Hiiii, welcome! I used to be the president of the “I’ll be happy once X happens” club!!

In this article, we’re going to cover how to stop putting off your happiness until you cross the next finish line, so you can start living (& enjoying) your life now instead of later. 

Sound like a plan?

Being achievement-oriented has gotten a bad rap in the personal development world over the last couple of years.

As we start critically examining the patriarchy and how it’s shaped our everyday lives, working, doing, and hustling are demonized.

Our culture tends to look at things through an all-or-nothing lens. So while there’s been a more significant focus on slowness, mindful living, and being (instead of doing), it’s also made people think that hustling or achieving is no bueno.

That’s not exactly true.

The point isn’t that you should give up your dreams, never set a goal again, and commit to being a couch potato, because GOD FORBID you work hard on something.

It’s about untangling achievements with your identity and sense of self. Because for a lot of us, achievement became less about what we do and more about who we are.

What you accomplish isn’t meant to define you. 

What it IS supposed to do, is give you healthy goals to strive for because you like them, it’s an enjoyable way to spend your time, and achieving them is an added bonus.

If you feel exhausted by your goals and what it takes to achieve them, it’s time to examine your relationship with achievement.

Things to consider:

1. Why do you want what you want?

I’ll give you a hint — the only reason we do or don’t do anything comes back to emotions.

For example, if you want to hit 10k followers on Instagram, have 100k in your bank account, or quit your full-time job, your desire has little to do with achieving those things, and everything to do with how you think achieving those things will make you feel.

So the better question is, how do you want to feel? 

Another consideration: what do you feel currently that you no longer want to feel?

If you crave safety and security by having 100k in your savings account, you most likely feel the opposite way now — maybe looking at your finances makes you feel unsafe, unsupported, or ungrounded.

An enlightening starting place is to identify how you feel, what you hope the next box checked will help you feel instead, and what you think prevents you from feeling that way now.

Another thing to get honest about: do you want this for you? Or because you want to manipulate how others see you?

Many people have a subconscious belief that achievement is what gains respect, love, admiration, and belonging (and that we aren’t good enough as-is).

We become invested in having what we want so that others will perceive us in a certain way.

Our egos love that, because it thinks we’re creating a buffer around rejection and disappointment — in reality, it’s not true.

Think about your goals and the things you want to achieve. Let’s say you are guaranteed to get what you want, but there’s a catch – you’d never be able to tell anyone about it. Not a soul. Ever.

Would you still want it? Would it still be important to you if it was all grind and no glory?

2. Circumstances won’t change how you feel

Is it easier to be happy when you have the house of your dreams, a doting and loving partner, money in the bank, and a snatched body?

Do those circumstances naturally produce better feelings than living in a cramped apartment with a roommate you hate because they never put their dishes away, going on your 7th failed hinge date this month, an empty bank account, and unwanted chin hairs? 

Maybe.

But what’s also true is that your brain has consistent beliefs about the world.

If your subconscious belief is “the next [goal I hit] will FINALLY make me feel [the emotion I want],” you will carry that with you everywhere. 

If you change your circumstances without changing your beliefs, your feelings won’t change either.

They might temporarily, but when the high of getting what you want wears off, it’s back to “well.. what’s next?”

It’s why people who thought getting rich and famous was the key to everything get what they want and still feel lonely.

It’s why women can lose 40 pounds and have their dream body, but still don’t feel good enough.

The only way to have the feelings you want later is to create them now (I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I don’t make the rules!).

What’s ONE thing you can do today to create your desired feeling? If you want to feel safe with money, what’s an action you can start and complete today to make that happen?

Is it transferring $5 to savings? Is it opening a high-yield savings account? Is it keeping $100 in cash in your wallet?

Maybe it’s not about money, and you want to feel safe by snuggling up on the couch with your favorite blanket and watching your favorite show for the 100th time.

The feeling of safety is the same no matter how you trigger it, so whatever makes you feel safe, do it! 

And at the risk of you wanting to slap me through the screen, my best advice is…

3. Fall in love with the process

I KNOW it’s cliche, but it’s a cliche for a reason. 

(Warning: tough love reality check incoming)

If you keep happiness locked away in the next box you check, you will spend 95% of your time hating where you are and 5% riding the high of whatever achievement you hit.

And that’s how you’ll spend your life until one day you wake up and realize you spent all of your life waiting to live instead of actually living.

Yikes, right?

I spent 25 of my years living that way. I’m so thankful I’ve changed my perspective, but I also kick myself for letting my ego call the shots for that long.

Today is all we have. So get out there and do something with your time that makes you feel alive.

You don’t have to stop dreaming, and you don’t have to stop achieving. But stop making that all you do.

Make the process as fun as the goal, so that when you finish, it’s just the cherry on top. Because you know that you lived, learned, and had a ton of fun along the way. Because that’s what it’s all about, anyway!

That doesn’t mean the journey is always easy — toxic positivity is never the goal.

It only means you stay present and commit to making the process as good (and hopefully better!) than the outcome.

It was yet another trendy buzzword bandwagon that I wasn’t keen to jump on — I blame it on being an Enneagram 4.

But one day, it hit me like a freight train, and I thought “Oooooooh…. THIS is what people mean when they talk about reparenting! I get it!”

