S2 EP332 – Clinging to a Job You Hate

Hi everyone, and welcome back to the Inner Bonding Podcast. I’m Dr. Margaret Paul, and today we’re exploring a topic that affects so many people, often far more deeply than they realize, which is why so many people stay in work that drains them, depresses them, exhausts them, deadens their spirit, and sometimes even makes them physically ill. And perhaps even more important is what would it take to begin creating work that truly supports your soul’s journey and your purpose for what you came to the planet to offer. 

Be sure to stay to the end because I’ll be sharing more about how you can discover your purpose and move toward manifesting it.

Please don’t judge yourself if you’re in a job you dislike. There are practical realities in life. People have families, mortgages, responsibilities, health concerns, financial fears, and physical limitations. This podcast is not about simplistic advice like: “Just quit and follow your bliss.” That kind of advice can actually be irresponsible.

What we’re going to explore today is much deeper.

We’re going to explore:

• Why people become trapped internally
• The wounded self’s beliefs that keep people stuck
• The fears that override inner truth
• The difference between responsibility and self-abandonment
• And how your loving adult can begin guiding you toward integrity, vitality, and authentic security

Often the deepest suffering isn’t simply the job itself. It’s the ongoing self-abandonment. It’s waking up every day saying:
 
 “I don’t matter.”
 “My feelings don’t matter.”
 “My soul doesn’t matter.”
 “My aliveness doesn’t matter.”
 “Survival is more important than truth.”

And eventually this internal betrayal takes a huge toll emotionally, physically, spiritually, and relationally.

So today we’ll explore how to begin healing this.

Let’s begin by understanding something important, which is that most people do not stay in jobs they hate because they are weak. They stay because they believe they have no safe alternative. Their ego wounded self has convinced them that they are stuck.

The wounded self is always trying to control pain, avoid rejection, avoid uncertainty, and create external security.

And often, the wounded self says things like:

• “You can’t survive without this.”
• “You’re too old to change.”
• “You’re not talented enough.”
• “You’ll fail.”
• “You’ll lose everything.”
• “You’re trapped.”
• “It’s selfish to want more.”
• “You should just be grateful.”
• “Nobody likes their job.”
• “This is life.”

Now some of these thoughts may contain partial truth. Life does require responsibility. But the wounded self may be turning responsibility into self-abandonment.

The loving adult says: “Yes, we need to be responsible. And we also need to honor our soul’s purpose.”

The wounded self says: “Security matters more than aliveness.” And this creates profound inner conflict, because your soul, which is your inner child, knows when you are living against yourself. Your feelings know. Your body knows. Your nervous system knows. Your energy knows.

This is why people often experience:

• Fatigue
• Depression
• Anxiety
• Brain fog
• Irritability
• Numbness
• Resentment
• Addictions
• Emotional eating
• Loss of creativity
• Chronic stress symptoms

When you spend years forcing yourself to do work that isn’t in alignment withs your deeper self, your entire being begins to react because the soul naturally resists going against yourself and your purpose on the planet.

Not every unpleasant job is wrong for you. Sometimes growth requires challenge. Sometimes there are periods of sacrifice. Sometimes we do work that isn’t ideal because it supports a larger vision. But that’s different from soul-deadening self-abandonment.

The key question is this: Are you choosing the work consciously from your loving adult, or are you trapped there, coming from the fear of your wounded self? The loving adult may temporarily stay in a difficult work situation while actively planning change, while the wounded self numbs out, perhaps falsely believing that there is nothing you can do, which disconnects you from your inner and higher knowing about what would bring you aliveness.

If you are operating from your wounded self, you have likely stopped dreaming, stopped imagining, stopped listening to your intuition. Instead you adapt to deadness, and adaptation to deadness seems to have become normalized in our culture, with people saying things like “Everybody hates Mondays,” or “Work is supposed to suck,” or “That’s just adulthood.”

But your soul came here to create and express who you are on the planet. Your soul came here to love, to contribute, and to evolve.

And while not everyone’s path involves a dramatic career transformation, your soul wants you living with integrity rather than chronic self-abandonment.

This is why I created my 30-Day video course, Passionate Purpose, Vibrant Health. If you’re looking to change your life to one that is aligned with your soul, this course is for you. You can learn more in the description below.

One of the greatest reasons people stay stuck is because the wounded self fears uncertainty more than suffering. Think about that. Many people would rather suffer in familiar misery than risk the unknown, because the unknown feels uncontrollable and the wounded self is addicted to control. And even if trying to control certainty may be causing inner deadness, to the wounded self this feels safer than uncertain possibilities. So many people remain in situations, both in work and relationships, that slowly diminish them.

Underneath this is often a deeper fear – the fear of fully becoming yourself, because becoming yourself may require:

• disappointing others
• changing relationships
• risking criticism
• failing publicly
• facing financial uncertainty
• and leaving old identities behind

And the wounded self says: “That’s too dangerous.” But eventually another kind of pain emerges – the pain of an unlived life. And that pain can become unbearable.

This reminds me of an episode of the Golden Girls. Dorothy falls in love with a man, played by Dick Van Dyke, who is an attorney, and who is a clown in his spare time. They are headed toward marriage when her lover decides to give up being an attorney and join the circus as a clown, saying that this is where his heart is. There is a court hearing for the Golden Girls where he shows up in court as a clown, representing them. He does a great job in court – and of course this is an extreme example of someone following what brings them joy, but Dorothy is embarrassed and decides to end the relationship. And he accepts that because his heart is so excited about being a clown rather than an attorney, and he is willing to lose her rather than lose himself.

