Always On, Always Anxious: Learning to Take Small Risks at Work

If you’ve ever felt a tight knot in your chest as the clock creeps toward 6 p.m., you’re not alone. For many of us, the anxiety doesn’t come from the work itself but from the constant, unspoken expectation that we should always be on. Always available. Always ready to respond to that Slack message or email ping the moment it arrives.

You may feel you have to earn every minute of your salary by sitting at your desk from 9 to 6—even if you’ve already finished your work hours ago. You catch yourself measuring your value not by what you accomplish, but by how visibly “present” you are. The thought of signing off a little early or stepping away in the middle of the day feels almost unthinkable.

That’s part of the trap. You’re so used to this state of vigilance that it doesn’t even register as a choice anymore. You tell yourself you’re just being responsible or professional. But what’s really happening is that you’ve stopped recognizing how much of your behavior is driven by fear. Fear of looking uncommitted. Fear of losing credibility. Fear of disappointing people who may not even notice you’ve stepped away.

This is why the idea of taking even a tiny risk—like leaving at 5:45 instead of 6—can feel so threatening. It sounds dramatic to call it a “risk,” but for many of us, that’s exactly what it is. You worry that the moment you ease up, everything you’ve worked for will collapse. That you’ll be criticized, excluded, or branded unreliable.

So you double down on over-functioning. You keep proving yourself by always being responsive and always being “on,” because you’ve learned to equate that with safety. And ironically, the longer you do this, the harder it becomes to imagine any other way to work.

But here’s the thing: Most of the time, nothing happens when you step away. The world doesn’t shatter. The people who rely on you still trust you. Sometimes, they respect you more because they see you setting boundaries instead of operating in constant anxiety.

If you’ve been stuck in this cycle, you don’t have to start by taking huge leaps. You can practice experimenting with small, intentional risks that remind you you have agency:

• Leave at 5:45 once this week, even if it feels uncomfortable. Notice what actually happens.

• Start your day at 9:30 if you don’t have early meetings, and see if anyone even notices.

• Don’t reply to non-urgent emails after 6. Tell yourself you’ll get to them tomorrow—and then follow through.

• Take your lunch away from your screen, even if you feel “unproductive.”

You don’t need to be reckless. You just need to prove to yourself, little by little, that your worth isn’t defined by constant vigilance. That you can show up, deliver great work, and still have space for your own life.

Over time, these small experiments will teach you that most of the risks you feared aren’t really risks at all. They’re just boundaries—healthy ones that let you be a more effective, resilient, and fulfilled version of yourself.

And the more you trust yourself to step away, the more you’ll realize you don’t need constant validation to feel worthy. You already are.