Why you might be feeling behind

You’ve probably experienced it. Reading about someone else’s breakthrough, the next essential insight, or the latest prediction about how the world of work is about to change. LinkedIn posts, long-form articles, podcasts, YouTube interviews with impressive guests, all quietly reinforcing the sense that there is more to know, more to track, and more to prepare for.

In those moments, it’s easy to feel overwhelmed and underprepared, as though you haven’t read enough, researched enough, or written the report that might somehow shield you or your organisation from whatever is coming next. The world is noisy, and social platforms, often driven by well-intentioned people, have a way of amplifying that noise until it starts to feel urgent and personal. The result is a familiar mix of low-level anxiety, mental fatigue, and a persistent sense of not quite being ready.

What’s striking is who tends to feel this most acutely. It’s rarely those who are disengaged or indifferent. More often, it’s thoughtful, curious people who are actively trying to understand what’s happening around them, who care about doing good work and making responsible decisions. Over time, that thoughtfulness often brings more responsibility and higher expectations, along with a quiet assumption that staying on top of everything is simply part of the job.

Progress, in this context, can start to feel strangely invisible. Each new thing you learn immediately reveals something else you haven’t yet explored. Positive feedback lands briefly, if at all, before being overtaken by the next demand or emerging idea. The internal bar keeps moving, and the evidence that you’re doing a good job never quite feels sufficient to quiet the sense that more is required, especially as the year draws to a close and unfinished intentions feel heavier than completed ones. 

The feeling of being behind often isn’t about a lack of effort, but about comparing ourselves to standards no one could reasonably meet.

The pace of change you’re navigating now isn’t linear. We’re no longer in a world of discovery, pause, reflection, then the next step forward. Instead, we’re living with something closer to exponential progress, where each new development becomes a tool that accelerates the next. The time between breakthroughs keeps shrinking, and as a result, the world you’re operating in, and the one just over the horizon, feels fundamentally different to how it did even a decade ago.

In that kind of environment, trying to “keep up” can feel like the goalposts are constantly being moved. At the same time, the expectations of organisations, customers, and users are accelerating too. Even when it’s not fully articulated, there’s often a background sense that if you don’t adapt quickly enough, someone else will, and they’ll be ready to step in where you’re not.So you turn to the places that promise orientation. Social feeds, newsletters, podcasts, long-form articles, interviews with impressive guests, all offering insight, context, and predictions. But what’s presented there is often a curated view of confidence and coherence. Not necessarily because anyone is trying to mislead, but because visibility tends to reward clarity and certainty. The hesitations, doubts, and unfinished thinking rarely make it into public view, and it becomes easy to wonder why everyone else seems to have a firmer grip on what’s coming than you do.

“Hesitations, doubts, and unfinished thinking rarely make it into public view”

In response, many people start accumulating. Articles are bookmarked, posts saved, reading lists built, and podcasts queued up, with the quiet hope that if enough of the right material is consumed, preparedness will eventually follow. But learning like this never really finishes. There’s always something else to add, another perspective worth considering, all happening alongside the reality of work, family, responsibility, and the basic need to rest. The result is a persistent sense of being never quite done, even when a great deal is being carried and delivered.

This pressure is particularly pronounced in digital, technology, and knowledge-heavy work, where you’re often asked to make decisions about things that don’t fully exist yet, while still being expected to keep organisations safe, remain relevant, and inspire confidence in others. Living in that state for too long comes at a cost. When everything feels urgent, judgment becomes less settled, confidence becomes conditional, and attention fragments. Not because progress isn’t happening, but because there’s no longer a clear point where it feels acceptable to pause, reflect, or simply be satisfied with what’s been done.

“When everything feels urgent, judgment becomes less settled, and confidence becomes conditional.”

At some point, it becomes worth naming what’s missing. Not another tool, framework, or insight, but a set of decisions you may have quietly avoided making. The things left open-ended “for now” because closing them down feels risky. Not because you want to be fixed or dogmatic in your thinking, but because it’s genuinely hard to know what “done” even looks like in a world where perfect is unachievable and certainty is always provisional.

Leaving things open can feel responsible. It keeps options available and signals humility. But over time, open-ended starts to harden into permanent background noise. Questions without boundaries don’t stay neutral; they continue to demand attention. Without realising it, you end up carrying a growing list of things you’re not actively working on, but haven’t consciously decided to stop working on either.

“Questions without boundaries don’t stay neutral; they continue to demand attention.”

There’s also something uncomfortable about forming strong views in public-facing work. Having an opinion can feel like stepping into the open, where it’s immediately exposed to critique or misinterpretation. Staying in learning mode and continuing to gather perspectives can feel safer. But sometimes that openness is less about curiosity and more about self-protection, particularly in environments where confidence is expected, and uncertainty is rarely rewarded.

Over time, curiosity can quietly turn into obligation. Learning that once felt energising becomes something you feel you ought to keep up with, and when there’s no clear purpose or opportunity to apply what you’re absorbing, resistance sets in. Letting something go can feel even riskier. There’s often a half-formed fear that the very thing you choose not to follow will be the thing you’re asked about next. And yet, being able to say, “I don’t know enough about that to have a view right now,” or “I’m choosing to focus here for the moment,” often creates space for others to contribute, rather than reinforcing the false idea that one person should carry everything.

Seen this way, some of the weight you feel isn’t just about pace or volume. It comes from the accumulation of unmade decisions, from the things never consciously chosen, prioritised, paused, or left to someone else.

As the year comes to a close, it’s tempting to read unfinished intentions as evidence of failure. But some of what remains undone may not be unfinished at all; it may simply be unnecessary. Not everything you once thought you needed to engage with still deserves your attention, and often the weight comes not from what you haven’t done, but from the expectations you’ve quietly carried without revisiting.

It can be freeing to look again at the things you’ve been holding onto, the saved articles, the growing reading lists, the queued podcasts, and ask a more honest question. Do you actually want these, or do you feel you should? Where obligation rather than interest is doing the work, it may be enough to draw a line, acknowledge that it’s done for now, and let it go, not as neglect, but as choice.

Narrowing focus doesn’t mean thinking smaller. It often creates the conditions for depth rather than breadth, for judgement rather than reaction. Choosing fewer things can protect energy, attention, and presence, not just at work, but in the spaces that matter most. Carrying less can be a sign of discernment, not disengagement.

At its heart, this is about permission. Permission to pause. Permission not to have a view on everything. Permission to let something sit on the shelf, or to trust that it may be better carried by someone else for a while. Entering a new year this way feels different. Lighter. Less driven by what feels urgent or externally amplified, and more shaped by what you consciously choose to give your time and attention to. And often, it’s that version of you, thoughtful, engaged, and unburdened, that those around you need most.