Today's episode is an interview with Cait Donovan, Host of FRIED, The Burnout Podcast. In this episode, Cait and I talk about burnout and get into an honest conversation about what burnout really is and how to get back to a healthier place.
Welcome back to the She’s Wild Podcast. Today's episode is an interview with Cait Donovan, Host of Fried, The Burnout Podcast. Cait is also the author of The Bouncebackability Factor where you can learn how to end burnout, gain resilience, and change the world. Her book and podcast is for everyone who has ever felt FRIED with a special focus on the female entrepreneur. In a world where women are told that they can have it all and be it all, the high achievers are looking down from the top of the mountain and wondering why it doesn’t feel as good as they thought it might.
In this episode, Cait and I talk about burnout and get into an honest conversation about what burnout really is and how to get back to a healthier place.
Memorable Moments:
3:34 And I had everything that I could have ever dreamed of wanting. Because I did not grow up in a place where where I had the example of large amounts of money, large amounts of financial success. You know, everything was always a struggle. So I got to this place where I was like, oh my god, I can check off all these boxes that I never thought I'd be able to check off. Why am I so miserable? Why is my body breaking down? Why am I so tired? Why am I so resentful toward my patients? Every time I got a phone call. I was like what do people want from me? Like I couldn't even and it sounds I say these things with like full knowledge of how awful it sounds for a healthcare practitioner to feel resentful toward their patients. I understand what it sounds like. I'm telling you that it's embarrassing, but also the truth. I didn't realize what I was going through was burnout until like six or seven years later.
11:50 But our brains are designed or designed to find the thing that we find pleasurable, get it as much as we can, and then become complacent and want something more. That is literally how our brains are designed. And originally, that helped us travel further. It helped us intermingle genes with further, right, like tribes. And because we were spread out because we were searching for something more because we were pushing our boundaries.
15:52 And the more we start respecting other people's calendars, the more our calendars will start to be respected. But at the end of the day, no one respects your calendar, if you don't.
21:07 The emotional side to me is, if anything changes in your day, last minute, you absolutely lose your mind. So if one thing gets added to your to do list, or one person asks you one additional question, or you get one email that you weren't expecting to get, it throws everything off completely, you have no emotional space for flexibility and responding and reacting because you are so close to the edge, that no matter what, it'll just throw you right off.
22:54 On top of that, I see massive amounts of resentment. When you're burnt out. Everything feels unfair. I'm doing all these things for all these people. And I'm not getting the gratitude, I'm not getting the praise, I'm not getting the speaking slot, I'm not getting the I'm all these things, and I'm not getting what I deserve in return.
23:37 And then there's a host of physical symptoms, headaches, anxiety, gut issues, inability to sleep, low libido, foggy brain, neurological symptoms, there's a whole host of symptoms that could that you know, the kind that you go to your doctor and your doctor does your bloodwork and he's like, everything's fine. And you're like, it's not it's not I'm not fine. I'm not fine over here.
30:07 So if you are afraid that you're burnt out, you are burnt out.
Connect with Cait Donovan:
Instagram: Cait_Donovan
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/caitdonovanspeaks/
https://friedtheburnoutpodcast.com
https://www.facebook.com/groups/friedtheburnoutpodcast
Speaking Inquiry: https://www.caitdonovan.com/speaking
Resentful Journal: https://www.caitdonovan.com/resentment-journal
Where to Start If You Think You Might Be Burnt Out & Want to Recover: https://www.caitdonovan.com/blog/what-episodes-of-fried-do-i-listen-to-first-for-burnout-recovery
Cait’s Book Recommendation: The Body Keeps the Score via Amazon: https://a.co/d/iPUUxfu
Connect with Nancy:
Instagram: https://instagram.com/nancysurak
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/nancysurak/
Website: www.nancysurak.com
She’s Wild Sound Production by:
Luke Surak, Surak Productions: surakproductions@gmail.com
Nancy Surak00:00
Hi welcome back to She's Wild the podcast for women in land and development. Today's guest is Caitlin Donovan, the host of Fried, the Burnout Podcast, and author of the BounceBackAbility Factor, a book all about ending burnout. Before I get into today's interview, I did want to come on and wish everyone a very warm holiday season as we enter into the end of 2022. And I wanted to let you all know that after today's show, we will be concluding the first season of she's wild, we will be back with Season Two of She's Wild on January 10th. And for the entire month of January, we will be featuring interviews with women who are in the development space, and the land and development industry. So enjoy today's show. And I'll see you guys back on January 10. Caitlyn, welcome to the show, I am going to tell you why I invited you here and then I'm going to let you tell us more about yourself. But I recently heard a podcast that you were on. And when I heard you speak about what burnout is in the signs, it slapped me across the face. And I was just like, oh my god, I have been living in this state of mine for years. And I thought, you know if it is that impactful for me that I should bring you on to talk about it here as well. So welcome to the show.
