By Dr. Abiola Salami
The CEO’s Hidden Hangover: Why Great Achievers Feel Empty After Big Wins By Dr. Abiola Salami, Author of TITLE: Taming the Invisible Toll of Leadership Expectations
Introduction. – The Applause Fades Faster Than We Expect
The ballroom shimmered with light. Cameras clicked, champagne glasses clinked, and the audience rose to applaud the CEO of the Year. Hours later, in her hotel suite, she sat alone, staring at the trophy on the table. Her phone buzzed with congratulatory messages, yet she felt a hollow quietness inside.
That moment captures what I call the emotional hangover of achievement. It is a quiet, confusing dip that often follows success. It’s the uneasy stillness after the spotlight, the whisper that asks, “Is this all there is?”
In my years coaching executives and public leaders across Africa and beyond, I’ve learned that success has a shadow. We prepare leaders to recover from failure, but rarely from victory. We train them to climb, but not to land.
When Success Stops Feeling Like Success
Achievement should feel fulfilling. Yet many high performers admit that the moments after their biggest wins often feel strangely anticlimactic.
Why? Because behind every milestone lies an invisible invoice. The emotional debt accumulated from pressure, isolation, and unrelenting performance expectations.
In TITLE: Taming the Invisible Toll of Leadership Expectations, I describe it this way:
“When you are constantly performing strength, you start renting your peace to your performance. Eventually, your soul will demand a refund.”
That demand often comes quietly through fatigue that no amount of sleep can fix, or through anxiety that surfaces in the calm after the storm.
The Paradox of Applause
The higher a leader rises, the fewer people can understand their fatigue. Applause, while affirming, also isolates. Everyone celebrates the achievement; few understand the emotional price.
One senior executive once told me, “Dr. Abiola, the applause used to energize me. Now it scares me because it means I have to maintain a version of myself that people expect, not who I really am.”
That’s the paradox of applause. It validates you publicly but can detach you privately. You become an icon to others and a stranger to yourself.
The Illusion of Arrival
We grow up believing happiness lives on the other side of success. We think when we get the promotion, when we publish the book, when the valuation crosses a billion. But success is not a destination; it is a transition point.
The danger of the arrival illusion is that once we get there, we expect perpetual joy. Instead, we often meet silence and that silence can feel like failure.
As I wrote in TITLE:
“Leadership is an emotional marathon disguised as a professional role.”
Every finish line simply reveals another stretch of road. Without emotional recalibration, that motion leads to internal depletion.
The Hidden Emotions Behind High Performance
When success begins to sting, it doesn’t always show up dramatically. It appears subtly:
- Irritation at small issues that never used to bother you.
- A strange numbness after major wins.
- Difficulty sleeping despite being celebrated.
- Guilt for feeling ungrateful.
- Fear that your best days are already behind you.
These are not signs of weakness. They are signals of an internal imbalance with your nervous system trying to process an adrenaline withdrawal after prolonged performance pressure.
Neuroscientists call it an emotional hangover. It is a residual psychological and physiological state that lingers after intense experiences. Dopamine, the brain’s reward chemical spikes during achievement pursuits, then drops sharply once the goal is reached. The resulting void can feel like emptiness.
When Achievement Outpaces Identity
I once coached a founder who sold his company for millions. Everyone around him expected celebration. Instead, he told me, “I feel like my purpose retired with the business.”
His achievement had outpaced his sense of identity.
When our achievements grow faster than our emotional capacity to integrate them, the result is fragmentation. Leaders begin living externally, sustaining performance for others while losing intimacy with themselves.
The Courage To Name Your Fatigue
Taming this hangover begins with courage. The courage to admit what’s really going on behind the professional smile. You don’t have to apologize for being human at the peak.
Even Olympians rest after victory laps. High achievers must too.
So before rushing into the next project, pause and ask yourself:
- What emotional cost did this success demand?
- What parts of my joy did I postpone to reach it?
- What version of me have I neglected in the name of achievement?
Such reflection is not indulgence; it is maintenance. It prevents burnout from masquerading as ambition.
A Whisper from Your Inner Boardroom
Every leader has what I call an inner boardroom. It is a sacred internal meeting between purpose, ego, fear, and faith. After every major win, convene that meeting.
Listen to what your inner voice is trying to tell you beneath the noise of recognition.
Sometimes the message is simple: “Rest.” Sometimes it’s deeper: “Redefine what winning means for this next season.”
Either way, the emotional hangover eases when you stop pretending it isn’t there.
An Invitation to the CEO Forum
If this resonates with you. If you’ve ever felt the quiet cost of success that no one talks about, then the CEO Forum during TPP Fest 2025 is a room you belong in.
It’s a confidential, high-trust space where top executives gather to explore what I call the emotional economics of leadership where we obtain insights on how to lead powerfully without losing peace, how to sustain success without sacrificing self, and how to transform expectation into alignment.
At the Forum, we don’t just talk about profits and performance. We talk about the people behind them, the humans wearing the titles, carrying the weight, and taming the invisible toll of leadership every day.
Join us. Let’s continue this conversation face-to-face in a place where authenticity meets strategy, and where great leaders come not to perform, but to recharge.
Truth be told, you can’t lead the world effectively if you’ve lost yourself internally. Reach out to my team to reserve your seat and bring your Csuite Leaders along.
Next week on Taming the Emotional Hangover of Achievement
In Part 2 — The Science and Psychology of Success Fatigue, we’ll dive deeper into why this crash happens. We will explore the biological, psychological, and emotional patterns that turn achievement into anxiety.
Because the truth is, the same system that fuels your climb can sabotage your calm.
And until leaders learn to manage the inner aftermath of winning, even the best external success will feel incomplete.
About Dr. Abiola Salami
Dr. Abiola Salami is the Convener of Dr Abiola Salami International Leadership Bootcamp ; The Peak PerformerTM Festival Made4More Accelerator Program and The New Year Kickoff Summit. He is the Principal Performance Strategist at CHAMP – a full scale professional services firm trusted by high performing business leaders for providing Executive Coaching, Workforce Development & Advisory Services to improve performance. You can reach his team on hello@abiolachamp.com and connect with him @abiolachamp on all social media platforms.
For private coaching, boardroom recalibration, or executive healing strategy, connect email me directly at hello@abiolachamp.com to begin your private Executive Coaching Session.
