105: Stop Producing Your Life: Cara Chace on Social Media Burnout and Writing Her First Book
When Cara Chase was a teenager sitting in a Denny's with her dad, she told him, “I want to be a writer.”
He shot it down before she could finish her Grand Slam. How on earth would she make a living doing that?
It took her 30 years to come back around. Today, she calls herself a writer.
In between, Cara became a federal special agent, then the social media manager for Megadeth, and then founded a digital marketing agency. She knows how to do social media well — except it made her sick.
After three years of healing, she took a two-week break over the holidays in 2025 and felt better than she had in years. The day she switched back into content calendars and platform strategy, however, her body reacted to everything she ate.
That was the spark for her book The Social Media Burnout Cure, out now.
In this conversation, we talk about what happens when you catch yourself composing a caption in your brain in the middle of a moment where real life is happening. Cara's answer to what to do with “caption brain” is so simple it gave me goosebumps: don't post it. Put it in a Google Doc. And that's exactly how she wrote her book — in just three months.
The best parts? She did it without burning out and says that the process was the easiest thing she's ever done.
You'll hear how she mined 10 years of her own blogs and talks for material she didn't know she'd already written, why she works from a "morning menu" instead of a word count or to-do list, and why she fired her first cover designer even with a deadline looming. Plus — her favorite Megadeth song and what's in her mug when she writes. You know, all the things we writers want to know.
If you've ever said "If it weren't for my business, I'd never be on social media again," this one's for you.
What you'll discover:
Thinking in captions? Write it down instead. Every time a gold nugget bubbled up, Cara put it in a messy working Google Doc instead of an Instagram reel or story.
Mine your own archive. A decade of blogs, talks, and course scripts delivered more of her book content than she expected. She'd been circling this theme for years.
Try a morning menu, not a checklist. Cara rebels against her own routines, so she lets each morning decide for itself based on her season, her cycle, and what feels right that day.
The hard part isn't always the writing. For Cara, the messy middle was organizing everything. And the moment she thought she was done, she realized she had half a book. A moment so many authors can relate to.
Trust your gut, even with a deadline. She knew right away her first cover designer wasn't a fit. This time, she didn't let sunk cost make the call.
Writing how you speak takes repetition. Readers tell Cara they can hear her voice on the page. That came from 10 years of blogging, emails, and scripting.
Signposts, not stages. You don't have to delete your social media profiles. Set them up to point people to where you actually show up — your email list, your podcast — and post when you have something to say.
The Instagram experiment. Cara stopped posting to her feed in January. By March, her website traffic from Instagram hadn't dropped — and her engagement went up.
Meet Cara
Cara Chace is an author and burnout coach helping women entrepreneurs build sustainable, anti-hustle businesses without trashing their nervous systems.
She built what she wishes she'd had when she burned out — when the planners, the productivity hacks, and the color-coded calendars left her more exhausted, more behind, and more resentful than when she started. Through Chaos Detox, her signature course, and her forthcoming book on social media burnout, Cara teaches women how to stop white-knuckling their way through the week and start building a business that fits the life they're actually living.
She's the host of the Ditch the Chaos podcast, a 10-year entrepreneur, and a former Special Agent. She lives in Idaho with her family and runs her business with margin, intention, and a deep aversion to hustle culture.
Connect with Cara:
Listen to the Ditch the Chaos podcast
Connect with Jacqueline Fisch:
Timestamps:
00:00 Welcome And Cara Chace Intro
01:32 Authors And Social Media
02:35 Early Writing Roots
03:47 Denny's Dream Detour
05:58 Becoming A Writer Again
08:02 From Anthropology To Special Agent
09:57 Burnout And Career Pivot
13:23 Agency Life And Health Crash
17:34 Marketing Mode Trigger
21:20 Social Media Colonized Brain
22:39 Spark And Writing The Book
24:46 Capture Ideas In Google Docs
26:25 Escape the Algorithm Trap
26:41 Reclaim Stillness and Autonomy
28:32 How the Book Began
29:48 Messy Middle and Structure
31:24 Writing Without Routines
33:50 Trusting Intuition in Publishing
35:36 Why the Draft Came Quickly
37:58 Metalhead Detour and Focus
39:36 Writing Soundtrack and Coffee
41:44 Signposts Not Stages Strategy
43:47 Instagram Experiment and Wrap Up
If you loved this episode, listen to these next:
96: Hazel: Stop Scrolling for Inspiration, Go Read Your Own Archive Instead
103: Liz Holtzinger on Writing in Public — How a Substack With One Subscriber Became a Book
As a bonus, you might like my popular blog post: 26 Things to Do Instead of Scrolling (When You Want to Feel Alive Again.
