If you’ve been on social media lately, you’ve probably seen plenty of postal founders bragging about being in their self-care era.

And you know, it’s usually videos of them doing like their skin care routine, going to the gym, relaxing in a spa, etcetera and just focusing on them.

And while this is great, I’m so all for this.

But the problem is what happens when self-care stops being care and turns into excuse for bad behaviour?

Now the bits I mentioned above are the physical aspects of self-care, but there’s also a trend of mental self-care, which is where sadly, some of the toxicity comes in.

And whilst it’s totally needed, it’s not being handled very well.

So today we’re going to unpack how this trend is messing with work ethic, relationships, and expectations, and how to spot the difference between healthy boundaries and plain old selfishness.

Hello and welcome to Sniffing Out the Bullshit, a podcast for ambitious entrepreneurs who want help wading their way through the bullshit jungle of entrepreneurship, and then the tools, skills, and mindsets that are actually required for success.

I’m your host, Sabrina Chevannes the No Bullshit entrepreneur.

So since a pandemic, there’s been this mass episode of burnout, both founders and employees alike, right?
And McKinsey called it the great exhaustion because mental health conversations surged.

Self-care talk, which was once a kind of funny subject where people didn’t want to broach and they didn’t feel comfortable talking about, suddenly became normal and even aspirational.

And in Deloitte 2023 Women at Work survey, they found that about 50% of women globally reported being feeling burnt out, which is up from the pre pandemic levels.

So things aren’t easing up at all. And it’s not just a pandemic trend anymore.

It’s a complete shift. Now this shift has seen a rise of the soft life, which originally started as a push back against hustle culture.

So many people, especially millennials and Gen Z people are now rejecting the constant grind.

And Tik Toks went completely viral with people talking about quitting their job to go rest in Bali and stuff.

And now influencers are selling this dream of working less and living better.

Now don’t get me wrong, we would all want to do that, right?

I would love to work less and earn more.

But we also need to be practical and social media rewards vulnerability and aspirational content.

So a founder crying on camera about protecting my peace is really relatable and shareable, which then means more reach and this trend snowballs.

So this has caused this huge spiritual slash Wellness economy boom.

And the global Wellness industry grew to $5.6 trillion in 2023.
I said trillion and this, this, this numbers from the Global Wellness Institute.

And obviously it’s 2025 now and those numbers have probably gone up even more.

But I haven’t managed to find, find any more recent stats since then.
And I just think this is crazy.

And there’s always like sub niches exploding everywhere.

As we’ve got meditation apps like Calm and Headspace and Balance, they doubled in subscriptions.

You’ve got corporate Wellness coaching becoming a $15 billion market, and you’ve got things that didn’t really even exist before, which is like manifestation coaches, energy boundary mentors.

And they are like blooding social media with their content.

So it’s utterly crazy how different the world of entrepreneurship looks now.

And the founders who wants glorified hustle porn are now criticized, somewhat correctly of course, but but it’s it’s, it’s interesting.

And the extreme though is that people then want to do less or even nothing in some cases and still expect the same results.

So there’s a massive shift and founders who now post about boundaries to look healthy and involved have just popped up everywhere.

It’s it’s a thing, they’ve it’s a virtue signalling thing.

There’s lots of talking and not enough doing and genuine Wellness is vital, right?

But business fundamentals still matter.

So just posting about boundaries all the time so that you look like you’re caring about yourself when actually not doing anything is not exactly a good thing.

And some are swinging so far that they now under deliver, they ghost clients and they dodge responsibility, all in the name of self love.

And the real winners, Well, it’s the self-care brands and the service providers, right?

The people running those corporate retreats and spiritual workshops, they have such a huge demand because of now the shift to focus on mental health.

And I said it’s great that we focus on mental health, but not if it’s done for the wrong reasons.

We’ve got TikTok coaches selling high ticket heel to succeed masterminds which is basically 5K for vague group calls about rest and receive that these buzzwords are coming up all over the place.

And while there are some amazing people who are qualified in this era who are doing some fantastic stuff, which has been genuinely helpful to myself personally as well as well as thousands of others of entrepreneurs.

I know there is a huge burst of people who have no idea what they’re doing.

And they’re just jumping on this trend to take advantage of people who wanted to do less.

So how did we shift from self-care, which is a good thing, to essentially self indulgence, which can actually be dangerous, right?

Well, it often starts with the right intention.

Founders genuinely want some more balance.

