“Some people run away by packing their bags.  Others run away by staying in the same place too long,”  Richard Gadd (Baby Reindeer).  I’ve heard and read some incredibly powerful quotes and they often give me pause—a few have stopped me in my tracks.  This one was full stop, slap in the face, reality is here.  Certain things resonate with us at certain times in our lives and this is one of them for me.  I needed to hear this in the midst of the circumstances going on between work and home right now.  Doing the same thing, being the same person every day only gets us more of the same.  If we are happy in that regard then it isn’t an issue.  If we aren’t happy or if it seems the weight of holding up something not meant for us to hold in the first place becomes too much, then we need to consider why we stay. 

The human brain is an amazing thing.  It can convince us that we aren’t capable of changing the circumstances.  That we are meant to stay where we are.  That is too scary to move forward whether on a goal or on what to eat.  It is capable of showing us the most beautiful dreams and tearing us down.  I’ve experienced both kinds of running away.  The kind where we think the answer always lies somewhere else, anywhere else but where we are.  That we have to know it all and that if we let down our armor we will be vulnerable so we can’t stay in one spot.  I’ve also been the one to stay where I am for an unhealthy amount of time, both out of stubbornness, and out of fear, and out of hope that things will change.  Right now I am in the same place. 

I’ve created so much work for myself saying that it’s all for my family, that I’m trying to build a better life for them.  That is true—but how much of this is also so I can avoid the reality of the differences building in my home?  How much of this is trying to control what’s going on around me because I have no control over some major portions of my life (events at work, thoughts/beliefs from other people).  I’ve said before the human brain isn’t designed to stay in limbo, wondering what if, what’s next.  So we create a response and either flee or root.  When we flee we still take the baggage of the situation with us if we don’t figure out where it started.  When we root, we like to think we are sticking out but we are avoiding what we can do to help ourselves.

The statement immediately begged the question of what am I avoiding?  It wasn’t a matter of running away through leaving, I knew instantly I was running away by staying.  By thinking I couldn’t do it on my own.  And worse, I know that decision, my behaviors and actions have mad other people stay where they are as well.  That was never my goal—that was my brain protecting itself by trying to be in control.  We have all done this at some point.  So how do we stop?  How do we stop running at all?  Facing ourselves is by far one of the hardest things to do.  Once the mask is off there is no where to hide.  There is a reality that we can’t avoid in that particular mirror.  I know that my legs are getting sore, both from the days I move, and from the days I hold myself hostage to whatever I’m going through in my mind.  We can move the mind—it shouldn’t move us.  So it’s time to unleash the chain and see how far I can go.  Will you go with me?    

Today I am grateful for catharsis.  I’m not sure how much of the story I will eventually share because it is still in progress, but my husband and I have had a tumultuous several weeks to the point where we knew we were going to have to make a decision about our marriage.  He and my son are on a trip with my father, my uncle, my brother, a mutual friend, and a group of my father’s friends and when they left I felt my whole world shatter.  The people you love leaving on uncertain terms is such an unsettling feeling.  I had a lot to process in those first few hours.  I went about my normal business, cleaning and organizing.  As I was putting things away, I couldn’t contain the emotion.  I started howling and crying like I hadn’t done in ages.  It felt like part of me had been ripped out, I felt nauseous with uncertainty about what we do next.  I cried for about 2 hours.  Once I pulled myself together, I finished planting some of my seeds and working in the dirt.  Then I did the dishes.  Then I worked out for over an hour.  Then I made myself some food—I hadn’t eaten all day.  That was my first meal alone in ages.  I went upstairs and I put laundry away, organized my son’s drawers.  Then I drew a hot bath with bubbles and salts and I sat in it for over an hour listening to healing frequencies.  I almost fell asleep a few times.  It was after that when I felt the weight fall off of me.  I can’t control what comes next, what decisions we will make individually and together.  But in that moment I could feel some peace. 

