High-Functioning. High-Pressure. Completely Dysregulated.

Leadership Burnout Isn’t a Capacity Problem — It’s a Nervous System One

There was a season where, on paper, I looked like I was thriving, and by most metrics - I was!

I was leading projects. Supporting clients. Holding space for teams. Creating, designing, mentoring — doing meaningful work that mattered deeply to me.

And yet, behind the scenes, my body was quietly unravelling.

My shoulders were permanently tight. My breath sat high in my chest. I woke up tired even after a full night’s sleep. Brain fog crept in where clarity used to live. My nervous system felt constantly “on edge,” scanning for the next problem to solve, the next person to support, the next crisis to navigate - although I didn’t know any of the language to identify this, or even that this was ‘a thing’!

I told myself it was normal.

Because when you’re a high-achiever, burnout doesn’t always look like collapse. Sometimes it looks like competence. Productivity. Capacity.

Sometimes it looks like being the one everyone leans on — while you’re privately dealing with chronic stress, leadership exhaustion, anxiety symptoms, and emotional burnout that no one else can see, and maybe you don’t even see if yourself!

Sometimes it looks like high-functioning burnout.

And sometimes it looks like a nervous system stuck in survival mode.

The Hidden Stress Loop of Leadership

One of the biggest myths about leadership is that burnout is caused by “too much work.”

In my experience — both personally and through trauma-informed somatic coaching — that’s rarely the full story.

Burnout often happens when your nervous system stays locked in stress responses for too long:

• Constant decision-making keeps your body in low-grade fight or flight

• Responsibility creates hypervigilance — always scanning for risk or failure

• Emotional labour leads to quiet overwhelm and compassion fatigue

• Pressure to perform disconnects you from your body’s signals

• Work stress begins to affect your physical health, sleep, and mood

Your brain might be functioning brilliantly… while your nervous system is completely exhausted.

And when your body never feels safe enough to downshift, even rest stops working.

Weekends don’t restore you. Holidays feel like catching up on sleep rather than genuine recovery.

You become functional — but not regulated. Productive — but deeply tired.

This was me - for years.

The Moment I Realised Something Had to Change

I didn’t wake up one morning and decide to prioritise nervous system health.

I hit a wall.

Actually - I didn’t hit it.

I ploughed into it at 100 mph thinking the wall wasn’t even there.

That is how disconnected I was.

The kind where your body starts whispering first — tension, anxiety, pain in joints, digestive issues, fatigue — and when you don’t listen, it gets louder.

Overwhelm became my baseline. My patience shortened. My creativity — usually one of my strongest leadership tools — began to fade. I felt constantly wired yet exhausted, unable to fully switch off even when work stopped.

That was the turning point.

Not because I suddenly had less responsibility. But because I began to understand that sustainable leadership isn’t about pushing harder — it’s about learning how to lead from regulation instead of survival.

What Somatic Trauma-Informed Leadership Actually Means

Somatic, trauma-informed work changed everything for me.

It taught me that leadership doesn’t just happen in your thoughts or strategies — it happens through your body because your body carries everything: stress, pressure, past experiences, unprocessed emotion, and the invisible load of responsibility.

Your nervous system isn’t just reacting to today’s workload — it’s responding through the lens of everything it has learned about safety, threat, and survival.

And that shapes:

• How you respond to pressure and workplace stress

• How you handle conflict and difficult conversations

• Whether you react from urgency or respond with grounded clarity

• How psychologically safe people feel in your presence

• How clearly you think when overwhelm hits

• How your body holds and processes anxiety, burnout, and emotional load

Somatic trauma-informed leadership means learning to listen to the body’s signals — not override them. Because the tension in your shoulders, the shallow breathing, the racing thoughts, the emotional shutdown, the chronic fatigue… they’re not random.

They’re information your nervous system is carrying, and communicating.

And here’s the powerful part: burnout isn’t a personal failure. It’s often a nervous system that has been working overtime to keep you capable, functioning, and safe for far too long.

It’s been protecting you.

When we begin to notice our somatic signals, we’re not searching for problems — we’re finally listening to the intelligence of a body that has been holding more than we realised.

Somatic trauma-informed leadership means learning to listen to the body’s signals — not override them.

Because the tension in your shoulders, the shallow breathing, the racing thoughts, the emotional shutdown, the chronic fatigue… they’re not random.

They’re information your nervous system is carrying, and communicating.

And here’s the powerful part: burnout isn’t a personal failure. It’s often a nervous system that has been working overtime to keep you capable, functioning, and safe for far too long.

It’s been protecting you.

When we begin to notice our somatic signals, we’re not searching for problems — we’re finally listening to the intelligence of a body that has been holding more than we realised.

Moving from Survival to Sustainable Leadership

The shift didn’t come from working less overnight.

It came from learning to regulate while leading — supporting my nervous system in real time instead of waiting for burnout recovery after the crash.

Small, changes began to rewire my stress responses:

• Pausing long enough and regularly to notice and pay attention when my body felt unsafe or overwhelmed

• Regulating before big conversations instead of powering through anxiety

• Designing my environment — through neuroaesthetics — to reduce sensory overload and chronic stress triggers

• Recognising that overwhelm, irritability, and exhaustion are signals — not weaknesses

• Building micro-moments of nervous system regulation into my workday

And slowly, leadership, and life in general, began to feel different.

More grounded. More spacious. More sustainable.

Not perfect — but regulated enough to thrive rather than just survive.

If You’re a Leader Feeling Burned Out…

You’re not alone — and you’re not broken!

Chronic anxiety, brain fog, poor sleep, tension, irritability, and overwhelm as well a million other responses we can have, are often signs of a nervous system that has been carrying too much for too long.

Sustainable leadership doesn’t start with another productivity strategy, committee meeting, or time-management hack.

It starts with safety in your body.

Because when your nervous system learns how to return to regulation, everything shifts:

Clarity. Presence. Creativity. Emotional capacity. Energy.

Not by doing more — but by leading from a place that is finally rooted and rested.

You’re invited on a journey…

A restorative one.

One that teaches you how to engage with your own Nervous System, your own body, how to hear it, read it and respond to it so that you can be stretched, without the stress.

Through exploring your own world, your surroundings, your responses, your history and your world, you will start to see your story open up and just how much of that story has been facilitated and protected by your body and it’s responses.

Half the battle is courage…

But you’re not alone.

I’d love for you to book a call if you’d like to chat about how to grow in health, home, capacity and resiliance.