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What to do when that inner spark inside you feels like it's fading away.

Why do you feel unmotivated? The answer isn't always clear. Could it be your diet, sleep, a lack of time with friends, not drinking enough water, or some mysterious combination? Sometimes, low motivation manifests as mindlessly scrolling on your phone or struggling to focus after lunch. But sometimes, it runs deeper than that. Ask yourself: Have you ever felt your work energy slowly draining, yet couldn't identify why? You're still capable of basic tasks. You show up on time and complete your work adequately—no one else notices anything wrong. But that inner spark that once drove you—the one that used to burn so bright—flickers and dims with each passing day. You start to feel just like this famous GIF from The Simpsons.

You're not alone. There's a name for what you're experiencing—it's called “quiet cracking”—and according to recent research from TalentLMS, a staggering 54% of employees feel this same squeeze, as if someone is slowly dimming their inner light. Unlike “quiet quitting,” where employees consciously choose to do only what their job requires—nothing more, nothing less—quiet cracking is far more subtle and sneaky. It's not a deliberate choice, but rather a gradual erosion of job satisfaction that happens so silently, you might not even notice the cracks forming. But here's the good news: once you recognize it, you can identify the causes and find the right solution to piece yourself back together. Your unique spark isn't gone forever—it's just waiting to shine again.

What is quiet cracking, exactly?

Think of a slow leak in a tire. At first, everything seems normal—the tire functions and gets you where you need to go. But gradually, that tiny leak deflates the tire until one day you realize you’ve been driving around all this time with a flat. No wonder it’s been so hard. Quiet cracking works the same way with your workplace satisfaction. Quiet cracking is the leak in the tire that is your workplace satisfaction. Or, as the researchers at TalentLMS put it, quiet cracking is “the erosion of workplace satisfaction from within.”

stress, overwork, quiet cracking, employees, dissatisfactionQuiet cracking and burnout are different. Photo credit: Canva

Unlike burnout or quiet quitting, quiet cracking differs from other workplace issues because its symptoms are hard to spot. It's slow, gradual nature silently chips away at your self-worth and motivation. This erosion of motivation, workplace engagement, and well-being can leave you feeling confused, stuck, unheard, and unsure about your future.

For employers who might dismissively ask “Who cares?”, the answer is clear: quiet cracking has been shown to follow a predictable pattern—disengagement leads to decreased productivity, which ultimately results in resignation. Gallup reports that disengaged employees cost the global economy $8.8 trillion annually (nearly 9% of total GDP) due to workplace unhappiness. What was once an individual concern becomes a significant organizational issue—and failure.



7 common causes of quiet cracking

  1. Lack of recognition and appreciation: Like the clip from The Devil Wears Prada demonstrates, when your contributions consistently go unnoticed, motivation begins to slink away. You might work late on projects and pour your heart into your work, yet receive not even a simple “Thank you.” And while employees aren't seeking constant praise, research shows that those experiencing quiet cracking are 68% less likely to feel valued and recognized at work compared to their peers—meaning they need something.
  2. Insufficient training and development: Research shows that employees who haven't received training in the past year are 140% more likely to feel insecure about their jobs. When the company you dedicate 40+ hours to each week shows no interest in your professional development, your motivation begins to wither. Being asked to adapt to new technologies or processes—whether it's learning new task management software or adjusting to increased office time—without proper training is like being thrown into deep water without swimming lessons. Soon, anxiety and confusion spiral, making your entire work life feel overwhelming.
  3. Managers who can't connect and poor communication: Nearly half (47%) of employees experiencing quiet cracking report having managers who are unresponsive and inattentive to their concerns. When these employees vulnerably share their struggles or ideas, they're met with managers who are constantly distracted, dismissive, or unreachable. The crack begins to widen into a chasm.
  4. Unclear expectations: 15% of employees say they don't clearly understand what's expected of them. In today's rapidly changing, AI-adapted workplace, this confusion only makes things worse.
  5. Overwhelming workloads and mounting stress: One of the top three concerns that drive job insecurity is overwork. With 29% of workers reporting unmanageable workloads, it's no wonder that many employees are quietly cracking under the pressure.
  6. Career uncertainty: While 82% of employees feel secure in their current positions, only 62% feel confident about their future at their company. This 20-point gap reveals a profound disconnect: employees are questioning, “Where do I fit in the company's future?” When they can't find an answer, quiet cracking sets in—and motivation vanishes.
  7. Fear and isolation around change: It's a rapidly changing world. A Pew Research survey found that 52% of workers worry about AI's impact on their jobs, while another 32% fear reduced employment opportunities. When change feels more threatening than exciting—and you're facing it alone—that fear gradually corrodes your confidence.

