The single word that changed my life

The headline for today’s post is not sensational or exaggerated. There really was one single word that changed my life, and I’d like to tell you that story today.

When I was in my 20s, I was brimming with ambition and determination. I was smart and a hard worker, so my early career successes were constantly rewarded. In fact, my company was aggressively pushing me forward with promotions and weighty new responsibilities.

I thrived in this environment but it was highly stressful. I was moving up the company so fast that I was almost always the youngest person in the room. At one point, I was managing a $1.5 billion account before I was 30 years old. Every day I faced a situation where I wondered “What am I doing here?”

The confidence the company placed in me was motivational and exhilarating. The sky was the limit and I was happy to be zooming up the company organizational chart.

But this furious pace of progress took a toll on me. Having so much responsibility at such a young age forced me to work harder to compensate for my lack of experience. By the time I was 35 I was in one of the most stressful global marketing jobs in the company and struggled to find moments of happiness. It seemed like I always had to be “on” and with the advent of mobile technology, there was no escaping work and endless customer…