My big ah-ha! moment is what I’m going to share with you now –  what reparenting is, why you might want to explore it in the first place, and a couple of tangible practices to get you started!

Okay so — what is reparenting, anyway?

The short answer is that reparenting is providing yourself with the emotional support that you lacked as a child from your caregivers.

For the long and juicy answer, we have to start at the source: parenting styles.

A movement that’s growing in recent years is conscious parenting. This parenting style focuses on teaching children how to learn and grow as individuals rather than obeying adults, following rules, and behaving. 

Parenting has shifted to teaching children how to identify, feel, and regulate emotions instead of invalidating them.

Disclaimer: I’m not a parent, but these are my observations of the parenting world.

As a society, we are finally discussing mental health openly. We now recognize that unhealed trauma can cause harmful behavioral patterns, which can unconsciously be passed down from parents to children through multiple generations *generational trauma has entered the chat.*

Unfortunately, emotional intelligence and conscious parenting styles weren’t mainstream in the ’80s and ’90s, so millennials didn’t typically experience this type of parenting from our caregivers *womp womp*

I don’t know about you, but my emotional experience was frequently invalidated — as a sensitive person I was often labeled “too much” or “dramatic.”

I learned that my emotions made people uncomfortable and that they were problems that needed to be solved. As a result, I didn’t learn how to effectively validate or regulate my emotional experiences.

This became a breeding ground for low-self esteem, negative self-talk, and severe nervous system dysregulation. 

The relationships you form with your caregivers and interactions with them deeply influence how you develop. Maybe you had an over-critical parent that harshly ridiculed you when you got a C in math class, made unhelpful observations about your appearance or weight, or was emotionally cold towards you when you were upset and needed comforting.

Humans are observational learners. The behaviors we see others engage in are often the ones we adopt for ourselves.

If your caregivers were critical of you, that likely became how you talk to yourself.

If your caregivers didn’t model how to soothe and support you, you didn’t learn how to soothe and support yourself.

Reparenting is the process of teaching yourself that as an adult. It’s giving yourself everything you needed as a child but didn’t get.

How to reparent yourself

Step 1. Identify what you need  

You might not know your needs if you’re not used to comforting yourself. Meeting your needs is a muscle you build over time, so if it feels confusing right now, that’s okay. Here are some ideas for how to gain insight:

Look to the past 

Think back to a specific moment in childhood when you felt you weren’t adequately supported; what did you need instead?

Maybe your mom forgot about your dance recital and never said sorry, you got accused of lying about breaking a vase when you didn’t, or you fought with your sibling, and your parents took their side instead of yours.

What would you do if you could go back in time and play the role of your caregiver(s) in that specific moment?

How would you talk to yourself? What did you need to hear? How would you have wanted them to respond to make you feel better?  

Look in the present 

You can also think about situations that have happened recently. Maybe you got passed over for a promotion at work, a long-term client in your business decided not to resign, or you fought with your partner about dishes (again).

If you were venting to your best friend, how would you want them to show up for you? What would you wish they would say? 

You can also flip it — If any of those things happened to your best friend and they were venting to you, what would you tell them? 

Thinking about how you would like others to show up for you, or how you would naturally show up for others in a similar position, can bring a lot of ideas of how you can show up for yourself.

Knowing your love language and how you prefer to give and receive love can also show you how to meet your emotional needs.

2. Bring awareness to your self-talk

How do you respond when you have big feelings? What are your thoughts and feelings about the emotional experience you’re having?

Do you allow your emotions, or do you tell yourself that you shouldn’t have them? 

When you make a mistake, do you kick yourself, think about how stupid you were, and overthink what you’d change if you could go back in time?

These are perfect opportunities to practice reparenting. Instead of playing the role of the overly critical parent, decide how YOU want to talk to yourself at that moment.

What would feel good? What would feel like you’re being wrapped up in a warm hug?

For me, a thought I like to practice is “It’s okay that you feel this way,” or even “Of course you feel this way; this is a sucky situation.” Before I go into problem-solving mode or resolution, I make sure my inner child knows she’s safe. She’s not only allowed to have big emotions but they’re welcomed.

Decide intentionally (and in advance) how you want to support yourself through tough or big emotions and what you can do to build trust with yourself.

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Reparenting can feel awkward and clunky at first, just like any new skill. Be patient and stick with it! Over time, you will be able to easily calm your own nervous system, speak kindly to yourself, and build self-trust. When you have your own back (no matter what) and can depend on yourself to carry you through the hard stuff, life feels more manageable. 

The problem is that you are using goal-setting techniques that aren’t effective for you and then blame yourself when they fail.

It’s like trying to cut wood with a rusty, dull axe and then blaming your skills when it doesn’t work. In this blog post, I will teach you why your metaphorical goal-setting axe isn’t working, and I’ll share my all-time favorite (albeit a little unconventional) goal-setting technique!

Here are the reasons what you’re doing is missing the mark:

Reason #1: Arbitrary timelines

People often unconsciously use goals as a means to control and predict outcomes. Translation: you’re using goals as a way to cope with the uncertainty of life and to pressure certain things to happen within arbitrary timelines.

