[00:00:00] Here’s the thing about balance that nobody really tells you. Balance is not a checklist. It is not something that we earn after drinking enough water color, coding our calendars, or finally mastering the morning routine .

Balance is actually a feeling, and I get it. That is a lot more hard to quantity. It’s hard to give it a solid yes or no, but you know when you’re in it and you definitely know when you’re not.

The tricky part is that most of us don’t realize when we’re slipping out of balance until we’re, you know, doing those things like snapping at our kids, procrastinating, things that we really do care about, or wondering why even the good stuff, it just doesn’t feel that good anymore.

, And here’s the truth. Being out of balance does not mean you’re failing. I hope you can hear me on this. It means you’re human and if we [00:01:00] can recognize the signs early, we can course correct before overwhelm shows up.

Now, to me, overwhelm is balance’s. Big, dramatic, scary, sister. Okay. She barges in, she takes over, and it is just all chaos. It’s a dumpster fire. And what we wanna do is we wanna protect ourselves from getting into that overwhelm. And one of the best ways we can do that is start to recognize when we get.

Imbalance. So today we’re breaking down five red flags. That might mean you’re out of balance, and as we go through them, I want you to check in with yourself, not to judge, but just gently ask, is this me? Because once you know where the imbalance is, you can start reclaiming the calm, the grounded, the joyful version of your life that you do deserve.

You deserve to feel balanced. Being busy is not a badge of honor that I want you wearing. [00:02:00] Chaos should not be your personal mascot. You deserve to feel balance, and you are still highly valuable when you live in balance. I’m saying that in case you need to hear that because I used to believe that my value was in my accomplishments, was in my productivity was in how many things I could check off of a to-do list.

But in all of that racing and all of that hustle and all of that rushing, there was no room for balance. I had to work really hard to undo those beliefs so that I could sit. In balance and feel really good about myself simultaneously. Now, I touched on this, but I wanna just say there is being out of balance and there’s being overwhelmed.

So I have been both and we are gonna talk about each one. This week we’re gonna talk about balance. So before we get into these five red flags, [00:03:00] what is balance? Balance is not a checklist. There is no set number of steps that equal balance, that you can just check off. I wanted that. I hoped for that.

That’s not what it is. Balance is a feeling. It’s your feeling. And you know when you feel that, you know, when you kind of look around and all areas of life just feel good, they’re not perfect.

I mean, they’re still, we’re still human. There’s still real life happening, but you just feel good. Those beautiful moments are the most beautiful version of balance. Now, we can also be in balance when there’s things that aren’t going quite the way we want. Ultimately balance is a feeling. It’s how you feel.

So let’s get into these five red flags that can tell you if balance is leaving the building. Number one, your calendar either keeps surprising you or it’s running you. Now I think we have two different personalities here. We have the personality who is very organized, [00:04:00] but there’s. Too much on the schedule.

You’re trying to cram too much into every single minute, every single second. There’s not enough breathing time in between. There’s not enough time to even get up and go to the bathroom before you jump on the next meeting or to get from the activity to the parent pickup line without even getting to take a deep breath before you run.

So there’s that version. Where the calendar is running you, there’s the other version where maybe you aren’t looking at your calendar often enough. You haven’t found a scheduling system that works for you, and so you keep getting surprised by things that show up on the daily that you forgot about. But either way, the calendar is a source of stress.

So if you generally. Feel stress around how much there is that it’s sneaking up on you, that it’s surprising you that it’s take longer? That it’s taking longer than you [00:05:00] expected. That’s a big one. There’s a red flag there. Number two, self-care has become some daycare. Now, I am not talking about spa appointments, although those are really fun.

I’m actually going to have one tomorrow. What I’m talking about though are those key pieces that are truly necessities for us to show up as the best human version of ourselves. We’re talking about sleep, we are talking about exercise.

We’re even talking about quiet time, and all of those things keep getting pushed to later, but later never comes. If you constantly think. Next week will be better, next month will be better. And then you get to next week, you get to next month and it’s not better. That is a huge red flag. So those priority items, your so those priority items, your physical care, your spiritual care, your [00:06:00] mental care.

If those constantly get pushed to later, there’s a red flag. Number three. Your joy feels muted. So even good things, happy family times, business wins. They don’t feel as satisfying because you’re stretched so thin. If you know, you know, and if that is happening, that is a red flag. Number four. You’re more reactive than intentional.

Now, this one is hard because it tends to come with a lot of guilt, sometimes even shame, which I hope you can let go of.

This one can hurt because throughout our day. We can be spending the day putting out fires, responding to everyone else’s priorities, and we often might do it in a way that doesn’t feel truly good. We snap at the kids, we get feisty with the person who’s [00:07:00] taking too long at the checkout counter. We’re being reactive.

There’s a lot of emotion because. Our relationship with time isn’t good. We don’t feel like there’s enough of it that we have this scarcity mindset, and so we are reactive instead of intentional. Our fifth red flag is that your relationships are fraying. Whether it’s snapping at your kids or avoiding friends texts or not responding, not RSVPing, not getting back to people.

