FRIED. The Burnout Podcast

Burnout Recovery works better with support. UNFRIED is our small group (5 people max!) coaching program to help guide you through your recovery. Apply now! [http://bit.ly/unfried]​​Your brain craves creativity, and the arts might be the secret weapon against burnout. Genein Letford joins Cait Donovan to break down how music, movement, and self-expression fuel emotional resilience, sharpen thinking, and restore energy. Why does chronic stress shrink key areas of the brain? How can creative outlets like music and movement reverse the damage? And what’s the deal with brain capital, and why should you care?From brain breaks to the magic of third places, Genein shares science-backed strategies to help your brain recover and thrive. Whether burnout has dulled your creativity or you’re looking for a fresh way to recharge, Genein and Cait’s discussion might just change how you think about art and your own well-being.Episode Breakdown:00:00 Introduction 03:22 The Power of Music on the Brain05:59 Brain Structures and Music07:22 Music’s Impact on Emotional Intelligence10:47 Burnout and Brain Health15:54 Self-Awareness and Personal Preferences17:21 Understanding Brain Capital21:21 Rebuilding Brain Health Post-Burnout25:03 Importance of Brain Breaks29:00 Third Places for Social Connection32:08 The 2-5-7 Strategy for Brain Health38:39 Enhancing Focus Through the Arts45:25 Social Connection and Neural SynchronizationLinksConnect with Cait:Initial Call with Cait: bit.ly/callcaitInitial Call with Sarah: bit.ly/callsarahvBurnout Recovery works better with support. UNFRIED is our small group (5 people max!) coaching program to help guide you through your recovery. Apply now! [http://bit.ly/unfried]Podcast production and show notes provided by HiveCast.fm

Discover the struggle many high achievers face between giving and receiving. The conversation emphasizes how neglecting personal needs can lead to burnout. The co-hosts introduce 'receivership' as a crucial concept for balancing energy. They challenge the stigma around self-indulgence and redefine selfishness as 'self-full'. Through practical exercises, listeners learn to embrace energetic abundance and the importance of self-care. Plus, a guided meditation helps connect with the earth and expand one’s capacity to receive.

Burnout Recovery works better with support. UNFRIED is our small group (5 people max!) coaching program to help guide you through your recovery. Apply now! [http://bit.ly/unfried]Burnout doesn’t happen overnight. It creeps in when we ignore the signs, stay stuck in routines that no longer serve us, and let fear call the shots. Anne Marie Anderson knows something about pushing past hesitation, and in this episode, she shares how audacity—taking bold, intentional action—can keep burnout from taking hold.A three-time Emmy Award-winning broadcaster and author of “Cultivating Audacity,” Anderson walks through the barriers that keep people from making changes: fear, time, money, and that relentless inner critic. What happens when you stop letting those things dictate your decisions? How do you create space for what actually matters?Anderson breaks it down with real-world strategies. She explains why disenchantment is a warning sign, how small acts of courage add up, and why building a strong front row of supporters makes all the difference. If you’ve ever felt stuck but weren’t sure what to do next, this episode is your push to start moving.Episode Breakdown:00:00 Introduction02:26 Connection with Nicole Khalil and the Theme of Boldness03:17 Anne Marie’s Background and Career Journey05:13 Recognizing Early Signs of Burnout: Disenchantment07:04 Taking Risks and Measuring Them08:09 Overcoming Barriers: Fear, Time, Money, and Inner Critic10:09 Making Friends with Fear12:20 Urgent vs. Important: Managing Time15:13 Flexibility in Planning and Adjusting18:35 Financial Barriers and Money Management22:30 Exploring Your Money Story24:24 Inner Critic: Identifying and Managing It31:30 Childhood Influences and Parental Expectations34:05 Over-Engineering Children's Lives and Burnout37:24 Cultivating Audacity: Small Steps to Big Changes40:06 Building a Supportive Front Row41:03 ClosingLinksConnect with Anne Marie Anderson:https://annemarieanderson.com/https://www.instagram.com/annemarieandersontv/https://www.linkedin.com/in/anne-marie-anderson-3557ab39/https://annemarieanderson.com/freechapter1/Connect with Cait:Initial Call with Cait: bit.ly/callcaitInitial Call with Sarah: bit.ly/callsarahvBurnout Recovery works better with support. UNFRIED is our small group (5 people max!) coaching program to help guide you through your recovery. Apply now! [http://bit.ly/unfried]Podcast production and show notes provided by HiveCast.fm

Burnout recovery is a journey filled with small, achievable steps. Personal reflections reveal clarity and desires even in the toughest times. Community support plays a vital role in healing and reclaiming balance. The importance of celebrating even minor victories is emphasized, and listeners are encouraged to share their experiences. Insights into nervous system healing and embracing nature help illuminate the path forward. Letting go of control can foster personal safety and progress on the way to recovery.

