You Need to DETACH at Work

Summary

In her video, Jennifer Brick emphasizes the power of detachment at work as a means to gain better opportunities, reduce stress, and steer clear of office politics. Drawing inspiration from Samantha Jones of "Sex in the City," she discusses how detachment helps in maintaining boundaries and making objective decisions. Brick argues that detachment allows individuals to separate their identities from their job roles, leading to a healthier work-life balance. By learning detachment, individuals can manage work stress better, enhance their decision-making, and navigate workplace dynamics with confidence and clarity.

Highlights

• Jennifer Brick shares advice on achieving detachment at work for better recognition and opportunities. 📈
• Inspired by Samantha Jones from "Sex in the City," the talk emphasizes secure self-identity and objectivity. 💁‍♀️
• Detachment reduces stress by preventing one from absorbing negativity and drama. 🌈
• Clear work-life boundaries are essential, and detachment helps maintain them. 🚪
• Greater detachment leads to an abundant mindset, making way for career growth and financial stability. 💪

Key Takeaways

• Detachment at work leads to less stress and a more centered work life. 🎯
• By being detached, you can effectively manage office politics and toxic environments. 😎
• Detachment helps in setting clear work-life boundaries, preserving personal space. 🛡️
• A detached mindset can improve decision-making, leading to better career outcomes. 👩‍💼
• Embracing detachment promotes confidence and self-assuredness in workplace interactions. 🌟

Overview

Jennifer Brick dives into the concept of detachment at work, explaining how it helps in fostering a healthier career environment. Inspired by the character Samantha Jones from 'Sex in the City', she explains that detachment doesn't mean apathy but rather maintaining a healthy distance from emotions and outcomes. This mindset not only reduces stress but also enhances decision-making abilities, leading to better career and personal life management.

Brick believes that detachment is key to drawing a clear line between professional and personal life. With examples from 'Sex in the City', she illustrates how maintaining emotional distance can empower professionals to remain unfazed by the daily ups and downs of the workplace. This strategy allows for better management of situations, enhancing one's ability to set and maintain boundaries effectively.

In her analysis, Brick argues that by detaching your identity from work, you create room for personal growth and resilience. She emphasizes the importance of knowing your power, setting boundaries, and constructing a strong self-identity separate from work. Detachment, she suggests, is a powerful tool that encourages an abundant mindset and prepares individuals for both career success and personal contentment.

Chapters

• 00:00 - 01:00: Introduction to Detachment The chapter titled 'Introduction to Detachment' discusses the importance of detachment in professional settings. It highlights that detaching at work can help attract opportunities, gain deserved recognition, and avoid unnecessary office politics. The chapter promises to instruct readers on how to shed insecure behaviors and adopt a more confident disposition. It explains that detachment involves being objective and discerning in various situations. The overall goal is to improve one's career and life by embracing a detached attitude.
• 01:00 - 05:00: Understanding Detachment Through Characters In this chapter, the concept of detachment is explored through the analysis of characters, highlighting the benefits of being detached. The idea is illustrated using Samantha Jones from 'Sex in the City' as a prime example. Samantha is depicted as someone with a strong self-identity, who remains unaffected by external negativity, judgments, or drama. Her character rarely becomes overly attached to people, career objectives, or money. On the rare occasions she does show attachment, she quickly recalibrates to maintain a secure detachment.
• 05:00 - 10:00: Benefits and Examples of Detachment The chapter "Benefits and Examples of Detachment" explores the contrasting attachment styles, focusing on the character Carrie who exemplifies anxious attachment. Carrie is depicted as someone who constantly seeks approval from others, whether it be from the men she dates, her fashion choices, or her professional opportunities. An example provided is her experience at Vogue, where her anxious energy leads to a negative first impression and an unprofessional incident. The narrative conveys the advantages of overcoming anxious attachment, suggesting that detaching from such patterns can bring numerous benefits.
• 10:00 - 15:00: Types of Detachment Detachment at work can significantly reduce stress levels. Detached individuals are not affected by toxic co-workers, project emergencies, or unfair criticism from superiors. They maintain emotional regulation and don't let either criticism or praise impact them excessively, allowing them to handle intense situations without carrying stress.
• 15:00 - 25:00: Steps to Detach at Work In this chapter titled 'Steps to Detach at Work,' the focus is on the theme of overanalyzing situations and letting stress affect one's mental well-being. The narrative uses an example from an episode of 'Sex in the City' where Samantha, unlike others, isn't depicted as someone who tends to overthink or stress about work. Despite this, a scenario is described where her former assistant, after leaving to start her own PR firm, finds herself in a chaotic situation at a big Hampton's party when a firework show begins prematurely. The assistant, overwhelmed and on the brink of a breakdown, turns to Samantha for help, highlighting the importance of maintaining composure and detaching from work stress.

