Ellen S. Wright, LMFT

On August 20, 2026, I had the opportunity to facilitate Moving Beyond Burnout, a professional training for Virginia Court Appointed Special Advocates (CASA) staff, volunteers, and professionals who support children and families involved in the child welfare and court systems.

More than 170 participants joined the training live, with the workshop also being broadcast for additional participants. What began months ago as an idea for a training became a beautiful opportunity to connect with professionals around something I believe deeply:

We can care deeply without carrying it all.

Throughout the training, we explored burnout, compassion fatigue, secondary traumatic stress, nervous system regulation, boundaries, capacity, and the very real impact of caring work on the body.

We also looked beyond burnout as an individual experience. Helping professionals work within systems, and sometimes we may be relatively regulated while working alongside colleagues, organizations, families, or other professionals who are experiencing burnout, compassion fatigue, secondary traumatic stress, or chronic stress themselves. Those experiences do not remain neatly contained within one person. They can influence communication, decision-making, relationships, expectations, and the overall functioning of a system.

Part of moving beyond burnout, then, is learning not only how to recognize and respond to what is happening within ourselves, but also how to navigate systems where other people may be operating from stress, depletion, or dysregulation without automatically absorbing, carrying, or reacting to it ourselves.

This was not simply another presentation about self-care.

I wanted participants to understand what may actually be happening inside of them—and around them—and to leave with practical ways to remain connected to themselves while continuing to do deeply caring work.

We used the metaphor of a backpack and the rocks we accumulate along the journey—our own experiences, the trauma and needs of the people we serve, organizational pressures, family responsibilities, expectations, and all of the things caring professionals can unconsciously begin to carry.

The invitation was not to stop caring.

It was to learn the difference between caring and carrying.

The response was incredible.

Participants described the training as:

“A+.”

“One of the best trainings I have attended.”

Others shared how much they appreciated the information, the practical tools, and the way the training helped them think differently about their own experiences in helping professions. I am deeply grateful for the opportunity to do this work.

My work is ultimately about helping people understand what is happening within themselves, reconnect with themselves, and create lives and relationships that feel safer, healthier, and more authentic.

That mission includes the professionals who spend so much of their lives caring for everyone else. Because sustainable helping does not require us to become less compassionate. It requires us to learn how to remain connected to ourselves while we care for others—even when the systems around us are struggling to do the same.

Care. Don’t carry.

Moving Beyond Burnout is available as a professional training for organizations, agencies, educators, mental health professionals, child and family service providers, and other helping professionals.