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224: What if burnout isn’t about work, but what Mom & Dad taught your nervous system?
What if burnout is more about your Mum & Dad, than your workload or type?
In this episode, we explore:
- The overlooked link between your early experiences of responsibility and your current work patterns — especially burnout, over-functioning, and decision paralysis.
- How common parenting styles shape your nervous system’s relationship to responsibility and leadership.
- Why your body might freeze, collapse, or push harder when you’re trying to make your next big move — and why that’s not a mindset problem, it’s a somatic pattern.
You’ll learn:
- A breakdown of the 4 parenting styles (Authoritarian, Authoritative, Permissive, Neglectful) and how each one shows up in your work habits today.
- The Polyvagal Theory lens on how your system learned to either brace, bypass, numb out, or stay steady with responsibility.
- How to notice when you’re being authoritarian, permissive, or neglectful with yourself — especially when making decisions, leading a team, or running your business.
- What it means to become authoritative with yourself — holding standards with warmth, ambition with boundaries — so you can build capacity, not just force productivity.
Next Listen: 199: When Burnout Isn’t Just Stress: VAs, OBMs, Your Nervous System, Delegation, Capacity & Control
Further Reading & Sources
*This framework draws on established research and therapeutic models, including Baumrind’s foundational work on parenting styles (1967, 1971), Maccoby & Martin’s expansion of that typology (1983), and Steinberg’s studies on the outcomes of authoritative parenting (1992). It’s also informed by Polyvagal Theory (Stephen Porges), The Body Keeps the Score (Bessel van der Kolk), Focusing (Eugene Gendlin), Hold Me Tight (Sue Johnson on adult attachment), and Trauma and the Body (Pat Ogden on sensorimotor psychotherapy).
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“I’m ready for something else... but I don’t know what that is.”
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Book - Somatic Intelligence for Success
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Published on 1 month, 2 weeks ago