Lucy Gernon (00:01.036)
Are you a female leader who is still putting herself last? Today’s question, question, we need a bloopers reel, Ali. You really should cut these out and keep them for bloopers. Actually, please, can you? That would be really fun. Can you keep some of these bloopers if I ever do them? I’m gonna have them. Sorry. Okay.
Are you still putting yourself last as a female leader? Today’s question hits hard. This mistake shows up constantly as postponing your own needs, your own desires, your own development until things calm down. Except spoiler alert, they never do. And that’s why in today’s episode of the 360 Leadership Podcast, I’m revealing the third mistake and the impact it is having on your time, on your leadership, on your family and on your wellbeing.
So tune in to find out what to do about it.
Lucy Gernon (00:57.934)
Hi there and welcome back to another episode of the 360 Leadership Podcast. We are on part three of our five part mini series on the hidden mistakes that high achieving women in senior corporate leadership make that are keeping you stuck in stress, overwhelm and self-doubt. Now, like I said, today’s question is a hard hitting one, but I want you to be honest with yourself. Are you still putting yourself last?
This means you’re probably saying yes to things you want to say no to. You’re postponing things like doing things for yourself, like investing in your development or going to meet a friend for coffee until things calm down. Except do they ever calm down in your role with your life? I see this time and time again with brilliant women leaders.
senior managers, directors, vice presidents, managing directors of companies, and even C-suite executives who are juggling work, family, teams and life. But it comes to investing in themselves, it’s always maybe next year, maybe next quarter. Not the right time. I have this thing. Now, this is what I call the timing trap because it’s perfect, really. It’s your
inner critic and your saboteur is literally telling you it’s not the right time for you to slow down. Something bad is going to happen if you slow down. And this belief is the thing that has you where you are if you’re struggling with work-life balance, if you don’t have enough time, if you don’t feel good in your body and in your mind, it’s because you are putting your attention on other people’s priorities.
This belief that you need things to settle down before you say yes to your own growth. It just is keeping you stuck. So whether you’re working on a restructure or a team change or a new project or some new Trump policy that’s caused chaos in your organization or something at home that’s going on, there will always be a reason to wait.
Lucy Gernon (03:17.41)
Now, in my experience, I’ve had lots of women, lots of podcast listeners too, who have said to me, I really wanted to come and work with you, Lucy. I’ve listened to your podcast. I’ve binge every episode. I absolutely love it. But I didn’t feel like I was ready or work was really busy. I had one lady in particular who said she thought she could do it all on her own from listening to the podcast and God bless her. She tried. She listened. She tried to take action.
But because she didn’t have the full support, the full suite of tools, the full accountability and all of the things that we provide, couldn’t. And what happened was she came and she was in a place where things weren’t great at home. She was completely overwhelmed with everything. And it was all because she thought she was doing the right thing. She wanted to please. She wanted to do a good job. She, you know, she took her career seriously or she still takes her career seriously.
And she didn’t believe that she could actually invest in a time in herself. Never mind the money. It’s usually about the time, right? And now she’s working with me and she has realized that it was all bullshit. have your task and come back to me. If you can’t find one hour for your own development, one hour out of your week, you should be doing 10 because there’s something very wrong with your calendar.
If you can’t carve out space for your wellbeing to go for a walk, to go to the gym, to like take care of yourself, again, that’s not normal. It’s not okay. Like I get frustrated because I was conditioned when I worked in corporate to think that that’s just how it needed to be.
But it doesn’t. If you apply a lot of the principles that I teach you when you work with me, it doesn’t have to be that way. And I have so many case studies to prove it. You’ve got to look beyond your current organization, beyond your current role and really remind, realize that you’re you’re in a culture that maybe does that or maybe it’s not even in your company culture. Maybe that’s a you thing. And you’re just reenacting an old self sabotaging pattern. But I want to tell you today that like
Lucy Gernon (05:27.242)
I fell into this trap too. When I left corporate to start my own business, I realized that I had listened to my very first coach’s podcast, Binge It. I actually was really skinny back then because I used to go for walks and listen to her podcast. I listened to her for about 18 months and I thought I could do it all on my own. And then I realized that there’s only so much I could take from the podcast and implement because I needed personalized guidance. It’s the same with you guys. This is all generic. It’s not personalized to you. And I realized that
I was helping everyone else succeed, but I wasn’t investing in the kind of support that I needed to grow. And the truth is, I probably didn’t think I deserved it. Not probably, I didn’t think I deserved it. I was scared. I didn’t know if I was going to make the right move or all those kinds of things. But when I invested in myself for the first time, like I have never looked back. Now I’ve coaches for everything because I realize it doesn’t have to be as hard as we make it. When you’re a high achieving woman,
When you have ambitions and dreams and you want to make an impact in the world, you don’t have to do it on your own. You shouldn’t be doing it on your own, right? You really shouldn’t be doing it on your own. Really, really, really, you don’t need to. But you do need to take care of yourself. Now, one of our 360 members, let’s call her Laura, she joined after sitting on the fence for nine months. And she kept saying next quarter, she was talking to me in DMs and Instagram. And my team were emailing her and she was inquiring.
