Little Earthquakes

by Annalisa Holcombe, Founder & Principal Consultant of Connection Collaborative

Tell me about the moment the ground shifted under you. Was it loud, or was it quiet? 

Did anyone notice but you? What did you feel in that moment—panic? Clarity? 

Did something inside you whisper, This isn’t it—even if you weren’t ready to act on it yet? 

I’ve been thinking about these kinds of moments a lot lately. Because I think we’re living through a season of them—personally, collectively, culturally. And while the world feels full of noise and volatility right now, what I’m noticing most aren’t the explosions. 

It’s the tremors. 

The subtle shifts. 

The little earthquakes. 

In times of national reckoning (in my life that was after 9/11, and in the earliest days of the pandemic), I’ve watched people take stock of their lives in a way that feels different. They strip things back to the essentials. They ask: What really matters? What am I still holding onto that no longer fits? And then, slowly or all at once, they begin to change. 

I think we’re in another one of those times. 

Last week, I sat with two women in leadership who shared something I’ve been feeling too. One said, “I finally have a seat at the table. And it’s hollow.” The other told me, “I don’t even know what I want anymore. But I know it’s not this.” 

Those weren’t breakdowns. They were breakthroughs. Not external rebellions—but deeply personal uprisings. 

They weren’t just questioning their roles. They were questioning the entire structure—the cost of belonging to a table that was never built for them. And they’re not alone. I’m starting to see these quiet reckonings everywhere. In hallway conversations. In inboxes. In people asking if the success they were promised is even worth it. And rather than depress me, it gives me hope. 

Because here’s what I’ve come to believe: 

When people decide to stop contorting themselves to fit broken systems, it changes more than their careers. It shifts their families. Their communities. Their sense of possibility. These moments—these little earthquakes—are where real societal change begins. 

So if you’re feeling a rumble inside you—however small—it matters.

You don’t need a microphone or a megaphone to be part of something powerful. 

Maybe the revolution won’t begin with fire. 

Maybe it will begin with a thousand little earthquakes. 

Maybe it already has. 

And maybe you're a part of it.