Avery – 00:01

Our guest today said that she liked doing homework growing up.

Which, I mean, I think all high achievers enjoy learning at some point, but as a high achiever myself I cannot relate to enjoying doing homework.

I don’t think I like to be told what I’m supposed to be learning.

I really like to choose that.

But anyway, she is a really interesting person.

She has over 28 years of corporate leadership experience.

She brings a fresh perspective to mainstream leadership, which is what I really enjoy, and really wants to dedicate herself to fostering environments where individuals thrive.

Avery – 00:41

She is also the author of an Amazon bestselling book, Two of them, actually, including one that’s called the EVOLVE, the Path to Trauma Informed Leadership, and she’s been featured on ABC and NBC.

She has driven significant changes across departments from sales to marketing, reimbursement and customer service, and she’s a certified Dare to Lead facilitator.

Carolyn Swora is kind of a big deal and I’m very excited for her to talk to us about her burnout story so that we can also notice some of the red flags ahead of time.

Hi, I’m Avery Thatcher, a former ICU nurse and this is not your standard stress management podcast where we just focus on those band-aid solutions like the benefits of meditation, mindfulness and self-care.

You already know that you need some kind of recovery strategy to deal with your stressful life But what you may not know are all of the sneaky ways that society, our upbringing and our high achieving nature, and so many other factors contribute to our risk of burnout.

That, my friend, is what we talk about here on this podcast because you can’t do something about a situation that you’re not aware of, right?

So if you’re ready to get out of the pattern of burning out, feeling better, only to burn out again, it’s time for us to shut the light on the truth about burnout.

Avery – 02:06

Welcome, Carolyn.

I am excited to talk with you, especially because you said you like doing homework, which I am a high achiever.

And I just, when I read that, I was like, ew, ew.

Carolyn – 02:16

I love doing homework and I’m really happy to be on here and talking with you, Avery.

Avery – 02:22

Sounds good.

Yeah.

So let’s, let’s talk about that then.

Cause we want to know, like, when did you first identify as a high achiever and what was it about homework that you enjoyed?

Carolyn – 02:34

Uh, you know, I, I loved school.

I can remember my first day of public school.

So I guess if we want to, and you know what, it probably goes back to kindergarten.

You know, that just reminded me, we had in our kindergarten class, uh, our teacher was, um, German and she gave the class a challenge.

Whoever could memorize The lines, I’m sure there were like four, I mean it was kindergarten, could play the role of Gretel in Hansel and Gretel and I went home that night, memorized everything, came back and got the role of Gretel and my best friend at the time was really mad because she wanted to

be Gretel and she had to be a tree.

So I think that’s probably where we could trace it back, but I loved my first day of school.

Carolyn – 03:22

I still remember it and I love doing spelling.

I still remember how exciting it was to come home and do spelling and even like math exercises.

Avery – 03:34

So it sounds like you have a very analytical brain.

Carolyn – 03:38

You know what, if my husband heard that he would laugh out loud.

You know what, I have a thirst to learn for sure, but I’d say it’s probably more of an emotional brain and I just love to learn new things.

I think probably some early signs of like a hyperactive brain maybe, always looking for the next thing.

Avery – 04:03

Hmm, yes.

So fast forward a little bit and tell us how did that play out in your professional life?

Carolyn – 04:08

Yeah, well, I do want to point out I wasn’t somebody in high school for, like, I didn’t even get 80% in high school.

I went to university, I’ve got four degrees, but I wouldn’t say it manifested into a real academic-like career.

But how did that play out in my professional life?

Can we just back that up a second?

Four degrees.

Tell us what they are.

I’d like another one too.

Carolyn – 04:37

I got a Bachelor of Kinesiology first, that was my undergrad, and then I went to Teachers College, got a Bachelor of Education for teaching high school, and then I got a Human Resources Management Certificate, so a diploma, and then I got a Masters of Industrial and Organizational Psychology.

Avery – 04:59

Fascinating.

Carolyn – 05:01

Yeah.

Avery – 05:01

Oh, I love that.

And so what is your next degree going to be in?

Carolyn – 05:04

It’ll be a PhD in something.

I’m not I’m not sure.

But you know, the amount of time and dedication it takes for that.

