There’s a lot of information out there about changing your mindset, positive thinking, and not letting outward circumstances dictate your inward reality.
That advice doesn’t apply if your workplace is toxic. If you work in Chernobyl or an active lava field, no amount of positivity, optimism, or direct communication will keep you healthy, or even minimally safe.
A phrase that I have used is “My job is toxic to me. I cannot engage with my job without it harming me.” With that phrase, I stopped trying to “prove” that my workplace was dysfunctional or that my assigned goals were unattainable. The environment was toxic to me.
I do not need to stay where the air is poisonous to me. And neither do you.
Sometimes you have external barriers to leaving a job. Maybe you don’t have another job lined up, you’re supporting family, or you haven’t updated your resume in 12 years.
But sometimes the barrier to leaving is internal.
What is in your head, telling you that you can’t leave?
What if everything feels toxic to me? How can I stop being so sensitive?
Trulee, YES, that is SO HARD when everything is overwhelming and everything hurts.
I am all about doing 1 Thing. Think of everything that feels toxic to you. Pick ONE THING that you can not do, do less of, or distance yourself from. Picking the easiest or smallest thing counts!