When Hersey says “We have been traumatized deeply,” she points to a collective condition rather than an isolated diagnosis. Communities shaped by economic precarity, racism, war, or historical exploitation may inherit both the necessity and mythology of overwork, where survival required relentless labor and rest felt unsafe. The result is a cultural memory in which slowing down triggers fear—of loss, of falling behind, of being harmed.
Seen this way, grind culture doesn’t appear out of nowhere; it attaches to older wounds and then reproduces them, turning coping strategies into expectations that harm the next person in line. [...]
