Hello and welcome to the Aligned Achiever Podcast. We are diving into more this week. We are following on from the last episode, and we’re going to be talking about the real reason you’re questioning everything and what to do with that feeling. I’m your host, Siobhan Barnes, and I’m excited to dive in. 

So I usually speak to women when they are at that point in their journey where they have achieved a lot of success. So I work with these high achieving, driven, brilliant ones, probably just like you, and our conversations usually start like this. I don’t even know what I want anymore. I used to love this job, and now I just feel kind of numb and like I’m going through the motions. I’m beginning to question everything, and it is terrifying.

If any of that sounds familiar, I want you to know this. There’s nothing wrong with you. In fact, the very fact that you’re questioning everything is a really powerful sign.

In today’s episode, we’ll unpack what this questioning really means, why it’s happening now, and what to do with that feeling, especially when you’re juggling a million things and showing up for everybody else. 

So as I alluded to in last week’s episode, we did a little bit of a deep dive on this, and I spoke about the quiet question that successful women ask themselves, but rarely say out loud. And this is really a continuation of that conversation where we’re really talking about why you’re questioning everything and what to do with that feeling. 

So let’s talk about the sensation of questioning. Now it usually doesn’t come on suddenly. It creeps in slowly, like a fog. Maybe one day you realize, I don’t feel like myself anymore. You’re going through the motions, meetings, deadlines, family logistics, to do lists, rushing home, putting the kids to bed, then hopping on another call, and amongst all the doing, deep down, there’s a quiet disconnection. Maybe you used to feel really motivated and lit up by your work and everything now feels like a slog. Maybe you’re not even sure what you enjoy anymore, because you’ve been in the go mode for so long that you haven’t stopped. Maybe you’ve secretly Googled job boards, therapist directories, coaching programs, retreats or how to take a sabbatical without blowing up your life. And maybe you’ve even gone on a retreat to hit reset, only to come back and get sucked back into more of the same.

All of this points to the rising internal noise that says something’s off, but I don’t know what. Here’s what I want you to know. You’re not unravelling. You’re realigning. The questioning isn’t random. It’s not a result of failure or burnout alone. It’s not a reason to feel guilty. It’s a natural pause point in your evolution as a woman, a leader and a human and I think this really happens as a bit of a slow burn, and particularly for women.

I know, for me on my motherhood journey, it has been so, so rewarding. And at the same time, I can find that I center that above all else, I recently found myself in an interesting position where I had two kids at home. One of my kids went away for this amazing six week adventure in Australia which was absolutely epic. My husband had left early to go for a business trip, and so I was at home alone with the two kids, and my two kids were away on a sleepover, and I found myself thinking, Oh, I’ve got this Saturday night to myself. What do I want to do? And I realized, gosh, I haven’t thought about what I want to do on a Saturday night, just me alone in a really, really long time, like I’m talking years here. And I’m not saying that I don’t love my Saturday nights usually, typically for us in the Barnes household, a Saturday night is a family dinner because we have a busy week of active kids, and our weekends are full of kids sports. I’m talking Friday nights, Saturday full days and Sunday full days.

So Saturday nights are our time to have family dinner and cook and take our time to prepare a lovely meal. And whilst I love that, it was really interesting to be at this point where I was like, Oh my gosh, what do I want to do?

And that made me think about how so subconsciously, the default is just doing what works for the whole family. And again, it serves me. I love it. But it was really nice to be quite selfish for myself and be like, You know what? I want to go and hang with my friends, and I got to go bowling, go to have dinner. It was a really lovely evening with some lovely people. You know who you are, if you’re listening to this podcast.

And I just felt so filled up like, oh my gosh, it’s me. It’s me that’s going out for dinner, it’s me that’s going to bowling, it’s me that’s showing up to. The conversation. And I think as women so easily.

The reason why I share this story is that we can kind of lose ourselves in the identities and the roles that we play, even though we might want them.

And so you know, if you’re questioning and you’re at this pause point going, hang on a minute. Is this what I want? Like? Who am I anymore? It’s because you know your identity has shifted and changed. You’ve grown. Your values have shifted. Your priorities have changed, your capacity for misalignment has shrunk, and the container that you built your career in, like whatever you do. And when I say container, that’s quite a coachy word, but I mean the definition of like where you work, like the organization you’re in, the industry you’re in, and what you specifically do.

