3 Steps to Cultivate Resilience & Retention: How to Navigate High-Functioning Anxiety in Leadership

“And that’s because high-functioning anxiety can be a powerful alert system. And it’s really, as you know, your mind’s way of tapping you on the shoulder and saying, hey, something needs your attention here.” ~Dr. Lisa Hartwell

Aloha and welcome,

Ever felt like you’re on top of the world, but inside you’re paddling furiously just to stay afloat? That’s high-functioning anxiety, and it’s more common among high-achievers than you might think!

In this episode of Anxiety Ease, I’m going to share my 3-prong approach to navigating high-functioning anxiety in leadership. 

This is a portion of a workshop I will deliver to the National Center for Victims of Crime conference in Portland, Oregon on September 19, 2024.

Leaders in trauma and victim services...you’re not alone! Cultivating resilience is key. Take time to pause and recharge regularly. 

It’s not just essential, it’s transformative.

Mahalo for listening and be sure to reach out to learn about my new leadership workshop,
Dr. Hartwell

Episode Links:

Stop the Insomnia! Here's it is: Sleep Without Overthinking: A Professional’s 3-Step Mini-Guide to Sleep and Success (even) with High Functioning Anxiety. It includes a training video, guided imagery meditation, and easy tracker system to help you eliminate overthinking. It's time to finally enjoy the peaceful slumber you deserve. Let's unlock the secret to stop the mind chatter as soon as your head hits the pillow. Click here to purchase for only $9 introductory price.

Get your copy of Dr. Hartwell's new book, Cultivating Professional Success: Even When High Functioning Anxiety Drives You To The Edge at www.drlisahartwell.com

Enroll in my FREE Hartwell Anxiety Assessment: www.hartwellanxietyassessment.com

Want to connect?

Follow me on Instagram: @drlisahartwellanxietyreslience

Join my supportive community for ambitious professionals and business owners who struggle with overwhelm & high-functioning anxiety: https://www.facebook.com/drlisahartwell

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Transcript

“And that’s because high functioning anxiety can be a powerful alert system. And it’s really, as you know, your mind’s way of tapping you on the shoulder and saying, hey, something needs your attention here.”


Aloha. Hello, my fellow high achievers. I wanted to let you know that I created a really fun little easy three step process for you to help you have better sleep success. Quieting your busy mind at night. Stop that overthinking the minute your head hits the pillow. And I totally get it.
And waking up the next day refreshed and ready to go and not feeling so exhausted and possibly not necessarily needing three or four cups of coffee to even get you going in the
morning. But a concept, right? So I have a three step process that I walk folks through, and I wanted to create something that was very simple three step mini guide for you, and I'm going to put the link in the show notes for you. But honestly, I price it less than a cup of coffee.
So, let's walk you through and learn how to reset a new mindset about how to think about sleep. And I included a restful resilience meditation for you, as well as a very easy process that I use of bullet journaling. That's really going to teach you very quickly how to sleep better and get to the core very quickly about why you're not sleeping. This usually takes about an average of three days with my clients that I work with, but I give you about seven days to really work through this process.Go ahead and click on the link in the show notes and happy sleeping.


Hey everyone, welcome back to anxiety ease.I'm your host, doctor Lisa Hartwell,today I'm super excited to share with you that next week I'll be speaking at the National center for Victims of. Crime conference in beautiful Portland, Oregon on September 19, 2024 which is about four and a half hours from where I grew up in Ashland, Oregon. So I'm excited to be back in my childhood state and meet up with some of my longtime friends from childhood there and hang out with them for a while as well. But I'm excited to be there.


This is my fourth time speaking for them over the course of about ten years. So they are my peeps. I enjoy getting together with them and talking and networking and collaborating with all the professionals that work with victims of crimes. So it's a really amazing organization that does
a lot of amazing things for both victims and the criminal justice system. So let's dive in.


I want to kind of get straight to it. I just wanted to share with you a little bit about what I'm talking about. As far as my workshop, it's title is cultivating resilience and a three prong approach to navigate high functioning anxiety in leadership and unveiling its role in self care on the road to burnout and victim services.


And. Phew, that's a mouthful. I know. Typical, you know, academics like long titles for their things, so. So that's why the podcast episode title is quite short.


But trust me, it's packed with valuable insights and practical strategies. And I thought I would just kind. of hop on here and share with you what I'm going to be talking about, because I am right now, as during the conference, I'm going to be working on setting up a coaching program for leaders and leadership for folks that work, especially in the criminal justice system, and how to manage themselves. And like I said, on the road to burnout and how to create better teams. And I have a framework that I use. So let's talk about the topic and. And let me tell you a story. This is pretty typical of a lot of the professionals that I work with, especially those working in victim services, or trauma services at that and, you know, it could be anybody, but,you know, these high achieving professionals and I this one in particular, I'm thinking her name was Sasha and she was always, always on top of her game and.beneath, always looking put together a very polished exterior. She was always, always grappling with high functioning anxiety. And that is typical of a lot of us that work intrauma environments and criminal justice because of the pressure and the stress and kind of crossing. Your t's and dotting your is on a daily basis. And many ambitious professionals and leaders experience a silent struggle. And I always say it's kind of like they're swans. They're calm and serene on the surface. But underneath the water you don't see. Their feet, their little paddles, you know. Their webbed feet paddling furiously underneath. 

And that's why this topic is so important and I love speaking about it. And helping folks navigate with a very specific framework. And that's because high functioning anxiety can. Be a powerful alert system. And it's really, as, you know, your mind's way of tapping you on the shoulder and saying, hey, something needs your attention here. And in the workshop that I'm going to be speaking in Portland about talking about this three prong approach to managing this particular specific kind of anxiety.


And I always say, imagine it like a three legged stool. And if you take away one leg, the stool is going to topple over. And the same goes for our approach. each prong is essential for stability and balance. And so really what I have done in this workshop and what I'm going to be rolling out in my program is really talking about three very specific steps. And that first step is focusing on reset.


And this is all about permission to pause and recharge. When we work in these environments, it's very difficult to take time and remember that we have to actually schedule and give ourselves permission to pause and recharge.So we can keep ourselves at baseline functioning.


If we don't. That's what happens with high functioning anxiety, is when you get triggered because you don't have it all day long. It's really only when you get triggered that, you know, you're the, oh, I forgot to keep myself at baseline. And I always, when I work with clients, have them do a gauge for me on, you know, on a scale of zero to ten. And I say, if you're always, if you're operating always at a, you know, eight, nine and ten for most of your day, you don't have much bandwidth Or leeway to have things happen and so you really want to take.


Time and give yourself permission to reset, give yourself permission to pause and recharge and keep that anxiety anchored down between. A, probably a two and a three is pretty average. And that should be your goal for where you're reaching for, to keep things stable pretty much all day. 
When I do this step with folks. What I do is I actually engage people by using nature inspired metaphors. 

And those of you that don't know. Me, I use an apple orchard metaphor. And this illustrates how 
seasons of growth require moments of pause and renewal. And I take folks through a very specific guided imagery, reflection type of meditation to help them really identify the root causes of their overwhelm and overthinking that contributes to this difficulty. Keeping yourself anchored and grounded, you know, at that two or three level all day long. I usually split people up into small groups and have them have small discussions about where they can share their personal experiences. How they feel stuck and how they've attempted to reset in the past and what's worked. We always want to emphasize what's worked and then, of course, what hasn't worked.


And then I take them through step two. And I have labeled this as refresh, which is really about clearing the mental clutter and gaining clarity. And this is about using science based strategies to get really this refreshing perspective. Including techniques to reduce mental clutter. And then you get to make informed decisions with confidence throughout your day. I walk people through discussing how cyclical situational anxiety often leads to high functioning anxiety, how this impacts your leadership and your teams, and really with the focus, just like nature, the point is to help yourself before you can help others. What happens if you're disconnected from that and you're not keeping yourself grounded throughout the day? You are always going to send everything.


Through your own filter and not have perspective of what's really in front of you. And so it's really about taking care of yourself before you take care of your team. But at the same time, when you're in leadership, sometimes you forget to do that. And you have to schedule in and do that with intention, essentially. Right.


And then the third step that I take folks through is this idea of just renewal, And this is about igniting your passion and purpose for why you're doing what you're doing. And I take people through a very  specific method to reconnect them with their passion and purpose for being in leadership, for working and doing the tough work working with amazing teams and really tailoring it is the key to what your individual needs are. One size does not fit all. There has to be a personalized technique for you to renew your focus. And there has to be a personalized technique that works for you as far as taking action. And during the workshop, what I do is I walk folks through, you know, what does it mean to draft an action plan that integrates the ability to reset, refresh and renew in their daily routines, focusing on rewiring their neurobiology and. Basically renewing their commitment to their purpose.


Because that is their true anchor. And what I always do is I offer folks time to, you know, time to spend with me after the conference. The conference is actually three and a half days, so it's a very long conference. And like I said, I know this, this group, and it's really fun to be able to talk to them about what it means to have resilience building and thinking of that as like this. Inner rubber band that it stretches and bends, but it never breaks. And we explore how to strengthen that rubber bands so it can handle the pressures of leadership, especially within victim services.


And whenever we talk about, you know, strategies, everybody's looking for strategies and frameworks and all that. And I always talk about at some point, yes, we can have the guardrails of strategy, but really seeking perfection is really an illusion. And I want them to shift to retaining their peace of mind. That isn't just about the prevention of something,that is prevention of burnout, but it's more about how do we live. 


For each day that contributes to the bigger picture and it's always about finding that sweet spot 
productivity really truly meets joy and your passion for doing the work and just emphasizing to folks that self care and taking care of yourself and growing yourself before you grow others, you know, isn't always just about, you know taking a bubble bath at the end of the day or, you know, taking one day off, even though those are amazing. It's really about creating sustainable habits that nurture your mind, body and your spirit. And much like tending to your garden or in my metaphor, your orchard and regular care every single day, sometimes multiple times a day, leads to beautiful orchards. And I always say that it's really fun to work together on these things. And whenever we have a collective consciousness to go in the right direction and with a mindset of growth and a mindset of growing forward, you can never ever go wrong.


And I am so excited to show up and share my insights with folks in Portland next week. I look so forward to being away and creating new programs for you folks as well. So you take care and I will see you after next week.


Aloha.