The Mental Offload Podcast Shawna Samuel

In an always-on culture, where work is more and more “greedy” about wanting our time and availability, how can we achieve balance?
At the Mental Offload, we’ve created a framework for achieving balance. It has 4 elements, that work together to support – or undermine – your balance. Your time, your team, your systems, and your mindset.  
Your balance will only be as good as the weakest of these 4. In this episode will talk about how it only takes one “wobbly leg” to throw us off balance.


What You'll Learn:


The 4 pillars of balance, and why you need each one
How the pillars work together to support balance
The major mistake that high-achievers don’t realize is sabotaging their balance 
How failing to address our weakest pillars can lead to burning out
 
For more information visit, The Mental Offload.

‘Tis the season…for school holiday events. But what happens when those events clash with your work schedule? 
Whether you’re dealing with multiple events scheduled right in the middle of the workday, a busy season at work that makes taking any time off tricky, or every working mom’s favorite…that last minute notice about a school event, the result is usually the same. You feel terrible.
This was doubly the case for a mom in one of my parent circles. Not only could she not make the school event, but as one of the only working mothers in her school community, felt like the only one who wouldn’t be there.
For many mothers, that’s a cue for guilt, shame, and fear that you’re somehow failing your child.
Time to unwind that noise.
In this week’s episode, we’ll cover 3 simple coaching practices you can use to regain your balance, and confidence, when you can’t be there for school events.
 
What you'll learn:
How working parents in France deal with work-school conflicts (and how you can cultivate that same mindset)
Why it pays to get curious about your kids really feel about your absence
What to do when you want to prioritize being at school for an event

For more information visit, The Mental Offload.
 

Sometimes, we get so busy on the hamster wheel at work that we lose sight of the longer-term picture. 
It might feel like it’s impossible to slow the wheel down and catch your breath.
But it’s necessary if you’re in the world of knowledge work.
Being strategic at work requires us to slow the hamster wheel down to a comfortable jog from time to time. This allows you to see the bigger picture and set strategic direction.
One technique for doing this: plan regular Think Weeks.
Think weeks are a tool of leaders and CEOs, but they can be adapted at any level of an organization. 
A Think Week will get you out of day-to-day execution mode, and give you the luxury of time for forward planning.
 
What You'll Learn: 
How a Think Week accelerates your personal and professional goals
Tactical tips for crafting your own Think Week
Common saboteurs for Think Weeks…and how to avoid them
 
For more information, visit The Mental Offload.

‘Tis the Season. Fall is a holiday time in so many cultures: Halloween, Diwali, Thanksgiving, Chanukah, Christmas, Kwanzaa, New Year’s…they’re all on the calendar.
But whether you’re celebrating one holiday or several, there’s so much extra stuff to take care of. Hosting relatives, parties, religious gatherings, cooking, shopping, decorating…It’s all packed into a short spurt of time, and it’s overwhelming!
Holidays are high pressure for working moms. Each holiday is its own deadline, along with a new to-do list, and you somehow have to find a way to manage it on top of everything else you’re already juggling.
But you don’t have to resign yourself to stressful, overwhelming holidays.
In this episode, we’ll tackle what really causes holiday overwhelm, and how you can make the holidays more peaceful, warm and enjoyable.  
 
What You’ll Learn:
The thoughts that drive overwhelm at the holidays How The Barefoot Contessa (yes, really!) inspired a complete rethink in my approach to the holidays One key shift you can make to ditch holiday overwhelm For more information, visit The Mental Offload.

Anxiety at work usually seems like a problem to be managed. Or even a crisis. Definitely something to get rid of.
Especially when your anxiety has you sweating over your upcoming meeting. Or has work living rent-free in your brain around the clock.
But, is anxiety all bad? Work from Morra Aarons-Mele (author of The Anxious Achiever) asks us to rethink anxiety. Data suggest that leaders disproportionately grapple with anxiety. 
Why is this the case? And does anxiety have important benefits for us?
 
What You'll Learn:
Anxiety can take you down at work, but learn how it can also be a leadership strength
Rethink your goals for anxiety management
5 Hidden benefits of anxiety for leaders
Coaching tools to reframe anxiety
 
For more information, visit The Mental Offload.

We’re living in a fraught time. The nightly news is filled with calamities, on every continent of the planet. 
In the face of so much turmoil in the world, women hesitate to speak about their own struggles at home and at work.
We self-deprecatingly tell friends that we’ve got “first world problems”. 
Women tell me they’re ashamed to even complain about feeling overwhelmed at home, or undervalued at work, because “it sounds so privileged”. 
This sets up an unhelpful hierarchy: problems worth caring about (the “big stuff” going wrong in the world), and “first world problems” (the “little stuff” going wrong in our homes). 
And it’s a form of self-gaslighting. Of trying to convince ourselves that we shouldn’t care so much about our own emotional pain, because it’s not “important enough” in the bigger scheme of things. 
As feminists, we need to examine this line of thinking. Because it’s one way that people in power keep women down.
 
What You'll Learn: 
Two things can be true: there are important tragedies in the world AND important issues at home
Why patriarchal, white-supremacist, late-stage capitalism runs on women’s exhaustion
A few reasons why we should retire the entire phrase “first world problems”
How putting yourself first can make you MORE equipped to cause good trouble in the world
For more information, visit The Mental Offload.