The identity crisis no one talks about
They celebrate your promotion to manager. You've finally arrived.
Except you haven't. You've been amputated.
Management isn't promotion; it's transformation through loss. Your expertise was once currency. Your output, tangible. Your control, complete. Each day ended with concrete evidence of your worth.
Now your metrics have evaporated. Meetings consume your hours. Your success lives or dies in others' hands: their growth, their decisions, their output.
This explains the technical work you finish after midnight. The rush when you solve problems yourself instead of coaching. The gnawing emptiness despite your new title.
You're not struggling with delegation or feedback. You're grieving your professional self.
The discomfort isn't the problem; it's the point. There's no technique to master here, only transformation to undergo. The satisfaction you seek won't come from task completion but from invisible catalysis.
Your impact will no longer belong to you.
Can you find worth in what you enable rather than what you create?
If this feels familiar, you're not alone. I've written more about it here.
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