What If Doing Less Heals More

Episode 111

What if your body isn’t “failing” you—it's protecting you? We explore how modern life traps us in fight-or-flight and what it really takes to teach the nervous system that it’s safe again. No gurus, no cold-plunge bravado—just clear steps you can weave into a busy week without adding more pressure.

We start with the culture that glorifies busy and shames rest, especially for women juggling midlife demands. Then we demystify regulation: why dehydration, late meals, and constant alerts read as threat; how caffeine hammers the adrenals and nudges the thyroid to hit the brakes; and why stubborn weight, poor sleep, and digestive gripes often signal a nervous system on edge. You’ll hear practical swaps that actually land—three slow breaths before meals, tapping you can do anywhere, earlier dinners, and tiny morning rituals that don’t require waking at 5am. We also unpack habit loops around alcohol and the “I deserve it” reflex, and how to reroute those urges with compassionate, repeatable alternatives that soothe rather than sedate.

This is a guide to doing less but better: planning meals to avoid 6pm chaos, protecting white space on the calendar, and saying no as a legitimate regulation tool. We share client stories that prove small changes work even in high-pressure jobs and family life. The goal isn’t perfection; it’s creating reliable safety signals so your body can switch gears, recover, and make every other healthy habit more effective. If you’ve been “vertically fine” yet quietly struggling, consider this permission to opt out of the busy badge and build calm from the ground up.

If this conversation helps, subscribe and leave a review, then share it with a friend who needs a gentler plan. Join our free Facebook community to keep the chat going and pick up simple tools you can use today.

Thank you for listening.

You can continue the conversation with us in the Far 2 Fabulous Facebook group. Come and connect with other women on a journey to empowered health.

For more information about Julie Clark Nutrition, click HERE
For more information about Catherine Chapman, click HERE

If you enjoy the podcast and would like to support the show, you can buy us a coffee HERE. Your support helps us continue creating episodes and improving our recording setup.

We look forward to you joining us on the next episode.

Transcript

Warm Up And Laughs

SPEAKER_02 0:01

Welcome to Far Too Fabulous. Julie and Catherine join us on a mission to embrace your fabulousness and redefined wellness. Get ready for some feastiness, inspiration, candy chat, and humour as we journey together towards empowered well-being. Let's dive in. Hello, hello everybody, and welcome back to the Far Too Fabulous podcast. I was going to try and do a newsreader one and I just couldn't do it. I can't do it. You've got your newsreader glasses on. Oh, what's her name? I can't even think. From um Incredibles that makes their suits oh yeah.

SPEAKER_00 0:40

What's her name? Something mode.

Today’s Focus: Nervous System 101

SPEAKER_02 0:44

Yes. I'll take a picture and I will put it in the mode. Got there eventually. I'll take a picture, I'll post it in the Facebook group when you can see what my glasses look like. But uh yeah, these are my these are my big ones that match all my blue clothes. Yeah, no, I did try and do a news reader, and and I'm just it doesn't suit you. I thought you were gonna start with bum bum bum bum bum and then go into and then go into yeah, but it was trying welcome and welcome to the far too fabulous podcast. It kind of flows too easily. I'm just yeah, I have to sing it. Sorry. Anyway, singing, sing is a good way to regulate your nervous system, which is what we are talking about today. Do you like that? That was a good that was really good.

SPEAKER_00 1:28

Very nice, yeah. Do you know what? Regulating your nervous system is everywhere, isn't it? It it is. People have got courses in it left.

SPEAKER_02 1:37

It is though, it's because we were talking about it about two weeks ago, or even two years ago. Yeah, but this always happens, doesn't it? Every time we talk about something, like Joe Wicks does a podcast on it, and you're like, No, we were talking about that, or Dr. Chatterjee finds an expert on it, and you were like, Oh, we know that it's goffy enough.