Today I am grateful to have a wish granted.  There are times they say be careful what you wish for—and it is true.  But even if those wishes don’t turn out how we expect them to, there is still something to learn from them.  I’ve often spoken of needing to be alone to figure things out.  I haven’t been without my husband and son for the last 7.5 years—we haven’t spent one night away from each other.  I haven’t spent one night away from my husband in nearly 17 years.  Even if people drive each other crazy, we get used to their presence.  So I have been looking forward to some peace being by myself, time to process and reflect while they were on this trip.  The circumstances of them leaving left me wanting and sad.  When you have that level of uncertainty, the not knowing makes loneliness a dangerous game.  Dark thoughts took over for a while regarding the state of my relationship and what I needed to do about it.  Fear.  Anger.  But as I processed through it, I realized that all couples go through rough patches.  Maybe not as bad as this one built around as much history, but they do.  As I was alone, I realized that I hated this kind of quiet.  That if I kept up my end of this bullshit I would be alone forever.  So I got my wish to have some solitude and quiet but it came with a heavy price.  A lot to work through.  We will see where it goes.

Today I am grateful to have the opportunity to learn about myself.  I’ve spent literally decades doing everything I’ve been told.  I’ve spent the last 7 years, moreso than in previous years, trying to keep our heads above water.  I’ve spent the last 3 years torn in so many directions, uncertain about which way to go, future projecting to see what the best path would be, splitting myself in no less than 5 pieces.  That kind of division leaves anyone empty and fearful.  It also leaves them exhausted and unable to process the day to day, to make their own decisions.  In the course of finding out about the quiet, understanding I am not a victim became key.  Understanding that I’ve repeated a pattern I learned about from my mother is key.  I have NO resentment toward my mom—she worked her ass off and she did what she could.  She repeated what she learned and she expressed what was done to her from my grandmother.  My mom took all of that shit and still is one of the most supportive and generous people I know.  But I can’t keep going down the victim path.  I didn’t realize how bad it was until I sat in the quiet and until a friend pointed out that this is where I come from.  All the splitting was my choice.  Yes, it was done for a reason, but it was a reason I thought I had to do at the time—I didn’t have to keep doing it.  I am grateful to see where I can change that behavior.  Make a decision.  No longer be the victim.

Today I am grateful to slow down.  Women in particular have the brunt of multi-tasking.  We are taught to wear the ability to multi-task like a fucking cape, like we have some super power.  They never tell us the long term consequences of lack of focus.  How it starts to feel like you can’t even complete a thought.  How it feels like you will never get everything done.  The frustration of starting and stopping things a million times.  Missing details and events and deadlines because of shifting priorities—then feeling guilty about missing details and events and deadlines.  The pressure to say yes and not knowing how to say no.  The anxiety of forgetting something, the clutter of sticky notes, notebooks, calendar reminders on the phone, actual calendars.  We are more than enough without having to be everything for everyone.  We lose pieces of ourselves as we try to maintain some image of what we are supposed to be—the idea that unless we can do it all without breaking a sweat that we have somehow failed.  The anger that comes when the stress wins—and it wins often.  The impact on our relationships, the resentment when it feels like the other isn’t doing enough.  The realization that it’s all a choice.  When we are forced to slow down, we are forced to reevaluate where we are—the choices we’ve made, whether or not it’s something we can change.  Our role in it.  What we really want.  We think we can take on the world and all it’s parts when all we need is to take on our part of the world.  Sometimes we need to slow down to remind ourselves that we only need to take one step at a time.  And that step simply needs to be in the right direction. 

