5 Signs You're Ready to Take the Next Step | Your Trauma-Wise Career Guide Ep 11

5 Signs You're Ready to Take the Next Step

Have you ever wondered if you're truly ready to advance your career after trauma, or if you're just pushing yourself too hard? Trauma-informed career coach Cyndi Bennett reveals five subtle but powerful signs that indicate you're moving from survival mode to genuine readiness for career growth.

What You'll Learn:

• The invisible transition from survival to stability most people miss
• Why traditional career advice fails trauma survivors
• 5 signs you're ready for your next career step: 
  • Energy extends beyond daily survival
  • Can sit with discomfort without derailment
  • Can envision an exciting future
  • Support system feels genuinely supportive
  • Trust your own judgment most of the time
• How to distinguish healing perfectionism from genuine readiness
• Why trauma experience is your greatest professional asset

Perfect for trauma survivors who:

• Feel stuck between wanting growth and fearing they're not ready
• Question if healing disqualifies them from career success
• Need permission to trust their readiness
• Want career advice honoring their healing journey

Cyndi shares her personal recognition moment and why readiness isn't about perfection—it's about capacity.

Key Takeaway: Your trauma doesn't disqualify you from success—it uniquely qualifies you for it. The world needs what you offer now, with all the wisdom your journey has given you.

Timestamps: 00:00 Introduction: Trauma as Professional Asset 00:52 Understanding Readiness in Recovery 01:27 Five Signs: Survival to Stability 04:35 Sign One: Energy Beyond Survival 05:14 Sign Two: Tolerating Discomfort 05:43 Sign Three: Envisioning Future 06:17 Sign Four: Supportive Relationships 06:45 Sign Five: Trusting Judgment 07:23 Overcoming Perfectionism 08:09 Recap and Next Steps 09:05 Personalized Guidance Invitation 10:13 Final Thoughts: Trust Your Readiness

When you're ready, here are 3 ways I can help you grow your career journey:

1. Free trauma-informed career development resources from my website! Visit https://www.cyndibennettconsulting.com for always up-to-date tips.
2. Ready to build a fulfilling career with trauma-informed support? Join The Resilient Career Academy Learning Community, where trauma survivors support each other, share resources, and develop career resilience in a safe, understanding environment
3. Ready for personalized trauma-informed career coaching? Explore my range of virtual coaching packages designed for different stages of your career journey. Visit my website to find the right support for where you are now. [Visit my website: https://www.cyndibennettconsulting.com/1-on-1-coaching]

DISCLOSURE: Some links I share might contain resources that you might find helpful. Whenever possible I use referral links, which means if you click any of the links in this video or description and make a purchase we may receive a small commission or other compensation at no cost to you.

Transcript

5 Signs You're Ready to Take the Next Step | Your Trauma-Wise Career Guide Ep 11

Cyndi Bennett: [00:00:00] Close your eyes for a moment, and imagine this, you wake up tomorrow morning and for the first time in months, maybe years, you're not just surviving your day, you're actually excited about what's possible. Now, here's what I find fascinating, most career advice tells trauma survivors to just push through or fake it till you make it.

But what if I told you that the very thing that makes you different, your lived experience with trauma, is actually your greatest professional asset? What if the skills you've developed to heal and survive are exactly what the workplace needs? There's something beautiful that happens when we stop trying to hide our healing journey and start honoring it as part of our career story.

But here's the challenge, how do you know when you're ready? How do you distinguish [00:01:00] between the voice of your healing and the voice of your fear? Most people think readiness looks like complete confidence, zero anxiety, and having it all figured out. But that's not how trauma recovery works. That's not how real readiness works. What if readiness isn't about being perfect? What if it's about something much more subtle, much more powerful?

Today, I want to share with you the five signs that changed everything for me. The signs that helped me recognize when I had moved from just surviving to actually being ready to thrive. These aren't the signs you'll find in typical career advice. These are the signs that honor your unique journey as a trauma survivor.

I'm sharing this because I believe something profound, your trauma doesn't disqualify you from success, it uniquely [00:02:00] qualifies you for it. But first, you need to know when you're ready to step into that truth.

The world is waiting for what you have to offer, not despite your journey, but because of it. And its time you knew how to recognize when you're ready to share it.

This is Your Trauma-Wise Career Guide.

​Did you know that trauma impacts how we navigate our careers, but most career advice ignores this reality? Imagine feeling confident and safe at work while honoring your healing journey. Welcome to Your Trauma-Wise Career Guide, the podcast that reimagines, career development for trauma survivors. I'm your host, Cyndi Bennett, a trauma survivor, turned trauma-informed career coach and founder of the Resilient Career Academy. If you're navigating your career. While honoring your healing journey, you [00:03:00] are in the right place.

Let me paint you a picture. You're sitting in your kitchen one morning, maybe it's coffee, maybe it's tea, and you catch yourself making plans for next month instead of just trying to survive today. It's such a small moment, but it hits you like lightning. Something has shifted.

