Navigating Boundaries and Self-Compassion in Avoiding Burnout

Shamis Pitts, owner of Pitts Leadership Consulting LLC, is on a mission to help people connect to their greatness, strengthen the employee–employer social contract, and support a thriving and engaged workforce. She provides leadership coaching, training, and development and is particularly committed to mentoring young black women professionals. This year, Shamis launched her “Let’s Live in the AND” campaign to create conversations around leadership and wellbeing.

Shamis’s story will ring true to overachievers everywhere. She started working 12-hour days as an undergrad; as a young professional in the startup world, she sometimes worked 100-hour weeks, powered by the mantra “Impact at scale.” The burnout alarms kept going off, but Shamis kept hitting snooze: A stroke. Tuberculosis. Weight loss. Localized alopecia. Paralysis. She kept over-extending and over-giving, and she had no idea how to ask for support.

After struggling with workaholism and her various health issues, Shamis took a hard look at the toll her lifestyle was taking on her physical and mental wellness. And after many years, she finally rounded a corner. In my practice, I meet so many women like Shamis—women who are driven to achieve, to push themselves beyond their own limits, to hit snooze and tune out the alarms and sink further and further into illness and unhappiness. If you are one of those women (or one of those men!), Shamis is a testament to the fact that you CAN turn things around.

At the end of this episode, Shamis and I urge you to ask yourself this question: What are you doing on a regular basis to ensure you’re being kind to yourself? If it’s hard to answer, it’s time for you to step back, come up with an answer, and then put it into practice. It takes some of us years (if not decades) of stops and starts, doctor’s visits, frightening diagnoses, compromised relationships, lost connections, and other alarm bells before we make a change. No more hitting snooze. If you’re not being kind to yourself, it’s time to wake up.

Learn more about Shamis:

Her website: http://pittsleadership.com/

Her Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/shamfucius/

Her 2020 “Let’s Live in the AND” campaign: http://shamis2020.com/

Here’s a good way to be kind to yourself this week: book a FREE call with me! Initial calls last 35 minutes and are a great way to kickstart your burnout recovery. Book your call at caitdonovan.as.me/free.

Be well this week—in every sense of the word. And don’t forget to wash your hands. ;-)

XOXO

Cait

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