Radical Self-Care For Leaders with Maria D & Liliana B

The fastest way to burn out in therapy is to believe you have to be available for everyone, all the time, no matter what your body is doing. We’ve both lived that lie, and after a powerful AAMFT leadership weekend, we can’t unsee what it costs. A workshop from Ashley Hicks on Leadership and Radical Self-Care gave us language for what we’ve been trying to practice: radical self-care is not a treat, it’s a leadership skill and an act of self-love that keeps clinicians sustainable. 

We talk about the weird double standard in our field: we tell people to set boundaries, then we call them “unethical” when they use them. We connect burnout to real-life health realities, including surgery recovery and the cycle of working to pay medical bills while work makes health worse. If you’re a therapist, supervisor, or practice owner, we dig into what accountability actually looks like: not just saying “take care of yourself,” but building norms that support time off, slower response times, and honest check-ins. 

You’ll also get practical ideas you can try immediately: do-not-disturb rules that protect family time, deleting the email app during vacation, turning off notifications, setting admin blocks for documentation, and finding an accountability partner when “no” feels hard. We end with a values-based prompt to sketch your radical self-care vision and take one small step toward it. 

If this conversation hits home, subscribe, share it with a colleague who needs permission to breathe, and leave us a review so more therapists can find it. What boundary are you ready to protect this week?

A Hero's Welcome Podcast  © Maria Laquerre-Diego & Liliana Baylon

Transcript

Welcome Back And Why We Paused

Maria 0:02

Welcome back, listeners, to another episode of a Heroes Welcome podcast. I am your co-host, Marila Car Diego, and I'm joined by one of my besties and my co-host.

Liliana 0:13

That's me, Liliana, one of your besties. I am your besties. Let's clarify that. Today's discussion is going to be on Liliana's identity. No, I'm just kidding. It is. Anyway, hopefully you noticed. Thank you for listening to our podcast. We are so grateful that it's tracking, that it's important to you, that you're sharing with others. Thank you, thank you, thank you. We took a break and not record ourselves. That was our intent to be recording. We're already in May. If we are tracking, and we have not actually recorded conversations between us, one, because we've been very vocal about dealing with dynamic disability, health issues. And for all of you who are familiar with know that our bodies dictate how we show up or when we show up. I sure do. A lot of times we schedule things and then our body says, not today, and we have to pivot. Which can lead into other conversations, such as how do you work on an agency or private practice, or how what are the ethics? And we will be happy to answer some of the questions in another episode.

Maria 1:27

Yes.

Liliana 1:28

In regards to what we're learning about it. But for today, we want to talk about an experience that we had in regards to leadership. There's a lot of associations that have leadership trainings. Let's just say that because we're bringing it. And Maria and I decided to go to the AMFT Leadership Hypnosis because we're both MFTs, uh, because we wanted to go in experience. And that weekend did not disappoint. We had a couple of workshops and we networking

AAMFT Weekend And The Big Takeaway

Liliana 2:03

with amazing therapists who shared projects that they're doing, research that they're doing, therapists who presented and they did awesome topics. Oh, incredible. Right. We my bucket was failed that weekend, so many ideas, but we want to focus on one training that had us, Maria and I, turning to each other and talk about like, wait, we're actually talking about self-care. And that was the title of it, which is Leadership and Radical Self-Care.

Maria 2:35

Yes. Yeah. It's such a timely conversation. So, yes, we've been absent because life is lifing right now. Our bodies are doing whatever, they're in control of us more than we would like to admit. And it's also been part of our own stepping back and having to listen and do radical self-care because we're living in a time where everything is so intense and heavy and happening constant, constantly. Having to, you know, having the privilege

Radical Self-Care As Real Leadership

Maria 3:10

to take the news app off of my phone because it was too much. You know, small pieces of that of being self-care, but looking at leadership as radical self-care, not only for ourselves, but as for the people that we are in leadership positions around was such an amazing. I mean, we could have spent days, I think, talking about this.

Liliana 3:34

Yes. I have the ability to stalk people. So right away I went and I found more about her. So I was like, I like, we connected to some social media. I said I attended, I love this. And I really mean it because one, let's break it down. I think that as therapists, we are not thought of how a role is actually of leadership. That's one. And then two, we have discussed this before. Then a lot of us in therapy move into supervision for different reasons, but then we don't think about the responsibility of leadership within that role.

