Lately, I’ve found myself talking to clients about something I know all too well. Something I’ve fallen into countless times myself.
I call it the trap.
It’s the place you end up when frustration starts running the show, when you’re spiralling with blame, anger, and resentment, trying to change everyone else’s behaviour so life can feel easier for you.
I’ve been there more times than I’d like to admit.
The first time I really noticed it was during my Navy days. Living, working, and sleeping in a high-pressure environment can wear you down. I was good at what I did. If something broke, I could fix it. Because of that, people started to rely on me. A lot.
It happened more times than I can count. Being woken up after only a few hours’ sleep because a system had failed, and everyone knew I’d be the one to sort it out. That responsibility was fine at first. I took pride in it. But over time, it started to feel like no one else cared enough to learn or take ownership.
What made it worse wasn’t just the fatigue. It was the attitude that came with it. The quickness to blame. The lack of accountability. The bare-minimum effort that left others picking up the slack. Some days it felt less like working alongside adults and more like managing a childcare centre.
I cared. I still do. But back then, that care started turning into frustration. And that’s when the anger began to settle in.
At some point, I started carrying that tiredness like a badge. I told myself I’d earned the right to be angry at the system, at the leadership, at anyone who didn’t see what I saw. Looking back now, I realise how much that mindset took from me.
When you’re caught in the trap, anger can start to feel like clarity. It convinces you that you’re powerful, justified, right. But really, it just keeps you spinning.
Even after I left the Navy, I didn’t leave the anger behind. It followed me into my next roles.
A few years later, working in customer service, I found myself in the same place. Frustrated, emotional, and tired of showing up. I’d think about all I’d achieved in the past and wonder how the hell I’d ended up there. I was looking backward for validation instead of forward for direction.
The truth is, I was angry at myself. Angry that I wasn’t where I thought I should be. Angry that no one else was fixing it for me.
That’s the trap. It convinces you that if everyone else just got their act together, you’d finally be fine. But it doesn’t work that way.
After sitting in that space for too long, I started taking inventory. Quietly, honestly. My living situation, my finances, my energy. None of it matched the life I wanted. And for the first time, I saw that my strategy, blaming, escaping, waiting, wasn’t helping.
It wasn’t anyone else’s fault. I just hadn’t taken ownership yet.
That realisation didn’t feel inspiring. It felt like defeat. But that was actually the entry point, if I let it be.
I started small. I asked myself one question: what do I actually love doing?
I looked at every job I’d ever had and found the moments that lit me up. The common thread wasn’t the job title. It was the drive. The part of me that wanted to learn, to help, to build something meaningful.
No one was going to hand me that feeling again, so I had to rebuild it myself. That was the shift. The moment I stopped trying to change the world around me and started changing how I showed up inside it.
Since then, I’ve faced the same emotions plenty of times. Anger, frustration, disappointment. But I meet them differently now. I don’t escape them or pretend they’re not there. I don’t sit in them either. I embrace them because they point me toward what matters.
When I feel the spiral coming on, I use the tools I’ve built: journaling, reflection, coaching, connection. I’ve worked hard to teach the people close to me how I think, and they know how to call me out when I start slipping.
That’s growth. Not perfection, just growth. And these days, I can see it sooner, before it really takes hold.
I’ve seen it in clients, colleagues, and friends. That moment when they look outward for relief instead of inward for truth. It’s human, it’s honest, but it’s also where we lose our power.
Sometimes, when I hear someone caught in that loop, talking about how they want other people to change or how the situation needs to change, I’ll listen. Really listen.
And then I’ll say something like, “I’ve noticed you’ve been saying you want this to change, and that to change, but you haven’t told me what you want to do differently.”
That question isn’t about calling them out. It’s about holding up a mirror. It helps them see how much they’ve been focused on everything outside of themselves. All that frustration, it’s not about blame. It’s just energy pointing the wrong way.
And in that moment, something shifts. The focus comes back to them, to where their real power sits.
That’s where the real coaching begins.
Once we can see what’s in their control, we can start using that mirror differently. Not just to reflect where they’ve been, but to see where they want to go.
We revisit what actually matters to them, why it matters, and what it would look like to move toward it again.
It’s a process I’ve lived myself. Reconnecting with what’s true, rerelating to it with honesty, and recreating from that place.
That’s the work. That’s the shift from reacting to creating.
Anger can keep you moving for a bit. But ownership, that’s what keeps you steady.
It’s the same question that stopped me once, because it forces you to see the part you actually control.
If you’ve ever found yourself in that place, the one where frustration bubbles up faster than logic, you’ll know it doesn’t just happen in one part of life.
It shows up when a project at work keeps shifting and no one’s communicating.
It shows up when you’ve just received feedback that stings, the kind that forces you to change direction, even when you don’t agree with it.
It shows up when you’re trying to be heard at home and everyone’s talking over each other.
It shows up when you care deeply but feel like you’re the only one holding it all together.
Those moments are real. And they hurt.
But the aim isn’t to shut them down or “think positive.”
The aim is to pause long enough to ask, what am I actually striving toward here?
Because underneath the anger or exhaustion, there’s usually something you value that’s not being met: purpose, progress, or a sense of direction.
Once you reconnect with that, things start to shift.
Not because the chaos disappears, but because you remember what matters and can start moving in that direction again.
That’s what pulled me through it. Not trying to change how I felt, but remembering what I was fighting for in the first place.
The trap’s not waiting for me like it used to.
I know what it looks like now, what it sounds like. And these days, I just choose differently.