Why high-achievers over-give
Ambition, relationships, and self-worth.
Hi, my friend!
This one’s a personal one!
I often tell my clients that love and career are two sides of the same coin.
Like the way we hold boundaries (or lack thereof) in a romantic relationship often reflects how we hold boundaries at work.
If we’re an over-giver in partnership, we’re often an over-giver at the office.
If you feel expanded around your worth in work, you’re often expanded around your worth in relationships.
You may have noticed that over the years, I’ve been rather quiet about my love life. That was by design. My career is out there for everyone to see, but my love life feels tender and sacred.
And though I’ve mentioned it here and there, I never gave you the tea about my relationship.
I was married for almost ten years to someone I loved dearly. He was an epic human, as you can imagine. But, a few years ago, our curriculum together became complete, and it was time to part ways. And I learned as much in the separation and divorce negotiations as I did in a decade of business ownership.
I learned that while I had done an amazing job cleaning up my boundaries at work (I’m kind of a boundary queen!), in relationships, I was a little messier.
While I’m clear on what it looks like to hold my clients at work…in relationships, my caretaking became codependent.
And while I am 100% responsible for my business, in my relationship, there were places I was outsourcing my agency.
And all those porous little boundaries made me so resentful.
As we sat through hours of mediation, I could feel my anger boil over. And at first, I thought I was angry at my former partner (and TRUST, he gave me reason to be!), but in the end, you know what I realized? I was freaking angry with myself.
I was angry about the over-giving, the caretaking, the wishy-washy boundaries, how much emotional support I lent. BUT GUESS WHAT?! All of those things were a CHOICE. A choice I was making from a wound because ultimately I didn’t feel lovable.
But here’s what I’ve come to understand since then:
Not all choices are made from clarity. Some are made from conditioning. From old survival strategies. From the version of us that learned that love is earned through effort, accommodation, or self-abandonment.
And I literally wrote the book on that for our work lives, but I didn’t update the operating system as quickly when it came to my partnership.
That’s the piece I want to name in this month’s reframe:
We don’t just “act in alignment” or “misalign” with our worth—we express whatever our nervous system believes is required to keep us safe, loved, and included.
Which means healing isn’t about shaming the past version of you for over-giving, over-functioning, or over-accommodating.
It’s about updating what you believe you have to do in order to be loved.
The thing about anger is that it’s an active emotion. It says, “a boundary has been crossed, and I want to do something different.”
Like I’ve managed to do in work, I want to come from a place of purpose, not pain. And I want that for you, too.
The Monthly Reframe
Your worth was never something you had to earn, prove, or negotiate for at work, in love, or anywhere in between. Would you ever look at a newborn baby and think, “better go to work and earn that worthiness!” NO! We are born worthy!
Our worth is constant, unchanging, and unbargainable. It’s not increased or decreased by how much you gave, how well you performed, or how little you needed.
So maybe this is the reframe to sit with this month:
You weren’t over-giving because you lacked worth.
You were over-giving because you hadn’t yet fully trusted it.
BOOM! Idk about you, but when I jotted that one down, I felt it in my bones.
And the work now isn’t to become someone more “boundaried” or more “self-protected.” Though I’d be lying if I said the impulse wasn’t there.
It’s to become someone who can sit in the deep, sometimes uncomfortable, knowing that you are already enough and act from there. Even if it feels risky. Especially if it feels risky.
And if that changes anything this month, let it be this:
You don’t have to negotiate your worth in any room you enter. Not in love. Not in work. Not even in the rooms of your own mind.
You were born worthy,
Amina xx
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