Ep 65: The Systems Keeping You Exhausted and How to Rebel
Spurred by a discussion on Threads about creating a life that supports the nervous system rather than constantly forcing it to adapt, I unpack why exhaustion in a capitalist society isn't a personal failure. I explore the historical roots of modern capitalism and explain why you shouldn't expect your nervous system to go quiet in the face of a genuine threat, along with how small, daily micro-acts of rebellion allow you to reclaim your personal power.
Key Takeaways
Systemic Design of Burnout: Capitalism is built to keep us busy and depleted so there is no time or energy left to analyze, question, or rebel against the system.
Rebellion Over Adaptation: Instead of trying to force your nervous system to adapt to overwhelming environments, true power lies in rebelling, slowing down, setting firm boundaries, and choosing where your energy goes.
Listen, Don't Silence: Your nervous system freaks out because it perceives a threat; the goal isn't to silence or force it into compliance, but to listen to its data and move away from the threat.
Generational Shifts in Autonomy: Autonomy and the ability to push back look different across generations; honoring how much room you have to rebel allows you to take calculated risks for your peace.
Micro-Acts of Power: Reclaiming your power starts with accessible micro-decisions, taking a breath before answering the phone, closing your inbox early, or taking a walk instead of forcing another meeting.
Chapters
(00:00) – Intro: Black Women, Recovery, and Nervous System Support
(01:22) – Reclaiming Personal Power in a Capitalist System
(03:16) – Rest Is Resistance and the History of Capitalism
(07:07) – Burnout, Recovery, and Living a Life of Ease
(08:01) – Small Acts of Rebellion to Reclaim Energy
(09:29) – Generational Differences, Career Pressure, and Rebellion
(12:46) – Nervous System Regulation and Listening to Your Body
(14:42) – How to Start Reclaiming Power Today
(16:35) – Closing Thoughts and Listener Call to Action
Resources Mentioned
Threads: Join the conversation with me @ashawilkersonesq
Love Notes: Subscribe to my weekly newsletter for updates on online courses, studio events, and community offerings
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Asha (00:00.834)
Hi hi, we're back with another episode. And this one I'm a little fired up about because I am responding directly after engaging with a post that I wrote on threads and then someone replied and commented, and I thought, my gosh, I need to hurry up and go record a podcast episode for this. So it's just coming straight off the top of my head, which actually
is aligned with my human design that I do really well at responding to things. So if there's a question that you have or a topic that you want me to cover, definitely leave me a message or leave a comment and I will reply. And that's my favorite thing to do because it's just fun to me. So here we go. I wrote on threads black woman, you deserve a life that doesn't completely I'm sorry, black woman, you deserve a life that doesn't constantly require your recovery.
And lots of people replied, and someone else wrote, This is something I write about that I keep coming back to weekly. I'm wondering if part of the work isn't simply learning better coping skills, but learning to create a life that supports my nervous system instead of constantly expecting it to adapt. When I have enough space, rest, and realistic expectations, I think I show up differently as a wife, a parent, a therapist, and as myself. And my response was.
I love this. We often talk about adapting, but we're adapting to systems that are designed for us to be anxious and in flight. We won't beat this system, but we can rebel against it. Rebellion looks like slowing down, saying no, and deciding what gets our energy. It's a challenge to switch, but it is possible. That's how we reclaim our energy and our power. So, as you know, this month we're talking about personal power. And we often
give away our personal power in so many ways that we don't even think about or recognize because either we have been taught socially, culturally, or in school we've been groomed to behave a certain way, or we're in corporate, and corporate expects us to behave and act in a certain way. And we go through these things, getting the results that we get. And then at some point we realize that the results that we're getting aren't worth
Asha (02:20.108)
What we're trading for. At some point they were. They got us the degree, they got us the job, maybe they got us the house, they got us the clout, the community, the money, whatever. They served a purpose for sure. But when they stop serving a purpose, you start to feel powerless if you don't understand where your power lies. I've talked to so many women and even myself before I made the leap leaving the US and moving to Portugal before I quit my tenured teaching position.
I felt like I was stuck, and that feeling of being stuck is because you feel powerless. You feel like you don't have an option, that you don't know where to go. So, as we're talking about reclaiming your power, I also really want to talk about the systems and the structures that keep us from feeling like we have any power and what we can do on a daily basis to reclaim that power. If you have not read Trisha Hershey's book yet.
Rest is Resistance. You need to go and read it. And or you could listen to a couple of her podcast interviews that pretty much break down and explain the book. But she does research in the United States about capitalism and black bodies in particular. As most of you probably know and are aware of the transatlantic slave trade, and black people were literally excuse me, literally trafficked from Africa to.
