We are told over and over again to never give up. Keep going. Push through. Persevere. Finish what you started. And of course, perseverance matters. I have built so much of my life around perseverance. Sport teaches us how to keep going when things are hard. Parenting teaches us that too. So does writing, work, relationships, and almost anything meaningful.
But what happens when perseverance stops serving us?
That is the question at the center of my conversation with writer and endurance athlete Lindsay Crouse.
When Continuing Becomes the Default
Lindsay is a former New York Times journalist and producer who spent 15 years at the Times, primarily in Opinion. She helped produce and commission hundreds of short documentaries through Op-Docs, and as an endurance athlete herself, she became especially interested in telling stories about female athletes and the hidden challenges they face.
Now she has written a book about quitting as a tool of perseverance, discernment, and self-trust. The Case for Quitting: The Surprising Benefits of Opting Out drops on Sept. 8, 2026.
We discuss how sometimes continuing is just the default. It is the thing we do because stopping would force us to face grief, uncertainty, identity loss, or the fear of what other people might think.
My Own “Positive Quitting” Story
In this episode, I share a story I haven’t really talked about before. After I had children, I kept racing. I was still winning. I was still showing up. I was still overdelivering. But I had lost almost all of my sponsors after pregnancy, and no matter how hard I worked, it felt like nothing I did mattered.
I remember sitting at dinner with people from my Master of Applied Positive Psychology program and saying, “I think I’m going to quit.” What I meant specifically was: quit chasing sponsorships. Quit trying to prove myself in a system where I felt unseen and unvalued, and quit staying on a treadmill that was no longer good for my mental health.
Someone called it “positive quitting,” and that phrase resonated.
The Pressure to Hold Up the Sky
Lindsay and I talk about how women often feel like they are not allowed to quit. In sport, motherhood, work, and leadership, there can be this sense that if we stop, we are confirming what someone else already believed about us. That we could not handle it. That we were not serious. That we were not tough enough.
So we keep “holding up the sky.” But at what cost? There is a difference between pushing through a hard moment because the thing still matters to you, and continuing because you are afraid of who you will be if you stop.
Questions Worth Asking
One of the most powerful parts of this conversation is the idea that continuing is also a choice.
So we can ask ourselves:
- Why am I continuing?
- Am I continuing because I love this, regardless of the outcome?
- Am I continuing because there is still momentum and meaning here?
- Or am I continuing because I am afraid of what happens if I stop?
Those questions can bring up grief, fear, and uncertainty. And they can also bring freedom.
This conversation is about being honest about what is working and is no longer working. Honest about whether the life you built years ago still fits the person you are becoming now. Listen to my conversation with Lindsay Crouse on Grow the Good.
Top 5 Takeaways
- Quitting is not always failure: Sometimes quitting is the choice that allows us to preserve our energy, integrity, health, and future possibility.
- Perseverance can become passive: Continuing is also a choice, even when it feels like the default.
- Identity can keep us stuck: When we are known for something, it can feel terrifying to let it go, even if it no longer fits.
- Women often feel pressure to “hold up the sky”: In sport, work, motherhood, and life, quitting can feel like confirming someone else’s bias instead of honoring our own truth.
- Hope can be complicated: Optimism and hard work can keep us locked into paths where we no longer have real control or momentum.
LINKS
1. Listen to Hope Is the Strategy: Burnout, Mattering, and Meaningful Work with Jen Fisher
2. Learn more about Lindsay Crouse
3. Follow Lindsay on Instagram
4. Read The Case for Quitting: The Surprising Benefits of Opting Out
5. Listen to What It Really Means to Matter
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Transcript
Sonya (00:12)
I decided to hit record because we already dove right into so many interesting topics. Lindsay, welcome to the podcast.
Lindsay (00:19)
Thanks so much for having me.
Sonya (00:20)
So for those of the listeners who have been living under a rock and haven’t heard of you, could you tell them a little bit about some of your previous work and what you’re passionate about now?
Lindsay (00:30)
Sure. So I worked at the New York Times for 15 years. I I left in January. I wore a lot of different hats there. I was a producer, working for our short documentary series, Op Docs. I found I’m commissioning a lot like hundreds of short films. a lot of them won awards, Emmys, Oscars. that was one amazing bucket of work. but I also
I was I’m a distance runner myself, an endurance athlete. And I started to notice that women’s voices weren’t necessarily like getting the attention. Well, that we weren’t necessarily telling stories in ways that I was reading. and so I started telling those stories myself. and I always worked in the opinion section, but I would sometimes pitch in for the sports desk. and I started to become really, really interested in female athletes, not only the amazing ways that they were able to endure and persevere, but also the some of the secret
Challenges that they were experiencing as well. so I wound up, as we were just talking about, I wound up producing a lot of our kind of impact-driven reporting in in opinion, where I was able to highlight the voices of of female Olympians who were sponsored by Nike and other shoe companies and kind of talk about the secret challenges that they experienced while being pregnant and help give them a platform to bring maternity rights to
Athletes at Nike and across the endurance sports industry and start really important conversations.
Sonya (01:58)
Yeah, and tell us just a little bit about your new book. and then I have many questions.
Lindsay (02:03)
Sure. Absolutely. So so I just wrote this book. I guess in a lot of my reporting at the times was really about how can we go harder, how can we do more? how can we persevere? And I think what was missing in some of that reporting is this idea of when is it also time to stop? And looking at how perseverance can not only work against us or backfire, but
To really kind of explore how quitting can be a way, can be a tool of perseverance and endurance, and a necessary tool that I think our culture doesn’t always really tell us about. and so in this book, I w I wound up talking to a lot of people, both experts obviously, but also the real quitting experts who are able to look at how quitting can be a way not only to get a rest or you know to pivot and redirect, but also sometimes a way, an a necessary way to help us
stop and then perhaps go further than we were going before. and that I don’t think in my life I really believed that. and I think there’s a lot of women who especially kind of are are in our forties, at least women like me and are like we’re living lives that we chose when we were 20 or even younger than that. in our not only asking ourselves why, but thinking about what should what in our lives
have we kind of inherited from those 20-something selves? and what is it time to let go of and why should we do that? and so that this book is asking those questions, not only for myself, but hopefully for readers who have similar similar questions.
