How to Take a Career Break and Avoid Burnout with Laura Nguyen

Erin: Welcome to Hotter Than Ever, where we uncover the unconscious rules we've been following, we break those rules, and we find a new path to being freer, happier, sexier, and more satisfied in the second half of our lives.

This is an episode about work and burnout. I don't know if you can relate, but I definitely can and I suspect you can too. It feels appropriate to air this episode this week as we are likely all cramming to get our end of the year work done. There are so many projects to do and deadlines to meet, especially if you're in corporate life. And I remember that it felt like a sprint in December when we were trying our best to push, push, push, push, push through all of it to get to the holiday break, which obviously comes with its own kind of work and deadlines, especially if you have kids, uh, and especially if they are going to be home for three full weeks. Weeks like mine are, but that is neither here nor there.

My guest today is Laura Nguyen. She is a marketing executive and entrepreneur whose expertise includes data driven marketing, digital marketing, and communications for fortune 500 companies. She is the founder of Solle Solutions, which is a marketing consultancy. She is also a certified executive coach.

She helps mid career high achieving leaders go from burnout to balance through her coaching program and online community. Think what you want about balance. I don't think you can have it on a day to day basis, but you can have it in aggregate. And Laura's new book, 'Career Break Compass", is a strategic guide to reclaiming work life balance through meaningful breaks.

We could all really use a break. Maybe if I had known that this was possible, the stuff that Laura talks about, I would never have gotten to a place where I needed to totally reinvent my career and my whole life because I was so burnt out. I'm grateful to be doing things in my own way, but for some people, maybe it would be easier or smarter or better to figure out how to structure a period of time off. This is a great conversation, I can't wait to hear what you think. All right, let's get hot.

Laura Nguyen, welcome to Hotter Than Ever.

Laura: So great to be here Erin, thank you so much for having me.

Erin: Yes. I'm so excited to talk to you because this idea of taking a break from your professional life is very appealing, and it's what I've been doing for the last two years. But I kind of did it through getting laid off and then deciding I was going to try something different. But it's, I think your approach sounds really practical, which is like deciding you're going to take a break, structuring that experience, and then going back to having a paycheck, which is maybe where I fell off of a strategic plan.

Laura: Well, you know, I think there's a structure, right? When we talk about there's the unplanned break and then there's the plan break. And so maybe we break that apart a little bit when we talk about career breaks. So typically when we think about career breaks, most people ask me, well, what does that mean? Is that a sabbatical?

Erin: Yeah, yeah, yeah, that's the first thing I thought.

Laura: Yeah, right. And so I think about breaks kind of in four categories. Like, the first is a sabbatical, you know, and that typically is where it's employer provided, you know, about 16% of employers have a sabbatical program as a part of their employee benefits.

Erin: And what does that look like? I think about that as an academic thing. Like every seven years, you could take a year to do research or travel or do whatever in academia, but that I have never heard of that in corporate life.

Laura: Yeah. So there's some really large organizations, like Deloitte actually is one of those, as a consulting firm that they have planned breaks where let's say you work for five years and then you can have, let's say, four or six weeks or sometimes longer as, you know, as a professional development type of sabbatical break for them. So that break is structured in a way that is like you work with your HR and you work with your manager and you kind of offload the work and that kind of thing. So that's like a sabbatical program that's employer based.

Then there's like a leave of absence. And so a leave of absence is either a medical leave of absence where people might have heard of, like a mental health leave of absence, or even a voluntary leave of absence where you basically can take, yeah, you take 12 weeks away from work. You know, from an FMLA perspective, if you're in the US and, you know, you could use that time to heal, rest and recover or whatever that might look like. And so that is a little bit different in structure than a sabbatical because that's an individually driven type of benefit.

Laura: And then the other kind of, the third option is you quit. You resign and then you have like this in between. Yeah. And then for some people, they travel the world for a few years, you know, or a year or so.

Erin: I don't ever understand people who are like, oh, no, I start my new job next week. And you're like, why? Like, please take at least two weeks to like, do something else. Like go visit your family, like, do something, but some people feel like they need to, like, jump right into the next thing.

Laura: Yes, Erin, that is--so that is one thing that I really recommend to people is if you're in transition in between roles where you've accepted another role or you've got an offer on the table, negotiate so that your start date is two weeks after your end date. Like, give yourself at least---you have to decompress. Like, you have to give yourself time because let's say you were at your last organization for five, six, seven years, whatever it is. If you don't take that time, you're taking all of that baggage into the next role and you haven't allowed yourself time to rest and recharge.

Erin: Right. And I think, but I think we live in a culture that treats work in a really pathological way, where it's like, I've certainly worked for like these intense, high achieving companies with like extraordinary people around me, but we're all working like, I don't even know, like, we're like, we're curing cancer and we're not. You know, and I, I don't understand how our culture has evolved to the degree that our work lives. When we're high achieving people, our work lives really take up like 80% of our lives and the rest of our life needs to be like, shoved into a corner. And I feel like for women especially, because we carry the domestic load, we carry the parenting load on top of the professional load. Like, I understand why burnout rates are so high. I understand why most of my friends who have been laid off in the last couple of years, which a lot of us have in entertainment and tech, don't ever want to go back to corporate life because what it is in their minds is a certain way of working that is almost punitive.

