Healthy Habits for Women in Business: How to Reduce Mental Load & Ask for Help Without Guilt with Sue Richards

Ever feel like you’re doing everything but still falling behind? Like your energy’s drained, your brain won’t switch off, and you're shouldering all the mental load alone? If asking for help feels like a weakness, and your healthy habits are nowhere to be seen, this episode is exactly what you need. 🌿

In this episode of The Remote CEO Life podcast, I’m joined by Sue Richards - coach, mentor, speaker and host of the PEP Talks podcast. She’s on a mission to help women in business manage their mental load, build healthy habits, and feel safe asking for help without guilt. We talk burnout, energy, motherhood and the pressures of being a female entrepreneur. It’s real, honest, and seriously needed.

Here’s what we discussed:

- How to reduce your mental load when you’re juggling motherhood and a business
- Why so many women in business resist asking for help and how to shift that mindset
- What healthy habits actually look like when you’re already overwhelmed
- How perfectionism, people pleasing and self-worth issues fuel burnout
- The connection between mental health, depression, and sustainable personal development

If you’re a woman in business constantly navigating mental load and wondering how to create more space for yourself, this is your sign to stop doing it all alone. Tune in to hear how building healthy habits and asking for help can change everything 💫

Follow Sue Richards on social media: Instagram

Check out Sue’s Website: suerichardscoaching.co.uk

#healthyhabits #mentalload #askingforhelp #womeninbusiness #mindfulness #mentalhealth #personaldevelopment #femaleentrepreneurs

Chapters

• 0:00 Introduction to Burnout and Its Impact
• 9:48 Recognizing the Signs of Burnout
• 19:25 Strategies for Preventing Burnout
• 28:45 The Importance of Sleep and Self-Care
• 39:54 Overcoming the Juggle: Business and Life Balance
• 40:51 Shifting Mindsets for Sustainable Success

Transcript

Sophie Biggerstaff (00:00)
Do you feel like you're constantly juggling business and life, but sometimes you're always dropping the ball. Never get into the end of your to-do list or actually achieving the goals you have. Like I can fully, fully relate. It always feels like I'm chasing my tail on something. And in today's episode of the Remote CEO Life podcast, we're going to talk about exactly how you can overcome that because I'm joined today by Sue Richards. She's a coach, a mentor, a speaker and host of the PEP Talks podcast. Sue helps ambitious female business owners reduce mental load, reclaim energy and finally ditch the overwhelm.

So they can create space, not just for business and family, but also for themselves. Through mindset shifts, sustainable habits and energy management, supports women to build a life that aligns with their values, not one that burns them out. So I'm super excited about this conversation today. As you know, I have been through my own burnouts many times and because I was focused on the wrong things, I wasn't focusing on the things that moving the needle. I was focusing on all of the things that I thought I should be doing to grow this business.

but actually sometimes what we think we should be focusing on and what we should be focusing on are very different things. And today we're going to be speaking about the subjects that we should be focusing on in our business to actually move the needle and drive our business forward rather than getting stuck in the weeds of the day to day. And Sue's going to give us some really practical advice on how to actually manage that. So let's dig into the episode.

Sophie Biggerstaff (01:17)
Welcome to the Remote CEO O Life podcast. How are you?

Sue Richards (01:19)
I'm good, thank you. How are you, Sophie?

Sophie Biggerstaff (01:21)
I'm good, thanks. Excited for our chat today. Do you want to share a little bit more about yourself and your background and kind of where you're at today?

Sue Richards (01:30)
Yeah, sure. So I am a coach, mentor, speaker and podcast host. And I work with self-employed mums, ambitious self-employed mums who have big goals for their business, but also want to be amazing mums as well. And I help them, in essence, I help them steer clear of burnout. So I talk about ditching overwhelm, minimizing mental load and carving out more time and energy for the things that

they want to do within their lives whilst also fulfilling their desire to be a brilliant mum and a brilliant business owner.

Sophie Biggerstaff (02:04)
Amazing and how did you come to this place?

Sue Richards (02:08)
Well, I think it all started in a sort of in this area when I was about 12, which is a little bit bizarre because most 12 year olds don't have a goal of working with self-employed moms and helping them avoid burnout. But I could see my dad was heading down that route of burnout. He was in a really high stress job, high pressure, constantly trying to prove himself. I'm not entirely sure to who.

but he was definitely trying to prove himself all the time and, you know, try and get to the next goal and the next thing and do the next thing. And he was a busy man, a busy, busy, busy man. And I told him when I was 12 that he would die before he retired if he carried on how he was living his life, because within that chronic stress and that high pressure environment, he was not looking after himself very well. His health habits were not perhaps where they should have been.

