Darling, something needs to give...
a note on liberation, not defeat (save this one)
Hi my lovely,
I’ve had several calls coaching clients this week and I have come to this firm conclusion: most high-achieving women aren’t overwhelmed because they’re doing too much. They’re overwhelmed because they’re trying to commit to every version of themselves at once.
You can be capable of building five futures and only have the capacity to build one well. And at some point, maturity looks like choosing what matters this season and letting the rest wait without guilt. If you feel stretched, it might not be about time. It might be about deciding.
In my group course The Kindling Academy a few common themes have surfaced this week, some of which may feel uncomfortably familiar to you (we cycle between teaching weeks, implementation live accountability weeks and coaching weeks, with 121 time and office hours for answering questions built in: it’s so generous and spacious and I’m so proud of it). Without revealing anything about my clients, here are those themes…
Across very different industries and life stages, we’ve been exploring variations of the same structural issue.
In one case, the work is intensely responsive. The days are shaped by other people’s needs, deadlines, and emotional weather. My client is intelligent, reflective, more than capable of building something of her own, and yet each attempt to move in that direction is absorbed by the urgency of what is already there. Nothing is broken, failing or inefficient. It is simply that her life is full, and nothing has been asked to move out of the way for her business.
In another case, there is no shortage of “discipline” (not motivation, that’s never enough on its own…) My client desires a plan, clear milestones, a measured rhythm of visibility and offer. She thinks strategically, but the ambition has has yet to be defined with a financial target or number. Without that specific anchor for her (money is not everyone’s anchor and no-one’s sole pillar) the work remains conceptual. It is thoughtful, but it is not yet directional.
For another, her work initially looks scattered: different projects, different formats, different audiences, yet when I helped her “zoom out” the coherence in her work was obvious. There was a central thread linking all her work. Her work, in essence, is about holding and shaping other people’s stories in the most gloriously considered, refined and masterful way. Once that centre was named, the fragmentation dissolved. What looked like separate strands were simply different expressions of the same core.
In each of these conversations, the talent, energy, ambition, effort and motivation was not in question. The issue was structural. There was no scaffolding strong enough to carry what they were trying to build.
We are very good at adding “because we can”, because I know you’re reading this and you’re a brilliantly capable and competent person (even if you’re in the middle of the half-term juggle, it’s a New Moon and it’s still grey and miserable in the U.K.) We are far less comfortable subtracting.
To let something give feels irresponsible and indulgent. It can feel financially reckless. It can feel like abandoning a version of ourselves that has been competent and reliable and praised. So instead we keep everything afloat. We respond. We manage. We cope. We maintain.
And then we wonder why the work we say we want never quite takes root.
At some point ambition requires structure, space and scaffolding. Not another idea. Not another saved post. Structure.
This might look like a decision about what this season is for (or not for). A number attached to the work so that it moves from creative hobby to professional direction. A clear articulation of who you are and what you do so that your visibility is coherent rather than scattered.
Sometimes that structure begins with something small. Writing once a week, consistently, not because it is optimised or perfectly strategic, but because it builds the muscle of thinking in public and forces your ideas to take shape. Sometimes it begins with a spreadsheet and an honest conversation about income. Sometimes it begins with letting two clients go so that mental space returns.
Clarity emerges the moment we stop trying to hold everything at once. You do not need more ideas. You need to decide what this season is building. You do not need to reinvent your life. You need to choose which part of it you are consolidating now.
And so, I’m sharing with you the exact questions I asked my clients in their follow-up “homework” this week…
Optional “Homework” for all
1. The Space Question
Possibly…decide what will give in the next 14 days (we can only do this with this timeline as we’ve been working together for a while)…
What are you reducing, stopping, delegating, or restructuring?
What makes that decision financially and emotionally safe?
2. Your Minimum Weekly Commitment
You need a minimum viable week.
What is the smallest repeatable set of actions you can commit to for four weeks?
3. Clarity Statement (because it’s always worth repeating…)
The work I do is…
I help…
The people I most want to hear from are…
4. Money Anchor
Do you need a number?
Annual or six-month target?
What would have to happen for that number to become real?
5. Three Themes
If you’d like to (we will go into this more later in the curriculum…) identify three core themes you will consistently speak to over the next month.
This is the work we do inside The Kindling Academy. We do not add more for the sake of creating a lovely tick-list. We build using structure and scaffolding. We attach numbers when needed. We articulate who you are properly, who you’d get a proper thrill from if they turned up in your box. We turn scattered capability into coherent, income-generating work that fits a real life.
If you are ready to stop circling and start consolidating, come inside as doors are now open again to join The Kindling Academy.
Oh, did I mention I’m moving house? Yep, I’m doing it tomorrow. And breattthe.
Expect a behind-the-scenes life update very soon…
With love,
Laura x
Did you see my recent post? It had a FREE journalling resource with 30 seasonally brilliant prompts.
Hi lovely! I’m Laura, a proudly multipassionate mum of three in the Surrey countryside, building a life and career that lets me use every part of who I am. I’m a coach–teacher hybrid for high-achieving, deeply creative women, and after burning down a thriving coaching practice twenty months ago, I rebuilt it from scratch three months ago. I’m also a part-time Head of Music, a professional soprano singing with groups like Monteverdi Choir and the OAE (plus the odd Marvel film), and a Squarespace designer for brilliant creatives. Home is joyfully full with my three kids and a soon-to-be multigenerational “Waltons-style” setup with my parents. I’m obsessed with learning, music, creativity, flat whites, conversations that matter, and building communities for extraordinary women. My word for 2026 is integrity, and everything I create this year is rooted in it.
Want a chat?
Thinking about working with me? Let’s book a call and have a chat to see if we’d be a lovely fit…
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reading this in Substack? Yay! Fancy sharing it! Amazing!