It’s surprising to me how long misery can be endured, especially in a draining job. While I was working in corporate, I thought the unhappiness I experienced in my job was normal. That it was just the price of success. Most people I knew were stressed too, especially my coworkers. Most of them seemed just as overwhelmed as I’d been. And so I kept playing the game, believing its what I needed to do to survive.

But each time I tasted real happiness—on vacation, during my son’s visits, in my writing—it started to chip away at this belief. It got harder to believe that staying in a corporate role I hated was my only choice. I decided to focus more on how following my joy might lead to a new career.

I began by returning to the activities that used to bring me joy, the ones I didn’t think I had the time or energy for. But once I started doing what I loved again, I started to feel like the old me, and it felt good. I started hiking again, something I was excited to do when I’d moved to Arizona but hadn’t done much of in my first two years. Being in the beauty of the Sonoran desert among the mighty Saguaro cacti was invigorating. It reminded me of a carefree happiness I’d once known.

Reconnecting with the person I was before the constant stress was enlightening. Walking desert trails, breathing fresh air, and moving my body reminded me that life could feel good again. As the heaviness lifted, my energy began to return—the kind of energy it takes to build a better life.

And energy wasn’t all I gained. I learned that when I’m in a joyful space, I’m more open to ideas, and it’s incredible how easily they begin to flow—without forcing them. Solutions to problems come more easily. Topics for books, articles, and future projects arrive faster than I can write them down.

The opposite is true when I retreat into fear or exhaustion. My thinking becomes narrow. Instead of seeing possibilities, I focus on obstacles. Instead of asking what might go right, I worry about what could go wrong. That flow disappears, and life begins to feel like a struggle again.

Reclaim Your Joy

If you’ve been running on empty like I was, finding your joy again can be difficult. It can even feel self-indulgent. But it’s not. It’s essential if you want to get back to yourself. At least it was for me.

That renewed sense of aliveness becomes the oxygen that feeds the fire. When your energy is restored, your capacity to plan, think creatively, and take meaningful steps expands. Reconnecting with what lights you up—whether through nature, movement, family, or something else—gives you the fuel you need to keep going.

But it won’t happen on its own. It requires you to make space for it—deliberately, and sometimes against the pull of old habits. The exhaustion of a stressful job doesn’t just disappear when you leave work for the day. It follows you home and convinces you that you don’t have the energy for anything more than the path of least resistance.

Reclaiming your joy means pushing back against that. It means walking away from what merely numbs you and spending your time on what actually restores you. Less scrolling. Fewer hours in front of the TV. More time doing the things that remind you what it feels like to live fully.

It’s much more difficult to create a better life from a depleted place. And it’s even harder to build a life you love from inside a version of yourself that’s been flattened by years of survival mode. You have to find your way back to yourself first. Joy—even small and ordinary joy—is often the first step.

When I first stepped into corporate life, I carried a quiet sense of pride. After more than a decade of the ups and downs of self-employment, there was something comforting about having a company badge, a steady paycheck, and benefits that everyone around me seemed to celebrate. Now, when I told people what I did, I could feel their silent approval and I liked that. I no longer got the bewildered looks I used to get when I told people I ran my own business.

But beneath that pride, something felt off from the start. I was no longer working on my vision. I was working on someone else’s. The work felt disconnected from any real sense of purpose or meaning. It didn’t take long for me to start feeling restless, wanting to pursue something that brought me passion. Something that made me feel alive again like I used to. That restlessness grew over time, and I began to think about other options.

Once I considered leaving my job, a familiar pattern emerged. Just as I would start sending out applications, something would happen. Each time, my boss would approach me with a raise or a promotion. The timing felt uncanny. Suddenly, the doubts I’d been carrying vanished. I told myself I’d misjudged things, that maybe I just needed to give it more time.

This cycle repeated itself three times. The first time, I convinced myself I’d been too hasty—that I would be happier in my new role now that I was making more money.

I thought my raises and promotions reinforced that I’d made the right decision. For a while these milestones were enough to keep me from leaving. Despite being unhappy in my work, I kept thinking I just needed to muddle through a little longer.

By the third raise, I recognized the pattern. But I was also earning more than I believed I could make elsewhere, and that reality made me feel more trapped than ever. I hoped it would get better eventually. But it didn’t get better. Instead, it kept getting worse.

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Beneath that surface-level stability lay a very different lived experience. Day to day, there was little positive reinforcement when work was done well. High-priority items were frequently dropped on my desk at the last minute, framed as urgent, with little or no warning and an expectation of immediate turnaround. Processes shifted without notice—I would be instructed to complete tasks one way, only to be chastised later when that approach had changed without my knowledge. As someone who takes pride in her work, the high expectations with minimal guidance weighed heavily on me.

But the dysfunction wasn’t the whole story. Even if the systems had been healthier, something essential was still missing. The work itself did not engage me or reflect who I was. I was asking a job that didn’t align with my values, creativity, or inner drive to somehow make me feel whole. The truth is that I was trying to find fulfillment in a place that could never offer it.

This created a strange emotional split inside me. Despite the outside appearance of success, I was miserable inside. I kept trying to hold on to the “security” I’d been taught to value, even as the day-to-day experience quietly chipped away at my confidence.

This is the duality of corporate life. You can feel validated by the structure while being invalidated by the work itself. You can feel proud of the title while being depleted by the culture. You can appear successful in society’s eyes while feeling deeply disconnected from yourself. This is the tension—the split between what corporate life promises and what you actually feel once you’re inside it.

The Gift Inside the Duality

The strangest part of corporate life is how it can feel both comforting and destabilizing. One moment, you feel grounded by your paycheck, your benefits, and the structure of routine. The next, something inside you whispers that you’re shrinking in ways you can’t quite name. That internal tug-of-war can be confusing—and exhausting.

The duality exists because both truths are real. You can appreciate the stability while also recognizing the cost. You can value predictability and still notice the parts of yourself that are slowly dimming. This tension isn’t a sign that something is wrong with you. It’s a signal that something inside you is waking up and asking if this job is still right for you.

Pay attention to that signal. It can be easy to overlook in the name of comfort. Because familiar is more comfortable. And thinking about shifting to a new career is scary. But that dread you feel on Sunday nights isn’t a personal shortcoming. It’s your soul asking for something more.

This is the gift. Your inner self, your soul, whatever you want to call it, always knows what you need. It’s been trying to tell you the whole time. All you need to do is listen, and have the courage to heed it, instead of talking yourself out of it as it’s so easy to do.

