As I sit at breakfast with a table full of women in Tulum, Mexico, I find myself reflecting on the winding road that brought me here — the long, quiet journey from hustle to wholeness.
And the question that keeps surfacing is this:
Why is letting go of hustle so hard for women — even when it’s clearly burning us out?
Because for so many of us, hustle wasn’t just something we did. It was something we were taught AND rewarded to be.
There was a time when hustle nearly extinguished my life force.
My physical body was depleted — burned out and inflamed.
My emotional body carried a quiet sadness I couldn’t name.
My mind stayed tight with fear, constantly calculating how to keep everything — and everyone — from falling apart.
And underneath it all was a belief I didn’t yet know how to question:
If I slow down, I will fail the people I love.
It began early — overachievement, perfectionism, disordered eating, blood-pressure medication at 25, hospitalization at 32. I was addicted to adrenaline, excitement, performance.
The first burnout was loud.
The second was silent — buried beneath success, productivity, and praise. Depression at 38, hidden behind competence.
For years, I believed my value lived in what I could produce, perfect, predict, and prove.
The Truth Beneath the Burnout
What I learned — slowly, tenderly, through therapy, yoga, acupuncture, whole foods, long hours in nature, and more tears than I can count — is this:
Burnout isn’t a failure of strength.
It’s the body rejecting a lie.
The lie that says:
- Your worth must be earned
- Rest must be justified
- Love follows performance
I was never meant to earn my worth.
I was meant to discover it through presence, remember it through stillness, and goose-bump moments of my body tell ME what was true.
Why Letting Go of Hustle Feels So Threatening
Many women ask me now, “Did something happen to you? Was it really that bad? Did people hurt you intentionally?”
And the best and most honest answer for now is: I will never know the intentions of others, I can only move through the experience as I created it to be. The deeper truth I have found is — I asked for it at the time, I created what my soul needed. And I even thrived in the chaos. Eventually, when it was time, I welcomed the unraveling.
But let me be frank letting go of hustle isn’t graceful.
It comes with:
- Identity loss
- Confusion
- The terrifying stillness of not knowing who you are without constant motion
I tried on every version the world offered — frameworks, models, roles — until I realized the only voice worth following was the quiet one I had been avoiding.
The whisper within.
Tune Out. Turn In. Turn Up.
The shift didn’t come through doing more.
It came through presence, the devotion to BEING.
Through breath.
Through prayer.
Through stillness.
And then, slowly, a new rhythm emerged:
Tune Out the noise — the expectations, the pressure, the compulsions to prove.
Turn In to the stillness where truth lives — and where trusted, loving mirrors can reflect who you really are.
Turn Up the courage to walk in that truth, even when it means letting go of what once felt safe.
The Space Between Hustle and Wholeness
This is where I live now — in the sacred middle.
I don’t reject ambition.
I practice focused alignment.
I make daily choices that feel good in my body — not choices fueled by adrenaline, urgency, or fear.
I lead from presence instead of pressure.
I invite the community instead of carrying it all alone.
Every morning, I breathe deeply.
I practice embodiment — reverence, stillness, prayer.
I consciously choose who I am becoming.
A New Measure of Power for Women
My mission — born from the ashes of overachievement and over-serving — is to help women and girls remember this:
Your value is not measured by how much you produce.
It is revealed by how deeply you can feel, love, and live as who you truly are.
Women are cyclical. Creative. Fluid. Transformative.
To the woman reading this who is tired, striving, and still searching:
You are enough, even when you rest.
You are worthy, even when you pause.
You are whole, even when you feel undone.
We are not here to prove our power.
We are born with it.
So soften your edges.
Lead with heart.
Unlearn the hustle — and reclaim the wholeness that has always been yours.
In light, love, and joyful presence,
KellyAnn Daubach 🌿
Founder,ConsciousTourism
