Minisode Series: Understanding Anxiety and Work Life Balance

This episode dives into the personal journey of balancing work and motherhood while navigating anxiety. Through reflections and shared stories, I explore the unique definitions of work-life balance and the importance of recognizing and addressing anxiety. 

• Discussion on Gary Vaynerchuk's take on work-life balance 
• Personal struggles with balancing career and family life 
• Understanding the different manifestations of anxiety 
• Sharing experiences of anxiety
• Importance of self-talk in managing anxiety 
• Recognizing anxiety as a barrier to engaging in fulfilling experiences 
• The significance of addressing anxiety for future generations 
• Encouragement for listeners to take action towards understanding their anxiety

Transcript

Work-Life Balance and Managing Anxiety

Speaker 1 0:00

Hello everybody , this is Still Rose's podcast . This podcast is created for women , by women , to elevate women's voices . Little mini-sode , again , a little bit late , but not really Is it late . Who determines what's late ? Really , for your own personal stuff , I just recently saw a post on LinkedIn from Gary Vaynerchuk where and if you have been listening for a while you know that I've actually been following him for quite a bit , ever since his early days at the wine library . Check out his story and check out his book Crush it . In general , his vibe is really cool Very high vibe , high energy and insightful , which it's a great combination of information . So strong recommend . If you're not following him or if you haven't picked up any of his books , pick it up , because his story is incredible in the sense that it really does show you you could start from a certain place and end up in a whole other place . I'm sure that 20 years ago , when he was at the wine library , he didn't imagine he'd be having his media empire . So it's just very interesting to see people progress in their entrepreneurship . I love it .

Speaker 1 1:14

Clearly , that was just a quick thing that top of mind popped into my head . Now the second thing I wanted to talk about oh , so I'm sorry . The thing that he posted about on LinkedIn basically outlined work-life balance and was , like you know , people get really stressed out , they get down on themselves about work-life balance I'm spending too much time at work or I'm not enough work , or whatever it is and we get hung up on like , oh , it has to be the 40 hours , it has to be 35 hours , whatever it is . And his post basically said , like it's really up to you , like what is your work-life balance ? Would look like Maybe your work-life balance includes working on Saturday morning for a little while , maybe it includes working evenings , like I don't know . It depends on what feels good for you , like what actually feels good for you in the moment . And I really I paused to really think about that because I'm , like you know , I get really stressed about that as a working mom trying to advance my , my career , and actually let me rephrase that Advancing in my career , as I have , has been hard for me a lot at times , because I want to be there for my kids and that's a personal for me . Like I don't want to travel . I want to make sure that I'm present and accounted for in their lives . I don't want them to always think of me as , oh , mommy worked all the time Although they probably will anyway , because it is what it is . But that's a personal choice . Other people feel more flexibility in that area . They're comfortable traveling while their kids are small . They're okay with being away from them for a couple of nights . I know a lot of people that go on vacations with other kids , and a lot of people you know strongly recommend that . I can't get my head around that just yet , but nevertheless , work-life balance is really what you need it to be , and you have to make it work for you . There is not a cookie cutter that you're supposed to be fitting into . So I wanted to plug that quickly because that popped into my head . Now .

Speaker 1 2:55

The other thing I wanted to talk about was anxiety . So I'm pretty certain that everybody has some level of anxiety that they feel in their lives . Anxiety can manifest in physical or mental forms . Physical is , you know , usually , oh , I can't breathe , my chest feels tight , I have chest pains , I feel tightness in my throat , my stomach hurts , you name it . Anxiety can happen because of these things . Now , sometimes anxiety is , you know it's not . Sometimes anxiety is is real in the sense that you get anxious because of a big test , or you get anxious cause you're trying to meet a deadline . There's a reason why you're feeling anxious . Sometimes there is no logical , plausible reason to feel anxious .

Speaker 1 3:41

Yes , I don't want to elaborate here . I'm going to share personally . So , for example , I started a new job . If you follow me on LinkedIn , you would have seen it . I started a new job with a new agency and I really am enjoying it . The people are really wonderful and very supportive , very nice .

Speaker 1 4:01

Unfortunately , though , for me , because I have had so much anxiety in the past few years overwork , things and just dynamics , just things that happen , because my anxiety has been so bad over the past couple of years I'm the one who's carried that forward . So , at the end of the day , I have this tremendous amount of oh my God , something's about to blow up , something's about to happen , Something bad is going to happen . I'm going to get screamed at , or I'm going to have an email that's like really condescending , or something's going to happen , or I'm going to get in trouble for something . And I texted one of my friends , one of my colleagues , and said you know , when does that stop ? When does the PTSD response stop for anxiety and she kind of laughed about it . She's very insightful . She actually has an episode for Steel Roses and she just said she's like it takes time . You know , it just kind of takes time .