Caitlin Donovan01:31
Thank you so much for having me.
Nancy Surak01:33
You bet. I want to go ahead and just dive in so that the folks here today can learn a little bit more about you and your background. Why don't you tell us a little bit more about your personal career journey, and how you ended up where you are today.
Caitlin Donovan01:47
So I started my whole career journey in med school, pre med program at Boston University, and I was a total geek in high school, I got a full academic scholarship, I was on the path I realized very quickly that it was not the right thing, ended up studying Chinese medicine instead. So I moved from Boston to California. I was 20 years old, going to school to learn acupuncture and herbal medicine, I had never had an acupuncture appointment before. It was this wild, wild world that I was jumping into. And I loved it. Like loved it. And I still love Chinese medicine, the beauty of the thought process and how things are connected. And I'm still obsessed with it all these years later, I met a man in Argentina, he was Polish. When I had one year left of my studies within six weeks, we were engaged. So I finished my studies, I moved to Poland, I have a fresh master's degree. I'm 24 years old. I'm getting married to someone that I met a year earlier and lived apart from this whole time. I'm living in a country where I don't speak the language. And I've got to be successful financially, way beyond the average salary of the area, because the average salary of the area would not have you been covered my student loan bill, nevermind any other bill. So not only do I have to be successful, but I have to be successful times for in a country where I don't speak the language. And I did it. I did it I found a way I made it happen. I ended up 28 years old on Polish TV, I speak fluent Polish. Now. I was in magazines. It was a whole thing. I was this like the acupuncture lady from the United States. You know, I was treating fertility it was this big deal. And I had everything that I could have ever dreamed of wanting. Because I did not grow up in a place where where I had the example of large amounts of money, large amounts of financial success. You know, everything was always a struggle. So I got to this place where I was like, oh my god, I can check off all these boxes that I never thought I'd be able to check off. Why am I so miserable? Why is my body breaking down? Why am I so tired? Why am I so resentful toward my patients? Every time I got a phone call. I was like what do people want from me? Like I couldn't even and it sounds I say these things with like full knowledge of how awful it sounds for a healthcare practitioner to feel resentful toward their patients. I understand what it sounds like. I'm telling you that it's embarrassing, but also the truth. I didn't realize what I was going through was burnout until like six or seven years later. So I was just in this constant cycle of feeling like crap feeling a little bit better and feeling like crap again, and I'm a healthcare practitioner. I'm a stress management expert. Because acupuncture teaches you that Chinese medicine is all about how different stressors affect the body. I'm a stress management expert. One day I read an article on burnout. And my whole world started to shift. I had that slap across the face moment that you mentioned. That's what happened to me when I read this article and I was like Oh my god. Oh my god. And that's what started this whole journey.
Nancy Surak05:07
Wow. So, back to that article. Do you remember what really triggered you? Like? Was it something specific? Do you have that recollection?
Caitlin Donovan05:16
The only thing I remember is that I kept saying the word burnout, and then describing what it meant, and I was like, I've never even heard this word I said earlier, I'm a geek when I say that. I mean, I probably read 90 books a year. I'm doing an extra degree right now for fun, right? Like, I will read scientific research at night to relax. You know, like, so. I was reading this and I was coming across information that I had never been privy to. I had been a healthcare practitioner for over a decade. How, how did this get past me?