Maria 4:13

Yeah.

Liliana 4:14

And how we have to be responsible and accountable to talk about our supervisees when it comes to radical self-care, not self-care, but radical self-care, because of what our field expects us to do as therapists. Let go of the supervisor, like a therapist, how we have to be available, how we have so many identities, but somehow our field focuses on one, even though they're asking us how you're taking care of yourself, by the way. But let's talk about this case. How are you taking care of yourself? But how are you going to be available to your clients 24-7?

Maria 4:55

Yeah.

Liliana 4:55

Right? Put boundaries because of ethics, but you have to answer because if you don't, you abandon your client.

Maria 5:04

Yeah. Yeah. It's this idea of like, yes, we're giving you permission and we're telling you to do these things, but it doesn't apply to me, right? Like it doesn't apply to us. Set boundaries for everybody else. But when I call on you, or you're you're required at the office for some reason, or your clients call on you, you need to answer, right? So it's like it's what's good for one is not good for everybody. And I think that was one of the things I took away from this was, you know, in leadership positions, but also just as humans trying to navigate everything right now. It's carving out this, yes, we know these things are important. And you know what, you holding a boundary could be an inconvenience for me. And that is my problem, not your problem. The problem isn't you've put down this boundary. The problem is I need to learn to navigate around that instead of making the person putting the boundary hold all of that responsibility and wait.

Liliana 6:00

Yeah. Yes. So all of that, right? So I think this training brought us for you and me, brought us the idea of we know we're in leadership for a while. Not because we've been taking leadership trainings, not because we've already participated. Well, we have, but that's another point. But I think it's more how aware we are of the responsibility because of the privileges, access, and platforms that we have.

Maria 6:32

Yeah, yeah.

Liliana 6:34

And absolutely right. And we were just talking earlier to our cohort of amazing shout out to our colleagues who are with us in our book club. We were talking about our books and what we're reading, but also talking about how burnout is so familiar to us.

Maria 6:54

Yes.

Liliana 6:55

And we minimize it.

Maria 6:57

Yeah. And we're desensitized to it.

Liliana 6:59

We're desensitized. So for all of you to put it in perspective, one of my colleagues in that group shared about a

Burnout Signals We Keep Minimizing

Liliana 7:06

band that she wears to track symptoms. So I got that band because I'm I have the aura ring, I have the eye watch, and now I'm carrying that, like I'm full of you're a data center. I'm just data center, that's exactly it. I get that morning to Atlanta where we went in, and out of 16 points, just in the flight, I had already consumed one third of my points. And I started laughing because Maria and I met at the airport and I shared that data, and we're like, okay, what does that mean for you? But is that awareness that I want to bring back to that training that we took? So shout out to Ashley Hicks, that's the person who did that training. And when she was talking about radical self-care as an act of love. And how we go engaging into practices where the leadership in those practices tell us about self-care, but do not do check-ins or they do not have it within the practice of actually engaging in self-care.

Maria 8:15

Yeah, there's no enforcing that and supporting that. And I think the other thing that really stood out to me is that as leaders, we can't just say go do these things. We also have to be doing these things and being very vocal to our, you know, our cohorts, that this is why, right? And I know for me in the last couple of years, that's been a big shift. When I when I do need to work from home, or I will be unavailable because my body decided not today, Maria.

Liliana 8:45

Yes.

Maria 8:45

Um, being able to just verbalize that. I'm having to work from home, or I am not available today because I am not well.

Liliana 8:52

Yes.

Maria 8:53

Right. So I'm going to take my day to to take care of myself in the way that I need to. You know, I have the the privilege to have structure and people around that can pick up the pieces that are required. But I think the other thing that's come through for me really loud and clear is there's very few things that really cannot wait for me to be okay. Yes. Right? There's very and we aren't given permission like that very often in our field. It's like, no, you must be available. You you have to be you have to be responsive. You people are counting on you. And and yes, and I am I'm a human in a body that has needs, but has needs. And I know Liliana, you and I have talked about this, but we've learned the hard way when we don't listen to that message. Yeah. There's a much harder, longer recovery road.