And sadly, he followed through on my message and passed away when he was 56 of a heart attack. So even when I was 12, I knew I wanted to help people live longer, healthier lives. And my idea at the time, with little knowledge about the coaching world when you're 12, was to go into medical research. So I did a degree, science degree about the human body.

with the intention to then do a PhD and go on into medical research. That never happened. But when I then hit 40, I'd lost myself as a mum. My energy was rock bottom. I'd lost my confidence. I'd lost my sense of self. And I'd also gained a bit of weight. So in a round, I know this is a sort of like slightly roundabout story, but I promise you I'll get to where I'm going.

I retrained as a personal trainer and a nutritionist in my early 40s, having found the power of regular movement and eating well for my own energy levels, my own confidence, my self-esteem, and also simply my patience with my kids. Because I was looking after me, I had more time and energy for my children.

And then since then, I've been working in that field of sort of health and fitness. But what I've realized as I've been coaching clients with health and fitness is actually there's a massive hustle culture. There's a lot of self-employed, well, self-employed people full stop out there and employed people for that matter, who are hustling and grinding and constantly trying to get to the next thing and the next level and do, you know, prove themselves worthy of something or other. And they probably don't realize that's what's going on, but that's what I see.

And as I was coaching people with more of the health and fitness side of things, I realized that a lot of limiting beliefs were holding people back. And so my business has sort of evolved over the last 10 or 11 years to work more in the deeper layers of digging into why the women I work with who are intelligent women who know that they need to look after their health, who know they need to prioritize their sleep, who know they should be eating.

a nourishing diet, why aren't they doing that? And so I dig in and help them suss that out really. So I bring my health and wellness background in, but I also work on mindset shifts too. So we talk a lot about habit change, but also mindset shifts too.

Sophie Biggerstaff (05:28)
Incredible. Well, that's that is a very impressive story that it kind of all started when you were 12 minutes. It's very interesting, actually, because I actually recorded a podcast yesterday and this lady was a productivity coach. And I said, where did this like first conference was that when I was 12? I'm like, this is so interesting that actually is coming from like something that's so far.

before you got to this stage of your life and you're able to bring that into your world now. I think that that's super, super powerful. And it's obviously from like a difficult circumstance that you saw your dad going through that. That's not ideal for any 12 year old to see that, but you've been able to turn that into your superpower of like helping people and get through that burnout because, and I can speak for myself, like I've experienced actually four burnouts in the past.

Well, probably in the past eight years, most of them when I started my business. And some of them completely wiped me out. They floored me. I couldn't work for months, actually, because I wasn't looking after myself. And I fully agree with you that we are always trying to achieve something.

based on what our limiting beliefs or our self-worth is telling us. And it's obviously all coming from a subconscious place. And I've done a hell of a lot of subconscious reprogramming work over the past three years, particularly since my last burnout. And I haven't had one for three years, thank God. So I must be going in the right direction. But it's very difficult because you need a really high level of self-awareness to recognise why the burnout.

is happening. So having somebody like yourself to reflect that back and look into that and delve into it a little bit deeper is really powerful. And definitely something that I didn't, I didn't have and didn't know that I could have back then when I was experiencing the burnout, because actually, when you're in the burnout, because of these limiting beliefs, you're like, well,

No, this isn't happening to me. Like I can get through this. Like I can just keep going in the way that I was living my life before. But actually if you're having four burnouts in a certain period of time, something has to change. And it took me a really long time to the point where I had long COVID in 2022. Is it 2022? Yeah, 2022. And it completely wiped me out. it was, I would almost say that long COVID that I had was actually more like a burnout where it just...

completely flawed me and it wasn't until that point that I was like, I really have to make a change here because if I don't, then I am gonna go on a path of self-destruction basically. I'm doing this at this point to myself and I was just overworking and overworking. So I totally can see how people can get themselves into that state and I also can see the health effects that that has had on me. Like even now, I told you before we entered this recording that I've just started a detox, right? So.