Nahal Yousefian, former Head of HR at Netflix, shares her journey through burnout and the lessons learned about workplace culture. She discusses how corporate jargon and unclear communication contribute to employee stress. Nahal emphasizes the need for honest conversations and proactive strategies to enhance well-being. The conversation also touches on the impact of AI on creativity and the critical shift needed in HR practices to adapt to a changing workforce. Ultimately, Nahal advocates for a future of work that prioritizes genuine connection and mental health.

Burnout Recovery works better with support. UNFRIED is our small group (5 people max!) coaching program to help guide you through your recovery. Apply now! [http://bit.ly/unfried]Burnout sneaks up slowly, leaving you drained and wondering what went wrong. Cait Donovan joins Nick Korte on Nerd Journey to talk about how chronic stress builds over time, why layoffs can be a breaking point or a relief, and what it really takes to recover. She breaks down burnout risk factors, the role of personal history and workplace culture, and why some people hit a wall while others find a way forward. How do you know when it’s time to make a change? What steps can you take to regain control? Cait shares strategies for protecting yourself, setting boundaries, and rethinking resilience in a way that actually works.Quotes“Burnout has to be the end result of a long period of chronic stress. It’s like chronic, chronic stress.” (06:03 | Cait Donovan)“Sometimes we have to start with the really practical stuff and allow that to shift our emotional state rather than sitting and working through an emotion while the stressor is still alive for you. We have to shift the stressor so that you can work through the emotion and not the other way around.” (17:15 | Cait Donovan)“If you are in a situation that for some reason is toxic or sort of impossible to ignore, you can’t meditate your way out of it.” (26:51 | Cait Donovan)“I think that it’s wise to remember how much power and autonomy you do have in your life. When you are under chronic stress, we tend to end up under this illusion that we don’t have any control and that we don’t have enough autonomy. And if you’re feeling that way right now, I would challenge you to challenge that.” (50:28 | Cait Donovan)LinksThis episode was also published on Nick's show Nerd Journey - https://nerd-journey.com/chronic-stress-connecting-the-dots-between-layoffs-and-burnout-with-cait-donovan/Nick's Layoff Resources Page (the most impactful conversations and advice from his show on burnout, including the one with Cait) - https://nerd-journey.com/layoffresources/Nick's blog post that speaks to his love for podcasting and how the layoff resources page came to be  https://blog.thenetworknerd.com/2025/01/25/a-healthy-obsession-lessons-learned-from-300-episodes-of-the-nerd-journey-podcast/.Previous episodes featuring Cait in which she shared her story of burning out and the transition into coaching and speakinghttps://nerd-journey.com/across-the-patterns-of-burnout-with-cait-donovan-1-2/https://nerd-journey.com/the-beautiful-right-turns-with-cait-donovan-2-2/Some of the most impactful episodes featuring technologists sharing their stories of burnout:https://nerd-journey.com/riding-the-burnout-wave-with-jonathan-f-2-2/https://nerd-journey.com/countdown-to-burnout-with-tom-hollingsworth-3-3/https://nerd-journey.com/management-and-the-hypergrowth-startup-with-andrew-miller-2-3/https://nerd-journey.com/pause-and-step-outside-with-andrew-miller-3-3/https://nerd-journey.com/burnout-and-recovery-with-josh-fidel/Connect with Cait:Initial Call with Cait: bit.ly/callcaitInitial Call with Sarah: bit.ly/callsarahvBurnout Recovery works better with support. UNFRIED is our small group (5 people max!) coaching program to help guide you through your recovery. Apply now! [http://bit.ly/unfried]Podcast production and show notes provided by HiveCast.fm