It really wraps up your identity, the expectations on you, the metrics of success. And you might find that as you journey along your career, that it might not fit anymore. And that’s the thing, right? There’s always going to be an adjustment needed, because the decisions we made 5, 10, 15, 20, years ago to go into a certain career, they might shift and evolve and change.

And as I spoke in last week’s the last episode, the world of work is changing, and so those old paths are no longer there. So you know, we’re we’re out growing constantly, and we’re having to adapt. We’re having to change, and that’s what creates this feeling of dissonance.

Dissonance is like when something feels off. So you might still function, you might be doing all the high achieving things, and it might be like good enough, but you don’t feel fulfilled. And this is a crossroads moment, and while it’s deeply uncomfortable, it’s also full of power.

And I often say to my clients when they come to work with me, like it takes a brave soul to say, You know what, I’m gonna explore another path, where you say I’m not gonna just do the status quo and just go, Okay, this is good enough. I’m not gonna shift. I’m not gonna change. And so it’s very brave, but there’s so much richness on the other side.

So I feel like it’s for me, this is a path that I love to walk. It’s not easy, but I’m very fortunate to have met incredible people following my own path and my own journey, of like following my intuition on which way to go. And I highly recommend that if you have this feeling, don’t ignore it. In my experience, it doesn’t go away.

In the same breath. Don’t catastrophize it. You don’t have to quit your job tomorrow. Nothing has gone wrong, and please don’t judge yourself for it. You’re not being ungrateful. You’re being honest. And that questioning is like quite sacred.

It’s a signal that something deeper is asking to come forward, and that’s when the real shift happens, when you respond differently than you ever have before.

Now, most often people, when they’re at this point, say, well, it’s all very well, I’m unfulfilled or nothing’s quite right, but I’ve got bills to pay, I’ve got my kids school fees, I’ve got a mortgage. I can’t just walk away. And again, it’s not this all or nothing thinking when you’re feeling like something’s off and you’re questioning everything, that doesn’t mean you have to blow everything up and you have to quit. Rather, it’s an invitation to get curious and ask, okay, what’s going on?

So I want to share with you three things that can support you right now, even if you know you’re finding yourself busy and you don’t have hours of free time or the luxury of taking a sabbatical.

Here are three things to do and give yourself some grace to sit with when things feel like they’re off.

So number one is pause with kindness, not urgency.

You do not need to figure everything out today. But can you give yourself 10 minutes to listen, whether it’s in the shower, on a walk or in the car? I know we like to fill our ears with podcasts, and we like to be, you know, educating ourselves, knowing what’s going on in the news and, you know, getting our to do list checked off. But sometimes the pause is necessary, and we need to pause with that kindness, not urgency.

For some people, going on a walk or run is where they can clear their head and think or swim. For others, journaling works. Personally, I’m a huge fan of journaling. I love the morning pages suggested by Julia Cameron, author of The Artist’s Way, which I’ll link to in the show notes if you’re curious, but find your way to tune in and listen.

For some of you might be listening, talking to a friend, working with a coach or a therapist. There are different ways that you can pause, but I encourage you to figure out what works for you, to listen to you without needing anybody else. That’s really, really important.

And then when you do, step number two is get really curious, not critical.

So you want to ask yourself like, what is all this questioning? Showing me right? What is it? What is it? Showing you, where are you living on autopilot? What’s one part of your day or an area of your life that drains you and one that energizes you?

Yeah, so I’ll give you an example for me. Recently, I was questioning. Actually, no, I’ll share an example from a few years ago. So a few years ago, we were coming off the back of COVID. I was doing a number of different things. I was doing my one on one coaching. I had a group program I was running which was focused on burnout, and I was working as a trainer at a coaching school, and I also had kids who were going back to school, two of which were having some challenges around mental health.

And it all felt like everything was happening. I was questioning, was I a good enough mum, because my kids were struggling and it was impacting my work, because sometimes I wasn’t able to hop on calls because, you know, I had to deal with my kids. It was like kind of emergency situation, and I was questioning, what am I doing? What is what is going on? And the questioning was showing me that I had too much on my plate. I had committed to too many things, and I actually needed to simplify.

