There is a kind of success that looks really good from the outside.

You’re accomplishing things. People depend on you. You’re getting promoted, winning awards, building a business, serving at church, taking care of your family, showing up for everyone around you.

People might even look at your life and think, She has it all together.

And maybe, for a while, you think you do too.

But underneath all that achievement, there can be another story running quietly in the background:

I’m not enough.

So you work harder.

You accomplish more.

You become more useful, more successful, more needed.

And every accomplishment quiets that voice for a little while.

Until it doesn’t.

Then you need the next accomplishment.

I know this pattern because I lived it. And recently, I sat across from someone on the It’s Your Story to Tell podcast whose story looked different from mine in many ways, yet underneath it I heard something incredibly familiar.

The striving.

The anxiety.

The need to achieve.

The desire to control the outcome.

And eventually, coming to the end of yourself.

 

When Achievement Becomes a Way of Feeling Safe

Achievement itself isn’t bad.

Leadership isn’t bad.

Wanting to grow a business, make an impact, provide for your family, serve others, or pursue excellence isn’t bad.

The question I’ve learned to ask is:

Why do I need this?

That question can reveal a lot.

Am I pursuing this because I feel called toward it?

Or am I trying to prove something?

Am I creating from a place of peace?

Or am I terrified of what it would mean about me if I failed?

Am I leading because I want to serve?

Or have I attached my identity to being needed?

Am I working hard because I enjoy the work God has placed in front of me?

Or because slowing down would leave me alone with thoughts and feelings I don’t know what to do with?

Sometimes what looks like ambition from the outside is actually survival on the inside.

I know that because achievement became one of the ways I learned to feel safe.

If I could succeed enough, earn enough, accomplish enough, help enough people and keep everything together, maybe I could finally feel like I was enough.

But the finish line kept moving.

 

Why “Enough” Never Arrives Through Achievement

There is a problem with trying to heal an internal wound through an external accomplishment.

It doesn't last.

You reach the goal.

You celebrate.

For a moment, you feel relief.

Then the question comes:

What’s next?

So you set another goal.

You run a little faster.

You carry a little more.

And eventually, what once made you feel successful doesn't even give you the same sense of satisfaction anymore.

During my conversation with Wes Key, he described this beautifully. He had become a highly successful business owner. He had built teams, received recognition and achieved things many people would consider evidence that he had “made it.”

But underneath that success was a voice he had carried for years:

You’re not enough.

He described winning an award and feeling good about it for about five minutes before his mind moved to the next thing.

I immediately recognized it.

Because I had lived my own version of it.

There was a time when I thought thriving meant achieving more, earning more, being recognized, traveling and building a life that other people could look at and say, Wow. She is really successful. She has it all together.

But when your identity depends on achievement, success cannot give you rest.

It requires you to keep proving yourself.

 

Sometimes Anxiety Doesn't Look Like Anxiety

This is another reason I think we need to talk about this.

We often picture anxiety as someone who is visibly worried, fearful or unable to function.

But sometimes anxiety is incredibly productive.

Sometimes it looks like perfectionism.

Overthinking.

Overpreparing.

People-pleasing.

Controlling details.

Difficulty resting.

Constantly anticipating what could go wrong.

Needing everyone around you to be okay.

Working harder when something in your life feels uncertain.

And sometimes, the person experiencing it doesn't recognize it as anxiety at all.

They call themselves driven.

Responsible.

A high achiever.

A leader.

The person everyone can count on.

And they may genuinely be all of those things.

But there can still be something underneath those strengths worth getting curious about.

Why might I be responding this way?

That question is very different from:

What is wrong with me?

Curiosity allows us to stop judging the behavior long enough to understand what it has been doing for us.

Maybe achieving helped you receive affirmation.

Maybe perfectionism helped you avoid criticism.

Maybe people-pleasing helped relationships feel safer.

Maybe controlling the details helped you manage uncertainty.

Maybe staying busy keeps you from feeling grief.

Maybe being the strong one meant you never had to admit that you needed someone too.

These patterns often make sense when we understand the story underneath them.

The problem is that a strategy that once helped us survive can eventually become the very thing keeping us exhausted.

 

Your Body May Eventually Tell the Truth You've Been Avoiding

We can ignore ourselves for a long time.

We can push through.

Pray harder.

Work harder.

Drink another cup of coffee.

Tell ourselves we just need to get through this season.

But eventually, our bodies may begin communicating what we've been unwilling—or simply unable—to acknowledge.

I cannot keep doing this.

That realization can feel terrifying, especially for someone who has built an identity around being strong.

Because if I am the person everyone comes to, what happens when I need help?

If I'm the leader, what happens when I don't know what to do?

If I'm the one who holds everything together, what happens when I can't?

If my faith is strong, shouldn't I be able to handle this?

That last question can be especially painful for Christians.

Sometimes we unknowingly turn faith into another area where we have to perform.

Pray more.

Trust more.

Read more Scripture.

Have more faith.

Stop feeling afraid.

And when the difficult emotions remain, we assume we're doing something wrong.

But what if God isn't asking us to perform our way into His presence?