I’m going to wait till there’s a bit more space in my life to do that.

But along the way, there’s been a lot of certifications and such like, I just I just love to learn new things.

Avery – 05:23

Beautiful.

Okay, let’s go back into then your professional life and how this is kind of played out and all of the path leading up to Dr. Carolyn Swora.

Carolyn – 05:34

Well, it’s not doctor.

Yeah.

Oh, that’s right.

Future doctor.

Avery – 05:37

Future doctor, yes, leading up to.

Carolyn – 05:39

That’s funny.

I’ve never been shy about trying new things, let’s put it that way.

And I found myself at a crossroads a few times thinking like, what do I do?

So after I graduated from Teachers College, I didn’t want to do it.

And that’s what put me into HR.

And you know, the funny thing is that HR degree or diploma, I never worked in HR, never once.

I did interview and potentially would have gone down that path, but I kept having opportunities put in front of me like, hey Carolyn, do you want to try this?

Carolyn – 06:18

Do you want to try this?

And that’s really kind of how I followed my career was who am I working with?

Not what am I doing?

And that’s pretty much defined everything up until 2016 when I left my big corporate role in big pharma.

How did all this play out in your personal life as well?

I’d say confident demeanor.

I have a very strong belief in myself and that I will figure stuff out and I’ll get it done.

Carolyn – 07:06

And again, I’ll come back to I feel like I can get through anything and do anything as long as the people or community I’m with works well together.

And that’s always really been my superpower.

You know, one career path that I didn’t take was I was going to become a professional coach.

So, I chose to do Teachers College instead of getting my masters in coaching, like athletic coaching, I would have gone to the Olympics as a coach.

But really my performance when you think about it on a court, on a field, is sort of similar to like in a business environment.

And so I think that’s really how it all translated is how can you know stuff, but also bring everyone together so that you can accomplish things, whatever that might be.

Avery – 07:57

So this all sounds beautiful.

So how did Burnout weave its way into all of this?

Carolyn – 08:02

Yeah, that’s a good question.

I just, yeah.

You know, some very unfortunate circumstances showed up when I was 31 years old.

And, you know, at that point I was, you know, I was going to have a big career.

I wanted to go global in this pharma company and I was pregnant with our first child.

And my husband at the time received a diagnosis, a pretty life-threatening terminal illness of stage four kidney cancer.

And that turned things around for me pretty fast.

Carolyn – 08:37

It was a big eye-opener and so I can’t say I slowed down my ambition if I’m being honest.

I think I kind of fooled myself into thinking I slowed down my ambition or at least I tried to make more space to do more.

So the ambition and overachieving I think just amped up.

It just went into like a higher level because now I had this really unfortunate situation with my husband and we had a baby on the way and I had these career goals.

Avery – 09:13

Absolutely so we often talk about how hindsight’s a jerk because looking back on it now you’re like well there they were.

So if you could go back and tell that version of yourself one thing that they would actually receive what would you tell them?

Carolyn – 09:33

Probably would have gone back to the Grade 1 Carolyn or the Kindergarten Carolyn.

And I would have said he didn’t really want to be Gretel in the play.

So don’t go home and memorize those lines.

Do what you want.

I think that’s what I would have gone back to say, um, because by the time, you know, Paul was diagnosed, it was already deeply, deeply ingrained into me that there was no room for, there is no room for crying.

There was no room for this not working out.

It was just like, well, Carolyn, you’ve done it before.

Carolyn – 10:13

You’ll do it again here.

And this really sucks.

So buck you know, buck up buttercup.

Avery – 10:20

I just want to, that gave me chills and like brought tears to my eyes, just that thought about you doing what you want, not what you think you should, and just how that really played out for you.

Thank you so much for sharing that.

That was so powerful.

Carolyn – 10:38

Yeah, thank you.

Well, until you said that I hadn’t really thought of it, just didn’t know how to stop.

I didn’t know how to slow down.

Multiple speakers – 10:49

So did burnout force you to slow down or did it do something else?

Carolyn – 10:54

Well, it did.

It forced me to slow down, but it took four years.

So by the time like my husband was diagnosed in 2003, my official burnout didn’t happen until 2007. And by that time I had two baby like two kids.

