What if the reason I feel exhausted by Thursday is not my workload, but that my brain is doing its job too well? I have come to understand that my mind naturally focuses on problems because it is built to notice threats. That is not a flaw. That is biology. The challenge is that joy does not demand my attention the way problems do, so it quietly slips past me each day, and I don't realize what I am missing until I begin to track it. At the end of each day, I take a moment to write down three...

Joy needs emotional space, and I am learning that it rarely appears when I am rushed or anxious. When my anxiety rises, my mind begins scanning for problems. Even good moments pass by unnoticed because my attention is fixed on what might go wrong.

I was dead right, and it cost me a relationship. I still think about it. That moment changed me. It taught me something I now share with every leader I work with. My signal is data, not a command.