Burnout Recovery works better with support. UNFRIED is our small group (5 people max!) coaching program to help guide you through your recovery. Apply now! [http://bit.ly/unfried]Burnout is more than feeling tired. It’s a challenge that affects every aspect of life, especially for healthcare professionals. In this episode, Dr. Jessi Gold shares her deeply personal experience navigating burnout as a psychiatrist during the pandemic, and offers a rare glimpse into the struggles even experts face. What can we do when the very systems designed to support us become the cause of our suffering? Dr. Gold and Cait Donovan explore the systemic issues in healthcare that perpetuate burnout, from overwork to the culture of self-neglect ingrained in medical training. They also discuss how small shifts—like embracing vulnerability and prioritizing self-care—can make a meaningful difference, even in a broken system.How can we address burnout without blaming individuals for their struggles? Dr. Gold and Cait’s discussion invites you to rethink how we approach burnout, recovery, and the collective responsibility to create healthier environments.Quotes“As a psychiatrist who is an expert in burnout, I have an extra added layer of fun to this story, which is that I see people all day and tell them they’re burnt out and don’t necessarily apply the same thing to myself.” (04:32 | Dr. Jessi Gold) “It’s so hard to admit that something like work or systems at work could make you feel ill. I feel like it’s so much easier to be like, it just made me tired, but it didn’t actually hurt me in some way that needs to be replenished or fixed or whatever.” (14:21 | Dr. Jessi Gold)“Our culture is a culture of silence and shame. Most of us are struggling and don’t mention that we’re struggling. And if we knew other people were struggling, even a little bit, we would open up to them more and feel safer in our culture.” (42:42 | Dr. Jessi Gold)“If someone said this job is really, really hard emotionally, physically, every other thing that you can think of, and it will impact you, and you will burn out from it. And as a result, you need to take care of yourself in the process. I would have been like, ‘Oh, okay.’” (43:53 | Dr. Jessi Gold)“The second I started to burn out, that’s what went, right? Like, the second that I was not okay, like, to a more extreme extent, I was not treating patients the way that I would want them to be treated, right? As humans.” (50:42 | Dr. Jessi Gold)LinksConnect with Dr. Jessi Gold:https://www.drjessigold.com/https://www.instagram.com/drjessigold/https://www.linkedin.com/in/jessi-gold-md-ms-14844bb/Connect with Cait:Initial Call with Cait: bit.ly/callcaitInitial Call with Sarah: bit.ly/callsarahvBurnout Recovery works better with support. UNFRIED is our small group (5 people max!) coaching program to help guide you through your recovery. Apply now! [http://bit.ly/unfried]Podcast production and show notes provided by HiveCast.fm

Discover the power of self-compassion in burnout recovery. Embrace your limitations without shame and learn that healing isn’t a race. Listeners share insights on personalizing self-care and the unique, non-linear journey toward wellness. Explore how to simplify recovery tactics and establish healthy boundaries, while also highlighting the impact of community support. With heartfelt anecdotes and practical strategies, this discussion empowers individuals to navigate their recovery paths authentically.