This is the problem so many of us face. The transition from survival to stability is often invisible. We're so conditioned to focus on crisis management that we miss the subtle signs of our own healing. We wait for some dramatic moment of arrival, some clear signal that we're ready. But healing doesn't work that way.

In survival mode, everything feels urgent. Every decision, no matter how small, feels [00:04:00] overwhelming because your nervous system is on constant high alert. You're managing trauma responses, navigating triggers, and you're just trying to get through each day. The idea of taking on something new, like a career change, a promotion, or even a new project, feels impossible.

But here's what I've learned, readiness isn't about perfection, it's about capacity. And there are five specific signs that indicate you're moving from survival to stability.

Sign number one, your energy isn't consumed by just getting through each day. When you're healing, you start to notice you have energy left over after handling your daily responsibilities.

I know something had shifted when I found myself having enough mental space to consider what I actually wanted to do with my evening, rather than just collapsing into whatever [00:05:00] required the least effort. You can think beyond today. You have moments of genuine curiosity about new opportunities and decision making doesn't feel quite so exhausting.

Sign number two. You can sit with discomfort without it derailing you. Trauma leaves us with heightened sensitivity to discomfort, but as we heal, we develop greater capacity to tolerate the inevitable discomfort that comes with growth. I realized I was ready when I could feel nervous about something without that nervousness consuming my entire week. The anxiety was still there, that's normal, but it wasn't running the show anymore.

Sign number three, you can envision a future that excites you, even a little bit. During deep trauma recovery, it's nearly impossible to imagine any future, let alone an appealing one. But as we heal, our capacity to [00:06:00] dream gradually returns.

For me, this started small, wondering about that workshop I bookmarked, imagining work that energized rather than drained me. These weren't grand visions, just quiet, "what if" moments, that felt hopeful, rather than overwhelming.

Sign number four, your support system feels genuinely supportive, not just necessary for crisis management. In survival mode, relationships often revolve around crisis management, but I knew things had shifted when my conversations began including my goals and dreams, not just my struggles. When people started asking, what are you excited about, instead of just, how are you holding up?

Sign number five, you trust your own judgment, most of the time. Trauma can severely undermine our confidence in our own decision-making. Moving towards stability means slowly rebuilding faith in our own wisdom. This doesn't [00:07:00] mean never second guessing yourself. It means you can access some sense of what feels right for you, and you've had enough positive experiences of trusting yourself, that it doesn't feel completely terrifying.

But here's where a new problem emerges, even when we recognize these signs, we often don't give ourselves permission to act on them. We think we need to be completely healed, completely confident, completely ready, before we can try again. This perfectionism around healing is just another form of the trauma response.

We are so afraid of being hurt again, of falling again, of not being enough again, that we set impossible standards for our own readiness. The truth is you don't have to be completely healed to be ready. You don't have to have it all figured out.

Readiness is about having [00:08:00] enough internal resources to handle both ordinary daily challenges and additional energy required for growth and change.

So let's recap what we've covered today. You've learned the five signs that indicate you're moving from survival to stability, having energy beyond daily survival, tolerating discomfort without derailment, envisioning an exciting future, having genuine supportive relationships, and trusting your own judgment. You've also learned that readiness isn't perfection, it's about capacity. The very fact that you're considering whether you might be ready suggests some part of you knows you are.

But here's the gap, knowing these signs intellectually is different from having the tools and support to act on them confidently. You might recognize yourself in these signs, but still feel uncertain about what your next [00:09:00] step should be, or how to take it without compromising your healing journey.

If you're ready to bridge that gap, if you want personalized guidance on how to navigate your next career move while honoring your trauma recovery, I invite you to book a free resilient career discovery session with me. In this 30-minute call, we'll assess where you are in your healing journey, identify your specific career goals, and create a trauma-informed action plan that feels safe and sustainable for you.

You can book your session@Cyndibennettconsulting.com. I'll link it in the show notes below. During our call, you'll get clarity on your next steps, tools to manage any anxiety or triggers that come up, and most importantly, permission to trust yourself and your readiness.

If you don't take action on this readiness you're sensing, you might spend months or even [00:10:00] years waiting for a perfect moment that never comes, missing opportunities that could transform not just your career, but your entire relationship with your own capabilities and worth.

Before we wrap up, I want to share something that might surprise you. The moment I knew I was truly ready wasn't when I felt completely confident. It was when I realized I was more afraid of staying stuck than I was of trying and possibly failing. That shift, from being more afraid of the risk than the regret, that's when you know you're not just surviving anymore, you're ready to live again. And your career? It's waiting for you to remember that you deserve not just to survive your work, but to thrive in it.

The world needs what you have to offer, not someday when you're fully healed, but now, as you [00:11:00] are, with all the wisdom and resilience your journey has given you. Trust yourself. You are more ready than you think.

You're not walking this path alone. Every step you take toward a trauma-wise career is an act of courage, and I'm here cheering you on. If today's episode resonated with you, share it with another survivor who needs to hear this message. Together, we're rewriting the rules of career success. Keep rising, keep healing, keep building.