I’m Siobhan Barnes, ex-commercial and corporate real estate professional turned leadership and life coach, supporting high-achieving professionals to step into purpose-led careers without having to sacrifice their soul, sanity, or steady paycheck. I’ve coached hundreds of professionals to figure out their unique path to create meaningful success that feels as good on the inside as it looks on the outside using my signature aligned achievement method.

In this podcast, I’ll share how you can get clarity on your unique path, how to make an impact and step into more purpose in a way that’s right and true for you. Let’s dive in. Hello and welcome to the Aligned Achiever Podcast. I’m your host, Siobhan Barnes, and if you’re here today, I don’t think it’s by accident. Maybe something stopped you when you heard the title of this podcast episode, which is All Around the Quiet Pivot, the loneliest season nobody warned you about. I believe that this season is something that goes unsaid. unknown. And even those that are closest to you can not realize how the internal shifts and the internal pivots that you’re making are really profoundly impacting you. And so if you are in a season of pivoting, whether that is in your career, in your relationships, or just personally in terms of growing and maturing as an individual, I just want you to know that you’re not alone in that. And I can understand that it’s a challenging time.

I’ve seen in my own life and in the lives of the women I work with and the DMs I get from women at midnight who look like they have everything together, that they’re thinking about pivoting and it’s something that nobody sees. when you are in these moments where you’re like, maybe I want to make a shift, it doesn’t come with a launch party or a LinkedIn post or a celebratory toast. And it’s actually very confronting. And what’s happening is there’s a silence between who you were before and who you are becoming. And it’s a constant evolution. And I want to talk about why this season is the loneliest one that nobody warned you about, just to let you know that you’re not alone. Because when you’re in it, oh, you are in it.

I’ve gone through several of these pivots in my own life and these seasons, and it can sometimes feel like you’re in a blizzard, in a storm, and you can’t even see 1 meter in front of you. So if you’re listening to me right now and you’re driving, keep driving. If you’re on a walk, keep walking. If you’re lying in bed, just relax there, and let’s just have a conversation about this particular season.

So here’s what I’m seeing right now. What I’m seeing with professional women, and I really want to be honest about it because I think honesty is the important thing, is that The women that I work with have built something real, a career, a reputation, a track record. And from the outside looking in, people look like, oh my gosh, she’s got it made. She’s got everything together. She’s a woman who’s done the work and hit her goals. She’s checked the boxes. And from the outside, life looks like what other women would be saying, oh, I’d love to be that. But inside, what these women are dealing with is a shift. And sometimes women can’t even pinpoint when that shift started. Maybe it was a Monday morning when, she just needed to take a moment and have that extra sip of coffee before walking into the office and, getting to her long to-do list. Maybe it was the promotion that she should have really wanted that felt excited, but has caused her to have so much on her plate that she’s burning out and overwhelmed. Maybe it was a moment in a meeting where she looked around and thought, gosh, I don’t think I want to be in this room anymore.

Not just this meeting, but this life that I have and this version of me. And the truth is it can be very disorienting whether or not you can pinpoint it or not. And nothing has really gone wrong. So when women come to me, they say, something is wrong. Like I built this thing that I really wanted. And now I’m not sure. I don’t know where to go from here. And it’s confronting because no one has fired you. Nobody has pulled the rug out from under you and made a decision for you. for you, when your life is good and there’s a quiet knowing that creeps in that won’t leave that says, this isn’t it, there’s something else, that can be confronting because then you’ve got to do something with it.

So what a lot of women do is they push that voice down, they push harder and optimize and they think maybe I just need a better morning routine or maybe I should speak to a therapist or maybe a holiday will do it. Maybe I just need to focus on gratitude and just focus on all the good things I have in my life because How dare she want more than she already has, right? So much. But the whisper doesn’t stop. Now, the whisper isn’t a problem to fix. If you’re in this position, I want you to know there’s nothing that’s gone wrong. Rather, it’s an invitation to listen. Now, here’s the part that nobody talks about, and that’s the loneliness. When you’re in this season, the season where something isn’t quite right, you start to realize that most of the people in your life are are really invested in the version of you that you’re outgrowing. And I don’t mean that in a harsh way. I don’t think people are bad and malice. Like they love you and they love you the way they know you, the one who shows up in a certain way and who plays a certain role and who makes sense in the dynamic that you’ve been with them. But when you start to shift even internally, even before you’ve done anything externally, it creates a distance and you can feel it.

