Let's Think About It Podcast

Episode 60: Protect Your Energy at Work - How to Lead Yourself When Burnout Hits

• Morice Mabry • Season 2 • Episode 60

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Episode Summary:

In Episode 60, Coach Mo steps into the Inner Arena to answer real-world leadership questions from listeners who are barely hanging on. From Stacy, a higher ed leader feeling invisible and depleted, to Kevin, a senior healthcare manager stuck on autopilot — this episode dives deep into what it really means to lead yourself when your tank is empty.

Coach Mo unpacks the invisible cost of emotional over-functioning, the warning signs of energy leaks, and how to use simple but powerful resets to plug the drain. If you’ve been giving your all and still feeling “not enough,” this episode is your wake-up call — and your reset button.

Key Takeaways:

  • Energy Protection isn’t self-care fluff — it’s leadership armor.
    Learning to pause, breathe, and reset lets you reclaim power when emotions threaten to take the wheel.
  • Rep Resets (Coach Mo’s signature breathwork tool) are a 3-minute solution to ground you under pressure and reset your leadership energy in the moment.
  • Your inner critic gets louder when your values are violated.
    That exhaustion you feel? It’s often not from what you’re doing — it’s from how far you’ve drifted from what matters to you.
  • If you’re people-pleasing your way to burnout, you're leaking energy with every “yes” that dishonors your values.
  • Purpose isn’t lost — it’s buried under depletion.
    Kevin’s story shows that the flatline feeling isn’t failure, it’s a signal. Getting your SWAG back (Self-awareness, Why power, Aligned actions, Grit) starts by identifying what shifted.

Listener Questions Answered:

  • Stacy, Director of Academic Affairs (Higher Ed)
    “How do I protect my emotional energy without letting people down or checking out completely?”
    → Coach Mo breaks down the dangers of emotional overfunctioning, silent resentment, and how to use Rep Resets + Energy SWOTs to get grounded again.
  • Kevin, Senior Ops Manager (Healthcare)
    “How do I reconnect with my purpose when I feel emotionally flat?”
    → Coach Mo walks him through the “Why Power” diagnostic — part of the SWAG framework — and how to identify the exact values no longer being honored.
Speaker 1:

Welcome to the let's Think About it podcast, where we embark on a journey of thoughtfulness and personal growth. I'm your host, coach Mo, and I'm here to guide you through thought-promoting discussions that will inspire you to unlock your full potential. In each episode, we'll explore a wide range of topics, from self-discovery and mindfulness to goal-setting and achieving success. Together, we'll challenge conventional thinking and dive deep into the realms of possibility. Whether you're looking to find clarity in your personal or professional life, or seeking strategies to overcome obstacles, this podcast is your go-to source for insightful conversations and practical advice. So find a comfortable spot, chill and let's embark on this journey of self-improvement together. Remember, the power of transformation lies within you, and together we'll uncover the tools and insights you need to make it happen. So let's dive in. Welcome to another episode of the let's Think About it podcast. I'm your host, coach Mo, and today we're going to change it up a little bit. I'm going to answer questions from you. Some of you reached out to me and had some questions pertaining to just a variety of topics that we have, and I picked a few questions that I want to answer here on the podcast, which I'm going to focus on the theme around energy protection and leading self, because that's really important to me and I talk a lot about that and it ties to some of the questions that came in. But what exactly is energy protection? And we show up every single day giving energy to things that we shouldn't be giving it to, like worrying about things we have no control. That's one example in how we give our energy to places and things that we have no control over. It affects us in how we show up and lead ourselves right. It affects us because when the worry is present, when the doubt is present, you're not your authentic self. Okay, you carry certain emotional baggage and your stamina is just drained dealing with this. So here's what I mean.

Speaker 1:

So I'm going into this coaching session, the person that I'm working with, my client, immediately jumps on the call. I'm excited. She doesn't look right. I'm like what's going on? And she's like give me a minute, Cool, I can tell something was up right. So the first thing I said let's do a reset, before she even told me what was going on. Let's do a reset. So just to give you guys a visual of that is you take a deep breath, inhale for four seconds, hold it for four seconds, exhale for four seconds and hold it for four seconds. We do that about a cycle of five or six times. But what I do, though, also is here's something that you can try with this too when I had the client inhaling, I had them inhale affirmations like power, abundance, gratitude, giving whatever right On a positive side. Then, as they exhale out the worry, the doubt, the fear, the frustration, the chaos, whatever they're feeling right. So we did that for about three minutes, right Before I even started the session. She immediately felt feeling right. So we did that for about three minutes right Before I even started the session. She immediately felt better, right, immediately. What's going on?