Laura: Yeah. You know, I think there's a component of, you know, you think about what's changed in the workplaces. And the speed of technology has shifted how we work and how we live. And even just the trends around, let's say from a digital perspective. We had phones that then made us really accessible, ee've got email on our devices and creating that separation is really hard because we're so easily accessible no matter where we're at.

Laptops, we used to have desktop computers, right? Now you have laptops, you take it with you. I traveled with my laptop for 20 years. The first time I didn't travel without my laptop was when I left. Like that was the first time ever. And then also just the demand around some of these technologies, like you think about Slack or instant messaging and it goes above and beyond where you're constantly available. There's this really great book called Micro Stresses and it talks about this challenge of how we are constantly as employees dealing with all of these tiny little nuance things that add up and create just this compounded stress for us, which ultimately leads to burnout, because you're not having any boundaries in your life at all.

Erin: Well, yeah, and I think that a lot of professional culture, a lot of work cultures, company cultures, reward a lack of boundaries, reward this sort of idea of being a hero and being selfless and coming in in the last minute and always being willing to like, I mean, I, I totally. That person in my last job where we would have a hard thing we had to do on a tight deadline and it was like, all right, you know, I got this. I got this because I can do it, I'm capable of doing it. And I like the pats on the back that I get for, for my own masochism. Really, you know, it's messed up. But we're good girls, right? We're trying to, we're trying to win. We're trying to, we're trying to achieve and accomplish and rise. And you know, that is one way that women do do it in the workplace.

Laura: Yeah. I think the expectations, there's an expectation and there's an unspoken expectation amongst women and our peers. There's the expectation of doing the job. But to your point, of going above and beyond for unpaid labor is really the challenge. Volunteering, yes. For those projects, but volunteering for the events within the organization, DE&I programs and leading those programs without any benefit as a of how you're actually being measured.

And then you take that to another level of making sure that not only are we trying to do great work in our day to day work, but we also have to worry about people liking us or not, or being successful enough or not, or sponsoring other people to the table or not, or breaking a glass ceiling, and what does that look like? And that becomes a challenge. And I'm sure, Erin, you faced it as well, which is, how can we--it's this duality of, like, how do we help create spaces for women in leadership to have much more of an impact, but also, it's freaking exhausting.

Erin: Exhausting. I don't want to say that. Like, I mean, I was very successful in corporate life because I operate well when the rules are clear and the goals are clear and, you know, just sick me on a project and I'll get it done. But two years out of that life, I have a really hard time imagining how I could go back with this sort of evolved version of myself that has better boundaries, that takes better care of herself, that, you know, that doesn't want to be a machine, that isn't using work to sort of numb and overcompensate for the other things that weren't going as well in my life.

Like, I've sort of recalibrated a bunch of things, and then where paid work comes into that is a really complicated thing for me, and it's something I'm struggling with publicly in this podcast, which is like, I started this business of Hotter Than Ever to make content for women over 40. It's not monetized yet, so, like, you know, I now have my first advertiser. I'm, you know, excited about that, but it's very hard to see what lives between where I am and where I was, you know?

Laura: Yeah, for sure. So, first, congrats on your sponsorship, it's awesome.

Erin: Thank you.

Laura: Like, amazing, right? The first of many.

Erin: Yes, that's for sure.

Laura: That's phenomenal. You know, I think that's why, when I think about it for myself, you know, when I gave myself really four full months of saying, okay, I'm not going to do anything. I'm not even going to think about work. I'm not going to worry about work. I'm just going to allow myself to be in this space to rest and recharge and heal and realign myself on what are the things that I want to do.

Erin: And this is after leaving cold turkey or planning a break?

Laura: Yeah, so I planned a break, great question. Yeah, so I planned a break. It took me about, to be honest with you, 18 months to actually plan my career break. But I would say probably 15 of those 18 months was me just being scared. Right? Like being uncertain, being what the world, being worried about what the world was going to think, you know, being worried about whether or not our family wouldn't have a house to live in or being worried I wouldn't have another job.

Again, the fear really limited my step. And so I think the reality is that planning the break was a very fast process. Like logistically understanding what that looked like. But I needed almost the data and the confidence within myself to be ready for what was next. So, so I interviewed about 170 people as a part of the process to understand people who had experienced burnout, people who took career breaks, people who became entrepreneurs after leaving corporate, all of these things. And then I did all of this research because I was like, I have to know that I can cure my own personal burnout.

So I read every possible book I could. I read as much research studies as I could. And then I created a plan for myself that said, okay, I'm going to do in the month of, I'm going to do one month of play, I'm going to do one month of pause, I'll do a month of plan, and then I'll do a month of pursue. And so to your point around, you know, as we're continuing to evolve and what does that look like? Right. For me personally, when I opened up Solle Solutions, which is my marketing consulting firm, you know, there was a excitement, but also a fear of Now I have shifted from having, say, one organization that I am beholden to.

Erin: Yeah.

Laura: To having multiple and how do you balance what that looks like when you're coming in as a consultant and you're wearing all the hats, you're selling the business, you're setting up the infrastructure. You're running, you're actually providing consulting and doing the work, doing the actual client work. And I think now if I think about fast forwarding because my journey, our journeys are very kind of similar in timeline because I'll be about two years here and probably three weeks.

Erin: Congratulations.