Partly that detox is because my stress levels have been so chronic for the past, like, however many years, probably most of my life, I've had quite high stress levels that it has impacted me so much from like a hormone imbalance. I have really severe allergies and it's all because of my gut health. And obviously your stress levels impact your gut health. So I'm now having to do at the age, I'm 33, so I'm not old, but like.

Sue Richards (08:15)
Yeah.

Sophie Biggerstaff (08:37)
I'm still like mid halfway into my thirties almost, and I'm having to go back and do like reverse, reverse work of all of the silly things that I did as a younger 20 something year old to push for all of these burnouts and having to deal with that now in my body. So I totally, totally understand.

the need to eliminate these self beliefs so that you can get through these burnouts or like not have the burnouts happen basically.

Sue Richards (09:07)
Yeah, so my mission is to try and grab people before they get there so to spot so they can spot that they're heading in the direction of burnout I don't want anybody to get to the point of burnout because as you know, it's not a good place to be I've had a couple of burnouts myself Where I've I've literally stopped my business for periods of time which is quite It's quite upsetting actually because I know

that this is what I've been put on this planet to do. And I know that sounds really woo, but every time I pause my business or close my business down, I think that's it. I'm just gonna, just gonna go back to like regular paid work. A year or so later, I'm like, something pulls me back and I just keep getting pulled back to it. And I just keep thinking back to that 12 year old who was like, I'm gonna make people, I'm gonna not make people, I'm gonna help people live longer lives. And it's clearly...

literally, as I say, the reason I've been put on this planet is to help people do that. So I don't want people to get to the point where they're having to burn their business to the ground in order to look after themselves. I want them to be looking after themselves so they don't have to burn their business to the ground and take those steps as they start to recognise that they're heading down a spiral that's not one they can get out of easily.

Sophie Biggerstaff (10:21)
Yeah, absolutely. I think in this circumstance, prevention is going to be so much better than cure, right? In most things, prevention is better than cure. But obviously, I think sometimes burnout creeps up on us and we don't even realise it because of the limiting beliefs and the self-worth thing that you mentioned earlier.

And I noticed that you talk a lot about kind of minimizing mental load and maximizing energy. So I'd be really interested to hear your take on like, how do we do that? How do we prevent the burnout? Like what steps do we need to take to before we even get there?

Sue Richards (10:51)
So I believe those two things go hand in hand. So if we can minimize the mental load, we naturally maximize our energy because certainly the clients I work with, they are juggling a huge amount, right? So this is not to put any disrespect to anybody who's in an employed position or anybody who's not a mum. As you've just explained, yourself, Sophie, you've got yourself into that position of pushing and pushing and pushing and hitting the burnouts.

The people I work with, the ladies I work with, they have the juggle of the motherhood and the business. And then somewhere in the way they get lost down the gap in the middle. But because they've got the business and motherhood to juggle, their mental load is particularly high because they're trying to keep on top of literally everything. They've got all these like plates up in the air that they're spinning. And so I honestly believe that if they can let go of some of that stuff,

either by literally letting go of it, ditching it completely, or by finding somebody who can support them and help them and actually do that for them. So whether that's outsourcing to a service, whether it's asking your partner to help you, whether it's asking your kids to help you, whether it's asking your parents to help you or grandparents or friends or anybody, asking for help is one of the biggest steps we can take as women. And I do think that

And I've been there, right? I'm speaking a lot from experience. A lot of my coaching work comes from my own lived experience. But as strong, independent, ambitious women who have big goals for ourselves, we find it really, really hard to ask for help because we see it as a weakness, as a failure. And I should be able to do this all on my own, but we were never designed to do all on our own. You know, if you think back into, you know,

my grandparents generation, so sort of the pre-war babies, they would have all lived very close to their grandparents and possibly even their great grandparents. They would effectively had a village, a community around them so that when mum can't do stuff, grandma can step in. And we don't really have that in modern society anymore. We're so sort of scattered around, I was going say the UK, but the world. I mean, you're in Thailand and I'm here in Devon and we're still chatting with each other.

That village and that community, we don't have that support network. So we have to go find it, whoever that is that we have to help us. But we have to be willing to ask for help. People won't know we need the help unless we tell them. I think we have this perception that if we just look like we're struggling, somebody is going to come and pick up the pieces. It doesn't work like that, unfortunately. We have to be the ones to take the lead. So I think that's a massive step is asking for help.

