[00:00:38] Vesna: [00:00:00] Welcome to the Peak Revival Podcast. My name is Vesna. Today I'm gonna talk about the shadow side that drives high performing women. Now, in the last episode, I talked about the drivers. There are five drivers for high performing women, and in this episode I'm gonna talk about how those drivers have a shadow side, have a dark side you, I guess you could call it.

And if we are not aware of [00:01:00] it, it will impact our energy and our performance and our sustainable success.

 So it's important to understand the shadow side because we can make better decisions and we can include routines that are specific for each driver that protect your energy, your mental health, give you boundaries, give you more clarity, everything that you need to protect your wellbeing and your success.

so with each driver, what we are looking at doing is increasing capacity. So I think one of the things that I talk about a lot is energy is elevated, mood is improving sleep and nutrition and all of these things. All of that is to increase your capacity, because the more capacity that we have, the more we can do, the more output we have, the better productivity.

The better our relationships, the better our wellbeing, our mental wellbeing, the better our experience of our day-to-day life. And so therefore, anything that we can do to improve or increase our capacity will mean basically that. Our day becomes easier [00:02:00] and easier for us to handle and we can handle more, but still with a lot more ease.

So the first driver I talked about was the visionary. So that, driven by potential self-actualization, living a big life, expanded life, having lots of ideas of what to do. And so the visionary is never satisfied. It's always chasing the thing that's next. And so. The shadow side is that you are always looking ahead and you're missing the beauty of now, right?

You can be comparing yourself to what you want to achieve. So once we hit a certain goal, we're not acknowledging that goal or that progress or that win, but we are moving on to the very next goal and we're almost, I guess, competing against ourselves, right? We. We've, ticked off a goal or something that we wanted to achieve, or implemented something, created something, and then we're already looking at the gap.

We've already created a new idea or a new version of ourselves that we want to be, and therefore we have a gap now. And so instead of acknowledging our wins, we [00:03:00] only look at the gap. That's the shadow aside.

And so what we want to do is not just achieve and feel satisfied with our achievement, we want to step more into fulfillment. So satisfaction is really fleeting. We can have, you know, heaps of goals and achieve them, and then we are looking for the next one. And that's satisfaction, right?

But fulfillment. Is energizing. It's restorative and fulfillment. We don't get by doing anything fulfillment. We get by being in a place of presence and if we are always looking ahead and we're always looking for the next thing and the next goal. We are not spending much time, if any time in the present moment.

And I don't mean present while you are working on your task. I mean really sitting in your presence.

 So the things that you can do here is to build some space into that momentum, right? So I know that as you build momentum, you don't wanna stop the momentum. I totally, uh, recognise that. But you have to create space. 'cause without space, we don't get that mental. Emotional, physical rejuvenation, right? We really [00:04:00] need to value the space because it's within space that we increase our mental bandwidth, that we increase our capacity, that our nervous system begins to regulate.

And so whatever you can do to shut the, the noise, the goals, the outside world out, in order to create that space, it's gonna be. So key to, I guess in a way move faster, right? So it's a little bit counterintuitive. We think that if we stop, we're gonna lose momentum and we we're going to be behind.

But actually creating that space builds more momentum and gets you moving faster.

Also acknowledge your wins and your progress is a really key part because the visionary is always looking ahead. It never acknowledges the wins that it's already created. Also, look for making sure that you have good fuel for brain performance, because nothing is going to work for you when you have a foggy brain. So making sure nutrition is in order.

The second thing I talked about was a mission driven the driver to make a difference, right? So your work is about making a difference. So there's a real [00:05:00] mission and a cause behind what you do.

And the shadow side to that is that you can become a bit of a martyr. you can be over responsible or over functioning, and that leads to burnout. And it can be a little bit of a badge of honor. And so we end up saying yes to everything because, the cause matters. we struggle to set boundaries because we feel guilty.

We feel. Responsible for other people's outcomes, right? So this is a really key part. The mission driven leader will, step into this rescuer role, and this is where it becomes exhausting. So stepping into the rescuer role is where you over-function and you don't think that. Anyone else has the ability to do it without you.

You have to be in the process. And so therefore, the rescuer steps in and if it's meant to be, it's kind of up to me and doing everything. And that level of over-functioning means that when we step into rescuer, we put the other person into the victim role and we basically rob them of their greatness.

We rob them of their [00:06:00] resources, their ability to step. In or step up and make the changes that are necessary. Instead, we jump in there and we make the changes, so we rob them of that, if that makes sense. I did a whole episode on this on episode 27 because such a key part if you are doing any kind of mission work or.

