This Is Woman's Work with Nicole Kalil - Breaking Free from Unreasonable Expectations and Chronic Guilt with Dr. Jennifer Reid | 428

Episode Date: August 19, 2026

Guilt has become so commonplace in women's lives that many of us barely notice it anymore. It shows up when we set boundaries, ask for help, prioritize our careers, take time for ourselves, or simply admit that we can't do everything. But what if much of that guilt isn't a reflection of our values at all? What if it's the result of impossible expectations we've been conditioned to carry? In this episode of This Is Woman's Work, Nicole Kalil sits down with Dr. Jennifer Reid, psychiatrist, women's behavioral health expert, educator, podcast host, and author of Guilt-Free: Reclaiming Your Life from Unreasonable Expectations. Together, they unpack how guilt functions as a form of social conditioning, why women are especially vulnerable to carrying unreasonable expectations, and how guilt often keeps us focused on fixing ourselves instead of questioning the systems that created those expectations in the first place. In This Episode, Nicole and Dr. Jennifer Discuss: Why guilt can function as a form of social control. How guilt often masks deeper emotions like sadness, disappointment, and fear. Who benefits when women remain trapped in cycles of guilt and over-functioning. Dr. Jennifer's "Guilt Equation" and how expectations create unnecessary guilt. The four unreasonable expectations—or "Four Furies"—that drive guilt for so many women. How comparison widens the gap between expectations and reality. Why women tend to focus on what they're not doing instead of recognizing what they are doing well. Why the myth of "having it all" continues to fuel guilt and burnout. Dr. Jennifer's SPEAK framework for recognizing and responding to guilt. How to identify recurring guilt triggers and challenge the thoughts behind them. Healthy ways to establish and maintain boundaries without unnecessary guilt. How to navigate relationships with people who resist or ignore boundaries. The difference between healthy guilt that encourages growth and unhealthy guilt that keeps women small. Why letting go of unreasonable guilt is an act of resistance and self-leadership. Ultimately, this conversation is a reminder that not all guilt deserves our attention, and learning to question where it comes from can be a powerful step toward greater freedom and self-trust.  Thank you to our sponsors! Don't wait to teach your kids real-world money skills! Start your risk-free Greenlight trial today at Greenlight.com/TIWW.  Connect with Jennifer: Website: https://www.jenniferreidmd.com/  Substack: https://amindofherown.substack.com/  Podcast: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/a-mind-of-her-own/id1561999981  Guilt Free Groups: https://www.jenniferreidmd.com/guilt-free-groups  IG: https://www.instagram.com/jenreidmd/  Book: https://www.amazon.com/Guilt-Free-Reclaiming-Unreasonable-Expectations/dp/0593833465  Related Podcast Episodes: On Our Best Behavior: The Price Women Pay to Be “Good” with Elise Loehnen | 388 How To Defy Expectations with Dr. Sunita Sah | 271 How To Be Selfish with Naketa Ren Thigpen | 329 Share the Love: If you found this episode insightful, please share it with a friend, tag us on social media, and leave a review on your favorite podcast platform! 🔗 Subscribe & Review:Apple Podcasts | Spotify | Amazon Music | YouTube Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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Share it, rate it, and support the sponsors who support us. I am Nicole Khalil and you're listening to the This Is Woman's Work podcast. We're together. We're redefining what it means, looks, and feels like to be doing women's work in the world today with you as the decider for you. And let me repeat that. You are the decider. Not society's expectations, not other people's opinions, not the social media algorithms, and certainly not the patriarchy in any of its forms. And on this episode, we're talking about one of the biggest barriers to women doing their own deciding. And that's guilt. I, for one, would love to know who decided that women should feel guilty all the time and then go kick their ass and not feel at all guilty about it. I mean,

was there a committee or some sort of underground society? Some invisible contract women have been socially conditioned to uphold since birth that says we're responsible for everyone's feelings and well-being, their schedules, snacks, deadlines, and overall life experience? Because somewhere along the way, it seems that guilt has become our default setting. The guilt for working too much or not enough. The guilt for being ambitious, but also tired. The guilt that comes with saying no, or saying yes, when we should have said no, or saying yes, but with far too many exclamation marks. The guilt we feel when we need help, Want space, set a boundary, disappoint anyone, including a literal stranger.

