You may have been told you're "just a really nice person". You're the one who says yes before checking your diary. Who apologises when someone else bumps into you. Who can sense a change in someone's mood from across the room and has already started adjusting before anyone has said a word. People describe this as kindness, and sometimes it is. But if saying no makes your stomach drop, if you rehearse messages for an hour to make sure they won't upset anyone, or if you feel st

“Be kinder to yourself” is advice I give fairly often. I also think it’s advice we sometimes misunderstand. Self-compassion has become associated with slowing down, giving yourself grace, lowering expectations and accepting that you’re doing your best. All of those things can be important, particularly if you’re exhausted, overwhelmed, neurodivergent, living with chronic illness or have spent years speaking to yourself in a way you would never dream of speaking to another per

Resilience is one of those words that's almost impossible to argue with. Of course we want to be resilient. We want to be able to cope when life gets difficult, recover after setbacks and keep going when things don't quite work out as planned. The problem is that resilience has also become something of a workplace cure-all. If employees are exhausted, overwhelmed or struggling, the response is often to help them become more resilient: perhaps a wellbeing webinar, some mindful

You've deleted the messages. You've told your friends you're done. You can probably produce a reasonably comprehensive PowerPoint presentation on all the reasons this person was bad for you. And yet you miss them. Perhaps you check their social media. Maybe you replay old conversations or remember the good moments and temporarily forget the approximately 746 reasons you decided the relationship couldn't continue. Then comes the shame: What is wrong with me? Why would I miss s