Laura: And likewise, I think in that journey, what I've learned is how much I've had to unlearn in the process and almost observe myself in conversations. Like I remember being on a business pitch and there was something that happened. Like I just, this, this switch just flipped on in me that was, that was very, you know, like, very shiny. Like, let me do all the things. Here's the song and dance. Like I know it so well. And then I got off of that meeting and I felt so nauseated, like something just didn't feel right.

And I ended up saying, like, look, that that gig isn't for me because I knew something was off. But it's about that power of observation, of is this going to be a healthy experience for me or not? And how do I make sure that I'm also setting boundaries and protecting myself, but also doing what's in alignment with my values? And does this work align with my values or not?

Erin: Yeah, yeah, it's a lot to consider. It's a lot to consider. So how did you come to start to advocate for career breaks for other people after having had your own experience? And did you go back to the same corporate thing after?

Laura: No.

Erin: So you need a bigger restart.

Laura: I did, I did. And I knew that, to be honest with you, I felt like I had done what I needed to do, what I came there to do, and then it was time for me to move on. Our CEO and the head of HR was really supportive of me through my own break and what I wanted to do. And I think that's partially because they had experienced their own career break as well. So I was really fortunate to have folks who could be advocates for me and really be understanding for me. So I knew that I wanted to do something different, I just didn't know what that different looked like. Yeah, I felt kind of stuck, to be honest, so I started advocating for career breaks because I couldn't find any resources for myself.

Erin: Yeah. And that's often how it happens, right?

Laura: Yeah, right. And I didn't know how to articulate it in a way that could be helpful for people. And so where it started was I was like, well, I'll go to LinkedIn and I'll just share my story and see what happens. And it just, I think I had a viral post, quote, unquote, right? So, like, I got, it was like, probably 7 million views on that post. Like, tons of, like, thousands of interactions, thousands of comments. And I got 3,000 direct messages from people.

And that what really began my journey was some, like, people need some sort of resource because we feel really alone. And how do we help each other navigate these waters? Because there isn't a guide map, there's no roadmap to tell us where to go or how to do things and people feel lost.

Erin: Yeah. And we're like, so busy doing it right, doing it right, doing it right. And then all of a sudden, I think, especially in midlife, we wake up and we go, wait, what is this for? Why am I grinding so hard? Why am I pushing so hard? Whose approval am I seeking? Like, you know, I definitely, I definitely have witnessed different ways of addressing this that are short of actually quitting or actually asking for a break, which I want to talk about, like, how you even figure out whether your organization would be open to that. But I certainly saw in one culture that I was in, people just started stopping the volunteer work because they felt so overwhelmed by the workload of their job itself. And then they started pulling back from-- you know, I did a huge amount of DEI work when I was at Snapchat and I, I was really committed to, you know, helping increase representation on camera and behind the scenes for the shows that we were making because I really wanted our shows to look like our audience, which was, you know, Gen Z, the most diverse generation ever.

And the, the company was so happy to have me do this work, you know, to sign up to like, create a partner pledge and work with the Annenberg Institute and like, all this stuff that we did, but that was not in my job description. Like, and no one was giving me a bonus for that. And I saw, you know, it not at that organization specifically, but at various places that I've been, people being like, you know what? I'm not doing that stuff anymore, like, I'm not getting paid for it. But it's tough because you want to be like, you want to be invested in the mission of the company. You want to make as much of an impact as you possibly can.

And, you know, to my mind, in the places that I've worked, which have been tech and entertainment, there's 30 people lined up for your job. So like, the idea of being like, hey, I'm approaching burnout and I would like to take a four month break, then these are all the smart reasons and then I'll come back. And it's like, I mean, I used to say, like, we should get this deal done now because a year from now we might be making flying cars. Like, we do not know what tech is bringing our way. Now everything's AI it's like, oh, you step aside. Similar thing for maternity leave, right? That women feel like, I step aside to get--create human life for a hot minute before I come back to this zoom. And then, you know, and then you feel like, oh, like someone's taken my place, someone's taken over my projects. I'm not, you know, racing up the ladder in the way that I was. I'm not seen in the same way as I was, like, there is, you know, deeply researched and acknowledged motherhood penalty. You know, I would have feared a penalty from taking a break.

Laura: Yeah, for sure. And I did. I mean, to be totally honest, Erin. I mean, I did. And I think it's a a concern that most people have.

Erin: Yeah.

Laura: It's financial. It's financial security. And it's also these are folks that are high achievers that have goals. Like, we have goals we have yet to achieve. We still have years to work and things that we want to create and produce. And I think a lot of it is I had for me to create a separation between kind of this component of am I doing enough to continue to get the promotions and the dollars, cash, apprentices that I'm looking for. And put that almost as a, when is enough enough? Like, when is enough money enough? When is the next right title enough for me? Like, am I gonna be happier when I have, you know, a C suite title in front of my name? Like, if I'm a VP now, is that really gonna be different for me?

Erin: Right.

Laura: And is that really what I want for my life? And I remember talking to an executive coach that I had had, and he had been working with me and I had said, I don't know if I want that job, because the truth is, is that I also recognize I only have a specific number of years right with my kiddo and when I look back on my life, what am I going to be most proud of? And that's what I had to reframe myself of. I can still be successful. I can still do the things I want to do, but it might just look a little different in this season of life.