Speaker 1:

So she was really disappointed about and some of you can relate to this you give your all at work and you show up trying to be the best version of yourself, giving to the team, giving to your supervisor, doing whatever you can do to be the best version of yourself, giving your all. We've all had those situations where we do that, and then we get a performance evaluation and it's not up to par according to our supervisor's likings. So that's what we were dealing with here A high-level supervisor who shows up and they do all that they can do to help their team grow, move forward and everything. In this situation, this person, this leader, received feedback that was very unfavorable. It broke her down. I reaffirmed with her anyone in your shoes who give their all the way that you do and get that type of feedback that you're not good enough will feel disappointed, sad, distraught, upset, angry, all of those emotions. She was like you're absolutely right, mo, because that's how I feel right now. Absolutely, you feel like that. We all would feel like that in that situation.

Speaker 1:

I said but let me ask you this question. And then she was just like yeah, I said I asked what's your intent as a leader? She said my intent as a leader. I said yeah, what's your intent as a leader? She replied I want my team to be the best. I want to be supportive for them. I want to help them grow. I want to make sure that we are very collaborative.

Speaker 1:

She said all of these things right. I said it sounds like you have high value in teamwork, collaboration, communication and just to name a few. Is that correct? And she was like absolutely. I said it makes total sense. Then she was like what do you mean? I said think about it. You're showing up with all of these types of values that's very endeared to you and what you're trying to inject into your team, and then your boss tells you that you're not doing X, y, z Right.

Speaker 1:

So in that moment, and tell me if I'm right or wrong, are those values being violated? She said absolutely, I didn't think of it that way. I said, yeah, let's look at that. If you show up and you're trying to do your best to be very collaborative, promote teamwork, and someone tells you you're not doing it and you're not doing it well enough, you felt undervalued because your value was violated. So now you're leaking energy. You're leaking because now judgment's present, judgment of self that you have no control over in that moment. Because when that judgment is present, you're thinking worst case scenario, based on this person's supervisor's feedback, you take it, you endure it and you actually believe it. But it's just a judgment from the supervisor, right?

Speaker 1:

And I asked her what clarifying questions did you ask once you were told you were not good enough? She said I didn't ask any clarifying questions, I just took it and got really upset. Absolutely, you did. That's the normal response when you get discouraging information you react. The emotional response in that moment of acting wasn't favorable. So you got very emotional upset. Absolutely I did. It wasn't a response to that and I said in that moment what were your thoughts? I'm not good enough. I got to be better Frustration. So now I asked her how big and how loud was the inner critic getting? The inner critic was getting very loud. She said I kept blaming myself. The inner critic was reinforcing it. It was saying I told you I shouldn't be putting much time into trying to help my team because they're not going to care anyway. I said how true is that? She said it feels really true now, absolutely it does. But is it? She says no, I know it doesn't.

Speaker 1:

I said before we started this talk we had a reset. How powerful was that? She says man, I was very emotional doing the reset coming in. It just calmed me. I said how beneficial would that have been when you had received the information about your performance at that moment she's like, oh my goodness. I think now, looking back on it, I wish I knew to do this and I would have done it. That's how we protect our energy. That's just one tool of what we can do. Long story short, I'm not going to go through the whole coaching session.

Speaker 1:

But rep resets are key ingredients for energy protection. It regrounds us when we are experiencing energy leaks. Energy leak is when we're carrying unnecessary energy and it starts to pour out that we shouldn't be carrying. Think of that overwhelming feeling that we have at times and how draining that feels. What's your plan to make that draining energy go away? Most don't have a plan, so it's leaking. We're leaking this energy, it's draining us.

Speaker 1:

A rep reset like plugs the holes in the cracks and it brings you back. Having the awareness to know you're leaking energy is key. How do you know when you're leaking energy? When you feel overwhelmed, when you feel frustrated, when you feel guilt, when you feel burnout, when you feel doubtful all of those are key triggers and indicators demonstrates you are losing energy in those moments Think about it Moments when you're down on yourself, frustrated, worried, gotta make a decision and conflicted, all of those different things. How draining does it become over time? You're leaking energy and the quickest way is to do a reset, the breathing exercise, okay, so let's do this.

Speaker 1:

Let's get into some questions that came through. Okay. So here we go. We got this question from Stacey. She's from Atlanta. Stacey looks like she's a director of academic affairs. She's a higher ed. She's a new listener. Thank you, stacey, for chiming in.

Speaker 1:

Here's a question that says Coach Mo, I've been in higher education for 18 years and I'm starting to feel the cost of always being on Between back-to-back meetings, faculty politics and the emotional toll of student advocacy. I go home completely depleted. I'm also navigating menopause and trying not to lose my mind every time I'm interrupted during a thought. Everyone sees me as grounded and reliable, but inside I feel invisible and exhausted. How do I protect my emotional energy without letting people down or checking out completely First off? Stacey, thank you for reaching out, thank you for your honesty. That's an excellent question and let me just remind you that, as a coach, I don't give advice, because the answer is always within you. So my role is to guide you to a place where you regain your energy and protect your energy.

Speaker 1:

So, with that being said, ask yourself where are you leaking energy? What that means is where are you giving energy that doesn't serve your values or your role? So think about that. When you're honest with yourself and can effectively answer that question, you can start to pinpoint where that energy is leaking. My question that I would ask you is number one. Are you a people pleaser Because that's what it sounds like that there's a lot of yeses, you're saying yes a lot and within a yes there's always opportunities for no, and with no's it can be opportunity to protect your energy.

