Career Crisis: Myths and Mistakes That Keep You Stuck

A career crisis almost always arrives with two things: sharp fear and an urgent need to act. That combination is precisely what generates the most common myths and costly mistakes.

Myth 1. "I need to change everything — now"

The first reflex in a crisis is to change everything at once: profession, city, social circle. But Dr. Saulitis draws a clear line: adapting your approach is both possible and necessary, yet abandoning your core professionalism — your fundamental values, vision, and principles — means losing the ground beneath your feet. The depth of your expertise, the degree of personalisation, the format of your work — these are fair game for change. Authenticity is not.

Myth 2. "The harder you fight, the faster you'll get out"

This is a trap that works like a fishing net: the harder the fish thrashes, the more tightly it becomes entangled. In a moment of panic, every reflex says "struggle" — and that reflex is exactly what makes things worse. Understanding that blind struggling is not the answer is one of the hardest realisations to reach. It does not mean giving up or going limp. It means first identifying what is keeping you afloat — and moving from that point.

Myth 3. "An audit is unnecessary — the situation is obvious"

One principle Dr. Saulitis returns to repeatedly: before making any decision, conduct an honest audit. Look at concrete indicators before the crisis began and after. How much energy, income, health, and clarity did you have? If even one parameter is lower now, that is a fact — not a feeling. Decisions made without this audit are typically driven by emotional noise rather than an accurate reading of the situation.

Mistake: reaching for labels instead of facts

In a crisis, people eagerly grab onto fashionable terms and other people's interpretations of their predicament. Dr. Saulitis offers a different tool — the duck test: if something quacks, swims, and looks like a duck, it's a duck. Compare facts; don't chase clever explanations. This shifts you out of the dead end of interpretation and into a clearer, more precise view of what is actually going on.