Erin: Yeah, that's a big one, that's a big one. I mean, I have always been in this position of, like, when you're in a creative job in a corporation, when you get promoted, you don't get to do the fun stuff anymore. So I had these cautionary tales above me of bosses who had allowed themselves, who had sort of been like, okay, well, this is the next thing to be pushed into management, pushed upwards into management positions. And then their whole job becomes internal reporting and reporting upward and also evangelizing outward. But, you know, you could tell the executives who were unhappy about that because they would come in and meddle in your projects because they wanted to play with the toys.

And you know, I had the benefit of sitting in for a boss for her maternity leave twice. So I got a taste of what her job was and when she eventually left, I did not raise my hand for it because number one, she was the only woman at the next tier up. She was the only woman sitting in a room full of 30 men. And you know, she couldn't even speak without seeming strident, you know, or whatever. All this like gendered burden on her. I hated those conference calls when I was sitting in on her maternity leave. I was like, oh, there is like no room for who I actually am in this room.

And no, thank you, I don't, this is not for me. So sometimes you get a glimpse behind the curtain of like what succeeding upward in an organization can look like. And thankfully I had the, like, I love the job itself, the stuff of the job, the making of series and creative projects. Like as much in the trenches as you can be as an executive. I love that so much that I was like, I'm not going to allow myself to be promoted out of this, even though that was the next clear path. But I think that's very hard to do. I am very stubborn and hard headed, so I often let my path be determined by what I instinctively say no to.

Laura: Yeah, well, that's the power of it.

Erin: Yeah.

Laura: And I think that's the thing is you were being true to yourself. I think you're right because one of the things that I notice for myself is I'm a builder. Like I love building new products and I love going to market. And the second you put me in a run and maintain, I gotta go, like that's not for me, I want to build stuff. And so, you know, when I was to your point around being in being able to be a part of the building process.

Erin: Yeah.

Laura: And that's what I needed, like when I talk about I lost my mojo was like I needed to build stuff again.

Erin: Yeah.

Laura: And that was really the first I'd say, you know, nine months of my entrepreneurship journey was going back to building things again. And that has been really, really filling is being able to build new. And you know, that's been such a fun--and I love tech, you know, like I love building new sites and new databases and those types, I love that piece of it. And I had gotten so far away from it and it was fun to be able to get back in it. Even if it's, you know, sometimes you need some tactical to be able to provide real strategy.

Erin: Yeah, yeah, I think that's right. So what if you're working in an organization that is that hero culture, that is that self sacrifice culture. Like how do you gather up the confidence will strategy approach to go to your boss and say, 'hey, so I'm thinking about taking four months off or three months off or six months off or whatever it is. I'm super burnt out and I have other things I want to accomplish in my life and here's how I think it could go.' Do you start by looking at the employee handbook and going, did they even mention this?

Laura: Yeah, there's a couple ways. And I think most people go down the path of I'm just going to quit because there's no other option. Right. So to your point around starting with exploring, what are the options? Is there a sabbatical program? What is their leave of absence program? Is it 12 weeks, is it longer? Is it paid? Is it unpaid? And then, you know, I think understanding what are the options, having a conversation if you have, you know, you're a friend in hr, having that conversation and understanding. Talk to me about the benefits around this, especially if someone's experiencing burnout. A lot of organizations that are large now also offer burnout help. They even offer burnout coaching to employees. And so understanding what your I'd say voluntary benefits are, as well as your overall employee mental health benefits are, is really, really important too.

And then having the conversation with HR first is honestly where I would start. It's my personal recommendation because their role is to help you understand, you know, what are your employee benefits. And then once you can kind of understand what does that look like? Having the conversation with your direct manager of saying, here's, here are the three things, here's what I'm experiencing. I want to continue to be a value and benefit to the organization, but I need some extended time away from work. How can we make that happen and have the dialogue of understanding what that looks like? There might be several conversations is the truth, right? This might be a journey that you'll have over, say three or six months with your manager and you have to decide how you want to navigate those waters on. Is that something you can do? Can you wait three to six months before you activate a program? Do you need to do it immediately and be able to say, no, I need to take a leave of absence, like starting next week. It all depends on people's personal situations.

For folks that I know that are also a part of our online community, they've taken mental health leave of absence, which is essentially a medical leave of absence. So there's some paperwork that has to be completed with your therapist, and you might have to go have certain number of therapy sessions or whatever, that might be great, but take the time.

Erin: Or a therapy session.

Laura: Yeah. 100% agree. So it depends on what that looks like. Now, if that is not an option for people, then we have to talk about financially, what does that look like? How long do you want to take a break for and do it in a very logical way. There's a lot of folks I know that get to a breaking point that I've met along my interview journey. They got to a breaking point and they just left without really a plan in place.

Erin: Yeah.

Laura: And that creates a lot of uncertainty and a lot of fear. And so if you can have a plan in place of understanding the basics of your financial--what's your monthly expenses? How much do you actually need? What's your emergency fund look like? All of these foundational things around financial wellness is really important for this journey.

Erin: Yeah, Yeah, I think that's right. I think it's easy to talk about it in the abstract, and then when it comes down to the nitty gritty, the reason people don't take breaks from work is because they need the paycheck. Obviously, you know, I had some severance, I had some savings, I had some family help. And that is the only way I've been able to kind of take this sort of recalibration in midlife. And I don't want to treat it like it's magic, like it's easy to do this, because as much as everybody wants their take me away moment, I don't know if you're old enough to remember those commercials, but, you know, I feel like every woman has that at least, you know, for me, it's like daily--it's often just completely unrealistic, you know, to think about putting your own wellbeing that far forward like that it might come at too high a cost financially or in terms of your responsibilities in the rest of your life.

