OFF SCRIPT: The Blue Light Blur #2

Why “just a job” is a lie we tell ourselves

When values have to be explained, something is already wrong

For a long time, I told myself that what I was doing was just a job. Important, demanding, sometimes overwhelming, but still something that could be contained by that label. Calling it a job made the pressure easier to justify. It framed discomfort as commitment and silence as professionalism.

The first real crack in that story came in a place I didn’t expect.

During an Inspector promotion process, I was asked to articulate my leadership priorities. Not organisational ones. My own. I came up with three.

Substance over lip service.

Accountability.

Challenging the status quo.

What struck me afterwards was not the priorities themselves, but the fact that I felt the need to explain them as if they were new ideas. As if substance, accountability, and challenge required justification.

The opening line of my ten-minute presentation made that realisation unavoidable.

I began with, “I am a liar.”

Not in the dishonest sense, but culturally. For much of my career, I had lied about who I was, first to myself, then to the world. I had learned how to fit, how to stay acceptable, how to survive without standing out.

That moment didn’t make me angry. It made me aware. And once awareness arrives, it doesn’t leave quietly.

Competence as camouflage

Throughout my career, competence was my safest currency. Not just being capable, but being reliably excellent. The kind of competence that removes friction for other people. The kind that buys trust, space, and protection.

Over time, that competence became camouflage.

Looking back, I can see a pattern that repeated itself across roles and teams, usually in cycles of around four years.

First, I would watch and listen. Learn the social norms. Stay grey.

Then I would conform. Be visible, but only within accepted boundaries.

Then I would relax. Let more of my personality in.

And finally, I would reach the point where it became too much. Where questions formed. Where decisions, processes, and motives no longer aligned.

At that point, I would move. A new role. A new team. A reset.

At the time, this felt like progression. In hindsight, it was survival.

The extra work I took on, the habit of absorbing pressure that wasn’t mine, the belief that acceptance came from making myself indispensable, all fed the same loop. If I did more, gave more, carried more, I would be safe.

What I didn’t see was how tiring that became, because the exhaustion crept in slowly enough to feel normal.

When it isn’t a job, it’s everything

One of the reasons leaving felt unthinkable for so long was because this was never just a job. It was a career, an identity, a structure, and a source of meaning.

The uniform didn’t just represent what I did. It shaped how I understood myself. How I measured worth. How I interpreted success and failure.

Breaking away from that doesn’t feel like changing employment. It feels like risking the collapse of everything you’ve built. The fear isn’t about uncertainty. It’s about erasure.

That fear comes from institutionalisation. From years of having your identity reinforced, validated, and contained within a system that tells you, quietly but consistently, that this is where you belong.

The idea of stepping away can feel like shattering the narrative that has held your life together.

Neurodivergence, visibility, and quiet extraction

Neurodivergence was easy to dismiss for a long time because it didn’t present the way people expected. The work was internal. The cost was cognitive. The effort invisible.

When I did disclose, the response was often surprise.

“Are you sure?”

“You don’t look like someone with autism and ADHD.”

Those comments weren’t malicious, but they reinforced a familiar message. Difference is acceptable as long as it remains manageable and unobtrusive.

Part of my motivation for speaking openly, and later writing NeuroEdge, came from wanting to make the unseen visible. To give language to experiences that rarely had any.

What I didn’t anticipate was how quickly openness could turn into expectation.

Once I was visible, I became a route. Disclosures were directed my way. Questions landed with me. I became part of the proof that inclusion existed.

I cared deeply about supporting people. I still do. But inclusion without infrastructure quietly becomes extraction. Emotional labour shifts onto individuals, and competence fills the gaps left by systems.

It was never the trauma

Ironically, it was never the operational trauma that pushed me away.

The sudden deaths.

The fatal collisions.

The assaults.

The firearms decisions.

Those were accepted as part of the role. They were difficult, but they were understood. They had context.

What became misaligned was the human element. The politics. The manipulation. The way openness and effort could be leveraged by others for their own advancement, while I was expected to remain calm, compliant, and grateful.

Substance was spoken about. Lip service was delivered. But the values I had named no longer matched the behaviour I was witnessing.

Putting myself forward as an individual began to feel like breaking ranks.

That was the moment leaving became thinkable. Not because I was ready to go, but because I could no longer pretend I hadn’t seen the misalignment.

I didn’t leave then.

But the idea existed.

And once it exists, the story that this is “just a job” becomes very hard to maintain.