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What if the problem isn’t your job, but the version of yourself you had to become to succeed in it? Corporate jobs don’t trap us because they’re evil. They trap us because they slowly teach us to disconnect from ourselves. If you're in corporate America and your life looks successful on paper but feels empty in practice, you’re not alone.
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This isn’t about quitting your job overnight or chasing money, but asking what feels right for you and finding clarity before making your next move. We deliver actionable strategies for complex career transitions. From managing ADHD-related overwhelm at work to overcoming the disconnect of the corporate grind.
You’re not broken. You’ve just outgrown the life you built.
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Hello and welcome to episode 99 of Working
towards our purpose. Today's episode, we're going to talk
about how to stop feeling confused at work.
But before we get into that, we're going to take a moment and just check
in with ourselves and see how we're feeling today.
Alrighty. Hopefully you got a second to slow down.
Check in. I'm feeling pretty good. Got to play
some music before this, so that always is
helpful for me. But today's episode is
going to be for maybe someone
out there who is feeling confused at work.
Been kind of talking with somebody who's in the corporate
setting and
going through some stuff and just really feeling confused
by what's going on. And I think that
it's a feeling that's super common for me because I remember when I first
got into corporate America after graduating college,
I was always really confused. And I was like, I don't understand what's happening here.
I don't understand what's going on. And for
me, it was just a really confusing place. And so I definitely
empathized with my friend. And
it just brought up this topic of how
sometimes, you know, and I don't like to. To be, like, super negative,
especially on here, but. But sometimes when
you're in a corporate setting and you have bosses, sometimes they
intentionally confuse you and. And they want you to feel confused.
And yeah, I just want to, like, identify that
and call that out because I feel like for me, it was super common. For
my friend, it's. I could see it happening and.
And yeah, I've talked to people about it before and it's just. It's. It's crazy
and it's unfair. And I feel like. I feel like sometimes some
of the best workers are the ones that get taken. Taken advantage
of the most. Like the people that try the hardest and the people that want
to do a good job tend to get, like,
jostled around in that environment. And, you know, I'm not speaking to everyone, but
that was my experience. And. And I see it
sometimes. It doesn't even really have to be in a corporate setting, but just
good employees and people who are trying to do well often tend
to be the ones that get picked on and
treated unfairly. And it bums me out. I hate it. I hate
seeing bad bosses. And there's so many of them
out there, unfortunately. So
the point of today's episode is not to rag on bad
bosses, but to talk about how
you can look out for yourself. And it is
unfortunate that we have to do that. But I Think
that there's two things that I think you can do
to get yourself out of feeling so confused at work. Because,
for example, here's a story that from my
personal experience, when I was working my first job, my first big job,
I was there for a year, and most other people there when engineers were
there for a year, you became an engineer, too, and you started as an engineer.
One, you got to an engineer. Two, there was engineer. Three, and then,
I don't know, something above that. And that's just kind of the structure of how
it worked. So I came up on my year, and my
boss didn't really say anything to me. So eventually I was like, hey,
what do I need to do to be an engineer, too? I felt like I
was doing a good job. I felt like I was doing extra things that I
didn't need to. And he was like, oh, you're doing great. Everything's fine.
Just keep doing what you're doing. They only do this at a certain time of
the year, so just gotta wait till this certain time of the year. I was
like, oh, okay, sure. Kept asking him
because so much time kept going by. I think I was there for like a
year and a half before the time came.
And then he had my review, and. And I was expecting,
on his review, him being like, yep, you're an engineer too now. Here's your
title and salary raise. And
instead, we had a conversation about an incident
that happened. Like, one small thing that happened at work. And he was like, yeah,
you don't deserve it. You're not going to be an engineer, too.
This thing happened, and it shows me that you're not an engineer, too.
And I was, like, so confused because
every single time I asked him before that, he was like, yeah, you're great.
Everything's good. And he brought up one example
of, like, a miscommunication and was like,
yep, that's why you're not getting it. And
obviously I was, like, hurt, and I was, like, angry.
I remember him saying that and being like, I don't know what to say right
now. And I don't even really remember it very well. I think I
just got quiet and probably looked angry.
And then we left the meeting and we never communicated about
it. I don't think I ever expressed to him that I was angry because
for me, it takes a minute to process things.
Somebody can't just say something to me, and I just, off the bat,
can't have a retort. I very much need to think about
what's happening. Um, so that happened and then,
like, I felt like I couldn't because time went by and we just never really
talked about it. And I basically just then started looking for a
new job and then found a new job and quit, which probably isn't the
best answer, but it was the way I got through it
because I felt like I wasn't being taken care of.
Like, I tried hard, I gave my honest effort, and my boss was like,
yeah, nope, sorry.
And that was like, a big bummer for me. So, yeah,
I moved on. And not in a regretful way,
but that's kind of what led me onto the path of leaving that
corporate environment, because it was more of the same in my new job.
But, yeah, just the confusion of what's happening.
