Driving my daughter to school in the morning is a special time of day. Mornings are that way, especially when I wake before sunrise, which is very early this time of year.

My daughter has noticed that I am no longer stressed in the same way that I once was. When the people observing you their entire lives notice a shift, you listen if you are wise.

The shift

One cannot pour her heart into another’s life. Our work and reasons are our own. If that work is to follow the mission of another, so be it. Many of us are capable administrators, faithful implementors of our duty to one another, and motivated emissaries of company leadership.

When you start, it is always like this.

For some, finding the calling is following the vision of another. Excitement for the cause never wanes; no matter how skewed from the original vision the plan becomes over time, the passion for the cause remains steadfast.

Duty

That word— so close to dirty but held so high above. Duty. By whom are we given our duties in life?That question is not familiar to most of us.

Duty can be the glue that binds a family together across generations, and duty can be the mask that hides our calling across lifetimes.

Unexamined obedience is always a mask.

Our minds are capable of deeper work than accepting what is pinned on our shirts.

How “sticky” is the label that designates our place in the hierarchy of society, company, church, committee, and some families?

Some of us must have a crisis of sorts before these questions become visible to us. Questions with answers on the pages that went missing from the manual of life.

Crisis

Crisis is a word we understand to mean a terrible time. Crisis is a turning point, all directions are possible. Crisis, as we understand it, means that we fear it and do what we can to ensure safety from it “happening” to us.

Discomfort — the body signals what the mind is not yet conscious of.

I floated like a feather (and listened to a lot of Radiohead) through my childhood until I was about 30. Many important moments occurred in those decades, such as the birth of my children, getting paid to code for a living, and moving multiple times by choice and once or twice by compromise. I grew my roots later on, and not until I hit a wall of burnout so bad that depressive episodes became my normal for years.

Ultimately, my hand was dealt by the body that carries me; I was working myself to death. Years from now or sooner, if I continued shutting entire parts of myself out, the fractures would become too deep to contain my life-force.

I realized I had to leave corporate life and start to work on who I am and what I need to thrive.

Duty meant making enough money to take care of my family, not worrying about the grocery bill, getting take-out, and a house with space for a studio.

Duty meant providing. Duty did not care if I burned out.

When we leave because we have to is not as good as when we leave because we want to.

If you relate to any of this, subscribe to TheTechMargin for weekly articles (each Wednesday + occasional random days).

There is a path forward in your career that does not end with hating life and seeking (job-related) help for your mental health.

• Start taking care of yourself.

• No skipping gym days

• No late-night snacking

• Drinking every damn day is bad for you.

• See your doctor

• Floss your teeth

• Walk outside every day.

• Hangout with your loved ones

• Talk about the hard stuff.

• See your therapist

• Call someone you love and tell them you love them.

These are small and simple things we fail to do when prioritizing our identity to work duties over our duty as a person.

Start with one thing and do it daily. When I stopped drinking alcohol, I stopped punishing myself for doing something I knew was bad for me. The signal I sent to myself was a positive one, and it started a virtuous cycle, making consecutive choices easier to make in favor of my health and well-being.

I have created a toolkit for fighting burnout to keep you in the game for as long as you want to stay, and if you decide to leave and begin anew, it will be on your terms and in your bodily and mental well-being.

High achievers are in every field; we push ourselves to prove our worth and are wonderful at succeeding. We are absolute rubbish at remembering our minds live within bodies — our bodies.

Upgrade Your Mind In 7 Days will be available soon for purchase.

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TheTechMargin Courses is open to anyone who is interested in feeling more connected to themselves.

Peace My Friends — S

Be kind to yourself; begin now.

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