If you’re striving to lose 20 pounds in six months, does it really matter if it takes eight? Or 12? Or is the timeline a way to manage feeling uncomfortable when you look in the mirror?

Do you really need to be a millionaire by thirty-five, or is it a way for you to feel safe with money because you don’t right now? 

When goals are set this way, they become more of an escape plan than a helpful guidepost.

What would it look like if you completely let go of a timeline? I know, goals without timelines might seem taboo.

Traditional goal-setting advice recommends using SMART goals, which are specific, measurable, actionable, realistic, and time-bound. There’s nothing wrong with that approach and some people love them, but if you’re reading this article, I’m guessing that method hasn’t worked for you.

Getting too specific, too measurable, and too time-oriented can create rigidity. This causes you to feel suffocated by your goal instead of inspired by it, leading to disappointment if you don’t meet it perfectly.

Reason #2: Types of goals you’re setting

You can set two types of goals: process goals and outcome goals. A process goal is deciding to go to the gym three days per week. An outcome goal is setting a specific number of pounds you want to lose or an amount of weight you want to squat.

A money-related process goal is to put money in your savings account every time you get paid. An outcome goal would be to have an extra $5,000 in your bank account by the end of the year.

Theoretically, if you hit your process goal, you will likely achieve your outcome goal. So if you focus on outcome goals but neglect process goals, you fixate on what you want rather than what it takes to get there.

Reason #3: Assuming what is necessary

Let’s say you want to quit your job and go full-time in your online business. You might have a list of things or actions you need to take to make that dream a reality. Let’s say you need to create a website, post regularly on social media, advertise, get more clients, save a certain amount of money, etc.

How many things on that list will move the needle forward? What is genuinely necessary vs. what you think is necessary based on your perceptions or what others tell you?

If you enjoy the process, you are 83.6% more likely to reach your goals if you enjoy what you’re doing (yes, I made that statistic up). But think about it – do you want to hit a goal by muscling through things you wish you didn’t have to do or by doing what you enjoy? What do you think is going to be easier to stick with and will be more likely to produce the results you want? 

If you brain dump a list of what you think is necessary to achieve your goals, look down, and think, “YEAH, NO, I don’t feel like doing that,” get creative! What else could you do to achieve your goal that doesn’t include those things? Ask yourself what would be FUN!

There’s more than one way to get to 9. You can add 8+1, subtract 11-2, and multiply 3*3; few of many options. Where are you telling yourself the only way to get to 9 is 6+3? Find your flavor of how you want to get there.

Note: If no ideas you come up with sound fun, re-assess the goal. For example, if you want to run a marathon but every physical conditioning exercise you think of sounds awful, running a marathon might not be the best goal for you. If you are going to hate every moment of the process for a few brief moments of accomplishment, what’s the point?

My favorite (unconventional) goal-setting technique

As someone who often set goals I didn’t achieve, I knew I had to devise a better way. This approach releases timelines, creates opportunities for fun and flexibility, and focuses on outcomes through processes.

Step 1. Decide what area(s) of your life you want to set goals in.

Many of my clients’ goals boil down to improving relationships, finances, health, careers, or overall happiness. If you struggle with consistency and maintaining your habits, I’d recommend starting with just one goal and then working from there.

What area of your life would you most like to improve? What feels the most important to address first?

Step 2. Choose your goal

This approach differs from SMART goals because your goal can be vague. In fact, it should be! Let’s take health, for example. Your goal could be “improve health.” It could be “improve body image,” or “get stronger,” or “clear up my skin.” Whatever feels good for you!

Step 3. Formulate your goals into a question

Whatever you have identified in step 2, plug it into the question, “what’s something fun I could do today to support _________?”

• What’s something fun I could do today to support my health?
• What’s something fun I could do today to support my body image?
• What’s something fun I could do today to support my strength?
• What’s something fun I could do today to support my skin?

Whatever your question is, answer it! Brain dump everything you could do that would feel fun and would support your goal. If it feels fun but doesn’t support the goal, it’s out. If it supports the goal but doesn’t feel fun, it’s definitely out. Now, you have a list to work from.

Ask yourself this question daily, choose something off your list, and do it. It could be fun to do the same thing every day (or if you’re like me) you might get bored quickly and switch it up often. It doesn’t matter! As long as you’re supporting your goal and having fun.

That’s it :) Rinse and repeat!

Another option: ditch goals altogether

If this method doesn’t pique your interest or the information in this post didn’t spur any new ideas, consider taking a break from setting goals, period. *Gasp.* While goals help guide you in your pursuits, they are not the only way to be successful.

When we think of someone who doesn’t have goals, it’s usually with a negative connotation – *cue the image of someone unemployed, ripping bongs, and eating Oreos on the couch all day.* But the belief that you need goals to be successful is just that – a belief. Which means you can choose a new belief. Goal setting is a tool that should be used to help you, but it’s not a code of conduct to live by. If it doesn’t feel helpful for you in this season, drop it all together (without guilt!).

Instead, focus on living. Breathing. Being. Spend time on things that you enjoy and make you happy. When you follow that energy, achieving your goals becomes a natural byproduct instead of something you are pushing and forcing.

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Happy goal setting!

There are five reasons you might look at your life and think “I should feel happier — what gives?”

