Is your soul tired?

Or, why overwhelm and being too busy aren't the only causes of burn out

Photo by Artem Kovalev on Unsplash

I have lost track of the number of people who tell me they are tired at the moment to my asking how they are. On Monday morning this week, at the start of my group coaching session on my Believe & Achieve programme, pretty much all of the group noted feeling tired, fuzzy, overwhelmed (though not by the end of it!)

The days are short just now in the northern hemisphere, robbing us of energy giving daylight. And often those daylight hours available are actually quite dull with little in the way of sunshine. Some days it hardly seems to get light at all, not really.

I know many women who tend to go to bed earlier at this time of the year and certainly for tired minds and bodies, sleep is vital and can have a restorative power. Most of us don’t get the 7-8 hours that we really need to if that’s you, take heed and take more sleep.

However, have you ever had a period in time, and perhaps you are in it now, where no matter how much sleep you get, you still feel tired. Every morning? And most of the day? Whether it’s December or August?

Obviously there are some health conditions which can cause excessive fatigue so having a check in with your doctor is a wise move. However. Have you ever wondered what else can be causing this endless tiredness and weariness?

Well this might be the answer.

Health issues aside, when a woman is just tired all the time, regardless of sleep routines and vitamin supplements, the problem is generally that it is your soul that is tired.

And no amount of extra sleep of vitamin D is going to help that.

So, what do I mean by your soul being tired? 

Well, your soul is the essence of you, or who you are. And we women are pretty ruthless at putting our souls under fairly intolerable strain at times. 

We do this in many ways, do any of these sound like you?

• Unable to say no

• Take on too much responsibility in business, work or home

• Have problems delegating tasks

• Tolerate poor behaviour in others

• Don’t take regular opportunities for joy and creativity - too focused on work/ business/ family

• Keep the peace in relationships by compromising or ignoring your needs

• Engaging in gossip or being overly critical of others

• Running a business or involved in work that’s not really aligned with who we are anymore

• Holding grudges

• Negative self talk about abilities, failures

• Holding onto past mistakes

• Living a life that doesn’t serve your purpose

• Spending too much time with negative or critical people

If you can identify with any of these then this could be the reason for your endless fatigue. And honestly, many women could put their hands up to the whole list. I know that I could have done at one point and there are still some of these I struggle with from time to time.

Each of these is sending your soul, the inner you, a negative message. And it’s these negative messages that are weighing you down, robbing you of energy and creating that endlessly tired feeling.

So what can you do?

Well that would probably take a book to answer! But the first thing is to read a list like this and start to recognise yourself. And then take it one step at a time. Start to dismantle what drains you and seek out what fills you with fire.

For example, look at spending less time with negative people. Tricky if this is a spouse admittedly, but it can be done in other life areas. In my last job I stopped having regular lunch dates with a negative colleague to avoid the negativity and the gossiping. I didn’t do it brutally, I just decided to change my lunch routine to something that didn’t suit her, namely a long walk. This had a profound impact on my energy levels during the day and also my feelings about other colleagues that had been constantly in the firing line.

You could also start saying no more often. My best tip here is to practice this with the people you know will be least offended if you say no to their requests. Then work your way up to the more challenging people in time.

Another easy one – stop gossiping! this is totally within your control. When I think about which of my friends I like and trust the most, it’s the ones who don’t gossip or talk down about others all the time. It’s a habit that may of us get into, often learning it from our families, or the way our friends behave as we grow up. Conversations and friendships that revolve around talking about other people and what they/ their spouses/ their children etc. are getting up to, in a negative way are really unsatisfying.

Just in the way that we remind and counsel our children to ‘be kind’ about other people and ‘if you don’t have anything nice to say, don’t say anything at all’ we should remind ourselves of this too. After all, according to Eleanor Roosevelt, great minds talk about ideas, small minds talk about other people.

Make time for joy and creativity. Do things regularly that light you up and make you feel good. Dance (even if just in the kitchen), craft, walk in nature, go stargazing, read more books, WRITE a book.

A harder one is to honestly assess whether you are living a life that feels like it has meaning and purpose. If you’re not, you really will find it hard to motivate yourself, stay resilient to life’s slings and arrows and to feel well. If you’re in a rut, coaching can help.

So try it. Look at this list and also add anything else that might be taking your energy away. And set yourself the intention and a plan to start eliminating these things from your life – I promise you’ll feel lighter.

Coming soon to my Gather & Grow members is a video and workbook to help you with all of the above. It’s based on a previous workshop I have run for women in business and creatives called Light Up Your Life.

I’ll walk you through a process where you can look at different aspects of your life and put together a plan to lighten things up!

To get access when it’s ready - and to the other benefits, just upgrade to paid by clicking the ‘upgrade to paid’ button when you read this article on Substack (you can do this by just clicking through in the email).

With love,

Sarah x

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What is Gather & Grow membership?

Gather & Grow benefits currently include:

1. Monthly live journaling & intention setting sessions - last Sunday in the month at 7pm UK time - when you join you’ll be sent a link to the next one which is this Sunday, 28 January.

2. Access to my self guided version of my hugely popular workshop and tool, Your Inner Mentor. This is available from my website for £35 but members get it as part of their connection with me.

3. A super useful habit tracker to help you set new habits up and try new ways of behaving and being