“You’re pale as a ghost. What happened?” my husband asks.
Silence.
I can’t speak. Every muscle in my body is tense, aching, and sore – reminiscent of my marathon days even though I gave up my fitness routine three months earlier. How quickly I had morphed into a sedentary, miserable workaholic. There’s a pit in my stomach and I want to throw up.
“What’s wrong? You’re scaring me.” He continues probing.
I look up at him, holding back tears. I accentuate each word, spittle flying out of my mouth. “I hate my new job. I hate who I am in this job. I hate myself”.
Who is this person, I think. It’s as though I’m having an out-of-body experience watching myself, this woman I barely recognize. Un-showered. Deflated. Face distorted with such disgust. What happened to Shannon? What happened to the woman who used to love, live, and breathe work? Where did I go? Where is the happy, optimistic, always positive soul that used to occupy this body? This body feels like it has aged three years in the last three months.
My attention is slowly drawn back to the bright 15-inch screen sitting a foot away from me where it has held a permanent posting for nearly 15 hours a day over the past three months. My pin sized pupils dart to the bottom right of the screen, hoping that the digital clock has suspended in time so that I don’t need to join the dreaded online meeting that will kickstart the spin cycle of meetings to follow.
This was three days before I was fired. Me, a successful, type A, ambitious, results-oriented, high achiever, and top of my MBA graduating class. How did it come to this?
I had lost sight of who I was, what was truly important to me, and what I deeply desired. Somewhere in the middle of the global pandemic, I went on cruise control and began putting an organization’s needs before my own. In record time, I had gone from a top performer to an ineffective workaholic, chasing perfection and validation. I was spinning my wheels and under-delivering. I had developed an unexplained back injury that had me and my laptop bedridden for a week solid. To add insult to injury (literally), I had become a short-tempered mom who yelled at her kids for asking a simple question and prioritized work emails over our cherished bedtime routine. To an outsider, these would have been clear signs of stress. I knew the signs, but I ignored them.
But deep down, I knew it wasn’t working. I knew it was a bad fit and yet I kept pushing through. Why?
Because I was not a quitter. I had stick-to-it-ness. I was a git-er done at all costs type of employee, which up to this point in my career had always served me very well.
It was no longer serving me. I was in the wrong job. I knew it. And, staying in it was destroying me and everyone in my pandemic bubble.
When the day came when my boss had to let me go for poor fit, I didn’t feel sadness, failure, or disappointment. I felt relief. I was relieved that someone else had made the decision for me. Congratulations to me - I was not a quitter. In hindsight, I was worse than a quitter, I was a coward for not quitting.
What did I do next? What does one do when they no longer have their livelihood?
I reached out to a career coach. I now had irrevocable proof that my habits, my beliefs, the stories I was telling myself about work and career were no longer serving me and I knew I needed help.
Having now spent several months working with a coach, reintroducing self-care, daily showering, exercising, meditating, playing with my kids, reading, writing, and reflecting on my short-lived, yet life-altering experience, I found Shannon again. Not the old Shannon. I found a renewed, more confident, less people-pleasing Shannon. Welcome dear!
I now have a new job that I love. Not only do my skills and experience match that of the job description, but more importantly, my values and desires align to those of the culture of the organization. We are the right fit for each other.
Lessons from a people-pleasing workaholic
The lessons I learned during those awful three months of being in the wrong role and the months that followed are invaluable. I want to sing them from the rooftops so others can learn from them, set themselves up for success, so they too can find a job they love.
First, when evaluating new job opportunities, understand your non-negotiables. In other words, what is a must have in your new role and what are you not willing to compromise? These non-negotiables could include the usual suspects like salary and autonomy. I encourage you to dig deeper. Explore what your ideal job looks like, including workplace, your boss, coworkers, the type of work, the culture, and so on. Be honest with yourself and be explicit. An example could be “I want to work for an organization that values family”. Great! What does this look like for you? Be specific. For me, I want to work for an organization that understands my family is a big part of who I am, and their happiness directly affects how I show up in my job every day.
Second, set boundaries early and stick to them. For me, this looks like having dedicated time to pick up my kids from school, enjoy a sit-down dinner, and have a relaxing, uninterrupted bedtime routine. For others, this could be carving out 45 minutes at lunch to go for a walk outside or turning your work phone off after 6pm. Whatever this looks like for you, be specific, be clear, and be consistent.
Finally, it’s okay to quit. If it’s just not the right fit, it’s okay. Contrary to what we’ve been conditioned to believe our entire lives. In fact, it’s better than okay when the alternative is an unexplained,
debilitating injury, a mental breakdown, burnout, or a stain on your professional reputation. Putting on a brave face when it is so clearly the wrong fit will only harm you and those you love. My actions were not brave. I was afraid of quitting, and I let fear drive me.
Coaching helped accelerate my healing and reflecting process. I learned that the job hunt is not a competition that I need to win. It is a process for both parties to evaluate one another before embarking on a partnership. Now, during my interviews, organizations aren’t just interviewing me, I am interviewing them to ensure that my non-negotiables will be met and that the culture will be accepting and supportive of my boundaries.
If you or anyone you know are experiencing physical, mental, or performance issues at work, seek help. You don’t need to suffer alone. A coach can be a great resource in helping you find the right role or get out of a bad one.
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