1. You aren’t honest about what you truly want

Is the life you have the one you genuinely want? Or does society tell you that you should want it? For example, society tells us we should chase money, success, status, and power. And if you’re a woman, we’re told we should chase relationships, families and motherhood, and a house in the suburbs.

Consider these questions: did you build your life by following your intuition and desires? Or did you build your life by doing what you thought you should do? In a perfect world, what would your life look like? Does it look like the life you have now, or something different?

If your answer is “I don’t know,” that’s okay. But check in with yourself to see if “I don’t know” is your knee-jerk reaction because you do know what you want and you’re afraid of disrupting your current life to go after it.

Other times, this question is difficult to answer because we’ve been doing what we should do for so long, our true desires become muffled. It’s kind of like if you stop going to the gym, your muscles shrink over time. If you don’t often tune into your desires, you get out of practice.

Can you remember a time where you desired something and followed the spark? What did that feel like? Once you’ve identified that feeling, start looking for things that make you feel that way!

2. You don’t prioritize pleasure and joy

Is making time to enjoy your life the last thing on your to-do list every day? If so, you’re not alone. It’s so easy to get caught up in the demands of life that taking time for yourself gets pushed to the back burner.

What activities make you feel excited to be alive? Maybe it’s reading romance novels, going on long walks, or dancing to your favorite songs. Whatever activities you love, start building them into your daily routine just like you would pencil in cleaning your toilets or going grocery shopping. Having fun is just as important (if not more) than your have-to-do’s.

Joy isn’t something that’s “nice to have,” it’s a necessity for a happy and fulfilled life. Don’t be afraid to prioritize it through rest, hobbies, traveling, or anything else that you get enjoyment from.

3. You’re overly focused on what you don’t have

It’s a tale as old as time – the grass is greener on the other side. It’s a lot easier for us to put off our happiness by thinking it’s something we can achieve later than it is to commit to creating happiness for ourselves now.

Perfectionism is a contributing factor to this because many of us subconsciously believe that happiness is attained when we have arrived at our dream life. That’s a sneaky way to say “I will be happy once things are perfect.” This leads us to hyper-focusing on the things that are missing from our lives.

What would it look like if you started to appreciate the things that you have right now? What’s the last thing that made you feel genuine appreciation and gratitude? How did that emotion feel in your body? What are things in your current reality that make you feel that same way?

When you identify what naturally elicits appreciation and gratitude, it makes it easier to go out of your way to notice those feelings when they’re happening. Over time, your brain will gravitate towards this instead of focusing on lack. No gratitude journaling required!

4. You subconsciously choose safety over growth

The brain’s job is to keep you safe and alive. And while that’s helpful because you can’t live your best life if you’re dead, safety is often in direct opposition with you crushing your goals.

Most things in life that are worthwhile doing require some sort of emotional risk. To your primal, safety-loving brain, that is the equivalent of diving straight into a shark feeding frenzy.

When in reality, you’re being put on the spot as you interview for your dream job, turning your candle-making hobby into a business, or challenging yourself to work out and eat healthier.

Your brain will give you excuses like “this isn’t the right time for this,” or “this won’t work,” to keep you away from that emotional exposure or discomfort. If you don’t intentionally question and shift those thoughts, you will make decisions that support safety, not growth.

Sure, maybe you’ll fail and it won’t work. 

 If you don’t like a thought your brain is giving you, meaning it makes you feel like crap or it stops you from doing what you truly want, question it and choose a new thought.

What else could be true? Could everything work out in your favor? Is it possible things could be challenging but you’ll still put in the work and reach your dream? Could you  “fail” but get directed to something even better?

Those are possible outcomes, too. Our brains usually like to project our fears and convince us our worst-case scenarios are what will most likely happen – don’t let it!

5. Your inner critic steals the show

Most women I’ve worked with in my life coaching practice have shameful or critical self-talk. This typically stems from having a parent that was critical or shamed you for making mistakes.  

It can also stem from the voice of society, as women are often criticized no matter what they do. For example, if you wear make-up you’re trying too hard but if you don’t, you’re letting yourself go. Or if you are career-oriented you’re cold, but if you prioritize a romantic relationship you’re settling.

For my clients this shows up in everyday life as second-guessing their decisions, not allowing themselves to make mistakes, and setting impossibly high standards and shaming themselves when they don’t meet them.

It doesn’t matter what you have achieved or accomplished in your life, if your inner critic is in the driver’s seat, it makes you feel like nothing you do is good enough. It’s also a huge energy suck!

If your life doesn’t feel good, don’t panic! It doesn’t mean that there’s something wrong. It’s simply a sign that something is misaligned and needs attention. Tapping into your desires (and following them!), prioritizing joy, focusing on the good things you have, choosing growth opportunities, and creating kinder self-talk can all help you live your best life.

To eliminate overwhelm, people swear by productivity hacks, prioritization strategies, and making big tasks bite-sized. Don’t get me wrong, these can all be helpful – but they will treat the symptom of overwhelm, not the root cause. Let’s talk about a few other ways you can manage your overwhelm so you’re rocking your life and it’s not rocking you.