I think we also have to accept that we can't do everything perfectly either. So again, a lot of the clients I work with come to me not really realizing that they are massive perfectionists and it's really impacting on the energy they're putting into stuff and the time they're putting into stuff. So they're probably putting more time into things than they actually need to, putting more pressure on themselves than they actually need to when they could still achieve the same outcome.

with a slightly imperfect solution. So I really support my clients in taking small, simple steps to still get to where they want to go, rather than worrying about the top of the mountain, but actually thinking about, right, what's the next step? But with that sort of to-do list, and prioritizing what needs to be done as well. So there's loads of stuff we can do to minimize that mental load. I mean, it's a massive topic, but

If we can get a few things off our list in whatever way we do that, whether as I say, it's completely letting go of stuff. And sometimes that might be a relationship that you need to let go of, which is really damn hard. But ultimately, if you're stuck in a spiral of overwhelm and mental overload and exhaustion, that's pretty hard too. So making these short term difficult decisions is going to make life so much easier in the long, in the long run. So sometimes we have to

just suck it up for the short term to come out stronger on the other side. And then, maximizing energy. Well, that comes, as I say, from minimizing the mental load, but also from making sure we prioritize our sleep, eating well, moving our bodies on a regular basis, drinking plenty of water, know, literally the foundations of our health, nothing fancy, no, you know, no clever tricks or magic pills are needed.

We just need to get back to basics and so often when we're trying to achieve so much, we forget the basics and those foundational health habits also slip down the gap.

Sophie Biggerstaff (15:28)
Yeah, it's like the first thing to go, isn't it? When you're stressed, when you're overworked, you let go of all of the personal care, self-care activities. Even some people don't shower, for example, because they haven't got time in the day, or they don't go to the gym, or they don't go out and leave their house for the day. And I think from my experience, I feel like environment has a really big...

part to play in that. And if you are in the wrong environment surrounded by, I don't know, like hustle culture, people that are doing something completely different to you that aren't that supportive of you, or you're surrounded, you're in central London, for example, where it's 100 miles an hour, when you're in those environments, it's, it's that

that can shift your whole dynamic. Like you will just mould into the environment that you are into. Whereas, and I'm not saying go to the extreme of me where I've moved to a tiny little island in Thailand, but like I've moved into a Thailand island because it gives me a slower pace of life. Like I can go on a beach walk in the morning. I can go to the gym because everything here is catered around wellness.

I have chosen to put myself in environments that support my wellbeing so that I don't feel the need to work 13 hour days like I was when I was in London because actually I couldn't afford to go out and go and do things in the evening because it's so expensive. Whereas I've put myself in an environment that allows me to one, show up really authentically as myself and be able to do all the things that I love to do and to just like nurture me, make me feel like I can actually.

take time for myself because it's important and there's so many things that I want to go and do here that take me away from my business, give me that distraction and that permission slip to go and take those times away. And I think your environment has a really, really big impact on that. And I also love what you said around high achievers, asking for help or find asking for help really difficult. Like I...

definitely relate to that. Like it's definitely something that I've had to learn how to do. Even if someone just naturally tries to help me, I'm like, no, no, it's okay. Don't carry my suitcase. Let me just struggle with this up the stairs. And like, actually, no, like now I'm trying to surrender a little bit more into like people helping me and asking for help, particularly in my business, because I've got, I'm five years into business at this point and I've always had a low level of support in terms of.

a VA helping me do scheduling, things like that. But I'm starting to recognize that actually for me to get to the next level in my business, I need to ask for some serious help. Like really, really somebody that can guide me, me accountable, that can do some bigger tasks that I very well know that I'm not good at and could offload it onto somebody else. But there's a huge mindset shift around that. And there's also like what you mentioned earlier, the

the limiting beliefs that come into play, right? That we can do it all ourselves. And I don't need help because I can do these things. So talk me through a little bit about some of the limiting beliefs that you see that hold people back the most when it comes to this subject.

Sue Richards (18:27)
So, well, one of them is I can do it on my own and linked to that is I'll do it better than somebody else. So I need to do it because I'll do it better because the perfectionist in us feeds into that. And I mean, I'm guilty of this, right? I'm definitely guilty of this. Like if my husband does like cleaning around the house, it's not done how I would do it. And I have to just sort of...

Sophie Biggerstaff (18:38)
Go take.