And Paul was still in his battle with cancer and it was progressing but it hadn’t hit a devastating point yet.

By that point he was still pretty functional.

So I kind of like to say it’s like his illness gave me time to get better because we knew the inevitable was going to happen sooner than later.

I needed to get better before he left us and that’s what happened so I did have my burnout in 2007. Do you want me to tell you what actually stopped me?

Carolyn – 11:50

What was the first thing that made me leave work?

Two things, because I couldn’t listen to myself.

My body shut me down where I actually had trouble walking.

I couldn’t move my body properly.

And the second one was a really good friend who happened to be a previous manager and she took me out for lunch.

And what she didn’t know was that I was going out with her Basically to get permission to leave work for a little while.

I needed somebody to give me permission.

Carolyn – 12:25

And what I didn’t know from her perspective was that my mom and her or she had been, I don’t know the English, the grammar part there, but she and my mom had already been in connection.

And my mom thought that maybe, you know, Carol could talk some sense into me.

And so we were, I don’t know, five, ten minutes into the lunch and she just said, you know, it’s okay.

And I just started to cry.

It’s okay to take time off type thing.

In fact, you need to.

So I probably would have kept trying to keep going, but the body and really good people around me helped me see what was going on.

Avery – 13:08

So take me back to that moment though where she gave you permission to feel all that you needed to feel and to slow down and to maybe leave work and what did that feel like?

Carolyn – 13:20

It was a huge relief.

It was a huge relief.

And so the thing was, it was a huge relief and I allowed somebody.

It’s like until that point, I would not have allowed anybody else to tell me any different.

So it was like there was a wall around me and I wasn’t doing it to be a jerk.

I wasn’t doing it to try and brag.

It was survival.

Carolyn – 13:45

It was all I knew.

Because my mom had tried to talk some sense into me as well and I just, I couldn’t hear it.

I was like, what do you mean I don’t know what’s going on?

I know everything that’s going on around me.

So it was a relief.

It was also really hard.

It was really hard because I thought could have done better.

Carolyn – 14:07

I thought I was weak.

And I mean, I look back on it now and I think, oh my gosh, what’s weak about any of that?

Like it’s carrying the world on my shoulders.

Avery – 14:17

Of course.

But this is some of the narrative that society feeds into us that if we burn out, it’s our failure, our lack of ability to take care of ourselves.

It’s nothing to do with all of this water rushing into our boat.

It’s that we couldn’t bail ourselves out fast enough.

Exactly.

Carolyn – 14:34

Exactly.

Avery – 14:36

So we also talk about here how our red flags are sometimes hard to see because they’re pointed at us and we only see the skinny side of the flag.

That’s a good way to say it.

Yeah, I never thought of it that way.

And this is where people in your life can actually see the red flags because they’re standing to the other side of you.

They can see more of that flag.

So what do you think all of those people were noticing that you couldn’t see for yourself?

Carolyn – 15:01

Oh, there were so many things.

I mean, I was carrying this big career.

I had two, I had two promotions too while Paul was like during his illness.

So like I didn’t stop the achieving at work either.

What were people noticing?

Probably pretty disconnected.

I probably had a very calm demeanor, but like not emotive, not emotive, like not too high, not too low.

Carolyn – 15:27

I’d lost like I didn’t call my friends the way I used to so I lost that sort of that sort of joy and I wouldn’t answer calls so I remember one friend she just she’s like I’m gonna keep calling you until you pick up this phone this was back in the day where we did have voicemail and we didn’t really

have text names I remember Yeah, and those were red flags.

I remember thinking it was just too much effort to pick up the phone and talk to somebody and thinking, oh, it’s nice, but they just don’t understand.

This is very isolating.

I felt like nobody could see me or hear me, even though everybody could.

Yeah, what other red flags would they have seen?

I couldn’t, I had to have a lot of, well, I shouldn’t say I had to have a lot.

Carolyn – 16:14

I don’t know if people could see this, but you know, like I had groceries delivered.

I felt like I couldn’t do enough around the house as well.

Like there’s the overachiever, like what time did I have for that?

I felt like I was being judged a lot.

Again, I don’t know if people could see that.

Maybe I was reactionary, I had some pretty quick reactions to things.