Today I am grateful for connecting to myself.  I don’t know how to maintain it yet but I am aware now that accepting ease and allowing ease opens the doorway to allowing life, allowing what we truly want and who we really are to come to fruition. Embracing surrender and honesty about who we are, what we want, our capabilities, our ability to change—all of that is a state of what is.  Ther is nothing more we need to do than be with who we are in this exact moment. Being who we are will bring us exactly where we need to be.  When we allow what is, we allow life to flow, and as we’ve discussed many times, flow is where life actually happens.  It is here that we connect with who we are, knowing what we like and what we don’t like, what our preferred pace is, what we want to accomplish in life.  Ther is no pressure here.  There is no need to be and do a million things at once—to be all things for all people.  No, we simply are who we are and we are firmly grounded right where we are.  Sometimes we have to see the dark and embrace it in order to learn to step toward the light. 

Wishing everyone a wonderful week ahead.

“A mind that is stretched by a new experience can never go back to its old dimensions,” Oliver Wendell Holmes. Ironically this was on my calendar as well as in The Leader Who Had No Title on the same day.  They say the timing of the universe is impeccable and everything happens for a reason when it is meant to.  Clearly this message is meant for us now. When we talk in terms of inevitability and creating momentum that can’t be stopped, we need to know that once we have opened the flood gates, we cannot close them again.  Once we have seen the other way we can’t unsee it. We aren’t meant to play small once we have seen the expanse of our imagination and our place to use it.  We are designed to grow and create and it is for that reason that once we see other options and know what the possibilities are that we are forever changed—unable to go back to what we once knew.  It is new experiences, new thoughts, new actions that shape and mold who we are.  Why would we ever want to step in the puddles when we know there is an ocean that awaits us?  That isn’t to say there isn’t a time for everything, a time when we need to walk even though we can fly—but this isn’t about discernment.  This is about continuing the path of progress and not forcibly shutting our eyes to drown out what we now know exists. 

The very point of growth is to experience new things—new is the catalyst for growth.  Big ideas don’t come from small minds so we need to ensure that the goal is to constantly learn and explore and find new things to be curious about.  That curiosity leads us to possibilities.  What is this world without possibilities?  How do we know what is out there, what we have the option to become if we are repeating the same experiences every day?   For those who are content on their path and find their purpose/fulfillment in a particular pattern, it can be challenging to discover new options.  Not only is this about frame of reference, this is about shifting belief.  Stretching the mind means being open and learning to accept not only our fallibility, but the fallibility of the entire construct we’ve been raised with.  It requires letting go of fear and taking steps to find comfort or trust in something new—or trust in our ability to handle something new.  There are the lucky few who truly find contentment on a particular path, they are aligned with a goal and they continue to expand on that front.  That’s how we create the masters we spoke of the other day. 

The real test of growth is when we continually and consistently seek out those opportunities to stretch the mind.  We seek the experiences to create growth.  So not only are we allowing change, we actively seek it because we know we will find more opportunities as we go.  We seek growth because we know it expands our foundation.  This isn’t to say we are seeking to destroy what we have built—we are simply working on new ways to add to what we’ve built.  We always have the choice to ignore things we’ve learned.  But making the choice to stay small not only prevents our growth, it can inhibit the growth of others.  We are meant to be a light for each other and if we keep our light dim, then others won’t find their light.  Once we see that light we can’t go back to the dark—we want to expand the light.  Once we know there is more out there, we feel the hunger for it.  We can only feed it through new action.  I hope when those tests come in our lives that we all choose to grow.  I hope we all choose to keep our eyes open and I hope we all choose to believe that we can handle whatever comes our way.  Embrace the shape of the new and learn to fill the space we are given—learn to create the space we need.  There are no limits.  

“Daily ripples of excellence become a tsunami of success,” Robin Sharma.  This is the compound effect.  The things we do add up whether we see the results immediately or not.  It’s about finding what works, it’s about honoring who we are, it’s about staying the course.  It’s about learning from what we’ve done the day before, and learning today, and learning more beyond that.  Compounding (😊) on our discussion yesterday, it isn’t about sharing a perfect idea.  It’s about perfecting it as we go, as we learn from it.  It’s about getting that little bit better every day.  Gong for it every day.  Committing to it and building on it every day.  Shifting our mindset toward that level of success is only sustainable in increments until it has built into something that can’t be stopped.  Taking a large leap is sometimes necessary but the mind isn’t designed to take on massive change all at once every day.  We are meant to integrate and allow ourselves to become a different version through adaptation. 