stress, overwork, quiet cracking, employees, dissatisfactionLuckily, quiet cracking is fixable. Photo credit: Canva

How to fix quiet cracking

The good news? Quiet cracking is preventable—and fixable—with the right mindset and approach from management. First, establish what experts call “psychological safety” at work: an environment where people feel comfortable sharing concerns without fear of judgment. This means ensuring they feel truly heard. When a team member opens up to you, give them your complete attention—yes, it's fine to ignore Slack or Teams for a few minutes, we promise—and listen actively to what they're saying.

Recognition doesn't need to be expensive or elaborate. Adults don't expect you to pin their photo to a wall or offer praise without meaning. A simple “nice work” or “I noticed the extra work you put into that report” can make a significant impact. Make appreciation a daily habit rather than a special occasion. For workplace growth, invest in continuous learning opportunities—even brief 15 to 20-minute sessions—regardless of whether some employees say they “don't need them."


If you're personally experiencing quiet cracking and aren't sure how to discuss it, schedule a one-on-one meeting with your supervisor to share your feelings. If you don't have that kind of relationship with your supervisor or don't feel comfortable having this conversation, you can share this article or the original TalentLMS study—it explains why employees experience these feelings and offers constructive steps for managers, all while maintaining a blame-free approach.

Because as Nikhil Arora, CEO of Epignosis, the parent company of TalentLMS, reminds,

“Quiet Cracking may not be obvious at first, but over time it can wear down team energy, connection, and trust. But the solution isn’t complicated. When people feel stuck, unheard, or unsure about their future, that’s when disengagement creeps in. Giving employees space to grow—through learning, skilling, and real conversations—is one of the most powerful ways to turn things around. It not only shows people they matter, but helps them rediscover a sense of purpose and forward momentum, something we all seek at work and in life.”

Yes, quiet cracking affects many of us right now—but there's hope. By being more aware and understanding of each other's struggles, we can create workplaces where everyone feels valued and excited to contribute. The power to make positive change is in our hands.

Imagine a futuristic landscape where gleaming silver spires lined with effervescent lights rise like fabricated flowers from a green, expansive plain, stretching up toward the sun...

Probably not what comes to mind when you think about Africa, huh?

You might be surprised to learn that the second largest continent on the planet is also home to some of the world's most futuristic cities — and there are plans to build even more.


In fact, an estimated 70% of the African population is expected to live in one of these remarkable urban developments within the next decade.

Don't believe me? Take a look for yourself.

Here are five futuristic African cities that already exist, plus six more that are being built.

1. Luanda, Angola

The Angolan capital city of Luanda is already being called the World's Most Expensive City — but as the city grows and grows, people there are also using an expansive mobile phone network to provide quick and easy access to clean water for all citizens, regardless of their income.

Photo via ben sedin/YouTube.

2. Durban, South Africa

That crazy lookin' spaceship below is actually a multi-use sports stadium, and it's only one of the many stunning buildings popping up in the area. The buildings are designed with technology and infrastructure that actively address issues of poverty, crime, and environmental sustainability.

Photo by South African Tourism/Flickr.

3. Ebène Cyber City, Mauritius

The island nation of Mauritius is more than just the basis of a really expensive stamp. The self-contained "smart city" also hosts the internet registry platform for the entire continent, and it boasted high-speed access for all of its citizens well before most other cities in the world did.