Laura: Yeah, for sure. So one of the things that I created for myself, as well as a tool that I provide to others and as a part of the book, is also basically a calculator that says, right, here's all of your income, here's all of the expenses. What is a windfall potential depending on if people are looking at. If they stay until March and there's a bonus payout, what would that windfall look like? And it factors into the equation of how long they want to take their break for. And then once we get all those numbers, you know, lined up, the next thing goes, how long do you need to save net new savings? Do you need to save for you to take the break? So it's a very logical approach of how do we holistically look at your financial situation? What do you want to do during your break? Because some people want to travel, so we got to factor that in, and then we say, well, it could take you a year to save for that long of a break. And if that's the case, what do you need to start doing today to make your day to day manageable?

And a lot of that is reframing a lot of the day to day components of it and also putting in practices where for the first time ever, they're prioritizing themselves. So I have actually two clients right now that have recently told me that they no longer need the break because they have actually put in place the habits and the routines that allow them to rest and recharge without actually burning themselves out. So they're recovering in their roles and I just--one, I didn't feel like I could do it in my specific organization, to be totally candid. And then two, I almost needed such a hard reset. You know, when your computer needs to shut down totally and restart, like, that's where I was at. Like, I needed a hard reset to be able to relearn and unlearn a lot of habits that I had carried with me for decades.

Erin: Yeah, yeah, I relate to the needing a hard reset. And I think more and more of us are going to experience this moment of like, okay, I've been doing my working life a certain way for 20 years. Thirty years, and I've gotten where I've gotten and I know what I know and you know, I have my expertise and my success and my resume and everything looks great on LinkedIn. But as my estrogen starts to drop and I stop caring what other people think quite so much, and maybe my kids are more self sufficient or I didn't have them at all. You know, I think we come back to ourselves in midlife, I think we come back to like, why did I do this job in the first place? What was it that I was trying to get out of this career? Is this the best use of my one and only life? You know, and also like, if I'm 50 and I have another 30 or 40 years left, how do I want to spend that time. And I think it's worth the deep level of, of contemplation that could take, that it could take to plan a break, to lead into a break, and also that that could lead to a wholesale life reinvention, life change.

Laura: Yeah, yeah. You know, it's interesting. I think there's a study, it's a Deloitte study from last year that says 84% of millennials plan to take a career break. And if you really think about it, LinkedIn reported that 62% of people have already taken a career break today. So I think it's interesting to me because the numbers are so large and yet we don't talk about it. No one is talking about what this means. And do you want to point around that tap on the shoulder we get at midlife that makes us go, wait, is this it? Is this what it's going to be forever? And if that's the case, is this how I want to measure my life?

Erin: Yeah.

Laura: That I'm going to just go to work, it's going to be a grind, I'm going to hate my day to day, or I know that there's a dream I wanna pursue that I just haven't pursued. You know, there's the research that talks about regret and that the biggest regrets that people have are the chances they never take.

Erin: Sure.

Laura: Those are the most lasting ones. Right. And I think that's what lingers in our mind of, well, what if I had taken that leap of faith and shot my shot? Could my life had been different? It's that sliding doors kind of mindset. And when you get that tap on the shoulder, it's that voice inside of you that says, hey, this is time for you to do something different. You can choose to ignore it, but it will scream at you over time. Just like burnout was a tap on the shoulder until it starts screaming and you find yourself in the hospital or wherever it might be, whatever your breaking point is and that's what happens.

Erin: Yeah. And that's what happened to me and it's what happens to so many people. And the research is starting to show that the amount of stress that women are under when it's not managed metastasizes, you know, either literally it becomes cancer or it becomes these sort of undiagnosable, the Lyme disease, the autoimmune, the constant exhaustion, the why do I just feel so lethargic? You know, these kind of undiagnosable, almost like spiritual malaise that, you know, that that stuff is real. That is real and it is, I see it happening to women around me who aren't taking seriously the burden of stress on their lives.

Laura: Yeah, me too. There's so many incredible women who are such phenomenal leaders. And I see the same signs that you're, that you're seeing as well. And there's nothing. I just want to be like, just take, it's okay. Take the time to rest and recharge, it's okay.

Like, there's only--the thing is, we're going to accelerate, you know, our path to the grave if you continue to go at this pace. Like that's the reality of the situation. And if we have this one precious life, like, what do you want to do with it? I think that question is paralyzing for a lot of people.

Erin: Yeah, right. Yeah.

Laura: Or I even asked the question, what do you like to do for fun? Like, that's a really simple question. And people are like, I don't even know what you're talking about. I didn't, I can't remember what I did for. And I didn't either.

Erin: I worked and I had kids. You know, I had these twins and you know, I didn't have time for friendship. I didn't have hobbies. I didn't have much of a marriage. I just was like, you know, working or trying to give my kids some attention and. Fuck. I mean, I used to cry on the weekends and couldn't really get out of bed.

And then I couldn't bring myself to the kids in the way that I wanted to because I was so stressed. I was so stressed. I always thought, like, well, I'm just weak. Like, I just don't, like, I don't have the metal for this. Like I'm not made of the stuff that these corporate women are made of in. And maybe they have better boundaries and maybe they work differently and maybe they don't take everything to heart the way that I do.

