Individual Therapy: Feeling Trapped and Freedom of Choice

This past Monday, I met with my individual therapist and we talked about how I feel trapped by my current situation:  I am not able to make a job change easily because my family depends on my income and health insurance.  I can't get to the gym consistently because my work schedule is erratic and I come home from work emotionally spent.  I don't have the time I would like to pursue my advocacy endeavors because of my work schedule making it nearly impossible to meet with my colleagues.  It has made me feel more and more depressed and more and more demotivated.

When I explained all of this to my therapist, she understood how this could adversely affect me but brought up one point that stuck with me and made me think:  It is your choice, whether you realize it or not, to stay in that job.  It is also your choice to put all of your emotional energy into your work even though you don't get paid to be emotionally invested in it.  She asked me, "What do you think would happen if you chose to save that emotional energy for the other things in your life?"

Wow.

Why is it the simple things that always seem to be the hardest to change?  Being emotionally invested in my work has been ingrained in my since childhood.  I told my therapist that and she came back with, "No, that's your job.  Advocacy is your work.  Put your emotional energy into that and I bet you will feel better and have more energy to find a way to get to the gym and to be there for your family".

Huh.

It's a foreign idea, but makes a weird kind of sense to me.  She followed this up by explaining to me that I have the ability to choose what I devote my energy to.  I can't control the fact that I am currently unable to change jobs because of my financial responsibilities.  What I CAN control is who benefits from my energies the most - my job or my advocacy for veterans.  I have felt trapped because couldn't see any way to take control of the situation and it was causing me to become extremely depressed and unable to see any positive outcomes.

So now comes the hard part.  I have to change my behavior - a behavior that has been an integral part of my professional identity since I first started working.  I have to learn how to redefine what my work is so that I can devote my emotional energy to my advocacy, my health, and my family.  It is definitely not going to be easy but it will be worth the effort.