all of the things and she just was getting in her own way because really she didn’t she was telling herself this lie that that things were going to calm down but they didn’t calm down and then as usual when she came to me then things had actually got worse so i want you to know that she told me she said i wish i had done this sooner she said i’ve made more progress in the last six weeks than i have in the last two years that’s the power of saying yes to yourself before you’re ready okay
So if you’re not putting yourself last, here’s how it shows up. If you’re multitasking, come on back to me. Number one, you delay taking action until a quieter season that inevitably never comes. You prioritize other people’s needs and other people’s asks before your own. You fear investing in yourself unless it’s a crisis, unless like you really need it. Cause some things you’re like, I can figure it out myself.
Lucy Gernon (07:55.758)
Can you? You say things like, I’ll look into that after this promotion, this project, this trip, this whatever it is. Why does it matter if you’re saying no to yourself? Lovely lady. When you keep putting yourself last, you’re sending a subconscious message that you don’t matter.
Lucy Gernon (08:22.444)
And over time, your confidence and your self-worth begin to erode, your resentment builds and you wonder why you’re stuck. You wonder why you’re stuck. But here’s a reframe for you. The most successful women leaders that I know and I work with plenty of them, guys, plenty of them from the world’s biggest financial institutions to corporate banking.
to, I’m drawing a blank now, pharmaceuticals, tech, SaaS, medtech, legal professionals. These are smart ass biatches, okay? I mean, that we’d love. They’re not the ones who wait for permission. They’re excited and they choose to invest in their own growth, even when things are busy, especially when things are busy, because that’s when you need the support the most. If this resonates with you,
Please don’t wait for the perfect timing. If you’re ready for deeper support, I invite you to join the wait list for our next 360Litres club cohort. You’re going to get, first in line to know when a spot becomes available when we open up doors again, really soon if you’re listening to this live. And I would love for you to experience the kind of support that you deserve. So many of our members love the accountability that we provide because if you fall off the radar and you’re not shown up for the calls,
We have a whole process. In fact, I have a whole SOP for this on how to get you back engaged. Because I care deeply about you getting the results. The girls in 360 tell us that when they see that notification that their strategy power error, oh my God, I can’t talk, the strategy power error pops up. They take the time to sit down and do their strategic thinking. And if they don’t do it that day, it’s still a reminder to do it that week.
When we have our performance optimization and resilience building sessions where we focus on mindset and we focus on like movement and mindfulness, it helps you to de-stress and to build resilience. Then obviously you’ve got me and we’ve got the most amazing group of peer curated group coaching calls where you get to come on a lunch break and leave feeling lighter with more clarity, more connected and a whole lot of information that you can use to help you to thrive as a leader and as a life.
Lucy Gernon (10:47.234)
So I do invite you to apply for the waitlist. What will happen is, is when we open up spots again, you will get a first opportunity to apply to join 360Litres Club. And if you’re offered a spot, if we screen your application and you’re offered a spot, you will have a choice then whether or not you take it. If it doesn’t, if you’ve got like 72 hours to make a decision and if it’s not for you, we give it to somebody else who is ready to take action because…
I’ve had a lot of people waste my time and I’m done with time wasters. I only want to help people who are like, let’s go, I’m ready to rock. I can’t help you if you’re not ready to help yourself, right? So join the wait list if you feel called. And then, lovely lady, tomorrow come back because I’m going to be revealing mistake number four. Now this is one that keeps smart women silently struggling instead of strategically writing. And I cannot wait to share it with you.
And until then, remember, there is no perfect time. Your power lies in acting anyway. You’ve got this, lovey lady, and I’ve got you. See you again tomorrow. Same time, same place. Bye for now.