When we don't respond quickly enough, when we buy ourselves something nice, if God forbid we don't cherish every single moment, don't volunteer enough, aren't present enough, productive enough, patient enough, or grateful enough. And here's the thing. Guilt itself may not be bad. I mean, if we hurt someone, violate our values, or make a big mistake, feeling guilt can help us repair, grow, and do better. And that's healthy, I think, useful even. But Feeling guilty because we can't live up to some impossible, contradictory, constantly moving target that society created for us, that's not growth. That's manipulation. It's like guilt and perfectionism have gone hand in hand because intellectually we know that nobody is perfect. And yet women are still expected to somehow do it all, be it all, handle it all, look good while doing it and of course make it look effortless. And if that's the standard, we have no choice but to fall short. And when we inevitably do, instead of questioning that standard, we question ourselves. And then guilt comes rushing back in like it was waiting backstage for its cue.

And friend, we need to cut that shit out. So here to help us loosen guilt grip on our lives as Dr. Jennifer Reed, psychiatrist, women's behavioral health expert, award-winning educator, host of the podcast, A Mind of Her Own, and author of Guilt Free, reclaiming your life from unreasonable expectations. Her work explores how guilt becomes a form of social conditioning for women, why so many of us are trapped in cycles of overfunctioning and self-blame, and how we can finally stop measuring ourselves against impossible expectations that were never ours to begin with. So, Jennifer, welcome to this show. And one of the things that you say in your book is that guilt is a form of social control. Let's start there. What do you mean by that? And how is that showing up in our lives? Nicole, that introduction was really amazing. You covered so many different areas of guilt. I really think the more that I write and speak about guilt, I see it as social control because it is this seemingly acceptable emotion for women to feel. We talk about it with each other. We describe different things we each feel guilty about. It hides some of the other emotions that maybe are more difficult for us to share. But I think most powerfully, what it does is it turns us inward with criticism, with sort of self-blame and

says, I'm doing something wrong. I need to be better. In fact, I was just speaking to a good friend of mine who is just this amazing healthcare worker and she's overwhelmed and burned out. And she keeps saying, why can't I handle this? Why can't I do this? And it really clarified the sense that we are being pressured and taught and expected to turn inward and try and find something within us to make something better. And what does that do? It distracts our attention, right, from what's happening in the world around us? What's happening in the patriarchy? What's happening with some of the BS that women have to deal with in the workplace and then come home to the second shift? And so I think that social control really is what that is, is taking away women's energy, distracting our attention from the

things that we could go out and really kick some ass to try and make positive changes. Okay, I agree with all of that. But it was like a little light bulb went off for me when you said it hides more difficult emotions. I'm sure I've done that. And it's so much easier to talk about guilt because we all know it. It's like this accepted thing as opposed to I'm really sad that I'm experiencing this challenge in my relationship or, God, I feel so disappointed that I've yet again been left with the whatever, right? Like, I mean, God, there's so many examples. But guilt keeps it on us and keeps it from having to dig any deeper into those tougher emotions. And when you said that, I was like, oh, crap. So a follow-up question, and I have thoughts on it, but I would love to get your perspective. Who benefits from all this

guilt that we're carrying around? Well, when we are overfunctioning, because what does guilt you? When it's adaptive, as you said, it moves us toward someone. I want to repair. Maybe I'll take on a little more because I want to try and make it up to you. And so what it does in this massive scale is just that. So we are pushing ourselves to do more and more, taking on more, blaming ourselves if we can't get it done or we don't do it perfectly. Who's benefiting from that? Our employers, right, these corporations, certainly in health care, I see that over and over again with burnout. Who's benefiting from using guilt to keep your employees working hours that are unsustainable? Or going home and charting for six hours that night, right? Or any of the tasks that women then