Or maybe they're just better at hiding it, you know, I was great at hiding it in the office. I had like all kinds of fucking chaos going on at home. But I never brought it with me because we're not supposed to have personal lives. We're supposed to be Teflon, you know, as I think, anything, anything in corporate life when you are a woman that shows that you are a woman in a man's environment is a strike against you. It's fucked.

Laura: Yeah. It's such a double edged sword. Right. I think there's a whole conversation. There's a whole duality component or competing priority component of like, how can we both have--how can we be authentic?

Erin: Yeah.

Laura: How can we bring our whole selves to work?

Erin: Oh, yeah, that's so belong. Yeah.

Laura: Right. Like, is that real? Because the truth is, is that you're penalized.

Erin: Yeah.

Laura: If you do.

Erin: Yeah, yeah. Although I think that, like, younger generations are better at it than we are. That at least I am. I'm 53, so I'm solidly Gen X. Like, I looked at the millennials in my workplace and because they grew up expecting to be treated well and to be taken seriously and listened to by their parents, by their teachers, and now by their employers, they were not willing to do the things that I was willing to do. And they would speak up about, hey, like, me and my best friend who's a. Who's a guy, both got promoted at the same time.

And we compared how much salaries, you know, how much a salary bump we both got and it seems like he got a really big bump and I didn't. And he would step up to the table and go, yeah. Why is that? Like, they were willing to show up with full voice in the workplace in a way that, like, is really annoying to Gen Xers because we're used to, like, you know, the workplace can abuse me however it needs to in order to succeed. In quotes. It's very annoying to have these very empowered young people. But at the same time, like, I know I learned a ton from them, from their outspokenness and their. And their willingness to take a mental health break or mental health day or, you know, xyz, like, stuff that I was. I thought, well, I'll get kicked off the island if. If I ask for that.

Laura: Yeah. I think I'm like an old millennial. Is my personal challenge. Right. Of. I love that story that you shared. I think what has been really fascinating for me is honestly my ad were my admiration for these Gen Z.

You know, the studies have come out that Gen Z's, they've actually taken more sick days than any other generation. Now what's fascinating around that is they're actually taking the days versus we would just work through it. Like, oh, I'm staying home sick, but I'm just working, so it's totally fine.

Erin: Vacation. Work through the vacation.

Laura: Totally. I want to take the calls. I'll build the decks. I'll do whatever we need to do. It's just from bed. I'm just working from bed or I'm working from another venue, like I'm working on the beach, whatever it is. But I think what is the gap that I'm seeing today is especially for Gen Z who and for those who, you know, let's say, were in that Covid era when they were entering work and then now we've got, now they had all of this remote work is the support that they haven't really had the actual support when they're struggling. And I think that becomes a piece is there's, there's a whole component of loneliness around that as well. And their burnout is very different from the burnout that might be more common, say in a millennial or a Gen X, because we typically think of burnout as overwork.

Erin: Yeah.

Laura: But actually there's two other types of burnout. There's neglect and then there's under challenged. And so when you think about what that looks like and burnout can be at work, but it can be in our lives, in our relationships. Like when we think about what that looks like and even as a parent, parental burnout is a real challenge. And that's why I think the Surgeon General announced that like parental mental health is a major concern.

It's listed as, you know, like an epidemic essentially currently. And so it becomes a huge challenge of how do we support people through these changes in their life and give them the tools and resources to help them be successful. Not just saying I'm going to take a mental health day and like, yes, like laying on the couch can be great and watching Netflix, but they're not having the tools they need to really recover from burnout in a different way or get aligned with the values that they need to. So they're making the right decisions that are right for them that a mental health day is rest, but rest has many different forms of rest.

Erin: Yeah. That's so interesting. The Surgeon Generals exhortation that parental mental health is important, is that a camouflage way of saying mothers? Because I don't think fathers have the same burden, I don't think they carry the same load.

Laura: Yeah. I mean there's so much to unpack in there, because you talk about the, when you think about household level of effort within homes, primarily being on women, all of this unpaid labor that's being focused on women, the number of women who leave the workforce to care for their children's versus men, you know, and also we talk about just pay equity as a whole nother component and the fact that, you know, there is a penalty. There's a parental penalty, specifically for women. When you look at what that trendline looks like as well, I think it's interesting because it's almost one of those where I would say yes. And I think there's statistic that talks about how millennial men, millennial male parents are more engaged with their children than past generations. And maybe that could be one, Erin. That is like the nuance to the data.

Erin: Yeah. Yeah. It's just interesting to me where we call out gender and where we don't. And I don't have the same experience of the men in my life feeling this way about their working lives. Are most of your clients women?

Laura: Yes. But here's a really interesting thing. So I went to a conference. It was more like a meeting, a workshop meeting several months ago. And I was like, I'd love to come, like, I'd love to learn more. So I showed up and the first thing I noticed when I walked in the room was that I was the only female. Everyone else were, I would say, 50 plus year old white men. And I am not, you know, being, you know, being an Asian woman in this room, I was like, holy cow, why didn't someone tell me? Like when I registered for this event.

Erin: Right.