The amazing thing is that after the first hump in taking on these new thoughts, habits, it becomes a natural state.  Sharma suggests that it takes around 40 days—40 days of discomfort and tiredness, anger, frustration, fear—to allow the new way of being to become our new way.  Once we have adapted and integrated and accepted this new way of being, the rest is inevitable.  Once we align with that new way of being it can’t avoid us as it is naturally drawn to it.  We have become something else in the process, something that attracts what we’ve been hoping for.  Hope becomes a reality with focused thought and dedicated, consistent effort.  Often it provides a greater result than we could even imagine.  Sometimes a leap is necessary, but it is easier to sustain the long term changes through incremental steps.  We have a stronger foundation that way.  With a strong foundation, with each choice we make, we create and develop our opportunities for success to the point where we become successful.  Take a little step every day. 

“A genius idea alone has zero value.  What makes it priceless is the quality of the follow through and the speed of execution around it.  Even a mediocre idea excellently acted on is more valuable than a genius idea poorly performed,” Robin Sharma.  Following up on our talk about action yesterday is the idea that it doesn’t have to be a great idea to start, it just needs to be acted upon.  We learn more as we go.  There are millions of great ideas born every second.  How many do we know about?  How many are implemented at the personal level?  At the household level?  At the friend level?  At the community level?  Beyond that?  We talk ourselves out of sharing a good idea because we are afraid it won’t matter or that people won’t understand it.  We are afraid of what people will think.  We are afraid it won’t work—or that we may not know everything about it.  We build up this notion that an idea needs to be perfect in order to be shared.  That thinking limits what we are able to accomplish because we miss out on not only sharing the idea, but on the collaboration that we foster with other people.

Sometimes we aren’t aware of the impact we can have on others—and this goes for both positive and negative influence.  Sometimes we need to remember that we are the catalyst for a good idea.  Sometimes collaboration is the source of a good idea.  Otherwise we may simply need the fertile ground for those ideas to sprout.  The same is true the other way.  We aren’t always aware of how those around us influence our pattern to keep our ideas to ourselves, or to minimize it.  Having an idea that we feel passionate about needs to take precedence over what people may say about it.  We aren’t looking for perfection, we are looking for progress—we are looking for development of something.  Sitting on a thought that could greatly improve our own lives is foolish—and not sharing it our of fear is detrimental to our core.  That isn’t to say we don’t need practice getting comfortable with developing and then sharing those ideas, but more importantly we need to get comfortable building an idea and having confidence in ourselves to share it as it’s developing. 

A while back I spoke of the importance of understanding if we have an idea or a thought, a drive or something we are passionate about, it is with us for a reason.  It is ours to develop and create.  I remember sharing a story from Liz Gilbert about an idea she had for a book that she started and never got around to finishing. After some time a friend of hers started describing a book she was working on and it was the same idea.  From this concept Gilbert says she firmly believes that ideas are always around and have need to be expressed.  If we don’t take responsibility for the ideas that come to us, they will find someone else to bring them to live.  So trust that if it comes to us, we are entrusted to handle it.  Sometimes it isn’t about being qualified, it’s about being called.  Trusting our steps along the way.  Trusting ourselves to find the steps as we go.  Have the courage to start, to develop greatness, to define and refine the thought as we go.  That will get us infinitely further than sitting on an idea not acted upon.  It does nothing to keep an idea bottled up on the shelf or concealed in the mind.  Take the steps and allow it to unfold.  

