Wowza. Today you are in for a treat.

I’m joined by Annie Wright, LMFT—Annie is a licensed psychotherapist, trauma recovery specialist, executive coach, and author. Annie is also a successfully exited CEO of a multi-million dollar company and she now helps ambitious humans heal relational trauma so they can build lives that feel good on the inside, not just look good on paper. Annie is on Substack at Strong and Stable with a debut book on the way. She’s been quoted everywhere from Forbes to NBC to NPR.

I wanted to have Annie on the show to talk about what it actually takes for high-achieving women to feel good on the inside, and not just look successful on paper and this conversation definitely did not disappoint!

This episode is for the woman who:

Is highly capable, deeply trusted, and visibly successful

Has done everything right in the career playbook 

And still feels chronically anxious, exhausted, or empty

We talk about why that happens—and what actually helps.

✨ The “high-functioning woman” profile

🧠 Little-t vs. Big-T trauma (and why “nothing bad happened to me” is often the tell)

🏗️ The “House of Life” metaphor

🔥 Fear-fuel and fossil fuels

🫁 Nervous system tools you can use in real life

🧭 The Values Anchor Statement

💬 The myth that healing will make you lose your edge

All of these are included in her workbook here.

The 90-Second Wave – a nervous-system regulation tool for moments of acute stress

Values Anchor Statements – using your core values as leverage during hard conversations

Judith Herman’s Three-Phase Trauma Recovery Model

Safety & Stabilization

Processing

Meaning-Making & Integration

EMDR Therapy (Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing)

The idea that “trauma survivors have symptoms, not memories”

The Body Keeps the Score, by Bessel van der Kolk

Annie’s upcoming book:

“A regulated nervous system makes more things possible—without a doubt.”