Nancy Surak06:00
So, I mean, I've heard about burnout culture. I've heard when people say, I'm so burnt out, and listen, I'm gonna, I'm gonna be honest here. I sort of roll my eyes and I'm like, please, we're all burned out. Like we're all in that constant state of never enough, right? Never enough time. Never enough success. Never enough. You know, being on social media. Never enough sleep. Never, never enough money like never enough. It's just never enough. Like no matter how successful you are, it's never enough. So we're always like, chasing whatever, for whatever society's telling us, right? So I get it. But I never really personally said, oh, I'm like, super burned out until I heard your podcast, and I was like, Oh, crap, I might actually be burned out. So I want to talk a little bit about society's definition of success. Right. My podcast here is predominantly focused on women in commercial real estate, Women and land, women and development. Everyone that knows me knows that I'm a huge proponent of raising other professional women in my industry, because there's not a lot of us, we are definitely still the minority. But as a result, women that I know in my network circle, work ourselves to death, we are constantly chasing that "never enough", right? We're trying to push it out the door and slam the door and not let those voices interfere with us. Society has taught us in a male dominated industry that we have to be better than everyone else, everyone else around us, we have to be better than the woman next door, we have to be better than the men. In every meeting, we have to be over prepared. So I want to talk about society and changing this culture. Tell me a little bit about your thoughts around what can we do to end burnout culture?
Caitlin Donovan07:53
We need allies first and foremost. And when you're speaking, my head is saying, yes, white women have to do that. And black women have to do twice as much. Right? I'm immediately going to minorities have to do twice, three times as much sometimes. My husband recently hired someone and he said she came so well prepared. And I looked at him and I said, was she white? And he said no. And I said, yeah, do not reward her. Give her the job, if she's the right person for the job. But do not tell her that she needs to do that all the time. He was like she really doesn't. I was like, well then make sure she knows. Because we need more than anything. We need men that are fighting against this for us. Just like black women, Hispanic women need white women and Asian women need white women to fight for them. We also need men to fight for us and for them. So I think one of the biggest things is and the thing that you mentioned earlier, like you have a lot of male listeners for this podcast, even though that was not necessarily the intent. In the beginning. Men, we want to not need you. But we do. We need your voices. We need you to stand up. We need you to shout. To help shift this perspective. I have so many wonderful men that surrounded me and so many wonderful men that I follow on LinkedIn that are constantly pushing forward. This agenda of equity, not enough. Not enough yet. So I think this is the the biggest thing. There's only so much extra work any of us can do. To get us there without having people on the inside breaking it down.
Nancy Surak09:38
Yeah, no, great. So what do we do? You know, I have FOMO right. Fear Of Missing Out. I was with another company for a long time and I was the only female on the team. Young kids at the time. My kids are grown now. And I can remember flying out of the office at like 4:15 throwing my bag on my shoulder grabbing my laptop knowing that I was going to jump in my car, get on a conference call for the next 40 minutes, because I had to maximize every single little minute, right? Yeah. And I can remember the snickers when I left the office office, I can remember people saying under their breath, Oh, must be nice to leave at 4:15.
Caitlin Donovan10:21
Which is why we need allies.
Nancy Surak10:22
And wanting to punch people in the face. Like, are you kidding me? Like, I'm going to my second job, I gotta go pick up my kids from school, so that I can get them back to town, which oh, by the way, is 40 minutes there and 40 minutes back, like I'm killing myself, like I'm doing my best.
Caitlin Donovan10:36
Well, and I think we forget that the 40 hour workweek was designed for a one parent working scenario.
Nancy Surak10:43
Right? So for me, like, so I had this enormous fear, because I knew, right, yeah, the minute I walk out of this office at 415, and I'm doing the best I can do, I know that there's going to be a phone call that's going to come in at 430 or 445 that my associate is going to get that leans out of me. I know that I'm not going to get the next best assignment because I'm not there at five o'clock. 530. Whatever. I had, I had to train myself that that was okay. That was okay. But it was really hard. So I want to talk about fear and balancing fear of missing out on things that in your career.
