We usually talk about "quiet quitting" in the context of the workplace—an employee who checks out mentally, stops putting in extra effort, and simply does the absolute minimum to avoid getting fired.

But quiet quitting doesn't just happen at the office. It happens at the dinner table.

Men are conditioned to be fixers.

When a pipe leaks, you trace the line and patch the joint. When a customer flags an invoice issue, you reconcile the balance and clear the ticket. You identify the fault, apply the mechanics, and mark the problem resolved.

It’s an efficient mindset for the physical world—and a total disaster for long-term mental health.

When men think about the things that scare them, they usually list concrete, external threats: financial instability, career failure, or physical harm. But in my practice, the deepest, most pervasive fear I see in men is a different kind of HPV.

I’m talking about the fear of feeling Helpless, Powerless, and Vulnerable.

Physical injuries are visible, objective, and immediately understood. But when the injury happens to a man's mind, we treat it entirely differently. We call it an "illness."

An illness implies a personal vulnerability or a systemic sickness.

An injury, however, implies that a healthy system took a massive hit from an external force. If we started treating psychological trauma as an injury rather than a mental illness, the road to recovery would look completely different for men

We are conditioned to believe that a successful story only has one ending: the long, unbroken line that lasts until retirement or death.

Under this rigid framework, anything less than forever is automatically categorized as a failure.

But here is the reality we work on: a marriage or a job can end and still be completely successful.

When a man hits a wall in his life, his first instinct is rarely to book a session with a professional. Instead, he tries to handle it internally, or he does what most of us do: he leans on his immediate circle. He talks to his buddies over a beer, asks a trusted coworker, or confides in a family member.

Support from friends and family is invaluable for connection, but when it comes to executing a major life shift, you don't need a committee. You need someone who knows the way out.

There is a common trap that many men fall into as their long-term relationships mature. They work hard to build a life of safety, stability, and predictability. They focus on securing the home, managing the career, and showing up for the kids.

But often, in the pursuit of building a secure foundation, an unintended sacrifice is made: desire.

When a man sits across from me in the throes of divorce, or after selling his company, suddenly no longer needed at work or at home, he realizes he's spent a lifetime ignoring what he actually wants.

He built his entire identity around being needed by others and never asked: What do I want? What makes me feel alive?

You've been told your whole life: Don't be that guy who flies off the handle. Don't embarrass your family. Don't lose control. Push it down. Be safe.

You think you're doing the right thing. You're not being aggressive. You're not making scenes. You're not that guy who can't control his temper. You're being responsible, mature, safe.

But here's what's actually happening: You're trading anger for depression.

You're sacrificing too much for work. And deep down, you know it.

The boundary between work and life has disappeared, and you've let it happen.

None of this sacrifice will matter in the end.

You're carrying anxieties you won't share with your partner.

Whatever it is, you're keeping it to yourself. You don't want to burden her. You think you should be strong instead of vulnerable. After all, you tell yourself, we don't need both of us falling apart.

But here's what's actually happening:

Your silence isn't protecting your partner. It's creating distance.

Your relationship has become a logistics operation.

You and your partner coordinate schedules, manage kids' activities, discuss household repairs, plan vacations, and make decisions about a thousand practical things. You're busy together, but you're not actually connected.

When was the last time you had a real conversation?

Your partner had an affair. Or you did. And your world has shattered.

The betrayal feels absolute. The pain is excruciating. The questions are relentless: How could this happen? Why wasn't I enough? How could they do this to me? To us? To our family?

And underneath all those questions is the assumption that drives most of the pain: They turned away from me. They rejected me. They chose someone else because I wasn't good enough.

Your mind races with work-related thoughts when you're trying to sleep. You replay conversations, worry about upcoming presentations, or mentally solve technical problems. 

Sleep becomes elusive, and the exhaustion compounds the next day, making it harder to manage stress and emotions.

You hold yourself to impossibly high standards. Your code must be flawless, your work output exceptional, your ideas brilliant. Any mistake feels catastrophic, triggering shame and self-criticism. 

Perfectionism masquerades as excellence and ambition, and it’s a trap that limits your growth, damages your mental health, and paradoxically reduces your effectiveness.

You've stopped going the extra mile. You're no longer volunteering for projects, staying late to solve problems, or thinking about work during weekends. You do your job, but nothing more. 

Quiet quitting is your way of reclaiming your time and energy, yet you may feel guilty about it or worry about your job security.

Remember the early days of your career ?

Those were heady times when you loved solving problems, learning new technologies, and launching new products and features. But somewhere along the way, that spark dimmed and projects started to feel more like tasks.

The loss of motivation is not a character flaw but an important signal that something needs to change.

Are you unable to leave work at work, on your laptop late into the evening not because of urgent deadlines, but because it’s easier than dealing with the rest of your life? 

Work can become a refuge from personal struggles, failed relationships, or an empty apartment. 

There are clear signs of burnout among tech professionals.

The tech industry's culture of constant innovation, relentless deadlines, and always-on availability creates a unique breeding ground for mental health challenges that affect even the most resilient professionals.

I have created a list of the 5 most common warning signs that your job might be impacting your mental health, relationships, and career.

Power to is much better than power over.

But most men don't know the difference. And that confusion is creating a painful double bind.

Our relationship to power depends on whether we're wielding it or experiencing it. For men, power can feel like both a birthright and a trap. Society tells us to be powerful, to take charge, to be in control. But the same society condemns us when we use that power in ways that feel controlling, dominating, or oppressive.

So we try to do the right thing. We rein it in. We make ourselves smaller. We go along to get along. We downplay our opinions, soften our presence, apologize for taking up space. We try to be less intimidating, less domineering, less of what we're afraid others see when they see a man with power.

We trade one problem for another—from potentially abusing power to abandoning it altogether.

The question haunts us: How can I be strong without alienating the people I care about?

The balance feels elusive, and the fear of getting it wrong keeps us playing small.