Overcoming Overwork (HBR Women at Work Series)

3

When Your Career Becomes Your Whole Identity

by Janna Koretz

Danielle (name changed to protect identity), a partner at a major Boston law firm, was due at the office, but instead, she was curled on her bathroom floor, in her pajamas, crying into a towel.

It began slowly, in a meeting with a particularly pushy client, when a thought bubbled up in her mind: “Why the hell am I even here?” From that moment, she noticed that her impatience, unhappiness, and frustration with her job grew deeper, until all at once, she realized: She didn’t find happiness or fulfillment in her work—and maybe she never had.

For someone who had built her entire idea of herself around her career, this thought sent Danielle into an existential crisis. Who was she, if ...