Live+Work More Human

Outrage is loud, exhausting, and — according to your feed — mandatory. But what if the antidote to burnout isn't more hustle, more mindfulness apps, or more optimisation... it's awe?

This week, hosts Sally Clarke and Alexis Zahner unpack Sally's Fast Company piece on "microdosing awe" — the radical, deceptively simple practice of pausing to notice something vast, and why it might be the most underrated tool in your burnout-prevention kit.

In this episode

Why awe isn't fluffy — it's a nervous-system reset that pulls you out of fight-flight-freeze and into healing mode
The psychology of the "small self": why softening your ego (not shrinking yourself) is protective against burnout
How awe slots into Sally's BRNT framework (Breathe, Rest, Nourish, Talk) as the connective thread, not a fifth pillar
Why we're "saturated with outrage and starved of wonder" — and how algorithms are built to keep it that way
Anger is initiatory, not transformative: holding outrage and awe at the same time, not choosing between them
Emotional boundaries around what you consume — because nourishment isn't just food, it's your media diet
The "stravification" trap: why turning awe into a measurable, optimised habit kills the whole point
Practical ways to bring awe into the workplace — team WhatsApp photo threads, opening meetings with an awe share, one-on-one check-ins
Sally's five straight days of sensory overload in the Amazon jungle, and what it taught her about resetting perspective back home

Key takeaways

Awe = an automatic nervous-system regulator. You don't have to "think" your way to calm — your body can get you there in seconds.
You don't need Kilimanjaro. A sunset, a dog in the park, a piece of music — the size of the moment doesn't matter, the noticing does.
The "small self" isn't about being less — it's about stepping out of ego so you can see your problems (and yourself) more clearly.
Outrage and awe aren't opposites. You can be furious about broken systems and still let wonder ground you — one doesn't cancel the other out.
Urgency culture is profitable, not accidental. Outrage drives engagement — recognising that removes the self-blame.
Nourishment includes your media diet. What you scroll shapes your nervous system as much as what you eat.
Don't gamify awe. The second you're tracking "awe points," you've lost the plot — this is the opposite of a metrics game.
Bring it to work in small doses: open a meeting with an awe share, start a team photo thread, ask "what impressed you lately?" in a 1:1.
Awe is a courageous, almost radical act in a culture that rewards visible exhaustion — doing it anyway is the point.

Links & mentions

Sally's article on microdosing awe is out via Fast Company — find the link and more of Sally's writing at salcla.com
Sally's BRNT framework (Breathe, Rest, Nourish, Talk) — explored across her books and workshops
Referenced: Tara Brach's teaching that "anger is initiatory, not transformative" see more at tarabrach.com

Live + Work More Human is hosted by Sally Clarke and Alexis Zahner. Subscribe wherever you get your podcasts and learn more at www.liveandworkmorehuman.com
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Welcome to Brain Snacks! This tasty morsel of a conversation between your cohosts Alexis and Sally explores how AI can – if used effectively and thoughtfully – be a powerful tool to enhance human work, reduce burnout, and foster trust and creativity within teams. You will learn practical strategies for integrating AI ethically and in a human-centered way.

Key topics
AI as an enabler for human work
Reducing burnout through AI
Leadership strategies for AI integration
Building trust and psychological safety
Using AI data insights for organizational change

Learn more at www.liveandworkmorehuman.com
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Digital connectivity was supposed to make us faster, sharper, and more connected. Instead, it's quietly taxing the very things that make leaders effective: creativity, emotional regulation, real productivity, and trust. In this episode, Alexis unpacks "the digital leader's paradox" — the tension of needing technology to perform while it simultaneously erodes the conditions for high performance.
Drawing on the article she co-wrote with Professor Martin Gutmann (Lucerne School of Business) and Dr. Scott J. Allen (SMU Cox School of Business), Alexis walks through the four hidden costs of digital distraction — creative, emotional, productive, and relational — and makes the case that this isn't a personal discipline problem. It's a culture problem. She closes with the practical shifts leaders can make to design for focus, model presence, and lead the paradox rather than pretend it can be solved with a few "no phones after 6pm" rules.