Like they work their butts off on their businesses and at some point it just gets too much.

So they decide they prefer to have a bit more work life balance and they think I’m working too much, I need boundaries.

Completely normal.
So they read about setting their limits and protecting their mental health and that’s all good.

That’s what they should be doing completely.

Great. But then this is where sometimes the line gets blurred between Health Protection and convenient excuses.

So a rest day becomes a rest week. I mean, I’ve certainly done it.

I’ve certainly tried to justify having lots of time off because I need to protect myself and I need my rest.

And if I don’t look after me, then I’m going to look after anyone else.

And all the content that’s out there is is justifying my laziness and and I need to understand the difference between real rest and use an excuse.

And then boundaries become stone walls.

The ghost, the team members, they avoid the tough talks because all the name of boundaries and this whole not aligned in my energy becomes a default way to say no to anything that they don’t want to do, whether it be hard, boring or uncomfortable.

And these buzzwords are all over social media and while there can be a great thing, they’re now being abused and used as an excuse for bad behaviour.

So let’s look at some classics, right?

Because I already mentioned some, but these are the ones I see all the time.

First of all, the one that’s really pissing me off at the moment because I’ve had a fair few people use it recently who just use it as an excuse to to act badly and to not do anything.

And they say I’m protecting my energy.

And basically people now are using this phrase to dodge any situation they don’t feel like doing.

For example, I can’t deal with clients today.
It’s draining my vibe.

And you know, if it doesn’t align with my energy, then I shouldn’t do it.

But the translation to that is I just can’t be asked.

So no, not having that and as an excuse.

Next one is classic.
I said I’m setting boundaries now.

Healthy boundaries are communicated properly and they should be there.

Healthy boundaries are necessary. I know that I need to work on mine but they are definitely necessary.

But this version when they just say I’m setting boundaries is often used as unilateral ghosting.

So they’ll come up with sorry for disappearing mid project.

I just had to prioritize myself. This is not OK and this is an excuse.

Another classic is about flow.

I feel like I love the concepts of flow, but again, it’s overused and made an excuse.

So for example, people say this just isn’t in flow for me.

And this one is spiritual language that usually masks procrastination or fear of conflict.

For example, I didn’t finish this deliverable because I wasn’t in flow today.

No, you, you’re procrastinating.

You didn’t feel right doing it for whatever reason.

There’s a deeper meaning there.

You can’t just use inflow as an excuse.

And it’s similar to it’s not aligned with my higher self or frequency.

And this one is the vague spiritual catch all.

Basically to reject anything uncomfortable or difficult.

For example, I quit that partnership overnight because the energy just wasn’t right.

I’ve heard that a lot. And you know, when people get to a tough time where they have to work through things, they’ve got obstacles to go over, they don’t want to try.

So they’ll say that it isn’t aligned with their higher frequency.

And I’m sure while you’re listening to these, you’ll probably like, Oh my God, I heard someone say that this week, and it’s happening all the time.

So when people want to make an excuse for not wanting to do something, they bring out one of these phrases as an acceptable reason for basically saying Nah I can’t be asked.

Because prioritizing yourself is important and it’s become such a big deal these days that you cannot even question someone prioritizing themselves so they are able to use these phrases and get away with it because you will be seen as a bad guy for trying to even challenge them.

I’ve seen so many examples of this lately and I’ve personally had people say these things to me when they don’t want to admit that they just dropped the ball on something.

But there were also so many examples online.

Now I was in that So Bueno the Entrepreneur 1.

And there are so many examples in there of clients complaining that their coaches disappeared like halfway through a programme.

And I mean like 5K15K programmes that they’ve paid for money for.

And then they’re like, what’s going on? And they look at their coaches Instagram stories and there’s a post about them protecting their energy and they’ll be back when things are aligned, but then they’ll never return.

And I totally get that we need to protect our own energy and we absolutely need to look after ourselves.

And mental health is hugely important, sure.
But we cannot use these things as an excuse not to work or not to treat people properly.

And there’s actually a lot of psychology behind the shift recently.

And Doctor Kristin Neff is a leading self compassion researcher and I’ve seen her work and she’s been stating that self compassion boosts resilience and reduces stress, but when misused, it can slide into self pity and avoidance.

And I was reading this and I realized it. It goes hand in hand.

Where’s Maslax burnout inventory, which is probably the most cited burnout scale, right?

It shows that healthy boundaries can reduce burnout, which is great, which is why we put them in.

But boundaries that then sever connections increase isolation and lower work satisfaction.