Liliana 9:48

Yes. So I was sharing with my group that I had a minor surgery done, a pigeon surgery done two weeks ago. And the following day, I was like, I got this, and I tried to move. And unfortunately, my body said nene. So then I have to be rushed to urgent care. And so for the past week, I've been homebody because I couldn't go out, because if I lose blood, you know, that can lead to me Disney passing out. And the first question that they ask you, by the way, when you come for advice is are you hallucinating or have you passed out? I was like, girl, if I pass out, how will I know? And if I'm hallucinating, how will I be making this one call? Like we can use humor in here for all of this. But we come back to your body, if you truly believe, if you read the book, or if you share that you read the book, our body gives cores per se. Then you know that your body actually does give score. And for Maria and I, the ongoing conversation is how are we listening to our bodies, what we keep minimizing, what self-care looks like, and what does now radical self-care look like. So you can say as you listen to Maria, well, well, you you have the systems, you have like I can tell from my place, I'm in private practice. If I don't work, I have no income. Yet I had a conversation, which I will not name the name just because I didn't have I didn't share in order for me to have permission to share. But I remember having this uh conversation with another colleague who said, I have to go to work to pay medical bills. But if I go to work, I'm pushing my body to the point where my body now is taking me to medical appointments because this is what's happening. So is this ongoing cycle of not honoring each other's bodies?

Maria 11:49

Yeah.

Liliana 11:50

So I'm naming this because if you're listening to this and you're like, but I'm not in private practice, I don't have these privileges, the cost of not listening to our bodies, the cost for not advocating and the cost as leaders and not advocating for our supervisees and not advocating for employees or contractors in regards to how are you gonna do this differently so that we don't continue with this idea of our field that we have to be accessible 24-7 and is that your responsibility. Doctors do not have that responsibility, by the way.

Maria 12:29

No, do you know how long I'm waiting for an appointment? Because they are booked and will not see me at 7 p.m. Because that's the time that works for me. Yeah. And I, you know, I think during the pandemic, we saw some steps forward, right? I think it's still in your email, Liliana, where you talk about like, you know, I'm I'm emailing you when I'm available. Please don't feel response, you know, don't feel the need to respond outside of your own work times because all of

Accessibility Culture And The Cost

Maria 12:58

our our hours shifted for the pandemic. And I know you and I have talked, like ours have continued to shift because of our bodies and because of appointments that are needed, or we've started to recognize our own like limitations in terms of energy and focus. So I think that that's really part of the important conversation is like these boundaries are going to look different for everybody. And if you find yourself in a leadership position, and yes, I recognize I have those systems in place, but I haven't always. I've had to I've had to create them over the last four years so that I could function the way I wanted to and run my practice the way I wanted to. So, you know, if you find yourself in leadership positions, and let's be honest, most of us are in leadership positions, even if we don't have the title that goes along with it or the one of the ways that you can you know share this and help the colleagues that you're working with is doing it for yourself and then just being vocal about it, right? I'm taking Friday off to take care of myself, or you know, I finally made that appointment that I've been putting off forever, and then you get celebratory texts for you know doing the hard thing. But I love this idea of leadership and this radical self-care, not just being dismissed and you know, being, you know, words that we say to each other, but really truly being coming part of our practice.

Liliana 14:37

So, what would that look like for you? Which is what if you start with something small? We're not saying, go do this, because that will not work, because it's it's all patterns that are so integrated within. Um, Maria and I were very vocal about how we struggle with this. So, what is it? What is it? What is an action item that you can do in order to start doing this? And again, the radical self-care does not talk about let's go do a massage, let's do your pedicure.

