Your life looks good on paper. The business is working. The relationships are there. You're doing everything you're supposed to do. But something feels off, and you can't quite explain why.

In this episode, I share the story of a night that changed everything for me. A few months after my son was born, I found myself overwhelmed, disconnected, and carrying the feeling that I was dropping the ball in every area of my life. Instead of trying to fix it, I locked myself in a room with a notebook and got honest about what was really going on.

I talk about what happened when I stopped performing okay, why awareness was more powerful than problem solving, and how that one moment became the beginning of so many changes that followed.

Reflection from this episode:

• What would change if you stopped trying to fix how you feel and simply let yourself be honest about it?

If you've been carrying a feeling that something isn't right, even when life looks fine from the outside, this conversation is for you.

Work with me:

1. The Leaders Table: https://www.samanthapenkoff.com/leaders-table
2. Breakthrough Intensive - You already know you should slow down, delegate more, stop overcommitting & be emotionally present. So why can't you? That's what we figure out in 90 minutes + integration call 1 week later. Book your Breakthrough
3. Exhale: Private Coaching - For women ready to do this work until it sticks and you can't revert back. 3 open spots: Work with me

Connect with Sam: Instagram | Facebook

Hello, hello. Welcome back to Beyond Awareness. This is the podcast where we close the gap between knowing what you want to do or what you quote unquote should be doing to actually doing it. And my whole belief system is that it is more than just problem solving and finding the next tool to actually do the thing. We actually uncover

the belief beneath the thing that's keeping you in the same cycle and keeping you stuck not doing the thing. Because once you understand that belief and start to untangle it and under s like truly understand it, question it.

That's where it gets really interesting, really fun. But also things just become so much more clear. And you might not really want what you thought you wanted, like that thing that you wanted to do, you might not want that. Or it just becomes so clear on how to actually do that. And today I wanted to actually share with you.

Team that I was running, my income was great. We had moved, my partner and I had moved from Maine, which I loved, to the Outer Banks, which wasn't so great just in terms of we didn't have any family or friends there. but you know, then I had my son in October, and everything just seemed like it was falling into place. But at the same time, especially after my son was born, it was just like something shifted.

And I remember sitting on the couch one night right next to my partner and just feeling like something was inside of me that needed to come out. I didn't know what it was. I didn't know like how to say it. I didn't even know what I would say if I opened my mouth. I didn't feel like I was struggling or failing. I didn't feel like I was failing as a mom or anything like that. I was just kind of

Blank, like almost gone from my own life, like going through the motions. And so that was when I did look over to my husband at the time and I was like, I'm gonna go journal. And I went and grabbed a random notebook and locked myself in our spare bedroom. And I did that because I wasn't sure what emotions were going to come out. I wasn't sure if I was going to cry, if I was.

gonna scream in the my pillow like my mom taught me when I was young. I didn't know what was gonna happen. And I just wanted a s a safe space really to just write whatever wanted to come out and to have whatever emotions that were going to come up and out. And so that's what I did. And I remember writing at the top of the page, I feel like I'm dropping all of the balls. The mom ball, the wife ball, my healthy habits ball, the business ball

Because I wasn't joining like all of the team calls. Like I didn't feel enough in any single area of my life at that point. And this was December, December 17th. And after I journaled about three pages, I look kind of just flipped back through what I wrote. And for the first time, I realized I didn't fix anything. I wrote about really hard things.

And I wrote about thoughts that I was having in my marriage and scary things of like, I really want to do this, but I fear this. And what about this? And really real things. But I didn't try to fix it. I didn't try to solve it or anything like that. I just validated it really. And it felt so good. It felt so refreshing. And I think I did cry in the beginning just because I went into the locked room.

Pretty emotional, but by the end, it felt like a relief. And I didn't try to change anything after that. I still didn't problem solve after that. It was just pure awareness of what was happening in my life and how I was feeling. And I truly think it was the first time that I wasn't trying to be this like positive Sam, the toxic positivity. It was when I put away that hat and thought it's okay to not be okay, which we hear all the time.

