2027 Predictions for High-Achieving Women | Ep323

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Vanessa: Halloween hasn't even happened yet. I mean, my kids' costumes are still sitting in our online carts, yet people are already predicting 2027.

And I'll admit, I've been reading and listening to every single prediction. But as a therapist, I'm reading them a little bit differently because underneath all the talk about AI and the future of work, there's something I think high-achieving women are gonna want more of in 2027 than any new app or planner or anything like that. And once you notice it, you'll start seeing it everywhere, including in your own calendar. Here we go. 

You're listening to the Free To Be Mindful podcast, the space for high-achieving women who give their best to everyone and are ready to keep some of it for themselves. I'm Vanessa, licensed therapist, speaker, and mom coach. I know what it takes to build a life you're proud of without losing yourself in the process.

Each week, we get honest about ambition, identity, and the parts of ourselves that we quietly set aside. Here we [00:01:00] go

Hello, and welcome to episode 323 of the Free to Be Mindful podcast. I hope that you're feeling good, looking good, and doing better in this world than you were yesterday. 

If you've been around here for a while, you may know that I love a good marketing podcast. That's my thing. And this time of year, every single one of them starts with making predictions for the next year. And the more I listened, the more I noticed that a lot of those predictions are really talking about people.

So today, I'm putting my own therapist hat on and looking at three predictions for 2027 through the lens of what we, as high-achieving women, are craving.

And I'll start with a confession that most people typically never believe. And that is that I am a true introvert. And while I can show up in public well, and I don't mind public speaking, it takes real mental effort and preparation to actually get out there. Working for myself makes it pretty easy to stay in too. My main [00:02:00] coworker is my therapy dog, Ollie. And while he's an excellent listener, he's never once pitched me an idea, so I keep signing up for things. and every time I leave glad that I went.

The first prediction I have is the comeback of small in-person gatherings. Think supper clubs, run clubs, book clubs, And little weekend retreats. I think that those are going to be popping up everywhere as people choose a table of eight over a network of eight hundred.

And I see this in my own personal life too. As someone who works for herself, I spend a lot of time around other therapists, and more often than not, they just happen to be women.

This October has been especially full with Hispanic Heritage Month events and panels and things. And just this past week, I spoke on a wealth and wellbeing panel to a room of Latino entrepreneurs. And we were speaking about how our mental health shows up in the way that we think about money. And I was in a room of mostly women [00:03:00] entrepreneurs talking about uncomfortable parts of money and how mental health interweaves with these topics. And this was face-to-face. And I think that says a lot about what we're hungry for.

Before almost every single one of these events, there's a moment where I myself am negotiating with myself. There's the time, the energy, the outfit, and of course, the childcare, which with a two-and-a-half-year-old at home, is a whole big planning project.

But it always ends up feeling like working out. Getting there is the hardest part, but we're always glad we did it once we're on the other side. 

And the real benefit is having our cups filled by people who truly understand us, and they don't have to work in the same field that we do. My family and friends, of course, you know, we love each other and they love me well, but there's still something about being around other women who get the weight of building something that fills a different cup that we have as an [00:04:00] entrepreneur and/or a high-achieving woman.

This matters even more in a world full of AI. And I'll be the first to admit, I use AI every single day for automating tasks in my business, and I'm choosy, though, about which platforms I use. I base my choices on how responsibly these platforms handle it. And when AI takes care of planning the week or drafting an email, then I consider it more time that we can spend connecting with people who are aligned with us. And when things are getting harder to tell if they're actually written by a real person or not, being across from a real person becomes worth even more for our mental health.

So the second prediction I have is about how we get support, especially when it comes to our mental health. And while teenagers, I know it from seeing it in my own home, they may be asking Siri or a chat box for advice. High-achieving women are gonna be looking for a real person who specializes in exactly what they're dealing [00:05:00] with.