So you might feel that you’re present in a situation, maybe you’re at dinner and you’re with the people that you love and you’re having the conversation, but there’s a part of you that’s kind of withdrawn and vacant. Or maybe you feel it with a partner who sees that something is off in you, but you don’t have the language for it yet. Or maybe you feel it at work where you’re performing at a really high level, but it’s on autopilot and the guilt of that is eating you alive. And the loneliest part is that I don’t think you can Google this. You can’t really Google a playbook for I built a life that looks perfect and I want to burn it all down, but I’m terrified and grateful, but also confused.

Please help me with my next steps. I mean, with ChatGPT, you could probably have a good conversation, but there’s no roadmap for this. Now, what can happen is that when you’re alone in this, you can start to feel like something is wrong, like you’re ungrateful, maybe you’re self-sabotaging, like, oh, you should just be happy. But here’s what I want to say to you and what I really want you to hear. Nothing is wrong with you. are not ungrateful. You are not self-sabotaging. You’re growing. And growth is disorienting. It’s lonely and it’s quiet.

So as I mentioned before myself, I’ve been through several of these moments. And at the moment, I’m actually in another the coaching certification, all about body-mind maturation. I’m going through this process myself and it is absolutely confronting to feel disconnected to the way that you’ve been operating and to feel like it’s not working and to want to outgrow it. And I share this with you because I’m in it with you. I very much feel that this is this next level of depth that I’m adding to my work. I was actually on a call the other day with a client and she said, I know we’re speaking about careers, but I actually have this real personal thing that I want to bring up. And I said to her, and I want to say to you, all of that is welcome here. You are not just your professional persona. You are a woman, right? And everything else you’ve got going on in your life affects your work. It’s not separate. And to think that it’s separate is really setting yourself up for failure because of course you’re not separate. And so I really believe that the deepest work that we can do is to outgrow the old ways of being that don’t serve us and to allow that evolution and growth to emerge from us. So I’m sharing this with you because I think that it’s such a lonely season and nobody really talks about it. And so if you are in that lonely season, you are not alone.

And here’s what I’m learning. I’m learning that in the process of disorientation, it can be very helpful to find someone or a community of people who are in it with you. Because the people in your life, they love you, they care for you. As I said, they’re vested in the version of you they know. And when you can be in spaces and places where you’re with others who are evolving and growing too, you can be supported together. And this is something that I explore with my clients in the Pivot Pathfinders Mastermind, which if you’re interested in, I’ll pop a link to it in the show notes over at siobhanbarnes.com forward slash 146. But you know, when you’re in community with others who are saying, you know what, this isn’t it, and I’m going to figure out what that next step is, and also who I’m becoming in this process, then you’re surrounded by others and you realize that you’re not quite so crazy. And you can see that everyone has a very similar experience, that something is not working and something needs to shift. So my encouragement for you is don’t isolate yourself.

Don’t try and figure this out on your own. I’m about to speak on a panel, actually, talking about coaching in Hong Kong and the role of AI. And you can certainly have a conversation with AI about this. But when you’re in your loneliness, you know, we are hardwired as human beings to be around other human beings and for our nervous systems to co-regulate and to have that empathy and that warmth and that connection. So my invitation for you is to connect. Don’t sit alone in this because it can feel very lonely. And there are communities that can support you around that, whether that’s working with a coach or a therapist or Pivot Pathfinders might be right for you. know, don’t go it alone. So if you’re a woman in a quiet pivot right now, I want you to know a few things. Number one, the fact that you can’t explain why something is off or what’s going on. Is it your hormones? Is it self-sabotage? Is it something else? You know, it doesn’t mean that there’s anything wrong with you. Some of the most important transitions of our lives start without language. It’s a feeling. It’s a felt sense, a restlessness, maybe a tightness in your chest or a heaviness on Sunday nights that goes beyond normal where you’re thinking about the week ahead. You’re like, oh my god, I have so much dread.