You Need to DETACH at Work Transcription

• 00:00 - 00:30 if you want to attract opportunities get the recognition you deserve and actually stay out of petty office politics you need to detach at work in this video I'm going to teach you exactly how to ditch your desperate insecure Vibes and step into your detached confident energy we'll learn what Detachment is how it will improve your career in life and the simple process to detach at work let's begin with the obvious what is Detachment the simplest definition of Detachment is it's your ability to separate yourself from a situation when you are detached you were objective about how you approach a situation you
• 00:30 - 01:00 were not desperate for a particular outcome and you were not bothered by whatever happens next when you're detached you recognize that you don't have to absorb the negativity the Judgment or the drama that happens around you the perfect embodied example of detached is Samantha Jones in Sex in the City throughout the series we see that Samantha is a securely attached individual with a strong self-identity that is unfaced by other people's opinions and judgments we rarely see Samantha overly attached to a person career objective or money in the few instance where we do see it we see her very quickly reset that Dynamic to her
• 01:00 - 01:30 standard on the other hand we have Carrie who is anxiously attached she chases the men she dates the fashion she wears and approval from others when opportunities come her way she brings a desperate energy to them a very relevant example of that is when she lands a job at Vogue as a freas writer she is so anxious to gain approval she fumbles the first impressions and ends up like this drunk at Vogue which probably brings you to the question why should I detach the reason is simple there are so many benefits to ditching anxious detachment
• 01:30 - 02:00 M and the desperate energy that comes with it let's start with the most obvious benefit when you're detached at work you have so much less stress detached people are not bothered by something their toxic co-workers said or did the latest fire drill in a project or the unfair criticism from their jerk boss just like how they don't let praise and recognition go to their head either being detached allows you to be emotionally regulated in any situation and when things are intense it allows you to leave stress at the door we see that stress carries anxious attachment causes her the series is literally
• 02:00 - 02:30 centered on her complaining to her friends overanalyzing situations and letting people live in her head rent free while Samantha has her moments we don't typically see her scrutinizing conversations or stressing out about work for example there's an episode of Sex in the City where Samantha's assistant quits and starts her own PR form lending a big Hampton's party Samantha had pitched of course things go sideways and an expensive firework show starts hours early her assistant is on the verge of a complete menty be and she begs Samantha to help her Samantha
• 02:30 - 03:00 calmly steps in takes charge and gets people where they need to go okay and she gets a little bit of petty Revenge too this scene also perfectly demonstrates the second benefit of Detachment better decision-making have you ever been in a situation at work where your boss or a more senior leader is making emotionally driven decisions and you know the direction they're taking you in is a downward spiral after helping thousands of people through toxic workplaces one of the most common themes I see is emotionally driven toxic leadership where decisions are feeding
• 03:00 - 03:30 individual ego and not employee or long-term business outcomes when you are detached you're able to see the forest through the trees you're able to step back and be objective about how to solve a problem whether it's time to quit your job and what work to focus on instead of firefighting as we saw in that Hampton's party scene Detachment also enables you to remain and project confidence Samantha's assistant is firmly in Desperate energy not only does this leave her unable to fix a problem she can't influence others Samantha's confidence is what allows her to command
• 03:30 - 04:00 the room it's why everyone in the room does exactly what she says without question which brings me directly to the third benefit of Detachment throughout sex in the cities work life boundaries are blurry both for Carrie and for Samantha of course car's personal life is her career she writes a relationship column based on her romantic relationships and the Romantic relationships of her friends we also see Samantha mixing business and pleasure repeatedly throughout the series from casual encounters with her realtor to committed relationships like with Richard Wright and Smith Jared yet Samantha's Detachment enables her to