SPEAKER_00 1:58

It's coffee enough. Well, I just find that when you when you go through social media at the moment, and it is so oh my god, there's so many adverts now, isn't there, on social media. But it's used to explain anything if you've got problems with your sleep, you need to regulate your nervous system, if you've got if you've got weight issues, you need to everything is coming down to this is the buzzword at the moment, I think.

SPEAKER_02 2:22

And I mean it's true, it is true, it is true, annoyingly, it is true, and that's I like the I know when the kids come and say to me, Oh, I don't feel very well, and I do the usual what time did you go to sleep last night? Have you drunk any water? Have you eaten anything? Have you been to the toilet? And I go through all these very basic things and they look at me as if it is boring as hell. And I'm like, it doesn't it doesn't need to be big and exciting, like you don't have to, you know, have have a brain tumour or something just because you've got a headache. Yeah, it's like let's look at the simple things first. Let's look at the basics every time we're like, oh, it's boring.

Are We Failing At Relaxing

SPEAKER_00 3:02

I was like, yes, it is, yeah, it is, it is boring, but it's so important. So yeah, I just think I spend a lot of time talking to people who are stressed, yeah, and that's because when they are stressed, you get a whole number of different symptoms depending on you as an individual, and we have to talk about the nervous system, so it comes up all the time, but it just amazed me how much it's coming up on social media at the moment. So I I was just having a think about if we went back years and we had the same conversations with someone who maybe was born a hundred years ago about nervous system regulation and stress management. You know what they do to you, don't you?

SPEAKER_02 3:50

They'd burn you at the stake. Yeah, they might do that. They'd call you a witch and they'd burn you. That said, a hundred years ago, I mean, I'm sure there were stressful situations. Maybe their wheel fell off their cart, I don't know.

SPEAKER_00 4:06

But it's only a hundred years ago, Catherine. Not a thousand years ago, a hundred years ago. Yeah, post-war obviously there was things going on, but there was there was going to be stress, but the way that we the way that we kind of manifest it now or deal with it is so different, and it just led me to this thought like, are we just failing at relaxing? Yeah, yeah, we're just incompetent at relaxing, yeah. Yeah, because a lot of these people that I speak to, and and a vast majority of my clients are women over 40 or children, and uh children are really struggling at the moment, but women over 40, the guilt of uh around relaxing or not doing anything.

SPEAKER_01 4:51

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 4:53

Do you find that if you are sat doing nothing and somebody walks in the room? You have to justify it, don't you?

SPEAKER_00 5:00

You've got to I've just sat down, I've only just sat down, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 5:04

Or I'm just about to get up. Yeah. And I bet I mean, and so many people could hit us up, tell me that you relate to that because I just every time, and sometimes I have to just like have a little chat myself. No, it's it's perfectly alright that you're sat there doing nothing.

Busy Culture And The Guilt Of Rest

SPEAKER_00 5:22

It's perfectly okay. So, yeah, are we failing at relaxing? I think with the nervous system, one of the biggest issues is that lots of people are stuck in the fight and flight. And this is where the nervous system regulation, it sounds like a fancy word, but all we're really doing is telling our body that everything is okay by doing some of these things like breath work or meditation. Yeah, but we don't, it's not like it's in our everyday life to do that. We're all stuck in the fight and flight. Keep going, keep going, keep going. Uh, feel guilty if you stop. It even we've spoken about this in the in the past about if you're if you see someone, they go, Oh, how are you? How are you doing? Oh, yeah, I'm really busy. Oh, you must be doing good then if you're really busy. Yeah, just affirming it every single time.

SPEAKER_02 6:10

I'm successful because I'm really busy. I'm really busy. I've got no time.

SPEAKER_00 6:14

No time at all. Yeah, and I've stuck a broom up my ass and I'm cleaning as well. Yeah, multitasking. Our nervous system actually doesn't like multitasking as it goes, even though, as a bit of a joke, we say women can multitask and men can't, and that is true, mainly because we're forced to and we don't have any choice.

