I just finished a session with a client and I’m still thinking about it.
She is one of the most talented people I’ve worked with. Studied harder than most, worked harder than most, sacrificed more than most. Every step of the way she outran the people around her.
And today she told me she feels trapped.
All that effort, she said, has put her in a self-built golden cage. The hard work she thought would open the world had somehow, in her mind, shrunk it.
I understood exactly what she meant. I’ve been there myself.
But here’s how I see it, and I told her this today.
She hasn’t built a cage. She has built a toolbox. A rather extraordinary one.
That CV, those academics and credentials, the network of people who have seen her work up close, the problems she has solved, the trust she has earned. None of that traps her. It travels with her.
Wherever she points it, it opens doors. The question of which doors, and in what direction…well, that part is entirely hers.
She is the captain of her ship. She always was. She just forgot for a moment.
What I see again and again with talented international professionals is this: the moment they get a little perspective from the path, they start remembering how big the world actually is. And how many ways there are to use everything they’ve built. The corporate ladder, a complete change, something in between…all of it available, all of it valid.
All that hard work was never meant to narrow your life.
It was meant to give you the luxury to choose your adventure, like in those old books where you had to choose what page to go (I loved those).
You’ve earned that. Don’t forget you have it.