I’ve worked with many people who stayed in careers they hated for decades, and what they often regretted most wasn’t failure – it was never truly trying. Never trusting themselves or honoring their deeper calling, never believing their inner knowing mattered. And this is why learning to develop a loving adult through your Inner Bonding practice is so essential, because the loving adult has the courage to take action on your own behalf and can hold uncertainty without collapsing into terror.

The loving adult says:
 “I don’t yet know exactly how this will unfold, but I’m willing to learn.”

That’s very different from reckless impulsivity.

The loving adult doesn’t say:
 “Quit tomorrow without preparation.”

The loving adult says, “Let’s begin listening deeply to our inner and higher voices, so we can begin planning, learning, and taking loving actions.”
 Small loving actions can eventually create enormous change.

The challenge is about external security. One of the greatest illusions in life is believing that external structures can give us permanent safety. Jobs can disappear. Companies can go out of business. Economies shift. People get laid off unexpectedly after decades of loyalty. Too often people sacrifice their aliveness for “security” that isn’t truly secure anyway.

Real security does not come just from external structures, although we can’t discount the need to work and earn enough money to feel safe. But the experience of security also comes from your relationship with yourself. It comes from your willingness to learn, your adaptability, your creativity, your courage, your connection with guidance, and your capacity to respond lovingly to challenges.

When people abandon themselves internally, no external circumstance ever truly feels safe enough. I’ve worked with multi-millionaires who didn’t feel safe. There’s never enough money and never enough guarantees and never enough certainty because the wounded self can never feel secure. The wounded self constantly seeks control because it is disconnected from a source of truth.

The loving adult understands that you cannot control everything, but that you can learn to lovingly care for yourself through whatever happens. This is what creates authentic resilience. And often, when people begin reconnecting with themselves, entirely new possibilities emerge that they literally could not see before, because fear narrows perception while love expands it.

There is a profound cost to staying too long in work that goes against your soul. I’m not saying everyone must love every moment of work, but there’s a difference between ordinary challenges and chronic inner deadness.

The cost may include a loss of vitality and creativity. You might feel anxious and depressed. You might experience chronic resentment, addiction problems, relationship struggles, or you might even get ill, because when you continually override your authentic feelings, your inner child feels abandoned, trapped, unseen, hopeless, or used. You might try to numb the resulting pain with addictions, such as overeating, alcohol, shopping, social media, affairs, or workaholism.

But the real issue of self-abandonment often remains untouched. Again, this does not mean you should impulsively leave your job, but it does mean that you need to be honest with yourself and stop ignoring what makes you feel alive. If your inner child is suffering, your loving adult needs to listen.

So how do you begin shifting this? The first step is reconnecting with yourself. You need to learn about what you love, what energizes you, what matters deeply to you, what your God-given gifts are, and what brings true meaning into your life. The main question to ask is, “What actually makes me come alive?” “What genuinely nourishes my soul?” Rather than, “What will guarantee approval?” “What will guarantee safety?” “What will impress people?”

Sometimes the answer begins very small, but don’t ignore small sparks.  Your soul often whispers before it shouts. You can get hints by thinking about what you loved to do as a child.

And then ask: “What is one loving action I can take toward honoring my aliveness?” It might be taking a class, talking with someone who does what you want to do, expressing your creativity in some way, reducing debt and starting to save money, getting support from family, friends, or a therapist, and doing your Inner Bonding practice throughout the day so that you are listening inward.

One of the hardest things for people is learning to trust the unfolding process of life. The wounded self wants guarantees before moving forward, but life rarely gives guarantees. Growth requires faith, not blind faith, but faith in your capacity to learn, grow, adapt, and receive guidance.

You would need to do this even if you feel fear. If you wait until you feel no fear, you will likely not make changes. Courage is not the absence of fear – it’s choosing loving action even when fear is present. I remember reading a great book called “Feel the Fear and Do it Anyway,” by our deceased friend Susen Jeffers. Feeling the fear and doing it anyway has served me very well in my life.

Many people discover that once they begin honoring themselves, their energy and vitality starts returning because they are no longer at war with themselves. The soul, our inner child, responds powerfully when it feels loved.

If you are currently clinging to a job you hate, please be compassionate with yourself. There may be very real reasons why change feels difficult. But I also invite you not to normalize chronic self-abandonment. What you want matters. What brings you joy matters. And while life requires responsibility, responsibility does not mean imprisoning yourself indefinitely in a life that is crushing your spirit.

Your loving adult can begin taking loving action one step at a time to create a life aligned with love, truth, and aliveness. This is the path of healing, and the path of Inner Bonding.

If today’s episode resonated with you and you’re ready to discover what your purpose is, I invite you to check out my 30-Day video course, Passionate Purpose, Vibrant Health. It’s designed for anyone wanting to discover what brings them joy and create the health to pursue it. You’ll find the link in the description. Thank you for being with me today on the Inner Bonding Podcast, and I’ll see you in the next episode.

I’m sending you my love and my blessings on your journey toward your passionate purpose.