And where was I living? On autopilot. My default mode is to be busy, and it’s still one area that I’m working on. I really am walking this journey. I’m by no means a master at any of this, but I am still unhooking from this productivity narrative, which says that we have to be productive all of the time. So for me, I was on autopilot by just working all of the time and filling my days with work, kids, family admin and home stuff. Not so much exercise back then and certainly not a lot of me time to do things that I needed.

And so one part of the day was that drained me was having to context switch in my work and between kids like that was really draining for me, and I felt like I was getting nothing done productively. If you remember those COVID times, maybe you can relate to that. And the one thing that energized me was when I would go out on a solo walk in nature.

I was speaking to a friend about this the other day, how you will never regret spending time in nature, she will work her magic and restore you. And so that inquiry, that questioning, got me to say, hey, what do I need to do here? It’s a bit silly to be putting all this pressure on. This is a season where I need to adjust my priorities, and I got to change. So getting curious, not critical, really helped me get honest.

And that leads me to, you know, part three, which is zoom out and remember that where you are in life, it’s just a chapter. It’s not the whole book.

You’re not lost. You’re in a transition, and like any transition, it begins with awareness. And as I speak to this, it does feel like a previous chapter, right? Going back to my example, that was a chapter that was very stressful, and is certainly very different to now, where I’ve made some certain choices, more focused on my business, left the coaching school, and that has opened up different opportunities. Not that they’re better than or worse than, but just simply different, a new chapter.

And so just those three pillars, or those three steps, can really help you when you’re questioning everything. So I’ll summarize that again.

Number one, pause with kindness, not urgency.

Number two, get curious, not critical.

And number three, zoom out. Remember this is a chapter, not the whole book. 

If this episode feels like I’m speaking directly to you, it’s because I’ve been there and I’ve guided many women through this exact phase, and honestly, I work with my own coach around this sort of stuff. This is what I’m most interested in. I remember getting some business advice many years ago about, oh, you need to be more specific. You need, you know, maybe help people quit their jobs and start a business. And I was like, that sounds wonderful, but that’s not what I’m passionate about. 

I am really, really passionate about supporting women to navigate these transitions.

And I call it a pivot. I call it a transition. I call it a change. And I will tell you 100% of the work that sits underneath a pivot or a career change or a transition is that self mastery. It’s that identity work. It’s understanding who you are, what you take a stand for what matters and how you can then change your outside reality to match what what really matters to you, and that’s why I created the Pivot Pathfinders Collective.

It’s a 12 month program for professional women who are ready to realign their careers without blowing up their lives. Inside the program, we begin right there with this questioning, and we move through a very grounded seven step process to help you get really clear on who you are, explore your options and design a new path that’s actually aligned to the woman that you are now. And we really let go of all of those societal expectations or parental expectations or your own expectations, to really back, come back home to who you really are and. Step into that next level leadership, no matter what that looks like for you.

And you know, for some women, it’s going to look like completely pivoting their careers. For others, it’s going to be like, you know what, stepping into that leadership and going, I can lead in my organization, and I’m ready for that next step. I am not attached to what your next step is. What I am attached to is giving you the best tools so that you know what direction is best for you, and I know that it can be really hard to do for ourselves because we can’t see our blind spots. We don’t necessarily know what’s possible for ourselves, and we don’t have the tools to access that inner wisdom.

So this program, it’s not a quick fix, it’s not a hustle, it’s a gentle, strategic, supported process, because that’s what real change looks like. So we’re opening the doors again, and I would absolutely love to support you. And if you would like to hear more, you can come on over to the show notes over at siobhanbarnes.com/135, to get all the information that you need.

So in next week’s episode, we’re going to talk a little bit more about something really practical, which is how to find space to think when you’re drowning in deadlines.

Because clarity isn’t just about the reflection, it’s also about creating space to hear your own voice again. So we’ll be diving deeper into that point of how do you pause with kindness, not urgency, particularly when you are busy.

So until then, I invite you to give yourself permission to not have the answers. Let this questioning be the beginning and not the end. You’re absolutely not broken. You’re just being called into something deeper, and that feeling that something’s off, it’s worth listening to.

Thank you so much for being here, and please remember you are here for a reason beyond merely hustling, grinding and merely surviving, you matter.