The first thing you need to know stop smoking quietly It’s not really about stopping. Instead, the quitter keeps their job and chooses to do only the bare minimum rather than go above and beyond. The second thing you need to know is that the term is brand new, so everyone is still figuring out the rest. To quote the Oxford English Dictionary In our very online age, Google searches stop smoking quietly were practically non-existent until last August.
But now it’s everywhere. TikToks dissect the concept racked up millions of views, prompting a lot national media electrical outlets publish explanations on the subject. Polling company Gallup found that at least half of Americans– perhaps more so – fits the definition of a quiet stop.
Is this really something new? Many people have criticized the term, saying it is just another phrase for having a job. “At the time, it was called a regular shift” read the first comment, with more than 24,000 likes, on a TikTok. Others have argued that cutting back on work is too risky for women and people of color.
Amelia Nagoski, co-author, with her sister Emily Nagoski, of the book Burnout: the secret to unblocking the stress cycle, thinks the new term is useful, although she is not surprised by the discourse surrounding it. “This is all very familiar to me,” she told me via email. “I’m happy to see younger generations moving away from exploitative work cultures.”
I was curious about the relationship between silent abandonment and the more scientifically established phenomenon of Burnout. Nagoski and I discussed it — and the deeper connection between quitting and a broader campaign for better labor protections — over email.
Our conversation has been edited and condensed for clarity.
Caroline Mimbs Nyce: What do you think is the connection between silent abandonment and burnout?
Amelia Nagoski: I expect that quitting quietly might be part of a lifestyle aimed at preventing burnout or helping someone recover from it. Burnout begins with relentless demands and unattainable goals – those that employers thrive on by squeezing their employees not only for their time and work, but also for their obedience, their humanity, and their souls. Many of these demands are unspoken cultural expectations rather than actual job requirements, and they constitute the bullshit that workers abandon when they quietly quit.
If we don’t let go of the cultural demands that force us to conform in ways that aren’t natural to us, burnout progresses as we worry about the gap between who we are and what we are. supposed to be. When we understand that we will never cross that divide and see that we really don’t want to be the people we are told we “should” be, we are free to understand our worth on our own terms.
NYC: Because it’s so new, I imagine there hasn’t been much research on silent abandonment. But based on what we know about burnout, to what extent do you think it is rooted in psychological phenomena?
Nagosky: We talk about the research on frustration and abandonment very early in the book, because understanding it is fundamental to managing burnout. Basically, when we have unattainable goals, our brain can’t handle them. Our frustration turns to rage until we are finally plunged into despair. We then oscillate between frustrated rage and desperate despair, where we find ourselves stuck in a cycle of I hate this job; They can push it! Oh, no, I have bills to pay and kids to raise, and I can’t just quit, but damn, I want to set this building on fire!!!
And how you get out of this cycle depends on whether or not you can control the thing that’s causing your frustration (the “stressor”). Quitting quietly is a strategy when you can’t control the stressor. The revelation for many people is discovering that they have the opportunity to change the way they approach their work, that they don’t have to burn out. And the hardest part is dealing with the feelings that arise after implementing the change.
NYC: Some people have given up on this term, calling it a misnomer (i.e. you’re still working) or just another term for do its job. How useful do you think the term itself is?
Nagosky: Stop quietly comes from the perspective of people who sell not only their time, but also themselves to their employer. So their experience feels like stop. In this context, the term has a lot of meaning and is useful.
If an incurist person wants to say, “It’s just called ‘doing your job,’ duh,” then that person is missing out on learning something new about other people’s experiences.
NYC: What type of psychological relationship with work would you expect to see in someone who is considering quitting quietly?
Nagosky: If anyone thinks, Quitting quietly could be for me!I would expect that they have, in the past, invested a lot of themselves in their work and feel that part of their self-esteem comes from their contribution to their employer.
Throughout history, workers have found the strength to detach their self-esteem from unreasonable working conditions, to do their jobs without giving in to the pressure to value themselves solely based on their contribution to the economy.
For people who have found meaning and purpose in their work, quitting quietly can be accompanied by feelings of disillusionment, loss, and grief. But the good news is that we can all find meaning in various activities, even if capitalism and work culture tell us that we are lazy if we don’t fully engage in our work.
NYC: Is it realistic for a person to stop caring about their job? Is it easy, in practice, to change your mentality?
Nagosky: Each individual will vary in how easy it is to change their mindset towards work. Once you see the evidence that quitting quietly would be better for you, the real challenge is grieving something you thought was precious, grieving the time and energy you invested in a relationship where you didn’t weren’t valued the way you deserved, and find something new in your life that gives you what you thought (and were told) you would get from your job.
NYC: Your book focuses in particular on burnout among women. Would you expect quiet stopping to be different for women?
Nagosky: Generally speaking, because systemic sexism exists, it is generally assumed that women should and will be caretakers, as their job description says. So I would expect women to face more consequences if they choose to stop doing the emotional labor and intuitive tasks that we so often do without being asked.
Let’s also zoom out to an intersectional feminist perspective, where we can recognize that it’s not just misogyny, but a broad spectrum of bigotry that will make people suffer for protecting their borders. The consequences will be harshest for those who already experience the most prejudice: people of color, those with less access to education, anyone with a disability or living in poverty, anyone who has lost or never had family to provide a safety net due to poverty. being LGBTQ.
NYC: A lot of silent stopping seems to me to have to do with the amount of psychological space we give to work. Do you think that, culturally, we are overdue for a recalibration?
Nagosky: It’s not just that we’re overdue for a recalibration. We are overdue for a revolution.
The psychological space we give to work is not just a choice we make as individuals or even just in our minds. This is a cultural change that must be driven and supported by legislative support. Quitting smoothly is a step towards rational and fair working practices, but not everyone will have this choice. That’s why we say in our book that the cure for burnout isn’t self-care. The cure for burnout is for us all to take care of each other.
