Things keep piling up. And no matter how many times the promise is made to slow down, it never actually happens.

Here's what nobody tells you: taking a break won't fix it if you don't know what's actually driving the overstimulation in the first place. You'll just come back from your week off and fall right back into the same patterns.

This journaling session gets you to the root. Four prompts that'll help you figure out if you're even doing things you want to be doing, what staying overstimulated might be protecting you from, and what you'd actually do with your time if you had space to think. No fluff, just the questions that create real shifts.

Journal through these prompts:

1. What is overstimulating me right now?
2. Are the things that overstimulate me things I want to be doing? Or did I adopt them from someone else's expectations?
3. Even though I don't want to be overstimulated, I keep finding myself here. What could this pattern be protecting me from?
4. If I wasn't overstimulated and had more space in my brain and my day, what would I love to spend that time and energy doing?

You'll finish this session with clarity you can't unsee. And you'll stop spinning in the same cycle of overwhelm, break, repeat.

• Free Calm Mind Blueprint: http://www.samanthapenkoff.com/calm-mind-pod
• Newsletter: www.samanthapenkoff.com/prompts

• 90 min Breakthrough Intensives: We get to the root of what keeps you performing instead of enjoying. Plus a 30-minute follow-up call 2 weeks later. Click here for details.
• Private Coaching - 4 open spots: www.samanthapenkoff.com/privatecoaching

Connect with Sam: Instagram | Facebook

You keep telling yourself you'll rest after this project. After the busy season. After you get through this month.

But here's what actually happens: you hit your breaking point, book a retreat or take a week off, feel temporarily better — and then you're right back where you started. Overstimulated. Exhausted. Running on fumes again.

This episode pulls back the curtain on why we wait until we're desperate to prioritize ourselves, and why those big drastic measures (the retreats, the content courses, the "I'm taking next month off" declarations) aren't actually solving the problem. You'll walk away understanding what's really driving your overstimulation — and three practical ways to regulate your nervous system without needing to escape your life first.

Key Takeaways:

• Why retreats should enhance your life, not be a lifeline to revive you
• The question that reveals if you're actually prioritizing yourself (or just decision fatigued)
• How to stop the cycle of "I'll rest when..." and feel grounded in your actual everyday life
• Three tips to regulate your nervous system right now — no retreat required

You'll stop waiting for permission to feel calm. And you'll start trusting that you can feel less overstimulated without blowing up your schedule or booking a flight.

• Free Calm Mind Blueprint: http://www.samanthapenkoff.com/calm-mind-pod
• Newsletter: www.samanthapenkoff.com/prompts

• 90 min Breakthrough Intensives: We get to the root of what keeps you performing instead of enjoying. Plus a 30-minute follow-up call 2 weeks later. Click here for details.
• Private Coaching - 4 open spots: www.samanthapenkoff.com/privatecoaching

Connect with Sam: Instagram | Facebook

You've been running on autopilot through the holidays — buying, wrapping, planning, coordinating — because that's what you've always done. But have you ever stopped to ask: why am I doing this?

Most working moms don't question it. You just assume it's your job. That if you don't do it, it won't get done (or won't get done right). And honestly? Part of you might not even want to stop — because being the holiday coordinator gives you something. Control. Identity. Proof that you're a good mom.

This episode isn't about adding more to your plate. It's about creating awareness around the beliefs that are keeping you exhausted.

Strategic Journal Prompts:

• What would happen if you didn't coordinate everything this year?
• What are you afraid your family would think, feel, or say if you didn't coordinate everything this year?
• What does being the holiday coordinator give you? Is it identity, control, or maybe proof that you're a good mom?

These prompts might make you uncomfortable. That's the point. This is how you start questioning the beliefs keeping you stuck — and find a way forward that doesn't require burning yourself out to prove your worth.