• 04:00 - 04:30 maintain clear boundaries even when the water is Muddy she unapologetically prioritizes her boundaries and herself frankly I think the series does her a bit dirty in having strong boundaries where her friends don't under patriarchal structures we're supposed to hate ourselves and prioritize everyone else Samantha disrupts that standard on the other hand we see car's anxious attachment bulldozing boundaries sometimes in the most unhinged ways like the time that she crashed church to meet Big's mom and let's not forget how she stopped do Natasha multiple times there
• 04:30 - 05:00 is one more major benefit of Detachment and this one will make you richer more successful and happier in every area of your life the episode where Carrie runs the math and realizes she has spent $40,000 in shoes but has nothing in her bank account is the perfect example of this type of Detachment with her building going Co-op and The Audacity Of market rate rents in New York City even back then Carrie is faced with her dire financial situation she scrambles of course she's the main character of the show so she lands a high Pang gigot
• 05:00 - 05:30 Vogue she asks her financier or ex-boyfriend for help and expects her friends to lend her money there's one conversation in particular that perfectly encapsulates how Samantha's Detachment allows her to have an abundant mindset about money in addition to work love and everything else needs it you give it you need it you take it Samantha's Detachment allows things to flow easily in the series we see this time and again her PR firm is thriving she gets an apartment in an upand cominging neighborhood and men are plentiful in her life of course the series is from car's POV so we see her
• 05:30 - 06:00 projection as a glamorous writer however Carrie is not a reliable narrator there are several indicators of the truth her column is known but not necessarily well regarded in the eyes of the New York Society she wants to fit in with she's not elegant and that's the nicest way I could say that and of course we see her struggling financially and even her book deal which is the Holy Grail for an author isn't the career breakthrough she wants it to be in the real world the scarcity that anxious attachment creates keeps people stuck in dead end in toxic
• 06:00 - 06:30 jobs accepting bad job offers and struggling being detached enables you to remain open to opportunities to walk away from bad and toxic situations at work and ultimately to trust that the Universe has your back I know you're thinking this all sounds great and samtha really is the best character but before we get into how to detach there is one more thing we need to talk about because if you don't know this you will struggle to detach at work or anywhere else in your life in the examples that I've given you probably noticed something Detachment comes in different forms there are three different types of
• 06:30 - 07:00 Detachment the first is the one that most people think of when they hear Detachment and it's definitely the one that we think of when we think about Carrie and that is emotional Carrie is overly emotionally attached to everything in her life her apartment her clothes and of course her romantic Partners her emotional attachment drives her to you guessed it emotional reactions in the episode I mentioned earlier where she expects her friends to loan her money Charlotte's failure to offer her a loan enrages Carrie she shows up Charlotte's apartment
• 07:00 - 07:30 unannounced to confront her about it Carrie even acknowledges her money messiness and the lengthy amount of time it would take her to pay it back in that confrontation and if you've ever lent someone money you know it's not coming back in addition to this being an example of the lack of boundaries that Carrie has it also reflects her emotionality on the other hand Samantha maintains generally emotionally detached relationships obviously this is prevalent theme in her romantic encounters throughout the series but in general we see Samantha maintain her composure even when we know she's losing
• 07:30 - 08:00 her internally we also don't see her carrying work stress and complaining about the demands of her very demanding job her very ethos is to be unbothered the next type of Detachment is one that we see driving much of car's actions while it's obvious Samantha doesn't give a let's go back to what drove Carrie to get drunk at her first day of Vogue she has an obvious need for approval from others she had an idea of what someone who works for Vogue is like and this image triggers her sense of adequacy which makes her seek an escape
