The Great Shrinking
Have you ever caught yourself talking yourself out of wanting more? Maybe you used to want a better title, a bigger paycheck, or "life in the fast lane". But now, with kids to raise, a household to run, and a to-do list longer than your arm, it all feels like too much. So you tell yourself to just be happy where you are. You stop pursuing opportunities. You put your own hobbies on hold. You say "maybe next month" to your friends' invites. All the while, you swallow the feeling that you're failing on all fronts. And when you're overwhelmed, you assume the problem is you. You need to manage your time better. Be more organized. Get better at handling stress. But what if the problem isn't that you're asking too much of yourself? What if you've spent so much time adapting to everyone else's expectations that you've lost sight of what you actually want? Modern motherhood can bring on what I call The Great Shrinking. It's what happens when working moms start making themselves smaller to fit the impossible expectations placed on them. We shrink our professional ambitions to make more room for motherhood. We shrink our emotions to be the endlessly calm, capable mom. We shrink our personal lives because everyone else's needs come first. We shrink our own voices because society tells us that no one wants to hear our rage. Each individual decision seems reasonable. Logical, even. But over time, the cumulative effect can be devastating. We look up and realize that we've built a life with very little room left for ourselves. That's what we're exploring in this week's episode of The Mental Offload Podcast. What You'll Learn: The 4 areas where working moms tend to make ourselves smaller Why trying harder isn't always the answer to "meeting expectations" How to identify what's really driving your choices Making room for more, without burning out Because the goal isn't to become limitless. It's to stop making yourself smaller by default. For more information, visit The Mental Offload.