Caitlin Donovan11:21
Yeah, so for me, this fear is also related to this thing that you were saying earlier about, like, it's not enough, it's not enough. It's not enough. That not enoughness is a natural neuroscience based need that humans have. So we'd like to sort of blame this on society and say, society always wants us to have more. And it's capitalism that tells us that we always want more, and capitalism capitalizes on the fact that we want more, it encourages it. But our brains are designed or designed to find the thing that we find pleasurable, get it as much as we can, and then become complacent and want something more. That is literally how our brains are designed. And originally, that helped us travel further. It helped us intermingle genes with further, right, like tribes. And because we were spread out because we were searching for something more because we were pushing our boundaries. So this is a natural thing. When I figured that part out, I started to ask myself, instead of saying, like, Oh, my God, it's not enough. I need something more I need something more. I changed the it's not enough to oh, that's interesting. What's next? So I changed that sort of FOMO to curiosity. Oh, I'm letting that go. That's interesting. What am I gaining instead? So I started playing with my own brain and use and capitalizing on this thing in my brain that is always going to want more, because that's how we're built and talking to it in a different way. Oh, you don't want that anymore? That's interesting. What's next? Oh, you're afraid to lose that you're not going to get it? What are you going to get? instead? A relationship with your children that will last through adulthood ya? Maybe? Would you rather have that listing? Or would you rather be able to actually spend holidays with your children because they actually like you because they know you? Because you were there?
Nancy Surak13:35
Very powerful. And I did that, right? I mean, I did that?
Caitlin Donovan13:41
Yeah, exactly.
Nancy Surak13:42
I did those things. I would say, you know, and I have taught that to other people, especially my daughter who's almost 21, right? I have taught her like, Listen, you have you're gonna you're gonna get hired one day for a company and you're gonna have a job to do or you'll be an entrepreneur or whatever. It's perfectly fine for you to have an appointment on your calendar. That is for you. Whether that's working out, whether that's leaving to get your get your hair done, if that makes you feel great, or to spend time with your future children. That's okay. And nobody needs to know where you are, or what they just need to know. You have an appointment. That's it. You're unavailable.
Caitlin Donovan14:19
Yeah, the woman Shelly Paxton, she wrote the book Soulbbatical . She was on Fried a few months ago and she said that she blocks out me tings capital M capital E dash ME-tings. It's me time. It's for me. Doesn't matter what I'm doing. It's I have a meeting. I love this. It's so simple.I have a MEeting. And you and your team can even know what that means. They can know that that's just personal time. Doesn't matter.
Nancy Surak14:58
I love it. And let's make sure that when we see that amongst our peers that we don't kill people, right?
Caitlin Donovan15:06
Yeah. My husband works in a corporate environment and he fits the corporate bog, well, you know, he likes it. He knows how to work if it suits him, I could never do it. I'm an entrepreneur at heart. It's we live different worlds. I just want to say meetings are not respected. As a general rule, calendars are not respected. My husband works well in the corporate world, he enjoys it. But he'll look at me sometimes and say, I have four calls I'm scheduled to be on at 330. I'm like, didn't people see on your calendar that you were busy? He was like, Yeah, they just don't care. Right, you can't be on four calls at 330. No one can be on four calls at 330. So I think we also have to take a moment to recognize that the way that we're working is not sustainable, really, for any of us. And the more we start respecting other people's calendars, the more our calendars will start to be respected. But at the end of the day, no one respects your calendar, if you don't
Nancy Surak16:04
100%.