Once you recognize that the comfort of familiarity is keeping you playing small, it’s easier to stop holding yourself back. You stop telling yourself that something must be wrong with you for wanting more. You stop pretending that your need for meaning is unreasonable.

You stop settling for a life that only looks good on the outside and start creating one that actually feels good on the inside. You start treating your need for more as a valid, essential part of who you are, because it is. And you finally give yourself permission to want a life that fits.

If you’re unhappy in your job, you’ve probably already pictured leaving dozens of times. Maybe the thought shows up every Sunday night after a lovely weekend, or every time you sit down at your desk and find yourself answering another annoying email. Wanting out is the easy part. But knowing where to start is another thing entirely.

As the old adage goes, if you fail to plan, then you plan to fail. Leaving a draining job is no different. Over the next four weeks, I’ll share a series I built to help you create your blueprint to leave—so you can start moving toward the life you want.

Your blueprint begins by getting real with your finances.

Most people never sit down and calculate what they actually need to live. Instead, they carry around a number in their head that feels right. This number keeps them stuck because it’s often based on their current lifestyle, not their actual requirements. But what if a few months of cutting back is all that stands between you and the life you’ve been imagining?

When you don’t know the actual amount you need to cover the basics, everything feels riskier. Leaving feels more irresponsible. And the idea of making a change feels bigger than it actually is, or even impossible. But when you get clear on what you truly need, leaving becomes more than just a pipe dream.

Your Survival Number

Your survival number is the minimum you need to cover essential costs each month. It’s not your ideal or comfortable living expenses. And it’s not what you’re spending now. It’s just the essentials. It’s also only temporary. This is the amount you could live on during a transition if necessary.

Once you know your survival number, everything changes. You’re no longer guessing. You’re working with real information. And real information is what makes planning to leave possible.

Knowing your survival number gives you clarity and options. It tells you:

• What you actually need to cover your bare bones monthly expenses

• How long your savings could last if you had to live on the minimum

• How much breathing room you have if you take a lower-paying job temporarily

• What it would actually take to leave, not what fear tells you it would take

Ready to take your first step?

Knowing your survival number is the foundation. If you want to build a life that finally fits, it starts with a single step. I put together a worksheet to make this part simple. It walks you through your fixed and flexible expenses so you finish with a clear survival number—and the breathing room that comes with knowing it.

Survival Number Worksheet

529KB ∙ PDF file

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This first guide is free for everyone. The remaining three guides are available to paid subscribers, where we’ll continue building your personalized career exit blueprint—your buffer goal, your exit conditions, and the timeline itself.

Next week—Part 2: turning your number into a buffer goal, and the gap to close.

As a thank-you to early readers, paid subscriptions are 30% off through July 4.

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It happened multiple times over the four years I was in corporate. I would finally reach my limit and decide I was no longer willing to stay in a job that made me so unhappy. I would work up the nerve to put in my two weeks’ notice.

Once I made the decision, a rush of excitement followed. I imagined the freedom returning to my life—doing the activities I loved again, the things I’d slowly sacrificed for my job. I pictured myself hiking, enjoying quiet weekday trails instead of crowded weekend ones. I imagined shopping without rushing and traveling without guilt. The prospect of reclaiming my autonomy and happiness felt exhilarating.

But inevitably, the doubts would creep back in. What about the bills? How would I pay them? What about health insurance? What if I got sick? The questions piled on, one after another, until the excitement dissolved into fear. Fear of instability. Fear of disappointing others. Fear of making the wrong choice. But most of all, fear of the unknown. I never allowed myself to consider that the unknown might be good, or even better.

Each time I stayed, I sacrificed a little more of my happiness. A little more of myself. I chose fear over freedom, security over fulfillment—not because it felt right, but because I’d let fear have the final say.

I was stuck, and I couldn’t see a way out.

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Understanding Fear

Fear is an instinct wired into us to keep us safe, and most of the time that’s exactly what it does. I think about this when I’m on my daily walks as I step carefully around the holes scattered along the trail. Living in Arizona, I know that many of the holes are rattlesnake homes. Twice now I’ve seen one stretched across the path, its diamond markings glistening in the sun. Both times, it stopped me in my tracks, my heart racing. And both times, I turned around and took another route, unwilling to find out what might happen if I got too close. That’s fear doing what it’s designed to do: keeping me safe.

But my fear of rattlesnakes doesn’t stop me from walking outdoors. I don’t stay home, too scared to step out on the desert trails. It just makes me careful. I stay alert and watch where I step. I respect the risk without being ruled by it.

The Three Fears That Keep You Stuck

There are many different fears that can keep us stuck, but when it comes to leaving a draining job, three tend to show up most often. One tells you that you can’t afford to leave. Another worries that the unknown will be worse than where you are. And the third whispers that leaving might be a mistake you’ll regret. It’s usually not obvious that fear is doing the talking because it sounds more like your own voice disguised as logic.

Financial Fear

Financial fear is usually the loudest. It sounds practical to tell yourself that you can’t afford to leave because your bills won’t get paid. After all, housing, food, healthcare, and other necessities depend on money. The stakes feel high because they are. It’s easy to picture one wrong move putting you in a worse situation than the one you’re in now. That’s what makes this fear so convincing.

The challenge is that your brain isn’t particularly good at distinguishing between different levels of financial risk. It’s treating an uncertain income like a rattlesnake, assuming that any disruption to it is a serious threat. Your nervous system can’t tell the difference between “I might have to tighten my budget for a few months” and “I’m going to starve.” It reacts as if your survival is at stake. But financial uncertainty isn’t the same as financial ruin.

What those fearful thoughts conveniently leave out is that financial risk is manageable when you prepare for it. Most people who feel trapped by a lack of money have never actually done the math. They’ve accepted the version of the numbers that says it’s not possible to leave. But when you sit down and calculate what you actually need to cover your essentials, the gap between “I can’t afford to leave” and “here’s what it would actually take” is often smaller than your fears have led you to believe.

Just like the rattlesnake doesn’t keep me trapped inside my house, financial fear doesn’t have to keep you stuck in a job you don’t want.

Fear of the Unknown

There are so many unknowns when it comes to career change. You don’t know what the next job will be like—if it will be better or worse. You don’t know how long it will take to find something else. There will be new systems to learn and new people to meet. There will likely be a long process of applications and interviews with the possibility of rejection.

