92. Overcoming overwhelm with Katie Grimes

Sarah met life coach, business coach, and podcast host Katie Grimes through Women's Business League, and after spending an hour walking before even hitting record, they had to cut themselves off just to start the podcast. This conversation covers it all — nervous system regulation, the link between our relationship with our moms and our relationships with everyone else, why "regulated" might be the wrong word, the power of play (and pleasure) for mothers, and why conscious parenting happens mostly outside the moments you're actually with your kids.

Key Points

How our earliest relationships — especially with our mothers — create the programming that shows up in our parenting, our partnerships, and our businessesThe four rungs of the nervous system ladder: joy/contentment → fight or flight → freeze/fawn → trauma response — and how to recognize which rung you're onKatie's five-step process for regulating emotions in the moment: naming the feeling, identifying the driving thought, using movement, deciding how you want to feel, and shifting the storyWhy Sarah has officially retired the word "regulated" — and what the "flourished mother" offers as a more honest, embodied alternativeThe biology of play: why play is a nervous system state, and why accessing it outside of your kids is actually what makes you more playful with themThe powerful link between pleasure, fun, and co-regulation — and why resistance to play is the exact place to get curiousWhy conscious parenting is 95% of the work happening outside the moment you're in with your child — and why the scripts don't work if your nervous system isn't there firstThe Carl Jung quote that anchors it all: "Until you make the unconscious conscious, it will direct your life and you will call it fate"Why women tend to take care of everyone else first — and how that pattern gets directly inherited from our caregiversA gentle, realistic approach to movement and self-care: set the bar so low you can trip over it

Quotes

"Kids don't need a regulated mom — they need a flourished mom. She's fully expressed. She owns and celebrates the full spectrum of her human experience." — Sarah

"We don't need to feel better. We need to get better at feeling." — Gabor Maté (shared by Katie)

"Until you make the unconscious conscious, it will direct your life and you will call it fate." — Carl Jung (shared by Katie)

"It's not what's wrong with you — it's what happened to you." — referenced by Katie

"You can't solve a problem in the energy that created it." — Einstein (shared by Katie)

"The trigger is the gift."

"Set the bar so low you can trip over it."

Resources Mentioned