We are currently having individual development discussions at work and I am finding myself getting jealous/and or having the thought ‘I should be further in my career’. I’ve expressed to my manager that I don’t want to be a people manager at this time (as I don’t), but then I see colleagues taking on project work in their roles to develop their leadership and various other skills and I get a bit jealous thinking that there may be a time when they surpass me. Also, many people in my team are younger, and I feel with my age and experience I should be in a manager’s position or further along. I also get this feeling when I look at former peers on LinkedIn being promoted to or in higher roles than me. The silly thing is that I don’t want to be a manager! I really want to own my own business as a life coach and that will be my ultimate goal, not being head of a department. But I still get the stab of jealousy feeling like I should be in a higher role. My brain is sabotaging me to feeling jealous, about something I don’t even ultimately want! What am I missing here?

C – Colleagues are developing skills to move up the career ladder
T – I should be further along in my career
F – Frustration
A – don’t take an action, ruminate, think about how I ‘don’t care’ because I don’t want to get higher than my role
R – I don’t get further in my career?? (but I don’t actually want to?)