There's something strange about how we talk about difficult work experiences. The conversation usually jumps straight to: What did you learn? What will you do differently next time? What's your plan moving forward?
They're good questions from a nervous system that is grasping for survival.
But they're often asked before we've acknowledged something much simpler:
That was hard.
And sometimes...
It stayed with us.
Whether it's a toxic culture, a team that never quite meshed, a leader who slowly chipped away at your confidence, or a role that simply wasn't the right fit, we're encouraged to move on as quickly as possible.
But moving on without processing is just carrying.
I think of it like a backpack.
Every painful work experience becomes a rock. Instead of asking whether we need to carry it, we quietly drop it into the bag and keep walking.
At first, the weight feels manageable.
Over time, though, it changes how we move through work.
Those rocks show up in subtle ways:
assuming the worst before you have evidence working harder to prove your value feeling unsafe, even when you're finally in a healthy environment
I didn't recognize I was carrying one of those rocks from when I was laid off early in my career.
When I landed my next role, I didn't pause. I didn't recover. I just tried to prove I deserved to be there.
So when leadership started meeting behind closed doors and my workload shifted, my body reacted before my mind did.
I assumed history was repeating itself. I worked harder. Stayed later. Prepared for something that hadn't happened.
Only later did I realize what was actually happening.
I wasn't reacting to my current workplace. I was reacting to my previous one.
My environment had changed. My nervous system hadn't.
No one had ever told me I could put that rock down.
I wrote more about this in a recent blog, you can read it here.
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