Sonya (03:40)
So much enthusiasm about this topic. I’m just trying to hold back. I’m gonna do something I don’t normally do on the podcast, and I’m gonna tell a story about myself
Lindsay (03:48)
Mm-hmm.
Sonya (03:48)
because I think it’s very relevant to the book. and I’m just really excited to talk about it. And I I actually haven’t talked about it really. so I was sitting at a dinner one day. I did my master’s in applied positive psychology a couple years at the University of Pennsylvania, and I went into that program because I noticed.
in in myself and others, the myopic focus that we have on striving for our goals and what we think achieving those goals is going to get for us. and that showed up it as a pro mountain biker, as you know, racing these ultra endurance races around the world, like in every single thing I was doing. And in my master’s degree, I had a baby and a toddler. And I had just overcome two pregnancies, navigating pandemics,
Lindsay (04:31)
Mm-hmm.
Sonya (04:32)
losing almost all my sponsors, whenever I got pregnant.
making a documentary that a company actually did for free because nobody would cut nobody would support the documentary to tell a story about, you know, how female athletes don’t have to give up who they are when they get pregnant. so I went into this master’s degree and I learned about something called mattering. And that’s actually the subject of a book that I’m writing about. And it was I was like, my gosh, like I’m really struggling with this right now. I no matter how hard I work, nobody seems to care.
about my results or, you know, all these things that I’m doing and what I’m experiencing is actually antimattering in my sport and in all my efforts. So I had to make a decision about this. It’s like I kept, I kept racing. I kept like dragging my family all over the place. Like I was still winning races and I could never reclaim the sponsor. I I still have never had a bike sponsor since I got pregnant, which is insane. so I was sitting at the table,
Lindsay (05:26)
That is insane.
Sonya (05:27)
I was sitting at the table with all these people who are like my new kind of like
family essentially, cause I was sort of stepping away from the racing world. And I said to them, you know what? I think I’m gonna quit. I have overcome so much, but every time I like try to get these sponsorships, I I I over deliver everything and nothing I do matters. And this has become bad for my mental health. So I’m quitting. I’m not gonna try to get sponsors anymore. I’m all done. if I race it’s just gonna I might still race in the pro category, but I’m not gonna try to like stay on this treadmill.
and I know we don’t normally celebrate quitting, but I wanna celebrate right now that I’m quitting. And somebody raised their hand and like, this is positive positive quitting. And that has really stuck with me. And then I saw your book. So I’m just gonna leave leave that story there. Yeah.
Lindsay (06:13)
No, I think
that’s beautiful. And I think a lot of us are a especially women, especially as you know, you go through different stages of life. I think a lot of us learned early on to kind of follow directions to lock in and that consistency is the same as success, the continuing is the same as success. or even that, you know, like surviving the race is the same as success. And then as we get older, I think we realize
You know, it’s it’s not a war of attrition, or at least surviving that war of attrition is not the same as winning the war necessarily. and I think it is not only bold, I think the harder thing to do in that case is to quit. I think sometimes, as you said, like you were winning. You could have just kept going, but you realized it wasn’t good for you anymore. And I think that’s actually a more courageous thing to do than than we’re told. I I mean, I
You you read the book, I guess. So a huge like a a big chapter of it that was really important to me to write and was really the reason why I wrote the book was to revisit this article that I wrote in in 2018 about the Boston Marathon. and so I guess for for readers who have not read the book yet,
After the Boston Marathon in 2018, which was held in particularly brutal weather, I wrote an essay for the Times that was exploring why women finished at higher rates than men. And I mean, this has been confirmed now in studies. No matter the conditions, men are more likely than women to hit the wall. And the title of that piece at the time, it was really triumphant. It was about why men quit and women don’t.
For the longest time I would really disparage the kind of guy who would dare to give it all and to flame out with nothing. and then now I was in my forties. I mean, this is part of why I left the times. I was really expecting to reap the benefits of all of my life’s diligent, hard work. And instead, just as you were saying, I was frenetically pushing harder and just kind of in my case, failing more. Like I started to get into the cycle where pushing harder actually wasn’t
My hard work wasn’t working and I couldn’t understand why. And it was really important for me to kind of not only explore those impulses of why, why can I not see that the right option is probably opting out? and then and then can I get the courage to make these changes in my life? and try to, you know, reimagine now that I’m in my forties, what could what could a new way of thinking about life and success look like?
Sonya (08:49)
Yeah, and you know, and I I loved how your first chapter is about perseverance because when I was preparing for this podcast, I thought I was like, I want to talk about success and defining success, but like the opposite of quitting is not success, it’s perseverance.
Lindsay (09:04)
Exactly.
Sonya (09:05)
and we have been told over and over and over, never give up. Like we celebrate, like like you said, we celebrate everybody that pushes on no matter what. their bodies are shutting down, they’re doing everything they can to get to a proverbial finish line.
But they’re like abandoning themselves in the process of that. And as women, you know, I I personally felt a lot of pressure because it’s like, well, now I have to be the person who holds up
Lindsay (09:30)
Mm-hmm.
Sonya (09:30)
the sky for everybody else. Because if I quit, then it it confirms what everybody else believed was true about like female athletes. And I think women across
Lindsay (09:39)
Yeah.
Sonya (09:40)
many different areas feel this pressure that I can’t quit because I have to hold the sky up. because the
Lindsay (09:46)
Mm-hmm.
Sonya (09:46)
the
The culture we live in is trying to prove it otherwise. And now I think we’re at a place where that’s changing for us.
Lindsay (09:53)
Absolutely.