Caitlin Donovan16:05
And that's a critical point. If you're like, oh, but it doesn't matter. Well, then it doesn't matter. Right? Taking calls after hours, for example, sending and if that doesn't bother you, that's fine. But then don't complain about it. Because if it doesn't bother you, there's nothing to complain about. If it does bother you. I tell this story sometimes, because it was such a wonderful example, an example of a terribly set boundary. I love boundaries, I'm researching them currently getting ready for another book. And this was so great. I bought something from a company that works 24 hours a day online, right? So it's a downloadable template that I was using for my website. So I download this template, I have a question I send to the question Friday at 2pm. My time, Eastern Time. And I say, Hey, I have this I have this question. I'm not sure if I can change this color. And if I can, how I do it. And they write back to me at 515 on Friday, very fast. I wasn't expecting the response so quickly. But this is really fast. So I simply wrote back, thank you. I got an automatic message that said, you know, we really wish that people would try to email us during our working hours from nine to five Monday through Friday Eastern time. Because we have, we are so obsessed with making our customers happy that we can't tear ourselves away from our emails, and then it interrupts our family life. And then we can't spend time with our children. And I was sitting there, I was like, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, first of all, you just emailed me back at 515, which is after your hours. First of all. second of all, I did not request that you email me back within moments. Third of all, it is not my responsibility to manage your telephone use, and your inability to put your phone down. That is not my job. Forth, the better solution is to simply write Hi, thanks so much for writing, we'll get back to you within our business hours, which are as follows. That's it. That's the automatic message. That's all you have to say or nothing. You don't even have to say that exactly, or nothing. You don't even have to say that if you want to, because it helps you to hold the boundary. That's okay, you can do that. That's an acceptable sort of added reinforcement to your wall. If it helps you. Cool. But don't put it on me to hold your boundary between you and your phone.
Nancy Surak18:47
Right? Well, and I I've had to do that just in my real estate practice, right? Like, I will only communicate via text with certain individuals. Yeah. And it's my top 20% of my clientele. That's it. Yeah. Yeah. And people will call me, they will email me. And if they can't reach me, they'll text me. And I'm like, I am not responding to this text. Because the minute I open that door, it's open. That person knows that I'm going to respond. Yep. And it's in I struggle with that. Like, I really have to say, Look, I am not going to do this. And I'll pick up the phone the next morning and I'll call them but I'll say You know, I won't even say like I got your text, I'll just say, Hey, I saw you had a question. How can I help you? Like I don't want to not be helpful.
Caitlin Donovan19:33
The best and the better. The better answer would be if you prefer email. I saw your question in the future emails a better way to reach me. Absolutely. And then go into your answer. to actively discourage people from texting you if you don't want them to. I don't want people texting me either. I don't I don't need that. That amount of noise on my phone. Yeah, I'm busy. Instagramming right now Like, they leave me to my scroll sesh, please.
Nancy Surak20:03
Like 7 o clock at night. Yeah, no, I love it. So I wanted to take a step back and talk a little bit about how to identify that you could be burned out what to talk about, you know, are there three to five major common symptoms that when somebody calls you and they say, I think I need help? Yeah. What is it that that they're describing that they're struggling with or experiencing?
Caitlin Donovan20:34
So there's two separate answers to this question. The first one is the scientific research. And the scientific research is very clear that there are three components to burnout. The first one is physical and emotional exhaustion. This typically means to me that if you are someone who normally exercises and that sort of gives you energy clears your head, etc, you're exercising, and then you have to take a nap after you're crashing after or you have an inability to do it at all. So what you are normally accustomed to being able to do is no longer available to you physically, that's one of the the emotional side to me is, if anything changes in your day, last minute, you absolutely lose your mind. So if one thing gets added to your to do list, or one person asks you one additional question, or you get one email that you weren't expecting to get, it throws everything off completely, you have no emotional space for flexibility and responding and reacting because you are so close to the edge, that no matter what, it'll just throw you right off. So the first portion that we need to see is physical and emotional exhaustion. The next portion we need to see are is feelings of detachment. So feeling alone, even if you're not alone, even if you have a strong community feeling alone, and being cynical. So this is my grandmother would say being a negative Nancy, just being nonstop negative, even if you're like, you know, normally I'm a positive person, but I can't find it like I can't do it. So being negative and feeling detached is section number two that we need to see. The third thing we need to see is a drop in productivity, and a lack of awareness of the impact of your work. So not feeling your clients gratitude, not understanding that your work is valuable, feeling like everything is pointless and worthless. And like what are we doing on this big blue marble and like, what the hell. So feeling like there's no impact and no value to the work that you're offering the world. I think there's impact and value to every single job that has ever existed in some way, shape, or form, even if that impact and value is to get money in your pocket and keep your family safe. I'm cool with that. But if you don't have any clue that what you're doing matters at all. That's a really significant sign. So those are the things that the research gives us that the World Health Organization accepts. On top of that, I see massive amounts of resentment. When you're burnt out. Everything feels unfair. I'm doing all these things for all these people. And I'm not getting the gratitude, I'm not getting the praise, I'm not getting the speaking slot, I'm not getting the I'm all these things, and I'm not getting what I deserve in return. And that could be in your household, not getting the gratitude from my kids for cooking and cleaning, and I'm not getting the whatever it happens to be. So this inherent lack of unfairness, a lack of fairness, that leads to resentment is a huge, huge piece. From my perspective. It's something that I've seen in just about everyone. And then there's a host of physical symptoms, headaches, anxiety, gut issues, inability to sleep, low libido, foggy brain, neurological symptoms, there's a whole host of symptoms that could that you know, the kind that you go to your doctor and your doctor does your bloodwork and he's like, everything's fine. And you're like, it's not it's not I'm not fine. I'm not fine over here. And they're like blood says, okay, and you're like body says no.
