The Fixer Mentality: The Urgency Myth, Stress, Control, and Resentment
The Fixer Mentality: The Urgency Myth, Stress, Control, and Resentment
The fixer pattern has its roots in survival. It’s born out of the need to make chaos manageable, to find control when everything feels unpredictable. When you grow up in a world that feels unsafe—whether emotionally, physically, or relationally—your nervous system becomes a finely tuned alarm system, ready to pounce on the next potential problem. It’s not just a habit; it’s a physiological response, reinforced by years of being on high alert.
This survival mechanism becomes a personality trait: the fixer. If you don’t act now, the belief whispers, things will spiral. Urgency becomes the air you breathe. The feeling of “I must fix this” doesn’t come from logic; it comes from the primal part of your brain that thinks your safety depends on immediate action. And, here’s the kicker: it works. At least in the short term. You fix things, get a pat on the back (from yourself, if no one else), and feel that fleeting sense of stability. Dopamine floods in, and your brain stamps the moment with approval: "This. Do more of this."
But here’s the shadow side of being a fixer: it often leads to resentment. Because if you have to solve the problem—if it isn’t a choice—you’re left carrying the weight of “doing more,” of “taking on more,” of inequality. You feel the imbalance but don’t know how to stop it. And because you don’t feel like you have a choice, you start resenting others for what you’ve chosen to do. The irony? You’re really angry at yourself—for saying yes when you wanted to say no, for stepping in when you wanted to step back. But instead of turning inward, the resentment spills out.
This is where resentment becomes a trap. Brené Brown defines it as the experience of envy plus anger—the feeling that someone else has it easier while you’re left holding the bag. But I’d add that for fixers, resentment is the inevitable outcome of living in that “I don’t have a choice” space. You’re not just tired; you’re frustrated. You’re not just overwhelmed; you’re mad. And that anger, if left unchecked, corrodes your relationships and your sense of self.
Here’s where urgency plays its dirty little trick: it warps your relationship to stress. Instead of the low hum of “this is a long-term thing to figure out,” it rewires everything as a right-now problem. It drags the unknown into the present, reframing ambiguity as catastrophe and demanding you act immediately. In the haze of urgency, you lose the ability to see what’s truly important, what’s yours to solve, and what might not even need solving.
So how do you start untangling this? You pause. And I get it—pausing feels impossible when urgency is screaming in your ear. But the pause is where your freedom lives. It’s where you reclaim your agency. When that familiar wave of “this is on me” rises, ask yourself:
Is this actually an emergency? Or am I just uncomfortable with uncertainty?
Am I really the only one who can handle this? Or have I just trained myself to believe that? Are there other people, resources, or systems that could help?
What would it look like to respond with compassion instead of control and pressure?
This pause isn’t just mental—it’s physical. Tune into your body. Where does the urgency live? Is it in your chest? A tightness in your jaw? A buzzing in your limbs? Those sensations are clues, showing you where your nervous system is holding the stress. The body doesn’t lie; it just needs you to notice. Paying attention to these bodily cues can help you become more aware of the automatic thoughts and emotional patterns that fuel the fixer response.
And then there are the stories—the ones running on a loop in the background. “If I don’t fix this, it will all fall apart.” “No one else can handle this.” “I’ll be seen as useless if I don’t step up.” These thoughts are persuasive because they’ve been with you for so long. But what if they’re not true? What if they’re just echoes of an old survival strategy that doesn’t serve you anymore? Acknowledge them gently, without judgment, and redirect your focus to the present.
Breaking this pattern is about more than self-talk or deep breaths. It’s about rewiring the way your brain and body respond to stress. Every time you pause, every time you choose not to act out of urgency, you’re carving a new neural pathway. At first, it feels clumsy, even wrong—like you’re abandoning your post. But with time, it opens up space. Space to respond with clarity. Space to let others step in. Space to let the world be messy without you rushing in to clean it up.
This isn’t about abandoning your fixer instincts entirely. It’s about making them a choice rather than a compulsion. Some things will still need fixing, but not everything. And definitely not by you alone. The more you practice interrupting this pattern, the more you build a life where the fixer isn’t the hero—just another part of you that gets to rest sometimes. And isn’t that what you’ve always needed? A little more rest. A little more trust. A little more freedom.
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*Awareness is knowing what you genuinely want and need.
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*Action is when you are conscious that what you say, do and think are in harmony with your values.
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