I think yeah, a l a lot of us grew up with those sort of avatars of the tough man, right? Like the Marlborough man, the Terminator. Like these were the people that like really manifested toughness. And at the same time, there, you know, there are politicians who question whether female pol whether their female political rival rivals have the stamina to to actually run and to serve. I mean, it makes sense that we would feel this pressure around.
Quitting, and this I this kind of conviction that never giving up is one form of success, not only for ourselves and to prove that we can do it to ourselves, but to prove it for other people too. But I think the problem is that if you never stop and you say yes to all of these things and don’t prune and don’t curate, eventually the someone’s gonna pay the toll and it’s going to be you. So I quitting is the only way to to avoid that and kind of retake.
Reclaim control over your life.
Sonya (10:52)
Yeah. And you know, I I have another kind of question for you. It’s about like parenting, because my kids, like I play them this song by Sia, The Greatest, because at the end, they’re learning perseverance. And at the end of the song, she says, I’ve got I’ve got stamina, I’ve got stamina, don’t give up, don’t give up, I’ve got stamina. And like my kids have really latched onto that. And that has personally helped me so much. But there are times where
We do need to quit. So like when you’re trying to help people, especially like I hear I I’m a mental performance coach and I hear this complaint all the time with like, these young people, like they like pack it in all the time. how do we when when people are in their more formative years learning about the difference between like persevering and quitting, how do how do we do that without overindexing on perseverance and never giving up?
Lindsay (11:41)
so I think you really have to ask yourself, why am I continuing? and I think that’s a question that we don’t ask ourselves. I think knowing whether to quit or to persevere depends on the reasons why you’re continuing. Is it because you love what you’re doing, regardless of the outcome, or are you continuing because you’re afraid of confronting what might happen if you stop? and I think that that disparity isn’t something that we’re
I mean, the other question is: are you continuing because you’re denying a failure that’s already happened? what is the progress that you’re making towards your goal? Are you continuing despite the fact that instead of getting closer to your goal over time, you’re actually getting further away? in this case, you you have to understand the failure has already happened and you’re only exacerbating the failure by continuing. quitting is actually persevering is the failure in that context. Quitting is the
much smarter move to make.
Sonya (12:40)
What about the people like the kids where they’re like they don’t have that type of self reflection
Lindsay (12:45)
Mm.
Sonya (12:45)
and and just there’s adults that also lack self reflection. So what if you can’t answer those questions?
Lindsay (12:51)
I think then you have to ask, are you quitting on a bad day? As a quitting out of frustration? I think that’s something that we can absolutely teach kids. or do you just really not like what you’re doing? I mean, I was the kind of kid, and I imagine if you if you were a top performing athlete as well, I did so many things when I was growing up, and really that I didn’t like. and that I and hindsight
had no value because I didn’t like them. I wasn’t good at them. and I was just doing it out of this kind of mindless, almost like passive. It was easier to continue than to than to bring on the disruption of stopping and actually making that choice to stop. continuing was the default option. And so I think you do need to teach kids early on to recognize the difference between those two impulses. this idea that persevering
I think can be a very passive option and that a kid needs to reframe. I think sometimes you can give yourself you can give yourself or the child a a deadline to decide like do you still like this or do you want to do something else? maybe that it’s not quitting to sit on the couch and you know scroll through a phone, which I think most parents understandably want to stop our kid from doing, but
are to learn to decide early that you don’t want to do one thing in favor of another thing. I think girls especially are not taught to even ask themselves if they like something. or if they or more if they let rather than if they like something, do they actually want to do it? I think they’re taught to obey and do it and they are rewarded when they do that. And I actually think as parents we’re that’s a skill that we should teach our kids just as much as the skill to kind of, you know, keep going.
persevere, push through when it’s hard. I think you also need to recognize, A, when is hard in a way that’s bad for you, and B, when do you just not want to do something anymore and that’s fine.
Sonya (14:46)
Yeah. I I love how you were talking about like asking yourself the questions because in your book you talk about identity and it’s so hard whenever people have they’re known for something. you know, you you write about athletes in your book and even recreational athletes, you know, it’s it’s hard for them if they’ve been doing something for a really long time to switch gears when they’re super passionate about it because they don’t know who they are. They don’t know how people can relate to them anymore, what people even talk about.
when they’ve had these experiences of identity. so like what can people do to first of all recognize that their identity is the thing that’s holding them in place and that there’s more, that they’re there’s more to them than just this one thing.
Lindsay (15:30)
Yeah, I I don’t know if you’ve ever read the Audrey Agassiz memoir. but I think
Sonya (15:36)
I did.
Lindsay (15:37)
it’s in yeah, it’s it’s incredible. And I I’ll never forget the first chapter of it where he just kind of describes himself on the cusp of leaving behind his athletic career before the US Open and he’s looking at the mirror and he’s kind of always hated tennis a little bit, which I which I kind of related to, this idea of like, I love distance running, but sometimes I’ve hated it, and it’s felt like a compulsion, and I felt like he really conveyed
those themes really well. And so he’s looking in the mirror and he’s just saying, please let this be over. I’m not ready for it to be over. And it really encapsulated this idea of how athletes die twice. first when their bodies no longer let them perform at the peak of, you know, the peak of their sport. And then the next time obviously when when the rest of us die. And it’s so I think we can really learn from athletes about not only how to reincorporate
parts of our lives that we’re having to let go of into our future lives. well I th basically who we have been, it never really goes away. Like we can still build on that. And say we even want to continue to stay in our sport. You can continue to build on you can continue to A practice your sport, even if you’re no longer looking at it in a way where winning is the goal. The goal can just be to participate. So that’s one way to kind of re-reframe your identity.
when you’ve had to let go of one way of doing your sport. and then the other is to recognize that it’s always gonna be a part of you regardless, and that you know, lives aren’t linear. but just because you were a competitive athlete in one part of your life, you can use that same skill in business, for example. you know, business schools love athletes because the qualities that made you an amazing athlete are gonna make you great at something else. and so I’ve always been really interested in
watching athletes and how they kind of translate what made them amazing at their sport into future, future pursuits. And I think the rest of us can learn from that professionally as well. I mean, even though I’ve left the times, like it’s still part of my DNA and my bio. and I mean, in some ways it’s like you’re trying to leave something behind. You’re trying to re envision how to look at yourself. but you
You can’t. it’s it’s gonna be part of who you are and who you’ve been forever.