In our evolutionary past, the unknown often meant danger. Unfamiliar territory could mean predators, lack of food, or hostile groups. So we developed a strong bias toward the familiar—even when the familiar is bad for us. This is why people stay in toxic relationships. This is why they stay in cities they’ve outgrown. And it’s why they stay in jobs that are wearing them down.

Because known misery feels safer than unknown possibility.

But uncertainty isn’t the same as danger, despite what our fears try to convince us. Just because you can’t predict exactly what will happen if you leave doesn’t mean it’s the wrong choice. The rattlesnake comparison applies here too—an unpredictable outcome gets treated as dangerous even when no real threat exists.

The truth is, the unknown isn’t automatically worse. It just hasn’t been revealed yet. What makes this fear particularly sneaky is how the choice gets framed. Your mind compares the unpredictability of leaving against a perfectly stable, risk-free version of staying. But as we saw earlier, staying isn’t as stable as it appears. Jobs get eliminated. Industries shift. Companies restructure.

The unknown is an unwritten chapter full of possibility in both directions—which means the outcome you’re hoping for is just as possible as the one you’re afraid of. The question worth asking isn’t whether the unknown is safe. The better question is whether what’s familiar is actually working for you.

Fear of Making the Wrong Choice

Another fear that often shows up in moments of change is the fear of making the wrong choice. From a young age, many of us are taught that making the “right” decision is everything. We’re praised for good choices, warned about bad ones, and subtly taught that a wrong move can be hard to recover from.

Over time, this creates the belief that there is one correct path and that choosing anything else could lead to regret. We begin to treat decisions as tests that must be passed rather than opportunities to learn. The bigger the stakes, the more pressure we feel to get it right.

That’s why making the choice to leave a job can feel so overwhelming. We worry that if we leave and things don’t work out, we’ll have made a mistake that can’t be undone. So we delay, we overthink, and we search for a guarantee that we’re making the right call. And because the certainty we’re seeking never comes, we stay stuck.

The truth is that very few career decisions are truly irreversible. It’s true that once you quit, you can’t “unquit.” But you can get another job or try something new. If it isn’t the right fit, you can make another change—adjust your course based on what you learned. It’s common to pivot multiple times over the course of a lifetime. The idea that leaving is a one-way door with no way back is a story your fear is telling you, not a reflection of reality.

So if it doesn’t go exactly as planned, and it rarely does, chances are you’ll gain something along the way—new skills, new connections, maybe even new friendships. Very little of what you do when you put yourself out there is ever truly wasted. Often the unintended routes teach you something that couldn’t have been learned any other way.

Getting Unstuck

Here’s what I’ve come to understand about fear: it isn’t your enemy, and it isn’t always wrong. It exists to protect you from immediate danger and help you make smart decisions. While it can offer useful information, it isn’t always a reliable narrator. The story fear tells you becomes a trap when it stops you from moving forward.

But you don’t have to fall into the trap. Instead, try to understand where the story is coming from. Ask yourself whether the threat is real or imagined. Whether the risk is as serious as it feels. And then decide for yourself whether the story is actually accurate—or whether it’s your instinct for familiarity trying to preserve the status quo.

Recognizing these fears for what they are helps you to move past them. You realize that you get to decide for yourself. You don’t have to stay stuck.

A rattlesnake in your path is a real threat.

Leaving a job that drains you is not.

If this resonated with you…

I wrote You Don’t Have to Stay during the final month of my corporate job after learning I had thirty days left before being let go. It explores burnout, fear, identity, reinvention, and the courage it takes to walk away from a draining job to build a life that is more aligned.

Part personal story and part invitation to rethink what’s possible, the book was written for anyone who feels stuck between the life they have and the life they know they’re meant for.

“One of those books that makes you stop and reflect on your life, your choices, and what you’re holding onto that may no longer serve you.” — Leticia, 5-star Amazon review

“Best self help book I’ve read. Very powerful and well written. In addition to providing helpful information, it tells a story which made it enjoyable to read.” — Mary, 5-star Amazon review

“There is a way out and Amy gives you a good outline for it.” — Duane, 5-star Amazon review

Get Your Copy Here

While I work on some exciting enhancements to the You Don’t Have to Stay newsletter, I thought I’d share an excerpt from the book that started it all.

I recently found myself thinking about a painting I saw in Lugano, Switzerland called Voluntary Prisoner. It depicted a line of businessmen quietly waiting their turn to step into the darkness. The image stopped me in my tracks because it woke me up to the reality I’d been living.

The excerpt below comes from chapter 1: “The Story We’re Told.”

I hope you enjoy this preview.

“It’s easier to fool people than to convince them that they have been fooled.”

—Mark Twain

When I made the choice to return to corporate after the pandemic, I didn’t realize that in choosing stability, I’d given up something far more valuable: my sense of purpose. I went from feeling proud of the business I built—helping families and couples create meaningful memories—to days filled with meetings, emails, and tasks that didn’t inspire me.

I began to dread going back to work every Sunday. I no longer felt excited about my work—I was just going through the motions. The sense of creativity I once had as a business owner was gone.

I tried to ignore the discomfort I felt. I told myself that work wasn’t meant to be fulfilling—that it was simply a means to an end. I even created a timeline to endure it: just a few more years, then I could walk away comfortably.

So, I pushed through. But deep down, I knew I was lying to myself. And soon enough, I would be forced to face that truth head-on.

The Lie We’re Sold

From the time we’re young, most of us are handed the same script: get good grades, find a stable job, work hard, stay loyal, climb the ladder. If you follow that formula, you’re told you’ll be safe, successful, and firmly on the “right” path. It’s a story passed down through families, reinforced in schools, praised by society, and rewarded with approving nods every time you announce a promotion.

We grow up believing that security comes from a steady paycheck, that respect comes from a job title, and that responsibility means staying in a role even when it’s draining the life out of us. No one ever mentions that this script was written during a completely different era—a time when the corporate world operated by an entirely different set of rules. Back then, a single salary could support a whole household. People bought homes, raised families, took vacations, and retired comfortably on one income. Companies offered pensions you could count on, raises tied to loyalty, and job stability that truly meant stability. In return, employees stayed for decades, knowing their employer would take care of them as long as they took care of the work.

That system no longer exists—not in any recognizable form. The pensions are gone. The idea of staying thirty years for a gold watch is a relic. Salaries haven’t kept up with the cost of living. Loyalty is rarely rewarded, and job security can disappear overnight, no matter how hard you work or how much you care. Yet somehow, the conditioning remains. We’re still handed the old script even though the world that created it has vanished.

