Setting a boundary you must physically cross.

For months, he had worked from the kitchen table, blurring the line between work and home. He was always 'on.' Today, he made a rule: work stops at 5:30 PM, and he had to leave the apartment for 15 minutes. At 5:30 PM, he locked his desk and walked out. He didn't check his phone; he simply walked around the block. When he returned, the space felt completely different. He hadn't changed the kitchen table, but he had successfully created an invisible fence between his professional self and his human self. Crossing that physical boundary was the only way to validate the emotional one.

A heartbeat thought by Christian van Gils

When the need isn't for food, but for self-care.

She rushed through the door at night, immediately feeling a panicked, demanding hunger. She opened the fridge, ready to devour the first thing she saw. She was stressed, tired, and her brain interpreted the emotional deficit as a calorie deficit. But as she reached for the snack, she paused. The hunger wasn't coming from her stomach; it was coming from her spirit. It wasn't food she needed, but a simple act of restorative care. She closed the fridge, walked to the bathroom, and ran a very hot bath. The true energy crisis wasn't about sugar; it was about self-kindness.

A heartbeat thought by Christian van Gils

The nervous tic that confirms you're never truly offline.

He was sitting at dinner, laughing at a joke, when he felt the familiar, subtle buzz of his phone in his pocket. A crucial email. A late-night request. He excused himself immediately, reaching for the device. The screen was black. There was no notification, no text, no email. The vibration had been entirely phantom, a neurological tremor, a sign that his nervous system was so perpetually conditioned to work demands that it was creating its own alerts. He stared at the blank screen, realising the real problem wasn't the email volume, but the internal cage he had built.

A heartbeat thought by Christian van Gils

The metric that measures your worth, not your output.

She received her quarterly performance review: "Exceeded Expectations." The email was glowing, full of praise and numbers. But before she could celebrate, her brain had already calculated her internal score. She had skipped three nights of sleep, canceled four friends' dinners, and cried once in the supply closet. The external score was 10/10. Her internal score was 4/10. The contradiction was staggering. She understood then that the real damage wasn't visible on the company's ledger; it was recorded entirely on her own forgotten human metrics.
We made it possible, how ool is that!

A heartbeat thought by Christian van Gils

When your presence is loud but your contribution is quiet.

He attended the mandatory team-building event. He laughed at the right jokes, complimented the catering, and performed the required enthusiasm. He was physically present, a warm body in the room, but his mind felt miles away, watching the scene detachedly. He hadn't contributed a single original idea all afternoon, yet he felt profoundly exhausted by the constant social maintenance. He realized he was mastering a new form of presenteeism: not working while sick, but performing happiness while depleted.

for neither home nor work, just depleted from the effort of crossing the mental bridge.

The gradual, grinding friction of decompression.

The drive home was always the same: an hour of traffic lights and engine noise. But the commute was less about mileage and more about mental distance. He used the hour to physically shake off the meeting tension, to mentally file away the day's grudges, and to force his face into an expression suitable for family life. The friction was loud a low, grinding sound of forced transition. By the time he pulled into the driveway, he was ready for neither home nor work, just depleted from the effort of crossing the mental bridge.

A heartbeat thought by Christian van Gils

The power felt in the unclicked 'send' button.

She spent four hours crafting the perfect resignation letter: professional, decisive, and final. She detailed the workload imbalance, the toxic culture, and the absolute collapse of her personal life. She proofread it three times, savoring the clean, sharp relief of the decision. She clicked 'Save As' and filed the document in a hidden folder labeled "Emergency Exit." She didn't send it. But knowing that the emergency exit was ready, filed, and perfect, gave her enough immediate power and control to survive one more week. The true function of the resignation wasn't to leave, but to stay on her own terms.
"Manic Monday" by The Bangles: A quintessential song about rushing to work on a Monday morning.

A heartbeat thought by Christian van Gils

The exhaustion of performing recovery.
The Weekend by Michael Gray: A disco-house hit that's specifically about "living for the weekend."

Sunday evening. Her colleague messaged her: "Hope you had a relaxing weekend!" She replied instantly: "It was great, totally recharged!" The reality was she had spent the entire weekend staring at the ceiling, dreading Monday, and feeling profound guilt that she hadn't utilized the time for "self-improvement." The exhaustion from failing to recharge was heavier than the exhaustion from the previous workweek. She realized that the pressure to perform recovery was almost as taxing as the pressure to perform work.

The weight of absorbing a colleague's crisis.

Her desk mate confided in her about his imminent layoff. It was a brief, desperate conversation. She offered comfort and empathy, using the correct, professional phrases. But after he walked away, she felt a profound physical coldness. The news wasn't about her, yet the emotional data the fear, the instability, the injustice had been downloaded directly into her own nervous system. She spent the rest of the day carrying the weight of his unasked-for crisis, proving that emotional proximity in the office is the highest risk of all.

The ritual of self-protection before logging on.

Before opening her laptop, she performed a small ritual: two minutes of meditation, followed by drinking a full glass of water. It wasn't about mindfulness; it was about building an invisible shield. She knew that the moment she logged in, she was entering an arena of urgent demands and emotional turbulence. The small ritual was her only defense a mental barrier to prevent the chaos of the digital world from immediately contaminating her internal state. She needed to be grounded before she could face the onslaught.

A heartbeat thought by Christian van Gils