• 08:00 - 08:30 we also see both her approval seeking and internalized inferiority repeatedly throughout her romantic Partnerships with Aiden she learns how to be a dog-loving country girl with big she tries to blend in with high society with Alexander Petroski she tries to become a Chic prian on the other hand samaa's Detachment not only makes her uninterested in the opinions of others she doesn't seek approval from anyone even though is closest to her this is evident in the scene where Richard is interviewing her for that PR contract at his hotel chain in the interview he unfairly holds her personal life against
• 08:30 - 09:00 her she doesn't stand for it she calls out the double standard we know Samantha wants that contract but she maintains a willingness to walk away in the scene that I just mentioned we as the viewers know how that exchange does impact her in the moment but she maintains a detached presence instead of slipping into desperation and that is what ends up Landing her the opportunity which brings us directly to the third type of Detachment and this one is particularly relevant if you are in a toxic work environment or dealing with a difficult boss or cooworker worker this type of
• 09:00 - 09:30 Detachment is the one that we see Carrie struggle with the most and that is situational attachment Samantha is quick to walk away from toxic people and toxic situations even in situations where we know Samantha has a strong emotional attachment like in her relationship with Richard carry on the other hand well the series is almost exclusively dedicated to her chasing after toxic men who do not value her when situations turn toxic car's anxious attachment goes into overdrive instead of walking away she chases I I know a ton of my career
• 09:30 - 10:00 besties have tolerated toxic situations at work and Beyond and a massive benefit of Detachment is being willing and able to walk away from these situations without sustaining a massive amount of damage and even if you have been through a toxic Dynamic and tolerated it for a minute like satha did with her relationship with Richard it does not mean that you need to tolerate it in the future so let's get into the three steps that you can take to actually detach from work the first step to detach a work is something that I have talked about a ton on my channel in fact I have a whole video about it you need to
• 10:00 - 10:30 detach your identity from your job if your self-concept self-worth and self-confidence is all derived from external forces you are more specifically there is an overarching normalization of your professional self becoming who you are people choose career paths and companies and construct entire identities around it it runs so deep that people can't detach from those identities even when they no longer exist just search X Google or xmet on LinkedIn and see how many people def find themselves by their former employer
• 10:30 - 11:00 in Sex in the City car's identity is based on her being a New York City writer what's interesting is in season 6 when she follows the Russian to Paris that identity is dismantled and she's lost there is an entire Montage dedicated to her loss self as she's no longer a writer and no longer in New Yorker we see her desperation to assert her identity through her appearance and B shopping at Dior which lowkey I'm jealous about when Carrie does get a tiny semblance of recognition of her previous identity when she's recognized in Parisian bookstore we see her shift
• 11:00 - 11:30 their validation was necessary to her identity and her sense of self even at the end she needs external validation in order to Take Back Control of her life car's weak self-concept is strongly expose by Samantha we all know that many aspects of the show are extremely problematic first show that was supposed to be sex positive and push the envelope Samantha's lifestyle and Life Choices were portrayed with a lot of Shame Samantha is judged by her neighbors society and even by her friends this isn't to say that it was always easy or that she's always unbothered by others
• 11:30 - 12:00 judgment but through it all we see Samantha's strong sense of self and her Detachment from the standards and opinions of others she is able to detach because she knows who she is what is important and what she wants and she knows she doesn't have to apologize for it Samantha has an incredible sense of self in her goals in both her personal and professional life which we will come back to because she did not achieve that by accident but first we need to talk about the second step to detach without the step Detachment is impossible yet I never seeing it being discussed at least
