LinkedIn Presents.

I'm Maura Aronsmeli, and this is The Anxious Achiever.

We look at stories from business leaders who've dealt with anxiety, depression, or other mental health challenges, how they fell down, how they pick themselves up,

and how they hope work will change in the future.

I'd get panic attacks and anxiety, and I would find myself depressed more than usual,

and I started to equate that to certain personalities and certain coworkers that I'd engage with,

who would start to make me feel that way.

That's a quote from today's guest, Mindinda Hartz, describing the experience of being constantly

triggered at work. After years of facing toxic environments and racial trauma, Minda finally

figured out. It wasn't her. It was them. After years of these kinds of environments,

Minda realized, quote, I don't have to leave my career in someone else's hands, and I don't have to make everything work.

You know, many of us are triggered at work, and we're so used of it, we don't even notice.

Our personal boundaries are crossed, we're shamed, we're micromanaged, stripped of our autonomy,

or plain disrespect it. Workplace triggers

can be small things, like constantly feeling you're being talked over at meetings, or the avalanche

of emails that come outside of work hours. Or they can be larger racial slights like the ones

Minda will talk about today. Let's dive in now to understand a bit more

about how and when work can be traumatic and how we can start healing. Minda Hartz is an author,

an equity advocate, and the CEO of the Memo LLC, a career development platform for women of

color. I started our conversation by asking her

why she ultimately left working in corporate America and what was behind her decision to leave.

It really was just this feeling of isolation constantly, at least where I sat.

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