Work that really makes a difference. And you're out there trying to make some huge impact in the world, you've gotta be aware that that rescuer driver is there and it's not a bad thing. Right? I think if we didn't have rescuers, people talk so badly about it, but I think the rescuer driver, it puts you in that position where you're caring for people that you really wanna make a difference.

And I think that's really important in this world, but you really have to be aware And see when you're stepping too much into the rescue and how it's not serving people. Okay? It's really holding people back. The other one, for the mission driver is that you really have to prioritise self-care.

You're going to have to make sure that you take care of yourself because you absolutely cannot expand and increase your capacity when you are exhausted. So you're gonna have to pull away, [00:07:00] create some boundaries, and create some space and create some hard nos, some non-negotiable time that you can pull back and, take care of yourself.

And thirdly, detach from the outcome. Okay? Because often with the mission driver and the rescuer, there's a, an attachment to the outcome. Like, I have to help them to get these outcomes. It's up to me, right? And so at the end of the day, we can work really hard for something and it doesn't work out. And that's because a lot of things are beyond our control, even though we don't like to see it that way. and it's important that you let go of those outcomes.

The third one was the high standards driver. So this is about being a perfectionist, doing really great work. So there's a real driver to do a really good job, okay? And so that drives your ambition. And so, but the shadow side to that is that it can be hyper control it can be micromanagement of yourself and others.

It can be fear of failure or messiness. And so therefore you go into. Hyper control, hypervigilant. [00:08:00] So, feeling safe, doing the right things, being scared of making a mistake or experiencing anxiety or panic or shame when things don't go to plan. So you end up overworking to maintain control. And all of that can be totally exhausting, right?

Because you, you're trying to keep your finger on the pulse on everything and making ev making sure that everything's at a hundred percent and it's just going to drive a lot of fatigue and burnout.

So the shift here is in delegating more, and the shift is from control to trusting the process that and trusting that whatever happens, that you can deal with it, right? At its core, perfectionism is a fear of criticism and so. We do things perfectly so nobody can call us out or we feel ashamed if we've made a mistake.

And so to avoid that criticism, we do everything perfectly right. But I think at the end of the day, there has to be, you have to let go a little bit and go, you know what? Whatever happens, I can deal with it. I've dealt with it in the past and we all know that you can do things. Perfectly and someone still criticizes something, right?

[00:09:00] And so we can overcome criticism even if it's quite often just our own personal criticism, not even from others. But we can overcome that and we need to feel safe with allowing things to be at even 90%, right? It's not going to ruin your life plans if things are at 90%, and it will allow a lot more flexibility and ease into your life.

And you'll also have to have some weekly rituals to kind of reset. So things that kind of take you out of that environment and also give you that sense of control. When you have those reset rituals, you feel kind of more connected to yourself and more in control.

 The fourth one was the success or the achievement driver. So this is the thrill of achievement, the thrill of being the best in the world at what you do, right? So this the shadow side is this addiction to success, and that your identity, is tied to your output, right?

And so you're always chasing the next big win, and you struggle to slow down without feeling guilty. So you push to keep that momentum going and you feel a [00:10:00] sense of self worth through the results that you create. Okay? And so there's almost this feeling that if I'm not creating, if I'm not achieving, if I'm not successful, then I'm irrelevant.

And that's a shadow side of the success driver.

So for this one, you really need to harness recovery time, and it's almost like train, like an athlete. Like when you look at athletes, they put themselves under an enormous amount of stress, mental, physical, and emotional stress. Yet they are champions. And if you look at what they do differently, they add recovery time.

So stress plus recovery will equal, success and your high performance.

The other thing is to track, non achievement based goals, like your joy, your presence, your play, your laughter, time with family, like, track other things other than just these, you know, achievement based goals.

the fifth and final one is the redefine. So this is, you know, success on your own terms. And the shadow side of this is that the avoidance of ambition and [00:11:00] inconsistent follow through. So this, you know, wanting freedom and ease meant that there's no structure and there's no, follow through either.

And so. There's a fear of being burnt out. There's a fear of being over ambitious, and really the Redefiner should really own their ambition. Okay. Without any guilt. I.

Releasing that guilt of wanting more in your life or creating more and to schedule in some white space, right, to schedule in some space and some time to. Really get clear about your next steps in order to create consistency and some checkpoints in there would be good as well to track energy, mood and sleep, and things that impact, um, your day to day and things that need to be adjusted.

So those were the drivers and the shadow side to the driver, and as you can see, each shadow side has actually a different kind of core problem and a different way to address it. So I'd love for you to let me know in the comments below if you see an option to leave a comment to. Let me know. what would be one of [00:12:00] the first habits that you would include?

Like what was your driver and what's one of the first thing that you could include to help, increase your capacity with that shadow? Let me know in the comments below. 

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