• 12:00 - 12:30 not in this context have you ever been in a situation at work where a cooworker took credit for an idea or threw you under a bus for something that wasn't your fault how did you feel in that situation a lot of people that I speak with feel powerless if they speak up or push back they feel like their cooworker will get away with their behavior but they will be judged for standing up for themselves sometimes this is because when they have spoken up it has costed them harsh truth you need to hear alert if you have a coworker who is getting away with bad behavior it is because they have established more power and
• 12:30 - 13:00 more influence than you have and I'm not saying that to call you out I'm saying it so that you can do something about it you are not alone in experiencing imbalances of power at work our society and economy is literally built on Power and equity in Sex in the City we know Carrie is not a person in a position of power she wants to be a mover and Shaker but she's intimidated by and defers to people in power positions whether it's dealing with unit of vog or how she navigates her relationships with big throughout the series we see her both being unaware of her power and quick to
• 13:00 - 13:30 give it away and have you ever been guilty of that Samantha on the other hand knows her power and she plays her chips we see this in the very first episode of the series while Carrie meets big first Samantha is the first one to pursue him she is not intimidated by his power position in fact she sees herself as his equal while I don't think it's immediately apparent we increasingly see car's sense of inferiority she gives him complete control in their relationship even though it's incredibly frustrating for her Samantha on the other hand is very very clear on her power she
• 13:30 - 14:00 exchanges both on the socially accepted and taboo power levels she possesses to get what she wants knowing and owning your power at work are game changers this in my opinion is what enables you to actually detach at work you are immune to other people's BS when you have the same or more power and influence when they do and when you put yourself into that power position you are unafraid of bad behavior because your Vibe becomes try me this is one of the reasons why I talk about office politics so much so many people think office politics are dirty tactics and drama that they have to deal with but
• 14:00 - 14:30 that's not what office politics are that's just the approach that people with weak power use Office politics are about owning your power and establishing your reputation relationships and influence at work of course I need to shamelessly plug my upcoming Workshop power moves Mastery here this Workshop is a must attend and it always sells out it's going to help you establish a powerful mindset escape the drama at work and learn the seven power moves to know and own your power at work you can learn more and register at powermoves mastery.com now there is one more step
• 14:30 - 15:00 to detaching at work and this is one that won't just help you at work it's going to help you in every realm of your life it had actually been a few years since I re-watched the whole series so a couple months ago I decided to rewatch starting at season 1 episode 1 and there was something that was undeniable while I was watching it and I feel like no one talks about it throughout the series we get clues about car's dysfunctional family Dynamics for instance on that first day at Vogue episode we learned that car's father abandoned her when she was a child we could psychoanalyze this as origin of her anxious attachment and
• 15:00 - 15:30 Desperation for approval however I digress we also see how car's wounds and insecurities linger she never really gets over her exes at least not the significant ones and we see the insecurities from her past relationships being brought into her present ones well I would kill for car's closet I personally don't aspire to her attachment or emotional maturity level I think that there are a lot of wounds that rule her life she doesn't take a real effort to heal or grow and later in the series the movies and even the new series she hasn't really evolved D or healed but what actually did strike me
• 15:30 - 16:00 the most when I did that recent rewatch is how healed Samantha is her Detachment reflects her emotional and psychological growth she knows Detachment doesn't mean that you walk through life not caring about anyone or anything quite the contrary instead she has strong boundaries she values herself and she makes decisions that align with her priorities even when that means disappointing someone else when we process and heal the trauma we experience in life we liberate ourselves to live on our terms we don't give a what anyone thinks I know that this
• 16:00 - 16:30 is something that so many of you are working towards but you struggle with knowing how to do it so I want you to go watch this video next where I lay out a simple process to do just that I will see you there