take on from a work environment and then go home and do that second shift? if they have kids or care for an elderly family member. So I think the benefit, the people who benefit who don't want this to change, they don't want us to feel less guilt because we take care of things for them. And this is across the board. This even happens within family units, right? That your partner is like, oh, okay, if you just want to keep taking things on, that's great. Like, I can have some more time to go to the gym or it's natural that we say, okay, I'd rather have time for myself. But I think then the people around us benefit, and that's why, A, it's so important that we are aware of it. And B, it's difficult to make a change because we're pushing back against this powerful system that exists

and benefits from our constant guilt. Yeah. As you were talking, a very clear personal example popped up for me. I'm about to leave for my sabbatical as we're recording this episode. And one of the things that I've done from an overfunctioning standpoint and because I feel guilty about leaving my work and my family, I mean, they're going to come out in various stretches. But this is the longest all have been away from my family. And so, I've taken care of everything where you're talking HVAC and sprinklers and schedules and dog care and grooming and like, I mean, the list is endless. And my husband was like, you know, I can handle this stuff too. It's not that big of a deal. And I had to catch myself. He didn't ask for it. He didn't even expect it. And I drove myself into this pages of to do lists in an effort to.

to reduce the guilt of a more difficult emotion, which is a little bit scared to be leaving, getting so far out of my comfort zone, I didn't even know what to do with it. Like there's so much in there. I don't know if that example is helpful to our listener or not, but it just was jumping in my head as you were talking. Okay, in your book, you talk about the guilt equation.

Talk about this hidden math and how that plays out. Yeah, that was an important piece. It's I wanted to find some way to describe it simple. because as we're talking and as your introduction stated, this is so complicated and so broad, so many different topics, the guilt equation is simply this, that our guilt is created by our expectations of ourselves in a particular context or role. We can talk about where those come from, minus our perceived reality, which means minus what we notice we're doing, how well we believe we're meeting those expectations. And perceived is important because where we focus our attention, which is often on things we're getting wrong or things we haven't done yet, that's what we actually notice. That's our reality. That's our reality. And so I wanted to point out to women that both of these variables are not fixed and we can make those changes. And that's where the ideas about how to shift this guilt kind of come into play. So I like what you said. We have the opportunity to shift both parts of this equation.

So let's talk about examples of ways we may shift our expectations. So highlighting what are some of these key categories was so important because I want women to know they're not alone in feeling them. Like there are categories because I've talked to thousands of women throughout my career. The four categories are constant caretaking, taking care of everyone. That's not unfamiliar. Hyper responsibility, which I think you were kind of speaking to with all of the things that you took care of in order to take the sabbatical, that if anything goes wrong, it's my fault. And if anyone's upset or disappointed or misses me or anything, it's my fault.

I take responsibility. There's that seeking perfection, as you talked about, that we need to do everything perfectly and even appear. perfect as we do it, and then having it all, which are these, this idea that we can do it all and all at once and without any help, support, or signs of exhaustion. So these are these four categories. And what women can do is when they notice that guilty thought, they can use this equation to say, which category of expectation is this falling into? Because most of the time, they will fall into one of those four. And then I can say, okay, where did they come from? Right. Where are these expectations? My mother stayed home with us. My father was a physician.

And so my expectation of self, until I was writing this book, was that I would be able to do both roles perfectly, right? I would be able to cook homemade meals every single night and I would also be able to see all the patients that needed me. Well, of course, that's not true. These were positive role models, but the expectations I carried forth were not fair to me and were not reachable. So how do we start to edit those expectations based on our values, based on the mentors we really do want to follow, and be able to move forward with that as opposed to these unreachable expectations. I can't imagine there's a single person listening in who didn't nod their heads when you went through each of the four. I think we probably could hit all four of those in any given day.