But we absorb the message anyway: if you have a corporate job, you’re doing life “right.” If you walk away from it, you’re being reckless, ungrateful, or irresponsible. And because we’re human—wired for belonging and approval—we internalize these expectations more deeply than we realize. We learn to chase external validation. We convince ourselves that discomfort is normal and that burnout is simply what adulthood feels like.

Seeing the Truth

I didn’t fully understand how deep this conditioning ran until a moment on my European vacation stopped me cold. I was wandering through an art museum in Lugano, Switzerland, when I turned a corner and found myself staring at a painting that hit me like a slap in the face.

In it, a long line of identical businessmen stood shoulder to shoulder, each one waiting for his turn to receive a pair of handcuffs. Not forced, not resisting—just standing in line, polite and orderly, as if this were the most natural thing in the world. Their suits were crisp, their expressions neutral. They looked like the kind of men who checked all the boxes: steady job, respectable title, reliable paycheck.

And yet they were lining up for their own captivity.

I stood there staring at it, unable to move. The symbolism was painfully clear: not every cage has bars. Some come with health insurance and a 401(k). Some come with praise for being “stable” or “responsible.” Some come with the pride of being the reliable one, the hard worker, the one who pushes through even when it’s slowly breaking them.

What haunted me wasn’t the idea of being trapped — it was how willingly the men stood in line. No struggle. No questioning. Just quiet acceptance. But what truly horrified me was that I had stood in that line and gotten my pair of cuffs despite the fact that I’d once known better.

That’s how strong the conditioning is. It convinces you that giving up your freedom in exchange for security is normal. It trains you to mistake limitation for safety. And it teaches you that discomfort is simply the price of adulthood, not a sign that something is deeply misaligned.

Standing there in that museum, I saw myself. I saw every moment I’d stayed because I was supposed to. Every compromise I made in the name of being practical. Every time I ignored the voice inside me whispering, This isn’t who you are.

That painting didn’t show prisoners. It showed people who had forgotten they were free.

And in that instant, I knew: I didn’t want to wear my handcuffs anymore.

A few days later, when the vacation ended and I found myself crying on the plane at the prospect of returning to my self-imposed prison, I vowed to make a change, even if I didn’t know yet what that might be.

Here’s the truth no one teaches us: a job can look safe while quietly eroding your mental well-being. A paycheck can feel stable while keeping you trapped in a life that doesn’t fit. And the idea of responsibility can become a cage when it’s used to justify staying somewhere you’ve outgrown.

Corporate conditioning doesn’t ask who you are or what energizes you. It doesn’t care whether the work energizes your soul or drains it. It simply tells you to stay. Stay because everyone else stays. Stay because it’s what you’re supposed to do. Stay because leaving feels like breaking some unwritten rule. And that is what most people do. But if your soul is crying, yearning to break free as mine was, you do have other choices.

The corporate lie we are sold is not a moral truth, but an inherited belief system. And once you see it clearly, everything shifts. You begin to understand that you’re not failing, you’re not weak, and you’re certainly not alone. You’ve simply been living inside a story that was never written for your happiness. You’re working for someone else’s dream.

— End of excerpt —

If any part of this sounds familiar, you’re not alone—and you’re not broken. You’ve simply been living inside a story that was never written for you. The book, You Don’t Have to Stay, was written to help anyone ready to take off the handcuffs.

If this resonated with you…

I wrote You Don’t Have to Stay during the final month of my corporate job after learning I had thirty days left before being let go. It explores burnout, fear, identity, reinvention, and the courage it takes to walk away from a draining job to build a life that is more aligned.

Part personal story and part invitation to rethink what’s possible, the book was written for anyone who feels stuck between the life they have and the life they know they’re meant for.

“One of those books that makes you stop and reflect on your life, your choices, and what you’re holding onto that may no longer serve you.” — Leticia, 5-star Amazon review

“Best self help book I’ve read. Very powerful and well written. In addition to providing helpful information, it tells a story which made it enjoyable to read.” — Mary, 5-star Amazon review

“There is a way out and Amy gives you a good outline for it.” — Duane, 5-star Amazon review

Get Your Copy Here

While I was trapped in my corporate job, I stayed focused on the fact that I didn’t think I could afford to leave. The paycheck, the benefits, and the sense of stability seemed like too much to give up. What I didn’t factor in was the cost of staying. I was only looking at one side of the equation.

It wasn’t until after I left that I realized how much the job had actually taken from me.

The cost wasn’t just emotional. It showed up in my health, my energy, my time, and my ability to fully engage with my life. For months after leaving, my nervous system struggled to regulate. I had spent so long operating in a constant state of stress that my body no longer knew how to relax. I had to tell myself over and over that it was okay to slow down. It took daily breathing exercises and self-affirmations to bring my nervous system back to baseline.

One of the highest tolls the job collected was from my energy. For years, I had believed I was simply someone who crashed every afternoon. By two o’clock, I was exhausted. I assumed that was just my personality or the natural effect of getting older. I thought meaningful work could only happen during the first half of the day because after that, I had nothing left to give.

But once I left the environment that was draining me, I realized that wasn’t true at all.

I found out that with a couple of breaks during the day, I actually had energy for meaningful contributions—whether writing, cleaning, socializing, or something else—all the way up to bedtime. It felt like getting my life back. And it still feels unbelievable. I hadn’t realized that I’d been operating from depletion. I had thought exhaustion was normal.

You may have been asking yourself, “Can I afford to leave?” for months, maybe even years, and like me, convinced yourself that you couldn’t. But have you ever asked the other half of that question?

Can I afford to stay?

It’s not as obvious to factor in, but there are real costs—both tangible and intangible—to staying in a job that no longer fits. These costs are harder to measure than a paycheck, but they’re just as real. And in many cases, they’re more expensive in the long run.

The Health Cost

One of the most immediate costs of staying in a misaligned job is what it does to your body and mind over time. When you’re continually under stress, your nervous system stays in a low-grade state of alarm. Your body doesn’t fully relax because stress hormones remain elevated. This kind of chronic tension doesn’t just make you tired—it makes you sick. Over time, it takes a real toll on your health.

The symptoms are wide ranging. Insomnia creeps in as you lie awake replaying the day’s frustrations or dreading what tomorrow will bring. Headaches, back pain, and high blood pressure follow. One new ailment after another that refuses to go away no matter what you try. Weight gain happens too, whether from stress eating, elevated cortisol levels, or simply having no energy left to exercise.

