Corporate Anxiety — It’s Real.

If you think you don’t suffer from anxiety, think again. It’s your anxiety that brought you here.

If I could only use a single word to define corporate anxiety, it would be the word "should."

There is an exact parallel between the anxiety you feel right now and the length of items you think you should be working on instead of reading this.?

Your anxiety, that pit in your gut, and the never-ending frustration and pressure to produce are stealing who you used to be, and you know it.

I have a name for it -- it's called “corporate anxiety.” And unfortunately, you've become pretty good at managing it, living with it, and tolerating it. But it sucks.?

There is nothing in our vocabulary that drives up blood pressure, stokes anxiety, and steals our presence more than feeling like we should be doing something other than what we're currently doing.

Should is “an obligation, duty or correctness of actions.” And while we all have things we need to do, not everything can be something we should do. This is made worse — much worse — when we discover what we should be doing for work, the things we used to like about our work, are no longer the things we want to do. Now, we have competing “shoulds.”

On the one hand, you should do everything you are paid to do: emails, reports, travel, reviews … etc. But on the other hand, you feel like you should finally do something about how you feel about work. You should start something on the side, hire a coach or do anything other than tolerate another yesterday.

When you get to a place where all you feel and hear is all you should do, this is where corporate anxiety finds a home.

Corporate Anxiety (noun): A state of smoldering unease experienced by individuals deep into a career, often resulting from the pressure to conform to organizational norms, navigate changing priorities, and operate with diminishing control or influence over projects of their calendar, all while harboring an unexplainable fear of loss.

Well, that’s how I would define it, anyway.

But your life is not for rent.

Corporate anxiety can manifest in various ways, and the way it feels can vary from person to person. However, individuals experiencing corporate anxiety may commonly describe it as:

1. Overwhelming Pressure: Feeling an intense and constant pressure to perform, meet deadlines, or achieve high standards, which can lead to stress and tension.

2. Isolation: Experiencing a sense of isolation or disconnection from colleagues, as if you're navigating the corporate world alone, or with very few.

3. Unease and Apprehension: A general sense of unease or apprehension about work-related tasks, meetings, or interactions. The fire and passion you used to have for a task is diminishing, or has left completely — so you fake it.

4. Physical Symptoms: Sometimes, corporate anxiety can lead to physical symptoms like increased heart rate, muscle tension, headaches, or digestive issues.

5. Difficulty Relaxing: Finding it challenging to relax or unwind, even outside of work hours, due to persistent worry about work-related matters. This often leads to self medication.

6. Impact on Sleep: Often, corporate anxiety can disrupt sleep patterns, leading to insomnia or restless nights.

7. Impaired Concentration: Difficulty concentrating on tasks or making decisions due to racing thoughts or anxiety. And it causes you to think only of work even when at home or with family.

8. Emotional Exhaustion: Feeling emotionally drained or overwhelmed by work-related stressors. You don’t have any intimacy to offer anyone; not your spouse, your kids or your friends. You have n grace left even to offer to yourself.

9. Family Suffering: Unfortunatly, you have an image to keep up the moment you back your imported car out of the garage. You have to live up to your title and deliver. That takes energy to keep up that fascade, and that energy is always — always — taken from the people you share a roof with.

10. Guilt and Shame: How could someone who has so much feel so little? Why can’t I just be as happy as I used to be? Why doesn’t this feel on the inside as good as I’m able to make it look on the outside? Nobody would understand how I feel if I told them, and this sucks.

Corporate Anxiety Sucks. But you are not alone. I’ve created a home for people who are suffering and don’t know what to do about it. I’ve also dedicated the last 22 months of my life to helping people to navigate it. I talk it, I teach it, and I give people a place where they can come to see that it’s normal.

But here are some things I do that have helped me enjoy all my days, even my Sunday afternoons — and the return to the office after a long break.?

1. You Define Success: Instead of chasing external markers of success dictated by the quarter end, focus on what truly matters to you. Reflect on your values, passions, and aspirations, and redefine your own version of success that aligns with your authentic self.

2. Practice Courage: Corporate anxiety often stems from the fear of the unknown. Embrace uncertainty as a natural part of the journey, and do one small thing that shows you can manage change.

3. Be Selfish: Find some time for you. Be alright being alone with your thoughts. This brings me back to me, and it will bring you back to you. But it takes practice and it will feel selfish. Maybe it is and maybe it isn’t. I don’t judge that, I just know I’m a better dad, husband, friend, coach and person when I take time for me. It helps me put priority into my life and gives me clarity.

Recovery is the most important part of performance. Doing nothing is doing something. If you choose to “do nothing” for an hour, a day, a week, or a month, you are doing something - you are recovering. A life without recovery always breaks.??

4. Find a Community of People Like You. Surround yourself with a supportive network that encourages your personal and professional growth. Join a comminty life The Normal 40 Insider, or jump into a mastermind. You won’t believe how incredible it will feel to know you are normal, that others are going through it too, and that your best days are just in front of you.

5. Count your blessings. Just look around you. Glance at your camera roll for 4 minutes and consider all that you have. Being where you are, having what you have, and doing what you do, is not an accident. You have what you have because it’s been earned. Take some time to slow your life down and remind yourself — these are your best days and it doesn’t take more status to live them.

If you need a place to call home, a community to navigate Corporate Anxiety — a place where people like you do things like this, I have a tribe that would like to meet you.

It’s called The Insider. And for $25, it just might be the thing that changes your life. I show up there several times each month, and so do hundreds of others. It makes sense that you take time to join us, too.

Corporate Anxidety is real, but it doesn’t have to last forever, and you don’t have to go through it alone. And, in fact, you shouldn’t.

When you’re ready to start, you can find me here.

Here’s the link to join: https://linktr.ee/lon.stroschein

Lon -