My question is around when we look at this, establishing a better baseline for these expectations, because I think we do that. We have a tendency to compare ourselves to this ideal. image or perception that we have. And I don't know if that's fair. So like as an example, I've said this on the show many times before. One of the things I often do if I'm struggling with something for myself is I put it on somebody I love, like my daughter or my best friend. Like, okay, if my best friend was feeling all of this guilt about going on their sabbatical and doing all, I'd be like, what are you doing? Hey, crazy person, calm the fuck down. And so are there any

tips or tricks for level setting a normal, and I put that in air quotes, and maybe more achievable baseline for these expectations? Well, you highlight one of my favorite exercises from self-compassion, which is to speak as if you're speaking to a friend or a family member you really care about because it gives you that objectivity, right? We speak to those we care about so differently than our inner monologue. And so part of part of this work is paying attention to that inner monologue as harsh as it can be to notice what it's saying. So I love that. I love that. that you brought up that exercise. I think that's so important. I think in these other ways, thinking about comparisons, there's research that suggests we compare more when we're feeling more

insecure or feeling more uncertain about ourselves. So perfect storm, if you do that, and then you try and compare yourself to someone who you see who's projecting this image, let's be clear, not the reality, this image of perfection, is we say, oh, I'm not that, I should be that. And I think we do that in a sense because we believe it's motivating, right? I'm going to try and emulate this person. But what does it do? It demoralizes us. It gives us all of these different things that we believe we're not doing well. And that increases guilt, right? That just widens this gap between expectations and reality. Yeah, it's funny. I think comparison can be motivating if you feel motivated. Like, if you're doing it and you're like, oh, I feel like a piece of shit and I'm behind and

everybody, then it is not motivating whatsoever. It's stealing your confidence and all that stuff. Okay, let's talk about perceived reality, and I loved that you honed in on perceived. Can you share some examples where you see across the board women where our perception is not based in reality? I mean, name a topic and it comes up, right? So this sense that, you know, this friend I was talking about who's doing such beautiful work in health care still has this belief that she's not a good mother. because she's not home cooking dinner at night, because she's not able to meet to go to these all of a sudden,

last minute scheduled, middle of the day, concerts or something that are just seemingly designed to punish working women. I'll leave that, that's at my soapbox. But she's really saying, I'm not a good mother. This hyperbole, this always, this never, this should, they're so powerful and it comes up so often in the way we describe ourselves,

the way we talk to ourselves. So I'm a terrible mother. I'm the worst daughter. I didn't call my mother yesterday, or I am like the worst friend. I couldn't go to her event because I had a work thing. When we speak to ourselves that way, we are ignoring this whole swath of different ways that we are being, you know, loving, caring, engaged in these parts of our lives and these roles that we carry. And so it's so stark. It's not even a little bit of this. It's so much of sort of pushing aside this negativity bias on what do I need to do better.

And we're really missing out on so many different things. If I literally, I force a woman to say, what have you done with your kids this week? What was a moment? Name one moment that was good. And they're like, oh, well, we had this great talk. And then I took them to the movies and we got popcorn. It was so much fun. And then blah, blah.

Like, they can just list them when I really push them. Because otherwise, that's just wiped away. it's like tearing the baking scale I write about, right? Like you push zero and suddenly all of that goes away and you're left with what remains, which is what I need to do better. This episode is brought to you by Accenture. When your advertising operations fall out of sync, everything else follows. Spotify and Accenture are working together to reinvent the rhythm of ad sales,

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Visit scotiabank.com slash H-I-SA to learn more. Scotia Bank, you're richer than you think. So what I'm hearing is that we have a tendency to focus on what isn't versus what is or the gaps versus the gains or whatever you want to call it. And so forcing our brains to look at what is and what has happened is a way to at least maneuver or navigate through some of this. Right. I mean, it's sort of the basis for positive psychology. which is this whole, you know, type of psychology that really emphasizes going from sort of where you are to really flourishing. And that's in trying to encourage positive emotions, trying to savor things, trying to find meaning even in our day-to-day engagement. I think that women, you know, we've been told that value lies in what we're paid for, for example. And so the value in some of these caretaking tasks that we might actually really enjoy or find meaning in is undervalued by society. So how do we shift so that we really notice the meaning that's bringing in our own lives and to other people. How do we really pay attention

to things that are bringing us joy and engagement? Out my window, I can see my bird feeder and my kids tease me, but I love it. I love to just watch them every day. And I savor that that is a moment I have time to do. So how do we actually just even in little ways start to make those shifts? Yeah. You call those four unreasonable expectations, the four furies. I love that. I think, again, we can really to all of them, but I want to hone in on the having it all. It's an interesting phenomenon, and I've gone from, of course, we can have it all to nobody has it all to, you know, everything in between. What are your thoughts on having it all? And why is it creating so much guilt for women and doesn't appear to be as much for men? Right. I mean, men certainly have expectations

