better work newsletter #36

Let's get right into it:

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​Should you quit your job right now?

You’ve got some ideas about why you should (or shouldn’t), but every time you peek out of your shell, panic hits you square in the face.

🚨 Massive corporate layoffs!
​💸 Recession indicator, recession indicator!
​💀 AI is taking your job - adapt or die!

It’s hard to think clearly with so much noise. Still, the question hovers in the background.

I've watched clients play solo mental ping-pong as they mull over the ‘should I quit right now’ question. It goes something like:

'Should you quit your job right now?' isn’t a yes-or-no question. At this stage of your career, it’s a multi-pronged question of readiness.

There are three things I look at with clients when they’re stuck here.

Let’s walk through them.

Question 1: If all income stops today, how long would it be before you’re bankrupt?

This isn’t a fun question but it's an important one.

It's less about how much money you make, and more about how much money you have. I’ve met people making $500K a year who live paycheck to paycheck, while another person has a nice nest egg making $50K a year.

Knowing your numbers helps you calculate the financial risk you can handle when, not if, your income is disrupted.

My clients do this exercise with me because their default thinking is that they don't have enough cushion to make moves. It's not paranoia, it's protection; one medical disaster can be a person’s financial ruin in the U.S.

Feeling fear and discomfort towards loss of income is understandable. But I also know you routinely underestimate your abilities and resilience.

So, do the math. You won’t regret it. (Trust me, I was a math major 🤓.)

⚠️ Do not guess. Take a hard look at your numbers. Accuracy is important here.

There’s a mile between “I shouldn't leave” and “I absolutely cannot leave.” The numbers will tell you which one is actually true.

If you're the former, let's move onto question two.

Question 2: Imagine nothing changes in one year from now. What’s your first thought?

When I ask this question in 1:1s, my clients have 3 common reactions. (Think about what your answer is before you read theirs.)

❌ Denial: "That’s not an option." -D.

People claim it's impossible that nothing would change in a year. But years can easily slip by where the things that really matter don't really change.

Denial doesn't change the truth.

When my client and I sat in silence for a moment, she continued with, "Maybe that's not true. Because if I think back to one year ago, not much has changed since then."

☁️ Indifference: “¯\_(ツ)_/¯“

Apathy doesn't mean you don't care - it means you're not ready yet. That's okay. But don't confuse 'not ready' with 'never.'

Here's a quote from a client call:

Life has a way of life-ing. In certain seasons, all you can do is put your head down and push through.

But you want to know a secret? The ones who make the impossible possible are not superhuman or super lucky. They all start with the decision that 'good enough' is no longer good enough.

😱 Horror: "Don't say that!"

Always said like I'm a bearer of bad news. Horror is actually the sweet spot. You're ready to take a leap, but freeze without a plan. Let's start with what you know.

Look over the last decade or so of your career patterns. Then think about why you keep ending up in ‘the hallway’ - the liminal space between long-term career decisions.

The hallway is limbo. You're not in the old room anymore, but you haven't opened the next door. The longer you stand there, the darker (and scarier) it gets.

Good news though: you're ready to answer question three honestly.

Question 3: How would you spend your ideal day?

Building an ideal day doesn't happen overnight, but try visualizing it now. The version in your head is incomplete because you only know what you've experienced, and if you want something different, it's hard to know what you don't know.

To complete the picture, you need to act your way through it.

It took years of trial and error (and error) to figure out what worked for me. When I told a group of founders I work 25 hours a week, their jaws dropped open. One of them said, "This shouldn't be groundbreaking, but it also is somehow."

When I left tech, I knew that a 40-hour work week was not only bad for me physically (eye strain, back pain), but it was also nearly impossible to prioritize other things.

This was before I became a parent. When do people grocery shop? Go to the doctor’s office? Eat enough protein?

The 40-hour work week was not meant for people who want to live healthy, rich, fulfilling lives. It assumes your life is structured around work, not the other way around (thanks, capitalism).

How I came up with 25 hours of work per week is by starting with the things that were important to me. I blocked off the times on my calendar. All that was left over was 25 hours.

​Self-discipline isn't enough - you need structure. Building something new is the most important thing you can do to protect yourself from old habits.

No structure = No boundaries = New burnout

That's why I created ⏩ Forward on Purpose: a group coaching program with a built-in structure for mid-career women who are less interested in escaping their current job and more interested in building a life that works for them. It's for women who know they're done with something, but aren't quite sure what's next and they don't want to abandon everything they worked so hard to build.

→ Learn more here.

So...should you quit your job right now?

'Should you quit your job right now?' starts with figuring out if you're ready to quit beyond taking your emotional inventory on the decision.

All three questions assess where you are now and your options.

The answers won’t present a clear plan. They won’t give you certainty.

What they can do is help you stop making decisions from fear.

Because preparing for the worst is very far from building a life you want.

So let's say you decide to quit. What now?

In the next issue, we're going to map out the three most common options and their roadblocks. We'll cover the glorification of entrepreneurship, why you can't escape corporations, and the secret option that 99% of people don't consider (but would if they knew about it).

So what's your reaction to this issue? Reply with your emoji: ❌ (denial), ☁️ (indifference), 😱 (horror).

Take care of yourself,