SPEAKER_02 6:31

I think the statistic is that actually only four percent of the entire population can actually multitask. Well, really, is that an actual fact? I think so, and and for everybody that says, Oh yeah, I'm that four percent, can't be all of you.

SPEAKER_00 6:48

Can't be all of can't be all of us, but welcome to the people in the four percent club. I'm with you guys.

SPEAKER_02 6:55

You reckon, I know, but I mean our lives have changed dramatically. There is there's input from every single direction. There is never peace and quiet, is there? There's always something coming at you. The irony that social media is banging on about nervous system regulation is just unbelievable. It calls in the issue and then it's all under exactly that and the way that society expects us to behave, that we're not to miss out on anything, that we're gonna live life to the full, and and also I mean, I guess with things like social media, you get to see all of the things the other people are doing, and you're like, oh, I want to do that.

SPEAKER_00 7:45

Only the best things they're doing, they're not they're not sharing the worst things, are they?

SPEAKER_02 7:48

No, why are we and why are we not sharing us sitting on the sofa? That's interesting, isn't it?

SPEAKER_01 7:54

Yeah. I don't do that. No. Oh, that's just dropped. You're gonna do that now. That's just totally down to it.

SPEAKER_02 8:01

Totally dropped, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 8:03

Yeah.

Screens, Teens, And Constant Input

SPEAKER_02 8:04

I'm jumping around, I'm running around, I'm doing weights, I'm doing plotties, and doing hip. And I never ever highlight all of the all of the still things I do.

SPEAKER_01 8:15

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 8:16

The trouble is the still things that you do, and this is the same for me as well, are another task that we add to our to-do list, isn't it? Yeah. Oh, I must nervous system regulation on the list. Yeah, trying to do that. Yeah, when you think about it, it's actually insane, isn't it? It is, but it doesn't have to be complicated.

SPEAKER_02 8:39

It can literally be 15 minutes on the sofa with a cup of tea without Netflix on. Yeah. Just just sat there. But also, we we're not very good at doing of doing nothing.

SPEAKER_00 8:53

No.

SPEAKER_02 8:54

Like, if we went and sat on the sofa and somebody said you can't put the television on, you'd be like, oh, where's my phone then?

SPEAKER_00 9:01

Like, we can't just sit there and be. And it's a problem, it's causing massive problems. And the fact that we struggle with that, having not grown up with a phone, yeah, versus our kids that have, yeah, it's really worrying. I I'm all for the banning the social media for the under 16s. But do you know what my daughter was doing the other day? She was wondering if she could adjust her account now to put her age up so that if they did take it away, she'd be alright. Because apparently there's some people in Australia that managed to get away with that. Yeah. So she was she was looking for Charlie's passport because he is old enough to see because she was looking to see if you had to verify your um your age and stuff.

SPEAKER_01 9:47

I mean, it's clever five ways around it, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 9:49

Yeah, but also that her fear around losing her social media is so huge.

When Self Care Becomes A To-Do List

SPEAKER_02 9:56

Yeah. But I mean, the good thing is that her fear is based on the fact that she'd been missing out, and majority of her friends wouldn't be on it as well. So if she did manage to get fake ID and manage to get on it, she might be all alone. Yeah, this is this is true. Yeah, and I think that that's the the good thing. Mikey was we were talking about this with Mikey, who is 17 and as obviously has had his phone since the beginning of secondary school, and it's you know, you have to surgically remove it from his hand. However, he was on board with no social media for under 16, which really surprised me. And yeah, he could he could see the benefits of it. He would hate it if somebody inflicted that on him, but he could see the benefits, which was which was interesting. Yeah, so I've completely forgot what what we were talking about that led us to that point that social media is causing us us the problems that we then have to uh regulate our uh nervous system because of yeah, because of all of this, even though it's now telling us we should be we should be doing it, which is interesting, and then yeah, and then like you said, it becomes another tick box exercise that it's something that we have to do, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 11:13

It's just another task, and that in its in itself can be another stress, can't it? We can be regulating our nervous system, but that can be causing a stress, and some of the things that we do to help regulate our nervous system do put our system in stress.

