better work issue #14

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👀 You've outgrown self-help advice. Now what?

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👋 Hey, it's Susan. Welcome to better work - a personal development newsletter for high-performers who put themselves first so that they can show up for the people they love.

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When people give out generic advice, it's like a Hallmark greeting card at best and toxic positivity at worst.

Their advice isn't wrong, but it's useless. You've outgrown it. You have sophisticated problems that need sophisticated solutions.

🙏 And please, for the love of dog, stop calling them first-world problems. Since when has being dismissive about your feelings ever made you feel better?

Last time I checked, there's no such thing as the Suffering Olympics.

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Read the full newsletter below.

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It's 2018.

💍 I'm newly married to the love of my life. We live below our means and have a nice little nest egg. We don't have kids other than our two fur babies. Everyone is healthy, safe, and comfortable.

Life is problem-free.

And I'm fucking miserable.

For the first time in my adult life, I'm unemployed and I can't get a job anywhere. I was taught that as long as I work hard, I will get what I deserve.

I wasn't living in that reality anymore.

Oh, how I tried so very hard to be grateful for what I had.

I didn't need to work. Some of my friends were worried about paying rent. They had real problems.

I was so privileged to complain.

I was so selfish for wanting more.

No one actually said those words to me. But I believed they would if I was honest.

My husband tried to be encouraging.

You can do anything you want, he said.

What I really want to do is run away, I thought.

So I did.

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🇬🇹 Guatemala

I was married for only three months and I fled the country.

I rationalized with myself that I'll spend this time of being unemployed as an opportunity to learn. I enrolled in a Spanish immersion school in Guatemala and secured a homestay with a local family.

I thought I could use traveling to fix my problems. I didn't know what I wanted to do with my life, but I loved to travel.

Besides, this worked once before.

Four years prior, I hit a hard reset on my life and went solo-backpacking across Southeast Asia. I had the time of my life.

So I thought this trip to Guatemala would help me clear my head too.

It. did. not.

The trip was nice. Nothing bad happened.

But I missed my husband the whole time. The weather wasn't that much better (it was in January so it was still cold).

My heart sank when I realized I was just as unhappy there as I was at home.

If traveling doesn't make me happy anymore, then what do I have left?

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✈️ Don't use your fun to fix your problems

My escape trip to Guatemala taught me an important lesson: don't put pressure on the things you use for enjoyment to fix your problems, or you could lose them too.

My unhappiness didn't stem from being unemployed (though that did sting). It wasn't until the busy-ness stopped and I had too much time with myself to see the truth:

💔 I had been unhappy for a long time.

I needed to do some soul-searching without the distractions. I still wanted to find a job, but I committed to bettering myself as well.

I read book after book on self-help. If I wasn't reading, I was listening to podcasts. If I wasn't reading or listening, then I was journaling.

Like a typical high-performer, I threw everything at my goal.

I made vision boards, I meditated, I practiced yoga, I took courses, and I volunteered. I was so desperate to find my purpose and figure out who I was that I nearly fell for an MLM mentoring scam.

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Then I hit a wall. The techniques I cobbled together from my self-study weren't enough; I kept being pulled back to old patterns.

🫥 You know that feeling when you know what you're supposed to do, but some invisible force keeps holding you back?

I noticed this same blocker showing up over and over again with my high-performing clients. Different people, different industries, different life circumstances, but eerily similar invisible barriers.

I call these barriers The Four Blind Spots.

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👀 The Four Blind Spots

Blind spots can be hidden in plain sight. That's what makes them so hard to pinpoint.

The four most common ones that high-performers face are trust, identity, beliefs, and tolerance.

Here is a high-level overview of each blind spot.

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🔒 Trust

You don't trust yourself to make the right decision, despite evidence that others trust your judgment completely. You seek input from everyone else but struggle to grant yourself the same faith.

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🪞 Identity

You don't know who you are outside of what you do. Your worth is tied to your output, and you're terrified of slowing down because you might discover there's nothing underneath all that achievement.

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📜 Beliefs

You're living someone else's definition of success. The boxes you've checked don't feel like your boxes, but you're not sure what your boxes would even look like.

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🪢 Tolerance

You're being too hard on yourself. You expect personal growth to happen at the speed of your professional success, and you're frustrated when transformation refuses to follow your timeline.

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For 2018 me, my blind spot was identity.

I completely defined myself by my achievements. Not working meant that I was nothing - lazy and worthless. But when I reached a goal, I had a brief moment of satisfaction before I searched for the next challenge.

At this point, I couldn't continue on my personal growth journey by myself. I couldn't stop myself from falling into old patterns because I was so used to operating a certain way. I needed help.

I brought in professional intervention (therapy) and opened up to my friends (who gave me shit for thinking they would be anything but supportive...I love them).

Their support inspired me to help others in similar situations of being successful but unsatisfied. I offered coaching services, but I was determined to find a way to make this work more accessible.

🙌 That's how The High-Performer Blind Spot Quiz was born!

This quiz is for you if you feel stuck and you want to stop treating the symptoms and start addressing root causes.

👀 Plus, the quiz is fun and eye-opening (100% pun intended).

AND I'm inviting everyone who finishes the quiz to book a Breakthrough Call with me.

Think ➡️ strategy + core values + Tarot card reading.

Yep, I gamified the self-discovery process. No cookie-cutter discovery calls here.

🔮 I've already gotten reactions like "eerily accurate" and "literal magic."

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👯 Personal growth is not a DIY activity

You will hit a wall in your personal growth. It's just a matter of time.

Because as you evolve as a person, your problems evolve too.

🏠 It's like DIY-ing a house.

Thanks to YouTube, there's a lot you can DIY when things are simple. But when you run into an unexpected problem, working harder isn't the solution.

💪🏼 Strength isn't measured by brute force. Strength is recognizing your limits and calling for help.

Personal growth is not a Deal-with-It-Yourself activity.

Stop training for the Suffering Olympics, and start building your All-Star Team.

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That's all from me today. Thank you for reading.

🫡 See you on August 14th. Stay safe.

Take care of yourself,

Susan

Susan Lee

Career coach for holistic growth

Founder of Hey Ms. Lee, LLC​

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What did you think about today's newsletter? (🚨 make sure you confirm your choice on the next screen) 🤯 I NEEDED this! You read my mind. 🤔 It made me think in a good way. 🤓 Not my favorite but I enjoyed the read.

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✌️ After Work

This is a bonus section where I share opportunities, recommendations, freebies, and funsies.

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