Sue Richards (18:50)
take a deep breath and thank him for doing the bits that he's doing because that is supportive, but there's still a little like niggle that's like, that's not how I would have done it. So, but we have to embrace that, right? We have to embrace that. Otherwise we will always be trying to do it all ourselves. And as we've just said, that is not possible. So yeah, I can do it all on my own and I do it better than everybody else. They're the first two.

I get a lot of people pleasing showing up with people and they'll often say they're not people pleasers and they have great boundaries in place. And then when we dig deeper, I'm like, hold on a minute. You're spending time with people that drain your energy. You're saying yes to that thing over there, which means you're saying no to that thing over there. And that thing over there is the thing that you really want to be doing. So whilst yes, you're quite happy to do the thing you said yes to.

it's actually taking you away from the thing that you really want to be doing. So a lot of people pleasing, lot of perfectionist tendencies coming into play, a lot of good girl attitudes. you know, and a lot of not using our voices, a lot of not using our voices. So the whole like little girls should be seen and not heard adage coming through a lot. And I think that again, links to the asking for help thing.

And then I guess the final one, which again, we've already touched on really is the need to prove ourselves to feel worthy by proving ourselves of achieving something. Or I had one client recently who only felt good at the end of the day if she'd ticked things off her to do list. Now, bear in mind, she was the finance director of her own company.

she was doing like admin tasks, really, really basic admin tasks because it gave her the dopamine hit of ticking off the easy jobs from the list, which meant she was never ever getting to the strategic stuff because the strategic stuff she knew would take longer and would she would potentially fail at in her vote in her eyes. So her perfectionist in her

And her need to have felt a sense of achievement at the end of every day meant she stayed in the weeds of her business rather than actually doing the stuff that would move her business forward. Big ones to change, but it is possible. You just need some support to do it. I don't think, I honestly don't think you can do that sort of deep work on your own. Not fully, you can get started for sure, but.

to really make changes and actually implement the changes that you know you need to make. That's where having somebody in your back pocket lovingly kicking you up the ass and reminding you of what you're aiming for is really important.

Sophie Biggerstaff (21:31)
Yeah, I think that's a big one, it?

Yeah, that one's such a big one. Definitely the one around being seen and not heard and like asking and speaking up, sharing your voice and saying all of the things that you know you should be saying. But then also that element of you're almost procrastinating on the small tasks that really are not going to move the needle in your business. I am so guilty of this.

And I don't necessarily think it's from like a ticket off of the to-do list piece, but I think it's actually what I've come down to, because again, I've done quite a lot of this limiting belief work and I do a lot of my subconscious reprogramming work, but I've put it down to the fact that I am actually scared of success.

So sometimes I will postpone the big tasks that I know are going to move the needle because I'm terrified of what that could actually mean. So it's super, super interesting when you become aware of your own patterns, your own limiting beliefs. And I agree with you. I think you need some level of support in able to be able to reprogram those things. Whether that is through like I do it through like an online course membership program that I'm part of. And there's like different workshops that you can do based on what your limiting beliefs.

are, I fully agree, back obviously coaching, even therapies or cognitive behavioral therapy to try and reprogram some of those on like a, if you're really new to this subject, I think that can be really powerful. But it is so interesting when you gain a level of self awareness and you start seeing all of these, these limiting beliefs and patterns showing up and you're like, wow, okay, there's a lot here that's holding me back. And it can be really difficult to then make those changes because it's one thing becoming self aware.

And it's one thing knowing what you need to do, but obviously doing it is a whole different story. So what would you say that are like, if someone is stuck in one of these cycles, whether it be that they are procrastinating and doing all of the small tasks and not doing the big ones in their business, or is that they're like holding out from posting content because they're scared of showing up and showing their voice. What would be like the first step for you if you're working with someone?

to start making really small but incremental changes to help someone shift the narrative and actually take the better actions.

Sue Richards (23:44)
Okay, so if we go back to the client, I was talking about a minute ago who had the to-do list and she liked to tick things off. What I got her to start doing was as she was walking towards her office each morning, and then again, if she'd gone out over the lunch break as she was walking towards her office after lunch, so literally as she's opening the door, saying to herself, I am the finance director and owner of my business and I need to take strategic action so that she's starting to

almost give herself a little pep talk to step away from the, the shitty admin that she really shouldn't have been doing. and that worked really, really well. Also just having a break away from, from your desk, I think helps to recalibrate and reset and remind you of like what you're here to do. because I think we can so easily get drawn into that to-do list because it's sitting next to us.

and we just want to tick it off and tick it off and tick it off when actually when we step away and we just take a moment five minutes, 10 minutes, whatever and we start to think, okay, what am I actually here to do today? Then we can come back with a sort of slightly renewed energy and then go through that to do list and pick off the thing that's the most important thing for that day and then just flip it. So you can still do the shitty admin, but just do it at the end of the day.

