When I stepped away from my clinical practice, it wasn’t because I didn’t care. It was because I cared deeply—about my patients, my colleagues, and the future of medicine. I didn’t leave to escape. I left to help heal the culture that was quietly breaking so many of us.

You can love medicine and stop seeing patients. You can love medicine and change the way you see patients. Choosing to follow your heart, your gut, and your deepest callings is a compassionate, courageous, and powerful act.

Before I stepped away five years ago, I spent decades doing what good doctors do. I worked hard. I gave it my all. I practiced pediatrics for over twenty years. I had a thriving practice with patients who loved seeing me. I led productive teams. I opened thriving clinics. I designed and led trailblazing physician wellness programs. I showed up for everyone.

On the outside, everything looked fine. On the inside, something didn’t feel right. There was no dramatic collapse. I had already worked through burnout. I still enjoyed my patients. I had administrative time. I found meaning in my leadership work. The problem was more a gnawing. I was no longer working and growing at my full potential. I was wilting in roles that no longer fit who I had become.

When staying starts to feel like shrinking, it’s time to change. Longing for something different isn’t weakness—it’s wisdom.

Everyone around me assumed I would stay the course. My patients, colleagues, and family depended on me. My identity was entwined with being a pediatrician and a leader. What I didn’t realize is that I was already disappointing them—and myself—by not bringing my full self and true strengths to the table.

As physicians, we’re trained to ignore our own needs. To trust evidence more than intuition. To delay joy, carry heavy burdens, and define a “good doctor” by how much we’re willing to struggle.

How I made the leap

I didn’t plan to reinvent my career. I simply started getting coached while still practicing. Coaching gave me clarity. It helped me realize that yoga teacher training and coach training weren’t indulgences—they were lifelines. Tools for sustainable change.

Combined with my decades in wellness leadership, I came to understand something essential: Mindfulness and coaching aren’t luxuries. Mindset and mindfulness tools are nonnegotiable for a healthy, fulfilling career in medicine. They returned my energy, creativity, and clarity. Like Kintsugi, they mended the broken parts of me with gold. They reconnected me to what made me come alive.

I ultimately left my practice to follow a calling I had been discovering over years as a Chief of Physician Health and Wellness: To change the culture of medicine into one that is healthy, sustainable, and truly caring.

Three years in, my husband left his law practice to join me full-time. He was inspired by the impact of what I had built and suggested I hire him. Instead of arguing for a living, he now brings culinary medicine to our retreats and provides legal support for our growing business.

We moved to a small farm in Northern California—a place we purchased intentionally as a sanctuary for rest and renewal. A space for quiet revolutions. We began hosting physician retreats. Coaching, mindfulness, nourishing body, mind, spirit and soul, and honest conversations were the foundation.

A participant once said, “What you’re doing here is a metaphor for how to fix medicine.” At first, I brushed it off. But I’ve come to believe it’s true. We didn’t set out to fix the system—but by creating spaces for physicians to reconnect to themselves, we’re helping medicine heal from the inside out.

Why pivots feel so difficult in medicine

The cost of being a “good doctor” doesn’t have to be your well-being. And yet, that’s the message so many of us absorbed. We were conditioned to give until we’re empty. To stay the course. To overfunction and wear exhaustion and depletion like a badge of honor.

• In medicine, martyrdom is celebrated.
• Rest is considered weakness.
• The idea that medicine could feel aligned or nourishing is usually met with skepticism.

Time and again, I meet physicians across every specialty, at every stage of their careers, longing for something more. Peace. Purpose. Presence. Passion. This desire doesn’t make us selfish. It makes us human.

We weren’t taught to trust ourselves. We undervalue creativity. We try to do it all alone. Alignment doesn’t come from sacrifice. It comes from presence, trust, and sustainability.

You don’t need a perfect plan. You simply need a clear intention and the courage to begin. Change isn’t about abandoning medicine. It’s about realigning with what matters. Longing for change is not a liability. It’s often a sign of health.

When you’re already successful, change feels riskier. We usually have to give up structure, status, and predictability. You can be good at something—and still decide to leave it. You can enjoy it—and still know it’s no longer yours to do.

Success doesn’t come from self-doubt. It comes in spite of it. Letting go of self-doubt and learning to trust yourself isn’t arrogance. It’s a strategy for excellence. A sustainable one.

I made the leap only after nourishing my nervous system. I got coached. I practiced yoga and mindfulness. I took a pause. I reset. Instead of saying “One day,” I finally said, “Day one.”

What I do now

I still see myself as practicing medicine—but in a different form. I coach, write, teach, and lead retreats. I offer tools I wish I had a decade ago. I help physicians reconnect to themselves and their purpose. This is still healing work. This is still medicine. It just fits me better.

If the white coat—or the culture of medicine—no longer fits, it may be time to discover a new way to serve. One that aligns with your gifts, your humanity, and your wholeness. Craft that change not from obligation or fear, or catastrophizing, but from presence, purpose, and possibility.

When even one physician chooses to make a change from a place of courage and clarity, the entire profession begins to heal. Physicians can be the steady ones. The well-lit lighthouses. The healers who choose to stay whole. When even one physician chooses healing, medicine begins to heal too.

Jessie Mahoney is a board-certified pediatrician, certified coach, mindfulness and yoga teacher, and the founder of Pause & Presence Coaching & Retreats. After nearly two decades as a physician leader at the Permanente Medical Group/Kaiser, she stepped outside the traditional medical model to reimagine what sustainable well-being in health care could look like. She can also be reached on Facebook and Instagram.

Dr. Mahoney’s work challenges the culture of overwork and self-sacrifice in medicine. She helps physicians and leaders cultivate clarity, intention, and balance—leveraging mindfulness, coaching, yoga, and lifestyle medicine to create deep and lasting change. Her CME retreats offer a transformative space for healing, self-discovery, and renewal.

As co-host of the podcast, Healing Medicine, she brings self-compassion and presence into the conversation around modern medical practice. A sought-after speaker and consultant, she partners with organizations to build more human-centered, sustainable, and inspired medical cultures.

Dr. Mahoney is a graduate of Dartmouth College and the University of California, San Francisco, School of Medicine.