It goes beyond your physical health. Anxiety takes hold. The Sunday dread is real and especially painful after a nice weekend. You become more irritable than you used to be. More tired, even after a full night’s sleep. More likely to reach for numbing behaviors at the end of the day because you have nothing left.

Most likely you’re already spending money just to feel better. Common band-aid approaches include antidepressants, sleep aids, and painkillers. For me, it was DoorDash. I was too exhausted most nights to cook, so I ordered in way too often. I ended up spending a small fortune on overpriced food and delivery fees. When I finally added up what I was spending each month—easily $400, sometimes more—the number shocked me. That’s nearly $5,000 a year just because I was too exhausted to prepare a meal.

Take a moment to add up how much you’re spending per month just to cope with a job that’s draining you. And the next time you tell yourself you can’t afford to leave, remember that number. You’re already paying. You’re just paying to stay.

The Energy Cost

When you’re doing work that engages you, your energy expands. You feel curious, present, even happy. Conversely, when you’re doing work that doesn’t fit, your energy contracts, leaving you feeling depleted, just trying to get through the day.

When you’re not happy at work, the second version of you shows up more and more until it eventually becomes the default. It can creep in slowly, but over time, you start to notice that you have less energy for the things you care about outside of work. Maybe you don’t feel like going to your workout class one week, but then one week becomes one month until you’ve stopped going altogether. Instead, you find yourself wasting time in the evenings, binge watching or mindlessly scrolling. This is the death of creative ideas. It’s the erosion of the motivation needed to find something better.

Your energy is finite. Time spent managing frustration, stress, and even boredom leaves little left over for doing anything meaningful outside of work hours. Joy fuels your energy. Misery squelches it.

Maybe this sounds familiar. You want to find another job so you know you should be updating your resume, building marketable skills, or networking. The thought of doing one more thing feels impossible when just getting through the workday takes all that you have. So you stay, hoping it will get better. But the longer you stay, the more depleted you become, the less energy you have, and it becomes even harder to leave. This is the ironic trap of the energy cost. Staying costs you the energy you’d need to do anything about it.

Over time, this can feel like your new normal. That being a low-energy, unhappy version of yourself is just who you are now. But the engaged, curious version of you is still there, waiting to come back.

The Risk of Staying

Leaving feels risky because the cost is upfront and visible—you can see it, measure it, even panic about it. Staying is risky too, but the cost is hidden. It compounds over time, and often by the time you realize how much it’s cost you, years have passed. The truly risky choice isn’t leaving. It’s staying in something that isn’t working and hoping it will somehow get better on its own.

It was never really about whether you could afford to leave. It was always about whether you could afford to stay. You know what staying is costing you in your health and in your energy. That’s not nothing. That’s your life.

Once you see how much you’re already paying by staying, the cost of leaving doesn’t feel quite so high.

If this resonated with you…

I wrote You Don’t Have to Stay during the final month of my corporate job after learning I had thirty days left before being let go. It explores burnout, fear, identity, reinvention, and the courage it takes to walk away from a draining job to build a life that is more aligned.

Part personal story and part invitation to rethink what’s possible, the book was written for anyone who feels stuck between the life they have and the life they know they’re meant for.

“One of those books that makes you stop and reflect on your life, your choices, and what you’re holding onto that may no longer serve you.” — Leticia, 5-star Amazon review

“Best self help book I’ve read. Very powerful and well written. In addition to providing helpful information, it tells a story which made it enjoyable to read.” — Mary, 5-star Amazon review

“There is a way out and Amy gives you a good outline for it.” — Duane, 5-star Amazon review

Get Your Copy Here

A little over a year ago, I was on a flight home from Paris, crying at the prospect of returning home to a job I hated. I later realized that I wasn’t only dreading the return to misery. I was mourning the fact that my happiness would be stuffed back in the closet, locked away until my next vacation.

I’d been happy in Paris. Truly happy. Just like I felt truly happy whenever I traveled. Whether I was on a cruise, exploring Europe, or visiting my son in Colorado, I was a more alive version of the unfulfilled me going through the motions back at home.

Part of me knew I deserved to feel that way for more than four weeks a year. I wanted that kind of joy in my life every day. Not just in moments carved out between long stretches of exhaustion. I knew a different kind of life was possible because other people were already living it. I wanted it for myself too.

I was ready to choose happiness. I was ready to choose myself. That didn’t mean I suddenly knew what to do or that I had a grand plan. It meant I stopped ignoring my inner voice telling me that I deserved more from my life than survival.

If you’ve been following along, you may have read about that tearful plane ride home from Paris. If not, you can read more about it here.

The morning after I returned home, I woke up with one clear thought: you have to quit today. It was an unwavering conviction and nothing was going to stop me this time.

But when I logged into the computer in my home office, my resolve started to falter the way it always did. Then I read my boss’s message. Things had gone badly while I was away, she wrote, and she needed to discuss some changes. I took that message as my green light. My resolve was back in full force. I responded that I had a change I needed to discuss as well. She called immediately. And I gave my notice.

The path out wasn’t as straightforward as I’d imagined. They needed me to stay on for six more months to cover my boss’s maternity leave—which came with a generous bonus that gave me the breathing room to plan my next chapter. My departure didn’t ultimately happen on my own terms, but that’s a story for another day.

What matters is that once I finally acted on what my inner voice had been telling me for years, it was the first step in a series of events that led me to the happy every day version of myself I’d been seeking.

The Ripple Effect of Living Happy

Now that my days are spent doing work I love, I feel lighter. I laugh more easily when I’m out with friends. I’m more present in conversations with my family. When I’m out jogging, I smile and wave at neighbors with a friendly hello instead of running with my head down, avoiding eye contact, like I used to. I also have less anxiety and I sleep much better. Now if I wake in the middle of the night, I fall back asleep easily. And I wake up feeling fully refreshed.

I don’t write this to brag. I write this to inspire. Because I truly believe that happiness doesn’t just improve your own life, it improves the lives of everyone around you. It becomes a snowball effect in the best possible way. That was my theory, so I decided to look into it.

It turns out I was right. Happiness strengthens your capacity to meet life’s demands. You have more to contribute to your relationships. You listen better. You care more deeply. This strengthens family bonds, friendships, and community connections.

Think about the people who have impacted you most. They’re rarely the ones who were burned out, resentful, or running on empty. They’re the ones who were fully alive. The ones grounded in purpose and generous with their time. The ones who made you feel seen. When someone is truly happy, that energy ripples outward. It improves how they treat others, how they solve problems, and how they show up in the world.