1. First thing first: welcome your overwhelm

I know this sounds counterintuitive, but hear me out! Usually, when we feel overwhelmed we see it as a problem. And as humans, when we experience a problem, the first thing we do is rush to fix it. Or worse, we blame ourselves for having the problem in the first place.

What if just for a moment, your overwhelm wasn’t a problem? What if it’s just something you’re experiencing because it’s a thing that happens when you’re a human on this earth?

Nothing has gone wrong. Take a big, slow, deep breath in through your nose, and exhale out of your mouth like you’re trying to fog up a mirror. I’m serious – pause and do it!

How can you feel your overwhelm and just be with it without trying to fix it or eliminate it? What message is the overwhelm trying to tell you?

2. How often are you saying yes when you mean no?

There are times when we say yes to things we don’t want to do because we like our reasons for doing so. For example, you might say yes to your best friend’s bar crawl bachelorette party because you want to support her even though bars and drinking aren’t really your vibe. 

Saying yes when you want to say no gets tricky when the reason you’re doing it is because you feel like you “have to” to avoid disappointing or upsetting other people. That creates a big energy leak in your life and creates a fast track to resentment and burn out.

Time is the most precious and valuable resource that you have. If you viewed your time and energy like gold, would you still hand it out so freely? 

3. Intentionally fill your plate

Is your metaphorical life plate full of nourishing foods you love to eat, but you’ve realized there’s simply too much of it and there’s no way you can eat it all? Or is it full of foods you don’t like that you’re forcing yourself to choke down?

When you’re overwhelmed because too many great things are happening, that is different than being overwhelmed because you don’t like the majority of things you spend your time on.

Do you like the way your life is set up? If you look at an average day, do you like it? Would you want to live that day for the rest of your life? If not, it might be time to re-assess how you spend your time and if that honors what’s important to you.

4. Change your perspective about your to-do list

The funny thing about to-do lists is that they never truly end. It’s like a CVS receipt, that baby goes on for miles.

If you base your success on whether or not you complete the items on your to-do list or how close you are to the end of it, you will be chronically overwhelmed. The end of a to-do list is a moving target.

What if the goal shifts from getting things done to enjoying what you’re doing?

This can be done by creating more space in your day for rest or joy and/or making the blah, routine parts of life more fun. Have to clean the house? Listen to your favorite music or podcast. Need to workout? Go for a walk in the sun. Need to pay bills? Eat your favorite snack while doing it.

While not everything will always be fun, there are ways where you can infuse more of it into the things you’re already doing.

5. Speaking of rest…

Rest has become a buzzword in the personal development world with everyone and their cat preaching how vital rest is. I don’t disagree.

But what I see happen with rest is that people “rest” with the purpose of being rejuvenated so they can be more productive. It makes rest a means to an end instead of what it actually is – something you experience for the sake of experiencing it.

You can’t pour from an empty cup, but you don’t have to fill your cup just so you can empty it again. You can fill it up just because you want it to be full.

A note on resting when you’re overwhelmed or not used to rest – it can be really difficult to let yourself relax. As odd as it sounds, resting is a skill. So if it feels bad at first and you’re preoccupied with everything you need to get done, that’s okay. You’re not doing it wrong. Your brain may naturally wander, but stay committed and bring yourself back to the present moment.

6. Phone a friend

As a feminine-essenced being, you are a natural receiver. When you don’t ask for help because you feel like you “should” be able to handle it all or it makes you a burden to others, your inner feminine doesn’t feel nourished because she loves to receive with gratitude. Don’t shun that part of yourself because you don’t feel worthy of support.

If you were honest with yourself, what would feel incredible to delegate to another person? What would feel like a huge sigh of relief if you didn’t have to do it anymore? Think about who might be able to help you with that and go have a conversation with them! We can’t make it through life without support systems. Don’t be afraid to lean on yours.

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Everyone feels overwhelmed by their to-do lists sometimes, and productivity and time management hacks can be really helpful. But if what you’re doing isn’t cutting it, it’s time to reflect on what your overwhelm is telling you about how you show up in your life and what (and who) you make yourself available for.

You’re not alone!

To understand why this happens, we have to dive into feminine and masculine energy.

Feminine and masculine energy is used to describe the energetic flow of the universe. Despite the names, this isn’t a gendered concept – it simply illustrates the balance of all living things (think Yin and Yang). 

Understanding masculine and feminine energy

Masculine energy is associated with doing, light, structure, rational, and analytical. Feminine energy is associated with being, dark, flexible, emotional, and intuitive. You can think of feminine energy as water and masculine energy as the container that shapes the water. 

For example, trees embody feminine energy in the spring when they are budding and regrowing their leaves (creation), and masculine energy when they ground themselves by rooting into the earth (grounding). There’s feminine energy in the way that their trunks sway in the wind so they don’t break (flexibility), and masculine energy in the strength of their branches (strength).

Masculine and feminine energy in people

For people specifically, we all have a balance of masculine energy and feminine energy that governs our physical organs and biological functions – much like the tree. But these energies also show up as specific energetic and behavioral qualities that shape our day to day interactions with ourselves and others.

Healthy feminine and masculine energy is also known as divine or sacred energy. This means it’s in its healthiest, most balanced form. The divine masculine energy and divine feminine ebb and flow together.

