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Every success guru says the same thing.
"Get up early. Push yourself. Show up every day. No excuses. Hustle harder."
I used to say it too. Because that is what I was taught. Now? I cringe every single time I hear it, because I have seen firsthand, hundreds of times over 13 years, what that advice does to women who actually try to live it.
In theory, it is solid advice. If you are a man.
Men are biologically designed for consistency. After puberty, very little changes hormonally in the male body from one day to the next. Their testosterone levels follow a roughly 24-hour cycle, resetting daily. That means they are almost perfectly engineered to perform the same routine, with the same energy, and the same output, day after day.
Women are not. Not even close.
In 2024, 59% of women reported experiencing burnout, compared to 46% of men. And according to Gallup, that gap has more than doubled since 2019.
There is not a single thing about us that is designed to be consistent. We are built to ebb and flow. Our hormones shift in a roughly 28-day cycle (though it varies for every woman), and those shifts affect everything. Energy levels. Emotional range. Creativity. Memory. Sleep needs. Appetite. Social capacity. Confidence. The ability to absorb new information. How we feel about ourselves and our work.
Forcing a 'same thing every single day' routine onto a body that is literally not wired for it is not discipline. It is a setup for burnout. And it is happening to women everywhere.
I hear this a lot. 'I am on contraception.' 'I have gone through menopause.' 'That hormonal stuff does not apply to me anymore, I had a hysterectomy'
I hate to be the one to break it to you, but your menstrual cycle is just one physical sign of your hormonal fluctuations. It is the visible tip of a much bigger iceberg.
Whether you bleed or not, your hormones are still doing their thing. Oestrogen, progesterone, cortisol, thyroid hormones, insulin, and a whole cast of others are in constant communication with your brain and body. They influence your neurochemistry, your immune function, your gut, your energy production, your mood regulation, and your capacity to think clearly on any given day.
From the day you are born until the day you die, your hormones influence your thoughts and your actions. That does not switch off because of contraception or menopause. It shifts. It changes. But it does not stop.
You have probably experienced this already, even if you did not have a name for it.
Some days you bounce out of bed with energy to spare. You are sharp, creative, fast. Content pours out of you. You absorb new concepts without having to think hard. You feel confident in your decisions and genuinely good about where things are heading.
Then a week later, you are dragging yourself off the pillow. The ideas have dried up. You are re-reading the same paragraph three times and still not taking it in. Your motivation feels like it has taken a holiday without telling you. Decisions feel hard. Everything feels harder.
And then comes the thought: what is wrong with me?
Nothing! Absolutely nothing is wrong with you. This is your hormones doing exactly what they are designed to do.
Women also notice this in subtler ways: more anxiety or insecurity at certain points in the month, then natural boldness and confidence at others. Energy that dips and needs more rest, then periods where six hours of sleep is genuinely enough. Changes in digestion, appetite, and even how sociable you feel. All of it hormonal. All of it normal. All of it meaningful, if you know how to read it.
When you are out of sync with where you are in your cycle and you force yourself to perform anyway, it does not just not work. It actively creates more self-doubt. And that self-doubt compounds.
McKinsey's 2024 research found that 43% of female executives experience burnout, compared to 31% of their male counterparts. These aren't women who lack discipline or drive. They are among the most driven women on the planet. And they are still burning out at a significantly higher rate.
It usually sounds something like this:
"It is 5am. I should be up. All the successful people swear by this.
But I am exhausted.
Push through. Maybe this is exactly why I am not further ahead. If I can not even drag myself out of bed, how am I ever going to make this work?
Nobody is responding to what I put out anyway. Maybe I am just not good enough at this.
Maybe so-and-so was right. Maybe this is just too hard for me."
What started as a tired morning becomes a full spiral into worthlessness. That is not random and it is not weakness. For most women, it comes from a deeper belief that has been running quietly underneath for a long time, usually something around not being enough. (That is exactly what Own Your BS® was written to address, and what a Creatrix® Transformology® Reset can shift at the root.)
The point is: forcing consistency does not build resilience in women. It builds shame. And shame is a very expensive thing to run a business on.
Your hormonal cycle has four broad phases. Most women know them as menstruation, the follicular phase, ovulation, and the luteal phase. What most women do not know is that each phase comes with a distinct neurochemical profile.
In the follicular phase (roughly days 6 to 14 for most), rising oestrogen boosts dopamine and serotonin. You tend to feel sharper, more social, more willing to take risks. This is a natural window for pitching, creating, connecting, and starting things.
Around ovulation, oestrogen peaks and testosterone makes a brief appearance. Communication is easier. You feel more magnetic. If you have anything that requires presence or persuasion, this is your window.
In the luteal phase (roughly days 15 to 28), progesterone rises and your brain shifts. You become more detail-oriented, better at finishing things, and more inward-focused. But you are also more sensitive to stress. This is not a weakness. It is your brain doing different work.
During menstruation, both hormones drop. Your brain is actually doing a lot of integration and reflection during this time. Trying to match the output of ovulation during your period is like trying to sprint on empty. The body is not broken. It is in a different gear.
Understanding which gear you are in changes everything.
Put the stick down first. You are not designed to match a man's consistency model. You never were. That is not an excuse. It is biology, and it is worth taking seriously.
What you can do is get to know your own cycle well enough to plan around it. On the weeks where creativity naturally peaks, schedule content creation, client-facing work, anything that requires you to be inspired and visible. On the weeks where energy contracts, lean into admin, reflection, planning, and the behind-the-scenes work that does not need you to be 'on'.
You can absolutely show up regularly for your clients and your business. Regularity and robotic consistency are not the same thing. Showing up in alignment with where you naturally are means it flows. Forcing yourself against the grain of your own biology means it costs you far more than it should, in energy, in confidence, and in the quiet erosion of your belief in yourself.
Work with your cycle, not against it. Your business, your body, and your sense of self will all thank you.
Curious about what is running underneath the burnout? Own Your BS® is a good place to start. Or if you are ready to go deeper, find out about working with Bree 1:1