• Free Calm Mind Blueprint: http://www.samanthapenkoff.com/calm-mind-pod

• 90 min Breakthrough Intensives: We get to the root of what keeps you performing instead of enjoying. Plus a 30-minute follow-up call 2 weeks later. Click here for details.
• Private Coaching - 4 open spots: www.samanthapenkoff.com/privatecoaching

Connect with Sam: Instagram | Facebook | Reply to my newsletter

You love Christmas. You want to create magic for your kids. But somewhere between the cookie baking and the coordinating and the shoulds, you realize the pressure to make it all perfect is keeping you from actually being present. And that's the thing you wanted most.

This episode breaks down the belief driving the exhaustion — and what changes when you stop long enough to ask yourself: Why am I doing this? Do I even enjoy it?

• The hidden belief behind holiday burnout (and how it shows up on autopilot)
• What you’re trying to protect when you take responsibility for every detail
• A simple question to ask before adding one more tradition, event, or expectation
• How to create joy without performing perfection

After listening, you’ll feel lighter — like you can enjoy the season instead of choreographing it. Press play and give yourself permission to let something be easier this year.

• Free Calm Mind Blueprint: http://www.samanthapenkoff.com/calm-mind-pod

• 90 min Breakthrough Intensives: We get to the root of what keeps you performing instead of enjoying. Plus a 30-minute follow-up call 2 weeks later. Click here for details.
• Private Coaching - 4 open spots: www.samanthapenkoff.com/privatecoaching

Connect with Sam: Instagram | Facebook | Reply to my newsletter

You're in a meeting and another woman says something brilliant. Everyone lights up. And you feel... small. Threatened. Like you just got replaced.

Or maybe it's simpler than that — you see two women laughing together and your brain goes: they don't need you anymore.

It's embarrassing to admit. You're a grown woman. You're successful. You know this is irrational. But the jealousy? The comparison? The exhausting need to prove you're still relevant? It's there. And it's quietly running your friendships, your collaborations, the rooms you avoid walking into.

In today's journaling session, we're going straight to the root: the childhood moment that taught you connection = competition. And we're getting it out of your body.

Inside the free journaling guide, you'll get:

• All 7 strategic prompts with space to journal directly in the doc
• Bonus prompts on breaking the cycle and identifying where this shows up in your life
• Somatic release practices to rewire your nervous system
• No email required - just click, make a copy, and start journaling

Grab the complete guide here: Strategic Journaling to Process & Release Your Sister Wounds

This isn't just awareness work. This is nervous system rewiring so you can stop performing for belonging and start choosing it.

• Grab the free Google Doc with all 7 prompts + space to journal right in the document (no email required): Strategic Journaling to Process & Release Your Sister Wounds
• Free Calm Mind Blueprint: http://www.samanthapenkoff.com/calm-mind-pod

• 90 min Breakthrough Intensives: We get to the root of what keeps you performing instead of enjoying. Plus a 30-minute follow-up call 2 weeks later. Click here for details.
• Private Coaching - 4 open spots: www.samanthapenkoff.com/privatecoaching

Connect with Sam: Instagram | Facebook | Reply to my newsletter

You're not afraid of competition. You're afraid of being replaced.

That's why you hesitate to join the mastermind full of women like you. Why you stay late instead of delegating. Why the thought of bringing on a podcast guest who does something similar makes your stomach drop.

You tell yourself it's about staying focused or protecting your brand. But really? It goes back to that one time another girl made you feel like you weren't enough. Your body still remembers it.

Today I'm getting vulnerable and sharing my own sister wound - two events from senior year of high school. I learned it wasn't safe to let other women get close. And that lesson has been steering my business decisions, my collaborations, even who I invite on this podcast.

I'm not here to dig up the past for drama's sake. I'm here because I finally figured out why I pull back when I should be leaning in - and you probably do the same thing. Once we know this...we can set ourselves free from our sabotage!

