Wisdom from Burnout: The Secret to Unlocking the Stress Cycle by Emily and Angela Nagoski

• "Exhaustion happens when we get stuck in an emotion. We may get tuck simply because we're constantly being exposed to situations that activate emotion" (xiii)
• "In Human Giver Syndrome, the giver isn't allowed to inconvenience anyone with anything so messy as emotions, so givers are trapped in a situation where they are not free to move through the tunnel." (xiv)
• "what makes you stronger: connection, rest, and self-compassion." (xvi)
• "We thrive when we have a positive goal to move toward, not just a negative state we're trying to move away from." (xix)
•  Burnout advises moving toward "growing mighty, feeling strong enough to cope with all the owls and mazes and anything else the world throws at you." (xix)
• "The most efficient way to complete the cycle" is "Between twenty and sixty minutes a day" of "literally anything that moves your body enough to get you breathing deeply." (14)
• "Breathing is most effective when your stress isn't that high, or when you just need to siphon off the very worst of the stress so that you can get through a difficult situation, after which you'll do something more hardcore." (15)
• "Laughing together -- and even just reminiscing about the times w've laughed together --  increases relationship satisfaction." (16)
• "a twenty-second hug can teach your body that you are safe." (17)
• "Just petting a cat for a few minutes can lower your blood pressure." (17)
• "Thirty minutes of anything that works for you: exercise, meditation, creative expression [writing, drawing, singing (28)], affection, etc. Because you experience stress every day, you have to build completing the cycle into every day. Make it a priority, like your life depends on it. Because it does." (23)
• "If you're hiding from your life, you're past your threshold." (25)
• "Stress is not bad for you; being stuck is bad for you." (27)
• "Wellness is not a state of being, but a state of action." (28)
• "When something feels uncomfortable, you're probably doing something that creates more and better progress than if it were easy." (35)
• "Groups that are more heterogeneous generate more innovation and better solutions to problems, even though those groups feel less confident about their solution and find the process more difficult." (35)
• "Struggle can increase creativity and learning, strengthen your capacity to cope with greater difficulties in the future, and empower you to continue working toward goals that matter to you." (36)
• "With compassion for the wounded parts of our hearts, minds, bodies, and communities, our recovery from adversity can include an increased sense of meaning in life, moving us from coping to thriving." (68)
• "Meaning is not made by the terrible thing you experience; it is made by the ways you survive." (70)
• "When you feel trapped, free yourself from anything, and it will teach your body that you are not helpless." (98)
• "Contact with another person is a basic biological need; loneliness is a form of starvation." (134)
• "We need both connection and autonomy. That not a contradiction. Humans are built to oscillate from connection to autonomy and back again." (135)
• "Your internal state is profoundly contagious, and it is profoundly susceptible to 'catching' the internal states of the people around you at work and at home (136) . . . This mutual co-regulation begins from the earliest moments of our lives, and it shapes our brains." (136-137) 
• "Sharing space with anyone else means sharing energy - literally." (137)
• "If we turn toward someone with our difficult feelings -- sadness, anger, hurt -- and they tune in to our feelings without judgment or defensiveness, it helps us to move through that feeling, like a tunnel, to the light at the end." (142)
• "Signs you need to recharge in the bubble of love": "when you have been gaslit," "when you feel 'not enough.'' (147)
• There is a power to "someone who can take our hand in the dark and say, 'Any step we take together is a step toward the light.'" (148)
• "If you're not getting adequate sleep, better avoid talking to other humans." (163)
• "'When you are broken, go to bed,' gos the French proverb.'" (163)
• "Sleep is medicine" for mental health (164)
• "Sleep is a miracle. What else but sleep can mend a broken bone and a broken heart?" (166)
• "If you've dealt with the stressors but haven't dealt with the stress itself, your brain won't let you rest. It will constantly scan for the lion that's about to come after you, so when you try to go to sleep, your brain won't let you fall asleep, or it will wake you up over and over, checking for that lion. Complete the cycle, so your brain can transition into rest." (168)
• "So how much rest is 'adequate'? Science says: 42 percent . . . We're not saying you should take 42 percent of your time to rest; we're saying if you don't take the 42 percent, the 42 percent will take you. It will grab you by the fact, shove you to the ground, put its foot on your chest, and declare itself the victor." (168)
• "Your work is crap if your brain isn't rested." (172)
• Most of the books and articles about prioritizing sleep and rest make the argument that we're more productive when we get adequate rest. It's true that rest makes us more productive, ultimately, and if that's the argument that helps you persuade your boss to give you more flexibility, awesome. But we think your rest matters not because it makes you more productive, but because it makes you happier and healthier, less grumpy, and more, creative." (183-4)
• "when you are burned out, it's because you burned a specific gear in your brain, but the Lord gave us a lot of different gears. When you use the other ones, you regenerate." (186)
• "With shame, your core self is judged." (194)
• "Generally toxic; believing that if things aren't perfect, they aren't any good -- e.g., if you make one mistake, everything is ruined -- and feeling pressure from other people to succeed at everything you do." (195)
• "This is the tragedy of the madwoman. She whips us, and we achieve things. And so we think the whipping is why we achieved things and we'll never achieve anything without the whipping." (196)
• "They can begin to notice the ways they whip themselves, and practice putting down the whip, because they see that it's not the whip that makes them stronger; it's their persistence, their relationships, their ability to rest. They know that self-kindness helps them grow mightier, and they want that strength." (197)
• "Joy arises from an internal clarity about our purpose." (213)
• "The cure for burnout is not 'self-care'; it is all of us caring for one another." (214)