Divine feminine energy looks like being in touch with your emotions and intuition, owning your wants and desires, shamelessly following what brings your joy and pleasure, and graciously receiving help and support from others.

On the other hand, divine masculine energy is providing for others selflessly in a way that feels good to you and honors your boundaries, maintaining a healthy relationship with structures and routines, engaging in intellectual and analytical thought, feeling grounded in your life, and being assertive and confident.

However, sometimes these energies get out of whack. Our society values masculine energy and shuns the feminine. But when the scale tips too far into the realm of masculine energy without a splash of feminine energy to balance it out it becomes unhealthy, or wounded.

Wounded masculine is responsible for our society’s obsession with productivity, to-do lists, and getting as much done as possible. Wounded masculine energy is also characterized by aggression, wanting to force or control, and taking power from others.

Wounded feminine is feeling overly needy or dependent on others, repressing honest expression in favor of passive aggressiveness, or being manipulative towards others to get what you want.

When we are operating from these wounded paradigms, it makes it really hard to thrive. It can make it feel like something is always off but you can’t put your finger on what it is. It’s why we struggle to meaningfully create the lives we want.

Here are some common ways that wounded masculine and feminine energy show up in our day to day lives and what you can do to swing the pendulum back into balance.

Wounded masculine energy contributes to:

Obsession with results

Have you ever felt the pressure to reach your goals, achieve, and check boxes, but felt dread during the process? That’s our hyper-masculine society that prioritizes results over the process. We think that getting results is what will help us create feelings of success and happiness, but we completely ignore having fun on the way.

Feminine antidote: make the process fun

Smashing your goals is always fun, but what are you doing to practice enjoyment right now? If you knew you would get to your goal no matter what you did, how would you choose to get there? What sounds like the most fun? Then, do that!

Control

At the root of control is wanting to manipulate exact outcomes so we don’t have to deal with the discomfort of not having what we want. We think that if we can plan and meticulously set up all the dominos, then all we have to do is knock them over. It can also be a defense mechanism if we don’t trust ourselves to navigate and problem-solve in unexpected situations. 

Feminine antidote: surrender and self trust

If you need to have a sense of control over your life your are telling your subconscious “it has to be exactly this way and if it’s not I won’t be okay.” To soften this, practice the skill of surrendering – or accepting that you can’t perfectly bend your life to your will. This also requires self-trust that you can successfully navigate challenges no matter what happens.

Judgment

Judgment runs rampant in our society, and the thought “what will others think?” stops so many of us from pursuing the things we actually want. When we judge other people, we know what that feels like and we want to prevent other people from feeling that same way about us. When we become overly judgmental we limit our ability to connect with ourselves and others.

Feminine antidote: compassion

You can practice compassion in two ways – either towards yourself or others. The less you judge yourself, the less you judge others. The less you judge others, the less you judge yourself. Work on whichever feels easier and the other will follow too. Remember that there’s no one “right” way to do something or to be.

Perfectionism

When we don’t feel good enough, we turn to perfectionism. We think that if we can do enough (there’s that masculine doing again) then we will be loved, accepted, and we will finally feel worthy. Instead, this keeps us fixated on our not-enough-ness and only feeds the cycle of perfectionism.

Feminine antidote: practice being

You are worthy as you are just by existing.  Let go of the impossible standards you’re setting for yourself, you don’t need them! You do not need to do anything or achieve anything to be worthy, because you already are. Practice being instead of doing. Tip: consider what you would spend your time doing if you weren’t focused on achieving.

Wounded feminine energy contributes to:

Needing validation

Outsourcing validation looks like only feeling good when you’re getting compliments or words of affirmation from others. You feel really down on yourself and struggle to give yourself the validation you need, which can come across to others as needy.

Masculine antidote: confidence

When you are able to validate yourself, you clear up an energy leak because you’re not reliant on other people to make you feel good about yourself. When you practice validating yourself and building your own confidence you can create it whenever you want instead of waiting for others to create it for you.

Ignoring your own needs

Women are taught that our needs and desires don’t matter (thanks patriarchy), and we often end up self-sacrificing and ignoring our needs to satisfy others. It leaves us feeling small and unfulfilled. 

Masculine antidote: assertiveness

How can you create better boundaries, be more assertive, and stand up for what you want? How can you communicate to the people in your life that your enjoyment is a priority? What can you do to start embodying that?

Defensiveness

Do you have a habit of thinking you’re right and others are wrong? Do you struggle to take any kind of constructive feedback? Defensiveness comes up when we aren’t secure in ourselves and we don’t tolerate anything less than perfection. I struggled with this for a long time until my boyfriend pointed out how defensive I was to which I replied “no I’m not!”

Masculine antidote: security and grounding

How can you have your own back and be on your own team more? When someone is offering constructive feedback, it’s not an attack on your worth. It’s an observation about a thought or behavior. Stay grounded, view the comment with objectivity, and then decide if and how you want to receive it (from a non-defensive place).

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If you’re feeling like something is off in your life, think about the balance of your masculine and feminine energies. Are you in your masculine energy when you need to soften into feminine? Are you too far into your feminine and need to create some stability with masculine? Think about how you might be able to bring more awareness to how divine and wounded energies are showing up in your life.