And this has been studied quite a lot recently because I also noticed something in the Harvard Business Review, they reported on this conflict avoidance too.

They said that many boundary statements, the ones that we’re saying I’m, I’m creating boundaries, that what they actually do is a mask of fear of difficult conversations or fear of disappointing others.
It’s not enlightened leadership and in fact, the report said that people who swing too hard to protect their energy at all costs, they actually lose.

Community Trust and they become less productive in the long term.

So this stuff is really dangerous territory.

And other studies do link this constant self focus to a gradual slide into entitlement because naturally if you’re always focusing on yourself, this is what happens.

And they’ve seen this trend of people, you know, going from just take it, take it sometimes to take care of themselves healthily, to be like, I matter more than anyone else’s needs.

And this is now how a lot of people are thinking because they’ve been too much in this self-care era.

So this transition to self-care has led to the dark side of self-care where it becomes more selfish and this is where the trust starts to get broken.

People stop relying on flaky founders who only put themselves 1st and clients feel abandoned and staff resent carrying the load for these boundary Queens and kings.

And people talk, they say things like don’t work with them, they’re just going to disappear on you if things suddenly don’t serve them anymore.
And I hate the fact that it really undermines genuine self-care because when it becomes performative or selfish, it discredits real healthy mental health work, which is needed.

And I’m a huge mental health advocate and I’ve been working on my own boundaries and stuff.

But I also want people to understand the difference and the fine line between self-care and indulgence.

There’s a big difference with saying between saying I don’t answer emails after 7:00 PM, which is a healthy boundary to set because you want the evening time to be for yourself and your kids or whatever it is you’re doing.

There’s a big difference between saying that and then ghosting your client mid launch because you’re not in flow.

First one is a boundary, the other one is bullshit.

So if you’ve ever feel felt guilty for needing rest then you’re absolutely not the problem.

But if you’re using self-care to dodge grown up responsibilities then you might just be.

So the question is, how does all of this play out publicly and what should we be looking out for in order to protect our own energy?

Because as I said, I believe we should be doing that.

I don’t believe the principle is bullshit, but how it’s used and abused is.

It’s those social media posts that actually encourage laziness.

They make an excuse for not having to apply to people and they encourage others to do so too.

You see those endless carousels that say protect your peace at all costs or influencers in their fluffy robes and match your teeth going don’t reply to people who drain you, they don’t deserve your energy.

And all of those caption cliches which say you’re not lazy, you’re just resting, you owe no one your time.

Now again, if you listen to all of those, you’re like, this is totally true and they are all totally true in the bigger scheme of things.

But they can’t just be all stand alone things which you just take as your entire business strategy.

These are absolutely true and you shouldn’t be replying to people who drain you.

But sometimes you have to run a business and you have to reply to some exhausting things and you have to apply sometimes when you’re tired.

That’s just life. And this level of bullshit is coupled with the pure bullshit made of stories which are like saying I turned down 6 clients this month because I value my time too much to just work with anyone.

You see them all the time on LinkedIn or the I just work one hour a day and make 100 KA month because I cut out draining people.

That one’s more of an X thing but they are still all over these social media channels.

It’s the whole quiet quitting thing again but repackaged as luxury.

I don’t take meetings anymore. I just vibe and attract aligned money now.

People actually resonate with this a lot and this is what’s causing the trend to grow and it’s causing more gurus to pop up everywhere and help people achieve this this bullshit life.

I mean I get it, I’d love to earn 100K a month just doing one hour a day too, but it’s not realistic. Please like seriously think about it.

There are plenty of people claiming to be doing this short, but how many people are actually doing it?

I’m I’m sure they’ll be selling a course on how to do it though.

Feel free to pay the 997 for that and see how that turns out.

But it is bullshit and the amount of coaches now I’ve seen selling these like high frequency masterminds at like bits anywhere between 3:00 and 10K for just some calls on how to work less, rest more, and raise your vibration.

It’s making me just a little bit sick because they’re all selling you a fantasy.

I need some coffee after that. I mean, I saw a recent podcast expose the other day and it covered the manifestation gurus, the ones who are charging 10K plus for VIP days.

And when the clients asked for deliverables or support after the day or you know, any follow up to kind of back up what they’re saying, their response is I don’t work in that frequency.
It’s your job to align, not mine to deliver.

I mean, how bullshit is that? It’s like they are getting you to pay 10 play plus for a whole day and then have this perfect spiritual excuse not to deliver anything.
It’s actually just ridiculous.

