The Competency Trap (I Call It the Capable Override)

Someone pointed me to a term that stopped me cold: the competency trap. I read the definition and thought, oh, they've got a name for my entire personality.

Here's where it comes from. In 1988, two organizational researchers, Barbara Levitt and James March, described how companies get stuck doing what they're already good at. The old way worked, so it feels safe. Better alternatives look worse next to it, mostly because nobody has practiced them yet. So the company keeps polishing the old way, long after it stopped serving anyone. That's the business world's version, and it's about organizations.

I'm applying the same pattern to people. Specifically, to us. Gen X. I call it the Capable Override.

What the Capable Override actually is

We raised ourselves. Key around the neck, house empty, a note on the counter about what to thaw for dinner. Nobody was coming, so we got very good, very fast, at handling it. Competence kept us alive. I'm not being dramatic. It was the job, and we were great at it.

Then we hit about fifty and decided it was time to reinvent. And who shows up to run the reinvention? The same competence. It makes a plan. It sets a deadline. It pushes through exhaustion to prove it can handle this too. Reinvention becomes another job, and it's the worst boss we've ever had. So we either burn out, or we quit and tell ourselves we weren't that into it anyway.

That's the Capable Override. The most capable part of you still makes all the decisions, including the ones about what you want.

Here's the part I need you to hear: this is not a character flaw. It's a survival skill that never got the memo that you survived. It did its job. It deserves a thank-you note, not a firing. We're not going to attack it. We're going to stop letting it drive every single time.

How to tell it's happening

You turned "figure out what I want" into a spreadsheet. With tabs.

You have read four books on reinvention and finished none of them, but you have a very organized reading list.

Someone asks how you're doing and you give them a status update.

You can't rest until the to-do list is done, and the to-do list has never once been done.

You say "I'm fine, I've got it" so fast it beats the question.

If you just laughed and felt slightly caught, welcome. Same here. I wrote that list from memory.

Where to start

You don't start by overhauling anything. Eff that. That's the Capable Override talking, and it loves a big plan.

You start small. The method is called HOME, and it's four steps.

Here. Get regulated, but not for calm. Calm is a nice rumor. The goal is capacity, which means enough room in your system to actually feel what you want without it getting drowned out by the next task. You can't hear a quiet signal in a loud house.

Own. This is where Human Design comes in. It's a doorway that shows you how you personally know what's true. Not how the internet says you should, not how your competence says you should. How you do. Once you know that, you stop second-guessing every decision like it's an audit.

Move. One percent experiments. Not a new life, not a new career, not a vision board with a launch date. One tiny thing this week that's a little more true than last week. Say no to one thing. Take one walk with no podcast. Ask for one favor. Small enough that competence doesn't think it needs to supervise.

Experience. Let the results build self-trust. You do the small thing, you notice what happens, and you collect proof that you can trust yourself without managing yourself. That's the whole payoff. Trust you actually earned, instead of trust you performed.

None of this requires starting over. You've already got the skill. We're just moving it from the driver's seat to the passenger seat, where it can still help with the map.

That's the Capable Override. You've probably been living with it for decades. Now you've got a name for it, which is the first move.

If this landed, get the next one below. I'm writing a book about all of this called Gen X: We're Not Done, and the newsletter is where the good stuff shows up first.

I love you all, as you know.