Stress, Exercise, And Sleep Trade Offs

SPEAKER_02 11:28

Yes, yes, it it does, but yeah, it's it's slightly different. I mean it I say it's slightly different, actually, inside the body, it's the same reaction, isn't it? It's the same reaction if you are inside the body, if you are literally running from a bear, if you are sat in traffic and you're super super late and you're not going anywhere, same inside your body. Running, um, just running, running, same thing inside your body, stress, even though you're doing something brilliant for your muscles, brilliant for your endorphins, all of that stuff, it's still a stress, and it's being able to balance those things. I was and just like you said, another tick box exercise, trying to fit these things in. So you've got your list of things that you're gonna do for the day, and then you've you've been to work, you've come back, you've cooked dinner, and you're like, Oh no, I've got to go out for a run now. So then you've gone out for a run, then you've come back in, you've eaten your dinner at eight o'clock, and then you've kind of thrown yourself in bed, and and then wondering why you can't see it. Yeah, exactly. And all of those things, even though you know, eating a nourishing dinner and and going out for a run are all good things. The fact that maybe you've done them at eight o'clock at night, it's not great for your for your digestive system. Running on top of a a a crazy day, maybe you're not fuelled, all those sorts of things, just yeah, it's quite actually quite detrimental then. So, what might have been better was that you went and picked up a good book. So you didn't go out for your run that night. I know this is very strange coming from my mouth, but I can see I can see you slightly struggling with it. Struggling with it. Struggling with it. I know. But but yeah, maybe, yeah, maybe doing something different, doing some breath work, doing some meditation, doing some tapping. I think tapping is a really underused tool when it comes to regulating your nervous system.

SPEAKER_00 13:27

Yeah, I would tend to agree with that. It's so simple. I I recommend it so often in when I'm doing consultations because I just think it's so easy. You can do that tapping anywhere, and you don't even have to say anything. Just the fact that you're tapping on those points on your body that are connected to energy meridians is enough to say, oh, switch to parasympathetic. I think that's the biggest issue. It's like that valve has got sticky, yeah, and it's hard to shift from sympathetic to parasympathetic now with everything going on. So I think we do need to do some nervous system regulation in order to remind ourselves not to be in fight and flight. And a lot of the time that comes down to being the the main things in the um what's the hierarchy of needs? I can't remember Maslow's hierarchy of needs. Yeah. When you're looking at that from your body's nervous system perspective, yeah, get the word out eventually, is um am I safe? Yeah, am I nourished? All of these things come into that, don't they? Have I got shelter? All of those, but we just trigger that fight and fly all the time with just the way we live our lives and everything that's thrown at us these days, I think.

SPEAKER_01 14:45

Yeah.

Small Tools: Breath, Tapping, And Being

SPEAKER_02 14:45

And if you are constantly thinking, oh, I've got to do, I've got to go to the sauna tonight, I've got to do the run tonight, I've got to do the hit tonight, I've got to do. Are you doing those for yourself? Are you doing those because you think that you should be doing it? Are you doing that because you know society says that you should be doing it, and and if you don't do it, you don't feel safe because you don't feel like you're, you know, doing the trends you're in with in with the people. It kind of because sort of really links into all of that. But yeah, just knowing, yeah, knowing that you're safe and that you've you've got this.

SPEAKER_00 15:19

Yeah, and just you saying about when the children come and say they've got a headache, and and you're saying about the basics, if you haven't drunk enough water, that is a stress your body perceives as a threat, it therefore triggers the sympathetic nervous system. So before you go and do something like a cold plunge, which yes can have benefits, but if your body's going, I'm really dehydrated, what the hell's going on here? I can't function at every cell is not working at optimal level now.

SPEAKER_01 15:51

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 15:51

Is a cold plunge the answer? Or should you drink? Stress me out.

