Flourishing Spark ยท 04
The Quiet Drain
A 5-minute reflection: not on how much you carry - on how much of it is yours to care about.
Most leaders read the tiredness as the workload. Often it isn't. It's the distance between what your week rewards and what actually matters to you - and that gap costs more than the hours do. This reflection finds the gap, and the smallest move that closes it.
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A reflection in four steps
Take one ordinary recent week - not your best, not your worst. Last week will do.
The reflection back
The drain was the distance
Notice what just happened. You didn't find a lighter week - you found where the weight was misplaced. The tiredness was never only the volume; it was the hours spent pulling against what you value. That gap is the drain. And a gap is closeable - not by doing less, but by aiming the same energy a few degrees truer.
You don't need a different life. You need a smaller gap - and you've just named where it is, in your own words.
The evidence behind this reflection
What is actually going on: the drain comes from misalignment between what you value and how your days run, and that alignment (self-concordance) is measurable. A few well-established ideas sit under the four steps:
- The gap is the cost, not the load. Wellbeing and sustained energy track less with how much you do than with how well your actions line up with what you value - what researchers call self-concordance. Misaligned effort drains; concordant effort renews.
- Your inner signal is data. What energises or quietly depletes you is information about real needs - autonomy, competence, connection - not a mood to override. Self-determination theory treats it as a signal worth reading.
- Performing a self you don't feel is expensive. A standing gap between what you show and what you feel - surface acting - predicts depletion over time. Authentic leadership begins with noticing the gap, not hiding it.
- A 5% turn beats a grand plan. Change toward what matters works through small, repeatable moves, not one heroic pivot. Direction applied often outperforms intensity applied once.
Drawn from self-concordance, self-determination theory and coaching psychology. Nothing you write here is collected or stored - it stays in your browser.
Go deeper - reading
The Happiness Trap - Russ Harris (2007)
Authentic Gravitas: Who Stands Out and Why - Rebecca Newton (2019)
The Mind of the Leader - Rasmus Hougaard & Jacqueline Carter (2018)
References (APA 7)
Sheldon, K. M., & Elliot, A. J. (1999). Goal striving, need satisfaction, and longitudinal well-being: The self-concordance model. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 76(3), 482–497.
Ryan, R. M., & Deci, E. L. (2000). Self-determination theory and the facilitation of intrinsic motivation, social development, and well-being. American Psychologist, 55(1), 68–78.
Grandey, A. A., & Melloy, R. C. (2017). The state of the heart: Emotional labor as emotion regulation reviewed and revised. Journal of Occupational Health Psychology, 22(3), 407–422.
Hayes, S. C., Luoma, J. B., Bond, F. W., Masuda, A., & Lillis, J. (2006). Acceptance and commitment therapy: Model, processes and outcomes. Behaviour Research and Therapy, 44(1), 1–25.
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A Flourishing Spark · From alexandra-riha.com · Published June 2026
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