Small Boundaries That Actually Work

Liliana 15:11

Like that's very what is the word that I'm looking for, Maria? That's very superficial. Yeah, it is needed, it is lovely, but it's very superficial when you still have to check your phone, when you still are checking emails. I I because I started working with this by the way, when I go out and I meet with someone for coffee or for lunch, whatever it is, and I'm talking and they're checking their phone, I stop talking. So I was like, the internal message that I'm getting is that I'm not important. You're checking on someone else. So I started practicing that, by the way. When I go out to eat, like my phone is flipped down. Actually, my phone is I'm in silence. But it started with my email when I put that line. It started with slowly with band raised with clients in regards to when I'm available. So my work email for clients states something similar to this is what I'm available. And even when I'm available, I may be with a client. So like I have something to that effect. With supervisees, it looks like I'm not available. Is this an emergency? Do I need to come in? And by the way, it doesn't say that I'm perfect on it. We were together and someone, a supervisee texted me, and I'm like, oh my God, I have to step out. And Maria was, are you a primary or secondary supervisor? And I was like, Oh shit, that's right. So even like sometimes we need reminders of it, right? So radical self-care is the invitation to actually love yourself, prioritize yourself, and what are the acts of love that you can do in order for you to practice this and take it into all the roles that you do, but as a supervisor, Maria and I, or as supervisors, Maria and I, to get into how are we gonna take this and incorporate it and not only preach but to make sure that we are helding our supervisees and ourselves accountable for including this in our supervision.

Maria 17:14

Yeah, and I think you gave some wonderful practical examples. I know you know, in our clinic, when we know that someone's taking time off for themselves, we tell them delete the email app off of your phone. You can always read it, download it when you're back, but you don't need to even have the notification or turn the notifications off for that app while you're away. You don't need to, you don't need to be accessible all of the time. And it is so easy for us to slip back into, right? Because we are all brainwashed into this productivity, must be available mindset. So maybe it's that. Maybe you turn off the notifications, maybe you delete the app, maybe you schedule a time for you to do documentation in your schedule that is an appointment for you so that that's part of your self-care. That we you're not spending your Friday night or your Saturday catching up on documentation. Maybe it's just finding one other person to confide in and go, like, I'm struggling with this thing, and I need someone to hold me accountable when I say I'm gonna set this boundary, or I'm not gonna do this thing, or I'm not gonna sign up for another training until I finish this other certification I'm doing. Some of us in the room. But maybe it can be as small as that finding an accountability partner to help you hold some of those boundaries or or even come up with what do I need? What do I need? Because so many of us, we don't even know. We don't even know, we don't even know what it would look like if we slowed down or we said no, or we put some of these boundaries in place. And I think that those are good starting points, but I'd love to hear your ideas. How are you practicing radical self-care? What does that look like for you? What's working? What are what's been hard about it? Because this is hard. This is hard. Saying no is hard, not looking at your email is hard.

Liliana 19:04

Yeah, especially as females. I'm not gonna throw, you know, my male colleagues, especially as females, when you think about patriarchy, when you think about how females were programmed to nurture, to attend, to do. So not only this trainer was like, Yes, give me more. And by the way, that was the felt sense pretty much of the whole weekend. Oh my

Productivity Pressure And Self-Worth

Liliana 19:29

Gosh,yes. But even I was trying to remember his name when you were talking,evenlikeuhIthinkhisnameisCarlNewport,Iwanttosay.Um, he's the author of Deep Work. And he talks about a few things. And I was like,yes, because you're a male. So the more that I review his work, he was talking about how we were programmed to think that the more accessible we are, that speaks into our leadership. When in reality, you're a doormat if you continue doing that. So it's not about leadership, it's about how you don't appreciate yourself.

unknown 20:08

Yeah.

Liliana 20:08

Talking about a lack of self-love, lack of and so I really like that. And when you were talking, Maria, I was like, oh my God, you're talking about shallow work and dip work. That's actually his uh premises and his book. So, yes, as a supervised CSS therapist, is how do you develop time? And with AI, by the way, you can go and do some of this stuff. But how do you develop time into what is your day for administrative work and stick to it? What is your day for emails and like those administrative task-oriented stuff? What is your work for clients? And Maria, I know that you're really good about talking to the people who work in your agency about these things because that's one of the things why I like to hang with and and and to learn from them, because they have this setup in regards to you know what happens when.

Maria 21:04

Yeah.