SPEAKER_01 15:54

Yeah, yeah.

Safety, Basics, And Maslow

SPEAKER_02 15:56

No, exactly, exactly. It is yeah, very, very interesting. All of these, all of these shoulddings and and doings. We like we would had been talking about this again last week, hadn't we? And I I had said that lots of people that were not achieving their we always do go back to shedding fat, releasing weight because it's such an identifiable issue for people. And this is what we were talking about last week was that if you are constantly in that fight or flight sort of just anxiety, running around like a headless chicken kind of feeling, which I'm sure that everybody can identify with. Your body in no way, shape, or form is going to let go of any fat because it's gonna be like we clearly, you know, something terrible is about to happen. There is no way we're letting go of this fuel, yeah, because we're gonna need it to run from the sabre-toothed tiger or whatever horror your body feels it's reving up to, and and so being able to incorporate things that just give your body the rest bite from that like being revved up all the time into your daily life without it being a tick box exercise. Um it's a bit of a balance, actually, isn't it?

SPEAKER_00 17:26

It's it's such an important one, and I think people just hear that and they go a bit like, oh yeah, yeah, whatever. But that stress element, that impact on weight is so huge, it is virtually impossible when you're in that stress, the long-term stress, like the short-term stress, you can lose a ton of weight, but when you get that long-term stress and that produces inflammation as well, then it's really hard for your body to let go of weight because it won't see that it's safe to do so. You're absolutely right, and in some cases, it can be dangerous to do so because if your body has put that protection in place for a good reason, yeah, and then the fat in your body is a really good place to park up things that has been in excess in the blood, it needs to be put somewhere, whether that's toxins or hormones or whatever it is, you start to let go of that weight, then you've got a massive issue as well. So it's such a significant one, it really is. But I sometimes think that nervous system regulation isn't always about adding something in, it could be taking some of these things away. Like saying no is a nervous system regulation, yeah, yeah, isn't it? Absolutely.

SPEAKER_02 18:44

We always think that we should be doing something, don't we? And actually, we probably need to be doing the opposite and doing nothing.

Coffee, Adrenals, And The Thyroid Brake

SPEAKER_00 18:54

Yeah, but the basic things are so significant because they do have an impact. Our nervous system cannot work properly if we're tired, if we're dehydrated. Such a big stressor. Yeah, if we've if we're nutrient deficient, if we put a load of sugar in our system, there's so many things, isn't there? Caffeine. I must talk about caffeine for a for a minute because when you're stressed, your adrenal glands, those tiny glands on your kidneys, are the ones that produce those stress hormones. Caffeine stimulates the adrenals, it can be beneficial for certain things. We know that, and it depends on if you're someone that can process caffeine as well. I can't do it very well, but for some people, it can help enhance performance, but not if you keep hammering at it every single day and you keep punching the adrenals. I see it on the hair test results. The the adrenals go right down, and then what happens? Best mate, thyroid puts the brakes on. We've spoken about that before.

SPEAKER_02 19:56

So yeah, but that and that in combination with a stressful life, like they go hand in hand, don't they? I'm like, oh, I'm stressed, I'm running around, and you grab a coffee because you think that that's gonna perk you up and get you through the rest of your things to do list.

