Changing Jobs When Work Stops Working

I’ve had more than one season where I found myself awake in the night, wondering: What am I doing with my life?

Maybe you’ve been there, too—feeling restless in your work, burned out from a pace you can’t sustain, or just generally unsure if this “job” fits your life anymore. It’s a disorienting feeling, especially when you’ve spent years pursuing a path and investing yourself in something that no longer makes sense in the way it once did.

At Soul Care, we often hear from people in moments just like this. Maybe you're stepping away from a long season of ministry or work. Maybe you’re approaching retirement and wondering, “What now?” Or maybe you’re at the beginning of your vocational journey, and instead of clarity, all you feel is pressure. Wherever you are, you’re not alone. And you’re not doing anything wrong. Pending transitions are just their own kind of hard.

When Our Work Becomes Our Worth

In Western culture, the line between who we are and what we do is dangerously thin. From an early age, we’re taught to measure ourselves by our output: How successful we are. How productive. How needed.

That mindset can sneak into even the most well-intentioned Christian lives. We begin to believe that our work is our calling—and if our work is unclear, then maybe we are unclear, too. Maybe we’re falling behind. Missing it. I’ve had to wrestle with this myself.

For almost twenty years, I had an exciting career as a high-level research and strategy consultant for Fortune 500 companies. I worked on the most compelling projects, collaborated with wildly smart and capable colleagues, and traveled the world (six of the seven continents!).

But around Year 15, I felt something begin to shift. What had slowly been getting harder eventually became untenable. Travel that once felt like a gift became a grind. My projects shifted from meaningful to monotonous. And then burnout started showing up in my body.

I knew things needed to change, but I had no idea how to answer the question: What’s next?

After taking time away from my work to rest and discern where I was in this season, I realized I had been asking the wrong questions. Instead of asking “What’s the right next job?” or “What do I want to do?”—what I needed to ask was:

“How is my soul?”

And:

“What might God be inviting me into – not just to do, but to become?”

Reframing Vocation

We tend to think of vocation as our occupation. But a truer definition is a broader one.  Vocation is not about jobs or roles, titles or paychecks. It’s about living faithfully in alignment with your deepest identity in Christ.

We draw from the Latin word vocare—meaning “to call.” But we’re not “called” to one specific occupation that we discover (if we get it right) and then stick with forever. It’s more like a lifelong series of invitations from God—shaped by your season, your story, your experiences, and your giftings. Your job may change. Your energy may shift. But your telos—your deep purpose—remains anchored in God’s loving design for you.

What If You’re in a Fog?

If you’re in a vocational fog, unsure of what’s next, here’s some good news: You don’t have to figure it out all at once. In fact, that’s not even the goal. Discernment isn’t about getting it “right.” It’s about slowing down, listening to your life, and reconnecting with the Source who knows you better than you know yourself.

And you don’t have to do it alone. Having close friends, spiritual directors, and coaches alongside me helped me identify patterns affecting my sense of self, narratives that needed reframing, and visions of my vocation that my eyes weren’t yet able to see.

Vocational restlessness is a common life experience for so many of us. That’s why we created What’s Next, a vocational discernment experience. It’s a gentle but grounded journey for anyone in a season of vocational transition, disillusionment, or simply longing for clarity.

We offer space for reflection, conversation, and spiritual practices that help you attend to your soul—not just your résumé.

An Invitation

If you're tired of the pressure to figure it all out...
If you sense that something is shifting but you're not sure what…
If you feel the tension between your work and your worth…

We invite you to pause.
To reconnect with your Source.
To explore What’s Next—not just for your career, but for your calling.