What happens when feminist founders stop trying to outrun burnout—and start redesigning work around care, capacity, and real life?

In this episode of Feminist Founders, Becky Mollenkamp and Faith Clarke are joined by Meg Buzzi and Sarah Durlacher, co-founders of Fixchr, a boutique consulting firm that helps organizations navigate change through behavior, engagement, and collective practice.

Together, they unpack what abundance actually means when you’re juggling caregiving, leadership, partnership, and survival inside systems that were never built for human needs. This is a conversation about decolonizing time, rebuilding capacity after burnout, refusing urgency culture, and reimagining work that flows—rather than drains.

If you’re a founder who feels stretched thin, caught between care work and paid work, or craving a more spacious way to lead, this episode will feel like an exhale.

In This Episode, We Talk About:
• Why abundance isn’t just about money—it’s also about time, restoration, and choice
• How caregiving (especially for elders) reshapes leadership capacity
• What it means to decolonize time and stop moralizing productivity
• Moving from crisis-driven work to preventative, sustainable change
• The tension between billable work and long-term investments in community and ideas
• Why founders often become the last people to receive the care they offer others
• Designing businesses that can bend without breaking when life happens

Meg Buzzi and Sarah Durlacher are the co-founders of Fixchr, a boutique consulting organization that supports organizations, teams, and leaders through periods of transition and change. Their work focuses on behavior change, engagement, and helping groups move together—without defaulting to urgency, extraction, or burnout. https://www.fixchr.com/

About Feminist Founders
Feminist Founders is a podcast and community for business owners who want to challenge capitalist norms and build human-first, equity-aligned businesses. Hosted by Becky Mollenkamp and Faith Clarke, the show blends real conversations, feminist analysis, and practical reflection for founders who refuse to hustle themselves into the ground.

👉 Learn more and join the community at feministfounders.co

🎤 JOIN US IN THE FEMINIST PODCASTERS COLLECTIVE: http://feministpodcastcollective.com/

🎟️ Join Us December 18th for the Planning Sprint

If Amanda’s story hit home — if you also feel buried under tiny tasks, unclear on the big picture, and craving time to breathe, think, and reset — come join Faith and me for a 90-minute Planning Sprint on Dec. 18th.

This is not productivity theater.
This is support.
This is resourcing.
This is creating space for actual clarity so you can end the year grounded instead of gasping.

$199 • No sales page • Register here:
👉 https://beckymollenkamp.as.me/planning

______________

This week we sat down with Feminist Founders member Amanda Laird, a growth marketing strategist and creator of Slow & Steady, a feminist business practice rooted in integrity, intentionality, and the belief that women and creative entrepreneurs deserve to thrive without burning themselves to the ground.

Amanda helps solo creative entrepreneurs rethink their relationship with marketing and growth, and she does it through a holistic, feminist lens—one she developed through 20+ years in communications, deep study with Jennifer Armbrust (Sister), and a background in holistic nutrition that taught her to look at root causes, not symptoms.

But today’s conversation wasn’t just about her clients. It was also about Amanda’s own edges—the place where so many of us find ourselves:
the overwhelm of being a one-woman show, the longing for a slower pace, the guilt of resting before we “earn” it, and the capitalist potholes we keep falling into even when we know better.

Faith and I walked with Amanda through what it means to rebuild capacity, tap into community, hear the voice she keeps locked in the closet (her words!), and reorient her work away from exhaustion and back toward restoration, creativity, and support.

Spoiler: the answer involved a tiny sketchbook, a five-minute daily practice, and reclaiming the truth that we don’t build feminist businesses by doing it all alone.

It’s tender, it’s real, and it’s a masterclass in taking your own medicine as a feminist leader.

In This Episode We Discuss:
• Amanda’s core value of integrity and how it anchors her work
• Why “slow and steady” is both a philosophy and an aspiration
• How the feminine economy (Jennifer Armbrust) shapes her business
• The honest truth of being overwhelmed by tiny tasks and big dreams
• The eldest-daughter conditioning that tells us we must do it all
• Why capacity and organization aren’t the real issue
• How shame shows up around asking for or paying for support
• The myth that we must “earn” rest
• The voice in the closet: the wisdom of community, reciprocity & tapping into our network
• Rebuilding leadership from restoration, not exhaustion
• Help, harm, and why individualism keeps us stuck
• A practical (and compassionate) plan for moving forward:
• A “not right now” list
• A five-minute daily sketchbook practice
• Anchoring back into alignment-before-action
Turning toward community instead of isolation

🎤 WE'RE PROUD MEMBERS OF THE FEMINIST PODCASTERS COLLECTIVE

In this episode of Feminist Founders, Becky Mollenkamp and Faith Clarke reflect on The Weight We Carry — a focus group conversation about invisible labor and how it shows up in our personal and professional lives.

They share insights and takeaways from the powerful session, where participants told stories, named the unseen work they carry, and began exploring ways to release it. What emerged was both deeply personal and profoundly collective — a recognition that the exhaustion so many of us feel isn’t personal failure, it’s systemic.

Discussed in this conversation:
• How storytelling reveals the collective wisdom we already hold
• Why invisible labor is both embodied and systemic
• What it means to refuse to participate in your own sacrifice
• How trust, accountability, and community intersect in the work of release
• Why simple “one-two-three” solutions don’t work — and what does
• How shame, guilt, and perfectionism keep us in patterns of overwork
• The power of community in reprogramming the conditioning that makes us overfunction
• What medicine looks like when it’s rooted in collective care and belonging

Becky and Faith also share details about their upcoming small-group program—Releasing the Weight—a community container designed to help you identify, name, and release the invisible labor weighing you down — just in time for the holidays.

✨ Join the group experience: feministfounders.co/group

📰 Subscribe on Substack: feministfounders.substack.com

Business owners can contribute to the white paper

🎤 PROUD MEMBERS OF THE FEMINIST PODCASTERS COLLECTIVE