Alcohol Urges And Habit Loops

SPEAKER_00 20:11

It's just a it's a bit of a perfect storm, isn't it? I had quite an ex interesting experience the other day, so I haven't been drinking any ha alcohol at all. I'm on 57 days now. Oh wow, yeah. Although I don't want to make it like a celebration or I'm just not, I've just chose not to drink at the moment. Yeah, but the other day I had a significant amount of stress happen, and I came out of my office, went to cook the dinner, and the first thing I wanted was I really want a glass of wine. Yeah. Said to my husband, I want a glass of wine, and I understand why. Because I'm looking for a solution to my stress that's happened today, yeah, and I know that that isn't the answer, but I also know it would work because it's an immediate sedation, yeah, it's an immediate numbing out, right? To drink a glass of uh wine or something, and I didn't, and instead I I went for a walk, which I was gonna do anyway, because I've got to walk the dog, but I could have easily done that, and there was wine in the fridge as well, and I was like, I've managed to overcome a massive uh obstacle here. That's what it felt like, but that's the power of these things after all those days of not having any alcohol. The first thing that my brain triggered, because in the past it's gone, oh, stress equals wine equals we feel better. Hello, yeah, this would work. It was it was prodding like crazy, shouting at me, get the wine out. And I was in the place where the wine is. It's a well-trodden neural pathways. That that was that was mowed to perfection. That was like the that was like the Wimbledon lawn.

SPEAKER_02 21:57

Yeah, so true. True, yeah, and all of those paths lead to Netflix, yeah. So, but I mean, and that's what your body is designed to do, it wants to make it easy for you, it doesn't want it to be hard for you, it wants you to be relaxed, it wants you to be comfortable, and so and it also doesn't obviously doesn't realise that that the alcohol is is not doing good things for you. It's the same with cigarettes, it doesn't realise once you've done once you've created that habit, the body doesn't realise that that habit is like wrecking you from the inside out, it just knows that we've done it for a long time, we are still alive, so we clearly need it to keep going. So, yeah, it's it's really bizarre, isn't it? And the the w other interesting thing is that emotionally you would have felt relaxed and happy because of the alcohol, but internally the stress that the body is then gonna have to go through to clear all the sugar and the alcohol and the toxins and all that sort of thing. Absolutely, yeah, it's crazy, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 23:05

Yeah, it is because that would have impacted my sleep and how I'd felt the next day, and then my food choices would have been impacted as well, right?

SPEAKER_02 23:12

Next day, 100%, yeah, and that's not and then the emotional beating yourself up, yeah. Don't forget that. There would be a really healthy dose of that.

Plan Routines To Reduce Decision Stress

SPEAKER_00 23:21

There would have been a massive dose of it, so it's really, really interesting, but yeah, putting the basics in place and then thinking what can I remove rather than keep adding stuff in. And we're not saying don't do your exercise or your breath work, your meditation, etc. But I think sometimes it just it's another thing to do on the to-do list, isn't it? Yeah, absolutely.

SPEAKER_02 23:44

So um well, so perhaps what we're saying is remove some of the stressful things, remove some of the horrible things, and put some of the nice things in. So put some of the reading a book in, riding a bicycle, going for a walk. Do have a go at breath work. It is so simple to do. You don't have to do a really active breath work, you can just literally sit there and breathe. Like tapping is, I think some of these things people think are so simple, they can't possibly have the profound results that we say they do. But they really, really do. And and the exercise, the Pilates are so important. Have them in your also have these things in your everyday life as a routine so that you don't have to go through that mental fatigue and that kind of battle inside your head about will you, won't you, will you, won't you? Will I do Pilates or Pilots in on a Wednesday night? Well, will I, won't I, will I, won't I? When it's if it's in your diary, that's what you're gonna do. That's I this is one of the things I love about having planned all of my food is that you don't have that mental battle.

SPEAKER_00 25:00

And again, that's a stress as well as I I think it's one of the biggest stresses if if I haven't planned the meals that when it comes to dinner time, oh my goodness me, what are we having for dinner? Or I've got people asking, what's for dinner, mum? What's for dinner? And I'm I find that really stressful. I do.

SPEAKER_02 25:16

You're hungry, yeah, your body's like, we're gonna eat anything, we don't care if it's got nutrients in it, we will eat the cardboard, just anything. You're like, no, I want the family to have really good, nutritious, home cooked food, but I'm starving. And it's that whole it's it's mentally draining. Yeah. And so to be able to take those things out, um, there's enough stuff to be stressed about. We don't need to be, we don't need to be stressed about our our well-being. Book it in, make sure that it's not back to back with every single other thing that you're doing.