Build the United States economy. There is no US economy at this side if you do not have slave labor. It's not really a point that's up for debate, that is actual, factual US history. And capitalism, particularly brutal capitalism like we have in the United States, is built on keeping the lower class, the working class, busy. And when you keep people
Busy and running ragged and keeping up with metrics that keep changing and moving all the time, they do not have enough time to sit and analyze whether the system is working for them, how they feel about the system, whether they want to make a change. That actually prevents rebellion. You literally could not speak when you were enslaved, you could not gather.
Asha (04:41.336)
When our ancestors were enslaved. And even post-slavery, it the states made it criminal for two or three or more black people to be gathered together. That's where the loitering laws come from in the United States, because the white folks were so fearful that if we gathered and had an opportunity to talk, that we would rebel and maybe do the same thing to them that had been done to our ancestors. So
It is by design, not by accident, that you are caught up in a race of capitalism. Capitalism does not work literally by the d by design. Capitalism does not work if there are not people working at the bottom rung of capitalism. Because then there's a layer above who makes money off the people who are working. Then there's a layer above that who makes money off the managers who are managing the people who are.
Doing the labor. So our whole system or the whole system of capitalism is designed to keep you busy and overworked and exhausted. And so when we talk about in our healing language, in our girls' chats, in our friend groups, in our rebellion against the baby boomers, about living a life that we don't want to have to recover from, living a life of ease, not giving ourselves to
in our souls to the job for 40 years and then looking up and deciding what we have left or being fearful that we won't have anything to left to give it, that's not misplaced. It's not because you're lazy. It's not because there's something wrong with you. It's because you're actually feeling the squeeze of the system that is preventing you from living a life of rest and ease. You are going to have to recover at some point.
From this system because it is designed to deplete you and take everything that it has from you. Now, if you are enjoying the system of capitalism, I enjoy some benefits of capitalism. We all enjoy some benefits of capitalism. That's fine. It's not a a moral condemnation on whether capitalism is good or bad, but I'm talking about the real effects of the systems that we live in, particularly the capitalism in the United States, where it is quite brutal.
Asha (07:07.118)
Because it doesn't have to be as extreme as it is. So when we talk about recovery, burnout, or trying to bounce back, that is really, really hard in the system that is designed to keep us exhausted, burned out, and to prevent us from bouncing back. So how do we make a change? What do we even do? Asha, you're talking about living a life of ease, you're talking about
Rest, you're talking about this, but I am working so hard. I'm working from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. Then I come home and I feed the kids and I do a little bit of study so I can advance my life and I go to bed and I get six hours of sleep and I get up and I do it all over again. Where is the time for me to rest? Or you've gone to school and you've got a bunch of student loans and you're trying to make it on your own as an entrepreneur and the opportunities come, but they're just not close enough for you to be able to take that leap and leave the country or to
Really do your own thing in a way that you want. What are you supposed to do? I'm gonna tell you. Your rebellion is the key. It is in the little moments where you decide, I'm going to take a deep breath before I pick up this telephone call. I am going to decide that my hours for responding to email are between 8 a.m. and 12 p.m. And anything after that gets to wait until the next day. It's in the moments when you decide.
That it's best for you to go and take a walk right now instead of jumping into that meeting, or maybe even taking the meeting while you're taking a walk, because that's what you need in this moment. It is making sure that you choose what you and your body need as often as you can, and you stand up to the system and the habits and the behaviors that keep you busy and unfeeling.
It is hard to be completely different in a system that was designed to produce the results that it's getting right now. So the only way that you can make the change is to rebel against the system until you're able to create your own system. But the reality of it is that we live inside capitalism right now. It is idealistic. It is great to think that we can change the whole system. I know so many people in my graduating class and undergrad, high school, undergrad, and law school, we all thought,
Asha (09:29.836)
If we go into the system, we can make a change from there. The system is so much bigger than us. And I don't want to say that you can't make changes because I think that you can, but I think that the biggest the the biggest change is going to happen in how you show up to the system and how you choose to engage with the system. Now I'm very aware that people of different generations have different opportunities. My mom
We have this conversation all the time about what she was able to do within the system that she worked in. She was not able to have the same level of potential rebellion that I have because she was that first generation that came in under affirmative action in the United States for the school district that she worked in. And she said if it wasn't for affirmative action, they probably never would have given me the job. She was the one of the best, if not the best, principals.