Sonya (17:55)
Yeah, and I wanna come back to something you said because I I think it’s related to this, is you said like, I don’t know if this was before after we hit record, like who you are in your forties is not who you
Lindsay (18:03)
Mm-hmm.
Sonya (18:04)
are, who you were in your twenties, and yet we still continue to try to live based on those decisions. and that we to also talked about how having kids might actually change how you wanna live. can you tell us a little bit about how that has shown up for you?
Lindsay (18:20)
Yeah. so obviously I did a lot of reporting at the times that was around motherhood and the ways that mothers can be discriminated against, especially in male-dominated nom male dominated industries like sport, where I think traditionally it was really there was a norm, and it was that if you were a woman, once you started to have kids, you were no longer serious about your athletic career and it was over. and
As
many athletes have shown, that isn’t necessarily true, especially not if you have the support to come back. these can these can be two different things that can operate, you know, at the same time. but again, you need support to do that. I think for myself, having kids, it was a reality check for me because it required a really different kind of, I guess, discernment around what your needs are, and kind of
actually understanding what limitations are and that they do you know that ev well first of all everybody’s pregnancy delivery and recovery period is different. I think we hear a lot of success stories obviously because we are trying to correct certain misunderstandings around like the limitations around motherhood. But then I think for me it really was limiting. it was adjusting to a totally new lifestyle, a totally new schedule, a totally new way of
How to allocate my time. I was not able and still have not been able to come back athletically at the level that I would love to be. I think part of that is time. but it also might just be like my resilience and how I’m able to actually like handle this kind of athletic and physical setback. and I just need to be honest about that, like with myself, but also with other people. I think that they’re all different ways to come back from present from pregnancy and they’re not all kind of the Shiro.
girl power narrative that that I loved and that I think we all love. but then you can kind of be left thinking, what’s wrong with me if you’re not experiencing that as well. And the more I’ve had conversations with friends and almost like reported on it a little bit as well. it’s I think there are a lot of women that feel like they’re not coming back on the timeline that they should. and I guess I’m kind of one of them and at this point I’m sort of okay with that.
Sonya (20:41)
Yeah, thanks for sharing that. I mean, I’m hearing like a lot of big shifts for you, like leaving the times, like having kids, like having to change your, you know, your relationship with sport. Like that is a that’s a lot of of moving pieces that you’ve had to manage.
Lindsay (20:57)
Yeah. I mean how wha how wha how has how has that transition been for you?
Sonya (21:01)
Yeah, yeah, it’s it’s interesting because I was able to get back to my like the same level that I was performing at, but it felt very dissatisfying because I wasn’t able to train very much.
I was training about half of what I was training, and I wasn’t able to put in the the same effort into my workouts. and I would still show up to these races, and it was just this mismatch of effort with results. And it wasn’t I don’t know, it it made me realize how much I love the work. I don’t really care about the results.
Lindsay (21:31)
Mm.
Sonya (21:32)
I I like putting in the effort.
And I just couldn’t. My kids were sick. Like, this is what people don’t talk about. It’s like, it’s
Lindsay (21:36)
Yeah.
Sonya (21:37)
all about the pregnancy and the comeback. But it’s like when
Lindsay (21:39)
Yeah.
Sonya (21:39)
you have little kids, like you’re not sleeping for years. you
Lindsay (21:42)
Mm-hmm.
Sonya (21:43)
are sick so often that like people can’t even fathom how often you are sick and your kids are sick. So that is a massive setback to any type of training. The physical and mental energy that it takes to be doing all the things.
That takes away from your ability as an athlete to focus on being an athlete. So like I would be at these multi-day mountain bike races with my kids. I’d be like breastfeeding right before the start. And I’d have no time to like mentally prepare. And I just like somehow make it to the start line on time. And then it’s like, okay, go. And all of a sudden I just have to be like racing. And then I would somehow win the day. And then I go back and it’s like back into this, you know, kids want you and all this stuff. And I wouldn’t get to recover and like none of the things. And somehow just keep showing up every day doing that.
feeling invisible because nobody else was going through that experience truly understanding. so that was weird. Like
Lindsay (22:32)
that’s true, yeah.
Sonya (22:34)
the mismatch of that. and then I wasn’t racing internationally anymore because I didn’t want to be away from my family. Like I just really
Lindsay (22:40)
Mm-hmm.
Sonya (22:41)
wanted to to be experience my children and to be there for them. So I was really dissatisfied with racing because I love racing internationally and I love adventures and it felt just like
come back and do some things I’ve done, you know, five times already. Like it just felt really just I I didn’t want to do it. And then on top of that, there was no sponsor support anymore. So I was having to pay out of my own pocket to go to these races that I didn’t even really want to be at. so it’s it’s kind of like what is the priority here? And really looking in the mirror and saying, why do I want to do this? And and and if I still want to be an athlete, like does it have to still be in this domain?
Or can I get the things that I love from somewhere else? But like you’ve written about and said, like that liminal space and the grief around that is really hard.
Lindsay (23:22)
Yeah. Yeah. I think that’s where so when I left the Times like I know what I want to do next, I think. and I was about to jump right into that. And then I was like, wait a second, I have a book coming out. I’ve been shocked at how much that’s felt like a full time job. Like my day I thought I might be bored for a little bit. I’ve actually
Sonya (23:41)
Yeah.
Lindsay (23:41)
been quite busy, like almost surprisingly
Sonya (23:44)
Yeah.
Lindsay (23:44)
busy. because I can’t believe I was doing this while working, I guess, like while working a a salary job, like a full time salary job.
Sonya (23:51)
Mm.