As a therapist and as someone who also helps other therapists build their businesses, I always stress the importance of having a niche. Because think about it, we wouldn't go to a podiatrist for heart issues, and we also wouldn't ask our hairstylist to do our taxes, no matter how good the blowout is.

So when we're looking for a therapist, we want someone who is a true expert in the area we need help with. And if you've been listening for a while, you know as a New Jersey-based therapist, I work with kids and teens who look great on paper but are quietly struggling, and the moms who are raising them who are doing everything right and are still exhausted at the end of every day.

That specialization changes everything. A kid with straight A's who melts down every night needs someone who knows that good grades don't mean that everything's okay. And a mom running a team at work and then a household at home needs someone who won't make her spend three sessions explaining why she can't relax more [00:06:00] and really needs more time with the right specialist so that she can skip the overexplaining and just get to the help that she needs.

And even with all the growth in telehealth, data published by the American Psychological Association this past April showed that in-person care still makes up the majority of mental health treatment. No knocks to virtual spaces, just, you know, facts are facts.

And in-person and virtual support can both be great. What matters over what couch you're sitting on, your therapist or your couch at home while looking at your therapist on screen, is feeling like the person helping us knows exactly who we are. And that's true whether it comes to therapy or coaching.

Because I do offer coaching for high-achieving women, because we wanna talk to someone who gets it, not someone who tells us that we're doing the most when the most is just our baseline. So if this sounds like what you're craving for, no matter where in the world you live, I am opening up three spots for the month of November, and [00:07:00] all the info is below.

And then prediction three. Now, I promised myself that this wouldn't be one of those episodes where every prediction sounds like just wishful thinking because we could do that on our own. So I wanna take a look at what the numbers actually say. A 2026 burnout report found that 96% of women experienced high or extreme stress in the past year compared to 86% of men. And most workplaces still haven't caught up with the support that women need.

So I'm not predicting that 2027 is the year that someone else fixes this all for us because I don't know when that's ever gonna happen. But what I do know is that in 2023, the US Surgeon General put on an advisory on loneliness, and it compared the health impact of lacking social connection to smoking up to 15 cigarettes a day. And we would never treat smoking as a small thing if you're a non-smoker. Yet many of us treat connection as something that we'll get to once the inbox is clear and once [00:08:00] the kids are asleep, neither of which probably happen at the same time.

As high achievers, we know we're the experts at scheduling. We put the dentist on the calendar, along with the school conferences, the board meetings, the client calls, and connection just gets whatever time is left over. And for most of us, it's not much of time left over.

So my third prediction ties the first two together, and that is small gatherings and support from someone who knows us both point back to wanting each other.

I think that the women who feel their best in 2027 will be the ones who put connection on the calendar in the same way that they'd book a doctor's appointment. Because they know that that's a true health decision as well.

So taking a moment before you go, take a deep breath as you think about the last time that you left a gathering, big or small. And that you felt glad that you went. Think about who was it that was there. Who were you talking to? What were you [00:09:00] talking about? And how did you feel on the drive home?

Now think about what made it worth the effort of getting there, even with everything that you had to juggle. As we head into the last stretch of the year, picture one small gathering that you could put on your calendar before December. Maybe it's a dinner with two friends you keep meaning to see, or maybe it's an event that you've been on the fence about that is going to propel your business forward. Notice who you'd want there with you, and let yourself, allow yourself to want that and then to make it happen.

A lot of people leave their 2027 planning for New Year's resolutions or for goals for next year.

But business owners know that 2027 really gets planned in quarter four. So while we're mapping out next year's numbers and calendars, I'd love for us to plan for our people too. Think about the woman who came to mind while you were listening to this episode, and please share this episode with [00:10:00] her with a message that says, "Listen in, and know that we're overdue."

And if you need proof that it's worth the effort to do that, take it from an introvert whose main coworker has four legs and a wagging tail and know that I have never once regretted walking into a room full of women craving connection.

Until next week, always remember, in a world where you are free to be anything, you are always free to be mindful.

Catch you next time. 

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