Start Tiny: Three Minutes And Saying No

SPEAKER_00 25:56

And I I think if you because a lot a lot of people that I speak to, like there was a a really lovely lady who I've been working with for a while, she's got a she's in her 40s, but she's got a young family, she's got a really high level job, she's commuting to London. I actually listened to her and thought, I don't know how you're doing that. Yeah, I'm getting anxious just thinking about it. Yeah, but that's her life. So when I'm saying to her, You're very stressed, she knows that. Where do we put things in to help her? It was really basic little things. She started saying no, that was a huge thing. Yeah, she recognised that she needed some help at work, and she actually went and said to the boss, I actually have too much work to do. That was significant. So it's not telling her to go and do a cold plunge or a sea swim or a no, it's not gonna work for her, is it? Start small. She's already got loads on, but it was little things like how you start your morning. Yeah. Give yourself and we did three minutes, that's all. Three minutes before you're into that, right? Get the kids up, they've got to go to nursery, I've got to get on the train.

SPEAKER_01 27:07

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 27:08

Because she couldn't do any more than three minutes before she ate her meal. The three breaths. Yeah. That's kind of important. Yeah, yeah. Tapping while she was on the loo was another one we did because you've got to sit on the loo anyway. Yeah. Why not do a bit of tapping? That helped. Yeah. Yeah, I love that.

SPEAKER_02 27:26

Yeah, really, yeah. Keep it simple. Don't overthink it, don't overcomplicate it. I love that. I yeah, I think that I'm glad this is a big topic now because I I don't think that people would necessarily think about it. They'd know that they were stressed, and maybe they would go for the big things like like the cold plunge or something.

Hidden Stress, Plate Spinning, And Crashes

SPEAKER_00 27:51

Yeah, I've got to do something dramatic. Actually, the people that do the most dramatic things are normally the ones that don't think they're stressed. They don't recognise it. I used to be one of those. Yeah, and they and that's their norm. That that is their norm, and they don't know that they're stressed. People around them know they're stressed, yeah, but they can't see it. They just see it that I'm coping well, I'm juggling all the things, I haven't dropped a ball, I'm everything's good, I'm doing everything. I've got, I'm doing my fitness, I'm doing my food, I'm doing my work, I'm doing my family, I'm like duh duh. And yeah, and you're so stressed, and you've got these little symptoms that are niggling away. Can't recognize it.

SPEAKER_02 28:36

Do you think then? Here we go, that people like that, if they think that they stop or slow down for one second, that everything is going to come crashing down around their ears.

SPEAKER_00 28:48

Yeah, absolutely.

SPEAKER_02 28:49

That's why they don't stop.

SPEAKER_00 28:50

Yeah, yeah, and unless their body forces them to, which is what happened to me.

SPEAKER_02 28:54

Yeah, I was just saying, which is exactly what happened to me as well. I was thinking when you were talking about your client going up into up to London and just having everything on her plate, that was that 100% that was me, and everything did come crashing down around my ears, and I had to declutter my life. I had to work out what stuff had to go, what stuff obviously had to had to stay. I couldn't um rent out the children or anything. No, they have to stay, apparently. And yeah, so I had to look and see what I what I could release and and then and then put in stuff for me. And so when I start to feel those feelings of anxiety come back again, I that is my signal then to have another declutter through my life and say, like, what and I mean there's you know, there's a lot going on, there's there's plenty to plenty to strip out very frequently, yeah. But and also again, I think we I like the busy life. So for me now, and this like especially when nervous system regulation has really come to the forefront, I have been adding in a short meditation in the morning and a short meditation in the evening, just to remind my body that I'm okay, everything's okay, I'm safe.

