This episode is about stepping back without guilt

Cheryl: M Hello and welcome to work Stress and Anxiety by abgw. Hello, I'm Cheryl. Okay, so it was Stress Awareness month and I'm the stress coach and I barely talked about stress. Yes, I appreciate the irony. It was almost like it was sitting in the corner with a clipboard judging me quietly. And I didn't go quiet because I forgot. I didn't go quiet because I had nothing to say. And I definitely didn't go quiet because stress suddenly became less relevant, which would be lovely, but unfortunately the world remains committed to being ridiculous. The thing is, I went quiet because I needed to protect my energy. And that is what this episode is all about. Not just Stress Awareness Month, not just whether I posted enough or showed up enough, or maybe the most obvious marketing window there is. This episode is about stepping back without guilt. Because for, uh, high functioning women, especially women who are used to being capable, visible, useful, reliable and emotionally available to everyone, including the office plant, stepping back can feel strangely threatening. You can know that you need rest and still feel guilty for taking it. You can understand burnout prevention and still push yourself until your body starts filing complaints. You can tell other people to protect their energy and still treat your boundaries like it's an optional extra. So today we're talking about what happens when rest feels like failure, why stepping back can trigger so much guilt, and how to make one small, small, steady decision that protects your well being without turning it into some life referendum. So I had planned to take March off. We were in season three of the podcast. That was the plan. A clean, sensible, well behaved fan, very grown up, I must admit, very organised. The type of plan that looks lovely before real life gets its muddy boots on it. So what actually happened was, um, April became a rest period too. And April, of course was Stress Awareness Month in the uk. So there I was, a stress coach during the one month when it would have made perfect sense to be posting, talking, sharing, explaining, you know, showing up, basically waving my small branded flag, saying, hey, stress is real. Please stop pretending you're fine. And yet I barely talked about it. You know, at first that annoyed me because part of me thought, well, you're missing this opportunity. That irritating little inner voice started doing its usual performance with you. You should have posted more, you should have made more of this, you should have been visible, you should have used this month properly. You just hear that annoying voice in my head now. Which is all very charming, isn't it? That inner critic loves the word should. It wears it like a name badge back in the supermarket. But when I Stripped it back. The truth was simple. I needed the spade. I needed to focus on refining my work. I needed to protect my energy. I needed to build something useful, not just add more noise because the calendar said it was time. And um, more importantly, I needed to stay congruent to what I actually talk about. Because if I'm saying to women that stress management includes boundaries, recovery, pacing, nervous system steadiness, then I can't also force myself to perform well being while quietly ignoring my own signals. For me, that wouldn't be integrity. That would just be drama. And, um, frankly, we've all had enough of that already. So I chose to step back. Not because it was easy, not because it looked impressive, not because I felt perfectly peaceful about it, because I didn't. I felt a little bit annoyed. I thought, what if I lose the momentum that I've been building? You know, what if I look inconsistent? But I also knew this. If I pushed through purely to prove I was still visible, I would be doing the very thing I help other women stop doing. I would be treating my energy as, uh, something to spend for approval. And that is not stress management. So this is where I think so many high functioning women get trapped. Not because they do not understand rest, they do not because they've never heard of boundaries. Most of them could probably teach a small seminar on, um, boundaries while simultaneously answering emails during their break. The issue is not knowledge. The issue, I think is permission. Because stepping back can trigger all sorts of alarms. What if I fall behind? What if I lose momentum? What if people think I'm lazy? What if someone else overtakes me? What if I become irrelevant? You know, what if I disappoint people? That is a heavy belief to carry and it, uh, often hides behind competency. You keep going because people rely on you. You keep showing up because you're good at what you do. You keep performing because stopping feels risky. Keep saying yes because no feels like letting someone down. And then when your body finally starts asking for recovery, you don't hear it as information. You hear it as, uh, an accusation. You think, what's wrong with me? But here is the carbon, more useful truth. Nothing is wrong with you because you need recovery. Look, you're not a machine. You're not. You are a human being with a nervous system. Limits, responsibilities, emotions, history, sleep, needs, hormones, and probably far too many unread messages. Work related stress does not become more manageable because you shame yourself harder. Burnout. Prevention doesn't happen because you squeeze more productivity out of an already overloaded system. And stepping back without guilt doesn't mean you will never feel guilt. It just means guilt doesn't have to get to be the only voice in your room.


ABGW method focuses on rest to protect your energy and sharpen work

So let's bring this into reality because it's very easy to agree with the idea of rest. In theory, it's. I appreciate it's, um, much harder when you're looking at your diary, your inbox, your business, your workload, your family, your teams, your clients, your bills, your responsibilities, and the tiny emotional spreadsheet in your head that tracks everyone else's expectations. That is where stress management gets real, not some inspirational quote in the Tuesday afternoon decision. Do I reply now or do I wait? Do I take a break or do I push through? Do I cancel the optional thing or do I keep pretending it's essential? And this is where the ABGW method lens matters. Uh, awareness says this is what is happening. Balance says what needs protected, growth says what small experiment can I try and, um, win, Win well being. How do I move forward without burning myself down to prove that I care? That is the difference. We are, uh, not using rest as an escape hatch from life, we're using it as part of the structure that allows life to become sustainable. Because sometimes the healthiest decision is not to speak louder, post more, explain harder, or keep, keep showing up at the same pace. Sometimes the healthiest decision is to stop performing long enough to hear yourself again. So what does that mean? Well, in practise, it means lots of things. But the thing is, if rest protects your ability to return with clarity, it's not avoidance, um, it's strategy. So stepping back without guilt is not about never feeling guilty. It's about recognising guilt as an old alarm, not an instruction. It is about noticing when your nervous system is overloaded and responding steadiness instead of self attack. It's about understanding that visibility is not the same as value. And it is about practising what you preach, especially when it costs you something. So for me, that is also where integrity lives. So, yeah, I went quiet during Stress awareness month and no, I do not think that was a failure. I think it was a point. So sometimes the way I see it, it's about stepping back long enough to protect your energy, sharpen your work and return with more honesty, um, than performance. So if this episode helped you feel a little less guilty about protecting your energy, please follow Work Stress Anxiety by abgw. So that's it, uh, for now, thank you for listening.


Cheryl Parris: Taking rest doesn't make you weak

I'm Cheryl Parris and this is your reminder that needing rest doesn't make you weak, lazy, inconsistent, or less committed. It makes you human. And humans need recovery. So take the smallest next step. Pause if you need to. Protect what matters. And remember, calm first, reality first, then change. Remember, every step you take, no matter how small, is a step towards a brighter, uh, more balanced future. Trust in your journey. And remember, progress is progress, no matter the pace. Bye for now.