Living in Ebène Cyber City is basically like living in a spaceship in the middle of the Indian Ocean that you never have to leave unless you want to.

Photo by Starts/Wikimedia Commons.

4. Kigali, Rwanda

The Rwandan capital is the cleanest city on the entire African continent, which probably contributes to its shimmering, space-like qualities.

And with a population that's expected to triple in the next five years or so, Kigali's ambitious plans for expansion include some impressive sustainability efforts that are both affordable and accessible for people of all incomes and abilities.

Photo by Alex Niragira/Flickr.

5. Nairobi's Financial Centre, Kenya

The Kenyan capital is already being heralded as Africa's Most Intelligent City thanks to its vested interest in creating an integrated, tech-friendly community that connects living and working through and with the convenience of a smartphone.

Recent renovations are turning the downtown financial center into an international destination business hub as well, helping this ecologically sustainable city become economically sustainable as well.

Photo by Msamaria190/Wikimedia Commons.

6. Konza Technology City, Kenya

While we're still years away from seeing the full realization of Kenya's new "technolopolis" — ground was broken on the project in March 2016 — this multibillion-dollar "silicon savannah" aims to be the next big tech industry epicenter of tomorrow.


Rendering via ICT Authority Kenya/YouTube.

7. Safari City, Tanzania

Safari City is just one of several "satellite cities" planned for Tanzania's Arusha region, with a plan to mix affordable and luxury properties in each self-contained urban environment. This will hopefully enable people at every income level to live, work, and play without having to leave their cutting-edge homes.

Rendering via Nhc Tanzania/YouTube.

8. La Cite du Fleuve, Democratic Republic of Congo

This magnificent metropolitan mecca is actually being built on a reclaimed swampland adjacent to the DRC capital of Kinshasa — which might sound weird, until you realize that people are already calling it "the New Manhattan."

But with floating villages already popping up around the country as citizens flee from armed conflicts, building sustainable infrastructures is the obvious next step.

Rendering via Christian Mutombo/YouTube.

9. Eko Atlantic City in Lagos, Nigeria

Another landfill development, the up-and-coming Eko Atlantic City on Lagos' Victoria Island, is being built with plans to house 250,000 people and create 150,000 new jobs as "the new gateway to Africa."

This ambitious housing project will be powered entirely through self-sustaining green energy sources.

Rendering via Urban Lab McGill/YouTube.

10. Hope City, Ghana

In this case, "Hope" is actually an acronym for home, office, people, and environment. With its movie theaters, restaurants, sports centers, university, and hospital, this high-tech hub will actually create twice as many jobs as there is room to live there.

On top of all that, one of those rocket-ship-esque buildings will potentially become the new tallest building in Africa.

Rendering via OBR/Vimeo.

11. Centenary City in Abuja, Nigeria

Though it's still in its earliest stages, the Centenary City project is expected to revolutionize the entire Nigerian economy by creating a world-class urban destination integrated with biometric technologies and optimized for pedestrian, bicycle, and mass public transit.

Rendering via Centenary City Official/YouTube.

While some of these stunning urban centers are still years from completion, it's pretty remarkable to see these futuristic cityscapes take form on the African horizon.

It can be all too easy for us to reduce the African continent to a singular entity of rural poverty, but it's important to remember that there are many distinct, rich cultures spread throughout the more than 50 countries and 12 million square miles of land that make up the continent, and each has its own ideas to offer to the world.

So sure, there are some things to look out for when it comes to any kind of major urbanization projects. But even those are different problems than the ones that we tend to associate with Africa.

That's why these amazing new cities are so remarkable: They represent a chance for these countries to make their mark on the global maps of tomorrow and remind us that the brightest innovations are just around the savanna corner.

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One little change in how you talk to your kids can help them be more successful.

It's so simple, but a lot of people have no idea it's even a thing.

A child looks to the sky with an inspirational pose.

Why didn't anybody tell me this?