Warning Signs And Why Busy Isn’t A Badge

SPEAKER_00 30:19

Yeah, there's no tiger in the room, or you can even tell the tiger to go, yeah. In not not necessarily out loud, like in that way, but just by doing those things, you're telling the tiger to leave the room. Yeah. What's most fascinating is I see this with the people that I work with where you were, where I were was as well those years ago, is that the first thing that these people say that you probably said that I said was, why can't I cope when everybody else is? I see other people are getting on the train and going to London every day. I see other people doing this. Why am I the one that can't cope? And you make it into a thing that's your fault. That's your fault. I said those words to the doctor.

SPEAKER_02 31:04

Yeah, why can't I do this? Everybody else can do it.

SPEAKER_00 31:06

I said the same, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 31:08

And prided myself on spinning all the plates. Like, I can do this, yeah. Or why can't I now do this? Yeah, it's a it's a big societal pressure, and so yeah, and so we do not want nervous reg nervous system regulation to become the next societal pressure.

SPEAKER_00 31:28

No, we don't want it to be another thing you have to do, but I think being aware of it to know that if you have got symptoms going on, they're normally digestive, headaches, not sleeping properly, feeling more irritable, it's going to have an impact on hormone balance because of the uh connection with the adrenals and everything. If you've got these things going on, but you're still functioning, yeah, you're still vertically fine, yeah. You're not horizontally ill at this point, you're vertically ill, you're still functioning, but you've got these little niggles. That's when you need to go. Hang a minute, am I actually stressed?

Four-Leg Chair: Foundations Over Grand Gestures

SPEAKER_02 32:04

Yeah, yeah, yeah, absolutely. Don't wait until the entire system is broken and you've kind of like I was listening to that um that podcast, Dr. Chatterjee with the um GP talking about type 2 diabetes. Oh Dr. Amwin, yeah, it's good that one, isn't it? So good. And he and so he had then tipped over into type 2 diabetes and was then having to work twice as hard to be able to to keep everything to keep everything level because he pretty much had already broken broken the system. Yeah. And so yeah, when you see those warning signs, like it's not it's not normal to be tired all the time, people. I know that we are, but it's not normal. No, it's not normal to be stressed, it's not a badge of honour, don't wear it, take it off. Yeah, we do this is not the medal we want. No, no, I have got the gold medal in being the most stressed. Well done.

SPEAKER_00 33:11

But I've still got all my plates spinning, aren't I? Amazing. Yeah, exactly.

SPEAKER_02 33:16

And and yeah, and don't go for the the grand gestures of nervous system regulation. It is it's all the same things, isn't it? It's those four legs of a chair, yeah, making sure that those that foundation is all in place and and just yeah, little things, just five minutes things, you're right, reminding everybody about that, those few breaths before you eat something is just absolutely huge. Yeah, makes a massive difference. Just to remind everybody that if we are super, super stressed, even if we are, and I think I touched on this earlier on actually, it doesn't matter what we do, like healthy-wise, it's we're not gonna reap the benefits from it if we are like if that uh stress is pumping around our body.

Community Invite And Closing

SPEAKER_00 34:06

Yeah, absolutely. Well said. Thanks very much. Okay, quite like this, quite like these subjects. Okay, well, again, if you've got anything to say about this subject, please come into the far too fabulous Facebook group. Otherwise, we will see you on the next episode. Have a peaceful week.

SPEAKER_02 34:27

Thank you so much for joining us today. We love creating this for you. We'll be back next week with another great episode.

SPEAKER_00 34:33

Until then, we'd be beyond grateful if you'd subscribe to the podcast and leave us a glowing review. If you've already done this, thank you so much.

SPEAKER_02 34:41

Please do share the podcast with friends and family. You never know which tiny piece of information could be life-changing for someone you care about.

SPEAKER_00 34:49

We absolutely love hearing from you. So connect, comment, or message us on our social media channels.

SPEAKER_02 34:54

You'll find all the links in the show. And if you haven't already, come and join us in our free Facebook group where we continue the conversation and you get to connect with like minded women. We'd love to welcome you in. Until next time, stay fabulous!