The productivity addiction nobody talks about
You know that feeling when you finally sit down on the couch after the kids are in bed, and instead of relaxing, you're mentally cataloging everything you didn't get done today? Like a rolodex but in lieu of cards, is just the pending tasks in your to-do list.
Or when you take a "rest day" but spend the entire time feeling guilty about all the things you should be doing?
Yeah. That.
Is not that you’re bad at resting, but as a high achieving parent is something you fundamentally don't believe you deserve.
And until you fix that, no amount of bubble baths or yoga classes or weekend retreats is going to make you feel rested.
The invisible pressure of tying your worth to your work
Our bodies have a way of telling us exactly what we need to do. Especially when its something that you can’t keep doing.
When you tie your worth to your productivity, your belief system looks something like this:
My value = my productivity
My worthiness = my next event
My significance = whether people want to hear me speak
And as long as the calendar stays full, as long as the stages keep coming, that belief system works.
Until it doesn't.
Because tying your identity to your productivity is exhausting. Every date on the calendar feels high-stakes. Every opportunity feels like proof of your value. Every gap in the schedule feels like evidence that you're not good enough.
You're not working toward something. You're working to prove you're worthy of existing.
And your body knows that's not sustainable.
Why motherhood makes the hustle stop working
Having kids is what makes the hustle not work anymore because when you're not sleeping, when your capacity is already maxed out, when you're touched out and overstimulated and running on fumes—everything that you were kind of managing before comes bubbling to the surface.
Your body can only push down anxiety for so long.
You can only ignore the signs for so long.
You can only tell yourself "I'm fine, I'm fine, I'm fine" for so long.
And then one day, you're on a plane. Or in your car. Or standing in the kitchen making dinner. And your body says: No. We're done now.
Because you've been running on a broken belief system. And your body's trying to tell you.
What rest actually is (and why it's not what you think)
Okay, so what do you do when you realize your worthiness is tied to your productivity?
You probably just try every possible angle.
Therapy. Naturopath. Nutritionist. Gym membership (not to get healthy, but to "manage the anxiety"). Coaching.
But everything changes when you come to the realization that rest isn't an activity.
Rest isn't a nap. It's not a spa day. It's not even a week-long vacation where you finally "unplug."
Rest is a belief.
Specifically: the belief that you're worthy, exactly as you are, without doing a single thing to prove it.
If you believe your worth is tied to what you produce, then every moment you're not producing feels dangerous. Your nervous system reads "not working" as "not safe."
So you can take all the breaks you want. You can lie on the couch. You can book the retreat.
But if your nervous system still believes that rest = risk, you're never actually going to feel rested.
Living FROM worthiness vs. FOR worthiness
Heather Boersman has a framework which she discuses in her book, The Rest Revolution. Living FOR and FROM worthiness.
Living FOR worthiness: You do things to prove, validate, convince yourself and others that you're enough.
Living FROM worthiness: You do things because you're already enough, and now you get to choose what you actually want.
One is driven by fear. The other is driven by desire.
One is exhausting. The other is sustainable.
One keeps you stuck in the same patterns forever. The other lets you actually change.
Most high-achieving parents are living FOR worthiness.
We say yes to everything because saying no feels like we're not good enough.
We work late because our value is tied to our output.
We optimize every minute because being busy is the only time we feel valuable.
And then we wonder why we're so tired.
The 63-day belief reset
Okay, so how do you actually rebuild this belief that you're worthy?
Because it's one thing to intellectually understand it. It's another thing to actually believe it in your body.
It takes your brain 63 days to build a new neural pathway.
That's it. Two months.
So you pick one thought. Something like:
"I'm worthy."
"It's possible I'm worthy."
"I'm learning that I'm worthy."
It has to be something you can actually believe, even just a little bit.
And then you think it. Once a day. Every day. For 63 days.
That's the practice.
You're not journaling about it. You're not analyzing it. You're not creating a vision board.
You're just thinking the thought. Letting your brain hear it. Over and over. Until it stops sounding foreign and starts sounding true.
And yes, it's an uphill battle. Your brain will pull you back to the old belief. That's normal. That's your brain trying to be efficient, because thinking new thoughts takes more energy.
But if you keep going—63 days, one thought at a time—you'll create a new default setting.
And from that place? Everything changes.
The three things stealing your rest (and it's not your schedule)
She has this framework called REST, and it's built on three pillars:
1. Mindset – The way you think about yourself and about rest
2. Emotions – The feelings you're running from instead of processing
3. Nervous system – The survival strategies your body's still holding onto
Most of us focus on mindset. We read the books. We do the affirmations. We try to think our way into feeling better.
But if your emotions are unprocessed and your nervous system's still in survival mode? The mindset work won't stick.
Because you can journal about boundaries all day. But if your nervous system learned at seven years old that saying no means rejection, your body will override your brain every time.
You can set an intention to be more present with your kids. But if your sense of worth is tied to productivity, your body will flood with anxiety the second you sit down to play instead of checking email.
That's why rest isn't about doing less.
It's about releasing the patterns that make rest feel dangerous in the first place.
The part of you that's been waiting
Here's what I want you to know: that exhaustion, overwhelm and the feeling that something’s off isn’t because you’re broken. Is the way your body tries to get your attention.
Trying to tell you that the old playbook—the one where your worth was tied to your productivity—doesn't fit anymore.
It’s an invitation to stop running, and instead to come home to the truth that's been there all along:
You're worthy. Not because of what you do. But because you exist.
That's it. That's the whole thing.
And from that place—from that deep, foundational belief in your own worthiness—you get to choose what you actually want.
Want to hear more about rest, worthiness, and breaking free from productivity addiction?
This conversation came from my podcast episode with Heather Boersma, life coach and author of The Rest Revolution. We went deep on why rest isn't an activity, how to retrain your nervous system, and the 63-day practice that can rewire your brain to believe in your own worthiness.