledge it and I can hold it and I can still celebrate the other person.

Speaker 1: 11:50

Okay, we will all have traits that are less desirable, that sit in our shadow. That is the dark side of us. It's because we live in a world of polarity, which you've heard me say this a thousand fucking time on this podcast. We live in a world of polarity, okay, and when we are resentful, we are outsourcing our energy and our power to other people rather than looking inwards. Okay, again, this is the trap of being in that externally facing world.

Speaker 1: 12:17

Okay, then we have the physical cost you're burnt out, fatigue, you're stressed, you may have thyroid issues. You may not be able to fucking sleep. You have anxiety. You may be on medication for anxiety and depression because you just literally cannot function without it. You will always have thoughts of what if I do this? What if I do that? You know your mind is constantly in this state of hypervigilance and what you need to know about being in this state of hypervigilance is that it is the surefied way to completely fuck your nervous system. This is what's really going to damage your nervous system if you do not learn how to regulate this stress and to express this stress.

Speaker 1: 12:56

And you know, as children, we do this all the time. We shake our body, we dance, we scream, we, we move, we shake all of this stuff. We do it instinctively as children. But we get told as we get older that this isn't acceptable. But it should be.

Speaker 1: 13:12

If you are in in a business, you're gonna miss opportunities to put yourself out there because you're going to be afraid You're going to be sold in your growth because you're going to be stuck in your polishing mode instead of action mode and this can apply to like a job as well. Like you might be like oh, I really want to work on this project, but I can't put myself forward because I know I'll just be a perfectionist. Or I can't really handling this report, or my work is always late because I'm already like I'm always polishing it, or you're working really late into the evening the day before I don't know a deadline where you're just polishing everything and nothing ever feels like it's good enough. So what do you do to break free from this cycle? You need to reframe failure as Okay.

Speaker 1: 13:56

If you go into the world as an adult thinking you're never going to fail, you're a fucking idiot. Love you, but you're a fucking idiot, okay. Everybody fails. When we're children, we absolutely like, thrive off making mistakes because this is how we learn. And you know, the main thing that perfectionists will fear will be failure, but it's a natural part of success. So when you're worried about fucking, I'm worried I'm gonna fail. This, you know. And also, by the way, nobody's ever calling you a failure. The word failure only exists in your head. You know when was the last time you thought oh, my god, I don't know, sandra, she's a fucking failure. Nobody ever does that, no one. Literally, we only think of ourselves as failure and that's how we identify with ourselves. But I want you to ask yourself what's the worst that can happen, and literally sometimes it's just about learning as you go.

Speaker 1: 14:49

Okay, when you start a new job, like there's's a statistic oh my god, there's like research that men will apply for like 50, for a job if they meet 50 or 60 percent of their criteria, while women will only apply if they meet like 95 percent. This is why men get so further ahead in their jobs and their careers than women, because we hold ourselves back. But I'm like well, what happens if you apply for a job and the thing is, women feel like they have to go in and be perfect. Right, this comes from our witch wound. This comes from our woman wound. This comes from the way that we're conditioned as children and in society, and men will just go in and go, I'll get the job and I'll learn how to do it later. It's a completely different mindset and this is because women are way more cautious than men for so many reasons, because we are constantly like under threat by men, by our society, by being told that we need to stay small in order to stay safe. We shouldn't use our voice. It's not appropriate to use our voice, blah, blah, blah. You know if you listen to this podcast, you hear me talk about this stuff before.

Speaker 1: 15:52

Okay, so we need to reframe failure as growth. Ask yourself what's the worst that could happen and just do things as you go. Okay, you have to set boundaries around work. You have to schedule in that time for rest and rejuvenation, and I highly recommend that you go and you look at your human design. If you're a projector, you do not have the energy to be running around nine to five every single fucking day. I'm a projector and I love being a projector. It's one of my favorite things about me is being a projector, because I know how to manage myself now and I know that I should prioritize work four hours a day, because that's the best part of me and I actually get things done a lot quicker when I prioritize work and schedule my work that way, rather than trying to work nine to five, working really hard, working extra out long hours into the evening, because I end up just getting really um burnt.

Speaker 1: 16:45

So I want you to set limits. I want you to create a schedule and stick to it. You know what time are you stepping away and, even if the task isn't perfect, are you closing that laptop down at 5pm. Are you leaving at work on time? You know, I want you to practice saying no and you do not have to take every opportunity or project to prove your worth. Okay, like a mantra should be rest is productive, rest is productive, and I know that feels so wrong, but it's so right, because if you are not operating at 100%, it's like a battery. If you're not operating at 100%, then the battery just drains and there's nothing. You haven't got anything else left to give. I want you to refine what good enough means. I want you to challenge your inner critic. We don't want that. You know, 80% of the time things will be good, you know, and then the 20% of the times, things can just be okay and that's fine. I want you to remind yourself that progress is better than perfection, and something that you could do is to write down a task on where you've been procrastinating because it feels too big and break it down into smaller steps imperfect steps right, they don't have to be rigid or whatever, but if there's a big thing that you really want to work on but you're like, oh, I just feel so, like, so stuck before I want to step into it, then I highly recommend breaking it down.