Nancy Surak24:12
I want to cry. No, seriously, because I do take a lot personally, right. Like, I take a lot of moments to say something doesn't feel right. Yeah, right. And so I'll rewrite where where it feels wrong. Yeah, I will take that time off. I will crawl back into bed. I will turn my cell phone off. I will refocus my mental state. But I know that there are a lot of people out there who don't have those coping mechanisms for various reasons. Yeah. They don't know how to do those things without some additional assistance are encouragment.
Caitlin Donovan24:49
Or they don't have the level of autonomy available to them and their working environment that allows them to do it. Being able to make those decisions for yourself is a massive privilege.
Nancy Surak24:59
Absolutely
Caitlin Donovan25:00
right, which I have to. That's not that wasn't a dig. That's just saying like, not everybody can. I was just doing a workshop for a group of lawyers, they can't take a nap in the middle of the day if a partner calls them.
Nancy Surak25:13
I don't take naps in the middle of the day.
Caitlin Donovan25:15
But you know what I mean? I mean, I do. Lay down in the middle of the day. I will. I'm a Napper. Also, I'll just shut everything right down and lay down. But not everybody can do that. I have had years. And I used to say it always happens in June. always happens in June, which I used to think how odd is that? That I hit this like brick wall in June? Bam. And I'm like, That's burnout. Yeah. And was it? Do you think it's related to when your kids were finishing school typically? So you had like, was the school year harder for you than the summer?
Nancy Surak25:49
You know, it was all hard honey, it was allhard.
Caitlin Donovan25:52
You know how teachers get to like, teachers get to the end of the school year. And they're like, I'm so done. Whereas the rest of the world is like, we can't be done because we work all year round, you know, but you can be done because you know that something's finishing. And so if that was a natural part of your experience, that you're like, Oh, my God, I don't have to make school lunches right now I don't, the pickups are different. I can like things are a little bit easier. Or they might be harder in the summer, I'm just I'm just sort of guessing that if you had that happen 10 times, it might repeat itself. Now just just on memory,.
Nancy Surak26:26
It did for a long time, I do think it was tied to my kids, because I don't experience that June brick wall, like I used to right. But I used to say to my husband, I feel it coming on, I am so tired. I feel like I just need to crawl back into bed. And I I would acknowledge that right? I feel like I need to rest. And he would say come home and go back to bed. And I would do that. And you're right. That was a privilege, right? But it was like I work for myself. I'm an entrepreneur, I never take time off. Even when I'm on vacation. My phone is on my computer is on I have to be available to my clients, I have to be available for offers that come in or deals that go awry. You know, I'm in the process. Now I know I'm going to be taking some time off like literally like a handful of days, and I'm already training my clients like, hey, how am I going to be available here and setting those boundaries, I am all going to be unavailable doesn't mean that I'm not going to be watching for the the bombs that might go off. But for the most part, I need that time to regenerate my ability to do my best performance, my best work. So yes, it is a privilege. But at the same time, there are other trade offs along the way.
Caitlin Donovan27:42
But oh, that doesn't mean to say that everything in life is lucky. I just want to acknowledge that there might be people listening that don't have that level of autonomy.
Nancy Surak27:49
Right? Or, or the ability to say I need this and I might have sick time. But to take for themselves.
Caitlin Donovan27:58
Yeah, sometimes people can't. That's just what I'm saying though I work with people who literally will tell their bosses that and their boss will say to bad.
