Making your vision board a reality - How to prevent burnout and still get sh*t done

Because ya girl has GOALS (but she's also tired).

As long as I can remember, I have had this fear of time running out.

I witnessed a few family members pass away at an early age when I was a teenager and I think it reminded me at an early age of how limited our time on Earth is, and how our world can be turned upside down overnight.

I’m the eldest daughter of seven kids, which brings its own pressure and expectations to be an example and fulfil some sort of purpose in life. I got top scores at school, earned a degree and have always worked hard in every job that I’ve had. I’ve been raised to believe that perfectionism, pride and achievements are something to be honoured and celebrated. Pretty quickly in adulthood, my worth became tied to my how much I could produce.

When I failed my driving test for the first time, I cried for weeks.

I refused to get back into a car for another twelve months and even though it’s completely normal to fail the first time, I felt deeply ashamed. The truth was, I wasn’t used to failing. Even in subjects that I struggled with in school, I learned how to memorise certain information for exams so that I’d always meet the requirements.

I was terrified to drive after that, putting off my test for another year. Even after passing it took me a further five years to get in a car and drive because I had such bad anxiety around it. Because I’d failed once before, it had created this limiting belief that I couldn’t trust myself and that I was a terrible driver. It’s something I still have to work through to this day every time I step into the driver’s seat.

Why do we all feel this pressing need to be good at everything? How have we been conditioned to feel so deeply ashamed of failures, no matter how small?