Now they take the money, won’t deliver and actually use something spiritual as an excuse to commit what is essentially fraud.

And research shows that toxic positivity dismisses reality and reduces team honesty because teams with fake harmony have much lower trust than innovation. And let’s think about it.

It’s obvious why. Because think about those phrases that everyone throws around in toxic positivity.

It’s like, if you don’t have anything good to say, then don’t say anything.

Good vibes only or unfollow anyone who challenges you.

Now all these phrases, they do sound empowering and feel good.

They really do. And I believe that I want all that attitude from time to time.

But they also massively encourage echo chambers and in teams it means no one wants to give honest feedback and people live in fear of accidentally offending people.

And when there’s a problem, they just ignore it instead of dealing with a situation because they don’t have anything good to say.

Then I remember seeing all of those classic TikTok videos that went absolutely mentally viral and it was a creator posting.

Stop responding to your emails. It’s not your responsibility to apply immediately.

Protect your energy. And it got millions of views because it naturally encourages more people to do less.
Then why wouldn’t they love it?

However, it is terrible advice for founders who can’t ghost customers because they will literally lose work if they’re not replying quicker than their competitors.

And so I see these things and I see mute founders watching it and showing it to me as an example of why they’re not replying in three days to their clients.

I’m like, that just doesn’t work. And bear in mind, I do a lot of coaching for these new start-ups.

And I’m saying that unfortunately, customer care is the first thing you need.

You need to be there for your customers.

Like the best form of business is that is referrals and word of mouth and you know, your reputation.

If you’re slow and you seem like you can’t be bothered, that’s going to feedback and that’s not a good look.

And yes, I do believe that you need to protect your energy, like I said, and I do believe that you shouldn’t be instantly replying to everything, but you also need to have some level of customer care.

So self-care should restore you so that you can show up, not become a personality trait to excuse bad work and worse manners.

And we’re seeing too many founders now default to this unbothered mode instead of balanced mode.

And one is healthy and the other is harmful.

So I want to explore exactly how this hurts business and what the fallout is.

Because self-care when weaponized doesn’t just look bad, but it actively damages the very business founders who claim they’re protecting their energy to grow.

Now we’ve covered a few of them briefly already, but I want to highlight the main ways that I think this attitude could be dangerous, along with some stats to just back up what I’m saying are the ones you’re going to think I’m bullshit.

I think the number one reason I mentioned earlier is that it erodes trust.

And we’re in this like antitrust era already with like AI and everything that’s already fabricated.

People are just in this bullshit mode, right?

So we’re, we’re already in this era and it’s not a good luck.

Poor communication and missed deadlines never is a good thing.

And clients and colleagues would expect a decent excuse in these circumstances.

And protecting your energy or waiting’s a feeling flow just does not cut it.

So if you’re disappearing mid project due to energy misalignment, clients are going to feel abandoned and they’re going to lose faith.

And so once you’re known for being flaky, your referrals are going to dry up and your reputation is going to tank.

And a recent PwC report showed that 86% of customers say they will stop doing business with a company after just two poor experiences.

And reading this totally made sense to me because think about it, it’s that whole like once percent, twice shy.

And you know, for once that happened once, I’ve shame on you.
That happened twice, shame on me. So it all makes sense.

So I think if you’re quoting self-care, it looks like you just don’t care, which is definitely not what you want.

And the second big issue I think is team morale.

And I know a lot of founders may work alone, but it also applies to the freelancers they work with.

Like when a leader withdraws under this self-care banner and others end up doing double the work, they’re going to create resentment.

Now Gallup reports that companies in low trust and unclear boundaries actually see 59% higher turnover.

This is a very, very high percentage to go up from and it makes a lot of sense as well because who wants to work people who are just going to be flaky in the name of self-care when actually the employees would also want some self-care but they don’t have that excuse.

And both of these are issues then damages brand credibility because combine this with the founder spewing parcel brand content which preaches integrity and client care but then at the same time posting poolside pics with like hashtag self-care era while ignoring their DMS just looks unprofessional.

And it just takes 1 viral pose from a burned client to cause serious problems.

Because remember real investors and partners want consistent and stable leaders, not vibe chasers.

So at the end of the day, all of this actually kills actual revenue because even loyal customers won’t rebook if the delivery is patchy.

And we all know that a healthy pipeline is required to have a sustainable business.