The world doesn’t need more exhausted people doing work they resent. It needs more happy people who are awake and engaged. People who have the desire to offer their talents from a place of wholeness. Choosing happiness isn’t an indulgence—it’s a way of honoring both yourself and the life you’re here to contribute to. In short, being happy makes the world a better place.

Let Happiness Be Your Compass

Happiness is my compass now. Not a destination I’m chasing, but the thing I consult before I make a decision, take on a commitment, or choose how to spend my days.

My old wiring still resurfaces sometimes. The guilt will try to raise its hand. The voice that says wanting more is selfish will tickle the back of my mind. But I’m getting better and better at choosing things that make me happy.

Because here’s what I know now that I didn’t know when I was crying on that plane: choosing happiness isn’t selfish. It’s the most generous thing you can do. You cannot pour from an empty cup. You cannot give your best to the people you love, the work that matters, or the world that needs you when you are running on empty and slowly disappearing inside a life that was never really yours.

The world gets more from you when you’re happy. And you deserve to find out just how much more you have to give.

If this article resonated with you, my book You Don’t Have to Stay explores what happens when you stop settling for survival and start building a life that actually feels like your own. It’s part personal story, part practical encouragement for anyone feeling stuck, burned out, or ready for something more. You can learn more about the book here.

Most people stay stuck in jobs they hate because of financial fear. But the irony is that the job you’re clinging to for financial security could end tomorrow with little or no warning. And if that single paycheck is your only source of income, you don’t have security. You have the illusion of it.

I know this firsthand. Not once, but twice.

The first time was in 2003. My company merged with another, and my position was eliminated. I loved that job. I didn’t want to leave. But what I wanted didn’t matter. The new structure didn’t include me, and that was that. I was devastated. I thought if I worked hard and did good work, I’d be safe. I wasn’t.

The second time was recent. The company restructured and moved my team overseas. I was given one month’s notice. This time, I hated the job. I’d been miserable for years. And honestly, I was relieved. I’d stayed in that job far longer than I should have because I was clinging to the security of a paycheck. And then it was gone anyway.

Two layoffs. Two decades. Two completely different experiences. One job I loved and wanted to keep. One job I hated and should have left years earlier. But the outcome was the same both times: the security I thought I had didn’t actually exist.

The first layoff taught me that even when you love your job and do everything right, it can still be taken away. The second taught me that staying somewhere out of fear doesn’t protect you either. Whether you love the job or hate it, whether you want to stay or want to leave, the result is the same—your employment is not as secure as it feels.

The Broken Social Contract

It wasn’t always like this.

There was a time when the relationship between companies and employees operated under a different set of rules. If you worked hard, stayed loyal, and did your job well, the company was expected to take care of you in return. You’d get steady raises, promotions as you gained experience, and a pension when you retired. And most importantly, you’d have job security. Layoffs were rare and typically happened only when a company was genuinely struggling to survive.

That was how the system worked for decades. But in the 1980s, the rules began to change.

A concept known as “shareholder primacy,” introduced in the 1970s by economist Milton Friedman, took hold. The idea was simple: a corporation’s primary responsibility is to maximize profits for its owners. Before that, companies had balanced the needs of employees, customers, communities, and shareholders.

In 1981, General Electric CEO Jack Welch embraced this philosophy and made it his mission to maximize returns for shareholders above all else. Employees, communities, and long-term stability became secondary to one goal: increasing the stock price.

Welch didn’t just talk about it. He built systems to enforce it. One of his most well-known policies was “rank and yank,” where employees were ranked each year and the bottom 10% were let go, regardless of whether the company was profitable or those employees were performing adequately. It didn’t matter if you were doing fine. If you weren’t in the top tier, you were out.

There was also strong financial incentive for CEOs to prioritize shareholder value. In 1965, CEOs earned about 20 times what their average workers made. By 2001, that ratio had grown to 376 times. This wasn’t because CEOs were suddenly working hundreds of times harder. It was because compensation was no longer tied to the long-term health of the company or the well-being of its employees. It was tied to stock performance.

Since the fastest way to boost stock price is to cut costs, and the biggest cost on most corporate balance sheets is labor, employees became just another line item on a list of costs to be managed. If you’re an employee, it pays to remember that.

The Shift of Risk

The broken social contract didn’t stop with how companies treated employees while they were working. It also reshaped what happened in retirement.

For decades, companies offered pensions—guaranteed income for life after retirement. If you stayed loyal and did your job, you could count on a steady monthly payment. That began to change in the early 1980s with the introduction of the 401(k), which was originally meant to supplement pensions. But that’s not how it played out. By 1985, more workers were enrolled in these new plans than in traditional pensions. And because it was cheaper for companies, pensions quickly became a relic.

With a pension, the company carried the risk, promising a specific payout regardless of how the market performed. With a 401(k) that responsibility shifted entirely to employees. This meant that if the market dropped before retirement, it became the employee’s problem to solve. What was framed as a benefit was actually a transfer of risk from the employer to the employee.

And when you place that alongside the rise of layoffs, restructurings, and shareholder-first decision making, the pattern becomes impossible to ignore. The system no longer prioritizes stability for employees. It prioritizes flexibility for companies.

The old social contract said: You give us your loyalty and hard work, and we’ll give you a stable career and take care of you in retirement.

The new reality is different. You give your loyalty and hard work, and you’re kept as long as it’s profitable. The moment it’s not, you’re gone.

The inherent problem isn’t with how companies choose to do their business. It’s in thinking that working for a company is secure. Going to work believing that the old social contract is in place is entirely different from going to work knowing that it could change tomorrow.

I wish someone had told me this earlier. Not to make me paranoid or cynical, but to help me see clearly. Because the decisions I made about staying, and the fear that was keeping me in place, were based on a version of reality that hadn’t existed for years.

Stay tuned for next week’s post, where I’ll write about the risk of relying on a single source of income.

If you’re starting to question your own job security, my book You Don’t Have to Stay walks through how to think about leaving—without fear running the show. Click here to learn more about it.

If you’re reading this, there’s a good chance you’re not happy in your job. Maybe you’ve known it for a while. Maybe you’ve imagined giving notice a hundred times. And every time you get close, the familiar fears—paying your bills, ending up in a worse job, not being able to handle something new—come rushing in and stop you in your tracks.

I get it. I’ve been there.

I stayed in a job I hated for years because of doubts that kept me trapped and miserable. I was afraid that I wouldn’t be able to make enough money if I left. I was afraid that whatever came next would be worse. And deep down, I was afraid I wasn’t capable of handling any other job.

