I listened to an episode of Paul Millerd’s Reimagine Work podcast, where he talks through someone’s thought process six and three months before quitting a job.
The whole episode is very insightful, but one passage that stuck out touched upon how weird it is that, though we can depend on others for help in hard times, asking for such help tends to come with a deep sense of failure.
“Full-time paid knowledge work is a very, very unique setup in history. People are making enough such that they almost don’t have to rely on any relationships to get their needs.”
Coming from Latin America, I remember finding it notable that it was the norm in suburban America for each family member to have their own car. Not so much because of the opulence (that too) but mostly because of the sense (palpable in my high school) that needing a family member to give you a ride already made you a loser.
The expectation of self-sufficiency, beside all its other environmental and psychological implications, translates into the workaholic mindset, where you must do it all for yourself.