Welcome to the Black Girl Burnout podcast.

Kelly here, and I am going to start off with a small little announcement, which is that you may have noticed that my voice sounds a little bit different in the last couple episodes,

and it's going to sound a little bit different in the next couple episodes, because I have

been fighting allergies that have turned into a minor sinus infection.

So bear with me, if you like, grab a cup of tea with me as we talk today about opting out of hard work.

I love this podcast, so for me it feels effortless to do this. I don't feel like it's hard

work, so sitting here with a cup of tea while a little under the weather is not a difficulty

for me.

But I would like to ask the question to all of you,

how often do you think you are engaging in hard work?

Today we're going to talk about what I mean when I say hard work and why I think there are some types of hard work that are

toxic and then talk about ways to opt out of that and opt into doing things that flow and

bring ease into your life. We've talked about before on the podcast toxic hustle culture, this belief that you've got to grind, you've got to push, you've got to force yourself to do things.

And unfortunately, so much of that messaging keeps us opting into struggle, right?

It keeps us always pushing ourselves, not feeling like we are doing something meaningful

unless it is difficult, not feeling like there's any reward and taking an easy way out.

And I feel like that myth is slowly killing our culture and particularly killing black women.

We are some of the hardest working people on the planet. We're overeducated compared to other

demographics. We are entrepreneurial. Many of us have a main hustle and

three side hustles or two main hustles and one side hustle. We go, go, go, and we work hard,

hard, hard, hard. But not every type of hard work is healthy work.

And that's what I want to really have us opt into, healthy work, not hard work.

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