When expecting a child, a lot of parents tend to read anything they can get their hands on to figure out what to expect during pregnancy and the first few years of life. They tell you how to feed your baby, how often to take them to the doctor, and how to prevent choking tragedies and all kinds of other hazards.


But very few people are spreading the word about one simple thing you can do to help your child be successful.

Dr. Carol Dweck, a researcher pioneering a shift in how we view motivation in humans, is one of the few evangelizing about how to instill a growth mindset instead of a fixed mindset. Her talk on this was turned into an RSA Animate video. Another public figure trying to spread the word is Sal Khan from Khan Academy.

The quickest way to explain what it means to instill a growth mindset is: Praise your child explicitly for how capable they are of learning rather than telling them how smart they are.

For instance, here are how some conversations would play out to instill one type of mindset over the other:

FIXED MINDSET: "You read that sentence in the book — you are so smart!"

GROWTH MINDSET: "You read that sentence in the book — you worked so hard to learn how to do that and now you can! Congratulations!"

FIXED MINDSET: "You finished that puzzle so quickly — what a smart kid!"

GROWTH MINDSET: "I'm sorry I wasted your time with an easy puzzle — let me find another one that will give us a bigger challenge. I know we can do it!"

FIXED MINDSET: "You got an 80% on your test." (And then moving on to the next chapter immediately.)

GROWTH MINDSET: "You got an 80% on your test; that means you are well on your way to knowing this stuff! If you review the ones you missed and take the test again tomorrow, I bet you'll get closer to a 100%."

reading, mental health, academies, testing

A woman takes time to read with a young boy.

Photo by Adam Winger on Unsplash

It's a subtle shift in messaging, but the difference it makes can be huge.

When you change your approach to praise, you're changing the achievement marker (reading a sentence or getting an 80% on a test) from a value judgment on the inherent intellect of the child to a series of messages throughout your child's life that instead places value on the process of learning.

It means a child's self-worth and confidence in trying things for the first time doesn't become tied to how well they can immediately perform or how inherently smart they are because they know they have more than one chance to prove themselves.

This isn't just a theory or some New-Age hippie-dippie parenting trend.

Through field research with a class of seventh graders, Dweck has begun proving that a growth mindset can make a significant difference. She and her team tracked a group of kids who entered their school year with almost identical test scores and noted which kids displayed growth mindset attitudes at the beginning and which ones held the beliefs of a fixed mindset.

Check out how the kids' grades fared over two years:

The top line is for the kids with the growth mindset, and the bottom line is for the kids with the fixed mindset.

testing, students, environment, grading,

A healthy mindset has measurable, positive affects on a student.

Image pulled from YouTube video.

Why such a clear difference, though?

As Dweck explains in the RSA Animate video:

"We measured their mindsets — we saw whether they believed intelligence was fixed or could be developed. … They had entered seventh grade with just about identical achievement test scores. But by the end of the first term, their grades jumped apart and continued to diverge over the next two years. The only thing that differed were their mindsets. ...

They had completely different goals in school. The number one goal for kids in the fixed mindset is 'look smart at all times and at all costs.' So their whole lives are oriented toward avoiding tasks that might show a deficiency.

But in a growth mindset, where they believe intelligence can be developed, their cardinal rule is 'LEARN at all times and at all costs.'"

How early should you start instilling a growth mindset and is it ever too late?

entertainment, activities, kids, education

I'm not immune to looks like this as an adult either.

Photo by Hunter Johnson on Unsplash


Khan Academy's Sal Khan says it's never too early and it's never too late. He's passionate about providing resources to all children so they can learn, but he realizes that they only use the resources if they're excited and empowered to believe they can learn.

There are a couple of ways you can go about promoting a growth mindset, as Khan tells Upworthy:

A growth mindset can be instilled from the beginning.

"I think you can start from as soon as they can understand language. I think children naturally have a growth mindset. What I think happens very early, and maybe earlier than the school system is we project onto our kids where we say, 'Look she's so smart, she did that,' and that can be good positive reinforcement but it has a risk of the child getting addicted to that type of feedback so they don't want to take a risk where they might not get that feedback...or they don't want to shatter their parents' perception of them being smart."