I spent countless hours going over pros and cons lists, trying to decide if I should—or even could—leave. I Googled other job listings. I asked ChatGPT if I should quit a job I hated. One day, I was dead set on quitting, the next day I was going to save for one more year. Some days I was saving for three more years. I was basically driving myself crazy, going back and forth, while knowing deep down that I needed to leave.

But every decision was ultimately made by that four-letter F-word: FEAR.

Until it wasn’t.

In a full-on twist of irony, the job I was too afraid to leave ended up leaving me. The company was restructuring to cut costs and moving my team overseas. I was told my job was no longer necessary and given a month’s notice. And just like that, the job that I desperately wanted to leave—yet had been clinging to for security—was gone.

I was so relieved that I actually thanked my former boss when he gave me the news. The decision that I’d found impossible to make had been made for me.

In the end, my fears hadn’t protected me. They had just kept me stuck.

I wrote my first book, You Don’t Have to Stay: Leave the Job That Drains You for a Career That Lights You Up, because I wanted to help others who were exactly where I had been. Other people who were miserable in their jobs but didn’t think there was another way.

But after that book, I knew I had more to say, more to give. My first book didn’t tell the rest of the story. The story of how I was able to start from scratch and build a new writing career, despite the crippling fears that held me back. And those fears were real and strong—strong enough that I sought out every self-help book and podcast I could find to move past them.

So I started this newsletter, You Don’t Have to Stay, to go deeper into the strategies I actually used to prepare for leaving—the actions I took in the six months before my layoff that allowed me to step into writing full-time instead of scrambling for another job.

The book You Don’t Have to Stay gives you permission to want more. It validates that your unhappiness is real, that you deserve to be happy, and that wanting to leave isn’t ungrateful or weak. It tells you that you aren’t alone—and that the life you’re imagining isn’t out of reach.

But permission to leave isn’t the same as actually leaving. You can know with every part of you that you need to go and still find yourself stuck in the same job a year later, waiting for the right moment that never seems to come.

This newsletter fills that gap. Over the next few weeks, I’ll be breaking down the fears that keep people stuck—financial fear, fear of the unknown, and self-doubt—and why they feel so real. Then I’ll share the exact strategies I used to move past them: how I calculated what I actually needed, built my buffer while still employed, and prepared my exit so that when the layoff came, I was ready.

Next week, I’m starting with the foundation: the three fears that keep you stuck and how to tell when fear is protecting you vs. when it’s trapping you.

If you’d like learn more about the book You Don’t Have to Stay, click here.

Last week I wrote about what a toxic job does to your mental health. In this article I want to go further — into what happens when the job doesn’t just drain you, but slowly asks you to become someone you’re not and into the physical toll it takes on your body. This week I’m sharing an excerpt from my book You Don’t Have to Stay — Chapter 3. If any of this sounds familiar, you’re not alone.

You can read part 1 of The Toll a Toxic Job Takes on You here.

The following is an excerpt from Chapter 3: Toxic Workplace:

When the Job Asks You to Compromise Yourself

One of the most damaging aspects of a toxic workplace is how it slowly asks you to become someone you’re not. You’re told to follow orders that conflict with your instincts, values, and your sense of fairness. You tell yourself it’s just part of the job, that you don’t have a choice. But each compromise takes you a little further away from who you are.

I found myself participating in systems I didn’t respect and going along with decisions that didn’t align with my values. I wasn’t just doing work I didn’t love anymore — I was slowly becoming someone I didn’t recognize. I began to trade authenticity for self-preservation.

The first compromise came when a coworker was struggling with health issues. Wanting to support her, I adjusted her workload temporarily so she could manage without burning out. When my boss found out, I was told that she either needed to handle a full workload or go on sick leave — no flexibility, no compassion, no middle ground. I wanted to defend her, but I knew that would be futile. She went out on leave and the rest of the team suffered with a heavier workload. It was the first time I truly saw how little humanity there was in the system I was a part of.

The second compromise came when the department needed another senior team member. The strongest person on the team was selected and given the senior responsibilities — but with a catch. There would be no official promotion, no title change, and no pay raise. Just increased responsibility and more work.

I was tasked with delivering the news and expected to frame it as a positive. I didn’t believe it was right to place additional demands on a capable, willing employee without proper recognition or compensation. It felt like exploitation, plain and simple. But once again, I felt I had no real choice. Open discussion wasn’t encouraged in my department, and disagreeing with leadership led to feeling cut down. And so, I proceeded with delivering the “good news,” all while betraying my own sense of fairness.

The hardest moment, though, was being instructed to fire someone I didn’t believe deserved it. He wasn’t failing because of a lack of effort or ability — he was failing because the system itself was impossible to succeed in. I knew he was a victim of the same dysfunction that had been grinding all of us down. Carrying out that decision left me sick to my stomach.

My inner life was being corroded day by day, compromise after compromise. This eventually led to me crying on a plane back from Paris, my psyche crying out — I don’t want to do this anymore. I don’t want to participate in things that feel wrong. After repeatedly ignoring my moral compass, my body was rebelling. This kind of compromise was costing me far more than a paycheck.

“Your body keeps the score.”

— Bessel van der Kolk

The Damage a Toxic Workplace Does to Your Health

At one point during my corporate tenure, a colleague confided in me that she had started taking anti-anxiety medication because of the lack of support and the condescending way she was treated at work. She shared this with me in a rare moment of openness — most of us stayed tight-lipped about the dysfunction around us. That moment stayed with me because it revealed just how deep the sense of entrapment can run. Rather than feeling able to look for something better, she felt she had to change herself to survive in an environment that was harming her.

This is what toxic workplaces do. They don’t just affect your performance. They begin to affect your identity. They make you question your worth, your abilities, even your work ethic. Gradually, they convince you that you are the one who needs to change — through medication, self-blame, or emotional numbing — when in reality, you’ve simply stretched yourself too thin trying to survive an impossible situation.

Not all corporate workplaces are toxic, of course, and mine was certainly an extreme case. But if you find yourself working among dysfunction that has you questioning your sanity, let me tell you what that does to your nervous system.

When you spend day after day in an unpredictable, high-stress environment, your nervous system never gets a chance to power down. It stays on high alert, like a smoke alarm that never stops blaring. You’re constantly bracing for the next urgent email, the next shifting expectation, the next moment where you’re made to feel unprepared or inadequate. Your body begins to operate as if it’s in danger.

