Break-down or break-up?

You don’t have to buy what you’re being sold.

When I was 17, my Dad had a nervous breakdown.

He scrawled a resignation note on a piece of printer paper on his desk where he managed a department store, and walked off of his job of 18 years.

For the next year, the biggest decision he could make was whether to have grape or strawberry jam on his toast. He visited doctors and psychiatrists, attended talk therapy, and lived with the family - but, somehow completely separate from us as well.

A couple years afterward, at the suggestion of his psychiatrist, he began volunteering to teach english as a second language (ESL). That one step launched a new career as an ESL instructor at the community college, where he worked for 21 years.

Turns out, though he was a department store manager out of necessity, he was a teacher at heart. He had found his life’s work, the greatest work of his life.

For the past 37 years I’ve believed the “breakdown” narrative. That he was “well” and became “broken.” That he was “up”, and fell “down.”

But, now I think about it differently.

While society, doctors, his family, my mother, and everyone viewed this event as a sign of weakness - I think it was actually an act of extreme strength.

The day he scrawled his resignation note and walked out of the store, he made a declaration to live. Taking a stand for his own life, and what it meant, he stepped into the unknown.

Only many years later would I understand it as, literally, a life or death decision. I learned he had contemplated suicide for months before the “breakdown.”

So, here he was: faced with life or death, and he chose life. The decision cost him dearly: reputation, money, respect, shame, embarassment, social stigma, friends. It violated the gender norms he grew up with, changed his marriage, and his relationship with his kids.

But, it freed him to become who he was.

And, as life does, it all worked out for the best.

What’s this got to do with leadership?

You don’t have to go along with the “normal” view of things, and don’t have to buy what you’re being sold.

You don’t have to do things the way your company does them, or adopt the leadership style of Big Tech: the Amazon way, the MicroSoft way, or the Google way.

You can find ways to work that matches YOUR values anyhow. You can even scrawl a resignation note on printer paper and seek the greatest work of your life.

It’s a risk to live authentically, but meaphorically and maybe literally, the alternative leads to dealth.

Become who you are.

Now it’s your turn

Are you leading authentically?

Have you become who you are?

If you want to share, want support, or just to chat, hit REPLY and tell me what’s on your mind.

Warmly,

-m