In this conversation, we explore:
Why digital distraction should be treated as an organisational risk, not just a personal willpower issue
How fragmented attention specifically undermines creativity and strategic thinking
Why "always on" leadership mirrors athlete overtraining — and what happens without recovery time
The real cost of interruptions: task-switching can cut productivity by up to 40%, and it can take over 20 minutes to recover focus after a single notification
What phubbing is, and how it quietly erodes trust and psychological safety on a team
Five concrete practices high-performing leaders use to protect focus and presence without unplugging from work entirely
Why the answer isn't more discipline — it's a deliberate shift in team and organisational culture

Find more information about this topic and Alexis' article right here: https://www.wearehumanleaders.com/podcast/digital-distraction-alexis-zahner

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Welcome to Brain Snacks, bite sized learning moments from Live+Work More Human. In today's Brain Snack, Dara Simkin explores the concept of achievement syndrome, its roots in early programming, and its impact on burnout and authentic living. This succinct conversation delves into systemic influences, personal identity, and strategies for fostering genuine fulfillment.

Key takeaways

Achievement syndrome origins and impact
Systemic influences on success and burnout
The role of early programming and societal norms

Listen to the full conversation with Dara right here, and learn more at www.liveandworkmorehuman.com

Happy Brain Snacking!
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In this deeply honest conversation, your intrepid cohosts Alexis Zahner and Sally Clarke unpack why burnout keeps rising globally despite decades of research, media coverage, and “awareness” — and why it is *never* an individual weakness or failure.

Drawing on Sally’s work in burnout prevention and Alexis’s lived experiences across marketing, government, and consulting, we explore burnout as a *perfect storm* of three intertwined layers: societal narratives that glorify work and rugged individualism, organizational cultures that reward unsustainable effort while undermining autonomy, and the internalised beliefs we carry about our worth, productivity, and “being a good worker.”

We explore:

Why burnout is *never* a sign of personal weakness, poor time management, or not trying hard enough — and why it disproportionately impacts top performers, high‑achievers, and deeply responsible people.
Burnout as a “perfect storm”: how societal, organizational, and internalised layers interact to create chronic stress and disillusionment, often in ways that are invisible until people are already burning out.
The organizational drivers of burnout, from heavy workloads and poor leadership to bureaucracy, friction, and hypocrisy cultures where wellbeing messages don’t match lived reality.
The slow‑burn version of burnout: when work is not just “too much” but too misaligned, too inefficient, and too full of rework — draining spirit and motivation even when you care deeply about what you do.
Societal narratives that venerate work and conflating self‑worth with job title, prestige, or salary, including generational dynamics and cross‑cultural differences between places like the US, Australia, Japan, and the Netherlands.
How internalised stories about being a “good worker” or a “good girl/boy/person” can keep us stuck on the hamster wheel, over‑accepting responsibility and outsourcing our values to organisations.
The existential dimension of burnout: the painful gap between the career and impact we hoped for and the reality of how work feels — and why cynicism, disillusionment, and “what’s the point?” are key warning signs.
Self‑knowledge as a burnout antidote: practical reflection questions to unpack where your beliefs about work came from and whether they actually align with how you want your life to look and feel.
Why self‑compassion is not indulgent but essential when disentangling self‑worth from productivity, prestige, and external approval.
Concrete steps leaders can take right now: friction audits with their teams, small systems changes, and genuine role modelling of healthy behaviour instead of “do as I say, not as I do.”

Reframing burnout in this way is not about blaming organisations alone or bypassing personal responsibility; it’s about seeing the whole system we swim in, so we can create more courageous, honest, and sustainable ways of living and working — together.

Learn more including all the links you're after and a full transcript at liveandworkmorehuman.com
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