on them to maybe be the breadwinner or to be financially successful. But I think women, we've had an increase in opportunities because of our four mothers doing remarkable things. But the expectations haven't shifted that much, right? We're still really expected to be through our natural maternal instinct or caregiving instinct, the ones who take care of everybody, the housekeeping, the childcare, the planning of parties, the remembering of dates. We're expected to still do all of that. And so women coming in to say the workforce, having it all to me is like, I can have a family and a job I love and I can have a perfect body and I can be connected with everybody. I think having it all puts this pressure that women at every moment are able to do everything

perfectly in all these different roles. So I hear it all the time. When I go to work, I feel guilty that I'm not at home with my kids. And when I'm home with my kids, I feel guilty that I'm not doing, working on this project. And so there's a sense that having it all means that we are super women, like that we can clone ourselves and go in all these different directions. It's really, it's tearing us apart. And it's also making it hard for us to even enjoy our, accomplishments that do come along because it's like, okay, well, having it all means I better keep going. I better find something. What's next? What am I going to do well next? And I have to prove myself again and again. It's exhausting and draining and so different than thinking, how can I

have a really rich, meaningful, joyful life? That's very different from this having it all idea, which I think is just kind of a capitalist myth that pressures us into buying more things. No doubt. Yeah. I like the. joyful life. Like what, what if that is our standard across the board? And that might look different for you than it does for me or for the next person and that's okay. Yeah. But my experience is as far as we've come as women, it's all been additive. Yes, we can have these great careers. Let's stack that on top of the already existing expectation of you being a great mom and taking care of everything at home and, you know, all that stuff. Whereas men, they do have pressure

and expectations, it's just more narrow and nothing keeps getting added. And I actually think to their detriment, we have such low expectations of them in certain aspects. Like the expectations we have or what it means to be a good dad or to be engaged in the home is so low. And so it appears that they quote, quote, have it all because if my husband drops my kid off at school, he's such a good dad. He's so engaged. Nobody's ever fucking applauded me for dropping my kid off. And I think we've got to wrestle for all of us, this idea that it can't all be additive and we've got to set some more reasonable expectations, as you said earlier, across the board. Thoughts or reactions on that? No, I think that's so true. I think additive is a great way, this accumulation of roles and responsibilities without any

shift away from because I was just reading a paper about the sort of emptiness time period for women and the guilt that comes along with them actually may be looking forward to aspects of that. Not all of it. Of course, they're going to miss their kids and they're going to be challenges, but they don't even feel safe to admit that there might be parts of that they're looking forward to, a little more time for themselves, a chance to travel more, whatever that might be for them. And so I just do think we get so caught up in this that we are pressured into thinking we need to do it all, bring it all with us, continue this, as opposed to saying, How would I actually prune?

How would I sort of restore this art to kind of bring out this color underneath? And that means taking things away. That means removing. That means simplifying in a sense that really makes sense for you. And again, that's not going to sell more products. That's not going to get corporations more money. So it's not something that we're bucking the system by trying to make that change along with lowering our guilt. But I still think it's incredibly empowering for women.

It's literally the entire purpose of this podcast. Fuck the system. Decide for yourself. Yeah. Love that. So break down speak for us and how it helps us to protect our energy without increasing guilt. Yeah. Well, speak was great because I want women to be able to speak out. Because again, rather than looking inward, we're speaking out. And so there's a sort of powerful core message there. But the five steps of speak are very simple and they're the process of psychotherapy, essentially, if I'm working with someone. S is for showing. up. And again, if you're listening to this podcast, if you're reading the book or if you're thinking about these topics, talking to a friend, you're showing up and saying, I am valuable enough to take the time to do this, to turn attention and care inward. So that's S. P is pay attention. As I said earlier, we have to notice our really critical or negative or guilty or anxious thoughts because we are not those thoughts. And that's something I work with patients a lot on is because we are something separately. What is consciousness for that matter that I can say I'm not

