The Empty Underground Garage: A Metaphor for High Performers

Imagine it: You descend the ramp. The concrete yawns wide. Fluorescent lights hum. There are no cars, no footsteps. Just you, and a cavernous space meant to hold movement, now still. If you’ve ever felt this image in your bones rather than your eyes, this article is for you.

A lone sports car parked in an empty underground garage, illuminated by a single overhead light.

As a psychotherapist who works with high performers, I see versions of this scene all the time. In fact, many of my clients bring something like this into therapy without realizing it. Not as a dream—but as a lived experience: a sense of being parked underground, invisible, and working harder than most know just to find the exit.

This metaphor isn’t merely poetic. It's psychological. And for driven professionals navigating midlife transitions, reinvention, or burnout, it may resonate more than we admit.

The Architecture of the Inner World

In social psychology, our environments don’t just reflect our internal states; they shape them. An underground parking garage is built for transition—a place you pass through. But when high performers spend years "parked" in hyper-functional mode, that in-between state can become permanent.

The garage becomes a symbol of suspended identity. You’re not where you started, but not quite where you're going. It feels temporary, but lasts.

This is the psychological holding pattern of many high achievers. Especially those who are:

• Returning from parental leave and unsure how to re-enter with confidence

• Contemplating a second act after success in Act One

• Feeling a dissonance between outer accomplishment and inner depletion

Lonely at the Bottom: Isolation and Invisible Labor

Community psychology reminds us that meaning and well-being don’t exist in isolation. But in performance culture, we’re often rewarded for doing things alone. For figuring it out without help. For staying late in the underground garage, so to speak, while others have long gone home.

That image of a quiet, empty structure? It often represents the reality of invisible labor—especially for those whose identities intersect with gendered or racial expectations of competence and self-sufficiency.

Psychologist Valerie Young calls this the "imposter cycle": over-preparation, achievement, discounting success, then doing it all over again. CBT helps us track these patterns, but context matters too. Sometimes you’re not failing to thrive; you’re just alone in the garage.

Cognitive Distortions in Echo Chambers

In the silence of the empty underground garage, your thoughts get louder. If you’ve internalized beliefs like:

“I can’t afford to slow down"

“If I don’t do it, no one will”

“Rest is weakness"

…then you might be mistaking survival strategies for personality traits. CBT teaches us to identify and reframe these distorted beliefs. But reframing is not just about thinking differently; it’s about connecting differently—to self, to others, and to meaning.

Emergence: What Happens When You Surface

In mythology, descents into the underworld are always followed by emergence. But here’s the catch: no one emerges without confronting what they found underground.

For high performers, this means asking:

• What have I buried in the name of competence?

• What do I truly value, outside of achievement?

• Who am I becoming, if I let go of the version of me who clawed my way up?

These are not questions to answer in a productivity app. They require reflection, sometimes grief, and often therapeutic support.

The Garage is Not the Problem

The garage is not a failure. It’s a message. A liminal space between roles, expectations, and identities. But staying there too long without surfacing can quietly erode your well-being. Especially in midlife, when the urgency to align your outer life with your inner self gets louder.

In my practice, I work with professionals who are high-functioning but quietly struggling. They’re asking better questions. They’re ready to reclaim pace, purpose, and psychological flexibility.

So if you recognize the garage—its silence, its shadows, its weight—you’re not alone. It might be time to surface.

Further Reading & References

Tavris, C., & Aronson, E. (2020). Mistakes Were Made (But Not by Me). Mariner Books.

Young, V. (2011). The Secret Thoughts of Successful Women. Crown Business.

Bandura, A. (1986). Social Foundations of Thought and Action. Prentice-Hall.

Beck, J. S. (2011). Cognitive Behavior Therapy: Basics and Beyond. Guilford Press.

Sarason, S. B. (1974). The Psychological Sense of Community. Jossey-Bass.

Dr. Meagan Yarmey, PhD, MA, MSW, RSW, is a Toronto-based psychotherapist specializing in high performers, identity reinvention, and midlife transitions. She works at the intersection of mental health and career development.