Burnout Recovery works better with support. UNFRIED is our small group (5 people max!) coaching program to help guide you through your recovery. Apply now! [http://bit.ly/unfried]“This isn’t some soft skill, or a ‘nice-to-have.’ It’s a must-have,” says Jennifer Moss, workplace strategist, co-founder of The Workplace Institute, and author of award-winning books on leadership. Her latest book, “Why Are We Here?,” discusses how we can use hope as an operational strategy at work, how employees can learn to bring their whole, best selves to work by meting out goals in small steps and celebrating each small win en route to the larger goal. Leaders, in turn, can learn to, rather than mitigate those efforts, be conduits to employees’ mental health, in part by being encouraging and being receptive to employee feedback.This isn’t about drumming up toxic positivity but creating a safe and openly communicative environment, which is more easily said than done when employees feel, even subconsciously, that their freedoms are being taken away and that promises have been repeatedly broken. Jennifer and host Cait Donovan discuss how to foster trust between leaders and employees and how caring for oneself creates a feeling of safety—starting at a physical level—which is the first step in opening up lines of communication, and facilitating what Jennifer calls “a culture of positive gossip.” As many as seventy percent of employees report that their managers make or break their attitude toward their jobs. Join today’s episode of FRIED to learn how to introduce a hope-based strategy into your own work environment. Quotes“We can help our employees have quick wins every day, celebrate the smaller wins, recognize that we spend a lot of time lately only celebrating and rewarding and recognizing the big project end goals, not realizing that the day-to-day ennui, the day-to-day tedium is what is burning people out. And if we just made these goals more incremental — it’s actually how you support young kids, especially kids who are neurodivergent—you chunk out the goals and adults need those same inspirational ways of working, and that’s how we make hope a strategy.” (12:29 | Jennifer Moss)“That’s where we make hope a strategy and operationalize hope. It’s first recognizing that it isn’t some sort of soft skill or a “nice-to-have,’ it’s a ‘must-have,’ that it’s real. The military abides by this rule, and it can be operationalized on a day-to-day engagement in our work and in our employees’ tasks.”  (13:10 | Jennifer Moss)“You can be highly passionate about what you do, and highly driven and care about your organization and…highly engaged, but you can be similarly at the same stage of burnout. And if we can’t talk about those things, no one will know, and that’s when people quit, that’s when people hit the wall. It’s where everything just ends.” (24:33 | Jennifer Moss)“We are subconsciously rebelling because our freedoms are being taken away and we’re not necessarily aware of why we feel this dissonance.” (33:51 | Jennifer Moss)LinksConnect with Jennifer Moss:https://www.jennifer-moss.com/ https://www.instagram.com/betterworkinstitute/https://www.linkedin.com/in/jenleighmoss/Connect with Cait:Initial Call with Cait: bit.ly/callcaitInitial Call with Sarah: bit.ly/callsarahvBurnout Recovery works better with support. UNFRIED is our small group (5 people max!) coaching program to help guide you through your recovery. Apply now! [http://bit.ly/unfried]Podcast production and show notes provided by HiveCast.fm

Burnout Recovery works better with support. UNFRIED is our small group (5 people max!) coaching program to help guide you through your recovery. Apply now! [http://bit.ly/unfried]“We’re at a time when things are going to be shifting and changing,” says host Cait Donovan who, on this solo episode of FRIED, shares a workplace forecast for 2025 and explains what business leaders can do to best navigate this new landscape, rocky as it’s predicted to be. Today, Cait shares findings from a number of experts, including the future of DEI initiatives, how AI will affect employee benefits’ packages, which position on the corporate ladder will likely burn out en masse and what leaders can do now to best mitigate the fallout. She also discusses the increasing opportunities for freelancers as more and more workplaces continue to embrace flexible work. It’s not enough, she explains, to prevent the workplace environment—and the burnout that transpires therein—from becoming worse. Steps need to be put in place to actually make things better. Employers must be trauma-informed, to create psychological safety and transparency in the workplace, and in turn, employees need to be especially transparent and communicative about what they really need and want from their jobs. Join Cait to learn more about what to expect in the year ahead and how to continue championing employee wellness throughout 2025. Quotes“We can approach DEI practices through the lens of biology and physiology. So, I believe that the biology of belonging and the biology of psychological safety really roots the things we need for real true DEI overall into a science-based model that helps people feel a little more grounded in the approach and makes people less likely to have bad reactions to it.” (1:47 | Cait Donovan)“The reason that I think it’s important for them to be burnout-informed is because we can’t shift things in the culture to protect people if we don’t know what the risks are. And I think, we can’t really also create a positive culture without knowing which things make a negative culture.” (4:14 | Cait Donovan)“I think this is going to be probably a little bit messy to start out, but longterm, I think everything is getting more customized. Medicine is getting more customized, jobs are getting more customized. So, I do think this is the way of the future, I just think we need to be really careful, very inclusive, very transparent, and very clear about our intentions as we’re doing this, so we don’t create more problems as we go.” (6:50 | Cait Donovan)“I think we need to really be focused on that mid-level manager and their well-being because that’s where a lot of the well-being of the company spreads from.” (8:13 | Cait Donovan)“We’re going to have to make people more comfortable around change. We’re going to have to create a different level of psychological safety so that change can actually be absorbed and actually dealt with.” (9:33 | Cait Donovan)LinksConnect with Cait:Initial Call with Cait: bit.ly/callcaitInitial Call with Sarah: bit.ly/callsarahvBurnout Recovery works better with support. UNFRIED is our small group (5 people max!) coaching program to help guide you through your recovery. Apply now! [http://bit.ly/unfried]Podcast production and show notes provided by HiveCast.fm