Laura: Why did someone not tell me I would be the only female? I was nervous walking in, but at the end of that workshop, every. What's fascinating to me is, you know, every person went around the room and told their story and there wasn't a single dry eye. And they all talked about the struggles that they are facing as men in the workforce and trying to find their own purpose and identity in work and the expectations that they had felt. And I walked away with a newfound kind of appreciation for being able to, you know, it's almost like you're a fly on the wall, even though you're in the room. Being able to listen to their stories and their own challenges. It's different from women's for sure, but seeing it from that point of view was very different. So I had recently listened to a podcast with Elise Lone and Pulling the Thread.

Erin: Yeah.

Laura: And she had someone on and he talked specifically about the challenges for men and that, like, male circles tend not to be circles. Like, there's a lot of isolation that happens for men that don't necessarily happen in the same way for women. Because he talks about in the study that women are by nature kind of more social beings, typically have more community and men don't.

So typically what men talk about are sports and politics. And that's was what he found in his research. So what happened was, is that when they hit this point where there is a point of crisis, there's a deep sense of loneliness and identity that gets lost. And I was just talking to someone on their podcast yesterday, and he talked exactly about a friend of his who had withdrawn. He didn't know how to help him, and it was because he had quit his job, his identity had shifted, and he couldn't talk to the friends he had once had because that's not, he's not the same person he was. And he--there's almost a sense of what are we scared of when we don't reach out for connection? And what it comes down to is we're scared of being abandoned.

Erin: Yeah.

Laura: And so then it becomes a self fulfilling prophecy.

Erin: Yeah. I mean, I definitely see it, you know, as a woman who's out there dating in her 50s, and I tend to like guys around my age. They're in trouble. A lot of them are having a hard time trying to figure out the pivot, the reinvention, the, you know, how to stay relevant when there's all these young, hungry guys, you know, coming up behind them. When one thing I always look for when I'm dating someone or looking to date someone is, do you have guy friends? Do you have friendships? You know, because if you don't, then you're not--some part of you is lonely and not being cared for and that's worrisome to me because that just means more work for me.

Laura: Yeah, yeah.

Erin: It's self protective.

Laura: For sure, for sure. But I think it's also true even for some women. Like, I'm an introvert by nature and so when I found myself in burnout, I also, I'm also a Capricorn, which apparently Capricorns go internal, that's like a thing apparently, based on the astrology I read.

Erin: I dated one of those.

Laura: Yeah, and so in times of stress, we go inward. And there's a component of this loneliness factor that happens from that as well and you're right around asking the question. Even as female entrepreneurs, the most impactful thing for me was finding a tribe, finding a group of women who are all doing the same thing to just hold each other accountable, but honestly just understand the challenges really was the thing.

Erin: Yep, yep, that makes sense. So talk to me about when you go back to work after taking a break. What is that experience like for people? Do they feel refreshed, recharged, renewed, get given a different focus? Like that's what you would hope, right?

Laura: Yeah, Great question. So a couple of things, which is, have you ever been on a boat?

Erin: I have been on a boat.

Laura: Yeah. You know, when you get off the boat, how do you feel?

Erin: Little woozy, little like, whoa. Like the ground is different. Yeah.

Laura: Yes, right. There's a lot of movement and it's unexpected and you have created a lot of structure for yourself before. You've really had, or maybe not a ton of structure during your break and you're now back on land and it feels jarring, like you're moving but nothing else is. And you know, nothing else is moving, but yet you are. That's what a lot of people feel like. They feel disoriented because they're different.

And they're putting themselves into a world that is ultimately the same. And you're. When we talk about creating that sense of belonging again, right. Where you can be authentic and true, they get nervous about talking about the time that they've taken away from work and what does that look like? Right. And so why talk about what are the tools that you need in your toolbox? So the first one is really thinking about how can you continue to take the practices in your break and flow them into your day to day practices. So that's why I think about it as like your play, your pause and your plan. That's like, those are my three core P's.

So you need to keep doing things that you enjoy and that you love. Schedule it every week. Because if you start to miss that, if you skip a week, two weeks, a month, you're going to feel it and it's going to hurt. So you have to make sure that you're prioritizing that. Like, prioritizing pause and reflection is still really important because actually when you're out of your break, that's when a lot of the insecurities flood back. And because you are different, it is very easy also to go back to muscle memory of who you were before. Kind of that same thing we talked about, right? That switch turns on.

You have no idea. You didn't turn it on, it just did it automatically. But you have to be aware of that and observe that. So that really is a really key component. The next is finding a place for you, an environment for you that allows you to kind of come back to center is really important. And so I talk about it as creating a safe space for yourself. And so that could be a room that you have in your home, your home office, it could be your car, whatever it is.

And you have to define what that looks like for you so that you have that place to go to when you need to find some retreat, essentially a safe cove. And then the other thing that I always talk about is like self empathy, right. Like make sure that you are giving yourself the self compassion. There's a component of a common humanity, we're all going through this together. No one is perfect, and so giving yourself the self compassion you need is really, really important. And then my last is really like, take a time out.

Like when you're starting to feel like you are overloaded and blown, it's okay for you to go, okay, I'm going to need to take a little bit of a. I need to ease myself back into something or I need to schedule a mini break in my time. And I talk about that. A lot of it doesn't have to be huge breaks. It can be many breaks for you and that actually is more impactful. The science actually shows it's more impactful than a big extended break. You get something very different from those experiences.