Liliana 21:05

So, how do we create this value? Lisa Dion talks about values concept and and she gives examples of when you go into someone's home, what is the thing that you see? What is it that they spend most of the time? So I know you guys don't see it, but if I move around, you're gonna see books because that's one of my highest values of knowledge. But next to it, what you will see is pictures, and Maria has been into my house, uh, my home, and next to it is uh family pictures everywhere, every every vacation that I have done with my family, every uh stuff that they do, like I take pictures. My family is really important to me. But in all of that, what I notice in the radical self love is that I don't have pictures of me. And I take I do to do a vacation once a year just by myself. For the last four years, I couldn't do that because of my health. I was not allowed to travel. I didn't go for a walk by myself because there were like so many fears. But I used to do one trip for myself, just for me. Right. So mixing here things of there there is a lot of information when it comes to how do you prioritize you? How you don't become a doormat that says yes to everything. Think about the book the year of yes that we also read, which is what opportunities you're gonna say no to create room for yes. Yes. So that can be applied to self-care too. How easily you're prioritizing self-care and what would that look like for you?

Maria 22:45

Yeah, yeah. Well, you were talking about, you know, this goes beyond like pedicures and massages. And like, no, no shame. Like, I love a good massage. But the last time I got a pedicure, I sat there and was replying to emails while the technician was working. So, like for me, like, was that self-care? Not really, not really. I didn't walk out of that experience feeling better, feeling rusted, feeling like I recharged it all. It was,

Presence, Support, And Sustainable Leadership

Maria 23:13

it was almost like an inconvenience that I couldn't just be at my computer to do the things, right? So, whatever that might look like for you, but I think we're inviting you to like what would real radical self-care look like? And like think really big out of the box. Like it if I hate the freaking miracle question, but like if if Maria were in charge and could grant your wishes, what would your self-care look like? Think real big, and then are there small steps to move towards that? Right? For me, it's like I put a do not disturb on my phone when it's when I'm home. Yeah. There's a few things that are allowed to break through that. If there's an emergency at the office, if someone, you know, like there are certain things that you can allow to break through, but my phone goes on do not disturb when I'm home with my family because that is my protected time with them. Yes. I give so much. The other thing that came up, Lana, when you were saying that, it was like it's quality, not quantity. Yes. Right. I can do I can do a lot of things fairly well. Yeah. But I know that if I were to like reduce and do a few things, I could do them extremely well and have a much longer career because I am burning out like a flash in the pan.

Liliana 24:34

Yes. When you named the pedicure, by the way, I know Brene Brown didn't do it as shaming, but she was talking about how, and I don't know what she was talking about, but she went in and she was having a pedicure, and she became aware that first of all, you have the person like lower than you doing the pedicure, and then you have a phone like they don't exist. Yes. And how dehumanizing that was. And I remember listening and thinking about it, and I was like, no. So the lady that I go to my pedicures, I know how long she's been married, I know about her children, I know about her music, I know what because now we're engaging in a conversation. She asked me about my children, she asked me about my dogs. Like, is this beautiful fill but like fill my cup of like I'm getting to know you?

Maria 25:24

So it's a recharging experience, right? That you wouldn't get if you had that same appointment and were answering emails or text messages or or or or answering any of the other numerous demands that get put on us.

Liliana 25:37

Yes. So, you know what again, what action, what actionable items you can do. The invitation is Maria invited you to think about what the big picture and then what are the steps so that you don't feel like I can never attain it, but it's what are the steps? It is feasible if you're working with an agency, it is feasible if you're working for private practice, it is about management.

Maria 26:03

Yeah, right and support and having support. So if you if you need a space to talk that out, and what does that look like? You know, look around and form a group. And if you don't have it, like drop it down to us, like chat with us. We are always so happy to learn how other people are doing it and to share what we've learned along the way. Because oh my gosh, if someone can learn from my mistakes, please be my guess. They may save them from that with you because Maria now.

Liliana 26:32

My phone has a do not disturb after 9 p.m. mountain time, and then it gets lifted at 5 30 in the morning because that's when I'm off. I have a do not disturb when I'm working. Sundays are my refill day, which is I love cooking and prepping food, and that's my love language for my family. So I love prepping food on Sundays where I don't have to think about oh my god, what am I cooking? I'm so exhausted. Let's just go to the drive-thru. So taking care of my body. But my sleep is my number one band right now when you're in menopause and you get disrupted by hot blushes. That is a real thing, my friend. So if you are going through this track, you know what I'm talking about. I know sleep is precious, it should be protected. So my sleep hygiene, it's it's really important to me. So, what would that be like for you? We just share either you can do a pedicure, but are you present with the pedicure? What message can you put in your email? What are your boundaries when it comes to your work hours? What is the day for administrative tasks, which we have then? We don't count them in, one because a lot of times we don't get paid, but they're part of. Um when you're taking your CE, what are you doing? Because Maria and I have a blast.