Lindsay (23:53)
and you know, then just taking care of kids. I think I I think I just I think I think well my mom had five kids and I was the oldest of five. she did leave she was a teacher, and so she did leave her job when we were younger and did took care of us herself. But I think I thought because I just had two kids, and I don’t know, I’m a worker. I was like, this will be this will not be that hard. Like we have childcare, obviously. how could you have a full time job otherwise? But it wasn’t enough.
And I think I really but then at the same time I want to take care of my kids. So I I didn’t I don’t I don’t want somebody else to be with them constantly. and I think what you’re talking about there, just realizing that you’ve added a whole bucket of work to your day, whether or not you want to look at it like that, but you have. or it maybe it’s not work, but it’s it’s time. it’s if we’ve if we assess our priorities through time, like take have taking care of kids is a tremendous time obligation.
And you know, and then if you’re running, I I basically I just stopped running because I was like, this is by far the least prior the least of my priorities. But I got really unhealthy. I I I sort of didn’t realize that because I’d always run before, that if you stop and you you actually stop exercising, it’s really bad for you.
And that was a spiral that was harder for me to get out of. Like as I was saying, I’m still quite slow, for relatively compared to my previous self, but I’m enjoying it again. And that’s that’s really made the difference for me. but I another thing that you were saying before is that you were the only woman kind sorry, the only mom really doing this in your in your circuit. Like you were saying that, right? Like you were the only person balancing this. Yeah.
Sonya (25:37)
There was no one there was no like there’s no one
at the races with a baby and like I’d have to bring my husband and but like when your mom, like your baby and your toddler still want you. and yeah, and you feel like you just don’t feel seen at all. Not not that it’s anybody’s fault, but it just
Lindsay (25:53)
No.
Sonya (25:53)
you’re living a completely different reality than everybody else around you and you start looking around, you’re like, This used to be me and this just isn’t me anymore.
And do I even wanna be here?
Lindsay (26:00)
Yes. Yeah.
Yeah. I think the guilt I thought I’d reported and read and was knowledgeable enough about that to to feel like I was gonna get ahead of the guilt. and I I didn’t. like I think all the choices felt self defeating. It’s like
Take the break and feel guilty or skip the break and feel mad. and just kind of feel like you’re letting a lot of people down, including yourself. Like I think for me, a lot of times I was like, I’m not like this. but I also think it way it was validating because I think I’d always wondered before, like, what would I be like if I didn’t work hard? I just realized.
Sonya (26:44)
Mm-hmm.
Lindsay (26:45)
I can only do well if I work hard. I just cannot I like I don’t have enough talent to just kind of phone it in. And that was almost like validating for me. I was like, I really like I was working really hard before. Like, okay, that’s good to know. I didn’t just like coast. but it made me realize like I don’t I A don’t have the bandwidth or the ability to work that hard right now, at least not on everything. and then
Sonya (27:09)
Mm-hmm.
Lindsay (27:09)
it was also helpful to be like, like I guess like I said, when I was younger, I didn’t learn this lesson.
I would just do things anyway. and finally I was just like, I don’t want to. And I don’t have to, because I’ve built the systems that could let me step back from work for a little bit, like or full-time salaried work, given that, you know, I have income from another book, et cetera. and I’m in a dual I think it’s really important to say also like I’m in a dual income household. So but there there’s definitely a world before this where I would have just kept going anyway.
Sonya (27:40)
Mm-hmm.
Lindsay (27:40)
And probably just been really unhappy and continued to underperform. So I don’t
Sonya (27:44)
Mm.
Lindsay (27:44)
know. It’s all trade offs. And I think the more you deny that, the more miserable you become.
Sonya (27:49)
Yeah, I think like whenever you have a big life change, whether it’s having children or, you know, a diagnosis or s or something that just like completely changes your world, you have to look at yourself in the mirror and you see a different version of yourself that you didn’t know was there all along. And you have to talk to that version of yourself. but you still have that old version who’s like harping on you, like, what about this? Or you should be doing that, and like, what’s everybody gonna gonna think? and that’s that cage that you you talk about the cage in your book, the the cage that we’re stuck in
Lindsay (28:17)
Yeah.
Sonya (28:18)
and
Lindsay (28:19)
Yep.
Sonya (28:19)
We’re walking
away just feels like terrifying and how we think we just have to keep working hard and we’re just exhausting ourselves, thinking that we’re doing the right thing and we’re not.
Lindsay (28:30)
Yeah. I thought that I those ideas in the book that well the s the sort of science around learned helplessness, I don’t know why it resonated
Sonya (28:39)
Mm-hmm.
Lindsay (28:40)
with me so much, but I think it kind of it got back to this idea that
The idea that there is a way out sometimes that we don’t have to just push through the hard thing that we can actually get
Sonya (28:50)
Mm-hmm.
Lindsay (28:50)
over the wall. but we’re not letting ourselves see that. I I don’t think that’s the lesson that you’re supposed to take away from that story. For people that don’t know it, it’s basically a bunch of two researchers at the at the University of Pennsylvania performed these experiments where they put dogs in in cages and gave them electric shocks and basically didn’t let some escape.
And they just had to learn to endure the shocks. And then later when there wasn’t even a wall and they could have just easily jumped over it and escaped, they still just stayed and endured the shocks because they’d learned to. and I think there is a parallel sometimes for especially for women, but for any of us who are good at doing hard things, who are good at suffering, we don’t realize that we could just leave, that we could just
Sonya (29:37)
Mm-hmm.
Lindsay (29:38)
stop. instead we just put our heads down and push through it because we think we have to.
when objectively it’s just not always true, that we’ve learned to be helpless. and that we call it, I think sometimes like noble or heroic perseverance. but actually the better thing by all measures would just be to get out.
Sonya (29:59)
Mm-hmm. I also love how you wrote about how like not making a decision is still a form of a decision. Like I’m just gonna keep going because I can’t decide.
Lindsay (30:07)
Yeah. Yeah, this idea that continuing is a choice. and we often think again, I mean, I I know women are like this. we don’t even think of quitting as an option. I think sometimes because we don’t want to take the loss, we’re unwilling to take the loss. And so we tell ourselves that we can’t. And I think we would actually be happier and truly more empowered if we just told ourselves that we don’t want to.
That we’re not willing to. but instead, I think it’s really easy for us to say that we can’t. And that keeps us from even actually considering whether or not that’s true. Like you can’t leave your job. Okay, well, have you actually run those numbers? Do you actually know what those trade-offs would be? You can’t leave your relationship. Is that because you’re scared to be single, which is fine? but then own the fact that you’re choosing to stay. You can leave, you’re just choosing to stay.
You can’t stop training for this marathon, like even though you’re injured. Like actually it’s probably that decision’s probably gonna get made for you eventually. And you’re choosing to deny that this injury is real and is painful, is counterproductive. And eventually you’re gonna have to either the choices are gonna get made somehow, the trade-offs are gonna get made somehow. You’re gonna have to drop out of either training or of the race, or you’re just gonna do it in a lot of pain and probably slower than you wanted. So what was the point of that? I mean, I think women especially like we don’t quit, but
Do we win? Like not necessarily. and so that just that just means that persevering is not the plan A that we tell ourselves it is all the time.
Sonya (31:42)
Yeah, I think the real challenge is facing the fear underneath it all. Because especially like if you think that you can’t you can’t function in the world without the thing, you have to keep doing this. you know, I’m too afraid to quit because, you know, I won’t be able to make enough money and you think that that’s the case. Or I won’t be able to quit because nobody will respect me anymore. Or I won’t be able to quit because I’ll never be able to forgive myself and then I’m never going to try again. Like we get into these like catastrophic modes of thinking. and
My hope is that people listening to this podcast are gonna like be able to just examine their own lives and say, like, huh, like where am I kind of like having my head in the sand, just mindlessly striving towards something that no longer serves me and hearing stories of other people and reading them in your book too is like this gives me permission to do the right thing for myself.
Lindsay (32:31)
absolutely.
I mean, I I think I I don’t know why I hadn’t thought about it like this until writing the book. It probably just shows how conditioned I was to just really view perseverance and pushing through as like heroic and noble and absolutely the right choice. but I think I just hadn’t thought of the reason why I might be scared of quitting is that I just have this like fear of risk. and sometimes finally making a decision about something that I have outgrown.
Like that really scared me. not only because I didn’t want to deal with the disruption around it, but again, the risk of the uncertainty. and I know I am like that. I mean, I think there are definitely benefits to being like that. It means you’re not reckless. but I think if you do start quitting more, you kind of have to just suck it up. And again, like take the loss. understand that you are leaving something behind in terms of what you’ve already invested, but you’re also opening yourself up.
To new opportunities. And those can sometimes only arise once you’ve let go of a path, especially a path that you’re ready to leave. it’s rarely the smartest move to stay locked in a past decision for consistency’s sake. but we often convince ourselves that that’s the wise, the wisest move anyway. again, I think to avoid confronting these these risks. and
I don’t know. I think what we should probably fear most is failing to decide overall. because if we don’t decide, we’re just bouncing these decisions to ourselves five or 10 years down the line. and we’ll be leaving those future selves with the same hard questions, but even greater stakes. I mean, one thing that I was most persuaded about in writing this is that it does not get easier to leave if that’s something that you need to do. You’ll just get older. and I think
That to me was very persuasive.
Sonya (34:25)
Mm-hmm,
for sure. another thing that I love that you wrote about was was hope. And I thought about this a lot as well. Like, like hope is about agency and pathways, but like optimism is about like, you know, I have a positive view of what will happen in the future. So I’m gonna keep trying because something good will happen and I have my goals and I have my agency and I’m just gonna keep working towards this thing that I think will happen, even though this could end up being detrimental towards me. So can you can you talk to us?
About that a little bit?
Lindsay (34:57)
Yeah, I think so there’s there’s this a scholar named Laurie Berland who wrote about cruel optimism. and it’s this idea that optimism can actually also work against us. It can hold us back and keep us kind of locked in this pattern of trying because we believe that it’s going to work out. And this often happens when it’s something that we really desperately want to have happen, something that where failure is just truly not an option.
But ultimately the act of trying in a futile context where we don’t have control, like true control, to achieve what we want. that optimism is actually bad for us. hope is working against us. It’s keeping us locked in this pattern of trying when we’re not getting any closer to our goal. And in the meantime,
sacrificing places in our lives where we actually could succeed. I wrote about this woman who was just so, so poignant and powerful, I thought, in how she talked about her desire to get pregnant. and it was failing. And so she just threw herself into IVF and wound up losing a decade of her life to these 12 like 12 cycles a year. Anyone who’s done this knows how consuming it is. And it just it took over her life, but she never
no pregnancy ever stuck. and finally she just had to stop and she realized that she’d put all of her life on hold. They moved to the s she and her husband had moved to the suburbs. She never took a trip in that whole decade because she felt that she would just be pregnant the next like she never planned a trip more than a month in advance. because why would she do that? She was cer she was sure she was going to get pregnant. And so finally she just stopped and she started living the life that she always wanted to have.
And it was actually, it was a hard, it was a hard chapter to write because I’d first she’d written about this. and so I first reached out to her as an example of just giving up and kind of being okay with that, with letting go of hope and kind of accepting not getting what you want. And then I reached out to her to fact check and she had a baby.
Sonya (37:04)
Mm-hmm.
Lindsay (37:05)
and she’d just gotten pregnant on her own. in I can’t remember how old she was, but in her 40s.
Like somehow she has no idea how. And it was amazing and it was everything that she wanted, but it just confirms that hope had been holding her back because she’d been throwing herself into these. I mean, also these industries prey on our hope. and they are predatory and they want us to keep throwing our money into these these things that we really want, which she was very clear-eyed about. but ultimately.
Whether she got pregnant or not, it was never actually in her control. and no matter how hard she tried, that was gonna have no no impact on the outcome. but hope can convince us that it that our hard work will matter in areas where it won’t.
Sonya (37:51)
Yeah, I mean it’s it’s hard not to think about like meritocracy, how we’re taught that like we if we work very hard, we deserve our success. And if we don’t work hard,
Lindsay (38:00)
Yep. Yep.
Sonya (38:02)
you know, we deserve our failure. and just that’s the water we swim in.
Lindsay (38:06)
Yeah.
And I think and she was very clear about this. Like it’s not just meritocracy. It’s also just how I think like this isn’t in the book, but I’ve become really convinced of this. I think early success can actually be really bad for knowing how to quit later. because
Sonya (38:22)
Mm.
Lindsay (38:23)
A, you just get convinced that your hard work is going to pay off no matter what. and B, I actually think you get more scared of failure.
down the line because you don’t know how to do it and you’re worried that your life is gonna fall apart. And so you do everything that you can to avoid that failure, even if it’s already happening. and I mean there also like previous success blinds us to failure. I mean, there are studies around this around zebrafish, these tiny fish, where scientists are studying them to understand better how and why we quit and when we don’t, and how we respond to futility and zebrafish that have learned.
That swimming against a current early will will work. then can’t they just swim harder later when the current when the current is never going to let them is it’s just only going to push them further behind? And for them, the smarter decision would be to stop, conserve their energy, and wait for a time when when the current hopefully subsides. But pushing harder, swimming harder is only going to continue to exhaust them and to get them further from a time when they actually might be able to.
to get what they want.
Sonya (39:33)
Yeah, and I think I mean that’s such a cool story and that must have been really exciting to find that about the zebrafish. But that’s
Lindsay (39:39)
Yeah, my my college roommate works in that lab, but yeah.
Sonya (39:43)
so cool. Yeah, like so that describes so many people. It describes like me in so many different ways as well. Like I’ll just keep working harder
Lindsay (39:49)
Totally.
Sonya (39:50)
and harder and harder. how do people know the difference between like I gotta keep trying and I need to have hope versus okay, like this is now something I need to give up on?
Lindsay (40:01)
Yeah, I mean again, I think futility is the answer there. And there are a few ways to recognize that. I think one is how are you justifying that you’re continuing? and are you there’s there’s a concept called escalation of commitment where we will do a lot to justify continuing and to deny that we’re failing, and that we will actually try harder the more that we kind of
fall backwards. and that’s really bad for us. So you can kind of ask yourself, like, am I just saying just after this, I don’t know, just after this next thing, after this next thing, after this next thing, the then I’ll quit. and the goalpost just keeps moving. but another way to ask yourself if this is a temporary setback that you should push through, obviously we should push through a lot of setbacks.
Or is this a time when your hard work really isn’t working? Is are you getting closer, like look at how your progress has changed over time? Are you actually getting closer to your goal? or are you getting further away? And and also what is what is the do you have momentum? I think I also it’s funny, I a a lot of the things that I put in this book I intellectually understood or almost emotionally understood, but didn’t actually
recognize these patterns in my life. And I think I hadn’t realized how much momentum matters. momentum is energizing. Momentum makes you want to keep going. And we can’t overlook the impact that that has on our performance. if you are just throwing yourself into a failing cause, it’s really draining. and you it’s probably means you’re actually going to fall further away from what you want because you’re your your hard work
There’s a difference between hard work and work that’s pointlessly hard. and I think you you actually know the difference. you’re just telling yourself that you don’t. Like I know the difference, you know the difference. even the zebrafish know the difference. I thought that was a really interesting part of the book where we actually have counters, futility counters in our brains, and the zebrafish listen to them.
but as humans, we’ve actually taught ourselves to the head of that lab, Misha Arens. he he talked about how as humans we’ve actually taught ourselves to overlook those signals. but we have them as well. and so I thought that was, you know, often I think the idea of like listening to your intuition is a little too woo-woo for me or just a little too much, like it amounts to vibes. And I found that actually quite compelling, that you actually really know when it’s time to quit, but
Sonya (42:44)
Mm-hmm.
Lindsay (42:45)
you’re telling yourself that.
You don’t because you don’t want to listen.
Sonya (42:49)
Mm. And and you always hear like, it’s you know, it’s that last blow that will finally finally get you there. Like keep it going
’cause you’re just one b one hit away from your dream and then you just like
keep going and going forever.
Lindsay (43:01)
Yeah. And I mean, again, like if you think about it in the case of like IVF, for example, maybe you are, but what are the costs in the meantime? especially as they pile up over time. I mean, I thought about this a lot with her. I if I were to put myself in her shoes, like I am also like a die try die trying type. but at some point the costs really are overtaking the benefits and outweighing the benefits. And
If you actually stop and look at that and look at look at the costs to your entire life, you can often realize that those costs are real and true and overwhelming. And actually, even if you do get what you want, the cost may not have been worth it.
Sonya (43:44)
So you you said us a little while ago that like intellectually and emotionally you understood all these things, but writing the book really helped you like feel it, so to speak. Like you said, you talked about the momentum, but like how has writing this book changed you now? ‘Cause I mean, it’s a it’s a a huge journey to write a book and you’re trying to live these things as you’re writing the book. Now that your book is done, how is that coloring your perspective or your goals?
Lindsay (44:10)
Yeah,
it’s made me a lot more patient with myself. and a lot more. I mean, I think my approach to perseverance in the past was actually much more timid and much more narrow-minded than I would let myself believe. and I’ve decided to use this point in my life to to truly stop. I mean, clearly not truly stop because I’m promoting a book like my every day. but
To think about what matters most in my life overall. and it’s it’s obviously all the cliche things. it’s my health, it’s my happiness, it’s my family, it’s feeling like I’m doing work that I love. and I think I was getting really far away from that. And I think for me, what I hadn’t realized is, I there’s a there’s a big period in the I’m sorry, there’s a big part in the book about
Intrinsic motivation. And I imagine you’re the same way. And I imagine a lot of your listeners are as well. I’m somebody that has intrinsic motivation in abundance. When I love what I’m doing, I can’t be stopped. I like that’s that’s true passion, right? and that’s wonderful. And it’s the kind of thing that like I get up in the morning excited to do. And I was really getting away from that.
I was really starting to feel like I was forcing it. I mean, I was kind of feeling like that as I was writing the book tragically. and I just wrote this piece for the Times. it’s kind of like an adapted excerpt from the book. And I was just telling the editor there, I was like, this is the first time that I felt like I mean, this is embarrassing, but I know when I write something that it’s good, when like I just can’t stop reading it.
Sonya (45:55)
Mm-hmm.
Lindsay (45:56)
and it’s like it doesn’t matter if it’s good for other people, it’s good because I think it’s good.
And you know, other people tend to like it too, but what mattered most to me is that I liked it and that I
Sonya (46:06)
Mm-hmm.
Lindsay (46:07)
felt great writing it and that I felt like I was really enjoying like the thinking around it. And I felt like that as I was writing this piece. And so I just told the editor, I was like, thank you. Like I finally felt like like I enjoyed this again. and I think that’s because the things that I kind of just finally let like sink in about the book, about like stopping.
Like that’s the only way to get back that feeling sometimes. Like, especially when you’re really tired. Like I I’m the kind of person, like I don’t love the word burnout, and like I still don’t, but I think I was pretty exhausted. And when you’re exhausted and you also when you feel like you’re failing, it just it’s it’s the worst feeling in the world. And I think sometimes the only way I mean, I talk about that with like the athlete, the marathon runner, who’s like just trying to push and push and like failing and failing, and she’s hating it.
And then she finally stops, she finally just like does something else, does what she actually likes, and then she gets so much faster. and I’m willing to believe that that might happen for me. And if it doesn’t, hopefully I’ll be happy in the in the long run anyway.
Sonya (47:10)
Mm-hmm. Thanks for sharing that story. I I don’t I mean, I can understand how you would feel embarrassed sharing that, but I think that so many people can relate with that. I know I certainly can. And those are the things that I will like tell my husband, but I don’t say out loud to other people. So thank you for just like normalizing that.
Lindsay (47:26)
I think it’s also important something another another thing that I liked about writing this book is just kind of saying like I I didn’t want it to be only be a book about like people succeeding after they quit, but also just kind of recognizing. I mean, there are other people in this book who talk about the complexities of like you know, quitting might give you freedom, but it doesn’t necessarily tell you what to do next. it doesn’t give you structure, it doesn’t point you
in the right direction. All it does is hopefully give you some sort of clean slate to have the freedom to decide what’s next. so in that way the freedom is a good thing. but you could also feel kind of aimless. You could also feel judgment from other people. And I think the one thing about this period of life is that I I don’t think I’ve like had standout success in this period of my life yet. who knows if I ever will, but I think it’s important to just kind of
be honest about that uncertainty and kind of say that you have the confidence to confront it. then maybe other people can have the confidence, or at least the enthusiasm to do that as well if they want to.
Sonya (48:30)
This is sort of a a question that I don’t know if it’s a good question to ask, but I have to ask it is like, do we need even like do we even need to have standout success? You know, like I’m thinking about my own life, right? It’s like I’ve done all these like crazy things on a mountain bike and now I’m in this next phase of my life and I want of course like I want to do things that make an impact and stuff, but like I don’t care as much about standout success.
Lindsay (48:53)
No, that’s exactly right. And that’s kind of what I was saying too, was that I think people are sometimes they only want to use any of these strategies as like success hacks. and I’m kind of saying that I’m not.
Sonya (49:03)
Yeah.
Lindsay (49:04)
but then I don’t know how persuasive that is to people. It’s that you have to re you have to redefine what success is for yourself. And I I I am definitely saying that with like true sincerity and
Sonya (49:16)
Yeah.
Lindsay (49:16)
like I really have a very different way of assessing myself and how I feel about myself. And I think the real thing is just not feeling this fear again that I think I always kind of felt like a a real insecurity. I think I just feel more confident now. and it’s because
Sonya (49:37)
Mm-hmm.
Lindsay (49:40)
I’m not kind of
clinging to these little success indicators, to kind of prove to people that I’m good enough or worth listening to. Yeah. Yeah. But
Sonya (49:47)
Yeah, you’re not cringing you’re not you’re not cringing cringing through it all. Yeah.
Lindsay (49:52)
then that I don’t know if that means people want to be like me, that are listen to me. So it’s kind of a tricky, it’s a tricky needle to thread, but but I’m going to.
Sonya (50:01)
Yeah, I love it. Well, thank you so much for sharing that. I I I’m so excited for people to read your book and to follow your work. I mean, this question always seems obvious, but I’ll just ask it anyway. Where can people find all all of you, all of your things?
Lindsay (50:16)
Sure. I I went off most social media as I was writing this book. but I’m on Instagram. it’s at Lindsay Crouse and definitely I hope people I hope your viewers will read the book and I would love especially to hear people’s feedback and comments, not only on the book itself, but on their experiences with the topic. Like the best part of this book has been and this experience has been connecting with people like you, who have their own thoughts about it. And I I mean I interviewed tons of people for it, but I c I really couldn’t
talk about this book too much ever, and about the themes in this book. So we just love to hear from your audience. and you can get it anywhere you get your books, Amazon, obviously, Barnes and Noble, bookshop.org, et cetera, in all formats.
Sonya (50:59)
Yeah, thanks. I mean, I I think this book is going to just be so helpful to help people see more perspective in their lives and ask themselves reflective questions that can really help them just connect to the their why, why they’re doing things and where they want to go. So thank you for
Lindsay (51:11)
Yeah. Yeah.
Sonya (51:13)
for writing this book and for coming on the podcast.
Lindsay (51:15)
Thank you. It was wonderful to chat with you and I hope that your viewers like it.
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