Nancy Surak28:06
Yeah, that sucks.
Caitlin Donovan28:07
You know, like that this is this is a this is part of burnout culture that we talk about. But when you don't have the autonomy to decide for yourself, what you can do for yourself for your health. We don't the Americas of Americans especially don't trust this. A lot of countries in Europe, multi, I lived there for 12 years, and not every single one. But a lot of countries in Europe. If you go and you say I am burnt out, you get a three month leave with disability pay.
Nancy Surak28:38
That's amazing, right?
Caitlin Donovan28:39
But Americans would be like, Oh, she's taking advantage of it. He's taking advantage of it. That's not really true. That's, you know, like, it's, we don't we don't trust each other enough in this country. To know when we need rest. So some people are asking for these things and not just not getting them to those people, I say, let's work on your exit plan because this company does not deserve you, or anyone. Right. And that's again, another sort of privilege thing. Like if you can quit a job, then you're lucky. But I say let's we don't have to quit. But we do need to create a plan. And we do need to create a set of sort of rules and circumstances that you will accept another job under where you will be more protected
Nancy Surak29:24
And valued and valued for the time when they're 100 100% mental capacity or Exactly, exactly. Okay. So, I know that was a little bit of us a side dish, but it's all good. So if someone is thinking oh crap, like I might be burnt out.
Caitlin Donovan29:44
Do you have any tips of things that they should do like just to sort of either assess that dig into it a little bit more or, you know, should they call you? I mean, don't do you have on your website, right? Like don't call me don't text me. I
Nancy Surak29:59
I don't want your help. I don't want your business. I mean, how did they help how to folks here today.
Caitlin Donovan30:07
So if you are afraid that you're burnt out, you are burnt out, you know, people that are not burnt out or not having that worry, that's not what's happening. And so one of the first things that I recommend people to do in order to buy themselves some extra energy to be able to work on some stuff that they might have not have enough energy for right now is to do I have a mini course on my website that's called a resentment journal. It's like $32, or something, it's not it's a minimal, low cost, easy access thing. And you download the resentment journal, and it takes you through how to take those difficult emotions, resentment, irritation, anger, annoyance, sort of all these things that are digging at your energy all day, every day, and how to transform those into boundaries, and then how to state those boundaries in a way that makes them more likely to be heard. Right. So this is just like a little game that you get to play and not pretend like a gratitude journal is gonna save you when you're burnt out, because I promise you it won't. And really get honest about your emotional state, and use that as the information that it is to get you clear enough to take the next step. If you need one on one help all over my website, and all over the podcast website, there are links to book a free intro call with myself and with my coaching partner, Sarah, she specializes in empaths and highly sensitive people. So she does a little a lighter version than I do a little bit, I can be a little sort of in your face, kick your butt, kinda, you know. And so that's available to people all the time. But I would start with the resentment journal and see how much space you can open up for yourself and see what that shifts first and foremost.
Nancy Surak31:58
I love that. And obviously listen to your podcast, right?
Caitlin Donovan32:03
Yeah, there's on my website. On my blog, there's a blog post that was inspired by a company that started using Fried the Burnout podcast as their burnout recovery tool for for an entire team of people. Yeah, public health care that had been dealing with COVID. And they needed some help. So they started listening to the episode like a podcast club instead of a book club. Let's listen to this episode, let's discuss it. Let's create a plan. Let's listen to the next. So we gathered those episodes in one place and said, if you're feeling burned out, you need to start. Here's where you start. Listen to these in this order. And it'll help you get there.
Nancy Surak32:42
That's fantastic. So we'll we'll make sure that we add your your blog, to the show notes for folks who want to check that out. And also the link to your resentment journal, which is the first time I've ever heard those terms together with you, like I hear gratitude journal, and I do make a conscious choice every single day to get up and say, you know, thank you for the beautiful home I live in thank you for, you know, my career for the ability to be physical to have movement, to have a long marriage, the fact that my children are living a good healthy lifestyle. I'm very grateful for that. But I agree with you that that doesn't always fix when things don't go well in my day. And I get really frustrated right now.