that guilty thought, I'm something else noticing it. So paying attention is so important. E is examining that evidence. Where am I getting the most guilty thoughts? Is it after a phone call with my parents? Is it when I go to work and the kids in the morning are crying? Is it when I don't plan a date night that I'm supposed, et cetera, et cetera, when is that coming up? And then A is take action. And that's both inwardly as we talked about adjusting our expectations, increasing our awareness of things we're doing well, but it's also external actions. It's learning how to delegate in a way that we're not delegating while we're trying to protect someone else from having an emotion, right? I'm going to ask you to do this, but I also want to apologize because I don't want you to be resentful. And I'm

going to ask it in a way that maybe you think it's your idea, you know, that really thinking about how we can delegate, how we can allow disappointment in other people. That's really, really powerful. and how we can then learn, like, you'll survive this, I'll survive this, we can both be working together and still lead to a situation where, you know, you might be disappointed. Boundaries, which I see as kind of rules of engagement to bring you toward someone else as opposed to keep you apart. It's not a wall. It's scaffolding to protect that interaction. And then the K is just keep going. You know, you just, you have to keep going because as we've talked about, you are pushing back against this massive system that wants to keep you complacent in this

guilt. And so we're pushing back on that. It's this massive act of resistance. But I think one that we really can do in communication with each other. Okay, great. I want to hone in on a few of them, but the one that jumped out immediately to me is examine evidence, but you talked about certain people or certain situations that maybe kicks up the guilt harder or more frequently. Paying attention and then examining that, how do we then handle that if we're noticing like, oh my gosh, this person makes me feel the most guilty all the time or when I'm in this environment, gosh, it kicks up left and right and I can hardly stop it. If we pay attention and examine the evidence, then what? Right. Well, when you notice it, A, that's awesome because that's information you absolutely need

to figure this out. Then you can plug in the guilt equation to that situation. What is this guilty thought representing in the expectation side. And what am I perceiving? Do I think I'm doing anything well? If I really take some time and think about it, how am I showing up here? And so you're using that equation. Then if there are really distorted or negative thoughts, a technique we use in cognitive behavioral therapy is this thought restructuring. I was talking to my son about this recently in another area that our thoughts, our initial thoughts, are just rough drafts. And we all know how terrible they can be. And so we're taking them, right? And we're saying, wait, wait, wait, this is a really critical or guilty or anxious thought. It's a rough draft. How do I start to edit this?

Even bringing it more neutral. Instead of saying, oh, I skipped a day at the gym. I'm the worst. I'm totally lazy. I missed a day at the gym. I was tired and I needed rest. Right. Or even something positive. Like a missed day at the gym means I had a little more time to do something that was fun. Or I needed that rest to really go and have a great workout whenever. So how do we recognize those rough drafts and start to edit them so that they're more accurate and more fair because otherwise it's just that same message over and over again and it's that fixed system in the brain we're trying to rewire the brain here by practicing this is not just just for kind of theoretical purposes this is rewiring the brain so that it's not our first thought

every single day or every time we're in that environment every time i walk into the house at night I feel guilty the house is messier. Well, let's examine, is it my job? What changes could I make? What am I already doing to try and make this better? So that we're not just, you know, reinforcing that negative thought over and over again. Yeah. Okay. Great stuff. I love the reminder that it's a rough draft and rough draft. They're designed to be edited. So good point. As you might imagine, boundaries have come up many, many, many times. I like your framing of it. And we said, or, that there are a lot of people who are benefiting from our guilt. And I am going to give most people the benefit of the doubt and say that they're either unconscious or they want the best for you or they want to be part of the relationship to create a boundary together. But there are some people who are unwilling disinterested parties, right, and that benefit from your guilt and know how to manipulate it and play off of it. What is your recommendation? What is your recommendation? if we've identified people in our lives or in our work that don't seem interested in

