The Lie of ‘Toughen Up’ (And What to Do Instead When You’re Exhausted)

Anna stared at the glow of her laptop long after her colleagues had signed off. The office was dark, her shoulders heavy, but her inbox still buzzed with demands. In her head, the same line repeated itself:

“Just toughen up. Push through. Everyone else is coping.”

Across town, Leila was cancelling on friends again. Too drained to face another evening of pretending she was fine, she typed out the familiar excuse: “So sorry — just exhausted.” As she pressed send, guilt crept in. Why couldn’t she keep up like everyone else?

If you’ve ever heard that whisper — at work or at home — you know how it lingers. It’s the cultural script many of us were handed: toughness means ignoring exhaustion, pressing harder, and proving you can endure.

Anna had learned that the workplace rewards those who power through. Late nights, back-to-back meetings, instant replies at midnight. Her performance reviews never mentioned boundaries, only output.

But the cracks were showing:

• Mistakes slipped into her reports.

• Her creativity shrank under constant fatigue.

• Resentment brewed quietly toward colleagues who seemed less stretched.

What looked like resilience on the surface was, underneath, the slow burn of exhaustion.

Leila’s exhaustion didn’t end when she closed her laptop. It followed her through the door like an unwelcome shadow.

She found herself half-listening at the dinner table, nodding without really hearing her children’s stories from the day. The book on her nightstand gathered dust, too tired to read even a page. Invitations from friends shifted from texts to silence, the space between them widening each time she said no.

Even the small pleasures — a walk, a bath, a film — became impossible to enjoy. They weren’t restorative anymore; they just felt like reminders of how little she had left to give.

And still the whisper was there: “Just toughen up.”

For Anna, it came in a meeting where she blanked on a detail she normally would have known — a name, a number, something so small yet so obvious it left her cheeks burning.

For Leila, it was the sharp words she snapped at her partner when he asked what she wanted for dinner. The moment the words left her mouth, she regretted them. She wasn’t angry at him. She was exhausted.

And for you, it might look different. Maybe it’s the moment you sit in your car after work, hands still gripping the steering wheel, wondering how much longer you can keep this up. Maybe it’s the slow realisation that your friends have stopped inviting you — not because they don’t care, but because you’ve said no too many times. Or maybe it’s waking up at 3am with your heart racing, mentally replaying emails and conversations you can’t seem to switch off from.

These moments are quiet, but decisive. They’re the proof that “toughening up” is no longer working. What feels like strength is actually the first stage of breaking.

Here’s the shift: Rest is not weakness. Rest is recalibration.

Athletes already know this. Recovery is built into their training because muscles need time to repair in order to grow stronger. Without it, performance drops, injuries increase, and careers are cut short.

Why should professionals be any different?
Why should women like Anna, Leila, or you, believe that pushing beyond breaking point is the only proof of strength?

Recalibration means stepping back just enough to return sharper, calmer, and more effective. It means showing up at work with clarity and at home with presence.

That’s not indulgence. That’s strategy.

If “toughen up” has been your default, here are three simple recalibrations:

• Micro-pauses at work → Five minutes between meetings to breathe, stretch, or step outside. Small resets, big impact.

• Boundaries as strength → Closing the laptop at a set time, saying no when the plate is already full.

• Reframing rest → Seeing sleep, downtime, and quiet as fuel for resilience and sustainable success — not wasted time.

These aren’t luxuries. They are resilience strategies.

The next time that whisper tells you to “toughen up,” pause and pay attention.

Picture Anna in her meeting, Leila at her dinner table, yourself in the car outside work. Each of those moments is a signal — not of weakness, but of what happens when resilience is confused with relentless endurance.

You can keep pushing, numbing yourself to the cost until something breaks.
Or you can choose recalibration — stepping back, reclaiming rest, and returning with focus, clarity, and strength.

That isn’t indulgence. That’s what real resilience looks like.

Reflection for You: Where in your life are you still being told to “toughen up”? And what would shift if you allowed yourself to rest, recover, and rise stronger instead?