You don’t need to have a five-year plan to validate what your body already knows, which is why the embodiment piece is so important and something that’s woven into my work with real depth. Secondly, what I want you to know is you’re allowed to pivot without a crisis. We have this narrative that change has to come from chaos, right? Like, oh, I got made redundant, or there’s been a restructure, so I don’t have a job, or my partner’s moving and now I’m in another country. There’s this narrative that you need a moment to justify starting over, and that’s just not true. You’re allowed to leave something good for something even better. And you’re allowed to say, this was right for who I was, but it’s not right for who I’m becoming. That’s not quitting. That’s actually integrity. The third thing I want you to know is that this season will not last forever. I know it feels like it will, and I know it feels like you’re stuck in this fog with no exit. And in this in-between place, it can feel very disorienting, but it’s not a dead end. It’s a corridor, and you’re moving through it, even if it doesn’t feel like it. And I always reference nature, right? Like whenever we’re in the middle of winter, in Hong Kong, not so much, we still have the leaves on our trees. But if you visit a colder climate and you see the tree is barren, there are no leaves. It feels like it’s dead, it’s not going to come back to life.

But of course, when spring rolls around and the conditions change, the leaves start to show up, the flowers start to bloom. And it’s the same for us as human beings. We are cyclical, and we have that same natural life force within us as nature as well. The last thing I want you to know is you don’t have to do this alone. I know it feels like you do. And it’s another trap that I see high achieving women fall into is like, oh, I need to figure this out on my own. But the thing is, you can’t see your own blind spots. You can’t see what you’re outgrowing because you are so in it. And I know it feels like nobody gets it. But there are women right now listening to this episode who are feeling the exact same thing as you are. And if what I’m saying right now makes sense and it’s something that you can connect to, just know that I’m speaking about it for a reason, because these are the conversations I have day in and day out with women.

So you’re not the only one sitting inside a life that might look really great from the outside looking in, but feels a little bit hollow or just not quite right on the inside. You’re not only allowed to be terrified and excited at the same time, you’re not the only one who’s quietly pivoting. So where you are is perfect. So that’s really what I wanted to speak to today. And here’s what I want to leave you with today. If you’re in the quiet pivot, if you’re in the loneliest season that nobody warned you about. I want you to just take a breath. Not a deep productive breath, not a controlled breath work, you know, 4 counts in, hold, 4 counts out, hold. Just a real one.

And I want you to let yourself be exactly where you are. Not ahead of it, not behind it, thinking about the past, worrying about the future, just right here. Because this season that you’re in right now, it’s not a detour, it’s the path. And the woman that you’re becoming on the other side of this that you can’t quite see yet, she’s not a stranger, she’s actually you. More of the real you, the aligned you. And she’s worth every uncomfortable moment it takes to allow her to emerge. If you need to borrow my faith, please know that when I have this great privilege of seeing women like shed the layers of things that don’t serve them, to let go of the conditioning and the shoulds and And all of that, the vibrancy and aliveness that comes back and that vitality is gold. And that is absolutely possible for you too. So thank you for being here today and thank you for listening in.

And if this episode resonated with you, maybe share it with somebody else who needs to hear it. And you know, you can come and find me on LinkedIn. I’m at Siobhan Barnes, Instagram, I am Siobhan Barnes, or you know, email if you’re subscribed to my email and let me know what resonated with you. And if you do want support around your career and you’re going through a career pivot, but that there’s some soul searching you want to do, the Pivot Pathfinders program might be just the best. thing for you. So seeing you in this, knowing that you will get through this and sending all my love as you navigate this tender time. Thank you so much for tuning in. And please remember, as always, you are here for a reason beyond merely hustling, grinding and merely surviving. You matter.