Tips for preventing burnout with Parinaz Shams
By Nikki Michelsen
Nov 4, 2022
You’re probably familiar with burn-out…the overwhelm, exhaustion, and chronic stress that result from working too much, your relationships being on ice, and/or life handing you curve balls.
It makes you want to sit on the couch and eat Cheetos all day while sending calls to voicemail as you say “F it!” to society's expectations…Yeah, that lovely cycle of blah is called burn-out.
What you might not know, however, is that burnout directly impacts your menstrual cycle and therefore, your entire wellbeing.
Let’s break this down…First it’s important to remember that you are a system.
Your physical body is inherently tied to your emotions, thoughts, and lived experiences. The layers of you can never be separated.
When you experience something highly emotional or stressful in the outer world, your inner world will internalize that and then your physical body will manifest it.
One of the first places your body manifests stress is your menstrual cycle.
(I know, you’re probably saying WTF?! Can’t my ovaries ever get a break?)
Well, no, actually…for ages, female-bodied people have harbored stress in their menstrual cycle #FightThePatriarchy
The good news? You can take back control by learning the relationship between stress and your cycle and then start making new choices…
See, when your body is stressed out, it goes “shopping” for energy in your hormone-rich environment called the reproductive organs. This causes an imbalance to our hormones and leads to a number of issues including PMS, PMDD, acne, back pain, etc.
If you’ve ever suffered from serious period pain or PMS or noticed your period showing up late for seemingly no reason, it’s likely time to consider your stress levels in a real way and develop practices to alleviate the ongoing stress that is leading to burn-out.
As a spiritual life coach who supports ambitious professionals, here are 3 tools that I use for myself and recommend to my clients to keep my burn-out low and my period smooth sailing:
Plan for rest
Look ahead at your menstrual calendar and plan to increase your rest time (outside of sleep) in the days post-ovulation, but especially the 5-7 days leading up to and during your period. This could look like swapping high-impact workouts for yoga, or scaling back the number of clients you see that week.
Focus on high-quality digestion
Your digestion is your engine. When you’re burnt out, your engine struggles to run. Consider drinking a digestive tea in the morning before your coffee to ignite your digestive fire and get your system running on all cylinders. Bonus points for having a thermos of digestive tea at your work desk & sipping through the day!
Develop Routine
Your body and its cycles thrive on rhythm. Start getting the support you need to establish a routine that works for YOU and your lifestyle so that your sleep, diet, movement, and self-care are in support of reducing burn-out and promoting a happy menstrual cycle.
Written by Parinaz Shams, a spiritual life coach who helps ambitious men & women get their lives back by combining the wisdom of Ayurveda and Persian Spirituality with Modern fitness and Hatha Yoga. You can follow her on Instagram @_parinazshams_ and book a complimentary Wellness Activation Call with her if you're interested in coaching.
Image credit: Toa Heftiba (Unsplash)
