This is a very negative way of looking at it. Choosing to be a leader meant I had to give up being an individual contributor. I wasn’t “giving up my inner self”

This is a very negative way of looking at it. Choosing to be a leader meant I had to give up being an individual contributor. I wasn’t “giving up my inner self” or some other bullshit; I was giving up something I loved for something I loved more. There are all sorts of places in our lives where we make these trade offs. We give up being single to enter a relationship; we don’t “give up our inner self”.