editing any sort of rough drafts. Yeah, I mean, that can be so hard when you are showing up with an open mind being consistent, trying to be fair in the boundaries that you're setting, trying to set the stage for connection. And I think it's important to just remind yourself of that that I'm setting these boundaries because I want to try and maintain a relationship with this person. And if they are repeatedly ignoring those boundaries and just pushing right past, manipulating you, treating you poorly, frankly, how are you limiting your interaction with them? Even though you may have the message that this is how I'm supposed to engage with this family member or how I'm supposed to be treating a friend that I've had for 20 years who's treating me

this poorly, maybe it is a time that you're working on how to pull back from that relationship, right? I mean, there are circumstances where you just cannot. But I think recognizing that you and having boundaries and then I'm hearing to them and pointing that out to them, this is how we maintain our relationship. Otherwise, it's breaking, right? So here are the steps. I really want us to work toward a change. I really want us to make things better, but this isn't working without those boundaries. I may be extreme on this and it may be something I need therapy about. I will say I am very strong on the belief that all relationships involve two willing participants. And And if I've done everything, tried everything, attempted every form of communication that I can think of,

and the other person has proved themselves unwilling, I don't know. I, for whatever reason, I'm able to walk away guilt-free. And again, maybe it's just a coping mechanism. But for whatever reason, it's like I've done what I can and I'm done letting it, you know, just be one-sided all the time. They know where to find me if they want to participate. Okay. Okay. My last question is around, I don't know, all the lies that we've been told about guilt. So what's one lie about guilt that we as women need to stop believing immediately? I think that women are responsible individually for this guilt, that somehow they're just not getting it right in order to let go of the guilt. Like there's something they are doing wrong, that it's happening within them. It's happening. It's the water that we swim in every single. day, that guilt is more acceptable. Maybe it's a, people think it's a sign that you care if you feel

guilty. It's more acceptable than anger, especially in women, especially in women of color, right? This idea that expressing anger is very threatening or is very unladylike, whatever, however you want to pitch it. So I think this message that somehow guilt is better than these other emotions, safer than these other emotions is another myth. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Exactly. So how do we say, you know what, I'm actually not allowing guilt to be acceptable anymore. I'm not going to default to that because it hurts me, because it's hurtful. And I think that's a really important thing that women are saying, oh, it's just guilt. That's just what everyone has. Well, I think we can move away from it because it's draining us of the energy we need. Jennifer, this is such an important and relevant topic. And I know our listeners are going to want to learn more, as do I. So a reminder that Jennifer's book is called guilt-free. It's available wherever you buy a book. but let's keep our local bookstores in business. And she also has guilt-free groups that you can find out more about on her website.

It's Jenniferreadmd.com. We'll put that link and all the other ways to find and follow Jennifer in show notes. But guilt-free groups, I mean, sign me up, right? Jennifer, thank you for doing this work, for writing this book, and for being here today. Nicole, thank you for having me and good luck on your sabbatical.

Thank you. Appreciate it. All right, friend, if guilt shows up because you hurt someone, betrayed your values or behaved like a complete asshole, well, then good. That means your conscience works. But guilt because you rested or have a boundary or need something, yeah, I'm going to call bullshit on that because that guilt needs to get out of the driver's seat and stop making

our decisions for us. Maybe that's our biggest opportunity yet to learn to tell the difference between the guilt that helps us grow and the guilt that keeps us small. Because knowing the difference and letting go of the guilt, designed to hold us back, well, that is woman's work. Hey there, I'm Travis Hoyum, one of the hosts of Motley Fool Hidden Gems Investing. Each weekday on Motley Fool Hidden Gems Investing, we talk through the business news you need to know and the stories moving stocks on Wall Street.

On weekends, we game plan personal finance strategies and dive into the industry shaping tomorrow and host the experts, authors, and executives that understand them. Tune in for insights and a long-term perspective on investing, and of course, stock ideas, plenty of them. To quote a listener, it pays to listen. Check us out and subscribe wherever you listen to podcasts. Hi, I'm Ginny Ehrich, host of the 1000 Hours Outside podcast, and if you've ever caught yourself doom scrolling, who hasn't, or wondering if your kids are the weird ones, or actually the normal ones, or if the AI apocalypse isn't coming, but instead is already here, our show is for you. Each day, I talk with best-selling authors, entrepreneurs, doctors, educators, and thought

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