Speaker 1 4:56

Now , the reason why I'm sharing this is because I think again , I think a lot of us go through this where we feel anxious and we're not exactly sure why . Now I've had the benefit of being able to join online communities and take courses and really engage with all these wonderful guests that are on the podcast , and through engaging with all these people , I already knew the anxiety that I was feeling wasn't actually real . It was a trigger response in my body where I got so conditioned to feel anxiety that it's like oozing out of me and it's going to take time for me to not stop it , but time for me to break that habit . I've talked with you before about when change is happening . Here's another reason why I'm probably feeling anxiety when change is happening , your brain is rewiring itself and thus it feels uncomfortable , which also would tell you you're anxious . But you're not really anxious . You're just uncomfortable because you're going through a change and a growth . Recognizing these things in the moment is very interesting . So for me .

Speaker 1 6:05

What I've been doing is I've been acknowledging the anxiety . I know I'm feeling anxious and I know it's not real , and this is , by the way , the self-talk that I've been doing . I know I'm feeling anxious , but I know it's not real and I know that the reason I'm feeling anxious is just because of a response from prior events , past events . Now , this would apply to all anxiety in most cases . If you are , I'll use another one for me . I get anxiety .

Speaker 1 6:35

This is going to make me sound like a recluse , but I get anxiety when I have to drive long distances by myself and it sounds a little odd because I try to maintain a lot of independence and I want to lead with independence . But for some reason , when I leave my area , when I leave my town not just my town , but my area when I leave my local area , I start to get anxiety . Leading up to it , I will actually have nightmares leading up to the day that I'm supposed to go and drive somewhere because I just get this anxiety . Now , I don't know why that had started to happen , but in the last couple of years it had started to happen Again . I don't know why , but I also know that it's not real . Now my mom also gets anxiety when she knows she has to travel long distances , but she kind of leans into it .

Speaker 1 7:25

I'm trying not to lean into it . So I'm recognizing I have anxiety . But you're okay , jenny , you can do this , you can leave your area Like this is no problem . And I just self-talk my way through it and I kind of just face it . I throw myself into it because if I don't , what's the alternative ? If you don't face the anxiety , if you don't acknowledge I am anxious , I know I feel crappy , I know that I just need to get through this little hurdle and then I will be okay . If you don't make that choice , what is the alternative ? The alternative is you are allowing an anxiety response to hold you captive . You are allowing an anxiety response to take you away from something that would potentially be very rewarding for you personally , mentally , like whatever . If you get anxiety getting on planes , okay , I get it , me too . That's an area where I'll lean on a little pharmaceutical support . And here's another one water slides . I can't the closed water slide . I mean in general it's water slides Like that's not my jam .

Speaker 1 8:32

When my husband and I were dating and we used to take my stepkids to the water park . I had to take a sedative to be able to manage going , because I really wanted to go , but I knew my anxiety was gonna prevent me from really like doing anything . But I really wanted to participate , I really wanted to be involved , so that was my solution in that moment . Now I'm not saying everyone , go out there and pop some Prozac , but I am saying that sometimes I have to do what I have to do . Right , what is your anxiety keeping you from doing ? Is your anxiety keeping you from having , from traveling or having experiences ? You from having from traveling or having experiences ?

Speaker 1 9:11

And furthermore , depending on where you are in your life cycle , if you don't recognize your anxiety now and if you don't address your anxiety now , what will you pass on to future generations ? What is going to happen when you eventually have children ? Or when you you know , yeah , actually , when you eventually have children , when you you know , yeah , actually , when you eventually have children , when you get married ? Like what's going to happen in those moments ? Do you want to carry the weight of that anxiety with you like a hundred pound bell around your neck , or do you want to be free ? And I think that you all really just want to be free and I think that with work , if you can recognize it , acknowledge the anxiety , I know I'm feeling anxious , I know that it's not real , I know it's just my brain wiring its regular synapses and I have to get past this little hurdle because once I do , the reward is on the other side and the reward is a great experience . The reward is accomplishing a task you didn't think you could . The reward is living your life . So I do put that out to all of you .

Speaker 1 10:14

Today I've been feeling terrible anxiety . I've been tapping into some of my former guests and reaching out to people and saying , hey , I'm feeling anxious , I'm just telling people because I'm freaking out . Talk to someone , talk to someone you trust . Tell them like , hey , like this is kind of happening to me , like just trying to figure it out , talk about it , journal about it . You know I'm going to say meditate about it , because you know how I feel about meditation . Do something to combat it , because if you don't , you are not going to get to live your most authentic life . So I'll leave you

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Speaker 1 10:44

with that .

Speaker 1 10:44

I hope that you all are having . So I'll leave you with that . I hope that you all are having . I hope you all had a great January . Happy February to you all . January was like the longest month ever . Oh , tune in for tomorrow's guest episode . I didn't have my notes with me because I'm pulling a fast one and recording in my car , but guest episodes are dropping every Sunday 8 am or 9 am . I am going to start doing lives again . I just have to get myself settled with my routine . Check them all out . Very interesting stuff . I hope you enjoy this little mini-sode and I will catch you on the next one . Take care .