Do the important stuff, the needle moving stuff at the beginning of the day or when your energy is at its highest. For me, it's first thing in the morning. And I think for the vast majority of the population, it probably is in the morning when we haven't filled our brain with all sorts of other rubbish. The other thing that I really encourage my clients to do is really plan ahead and schedule as well. I'm not one for time blocking particularly, but just having a mental...

like moment the night before ready for the next day. So before you close the laptop thinking, okay, what are the, what are the like the one or the two or the three really important things I'm going to do tomorrow and get those written down so that when you then open the laptop the following day, you're already primed for that. You've almost subconsciously processed it overnight in your sleep as well. so that would be certainly one.

one trick and then the other trick is literally to just start, know, start with the easiest, smallest thing you can do, but that is needle moving. So not the easiest task you can do necessarily, but pick a difficult task. But what's the first easiest thing you can do in relation to that difficult task. So if it's posting on social media, what's the thing that's going to get something out there? So

You know, it doesn't need to be a snazzy reel. It doesn't need to be you speaking to camera if that's not comfortable at the moment. Maybe it's just literally some words on a static camera image, but you're getting something out there. And then that starts the momentum because then you're like, okay, that was safe. I'm okay. Nobody's trolling me in response to that post. Maybe I can do the next thing. Maybe I can start to put my face on a static post.

and then we can build up to maybe getting a video out there, for example. But it's the next easiest step. Rather than worrying about step 12, we just want to do the next easiest one.

Sophie Biggerstaff (26:58)
Yeah, it's so easy, isn't it, to get carried away and think about the long-term vision and what you don't have yet and all of the things that you are working towards. But actually, we just need to look at like...

How are we going to get there? What's the next step that's actually going to get us one step closer to that? Even if it's literally like 1 % closer every single day, I feel like we just forget that. we're so, obviously if you're an entrepreneur, most likely you're a big dreamer. You've got big goals. You're a very ambitious person most likely. So it's natural that our brain goes towards like the big goal first, but actually we need to almost break that big goal down into small goals so that we don't get overwhelmed in that process of like,

Sue Richards (27:19)
Exactly.

Sophie Biggerstaff (27:37)
achieving that overnight. I'm very guilty personally of wanting to skip all the bit in the middle and go from like where I am today to like where I want to be in five years time. And then someone reflected that back to me quite recently and was like, yeah, but don't you just want to enjoy like the time right now? You're never going to get that back. And I was like, yeah, good point. And sometimes you just get caught up in life and that's what happens. But I think if you can create a little bit more structure, like what you're saying around, create yourself a little bit more of a schedule that can be really, really empowering.

impact form and help you take at least one small step towards shifting that way of working and also obviously impact your positively your business, which is ultimately if you're an entrepreneur, what you want to what you want to probably do well with and where your goals are heading. that's really, really great advice there. And in terms of when someone comes to you, hope, obviously you're hoping to catch that burn out before

they get there, but in some cases, I imagine people are already at that burnout stage. what would be some obvious signs of burnout that you usually identify with clients that you can help them kind of eliminate or backtrack on to stop the burnout from fully happening?

Sue Richards (28:53)
Okay, so the first thing I want to say is when we're talking about burnout, we aren't talking about full burnout. Okay, that you and I, when we're describing burnout, we're talking probably there's a scale like zero to 10. We're probably talking about a seven or maybe an eight on the scale, but true burnout, just for the listeners who aren't fully aware of the scale. True burnout is when you've got suicidal tendencies. So.

I'm hoping Sophie, that's not as far down the scale as you guys, certainly not for me. I hit just exhaustion and lethargy and no motivation for life or business really, particularly in my business. I just didn't have any want to be pouring more energy into my business. completely just, you know, the love for my business had completely disappeared. Despite the fact, as I said earlier, I know this is what I'm supposed to be doing.