What if He is inviting us to become honest enough to recognize how desperately we need Him?

 

Surrender Is Not Another Thing to Achieve

This has been one of the hardest lessons of my own life.

Surrender isn't something I master.

It isn't a box I check.

It isn't, I surrendered in 2016, so why am I dealing with this again?

For years, discovering another area that needed healing could immediately trigger the thought:

I must have gotten it wrong.

Now I see it differently.

God revealing another place that needs surrender does not automatically mean I failed.

It may mean I'm growing.

There are things I can see today that I could not have seen ten years ago.

There are things I am ready to release today that I wasn't ready to release then.

Healing has been much less like reaching a destination and much more like allowing God into deeper rooms of my story.

Again and again, I find myself returning to the same place:

God, I can't do this in my own strength.

And perhaps that's part of what surrender actually is.

Not giving up.

Giving over.

 

What If God Isn't Asking You to Try Harder?

This is where the conversation becomes uncomfortable for those of us who know how to achieve.

Because trying harder is what we know.

Give me a goal.

Give me the steps.

Give me the book.

Give me the plan.

Tell me what I need to accomplish, and I will accomplish it.

But surrender doesn't work that way.

Surrender asks me to loosen my grip on the outcome.

It asks me to trust God while I cannot yet see what He's doing.

It asks me to let other people make their own choices instead of trying to manage their responses.

It asks me to admit when I'm afraid.

It asks me to grieve.

It asks me to receive help.

It asks me to stop pretending.

And sometimes it asks me to allow a door to close that I was absolutely convinced God was going to open.

That's hard.

But I've also learned that a closed door does not necessarily mean God has abandoned the story.

Sometimes the story is simply going somewhere we didn't expect.

 

Maybe the Question Isn't “What's Next?”

High achievers love that question.

What's next?

What's the next goal?

The next opportunity?

The next level?

The next thing God wants me to build?

I'm still a big-dream person. I don't believe God is asking us to stop dreaming, creating, leading or making an impact.

But I've learned to put another question before What's next?

What's underneath this?

What's underneath my urgency?

What's underneath my fear?

What's underneath my need for this particular outcome?

What's underneath my disappointment?

What's underneath my reaction?

What's underneath the story I'm telling myself about what this means?

And maybe most importantly:

What might God be inviting me to surrender here?

That changes the conversation.

Because now I'm not simply trying to change my circumstances.

I'm allowing God to transform me within them.

 

Your Struggle Does Not Disqualify Your Story

There was another part of my conversation with Wes that stayed with me.

Today, he shares openly about experiences he once would have preferred to keep private. And he has had people particularly men tell him that he is putting words to things they have felt but haven't known how to say out loud.

That matters.

Because somewhere along the way, many of us learned that leadership requires us to hide our humanity.

We think people need our polished version.

The successful version.

The healed version.

The version who has all the answers.

But I am increasingly convinced that healthy leadership requires something very different.

It requires enough self-awareness to know our own story.

Enough humility to recognize where we're still growing.

Enough courage to get support when we need it.

And enough honesty to stop pretending our accomplishments have made us immune to being human.

Your story doesn't become useful when it becomes perfect.

Sometimes the places you most wanted to hide become the places from which you can sit beside another person and say:

Me too.

I've been there.

You don't have to pretend with me.

And sometimes that is exactly where hope begins.

 

There May Be More Underneath Your Story

So today, I want to leave you with something to consider.

Maybe there is an area of your life where you've been trying really hard.

Trying to succeed.

Trying to fix it.

Trying to control the outcome.

Trying to make everyone happy.

Trying to prove yourself.

Trying to be strong.

Trying to make God answer the way you believe He should.

Instead of asking yourself how you can try harder, get curious.

Why might I be responding this way?

What is underneath this for me?

And then:

What would it look like to invite God into that place instead of trying to manage it by myself?

You may discover that what feels like falling apart is actually revealing something that has needed your attention for a very long time.

And you may discover that surrender isn't the end of your story.

It may be where a completely different chapter begins.

 

Watch the Conversation with Wesley Key

This week's It's Your Story to Tell podcast inspired me to think even more deeply about achievement, anxiety, faith, surrender and the stories we carry underneath the lives other people see.

Wes Key, author of Inspire, Nourish, Cultivate, joined me for an incredibly vulnerable conversation about growing up as a pastor's kid, walking away from belief in God, becoming a successful entrepreneur, experiencing devastating loss and anxiety, reaching the limits of his own strength, and discovering what surrender looked like when achievement could no longer carry him. His story is anything but a straight line.

We also talk honestly about a question many people wrestle with:

If God is good, why do painful things happen?

We don't offer a neat answer to a complicated question. We talk about what it has looked like in our own lives to wrestle honestly with God, confront the beliefs we've carried about Him, and discover that faith can hold our questions, grief, fear and uncertainty.

If you've ever felt like you should be stronger, wondered why achievement still doesn't feel like enough, struggled to reconcile painful experiences with your faith, or found yourself asking God what He is doing with your story, I hope you'll watch this conversation.

Because maybe the chapter you're in isn't evidence that your story has gone wrong.

Maybe God isn't finished writing it yet.