I didn't expect this

I didn't expect this

It's been two months since I resigned as Software Engineering Manager at Phreesia. I had been ready for a new challenge. I knew it was time to move on. And yet — it hit me like a brick. An emotional tsunami I wasn't fully prepared for.

The part we don't talk about enough We talk a lot about career pivots, new opportunities, and the excitement of what's next. What we talk about far less is the grief that can come with leaving a place — and more specifically, the people in it.

To me, the most important part of any job has never been the title, the projects, or even the impact. It's always been the people. Getting to support them, watch them grow, show up for them on the hard days — that's what makes work meaningful.

And the day I left, when that finally sank in, I wanted to hide what I was feeling. Even me — someone who openly champions emotional awareness at work and at home — felt the pull to push it down.

Why we hide our emotions at work I think this is more common than we admit. We've built workplaces that implicitly reward composure and quietly discount emotional experience. Employees are expected to "stay professional," and leaders especially feel pressure to appear steady. The result? We often lack the tools to process our own emotions — let alone to hold space for others going through something difficult.

But emotions don't go away when we suppress them. They go underground. And unaddressed emotions in leaders ripple outward in ways we don't always recognize.

Why I wrote Unstoppable I didn't always have the tools I needed to navigate life's harder moments. I've been through transitions, losses, and periods of real uncertainty — and for a long time, I faced them without a real framework for processing what I was feeling or building forward momentum.

I wrote Unstoppable because I wanted others to find those tools earlier than I did.

Over 40 days, the book walks you through practices that are realistic, grounded, and genuinely transformative. It's not a productivity hack or a motivational pep talk. It's a path — one that blends emotional tools, self-awareness, and daily practice into something you can actually build a life around.

Whether you're a leader trying to show up better for your team, someone navigating a major life transition, or a person who simply wants to go deeper into an already meaningful life — I believe this book has something real to offer you.

No other book I'm aware of brings these tools together into one clear, actionable path.

This is my way of reaching more people This chapter closing at Phreesia, as bittersweet as it feels, is also a reminder of why I do this work. Every person I got to support there — and every person I hope to reach through Unstoppable — is part of the same mission.

If you're curious, I'd love for you to take a look: https://jftiger.com/book