So lack of motivation is a big one. You mentioned it a little earlier on, but things like self-care slipping way, way down the priority list. So even to the point of not wanting to go and spend time with friends is often a signal that something's not right. So not eating well, disrupted sleep.

not wanting to exercise, even if you used to be somebody who exercised a lot, it just all disappears off the agenda.

What else? I mean, from a sort of more physiological standpoint, you've probably got quite a lot of tension in your body. You might not realize that it's there because it will have crept up on you as you mentioned earlier. You're probably quite snappy, irritable, impatient. But yeah, exhaustion is a really big one. That's when most of us would describe ourselves as hitting burnout because despite how much sleep we're getting, we're still tired.

I don't think that's a physical tiredness that we're experiencing. I think that's an emotional tiredness that we're actually experiencing because if it was physical tiredness, we would be able to resolve it by having a few really good night's sleep. So if we're not managing to resolve it by having a few really good night's sleep, there's something deeper going on there. And that for me is probably a bit of nervous system dysregulation. So you're in the constant fight or flight situation.

And that lack of motivation and the lethargy all sort of feed into that. And I see it as an emotional tiredness, like an inner tiredness that we can only resolve by taking a step back and allowing ourselves to look after ourselves again for a little while.

Sophie Biggerstaff (31:20)
Yeah, it's true. And something else that I experienced was actually, I'm expressing it right now actually, like I can't think, my, what's that word? Oh God, I've completely forgotten the word. Where you literally forget things, that was it, memory. As if I've just done that, like when I'm talking about it. Yeah, memory loss is literally what is.

Sue Richards (31:34)
brain fog.

Sophie Biggerstaff (31:44)
So memory loss is one of my problem signs. And actually I don't feel burnt out right now or about to hit a burnout, but clearly I just have memory loss in general, but it gets extra severe if I'm about to reach the burnout. Like I will literally walk into room, have no idea what I'm in room. Like I'll open an Excel spreadsheet and be like, what was I about to look at? Like I just lose all concepts of anything that I'm actually meant to be doing. So I think that.

Yeah, you hit the nail on the head with all of those symptoms. I've definitely experienced all of those as well. And the earlier, obviously, you can catch those and catch yourself figuring those out. The easier you're to be able to figure it out, basically. So I think that's a really good awareness around some of the symptoms to look out for for burnout. But it is frustrating that so many people let it get to a point of

full burnout or like, sorry, full burnout in the sense of the 80 % that you're talking to, like the full exhaustion and all of the symptoms that you mentioned earlier, before they make a change. Like in an ideal world, they make the changes like you've mentioned today to eliminate any chances of that burnout happening because that would obviously be way more beneficial specifically in the long run as well.

Sue Richards (32:47)
Yeah, I know what mean. Yeah.

Sophie Biggerstaff (32:56)
Yeah.

And I know you also are balancing a lot going on. Obviously you've gone through your own burnouts as well. But I know you're currently balancing obviously business, family, podcasting. You also do some speaking. Like how do you personally structure your own business and your life to make sure that you are focusing on your wellbeing as well?

Sue Richards (33:15)
Well, it goes through phases, you know, it's inevitable, right? I mean, I'm in a, I'm in a very, I don't like to this word, but I'm going to use it anyway, because I think it's easiest way to describe it. But I'm in a very busy phase at the moment. I've actually got three businesses. So I'm obviously speaking with you about one of them. Hey.

Sophie Biggerstaff (33:18)
Sorry, the lag is weird.

Sue Richards (33:33)
I'll carry on. Yeah, so I've actually got three businesses, the one I'm speaking with you about, Sophie, and then I also have, well, I'm an accountancy and tax tutor very randomly and have been for 24 years. And then I do some work alongside that as well. And that work just very much goes in peaks and troughs. So at the moment I'm in a peak phase. So life is a bit crazy.

Sophie Biggerstaff (33:41)
It's okay, you can carry on. There's a bit of a lag.

Sue Richards (33:55)
Yeah. And we're also in the middle of a six month building project. So, you know, it is full on. So I just make sure that I have a few minutes to myself every single day. I get up before I need to. I make sure I have at least half an hour to myself on my own before anybody else is up in my house. And that is almost that sacrosanct. I do that seven days a week.

and when we're on holiday as well. I love to have just a bit of time just for me, just to sit quietly, no social media, no podcasts. I might put on some gentle grounding music or something like that, but no sort of direct input as it were. I will take myself out on a walk most days. We do have a dog, which helps with that, course, but walking is like a meditation for me. I mentioned this to you before.

touched on the recording, but I use my walking time as a mental processing time. So sometimes it's half an hour, sometimes it's an hour, sometimes it's longer if I need it. Most days it's probably about half an hour. And those two things, possibly with a bit of journaling thrown in, are really my go-tos all the time, every day. And then on top of that, I try and build in.