Speaker 1: 18:07

We need to be embracing our feminine energy as women in the way that we work. Okay, perfection often stems from being stuck in our masculine energy, which is so damaging to our mind, body, into our fucking soul, right? So overdoing, overthinking, over controlling is actually dark masculine energy as well, or, like I don't know, shadow masculinity oh my god, I can't remember what it's called but basically it's not divine masculine, it's like wounded masculine that's the word I was looking for. So when we start to move from this wounded masculine energy of having to overly think, over control, overdue into like a feminine flow this is where we prioritize creativity and intuition we're able to tap into our inner knowing. Like I, I feel like I bang on about this and I will bang on about it probably till the day I die, if I'm being completely honest.

Speaker 1: 19:01

But what I really want to fucking get home to you guys is that, like you know so much, your ancestors know so much. You know so much because you have this beautiful intuition, as this woman that you are, you are fucking incredible and you have all the tools that you ever need already within you for any decision that you need to make, for anything like that you have it all within you. Within you, babe like I can't tell you it enough and I will continue to tell you it forever but honestly, stepping into your femininity and allowing yourself to break down that masculine shield and to sit there with your emotions and with your creative flow, oh my god, magical things happen. It's why some of the best entrepreneurs are women leading from their heart, not from their mind. Okay, they are the soul-based leaders that are completely just going for it with their heart, and that's the beautiful thing about women. Okay, and using our intuition is our moral compass. It's the way that we can make decisions, okay.

Speaker 1: 20:05

So, last thing, I want you to celebrate progress. Something that I make my fucking clients do all the time is to write down every achievement that they've made in their life. So this list better be fucking long, guys. Like it can include the certificates that you did, or going to university, or having this experience, having that experience it might even be on the really hard days you've gotten out of bed. These are all achievements. Like you should be having this like wealth of achievements, and you can do it through your life. You can do it for the last year. It probably would be nice to do it for the last year, actually, as we're at the beginning of 2025 and I want you to write it all down and look at how much of a fucking success that you already are, and the more that you start to look outside, you miss all of these beautiful progresses and the way, the outcomes of everything that you do. So I really want you to take a moment to pause for this.

Speaker 1: 21:02

Okay, and now a new way forward. I want you to take a deep breath in and a deep breath out and listen to this next question. Imagine what your life would look like if you could let go of the need to be perfect. You'd move faster, you'd achieve more. You'd have more joy, more satisfaction. You'll be done constantly chasing enough because you already are. You'll have a deeper connection with other people around you because you show up authentically, not this perfect version of yourself, but as a real, whole, powerful woman that you are. You don't have to do it all and you don't have to do it perfectly if you're like fucking hell. Kirstie, you have completely spoken to my soul and you are after this transformation.

Speaker 1: 22:00

I am currently opening applications for Reborn, which is my three months intensive, deep working mentorship where we use multiple healing modalities to basically work through the ancestor stuff the mother, the father and to rebuild yourself from the inside out. We are healing this inner child once and for all. And why is this different to therapy? Therapy, you just talk about stuff. In my mentorship, we are doing life healing. We are doing so many different things to move you along. You have an action plan. You are always moving forward to that future version of yourself where therapy is always about going back over things. We are not. We are really forward facing and we are going to make 2025 the best fucking year for any of my reborn clients. They know this and I'm just like so, so in love with all my reborn clients from 2024. They're absolutely beautiful because I'm having surgery. I will be opening slots to start mid-February, which which means by signing up now, you have an extended payment plan as well.

Speaker 1: 23:05

So I have put all the details below in the caption. If that is ready for you, if you're like I am, done being this high achiever that is just stuck in this perfectionism, stuck in this overworking cycle, I'm done feeling like I'm not enough and I'm ready to be the best fucking version of myself, then let me know, reborn is application. Only we need to make sure that we are the right fit for each other. That is the reason why it's an application, because I will not work with anybody that I can't get them a result. I will not work with somebody unless I feel like we, energetically, are a good match and that we can really make a difference together.

Speaker 1: 23:43

So, with all that being said, I'm going to leave it there for today. Thank you for joining me. If this eponym, if this episode, has resonated with you, I'd love to hear your thoughts. So send me a message or tag me on social media with your biggest takeaway, and remember perfectionism and overworking is a silent saboteur, but you have the power to break free. I'm here to help you every step of the way. So until next time, babe, I will see you soon.