Maria 27:58

I mean, if it's not fun while learning, I don't want to do it anymore.

Liliana 28:03

But we're like, that's a note, that's a podcast title, that's a like, but we're like laughing, but when we're present, we're present and we are attentive to what they're sharing with us, we're reaching out, like we're doing things. And the invitation for you is what are you doing in order for you to take care of yourself, in order for you to love yourself? And if you're in a leadership position, which you are, is how are you helping others around you and how are you asking for help?

Maria 28:34

Yeah.

Liliana 28:35

Will that sum up what we learn? I think so. Yeah. And giving and giving, because we had such such a moment of like permission giving in that training of like, oh, yeah, this and the refram from like, we're not gonna call this selfish anymore. This is this is required, right? This is required for me to be a good leader for a very long time. That's my that's my hope. Yeah, absolutely. So take a couple of minutes today and and think about like what are some small steps towards where you would like things to be, because you know, we can shape our profession, we can shape our work life. And I think we need to we you're given permission now to to do that. We don't have to accept what's been given to us. We can do better and demand better. So thank you, Ashley. Hopefully, I'm pronouncing your last name right. Higgs H-I-C-K-S for that amazing workshop. If you want to learn more about her, go and find out. Um she's in social media, reach out to her, take her training if she's doing more trainings.

Maria 29:42

Please do, and yeah, and and shout out to AAMFT. Listen, I have not been to an AAMFT thing in a minute, yeah, a long minute, and I I forgot what I was missing. So, yeah, you'll see more of me. Shout out to them because they did create it a space. When they said networking, it was not a shallow networking, so really we were like, by the way, everyone who has experience me and Maria, they know Maria is social and I'm an introvert, and I'm like hiding in a corner as always, because I was like, I don't want to do this.

Liliana 30:19

That's accurate. We say what like at least an hour, if not more. It was two hours later after the work ended, and we were with a group of amazing therapists, and we're learning about their projects, and we're like I went to my room thinking, what the heck happened? How could we bypass this boundary? It sure did, it should, but and and it like really did enhance the rest of our time there because we would see them, we would pass them, they were in other sessions with us, and it was just like this this community and connection that was magic. So, yeah, so I do. I get to um rope Liliana along, although I say that, but she got there before me and was already like surrounded by people because she I mean, she's she is an introvert in many ways, and she does need her recharge time, but she's also I mean she's a social draw. She she loves to connect with people as much as it drains. Thank you for using that word. Yeah, it does drain me. And when you're there, I will be present because I'm learning so much about leadership and being compassion and showing up and and and and making sure that you get to have a different experience in our field, right?

Maria 31:40

Well, that's that's your radical self-care. When you're there, you're fully present. But when it is bedtime, guess what, guys? You will not find her, she will not answer her phone, she will just dip out when her midnight clock hits. She turned before she turns it back into a pumpkin, she is back in her room. And I love that for you.

Liliana 32:00

Hey, we're at the bar. You want to come? Thank you. Have a great time. But I'll see you for coffee in the morning. Okay. So thank you for listening. Hopefully, you took some things besides like I should go to that AMFT training, which you should. It it is amazing.

Maria 32:20

It was so good.

Liliana 32:22

And hopefully you take some points, some talking points from this, and then you just go and take some time to draw it out what is your radical self-care vision, what steps will be needed for that, and then how you're gonna prioritize in small chunks in order for them to become habits.

Maria 32:45

Love that. Love that. And thank you again for listening and hanging out with us, whether this is on your commute or your lunch break. If you're choosing to willingly list to Liliana and I, we love that. We love that for you and we love that from you. Yes.

Liliana 33:01

Until next time.

Maria 33:02

Till then.