There's so much confusion around what's happening. And. And I would
talk to people at work, and I had a mentor, and he
never really gave me good advice. The only advice that he gave me was always,
just fall in line, be quiet, do your job, and get out
of here after eight hours. And that was his prerogative, and
that's what works for him. But for me,
acting against my authentic self and acting against what I think
is right, just to be quiet and not be
noticed did not feel good to me. And
it's. It's. That's very much encouraged in the corporate. My
experience is very much encouraged in the corporate environment, and I just really
couldn't do it. Like, I. I spent a
majority of my life, like, just, yes. Yes,
sir. Yep. Yes. Like, I couldn't. I couldn't not.
I couldn't just do that again. Like, it felt wrong, and it, like, ate
at my soul. And I was like, I can't. I can't do this.
But I'm getting off track here. But, like, what. What I'm
trying to get at is, like, if you are in that environment, like, how. How
can you, like, prevent the confusion? Because. Because I think sometimes what I'm saying
is, like, the confusion is intentional. Like, they want to keep you
confused because then it's easier to control you. Like,
it's easier to tell you what to do. It's easier to, like, have you fear
for your job. You know, it's easier to just do whatever
they need you to do so that their boss's boss's boss is happy.
And, yeah, confusion runs
rampant. Rampant. However you say that word, rampant.
Ramp. I don't know. There's lots of
confusion in the corporate setting environment and just maybe even in jobs in general,
but with bosses that maybe are
tough, but the two Things that you can do to prevent this from
yourself. Because there was so much gaslighting in my experience, in my friend's experience,
I think the first thing to do is just to write everything down. And
this seems unnecessary, but I think it's helpful because if I
were to write down things that happened with my boss right after
they happened, what happens is you get those actual feelings out.
Because the first day it happens, you're angry, you're upset, you're all these feelings, and
then the day goes by, and then you're like, well, okay, maybe it wasn't that
bad. And then somebody says something to you, and he's like, well, he's a good
guy. He's not that bad. And then all of a sudden you're
gaslighting yourself and you're like, well, I was just overreacting. It wasn't that big of
a deal. And this is how that stuff festers. And
it's extremely frustrating. I know that feeling so
deeply. And so to prevent that, you
write down how you feel. Because then two days goes by, people are trying to
convince you that he's a good guy, she's a good girl, whatever,
that you start
gaslighting yourself. But if you can read down what you wrote, you could be like,
well, wait a minute, I was actually pretty upset here. And some of the things
that were said were mean,
abusive maybe, or unfair. I
don't know, all kinds of things. Because
having an accurate representation of what happened will
help you. Because then the next time when you have another meeting and, well,
I didn't say that or I didn't mean that. You can have evidence and you
can be like, well, actually, you did say this, and
it helps for you going
and preventing just being confused. So I think
writing things down sort of gives you a history, and it also validates your
feelings. So if somebody is trying to gaslight you, you can look back
and read where you were at that day, and you can be like, well, no,
actually that did hurt my feelings. And I did feel like it
was unfair. So. So there's that.
And then. And then the second thing that you could do to. To help yourself
from feeling confused at work is talk to a third
party that's outside of your company. Because I think a lot of times people at
the company will, like, try to stick up for the third boss, or
maybe it's that. Or maybe
they have their own motives and
they want to be. They're also in that workplace. They're also
in that maybe bad environment. So it's like they're doing what they can to
get through it. And oftentimes it can be invalidating you and your experience
or confusing you even more. So talking to somebody completely outside of
it. And this is helpful because, like, I've done this with friends before, like, where
they're saying, like, hey, this. This is what my boss did today. And, like,
am I crazy? Like, this. Is this terrible? And I can be
like, that sounds like unfair. That
sounds. That sounds like they're doing something that is unfair to you.
And it's easier, you know, it's because I'm not. I don't
have any affiliation with the company. I don't know the boss. I don't know whoever.
So it can be help. It can be helpful to talk to people, like, outside
of the corporate bubble that you're in.
And. Yeah, so I don't know. Hopefully that's helpful. I just felt like I wanted
to talk about this feeling of confusion, because I always
had this feeling of confusion when I was in corporate. I just never understood how
things worked. And I say this story all the time. But when
I first got into corporate and started asking too many questions, my
mentor got a piece of paper and he drew a
briefcase on it and he wrote common sense on it, and he gave it back
to me and he was like, here, put this in the bottom drawer, all the
way in the back. Never take it out when you're here. And
that's just like the epitome of my experience in corporate.
And, yeah, I don't want you to feel confused
because it's isolating. It feels like you're alone. It feels like you're crazy.
I'm here to say that you're not. And it's a challenging environment.
Some people figure it out, and that's great for them, you
know, but for me, it was really difficult. And
for how I am, it was just a
hard place to be in. And hopefully these two things can
help you to get by. Maybe if the next
time somebody is, like, trying to gaslight you or, you
know, make you feel confused, because I think that's unfair.
Um, but yeah, that's. That's all I got for. For today.
Hopefully that was helpful. If you're
interested in helping reduce or soften your
inner critic, if you have a strong inner critic like I do,
then I have a free guide that can help you do that in the link
in the show notes, in the description. So head over there. But
thank you for listening. It's episode 99 and next
episode is 100. Maybe I'll try to do something a little bit special,
but I'm gonna do like a little bit longer of an episode and
talk about everything I've learned over the last three years of this podcast
and then probably go on a little bit of a hiatus. And
yeah, so don't miss out on next
week's episode. And thank you for being here. I appreciate
you all, and I will see you on another episode real soon. It.