What you'll hear:

• What a sister wound actually is (and the subtle ways it shows up in your business and leadership)
• Why my fear of being "outshined" was keeping me from bringing on the exact guests you need to hear from
• The 3-section journaling process that goes way deeper than "what are you grateful for" - straight to the emotional root
• How to tell if you're protecting yourself from collaboration, networking, or visibility without even realizing it
• Why your younger self created rules to keep you safe - and how to teach her a new definition of belonging

By the end, you'll likely recognize your own pattern. And you'll have the prompts to actually work through it - not just understand it intellectually.

This one shifted something big for me. I have a feeling it might for you too.

• Sister Wounds Journal Prompts: Strategic Journaling to Process & Release Your Sister Wounds
• Free Calm Mind Blueprint: http://www.samanthapenkoff.com/calm-mind-pod

• 90 min Breakthrough Intensives: We get to the root of what keeps you performing instead of enjoying. Plus a 30-minute follow-up call 2 weeks later. Click here for details.
• Private Coaching - 4 open spots: www.samanthapenkoff.com/privatecoaching

Connect with Sam: Instagram | Facebook | Reply to my newsletter

If you've ever written "I'm grateful for my family" in a journal and then felt... nothing... you're not alone.

Most gratitude journaling feels empty because we're listing things instead of tapping into feelings. And here's what I've learned: the goals you're chasing? They're always attached to an emotion you're craving. Maybe it's peace. Or freedom. Or feeling capable again. That's what we're digging into today.

I'm walking you through four prompts that help you identify the feeling beneath what you want — and then find ways to feel it right now. Not later. Not when everything's perfect. Today.

Strategic Journal Prompts:

1. What are you working towards right now — and what's the feeling you're actually chasing beneath it?
2. When was the last time you felt that emotion, even for five minutes? Get specific.
3. What elements from that moment are already in your life right now but you've been overlooking?
4. How can you feel that desired emotion today, in small ways?

You'll stop waiting to arrive and start feeling it now. That's the shift.

• Free Calm Mind Blueprint: http://www.samanthapenkoff.com/calm-mind-pod

• 90 min Breakthrough Intensives: We get to the root of what keeps you performing instead of enjoying. Plus a 30-minute follow-up call 2 weeks later. Click here for details.
• Private Coaching - 2 open spots: www.samanthapenkoff.com/privatecoaching
• Clarity Call: https://calendly.com/samanthasays/clarity-call

Connect with Sam: Instagram | Facebook | Reply to my newsletter

Do you have A LOT going on right now? You keep telling yourself you’re fine — you should be fine — but something still feels heavy?

You’re doing the things, showing up for everyone, checking the boxes… but underneath, you’re tired in a way that gratitude doesn’t fix. Maybe you’ve been carrying stress that no one sees. Maybe there’s a grief you’ve been trying to outrun. Or maybe you’re just exhausted from pretending you’re okay because “other people have it worse.”

Here’s the truth: you can be grateful and still feel overwhelmed. Both can exist. And in this episode, I’m vulnerably sharing the heavy things happening in my life currently + the moment I finally stopped minimizing what I was feeling — and the 2 shifts that helped me breathe again.

You’ll understand:

• Why naming hard things doesn’t make you ungrateful — it makes you honest
• The question that softened my hardest weeks: “How can this be easy?”
• How to stop carrying emotional weight that was never yours in the first place
• The journaling question that helped me see what I was carrying that wasn't mine

After listening, you’ll feel permission to stop “should-ing” yourself into silence and finally honor what’s heavy without getting swallowed by it.

• Free Calm Mind Blueprint: http://www.samanthapenkoff.com/calm-mind-pod

• 90 min Breakthrough Intensives: We get to the root of what keeps you performing instead of enjoying. Plus a 30-minute follow-up call 2 weeks later. Click here for details.
• Private Coaching - 2 open spots: www.samanthapenkoff.com/privatecoaching
• Clarity Call: https://calendly.com/samanthasays/clarity-call

Connect with Sam: Instagram | Facebook | Reply to my newsletter