Most people who feel stuck at work aren’t remotely unqualified for the next step. Not even close. They’re not unhappy, exactly.
They just can’t get unstuck.
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Over the years, I’ve noticed the same forces showing up again and again in my coaching sessions. I call them the Four Horsemen of Career Doldrums: Obligation, Inertia, Fear of Change, and Shortsightedness. Each one deserves its own conversation. Over the next few weeks, I’ll be writing about each of them in depth.
Today I want to start with the one that surprises people most when they finally see it clearly.
Obligation.
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Somewhere along the way, someone else’s expectations became your career plan.
A parent’s definition of success. A manager’s vision of your future. A salary that’s hard to walk away from. You’re quietly living someone else’s story.
Obligation is sneaky. It doesn’t feel like a trap when you enter it. It feels like the responsible choice, the one that makes the people around you proud.
The problem is that “responsible” and “right for you” aren’t always the same thing.
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One of my clients wanted to start her own business. But session after session, it stayed theoretical while it was draining her. Her boss was erratic and dismissive. Her daily calls were stretching to ninety minutes and leaving her depleted. At home, she had a young daughter not yet in daycare and a husband with his own demanding job (what I affectionately call “childcare hot potato”). Then all the minutiae of owning a home. She knew she wanted out.
But she stayed. Why? Because her boss had taken a chance on her. Because she wanted him to feel like he’d made a good bet. Because the salary was holding the household together. And because she kept finding herself extinguishing his fires instead of building her own thing.
That’s Obligation in full bloom.
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What I’ve noticed is that Obligation rarely announces itself. It hides behind reasonable explanations: “I’m not ready yet.” “Now isn’t the right time.” “I have people counting on me.”
All of which can be true. And none of which are the whole story.
The real question, the one I eventually ask all my clients, is this: if no one was watching, and nothing was at stake, what would you actually want to do?
For a lot of people, that question leaves them flummoxed. Because since they were young, they’ve been internalizing other people’s expectations. But then slowly, like a small earthquake, there are aftershocks.
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Have you experienced something similar? I’d like to hear your thoughts in the comments.
Next week: Inertia, the Horseman that doesn’t feel like a problem until you look up and five years have passed.
#careerdoldrums #makeworkwork #careercalibration