But if founders are avoiding sales calls and follow-ups in the name of energy and then they miss out on real opportunities, this is going to be detrimental.

And a bailing company study shows that 5% increase in customer retention can actually boost profits by 25 to 95% of tiny 5% increase does that.

It’s crazy. And a key go on about this because customer retention actually massively accelerates growth in a business more so than winning real clients.

They just don’t get that.
Don’t mean here, but what happens when he goes people?

Well, the retention tanks and therefore your profit tanks.

Unrest is most certainly powerful and absolutely essential.

But if your business depends on you, you can’t just disappear and expect trust, loyalty or money to keep rolling in.

Self-care without self responsibility is actually self sabotage.

So what does self-care actually look like?

Well, we know that self compassion is powerful.

Doctor Kristin Neff’s studies show that it builds resilience and prevents burnout when combined with accountability.

Same with boundaries.
They are also healthy when they’re clear, consistent, and communicated.

So these are the things that we need. The recovery rituals work best when they’re planned and not impulsive.

For example, scheduled time off, real sleep, distance and social connection. Not ghosting people out of the blue.

The self-care isn’t doing whatever feels good in the moment, It’s doing what you know you need to stay well and keep your commitments.

And it’s not actually easy to get the right balance. I said that boundaries are healthy when they’re clear because it’s un-communicated.

But what does that look like? Because many times they’re certainly not all three of these.

You need to absolutely ensure that your team, your clients, and your family all know your boundaries.

You can say that you won’t take calls after 6:00 PM, but you will reply by 10:00 AM tomorrow, for example, so that they’re not just waiting for you.

You also need to have exceptions for emergencies.

Please don’t dismiss everything in the name of boundaries because you need to protect both you and your relationships because you don’t want other people picking up your slack.

It’s so easy to slip into the toxic side of self-care, especially if you’ve been absorbing a lot of the content on this topic.

But I think there’s a bit of a self-care litmus test that you could do though.

So for example, before saying I’m protecting my energy, try asking yourself these questions.

Is this self respect or self avoidance? Is someone else praying paying the price for your break and am I running from discomfort or vesting to restore so I can show it better now?

If it’s running away, it’s avoidance and not care. So as a healthy founder, what can you do instead?

Well, I would do the following. First of all, communicate proactively. This is huge.

For example, hey team, I’m off on Friday for mental health, but I’ve delegated X to Y and here’s my emergency contact.

Very clear so people know what to expect.
I think you can plan recovery like it’s a meeting.

My real breaks go into my calendar and they are protected and prepared for just like a real meeting.

So I’m not going to cancel them. And I use systems and not excuses.

So automation, team delegation, and good time blocking, which will help you rest without dropping the ball on us and embracing hard conversations.

So healthy boundaries sometimes mean saying I can’t do that right now, but here’s how I can help.

This is much better than ghosting. So here’s what you can do.

Now if you’d like a little bit of homework, which I know some of you love to do, and I know I’m actually going to do this too, so please come do it with me.

So number one, I want you to review your boundaries.

Are they actually clear and communicated properly #2 I want you to schedule a real break.

I want you to put it in your calendar. Prep for it properly, and do not cancel it unless you’ve got a very good reason.

Same sort of reason you would cancel a real meeting. Treat it like a meeting.

And #3 if you owe someone communication, whether it be a client or a team member, do it today, not tomorrow.

Because real self-care also includes honesty.

So I want you to protect your energy, but I don’t want you to hide behind it.

Because true self-care fuels you to keep your word, do good work and build trust. It’s rest with respect.

So here’s the bottom line. self-care isn’t the problem.

Lazy excuses dressed up as spiritual words are the problem.

So if you’ve felt torn, wanting to rest but also guilty about dropping the ball, you are not alone.

So many founders are battling burnout and the fear of looking selfish.
It’s confusing, and you’re not bad for wanting a break, but your break should not break your word.

So this week, I want you to do a self check.
Where are you using self-care to avoid something uncomfortable?

Where can you rest better, not just more?
And where do you need to say the hard thing? Instead of just disappearing, reclaim the trend in a positive, authentic way.

So let’s make this the real self-care era, where you rest enough to show up fully.

Where you protect your energy so that you can lead, not so that you can hide Where boundaries.

Build bridges, not burn them. If this episode hits home, share it with another founder who’s struggling with the same bullshit.

Let’s help each other drop the excuses and keep the care real.

So until next week, keep hustling honestly and resting responsibly, and keep sniffing out the bullshit.