And that’s where the real harm begins.

Chronic stress floods your system with cortisol and adrenaline — chemicals meant to protect you in moments of crisis, not sustain you through months or years of pressure. When they never dial back down, everything starts to wear out. Your sleep suffers. Your digestion falters. Your focus and memory decline. Your mood shifts in ways that don’t feel like you. You’re not being dramatic — your body is sounding an alarm.

People talk about burnout like it’s just “being tired,” but it’s far more complex than that. A toxic workplace can disrupt your hormones, spike your anxiety, flatten your motivation, and chip away at your self-esteem until you start doubting your abilities altogether. It can show up in headaches, insomnia, digestive issues, chronic fatigue, even high blood pressure. The longer you stay in survival mode, the more your body pays the price.

And emotionally? The toll is just as steep. Your confidence shrinks. Your creativity shuts down. Your sense of possibility collapses to the size of whatever problem is in front of you. You begin to believe that exhaustion is normal, that anxiety is part of adulthood, that the heaviness you feel is just “how life is.”

It’s not. Or at least, it shouldn’t be.

This is what happens when the human nervous system is asked to operate inside an environment it was never designed for. We’re built for connection, clarity, and manageable challenges — not for chaos, shifting demands, or unreasonable expectations. A toxic workplace doesn’t just drain your energy — it rewires your baseline for what you tolerate.

And if this is happening to you, I want you to hear this clearly:

It’s not your lack of resilience. It’s the environment you’re in.

Your body has been trying to get your attention. Your symptoms aren’t failures — they’re signals. Signals that something is deeply out of alignment. Signals that your system is carrying more than it was ever meant to hold. Signals that your soul is asking for a different kind of life.

If this excerpt resonated with you, there’s a full book waiting.

📖 You Don’t Have to Stay goes deeper — exploring why walking away feels so difficult, how to recognize what your unhappiness is trying to tell you, and how to find your way toward work that actually lights you up.

Get your copy here.

And if you’re not yet sure whether your job has crossed the line, I’ve written an article to help:

Looking back over my years in the corporate world, from the clarity of distance, I can now see the toll the toxic job took on my mental health. But at the time — when I was in the trenches — I didn’t understand the full impact it was having on me.

It started about a year into the job, when mandatory overtime was implemented. There were just four of us manually entering thousands of records into an outdated system that couldn’t be automated. I spent hour after hour, day after day, staring at a screen and typing in records one after another. I ended my days exhausted. Too exhausted to make dinner. Too exhausted to do anything but order in and crash on the couch in front of the TV.

We were praised and promised great things for all of our hard work. I remember thinking it was only temporary and believing we’d be rewarded for going above and beyond. I was wrong. Instead of the promised reward, we got another round of records to manually enter. We’d officially proven to management that we were workhorses. They took that as a signal they could keep piling more on us.

So it shouldn’t have surprised me that after another year in the job, my energy levels hadn’t returned. By 2 p.m. on most days, I was mentally done. It was a struggle to get through those last two hours every day. I didn’t know what was wrong with me. The DoorDash orders that I thought would be temporary had become a regular occurrence. Then I started gaining weight, as the fast food and couch crashes caught up with me.

It got to the point where I no longer recognized myself in the mirror. Who was this overweight person? Where did the light in her eyes go?

Looking back, I can see it clearly now. There was nothing physically wrong with me. The afternoon crashes, the weight gain, the unconfident stranger in the mirror — they were the cumulative cost of staying in a job that was slowly robbing me of my mental health.

If you’re reading this and something in my story resonates, keep reading. Because what I’m about to share took me far too long to understand — and it might be exactly what you need to hear right now.

Shrinking Confidence

Toxic jobs don’t just wear you down. They erode your sense of self and begin to affect your identity. When you spend your days in an environment that makes you feel unprepared, undervalued, or inadequate, you start to believe those messages. The longer you stay in that kind of environment, the easier it becomes to absorb them as truth.

The result is a gradual decline in self-confidence. It becomes easier to second-guess decisions, stay quiet in meetings, and stop offering ideas. The self-doubt you feel at work begins to follow you home — into your relationships, how you carry yourself, even how you see yourself in the mirror.

For me, the weight gain and the loss of confidence became a painful loop. As the pounds accumulated, I felt worse about myself. As I felt worse about myself, I had less energy and motivation for self-care. It was a cycle I couldn’t seem to break no matter how hard I tried — because I was focusing on the symptoms while remaining inside their cause.

Rising Anxiety

Anxiety is one of the most obvious impacts of a toxic workplace. The stress compounds over time and can take many different forms.

Sometimes anxiety shows up as Sunday dread. I remember so well the crushing feeling I’d get every Sunday afternoon as I realized the weekend freedom was coming to an end. It was the same feeling that drove me to tears on a flight home from Paris.

You can read more about that flight here:

You Don't Have to Stay

Crying at 35,000 Feet

I was 35,000 feet in the air, staring out the airplane window as the lights of Europe faded beneath me, and I couldn’t stop the tears from falling…

Read more

5 months ago · Amy Burbank

Sometimes anxiety shows up in unexpected ways. I developed an aversion to grocery stores, finding all of the choices completely overwhelming. Much like the 2 p.m. crashes, I didn’t understand what was wrong with me. Why couldn’t I handle a simple trip to the store? It wasn’t until later that I understood that chronic stress can manifest in mysterious ways.

This is what toxic workplaces do. They don’t just drain your energy. They make you question your worth, your abilities, even who you are. Your confidence shrinks. Your creativity shuts down. Your anxiety skyrockets.

It’s a heavy toll to pay.

But this is not the way we’re meant to live. We’re built for connection, clarity, and manageable challenges — not for chaos, shifting demands, or unreasonable expectations. We’re meant to move through our days without constant tension. To feel engaged in our work, not drained by it.

If you find yourself in an environment that is slowly eroding your identity — one that has convinced you that you are the problem, that if you just tried harder, slept better, or worried less, you’d be okay — know this:

The environment you’re in matters. Your mental health matters. You matter.

After I left the corporate world, I lost most of the weight and found all of myself. I even found a bit more of myself that I hadn’t known existed yet — the resilient fighter I didn’t know I was, and the writer who puts her experience on the page in hopes of helping others who find themselves slowly sinking in the same boat.

It’s not too late to find the shore.

If you’d like to go deeper into the effects of a toxic workplace, I cover more in my book You Don’t Have to Stay — designed to help you move from feeling stuck to building a path forward, one step at a time. Read more about it here.