Speaker 1:

So if you're showing up to be and being a yes person, unintentionally, that's draining within itself. Where in those yeses, where are you leaking energy? Where are you giving energy that doesn't serve your values or your role? If you can answer that, you're moving steps toward protecting your energy without necessarily checking out, because it's not about checking out, it's about protecting your energy With the need to fulfill everyone around you, that's an indicator of a lot of yeses. And then, when you're not able to fulfill certain yeses, I can see guilt coming from that and with guilt you're carrying that overwhelming energy, which is energy leaks. That creates the drain on top of what you're dealing with physically and going through menopause, right. So you got to stop.

Speaker 1:

Pause, small pauses, day in and day out. That's what preserves your leadership power. The mini pauses I did a rep reset, whatever you want to call it. You do that. You're regrounding yourself. It takes about three minutes. So that's one thing, or you can introduce a certain tool that I use. It's called the Core Energy SWOT Analysis, where we look at, from an energy viewpoint, the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats, and this way you can just get a quick assessment of how your energy is really being distributed, what's the strengths and how you maximize your energy. Where are the opportunities of identifying the opportunities of where you can start to regain some of your energy? Where are you giving out too much of your energy? At? That's where the weaknesses will be Then what are the consistent threats? That's killing your energy, and being able to journal that through this tool is powerful. That's something that I use with clients. I actually use this in a membership. It's called the Inner Arena. That'll be coming out very soon and that's an important tool that we'll be using there, so I hope that helps.

Speaker 1:

Another question this is from Kevin Kevin's from Dallas. He's a senior ops manager in healthcare. He says I lead a regional healthcare operation team and manage 60 plus staff. Lately I've been on autopilot. I still show up, still get things done, but I don't feel anything about it. I used to be passionate. Now I just want to go home and sit in the dark. How do I get back in touch with my purpose when I feel so emotionally flat man, kevin, I hear you, bro, I hear you. It's like most people. They get into their positions, they're riding high, they're excited, they have passion and they run out of steam. They burn out. That's your nervous system asking for relief. That's good news. The numbness is the signal. It's the signal. I think it was three, four episodes ago.

Speaker 1:

Talk about the leadership swag. I did a podcast on it. What the swag is? The S is self-awareness, the W is Y power, the A is aligned actions and the G is grit swag. You've lost your swag, and particularly the Y power. The Y power reconnecting to your core purpose, the mission that fuels your courage and your commitment. You're missing that, kevin. You're missing the why power. How do you reclaim your swag? There's moments where you need to just pause. What's important? Why are you doing what you do? Why does it matter? What was different about the moment when you had your swag versus where you are today? What's shifted right? What value is being violated?

Speaker 1:

Start with identifying what values are very important to you and it's very simple. You can use chat GPT, have it list 50 values. Of those 50 values, identify the top 10 that are important to you and then prioritize them one through five. Go one through five. Then you got your top five values. When you identify those five values, are they being honored in your role right now as a senior ops manager? If they're not, that's why. That's why you're on autopilot your why power, that W in swag, why power it's missing, to get the swag back. You got to identify your why power, to identify the why power. You got to find those values, what's important, what's not being honored. Identify that and then, when you can identify what's being honored, you get your swag back. That's how it works, brother, that's how it works, man.

Speaker 1:

But I hear you, though. I hear you and it's tough. It's a tough spot and especially managing 60 staff members. I can imagine people pulling you in different ways. But there was a point in your career where you was excited. You had this passion. Where did it shift? What tweaked? What made your why power diminish? Identify that. When you can identify that, you get your swag back and with your swag, you regain your purpose. So that's what I would recommend, starting with identifying your why power.

Speaker 1:

So I'm going to pause there. Those are some powerful questions that were asked and I thank you, because leadership today isn't about what you do. It's about how you manage your energy and how you lead yourself under pressure, because, at the end of the day, the world isn't going to pause. The chaos isn't going to stop. You have to protect your energy and hopefully, going through some of these questions, I gave you some ideas of how you could get your energy back, protect your energy and lead self. Remember, it's all about that self-awareness being able to pause, breathe, visualize and act. Most importantly, when you can do that, you're taking strides and protecting your energy. So until next time, protect your energy, lead yourself, take care.

Speaker 1:

Thank you for joining me in this episode of let's Think About it. Your time and attention are greatly appreciated. If you found value in today's discussion, I encourage you to subscribe on your favorite podcast platform. Remember, the journey of self-improvement is ongoing and I'm here to support you every step of the way. Connect with me on social media for updates and insights. You can find me on Instagram and Facebook at Coach Mo Coaching or LinkedIn at Maurice Mabry, or visit my website at mauricemabrycom for exclusive content. Until next time, keep reflecting, keep growing and, most importantly, keep believing in yourself. Remember, the most effective way to do it is to do it Together. We're making incredible strides toward a better and more empowered you. So thank you, and I'll see you in our next episode.