#192| How Self-Compassion Help You Ditch Overwhelm: Overwhelm, Productivity, Time Management & People Pleasing

Do you ever catch yourself saying things like “I should have this figured out by now” or “I’m just terrible at this”? What if those thoughts are the real reason you’re feeling so drained and overwhelmed?

In this episode, Michelle reveals how negative self-talk quietly magnifies stress for working women and keeps them trapped in a cycle of exhaustion and guilt. You’ll discover what self-compassion actually means—and why it’s not indulgent or lazy, but the foundation of real emotional resilience and calm productivity.

In this episode, you will:

• Learn a simple three-step framework (mindfulness, common humanity, and self-kindness) to interrupt negative self-talk in the moment.
• Understand how treating yourself like a trusted friend shifts your mindset and restores confidence.
• Discover how small changes in your inner dialogue can dramatically lighten your stress and help you show up more fully—at work and at home.

Press play now to learn how to silence your inner critic, build emotional resilience, and finally give yourself the compassion you deserve.

Featured on the podcast
People Pleasing Purge Course

Wondering why you're overwhelmed? Take my "why am I overwhelmed" quiz to find out the source of your overwhelm, and what to do about it.

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Life can be overwhelming, but on this podcast, you'll discover practical strategies to overcome overwhelm, imposter syndrome, and negative self-talk, manage time effectively, set boundaries, and stay productive in high-stress jobs—all while learning how to say no and prioritize self-care on the Overwhelmed Worki...

Episode Transcript

Michelle Gauthier (00:00):
If you're already stressed and
overwhelmed, adding that extralayer of negative self-talk just
like doubles down on thebadness of the situation.
You're listening to OverwhelmedWorking Woman, the podcast that
helps you be more calm and moreproductive by doing less.

(00:20):
I'm your host, MichelleGauthier, a former Overwhelmed
Working Woman and current lifecoach.
On this show, we unpack thestress and pressure that today's
Working Woman experiences.
And in each episode, you'll geta strategy to bring more calm,
ease, and relaxation to yourlife.
Hi, friend.

(00:41):
Sometimes when you're feelingstressed and overwhelmed, or
maybe even when you're not, whenyou're just hanging out, does
your brain ever serve up somereal mean thoughts about you?
It might sound like, what'swrong with me?
Or I should be able to handlethis better, or I should have
this figured out by now, or I'ma terrible mom, whatever it is.
First of all, you're not alone.

(01:02):
Everybody has these thoughts.
Our brains just drop in somemean thoughts sometimes.
But the trouble is, if you'realready stressed and
overwhelmed, adding that extralayer of negative self-talk just
like doubles down on thebadness of the situation.
Sometimes the real suffering isnot even the circumstance, like

(01:23):
whatever it is that's makingyou feel stressed out, but that
negative self-talk can evenweigh more heavily and be worse.
So if you're like, okay, soundsgood, I hear what you're
saying.
How am I supposed to magicallystop being so hard on myself?
You're in the right place.
When you listen to this episodetoday, you'll learn what
self-compassion actually meansand how it builds real emotional

(01:45):
resilience.
And then I'll give you twoquick ways to get yourself out
of that negative self-talk loopwhen it happens to you.
Before we jump into today'sepisode, I wanted to tell you
that I have been working veryhard behind the scenes on a new
offer, which is a class calledPeople Pleasing Purge.
Kind of hard to say.

(02:06):
People pleasing purge.
And eventually this class willbe video only to watch at your
own pace.
But for the first round, I'mgoing to be teaching it live and
doing live coaching throughoutas you're learning how to stop
people pleasing.
So if you are a person who saysyes when you want to say no or

(02:27):
has a schedule that's just fullof stuff that you don't even
want to do, but somehow hasappeared on your calendar, or
you always do whatever yourmother-in-law says, even when
you don't feel like it, come andjoin my class.
I'm going to open registrationnext week.
But if you're a podcastlistener, you can register right
now.
I will put the link in the shownotes.
It has all the information.

(02:47):
It starts on November 3rd.
Okay, back to self-compassion.
So let's get into whatself-compassion is.
First, let's just start withcompassion.
The word compassion.
If you break it down, the C O Mpart means with and passion in
this case means suffering.
So compassion is withsuffering.

(03:08):
Let's take an example.
If you have a friend who'sgoing through a really hard time
and you are compassionate, youare with their suffering.
So you are with them in theirsuffering.
You are not making theirsuffering worse.
You are with them in theirsuffering.
And I'm betting that youprobably are a compassionate
person.
I bet you're great at takingcare of other people and great

(03:30):
at being compassionate to them.
So now let's turn it around toself-compassion.
It's essentially taking thosevery same skills and turning
them to yourself to giveyourself self-kindness in
situations where you're the onewho needs the compassion.
There's a researcher whose workI absolutely love, and I have

(03:51):
modeled a lot of the things thatI do in coaching after what
I've learned from her.
Her name's Dr.
Kristen Neff, and she's aleading researcher on
self-compassion.
And she's she puts it reallysimply.
She says, It really means justtreating yourself the way you
treat someone else who you lovewhen they're struggling.
If you had a friend who comesto you, let's say you're at work
and your work friend comes upto you and is almost in tears

(04:13):
and said, Oh my gosh, I just hadthe worst presentation.
I totally screwed it up.
I don't think I can do thisjob.
I should just quit.
Would you say, Yeah, you'reright.
You probably did it up.
You should probably just quit.
No, of course you wouldn't.
You'd be like, oh my gosh,you're allowed to mess up.
It probably wasn't as bad asyou thought it was.
This one thing doesn't defineyou.