A few times a week I try and build in some form of more structured exercise. And then I'm just fueling myself well. And I do really prioritize my sleep, massively prioritize my sleep. And by doing those things, sometimes that means I don't hit my desk till 10 in the morning, which I've taken a while to adjust to because, you know, so many of us are still in that Monday to Friday nine to five mentality. And

I always used to feel really guilty for not starting my working day until like 10 o'clock in the morning. But actually that first hour or two hours or whatever is still work. It's just not sitting at my desk work. It's mental processing, it's subconscious thinking, it's inspiration. It helps me really focus and bring some creativity into my work. And it just allows me to be reset and ready for my day ahead.

So I just naturally prioritise those things and have done for years. And yeah, as I said, sleep. mean, my kids laugh at me because I'm always in bed before them. And like 9.30, I'm like, right, I'm going to bed to read my book now. And they think it's hilarious. But I just think sleep is so foundational to everything else. It's the thing that everything else is layered on top of. If you get good sleep, everything else sort of naturally follows suit afterwards, really.

Sophie Biggerstaff (36:23)
I completely agree. Like sleep is literally the foundation of everything, a foundation of our wellbeing. And I have a business partner actually in another business that I run and she always says that we have to treat ourselves like a plant. We have to water ourselves, we have to feed ourselves, put ourselves in the right environment and what's the other one? Give us, give some sunlight, right? So that we can actually thrive in the environment that we're in. And I think sleep is part of that. And...

Yeah, it really is the foundation of everything that we do. And it's really important. It's definitely something that I've actually struggled with. Like my morning routine is on point. My evening routine and my wind down part, I really still have a little bit of work to do. And I also feel the same way that you do around like that guilt around not working first thing in the morning. I don't work in the morning. I really prioritise myself in the morning. I actually don't start work until about 11, sometimes 12 o'clock.

But then I will usually because I'm on a different time zone, I usually work during the evening. So I kind of make that up. My hours are a little bit more nocturnal, but I really would love to get into a better sleep routine because I do understand how important it is. And I want to follow your suit of getting into bed at 9.30 and reading a book.

I don't know if you've listened to the bit that where I finished speaking or not because of this delay. It's really annoying. But that's okay. So you've given some really good and

You've given some really good advice in this session, so thank you so much. It's been really helpful and inspiring to hear how you've overcome burnout, how you're helping other people overcome burnout. If there was one thing that you could give someone to take away from this episode to go and implement in their lives to make sure that they avoid the burnout at all costs, what would you suggest someone go and do today?

Sue Richards (38:02)
Well, I think it has to come back to sleep. Honestly, I just think when you get good sleep, you then naturally eat better, move better, you're more focused. Your brain will be firing on all cylinders. So your business mind will be doing what it needs to do to build your business. And you will have more energy and more patience around the people that you love as well. So sleep and therefore,

to get that good sleep, as you just mentioned, a really good evening routine that allows your body to actually go into those deeper phases of sleep. So I know lots of people talk about seven to nine hours of sleep, and I know there's a lot of scientific research around that, and I don't disagree with any of that, but if that seven to nine hours in bed is shocking quality of sleep, then you're not really getting the sleep that you need. So yeah, a good hour.

minimum of an hour really before you climb into bed. We need to be off screens and not being stimulated by external sources really, just allowing our bodies to rest and digest so that we can then drift off into a lovely deep sleep and wake up the next day feeling energized and raving to go.

Sophie Biggerstaff (39:09)
Amazing. I'm definitely going to be trying to implement more of that in my own personal life. And I think that's a really easy one for people to action and really great advice that you've been giving. So thank you so much for joining me today. If anyone wants to connect with you further, how can they get in touch with you?

Sue Richards (39:25)
Probably the easiest way is via Instagram. So on Instagram, I'm SueRichards.coaching.

Sophie Biggerstaff (39:32)
Amazing. Thank you so much for joining me. I've really enjoyed this conversation and hopefully it's helped inform some people about the burnout and how to prevent it.