When people say they want balance what they actually mean is they want to feel less stress and more peace. They want their life to be rich from their hobbies, career, relationships, family, and anything else that feels important to them.

However, this can lead us into a tailspin filled with more stress as we try to solve whatever we think is imbalanced in our lives.

In a technical sense, balance means creating equilibrium by weighing two things against one another.

This creates three unspoken assumptions when it comes to creating balance in your life:

1)  everything can and should be equal all the time

2) balance will give way to a lasting sense of ease and peace and

3) your priorities, physical and mental energy levels, and overall capacity are the same every day. 

In reality, perfect balance in this way doesn’t exist. If you think about balance as weighing two things against one another on a balance scale, perfect equilibrium is a delicate spot. It can very easily teeter to one side or the other.

When we strive for this kind of balance, it becomes really difficult to keep things at constant equilibrium and it can make us feel like we are chronically imbalanced. 

Enter the new kid on the block: harmony 

Harmony means the way you’re showing up in your life is aligned with your priorities, the energy that you have, and your immediate needs. Let’s talk more about each of these.

Your life is aligned with your priorities

We start to feel overwhelmed and burned out when we spend most of our time doing things that don’t align with our priorities. Our priorities are the areas of life that feel important to us to spend our time and energy on.

For example, one person may value being active and eating nutritious food, so physical health is an area of priority. Someone else may feel like their work betters the lives of their clients, so their career is an area of priority. Both of these priorities might even belong to the same person.

Other common priorities include romantic relationships, friendships, family, mental health, finances, passions and hobbies, finances, and spirituality.

Your life is aligned with your immediate needs

There are times when we “hustle” in one area of our life at the expense of other areas because there are urgent or time-sensitive needs to tend to. Maybe there’s a professional or personal project you’re working on, or you just made a big life change that needs more of your attention. Balance says that’s wrong because it’s well, out of balance. Harmony honors that different times of our lives have more immediate needs and there’s nothing wrong with shifting priorities (more on that below).

Your life is aligned with your energy

Each day we have a different level of physical and mental energy to give (this is especially true if you struggle with mental health issues or chronic health issues). When you bring awareness to these ebbs and flows and are more discerning about how you spend your time and energy, your life is more harmonious.

Harmony vs. Balance

If balance is like splitting a pie into two even halves, harmony is like slicing that pie into however many pieces you want at whatever size you want. For example, if “work-life balance” is 50/50, harmony is hobbies 20%, relationships and connection 30%, exercise and nutrition 15%, and work 35%.

The cool thing about harmony is that it doesn’t assume that each day looks the same. If you spend the entire day with your best friend, that day might turn into a day of 100% relationships and connection. That’s still harmony because it aligned with your priorities and immediate needs. But it’s not balanced in the greater sense.

Another example of harmony is in nature – think about a big oak tree during spring, summer, autumn, and winter. In the spring the tree is budding and regrowing, in summer its bright green leaves are creating energy, in autumn its conserving resources and its leaves are dying, and in winter its barren and without leaves.

If you looked at this tree over a week period in the dead of winter, would it look balanced? No, because it was only ever barren – you didn’t see evidence of buds or leaves.  But if you think about how the tree cycles across all seasons, it’s a harmonious phenomenon. 

Our priorities fluctuate like this throughout the seasons of our lives. Harmony is the idea that different seasons require different things from us and it asks us to surrender.

How to live more harmoniously

Assess your priorities 

Think about what areas feel like a priority in this season of life. What would an ideal day or week of focusing on those priority areas look like for you? When you think about your typical day or week right now, how closely does it align with that? Often we end up prioritizing what we think we should prioritize instead of what we actually want to prioritize (and then wonder why we are so burned out!)

Do this regularly when you feel things shifting and ask yourself what harmony would look like given what’s on your plate, what your energy looks like, and what’s important to you in this season.

Pay attention to your energy levels

A fast track to chronic overwhelm is by expecting yourself to perform at the same level of productivity every day. This is especially true if you are someone who menstruates because our hormones cycle monthly and with that, so does energy, cognitive function, and motivation.

Begin to honor your energy levels and ask yourself what your mind and body need from you. When you base decisions off of the answer to that question, life feels less like you’re fighting against the current and more like you’re being carried down the river effortlessly.

Stop expecting perfection

Things will become unharmonious or unbalanced at times – it’s a fact of life. It doesn’t mean that anything is wrong, nor does it mean that anything needs to be fixed. Notice it, ride out the wave, and see how you can recenter yourself (using the two tips above!)

Regulate your stress

Women often get into the trap of looking for balance because they are chronically stressed and frazzled. An easy thing to do is blame it on your life being unbalanced, but this mindset leads to even more stress as you attempt to find equilibrium.

You want peace, but you think the avenue to that peace is balance. It doesn’t have to be. Stress and nervous system management are key to feeling more peace without needing balance.

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Balance and harmony are two ways to think about finding more peace and fulfillment in life, but I find that harmony does a better job of accounting for how messy life can be. A system that requires perfect balance isn’t one that yields lasting results in the long term.

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You’re putting in hard work and it doesn’t seem to be working. What gives?

When you find yourself in a rut with your personal development, consider what energy you are bringing to your personal development efforts and how you measure changes.

How do you approach your personal development?