(04:35):
Let's go get a diet coke andfigure out how to move forward.
Imagine if you could turn thatlevel of just natural kindness,
because I'm betting in a regularsituation, that's exactly what
you do.
Different words, differentsuggestions, but same kind of
thing.
Imagine if you could do thatfor yourself, how much better
you could feel.
So if you feel like your brainoffers some pretty mean thoughts

(04:59):
and offers them prettyregularly, if you start paying
attention to it after hearingthis podcast, and you start
noticing when your brain throwsout some unkind thoughts, you
may be surprised with how manynegative thoughts are coming to
mind about yourself.
Remember, you can't controlthose.
You can't control what's cominginto your mind and just notice
them without judgment.
And here are the three thingsthat you can do to turn that

(05:22):
around.
Number one is mindfulness, oneof our favorite things to talk
about on this podcast.
So just simply noticing it,noticing what you're actually
upset about, and then what thenegative self-talk is that is on
top of that.
So, for example, if you'rehaving a really hard day at work
and you're having a really hardday at work and you're like, I

(05:45):
can't believe this job sucks sobad.
Anybody else would have gottena different job by now.
You're terrible at this job.
This makes you terrible at homeat night because you're in a
bad mood, etc.
Just if you were to take theapproach that from a mindful
perspective, if you were to justnarrate that situation from the
outside, this is the way thatyou would handle it with

(06:06):
mindfulness.
You would say, I'm feelingoverwhelmed with work today, and
my brain is offering a lot ofnegative thoughts about me as a
person.
Okay, so that's step onemindfulness.
Just describe to yourself whatis happening without judgment.
Then the next thing you do issomething that Kristen Neff
calls common humanity.
So when you're suffering likethis, it's really easy to feel

(06:29):
like you're the only one.
For some reason, and I talkedabout this last week, we did two
episodes on comparison lastweek, but there's just something
about feeling bad aboutyourself that makes you feel so
alone, like you're the only one.
So after you've done themindfulness step and
acknowledged I'm feelingoverloaded with work today, my
brain is offering a lot ofnegative thoughts about myself.

(06:50):
Use the power of commonhumanity to tell yourself, I'm
not the only one.
All humans struggle, all humansget overwhelmed, all humans
mess up, other people feel thisway too.
This is part of being human.
I'm not the only one goingthrough this.
The person sitting in theoffice next to me could very
well feel like this.
Whatever it is, justconsciously connect yourself to

(07:12):
the rest of the world, knowingthat you're not alone in the way
that you're feeling in thatmoment.
And then the third step is totalk to yourself like you'd talk
to a friend.
The way I often phrase it to myclients is if your best friend
were going through this exactsituation, what would you say to
her?
And when I ask myself thatquestion, I will literally
picture my friend and pictureher being so sad and upset and

(07:34):
think what I would say to her,which is, oh my gosh, that
sounds really hard.
I can see why you're upset.
Everything's gonna be okay.
What do you need right now?
Do you want to talk about it?
I think you're doing the bestyou can with what you have right
now.
So it's not about lying toyourself or like toxic
positively positivity,everything is great, everything

(07:58):
is amazing.
It's really just about givingyourself the same grace that you
give to other people andletting that kindness carry you
forward so that you can solvethe actual problem.
Because remember in the exampleI gave, you're just feeling
overloaded with work.
But what's really weighing youdown is the negative thoughts
about it.
So if you can remove those andbe with yourself in your

(08:18):
suffering and non-judgmental ofyourself, then you can solve the
actual problem.
If you want to go a littledeeper on this, you could try
doing a journaling exercise andthink of a time when a close
friend of yours was reallystruggling.
What did you say to her or him?
What was your tone?
How did you support them?
And then think of a time whenyou were struggling.

(08:39):
What did you say to yourself?
What was your tone?
How did you treat yourself?
And then notice whatdifferences there are between
those two and see if you canmodel the way that you treated
your friend when you need totreat yourself that way.
So remember, when you noticethat you're having negative
thoughts, the things to practiceare mindfulness.

(08:59):
Narrate what's happening, howyou're feeling, what you're
thinking without judgment.
Remind yourself of commonhumanity.
Everybody feels this waysometimes.
And then speak to yourself withkindness.
Maybe you should send thisepisode to your best friend and
say, hey, I just listened tothis episode and I'm going to
try to treat myself like I wouldtreat you if you were having a
bad day.
Do you want to try this withme?

(09:20):
And maybe together you guys canwork on having better self
talk.
That's it for today.
Have a great week.
Thank you for listening to theOverwhelmed Working Woman
podcast.
If you want to learn more aboutmy work, head over to my
website at MichelleGauthier.com.
See you next week.