09 Jun Exceptional and Exhausted #4: The Tuesday morning that cost nothing and yet it took years
Self-leadership awareness begins in small moments that cost nothing — and yet most senior leaders I work with describe taking years to reach them. Last week I was sitting in a coffee shop with my laptop. The barista nearby was cleaning the batch behind the counter, grinding beans for the next round, and there was something about that ordinary sound in that particular moment that stopped me.
I noticed I was present. No calculation running about what still needed to happen before I could feel this way. Just there, in a state I can only describe as pleasure.
How many steps did it take to get here.
For most of my first forty years, success had a clear definition and it was not mine.
Prestigious university, then another. Branded institutions. Titles that meant something in the rooms I was supposed to want to be in. A significant portion of the choosing was not choosing at all. It was compliance with a definition of a good life handed to me before I was old enough to question whether it was mine.
Jung calls what happens when you finally begin to question it individuation. In practice it is not clean. It is fixing the plane while it is flying. You hold the same position, the same responsibilities, the same financial architecture. And below the surface, a larger piece of work is happening. You are trying to hear something quieter than the noise of obligation. An inner whisper that does not demand. That simply persists.
Von Franz, one of Jung’s closest collaborators, wrote that the unconscious communicates through a felt sense that something is off: a discomfort without a name yet that refuses to go away. Most people I work with describe exactly this. The career is working. The performance is intact.
And somewhere underneath both, a quiet and persistent awareness that the life being lived and the life that is actually theirs have drifted apart.
What accumulates from living that gap is a particular kind of weariness. Different from the tiredness of a hard week. Closer to the tiredness of keeping something going that requires constant effort to maintain, because it was never quite yours to begin with. This is the same weariness that senior leader burnout recovery has to address at the root — not the surface tiredness but the deeper cost of a gap that has been running quietly for years.
What Actually Helps
One small thing that has helped people I work with: at the end of a working day, ask honestly:
What did I do today that I genuinely chose?
The first few times, the answer is unsettling. Over time, the question starts to change the day before it ends.
The coffee shop moment was a Tuesday morning. But it was one I was actually in, with no performance required of me.
That is not a small thing. And the distance between where you are and what that could feel like for you is where this work begins.
Curious which specific pattern is holding your leadership back? There is a short quiz here. Five questions, two minutes: Take the quiz
Becoming the leader your next level is already waiting for.
Danguole Litvinskaite, The Leadership Coach Exceptional & Exhausted Senior Leaders Eventually Find
Frequently Asked Questions
What is self-leadership awareness and why does it matter for senior leaders?
Self-leadership awareness is the capacity to notice the gap between the choices you are making and the life you actually want to be living. For senior leaders, this matters because performance can remain intact long after the internal cost of maintaining it has become unsustainable. Developing this awareness is not about slowing down. It is about being able to distinguish between what you are doing because you genuinely chose it and what you are doing because the pattern chose it for you.
Why do exceptional senior leaders often feel exhausted despite outward success?
The exhaustion that exceptional senior leaders describe is rarely the tiredness of a hard week. It is closer to the tiredness of maintaining a version of success that was defined by someone else, long before the leader had enough self-knowledge to question it. When the definition of success is not yours, no amount of achievement fully satisfies. The career advances. The weariness deepens. This is one of the most consistent patterns across the senior leaders I work with.
What does conscious choice actually look like in a senior leadership role?
Conscious choice at a senior level is not about dramatically restructuring your career or stepping back from responsibility. It begins much smaller. A useful starting point is asking at the end of each day: what did I do today that I genuinely chose? Not what was required, not what was expected, but what came from a clear internal decision. The first few times this question is unsettling. Over time it begins to shift what happens in the day itself, before the day ends.
How is leadership coaching different from therapy when it comes to identity and awareness work?
Leadership coaching works at the intersection of the professional and the personal without requiring a clinical framework. The focus is always on what is getting in the way of leading at the level you are actually capable of, and what it would take to shift that. The work I do draws on psychology, including Jungian concepts like individuation, but the entry point is always the leadership challenge in front of you: the calendar, the stakeholders, the decisions, the pattern underneath all three.
About the Author
Danguole Litvinskaite is an executive leadership coach based in Switzerland, specialising in helping exceptional and exhausted senior leaders advance without losing themselves in the process. With 14 years in investment banking across 4 countries, an ICF PCC credential, and 3,000+ executive coaching sessions, she works with senior leaders in tech, finance, consulting, and global financial institutions. Her 3-month intensive, The Integration Method, addresses the overdelivering pattern at the level where it actually lives, combining corporate strategy, leadership psychology, nervous system regulation, and career navigation. Clients include senior leaders at the largest tech companies, Big 4 firms, and global financial institutions.
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