From Burnout to Renewal with Dr. Ioana Popa

You can love your work, believe deeply in your mission, and still find yourself depleted. Sustainable leadership requires paying attention to the person carrying that mission—and making room for renewal along the way.

 

In this BOLDLY Breakout Spotlight episode of the Moving Forward Podcast, Melissa Harrison sits down with Dr. Ioana Popa, a physician-psychiatrist educator, executive coach, and co-founder of Team For The Soul Institute, for a conversation about burnout, daily regeneration, and discerning God’s direction for your life and work.

 

Drawing on her professional background and her own experience of burnout twice, Ioana shares how she discovered the importance of caring for her whole self—body, mind, heart, and soul. After initially believing a career change would resolve her exhaustion, she recognized that she also needed to change her daily rhythms and the way she responded to her own needs.

 

Ioana explains that depletion can emerge through subtle signs: difficulty relaxing, decision fatigue, feeling continually behind, or dreading the demands waiting after a vacation. For capable women accustomed to pushing through, these experiences can be easy to overlook or explain away.

 

The conversation explores the beliefs that keep women overextending themselves, including the pressure to say yes, remain available, and finish everything before resting. As responsibilities and opportunities grow, waiting for an empty calendar can leave renewal perpetually out of reach.

 

Ioana invites women to build moments of regeneration into their ordinary days. As she shares, “Resilience is not something that we build once. It requires daily rhythms of regeneration.”

 

Those rhythms can include preparing inwardly for the day, pausing between responsibilities, and creating space to release what you have been carrying before moving into the evening. Small moments of quiet and connection with God offer opportunities to notice your needs and respond with greater intentionality.

 

Melissa and Ioana also discuss how the desire to serve faithfully can become tangled with the pressure to meet every need. Ioana encourages women to extend to themselves the care they so readily offer others—and to pause long enough to ask, “God, what do I need today?”

 

Receiving support is another central theme. Ioana describes how working with someone who can help you recognize underlying patterns may reveal what another productivity strategy or self-help resource cannot. Whether through coaching, counseling, mentoring, or trusted community, women need spaces where they can receive care as well as give it.

 

Throughout the conversation, Ioana emphasizes compassion rather than self-blame. Recognizing depletion is an invitation to seek support and begin making changes, without turning your needs into another reason to criticize yourself.

 

This conversation is ultimately about renewing your capacity to live and lead with greater presence: caring for yourself, deepening your connection with God, and investing your energy in what matters most.

 

In this episode, we get into:

 

Burnout can begin beneath the surface.

Notice subtle signs of depletion and the patterns that keep you pushing through.

 

Renewal belongs in your daily rhythm.

Make room to pause, reconnect with God, and release what you’re carrying.

 

Your mission needs discernment and support.

Receive care and consider where God is calling you to invest your time and energy.

 

Ioana also explores how renewal connects with discerning your mission for this season. When several good opportunities are before you, clarity can help you focus your limited energy on the work that aligns with your calling.

 

Through Christian women’s coaching and executive coaching, Ioana helps clients clarify their goals, address burdens and internal patterns, and establish rhythms that support lasting change. She also shares about her Wake Up to Your Soul contemplation program and resources for incorporating renewal into a full life.

 

She offers a reminder about the importance of presence: “We don’t want to miss life because we’re so focused on the future and all the projects we want to do. Let’s live in the present.”

 

After speaking at 4word’s Executive Women’s Forum in San Diego, where her insights on “The Unburdened Leader” and burnout resonated deeply with attendees, Ioana has continued connecting with women in the community through one-on-one support.

 

4word is excited to welcome Ioana to BOLDLY this October in Dallas, where she will lead “Discovering Your Deep Mission for This Season.” Her workshop will help women discern their God-given direction for the coming year, consider where to invest their energy, and identify a practical next step toward greater clarity, confidence, and intentionality.

 

Learn more about BOLDLY at 4wordwomen.org/boldly/.

 

About Dr. Ioana Popa

 

Dr. Ioana Popa is a physician-psychiatrist educator, executive coach, and spiritual-care life and leadership coach who guides high-capacity Christian women from burnout toward renewal and their highest potential in Christ.

 

As co-founder and CEO of Team For The Soul Institute, she integrates medicine, psychology, science, and Christian spiritual formation to support sustainable leadership rooted in wholeness. Through coaching, speaking, and retreats, she helps women integrate soul formation and performance so they can lead with joy, peace, and renewed capacity.

 

A wife, mom, and grandmother, Ioana brings clinical wisdom, theological depth, and grounded hope to her work with women navigating the responsibilities of life and leadership.

 

Learn more about Ioana, explore her coaching programs, or schedule a consultation at teamforthesoul.com.

 

Follow Ioana on LinkedIn.

 

About Melissa Harrison

Melissa Harrison is a journalist, nonprofit leader, and President & CEO of 4word. She is passionate about helping women integrate faith, leadership, and purpose in the workplace. As host of the Moving Forward Podcast, Melissa brings a storyteller’s perspective to honest conversations about work, calling, growth, and the courage to keep moving forward.

 

Learn more about Melissa: melissaharrison.net

Follow Melissa on LinkedIn and Instagram

 

About 4word

4word is a global community for Christian women in the workplace, helping women grow in their faith, thrive in their work, and become the women and leaders God created them to be.

 

Find out more about 4word: https://4wordwomen.org/

Follow 4word on LinkedIn and Instagram