Connections get sacrificed first when we start to feel like there’s too much going on. When we start to feel too busy, the first thing we tend to let go of. Self care, right? I don’t have time to exercise today. I’m gonna have to just stay up late. It just is what it is. The next thing that tends to get sacrificed is relationships. You [00:08:00] cancel the date night, you bail out on the girls night or the lunch with girlfriends, or you’re getting snappy with the kids. So you’re not really being all there in the moments when you know you should, These are the red flags that I want you to just think about. Check in with yourself. How did you feel when we talked about each one?

And if there was one that felt especially poignant, that’s where I want you to focus this week. Just that one area. What can you do in that one area to give yourself a little bit more peace and a little bit more white space?

What we need to do as we move forward is we’re going to need to trust ourselves. I need you to trust yourself. Do you feel imbalanced or do you feel something else? Maybe the word you would describe is chaotic, or frantic or unsure or tired. These can show. Even for the most balanced person, but they should be very temporary.

And I wanna say that because [00:09:00] you might be like, well, yeah, this week my calendar is crazy because three things came up that I was not expecting. Or Yeah, you know what? For this week I haven’t slept as much. I haven’t gotten my exercise in, but you know that next week you’re gonna be right back to it because you.

Understand that this is truly temporary. That’s what we want. We’re all going to have moments that are a little bit more crazy. Okay? That is normal, but they should be temporary. It’s when they’re not temporary. It’s when they are continuous that we want to self-examine and we wanna make adjustments. I can tell you.

That the next few days for me are going to be a little more chaotic. I am getting ready to be outta town for two weeks. I am hosting a get together tonight. I am driving. I have a big drive going. Into the city, which is a few hours away from us tomorrow. There is a lot going on in the next few days. I wanna make sure I [00:10:00] have this podcast episode recorded so I can hand it off to my amazing producer.

There’s a lot going on, so right now I wanna tell you, if I was looking at just right now, I’m like, oh yeah, my calendar is a little chaotic. My self-care is a little deprived. I don’t feel like I’m worried about my joy. Uh, maybe I am a little more reactive right now because I’m like, okay, gotta get it done.

Gotta get it done. There’s a little less intention, although I will say I am taking moments to think about the intention that I wanna set for those two weeks that I’m out of town. So I am thinking about that. So just know in this moment right now as I am recording this, I could say, oh, I’ve, I’ve seen a few red flags, but I also understand that they are very temporary.

I know that this is only because in 72 hours. I’m gonna be gone for two weeks, so you know there’s a lot to do right now. That is normal human life. I just wanna make sure we understand that normal human [00:11:00] life is that there are moments of chaos.

There can even be moments of hustle. I just want them to be temporary so that you can have a lot of other moments that feel peaceful, joyful, good. They just feel good. So if chaos is your personal mascot, then getting back into. So if you’re in a moment and it’s temporary, okay, it’s temporary. But if chaos is your personal mascot, then getting back into balance should be the goal.

Here’s what I want you to remember. Balance is not about doing more. It is about noticing more. It’s noticing the signs that something’s off before you hit the wall. And if one, or even all of these five signs felt a little too familiar today, don’t use that as fuel for guilt.

Use it as your invitation. Your life is not meant to feel chaotic by default. That is the message that I want women to [00:12:00] understand. Your value is not in your busyness. Your life does not need to feel chaotic by default. It is meant to feel aligned, intentional, and deeply yours.

And the beautiful thing is getting back into ballots doesn’t require a total overhaul. It starts with very small, deliberate choices to take back your time, your energy, and your peace. So next week we’re gonna go deeper. We’re gonna talk about overwhelm, and I really do feel like overwhelm is the very big, loud, scary sister of imbalance.

And we’re gonna talk about how to stop it before it stops you. So this week, my invitation to you is just to notice. Where is your balance tipping? What small shifts could help bring you back? Because awareness is always the first step toward change always. So you’ve heard the five red flags. You’ve thought about how you felt as you [00:13:00] heard each one, and I want you to now just spend the week noticing, noticing where you see the tipping happen, when you feel the tipping happen, and then just look for small changes, maybe one single flag that you could work on.

And then within that one flag, what are small changes that you could work on?

Chaos should not be your default. Balance absolutely is your birthright. You deserve to feel joy. You deserve to feel peace, and you deserve to have white space in your life. That is your. You are right, and I hope that you hear that. I hope you believe that. And more than anything, I hope you know that it is possible.

It is possible. And I know that because I was the most out of balance, overwhelmed, burnt out working mama you could imagine. I was able to [00:14:00] shift. I was able to change everything. I was able to find balance. That moment in the ambulance happened in 2013, maybe 2014. The point is we are talking a very, very long time ago.

I am over a decade into being able to say. I have enough time and there was a, there was a a period of my life where time and I were enemies. There was so much scarcity around time. I never felt like I had enough time for everything, let alone to think about exercising or getting eight hours of sleep. So that’s why we’re gonna talk about overwhelm next week.

But for this week, just focus on noticing, notice those tipping points so that you can have more balance in your life.