And it can be practiced and introduced in later years, too.

"It gets a little harder but you can. Everyone has a growth mindset about some things and a fixed mindset about other things. I might have a growth mindset already about math or science or academics because I've experienced it multiple times and know that if I struggle, that the pain will pay off. But in basketball, as a kid, I probably had a pretty fixed mindset. I didn't touch a basketball until I was 11. [I thought] 'All the other kids are so much better, I'm never going to be [like them] ...' I had a fixed mindset but it was only in high school that I thought ... if I go out there and keep practicing and put myself out there and take myself out of my comfort zone ... and it pays off."

Whether you are a parent or plan on being one, are a teacher or a learner, or maybe even if you just struggle with impostor syndrome, this video may be the key to unlocking potential you've been feeling blocked from.

You can learn anything. Spread the news.

Watch Dr. Carol Dweck's RSA Animate video below:

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Tennis legend Andre Agassi is trying to teach kids to read in a new, very fascinating way.

He may have retired from tennis nearly a decade ago, but his passion for education remains strong as ever.

Tennis legend Andre Agassi spent his 21-year career schooling opponents on the court.

In that span, he and his unstoppable backhand shot took home 60 titles — eight of them Grand Slams. It's no wonder he's considered one of the greatest players in the history of the sport.

Andre Agassi during the 1988 U.S. Open Tennis Championship. Photo by Mike Powell/Getty Images.


In 1994, he created the Andre Agassi Foundation for Education.

Since its beginning, the group — which began as the Andre Agassi Charitable Foundation — has raised more than $180 million to put toward educational endeavors, opening the Las Vegas-based charter school Andre Agassi College Preparatory Academy in 2001.

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In an interview with People magazine, Agassi explains that his passion for education came from his own lack of one. When he was 13, he was pulled from regular school and sent to a tennis academy. While he found massive success on the court, he couldn't help but wonder what his life would have been like had he not.

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"I didn't have a choice in my life," he told People. "I just focused on tennis. And the thought of what would have happened had I not succeeded was kind of overwhelming."

Agassi during a tour of his foundation's school in 2010. Photo by Sam Morris/Getty Images.

Understanding the basics of language at an early age is key in preparing students for long-term success.

Educators around the world agree: Early years in a child's development are crucial to eventual mastering of language skills. At a young age, children's brains are more sponge-like than ever, making it so important to make the most of the brain's unique ability to develop new skills during this time.

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What we're seeing is that startling number of kids across the country can't read at grade level. And that's why the Agassi Foundation's latest endeavor has them looking to a unique solution to this all-too-common problem by making the most of early brain development.

GIF via Square Panda.

Agassi teamed up with Square Panda, a startup that makes innovative, multi-sensory tablet workstations for students.

Square Panda was founded by Las Vegas entrepreneur Tom Boeckle, who points to his own childhood dyslexia as his passion fuel, inspiring his goal of creating something to save other children from the same embarrassment and frustration he experienced as a child.

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The company's core product is the Panda Playset, and Agassi says he believes it will revolutionize how kids learn to read, telling USA Today, "This is a perfect way to lead a kid into those early years of development that gives them a chance at a much better education."

Here's the Playset interface in action. GIF via Square Panda.

The Playset is what's called an "adaptive system," meaning that it tailors itself to the child.

It grows with the child, helping them learn how to differentiate letters and learn the mechanics of creating words through a multi-sensory experience. It's really cool.

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As various studies have illustrated the benefits of multi-sensory learning — especially during early brain development and especially when it comes to language skills — it seems like there's quite a bit of science to back the Playset's core premise.

Another look at the Playset in action. GIF via Square Panda.

Will this partnership be the education-redefining innovation Agassi hopes? We'll have to wait and see.

In the meantime, it's great to see that there are people seeking out new ways to teach the pillars of education.