Success doesn’t silence old wiring. It just hides it.
The groundhog saw his shadow on Monday. Six more weeks of winter.
Which feels fitting, because we’ve been talking a lot about repetition lately — not of weather, but of emotional patterns that don’t disappear just because time passes.
In my last email, I told you I would share more about a personal example that surfaced for me in 2020.
Here it is.
What Happened When My Life Slowed Down
In 2023 I had a surgery that required a long recovery, so I was no longer training for a bodybuilding competition, or building another business.
Travel slowed way down.
Relative to the previous twenty years, my life got quiet. And when it did, emotional patterns came back louder than ever.
Not because I regressed.
But because there was finally enough quiet to see what had been driving me all along.
If you’re a high achiever over 40, this is the part no one prepares you for.
When the external noise quiets — when your career stabilizes, when your kids get older, when the constant climb slows, and your nervous system no longer has constant stimulation to hide behind — what surfaces isn’t laziness.
It’s wiring.
Old emotional reflexes.
Control patterns that no longer have a productive outlet.
And without a productive outlet, small things began setting me off.
A pile of clothes in my daughter’s closet.
My husband’s shoes in the middle of the floor.
The dog’s paws not being wiped when they came in from outside.
It looked like standards.
But it was really deep fear, and a lack of trust.
It makes sense.
I grew up in chaos. Loud. Unpredictable. Emotionally charged.
My body and brain learned hyper-vigilance early.
Stay alert.
Anticipate everything.
Control what you can.
And in my case, that became control everything you can.
Achievement never touched that wiring.
None of my wins — money, accolades, physique, business growth — softened it.
Because trauma was embedded in my nervous system. And achievement can distract you from trauma.
But it does not heal it.
And I see this constantly in the high achievers I coach. Especially in midlife.
When life slows down, the internal repetition gets louder.
Different calendar.
Same trigger.
So I had a choice.
The Hard Work I Had to Do in 2025
I started doing the deep work in mid-2024, and finally, 2025 became the year I stopped managing symptoms and went to the root.
Here’s what that work looked like for me:
- Talk therapy several times per month. My therapist was the first to point out: much of this trauma is stored in your body and can’t be resolved with talk therapy alone.
- Several sessions with a trauma therapist focused on complex PTSD, including EMDR treatment.
- Guided plant medicine to access what was stuck in my subconscious, followed immediately by months of integration work.
- Somatic nervous system work.
- And eventually, giving up alcohol completely.
The alcohol part matters. It wasn’t a dramatic decision, but it’s one that I had been building towards for a couple of years.
Alcohol is how I “unwound.” How I softened. How I connected.
But it was still numbing.
And when you’re trying to rewire a nervous system, numbing works against you.
I quit drinking on December 2.
Clear head. Clearer emotions. No escape hatch.
And something has definitely shifted.
And is shifting.
This past year (and past six months especially) has been the calmest, most grounded year of my adult life.
Not because life is perfect.
But because my nervous system is no longer constantly bracing.
Of course I still get triggered.
But I catch it quickly.
And I course correct immediately.
That’s growth I’m here for.
Why I’m Sharing This
Because for people wired like us, slowing down is harder than grinding.
Healing is harder than achieving.
It’s easier to set a new goal than to sit with unresolved pain.
It’s easier to push through than to process.
It’s easier to pour a drink than to feel your raw emotions (even boredom) in the moment.
But the repetition doesn’t break with busyness.
It breaks with courage.
The work will look different for each person.
I’m not prescribing plant medicine or EMDR or any specific modality.
I’m showing you what I chose when I realized I could not outperform my way to peace.
Nearly every high achiever I coach eventually hits this wall.
Not because you’re weak.
Because you’ve been strong for so long.
High Achievement Isn’t the Problem
If you are driven, disciplined, capable — that is not the issue.
But if your nervous system is still operating from survival…
No amount of success will create peace.
You can build the life.
You can build the body.
You can make all the money in the world.
But until you heal the wiring, you will keep repeating patterns that success alone cannot fix.
And therefore, you will never feel safe or at peace.
If This Resonates
If you’re in a season where your life looks successful on paper…
but you know something deeper is being asked of you…
Not to achieve more.
But to heal, recalibrate, and build the second half of your life from alignment instead of adrenaline—
I am selectively opening space for a small number of private 1:1 clients again.
This isn’t therapy.
And it isn’t hustle coaching.
It’s mentorship for high-achieving women and men who want to continue building meaningful lives — but from a regulated nervous system, clear discernment, and a vision that reflects who they are now… not who they had to become to survive.
If that’s you, you can apply for a complimentary consultation here:
We’ll see if it’s the right fit.
And if you’d prefer to explore some this work on your own first, my book The North Star Method is still deeply relevant to this conversation.
I finished writing it in 2024 — right as I began this deeper layer of healing work
While the book doesn’t focus on trauma processing, it does teach the mindset and discernment framework I’ve been using for years — the practices that help you slow down, separate ego from intuition, and make decisions from long-term vision instead of urgency.
It’s a starting point for learning how to listen well.
You can explore it here:
