The Three Temptations That Keep You Overworked

We're not tired. We're afraid to let go of what's not working.

I remember the first moment I felt like I didn’t have power in my work.

It wasn’t on a job. It was sometime during my last year of middle school and it was time to start thinking about what high school I was going to attend. My neighborhood school was out of the question - for both me and my parents. My choice was the Center for Visual and Performing Arts at Suitland High School. Acting, singing, and speaking in front of others always had come naturally to me since I was a child—I had the VHS tapes to prove it (thanks, dad!). Before I had ever conceived of how the world perceived me, “performing” felt like something that was mine.

But my parents had a different plan. In their mind, or at least in my mom’s mind after my parents divorced, I was going to a STEM school. No discussion. No curiosity about why I wanted to explore the arts. No room for another way.

And that was my first introduction to the exhaustion of success by conforming to the world’s way. The path already decided. The expectations already set.

So what do you do when you’re told this is your only way to go? You learn how to prove yourself. You learn how to succeed in systems that don’t reflect you. You learn how to make a way inside a structure chosen for you.

And before you know it, your work is no longer about what flows naturally from your being. It’s about what you need to do to make it.

I carried that belief with me for years—through college, through “corporate” America, through 15 years in PR. And the world rewarded me for it.

Until I burned out…twice.

But here’s what I didn’t realize then: The exhaustion wasn’t just from working hard. It wasn’t just the long hours, the weekends in the office, the relentless proving, or the pressure to keep going. I was trapped in the world’s way of working.

And the world’s way has three temptations—three lies that keep us overworked, burned out, and stuck.

Temptation #1: Believing That Our Identity Is in Our Work

The world tells us: We are what we do.

And because I couldn’t choose the work I loved at 14, I chose the next best thing—I made sure that when I did get the chance to choose, I had to be great at it.

Which meant that my success had to mean something. It had to be proof:

• Proof that I was smart enough to fit in with the STEM kids

• Proof that I could be successful on my own terms even if i didn’t do the “tech” thing

• Proof that I was right and “they” were wrong about me choosing my own path

I didn’t know it then, but I was robbed of the chance for the work to be about the work itself. It became a reflection of who I was. And if work is your identity, then failure isn’t just a setback—it’s personal.

Which means you can’t stop. You can’t rest. Because rest feels like disconnecting from who you are.

But here’s the truth: We are not our work.

And until we separate who we are from what we do, we will never be able to rest without guilt.

Temptation #2: Believing That the World’s System Is the Only Way

I grew up in a military household. My parents were in the military. My parents' friends were in the military. My first 4 years of interning was with the military.

The military was like a kingdom. It provided stability—paychecks, benefits, a structured path forward. It was a system that worked.

And even though I knew the military wasn’t for me, I still believed in the rules of the system it taught me. Do the work. Follow the plan. Climb the ranks.

So when I stepped into the world of work after college, I trusted my bosses like we were still in the military. I believed that if I did what I was supposed to do, success would follow.

But the world’s system doesn’t work like that.

Instead, we’re thrown into a hustle culture designed to extract from us.

And the more I tried to prove myself in that system, the more it drained me. I kept chasing a kind of predictability that simply didn’t exist outside of my military upbringing.

I had to unlearn this. I had to realize that if I wanted my work to be sustainable, I had to create my own system. One that wasn’t based on grinding until I had nothing left. One that factored in rest as a requirement, not a reward. One that wasn’t built on proving, but on becoming who I was meant to be.

Thankfully, that system already existed.

Temptation #3: Believing That It All Falls Apart Without You

I used to have a sense of pride in being exhausted. A belief that if I let go, if I stopped, if I didn’t keep everything moving, it would all collapse.

Add to this the pain of rejection from being a kid who was teased for not being like the other boys, for the teacher mispronouncing your last name, or even for talking with a southern accent. It felt like the only way to be safe was to be in control. Letting go was too dangerous.

So I doubled down. I worked harder. I made sure no one could ever say I wasn't pulling my weight.

And that’s how I operated for years. Until I burned out–not just because of what I was doing, but because of what I was afraid to stop doing.

I didn’t trust that things would be okay without my effort.

I didn’t trust that I would be okay if I wasn’t proving my worth.

And rest requires trust.

• Trust that our work will be there when we return.

• Trust that we don’t have to hold everything together.

• Trust that our worth doesn’t evaporate when we stop producing.

Because it doesn’t.

How I Recovered Rest and My Power

It took me years to see that my burnout wasn’t just a symptom of hard work. It was the result of believing in a broken system.

A system that told me my work was my identity. A system that told me grinding was the only way. A system that told me if I let go, I’d lose everything.

But none of that is true. What I did have to do was dare to let it burn. To grow exhausted with my own ways in order to receive a new way. God’s way.

I found a system that could anchor me in who I was becoming and not having to prove myself over and over to people who were just trying to break free themselves. In this system, I am already blessed, a rhythm of rest is the foundation of my life, and I don’t have to hold it all together. In fact, I can lay it all down.

And that’s my hope for us in writing this note. That we can pause and consider another way: A way that reminds us of our greatness, our worth, and our power.

When we resist the enemy, he will flee.

Love y’all,

Kevin