Let’s try a relaxing experiment before you read a single word of this email. If you are able to do so safely:

• Drop your shoulders away from your ears.
• Unclench your jaw and let your tongue fall away from the roof of your mouth.
• Soften your belly. Let it expand completely. You do not have to hold it in here.

Right now, you are safely entering a space where nothing is demanded of you. As women, we are often conditioned to operate in a permanent state of survival mode. We carry the expectations, the emotional labor, and the care of everyone around us. We treat our rest like something we must earn only after we are completely depleted, leading our nervous systems to an inevitable, heavy shutdown response. Then we wonder why we feel unmotivated.

True rest is not a luxury. It is a biological necessity and a radical act of self-preservation.

The "Freeze" State

When you find yourself scrolling into oblivion, or feeling completely unmotivated/procrastinating on a task, your inner critic usually screams that you are being "lazy." That is a lie! What you are actually experiencing is a neurobiological protective mechanism. When your nervous system has been running a high-anxiety marathon in the background for too long, it exhausts its dopamine reserves. To protect you from total collapse, your brain triggers a freeze response in order to conserve energy.

Your lack of motivation isn't something to be looked down on. It is your body going into "safe" mode because it has exhausted all of its energy.

This Month's Rest Experience: Mindful Lyric Listening

To begin gently shifting your system out of survival mode, we have to find ways to rest that do not require massive amounts of time or money. This month, we are practicing Mindful Lyric Listening. Music has a profound ability to bypass our analytical, overthinking minds and communicate directly with our vagus nerve to lower stress hormones.

Your 4-Minute Ritual:

1. Put on a pair of headphones (or earbuds).
2. Close your eyes or soften your gaze at the floor.
3. Press play on the track below.
4. Do not multitask. For 4 minutes, your only job is to track the warmth of the instruments and let the lyrics speak to you.

👉 [Listen to "i am enough." by Coax Marie], or any uplifting song that you prefer. Let the melody do the heavy lifting for you today. You are allowed to lay your burdens down, even if it is just for the duration of one song. You deserve this, and you are absolutely enough, exactly as you are right now, doing absolutely nothing.

📸 A Glimmer of Joy From My Phone

I love taking scenery and food pics. It slows me down to see the beauty in the small things that God has created. I snapped this photo because the warm glow of the sun in the background of the "peaks and valleys" of the sand reminded me that beauty exists even in the moments when the sun isn't the brightest.

Before you close this email, what is one beautiful, simple thing your eyes can rest on in your room right now as you listen to the melody of the song?

🛍️ I Got You!

For my highly sensitive, easily over-stimulated ladies, here's my favorite wellness item to block out the noise!! I swear by these and never leave home without them.

"Sis, Stop Spiraling" If your brain has ever turned one small thought into a full-blown three-season Netflix series, this one is for you. In this edition of The Anxious Woman Playbook, we're talking about overthinking, anxiety, and what's happening in your nervous system when your mind just won't let something go. Through relatable examples and cultural idioms, you'll learn how to interrupt the cycle and create a little more peace in your day. I need this!

Coming Soon! The next edition of The Anxious Woman Playbook is dropping soon, and this one is for everyone who's ever said "yes" when they wanted to say "absolutely not." Boundaries, Sis... Boundaries. Being available is not the same thing as being healthy. And constantly choosing other people's comfort over your own peace has a cost. Be the first on the list!

Your partner in wellness,

Erika T. Kendrick, LPC

​www.erikatkendrick.com​

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