But I don't know that we'd really let ourselves feel that. And so that was the opening for me of understanding what was happening inside and why I was feeling overwhelmed, why I was feeling not enough. And then from there, okay, well, what do I actually want? How do I want to feel? How do I want my business to feel? How do I want my relationship to feel?

Everything slowly but surely started to open up. And so The awareness of my feelings was only the beginning. It was just like the door that opened up everything else that came from it and that came of my life right now, which is amazing.

in d so many different aspects. And what changed that night wasn't this like massive shift. And then I got my divorce and then I started a new business. And then I became this super present mom. That's not what it was like. What it was the the change was starting to do things differently in the sense of when I felt off and when I felt like, hmm, this feels

Different, I stopped performing okay. I stopped performing like it's okay, I'm fine. No, I'm good. I started asking for things. Like I remember my husband had a job where he said that he needed to sleep separately all week long. And so I was the one sleeping with Griffin all week long as a newborn upstairs. And then he was getting perfect dreamy sleep downstairs. And I started asking.

For if I could sleep alone on the weekends. You know, could have done it differently, but that was like a huge moment for me. And then there was another day I'm remembering now that I woke up and I was just sad. Like for no reason. And maybe it was postpartum depression. I don't, I honestly don't think I really had that. But it there was this one day where I like I had this deep ache.

Which I've never felt before. And it was only one day. And I let myself feel it. And I let myself cry. And I opened up to my husband about it, which I had never done before. I had always tried to like hide that or be okay, right? Like performing okay. And I stopped doing that. That night was when I stopped, you know, pulling a blind o f over everybody else's eyes as to how I was feeling.

And when I did that, the overwhelm that I was feeling in all areas of my life didn't disappear. And I always tell my clients now the goal is not to like ever not feel overwhelmed or not feel stressed, not feel anxiety. The goal is to have a process to work through it and work through it quickly. So that night, too, it's not like overwhelmed disappeared, but it had somewhere to go that wasn't my body. So

For you, if you can relate to any aspect of this, maybe the overwhelm, or maybe just feeling like your life from the outside is great, but on the inside, it's like, ⁓ you're feeling like there's something there. You might not know what it is, or maybe you know exactly what it is. Maybe you have this desire to go for more, or you feel like you should want to go for more, but you don't really want to, whatever it is. I invite you to just stop performing.

This feeling and facade of being okay, of having it all together, really. Stop performing, having it all together long enough to be honest with yourself. And maybe for you it's not writing. Maybe for you it is. Maybe you can just go in and journal, lock yourself in a room. But also, it could just be saying it out loud in the car to yourself or in a voice note or telling a friend, telling someone that you trust.

The real answer when they ask how you are, or just asking yourself, what do I really want? Or if that feels too big, how do I really want my day today to feel or to be? How do I really want to be treated? How would I love my clients to feel about me? How would I love to show up to my client meetings? So, so kind of like pick apart your day and ask, especially if there's an area that you don't love.

dissect that and start asking questions. I love asking questions. If you want to dive into it with me, feel free. Links in the show notes to work with me. But the more honest you can be with yourself, the better your life will be. Full disclosure, I'm still working on this. I just got a book about boundaries actually. And I'm I'm realizing and and knew this about myself. I'm still not super honest. I'm working on being more vocal about my needs, but I've gotten so much better and it all stemmed

From this night, that I got really honest about how I was feeling and what was happening and didn't immediately jump to problem solving. So that is a little bit about my story and how I got started. And I hope that it inspires you if you are in a similar space, knowing that honesty and facing the hard feelings and hard situations that you might currently be going through truly is the first step.

to coming out on the other side. Thank you for tuning in this week and I will see you on Thursday for a strategic journaling episode. See you then.