>You can either get all mad and worked up and pissed off about it, and waste years of your career (as I did) being pissed off, stubborn, and refusing to change

I can relate to this. I became bitter and angry when I did not get promoted several times and was told that the company expects "more". I became a person I am not proud of.

My question is how does one extricate onself from such a bad place?