Perhaps, so not a lot of tolerance and always on the go, always on the go.

Carolyn – 16:43

You know, there was always things to go to.

I didn’t like being home for too long.

So the boys, I mean they were young, but we still had things to do and we’d go visit people and I just was always on the go.

Avery – 16:56

I think a lot of what you’re describing is really emotional burnout Like that might have been the primary driver.

And of course, we can experience all different, all the four different kinds of burnout at the same time.

But it seems like there was a lot of emotional burnout there for you.

Does that seem fair?

Carolyn – 17:14

Absolutely.

Absolutely.

I don’t think I was, I know I wasn’t dealing with any of the emotion.

In fact, there was a lot of emotion that was buried from previous years that had to do with my relationship with my dad.

And so, yeah, it really was carrying over.

And then Yeah, and then the whole part like not being able to walk, that was a short stint, it didn’t happen.

For very long and by the way it was after I decided I was going to run a 10k because it wasn’t enough going on.

Carolyn – 17:49

Yeah, so it was my body.

That was another piece as well.

Avery – 17:55

There.

So you said that something that helped bring you out of your burnout was emotional literacy.

Yeah.

So tell me how those are connected.

Carolyn – 18:06

Well, as part of my short-term disability plan at work, I was mandated to go see a therapist, which I thought was silly.

Of course I did, right?

And one of the first things he did was the stress inventory and you got points for the number of stressors in your life.

Yeah, I think like 90 indicated a lot of stress and I was well over 300. Like you can take any major stressor and it was going on in my life and he asked me he’s like what do you think about that?

I’ll never forget this and I looked at him and I thought inside my head I’m like well do you really want to know because I think everybody is just like weak asses like Come on, people.

And I just looked at them and I said, well, I don’t know, it’s not that big of a deal.

Like I can manage all of this.

Carolyn – 18:55

And that was the beginning of a really important element of my healing and getting better, which was, you know, cognitive behavioral therapy and learning to recognize some of these emotions.

Now, it opened the door for sure.

But I didn’t really entirely like I maybe step like two feet through into the door and it wasn’t it didn’t really continue because you know Shortly after that, well two years after that, Paul passed away and then there was just a lot more to get and then my dad passed away in there as well.

So I got myself into the door in that phase which helped with the emotional processing but it wasn’t until like years later that I was really able to start processing and identifying feelings and recognizing them and understanding that they show up in your body as physical manifestations as

well.

That I had no idea about until about a year ago.

Avery – 19:56

Do you feel open to sharing about what kind of brought that to light for you?

Carolyn – 20:05

What brought it to light was I took a few steps through that door back in 2007 to understand a little bit about emotions but in all honesty the survival mechanism is pretty strong and so I quickly I got better in about six months I went back to work after six months which gave me enough it brought

enough back into me brought me out of burnout enough to be able to Go through that last leg with Paul, which was, you know, another year and a half, almost two years.

And then, you know, carry on with the boys afterwards.

So what brought me to the most, the revelation about a year ago was probably like a burnout 1.5, 1.75. 1.5, 1.75. Kind of getting to another point in my life where I’m like what like what am I doing what’s going on and it really you know it came in the form of relationships with people in my family

the people that I love the most and I was just reactive and short and frustrated all the time and things weren’t going the right way and there was just there wasn’t a lot of joy and you know by this time I’m a trained certified Dare to Lead facilitator and so I’ve been doing this work around

vulnerability since 2019 and really, really started to turn it inward much more and deepened my work with it.

So that was a big driver, you know, kids, the boys were older and that was a big driver of this is looking at the reflection in them.

Carolyn – 21:36

I’m like, oh boy, what’s going on here?

Avery – 21:40

Hmm lots of really I don’t want to say great red flags because that’s kind of gives you the like yay feeling and it was not a yay feeling but still these are really helpful because I feel like so many other people that can relate to you and your personality and who you are can start to see some of

these traits in themselves yeah So go ahead.

Carolyn – 22:04

I was just the one other thing that came to mind is it became a game for me to see how much I could get done in one day.

And it was like a real high like, oh, look at that, I just squeezed that in.

And I was, I mean, I can juggle a lot, a whole lot.

Because before Paul passed away, if I go back several years, I also started a business, right?