With a genuine desire to expand, grow, and become a better person because it sounds fun and interesting? Or do you think about all of the things that are wrong with you that need to be fixed and changed?

Do you hear both voices? Which voice is louder? Which one is calling the shots?

Is it the second voice saying how much you suck because you always get really defensive if a client or boss brings up a teensy tiny thing they’d like you to do differently or that your natural inclination is to pull back in relationships when they get serious?

This is a sneaky force that drives us to personal development work. We think if we can just, well, personally develop, we can get away from our crappy feelings and finally start to feel better about ourselves.

The reason your personal development isn’t working is that you’re not using it to grow, you’re using it as a way to escape the discomfort that comes from not being perfect.

When you approach personal development this way, you don’t feel better about yourself when you make changes – you only find more things to fix. It becomes a moving target you can never seem to hit.

You’ve misdiagnosed the problem.

It’s like deciding your plant is turning brown because you are under-watering it. Then when you give it more water and it doesn’t get better, you think you need to try harder instead of considering another possibility like it needs more sunlight, the soil is old, or the pot is too small.

Your plant watering skills are just fine. The reason the plant isn’t getting any better is that you’re solving the wrong problem without realizing it. You need to put down the watering can and pop that bad boy in the sun instead.

In terms of personal development, you think the problem is that you have flaws you need to fix. Your efforts to solve this problem don’t provide you with any relief because the actual problem is that you have a poor relationship with your flaws.

People subconsciously think personal development looks like this:

Step 1. Identify what needs to be fixed

Step 2. Fix it

But really it looks more like:

Step 1. Write down a list of things that you don’t like about yourself or your life (like the fact that you procrastinate everything until the last second, you tell other people yes when you mean to say no, or that you keep holding yourself back from your dreams because you’re scared).

Step 2. Don’t try to change any of those things yet.

Step 3. Start considering why you want to change them in the first place. How do they make you feel? What do you think it means about you that you struggle with those things? How do you think you would feel if you didn’t do those things anymore?

This is where the work is.

It’s more effective but harder because you have to be willing to give up on your pursuit of perfection. When you’re operating under the belief that perfection is what will create the feelings you’re looking for, it can be hard to divorce that belief.

If you don’t feel like your personal development is working, take a break from fixing and explore where you’re expecting yourself to be perfect and how it makes you feel when you’re not.

Do you acknowledge and celebrate your progress?

Most of us have difficulty noticing or fully celebrating how far we’ve come because it can be hard to see small, subtle changes over time, and our brains are not naturally wired to look at what we’ve accomplished.

When it comes to changes over time, it can be hard to remember where exactly we started. It’s not like a weight loss journey where you can look at your “before” and “after” pictures and see the difference.

Have you ever had a dull, nagging annoying pain somewhere? Maybe you smashed your finger or you have a bruise on your shin from running into a coffee table. The first day it was sore and tender, and then each day it felt better until you didn’t notice it anymore, right?

Most of the time we don’t wake up and think, “hey! My bruise is gone!” The physical pain subtly fades and as it does, it fades out of our consciousness too.

One way I like to mitigate this effect is by journaling. Journaling doesn’t bring me much catharsis or relief in the moment, but I love being able to look back on snapshots of what I was thinking and feeling so I can fully appreciate the difference between then and now.

Another reason it’s hard to see our accomplishments is because of the way our brains are naturally wired.

There’s no survival benefit to celebrating accomplishments so the brain doesn’t do it naturally. If you don’t find that your brain gravitates towards appreciating how far you’ve come, all that it means is that you’re not yet practiced at it.

You have to purposely go out of your way to find things to be excited about.

When you think about the personal development work you’ve done, is it really true that nothing has changed? And nothing is happening? Or do you just not believe anything has changed because you’re still not perfect and so it’s not good enough?

When you judge your progress by if you feel good enough (and then you don’t) you assume nothing is changing.

What is your threshold for an accomplishment that is “good enough” to celebrate? If you force your brain to come up with an answer to that question it sounds like “I don’t know what’s ‘good enough’ but it wasn’t that.”

There’s nothing wrong with the work you’re putting in, your measuring stick just needs to change.

If your brain wants to say your success was luck, a fluke, and you could have done it better, that’s only one way to look at it.

What else could be true?

Could you be proud of the way you showed up for yourself?

Could you celebrate a unique way you did something?

Did you ask for help when you were scared to?

Decide what you think is worth celebrating, not what society tells you is worth celebrating. Money, success, power, status, and material objects are all things we learn we “should”  be proud of. Effort, determination, and creativity don’t always make that list, but you can decide if you want them on yours.

At first, it’s hard. It will likely feel awkward, forced, and clunky. Any time you learn a new skill that your brain isn’t practiced at, it’s difficult. And when you’re worried about being perfect, if you feel bad at something you’d rather quit than experience the discomfort of getting better at it. Keep with it.

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It’s normal to get in a rut with your personal development, but if you find that it’s making you feel worse more than it makes you feel better, it’s time for a change! Try working on the relationship you have with the things you wish you could change about yourself instead of quickly jumping to fix them in hopes that’ll make you feel better. Recognizing how far you’ve come, and not just how far you have to go, can also help you gain some perspective.

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