Erin: That's so great. I mean, change is so, so good. And I think people don't regret making changes. I think the thing that I know, I struggle with my kids, struggle with people in my life, struggle with this transition and that we don't give ourselves that vestibule. We walk into the building where we, you know, shake off our boots and put down our umbrella and put our coat in the closet and have that Mr. Rogers moment where you're changing your shoes and changing your sweater and giving yourself the grace of a transition. And I feel like your plan has a lot of sort of structured, thoughtful things inside of it that can help people work on the transition parts because those are often practices, right. That we can sort of insert into our routines.

And I'm a terribly inconsistent routine haver. But I know that if I'm feeling some kind of way, I better journal. I better at least meditate for five minutes. I better go exercise, like there are things that I know that if I do them, it'll help get me out of whatever little spin I'm in. That's kind of a thoughtful part of what you're doing.

Laura: Tools in the toolbox, right? And so when you're in the break, when you use the play, the pause and the plan. Each one of those has different tools that you use that then just become a part of. You're like, oh, I've done that before and like, oh, I need to go do that again. Or I have a list of like, when you think about, oh, I can't think of a single fun, I don't have a hobby. Like, what would I do for fun?

Erin: If not, what do I do for fun?

Laura: Right, right. And now you have a list to go back to that says, oh, here's actually 10 things that I've wanted to do that I just haven't done yet. So I'm going to do it next week. Or I remember what that feels like, so I want that feeling again, so I'll go do that. Like my daughter and I, I felt, honestly, I felt like my play tank was a little low a few weeks ago. So I was like, I don't know what I want to do. I really want to like plan a trip and go away for a long weekend, but that's not feasible. So, you know, I ended up my daughter and I just went bowling and it was so fun.

Erin: So fun.

Laura: But I wouldn't have done that before. I would never have prioritized that before.

Erin: Yeah, that's so great. That's so great. It's great for you and it's great for your kid and your relationship. What do you want our listeners just sort of as a, as a way to sort of round out this conversation. What do you want them to take away from this conversation that will lead to more success and happiness and, well, being in the next phase of their lives? Over 40?

Laura: Yeah. I think the big one is give yourself permission to take what you need. I think that's really the biggest thing is we feel as women most often that we have to self sacrifice or we have to wait our turn or whatever it is. I'd say like, be bold and take what you need. And so if it's a break, figure out a way to take the break and you've got the tools to do it now. So that's the beauty and the benefit of that even if it is like little things like being able to be true in yourself and setting the boundaries that you need are really key and important. Putting that phone away when you need to put the phone away, like that's put it in a drawer and don't go back to it.

Erin: Yeah.

Laura: I think that's the biggest thing is give yourself permission.

Erin: Yeah, I love that. I think as women we, we often need permission. I used to give advice, very unqualified advice on this podcast. And what I would often say is, you can ask me questions, and I will give you the answer that you already know, and I will give you permission to do the thing that you want to do that you feel like you need some external sort of approval for fine, you have it, ou have my permission. If you can't give it to yourself, maybe we can give it to each other, you know?

Laura: Yeah, I think the other thing you said. I was on a conversation with a friend yesterday, and she's a female founder, too, and I think, you know, she had said she was like, I just feel like, you know, other female founders, like, they have it figured out or like, people just have it figured out and I was like, mm, no, no, girl, no. We're all in this together. No one has it figured out, by the way, none of us do.

Erin: No, although some people are probably better suited to it.

Laura: Maybe they just hide it differently.

Erin: Yeah, exactly. They just present differently. Really nice having you on. I really appreciate this conversation. I think it's something we don't talk about enough. Like, you do have choices, you can break up your routine and the grind and take some space for yourself to change and to evolve. You know, we deserve that.

Laura: This has been so fun, and it's been honestly healing and cleansing for me, too, so I really appreciate this conversation Erin, thank you.

Erin: Wonderful. Thanks, Laura.

Thanks for listening to Hotter Than Ever. I hope you enjoyed this conversation about taking a break from your career to focus on other things or rest and recharge and avoid burnout. Do you have a colleague who's on the edge of burnout? Someone you're close to who you feel like could really benefit from this conversation?

Do you have a friend who is always threatening to quit their job because they just can't take it anymore? Has your sister been talking about traveling around the world for 20 years, but she never gives herself permission to actually go anywhere. Send them this episode, share this conversation with the people in your life who you think could benefit from it.

This may be just the thing that they need to hear to give themselves permission to live the lives that they want to live. At the end of the day, that is what Hotter Than Ever is all about. How do you want to live your life in the second half? And maybe taking a career break is just the thing to catalyze that vision for yourself.

Hotter Than Ever is produced by Erica Girard and PodKit Productions. Our associate producer is Melody Carey. Music is by Chris Keating with vocals by Issa Fernandez.

Good luck in this crunch period leading up to the holidays. Despite whatever expectations you might have, I want you to know that whatever you decide to do, whatever gifts you buy, whatever decorating or cooking or God bless you, cookie baking, however you deliver on the expectations of the season.

I think it's going to be just good enough. Remember, you are not just the orchestrator of everyone else's fun, but you should enjoy yourself too. So maybe make a hot toddy and do the things that you like to do and delegate or quit doing all the holiday stuff that might be tradition, but you're just not into it.

You're allowed to change the rules. You're allowed to do it your way. It's all made up anyway.