So you can see this ridiculous overachieving.

It was more about not like not being able to sit still with my thoughts.

It was, it was pretty, it was pretty bad.

Carolyn – 22:42

And so that had started to really ramp up.

I just couldn’t get enough done.

And, and my kids and my husband, I got remarried, would never like never see me.

And I was doing more work and it was my own business.

But the fact was my relationships were suffering as a result.

They’re not getting the best of me.

I don’t know if it suffers a big word, but they weren’t getting the best of me.

Avery – 23:11

That’s it.

And so our high achiever really needs to be balanced across all different spheres of our life.

And I think that’s when we really feel in touch with that true high achiever, when we’re actually living our best life, not just having the dream career that everybody would see as being the best on paper.

So tell us a little bit about what you’re doing now and how you’re finding that balance between everything.

Carolyn – 23:40

Yeah, so what am I doing now?

I would say I’ve had my own business now for it’ll be eight years next year so seven and a half years and my business is around culture and leadership and where I’ve evolved that work to is working deeply with leaders.

And helping them create team environments that build on vulnerability and courage and also And learning that safety isn’t just a checklist, and yes, there’s psychological safety.

But how does our body wisdom, how does our nervous system show up in this?

So my work is definitely with leaders who want to go deep and want to deepen their self-awareness.

And for me, it’s just a way of paying it forward for the people who help me find it.

You know, I believe we need leaders in our organizations.

Carolyn – 24:45

I know they want the best for themselves and others, but I think there’s just so much push on, again, performance at all costs and performance, the best performance can come when you look after yourself first.

And so that’s where I’m choosing to do this work.

Avery – 25:02

That’s beautiful, Carolyn.

So can you tell us where people can find out more about you if they want to learn a little bit more about what you do and connect with you?

Carolyn – 25:10

Yeah, I’m at carolinsora.com and you can find all about my offerings there in corporate, work with leaders and teams specifically.

And yeah, anything that’s going on you’ll find there.

I’ve also got my own podcast, which you were a wonderful guest on.

Great episode on burnout.

Avery – 25:30

It’s a great conversation.

Carolyn – 25:31

Yeah, and I’ve got a book as well, so really trying to get ideas and resources to leaders who are looking for them.

And then you can find me on social, the two most active platforms are LinkedIn and Instagram and you can find me at carolinswora.com.

Avery – 25:50

Sounds wonderful.

And of course, we’re going to link to all of those things, including your book in the show notes.

Thank you.

So before I let you go, if the person listening right now gets only one thing from this episode, what do you want it to be?

Carolyn – 26:04

Life can be hard, but it doesn’t have to be.

And we can experience joy every day.

And if your life doesn’t have a lot of joy or you’re finding it really hard to find it, then there’s probably an opportunity to learn something about yourself that can help you unlock the door and find more joy.

Avery – 26:27

That was the perfect way to end it.

Oh, I love that.

Thank you.

All right, Carolyn, thank you so much again for sharing your vulnerability and your experiences here.

I know that they’re going to help other people.

So thank you.

Carolyn – 26:40

Well, thanks for thanks for doing this work, Avery.

I think, yeah, a lot of people need to hear they’re not alone in this.

So thank you for doing your work as well.

Avery – 26:51

Hey hey, do not press that skip button yet.

Yes, this is the end of the episode, but I still have something else I think you’re really gonna like.

I know, you’re already an expert at setting goals that push you out of your comfort zone.

Let’s be real, you’re a high achiever after all.

But how often do you sabotage yourself on the way to achieving those goals?

Perfectionism, procrasti-planning, over-committing, holding yourself to a double standard.

All of these things can sabotage our progress by either slowing it down or making it impossible for us to achieve our goals.

Avery – 27:24

Like we talk about so often on this podcast, awareness of what’s causing the issue is the first step.

So take that first step by going to thetruthaboutburnout.com slash quiz to take our free quiz to discover your self-sabotage style.

And of course, I won’t leave you stuck.

Once you complete the quiz and discover your primary self-sabotage style, I’ll follow up with an email giving you ideas about what to do about it so that it stops holding you back.

Go to thetruthaboutburnout.com slash quiz to get started.

That’s it for now, until next week.