THE EFFECTIVE PROBLEMSOLVER #101
Every good changemaker I know has considered quitting.
Leaving the initiative. Walking away from the coalition. Exiting the field entirely.
Sometimes it’s a passing thought, sometimes it lingers for months. Sometimes it returns every morning like an old ache in a cold joint.
I’ve had this feeling off and on for the last five years.
And recently, more often than not.
It’s not burnout exactly, though I’ve felt that too.
It’s not despair, either.
It’s closer to something philosophical, maybe even sacred.
Should I even be doing this?
Is it working?
Will it ever work?
Am I the problem?
Are we all fooling ourselves?
A confrontation with the existential doubt that lives underneath most attempts to make a difference in the world.
These are not uncommon questions. But they’re usually unspoken.
We don’t often say them aloud in the sector, where the oxygen is thick with optimism, branding, and quarterly impact reports.
We celebrate “grit” and “resilience” and “system change wins,” but behind the scenes, we quietly watch efforts stall, people cycle through the same mistakes, meetings fill with posturing and polite dysfunction, and the hard truths go unspoken because we’re all afraid of sounding negative.
I see good people working incredibly hard—people I admire and care about—grinding away at initiatives they hope will move the needle.
And yet I also see them walking a familiar path: launching with too much confidence, simplifying too soon, confusing activity for progress, and building structures that reflect the constraints of their own funding, not the dynamics of the actual problem.
I don’t say that from a place of superiority.
I’ve done all this myself.
That’s part of what makes this so hard.
The longer you’re in the work, the more you’re haunted by the gap between intention and impact.
Between the change you hoped for and the reality you helped create.
And if you stick around long enough, you may start to question not just your project or approach—but yourself.
What you’re even doing here.
That’s the quiet moment when the question appears:
Should I just do something else?
And then a worse one:
What if I’ve wasted years?
I’ve returned to these questions again and again.
Not just in passing, but in long, hard, soul-level examination.
In meditation. In therapy. In long conversations with people I trust, who carry their own invisible burdens.
I’ve asked them: Do you ever wonder if you should just walk away?
They always say yes.
There’s a reason spiritual traditions across history speak of “the dark night of the soul.”
And there’s a reason every social change tradition worth its salt—from the civil rights movement to anti-apartheid and independence movements to grassroots organizing in every corner of the world—makes room for struggle, doubt, and weariness.
This is the part of the work that doesn’t fit in a logic model.
The part you can’t account for in your theory of change.
The part where you are not sure it’s going to work, where you are not sure you can make it work, and where the best you can offer is to keep showing up, eyes open, with less certainty and more honesty.
I don’t have a tidy ending here.
No “five things to do when you feel like quitting.”
No “here’s how I found my way back.”
This is not that kind of message.
This one is just to say: if you’re in that place, you’re not alone.
And if we can’t be honest with each other about the struggle, we will never be effective together.
Our work will be performative instead of powerful. Our teams will be polite instead of real. And our change will be shallow instead of deep.
So maybe I should quit.
Or maybe I should just say this out loud. Maybe we all should.
Because on the days we tell the truth, we become something more than a collection of programs, strategies, and plans.
We accept being human.
And that’s where the real work begins.
See you in two weeks.