Caitlin Donovan33:28
And it can lead us to sort of spiritually bypassing like saying, Well, this thing is really crap over here, and everything is really hard. And I'm really crushed. I have no energy, but I'm supposed to have gratitude. So I'm gonna say thanks for my beautiful house. And thanks for my long term relationship. And thanks for while ignoring this dumpster fire over here on the right.
Nancy Surak33:48
Great. Yeah, so let's not ignore that, right. Yeah. So I could, you know, talk to you literally like all day. But I'm not going to do that. I'm going to wrap up here. And I you know, I follow a certain format in my podcast, usually, because of who my guests are. We've been kind of all over the place today. But I do like to end with a few questions. One you've already answered. And the so the other two are going to be Do you have a favorite book or a podcast other than your own, that you can recommend to folks here? Just about, you know, life, life or things that you find incredibly inspiring, or burnout or whatever, is there something that you just love to consume that you'd like to share?
Caitlin Donovan34:33
I think there's an incredibly important book called The Body Keeps the Score by Dr. Bessel Vander Kolk. And that is about how trauma affects the body. How PTSD affects the body, how the stress manifests long term, and why so many of us are stuck in these cycles that we can't seem to break through and we think it's our fault and it's not. So it's a big way for me to allow other people to release this idea. Yeah, but it's your fault. Somehow. You created these mechanisms to save yourself. And you were successful for a long time. And now they're just outdated and they need upgrading. But how are you supposed to know that we don't learn this? If you're extremely burnt out? Don't read it right now, because it's a little science heavy, and you know, just sort of your way down the barrel like now's not the time. But I do think it's something that most people should read.
Nancy Surak35:25
Fantastic. And then I'll I always say, you know, where can my listeners? Where can the people here that are participating in our conversation? Where can they follow you? I mean, you know, we talked a lot about your podcast, you said you had a blog? Do you blog is very inconsistent. Okay, so do you post things on social media? You mentioned Instagram a little bit earlier? Do you? Are you active there with like tips or things should we be following you?
Caitlin Donovan35:50
I love being to places I love being on Instagram. And that's definitely a place to find me. It's Cait underscore Donovan. And I also really love LinkedIn. And I will connect with pretty much anybody as long as they're not sales pitching me within the first email. But I do love LinkedIn, and I put a lot of longer form content on there, I started a lot of conversations on there. I like the professional aspects. And that's where most of my sort of corporate things are, and, you know, speaking events and things like that are all on LinkedIn.
Nancy Surak36:23
And okay, so So because you brought it up, I'm going to ask you really quickly if someone is in an organization, and they said, like, wow, we want to have Cait come and talk to us, if they're in a women's leadership organization, or a company or an HR group, whatever. And they go, Hey, we're seeing this obviously, post COVID. There's times of burnout. I mean, let's face it. That's why That's why people are shifting jobs right now. I think 100% They're exhausted? Yeah, 100% totally exhausted. Where? Where can they reach you to say, hey, we'd like to have you as a speaker is there a place? On my website is Kate donovan.com, forward slash speaking. And on there, there's a link to book a call. There's, you know, my one sheet and the video of me in front of rooms, and all of that kind of stuff. And then there's an inquiry call that just says, Hey, here's 20 minutes, let's talk about what you want, what you need, and how we can get together. Fantastic. Well, I will make sure we have all those links, so that it's super easy for anybody listening, to come in and connect with you. I want to thank you again for gracing all of us here today, listening with your presence with your knowledge. It's been a pleasure getting to know you better. And, you know, I'm excited about just my own bounce back ability and sanely continue to set my boundaries, to refocus on my own mental and physical well being and health and make that a number one priority. So with that,
Caitlin Donovan37:51
Amen to that.
Nancy Surak37:52
We're done. Thanks again, Kate.
Caitlin Donovan37:55
Thank you.
Nancy Surak37:57
Thank you for joining us for another episode of she's wild the podcast for women and land and development. If you enjoyed today's show, please go out and rate us so that we can be found by other women in our industry. And if you know women who are working in land and development, please share this podcast with them. And if you know a total rock star woman, badass chick who is killing it in land and development anywhere in North America. I want to know who she is. Please reach out to me so that I can feature her on an upcoming episode.