In the entire school district for years on end. Her kids had the highest test scores, her teachers gave the highest ratings, they were an excellent school. And she was the only black administrator for a long time. And it wasn't because she was unqualified that she got the job. That's not what affirmative action is. Affirmative action said you had to give an opportunity to people who deserved it, who were from these particular classes. And so her ability, her opportunity to say, No, I'm gonna take a sick day today.
Or to say, no, I'm gonna push back when the superintendent calls because I need to handle something else with the student. Her ability to rebel to push back is smaller than my ability to rebel and push back because of the times that she lives in. I remember when I graduated law school, not even graduated, I had my first summer internship and when I interviewed for the job, I had my hair pressed. And when I went to the summer position,
I had my hair in kinky twists, and my mom was so worried that they weren't gonna offer me a full-time job because of my hair. Even in California. This was in 2005, summer of 2005, I believe. Maybe summer of 2000, no, summer of 2007, I believe. Six or seven, something like that. And I thought, mom, that's crazy. But I also knew that there were real cases. There were real
Asha (11:51.286)
Discrimination still happening today. And then a couple years later, maybe like eight years later after my summer, California was the first state to pass a law saying you cannot discriminate against black people based on their hairstyles. But I knew that being in the Bay Area of California and coming from a school in San Francisco, living in Oakland, that my law firm had enough exposure to black people that they knew that they would be in trouble if they fired me because of my hair.
And it was also a risk that I was willing to take because I wasn't in the same position that my mom was in when she started out in her career. So I was able, have been able, I'm still able to take more risks than my mom felt comfortable taking. I am able to engage in little acts of rebellion and ways that allow my nervous system to not just regulate, but to lead the way. If we
I think we have this wrong on the internet right now and in these is these healing spaces. We're constantly trying to learn the skills to have our nervous system to adapt to situations that are causing our nervous systems to freak the f*** out. But guess what? Your nervous system is freaking out because there's something threatening in your environment to your nervous system. And whether that's an old threat or a current threat, you have to decide and decide how to
Deal with, but do not expect your nervous system to quiet down in the face of an actual threat. So what's the solution? You move away from the threat. If the job is the threat, the job is the thing that is stressing you out, the emails, your supervisor, your boss is harassing you, don't expect or don't try to work to make your nervous system.
Ignore the threat. That's not what it is. Your nervous system is telling you that there's some kind of danger here, and your nervous system is trying to keep you alive. Listen to it. What is the anxiety in your chest telling you? Ask it what message do you have for me? And then really decide what it needs to be able to calm down. And it might be that it's enough to just take a breath. It might be you need to find a new job. It might be you need to go over your boss's head to HR.
Asha (14:13.174)
It might be any number of things, but do not expect your nervous system to go quiet. Do not try to train your nervous system to be silent. Learn how to recognize what it's telling you so that you can use your nervous system as a guide to say, no, this is not for me, or yes, this is. And that's where you regain your power. You don't need to silence your body, you need to listen.
To your body. You need to listen to your body. And the reason why you probably feel powerless right now is because you hear your body talking and you're trying to ignore it because you don't think that you have an option. So where do you start? You start with the little things. You start with taking a breath. You start with turning off your email a little earlier. You start with whatever it is that is accessible and easy to do right now so that you can start to take a little bit more control back.
To how you're showing up for these experiences that may or may not be designed for you to be comfortable in. And then when you have your nervous system in good working relationship with your brain, because your nervous system knows before your brain does, your brain will try to talk your nervous system out of what it's feeling because that's what we're taught. Mind over matter, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. But when you learn to work with your nervous system and let your nervous system guide you.
That's where your intuition comes from to know whether this place is good for you or not, whether this relationship is good for you or not, whether this opportunity should be a yes or a no. When you learn how to listen, you get to take your power back because you're making decisions from an empowered place. You're making a decision from your body's most ancient biological wisdom, the system that's designed to keep you alive.
Now that doesn't mean you won't have some false flags in there. Now that doesn't mean you won't have some false flags in there. There will certainly be some memories of some trauma from the past that'll come up, but you gotta listen to see what's a current issue or what's an old issue. So do not expect yourself, your nervous system to go quiet in the face of danger. But I want you to know that the little acts of rebellion.
Asha (16:35.66)
Are the way that you start to claim your personal power, especially or including systems that are not designed for you to be successful, not designed for you to rest, and not designed for you to be comfortable. I'm curious to know what you think about this. I feel like I was a little bit all over the place because I'm literally just talking from what's inside of me. so let me know. Leave a pod a comment on the podcast or send me an email and let me know.
Or find me on Threads, @ashawilkersonesq, and let me know what you think. All right, talk to y'all later.