“Lots of people have good ideas but the masters become masters because they had the courage and conviction to act on ideas; What makes greatness is white hot action around red hot ideas,” Robin Sharma.  I shared in my Sunday Gratitude that there is a different way of thinking when we get to a certain level.  After a certain time we need to do more than what we are told, we need to do more than perpetuate the machine.  We need to create new options and opportunities for ourselves, those around us, and for the business.  Expansion happens with new ideas targeting new issues or concerns.  It requires action in a different way.  We can become excellent at what we do, becoming an subject matter expert on anything with time and practice.  But to excel and go beyond that is to develop and create ways to expand that subject, to see it in a new light and find ways that it can apply to more people or apply to them in a different way. Part of becoming a master of our field is going after something new—knowing how to develop rather than simply produce.

Action can be a scary thing in the respect that action has the potential to change everything.  Action has the potential to make things different than how they are—or to expose how things really are.  Our lives are skewed by our perception so we are trained to act in a specific way in specific circumstances.  That is skewed even further when we throw in the perception based on our personal experiences as well.  So when an alternate approach seems the most logical, it’s natural to be a bit leery about taking that first step. Masters also don’t let the bumps in the road deter them either.  It’s the persistence to keep going through the learning curve and to keep trying again.  The spirit of collaboration and cooperation toward developing an idea is the persistence to keep going while shifting as needed.  It’s adaptability.  In short, it’s speed toward taking action and patience to develop the idea.  Stepping out of the prescribed course and recommending another path takes courage.  To act on it indicates a boldness and conviction in the belief of the idea we have.  We became subject matter experts through repetition and practice—and seeing where things could be improved.  We took chances to streamline our workflow.  But real mastery of the subject comes from taking our expertise and developing it into something more.  We release the fear of trying something new for the potential of something greater.  Courage and confidence come from taking action on those ideas and we naturally develop them—and in turn we learn and come up with more ideas and then we have the courage to follow those and so on.  Life doesn’t pause—it moves continuously and we need to take action when we are inspired versus when the time is right.  The time will never be right for everything.  We simply need to act on it when we have the feeling.  The difference between success and living the same life over and over again is the courage to take that action.  Create a new story.  Don’t just tell it, live it.

“Remembering the shortness of life strips away the distractions of life and reminds us of what is most important…that our months are numbered.  So what’s the point of playing small?  What’s the point of fearing failure?  What’s the point of worrying about other’s opinions?  What’s the point of denying your duty to lead?” Robin Sharma.  Last week I shared a thought I had about the inevitability of death and the fact that there is no point to play small or scared.  For most of us, whatever we do will be forgotten so there is no point in pretending what we do is so vital in the moment that we will suffer the rest of our lives.  All that we have is right now and fear of the past or the future is preventing us from making decisions we need to in this moment.  Knowing that we can be gone tomorrow is both a blessing and a burden.  The burden part is obvious.  The blessing comes because it allows us a freedom and a drive to pursue what calls to us in the moment.  To stick with the dream and to go after it because if we achieve it, it’s ours, but if we fail that is ours as well.  There’s no point in forgetting that we are here to lead ourselves and others to a better path.

Let go of the fear of what people think and the story we tell ourselves that we don’t know what we want or how to get it.  We most certainly know what we want, most of us just spend too much time pretending we can’t get it and then we believe those excuses so we start creating an environment where it’s a self-fulfilling prophecy and nothing we want comes to fruition. The shortness of life isn’t meant to scare us, it’s meant to motivate us to action toward what we are called to.  There is no point to do anything but other than what we are called to do. There is no reason to hold back from the life we are meant to have and what feels right.  Our time is finite and we don’t know the number of days we have available to us so it’s more imperative to make the most of each day.   I also want to elaborate on how quickly we can lose those we love.  We are never guaranteed any day we have, nor are those we love.  Things can change in an instant so it’s important to ask ourselves if what we are doing not only makes us happy and serves a purpose but if it keeps us in proximity to what and who we love.  What is the point in spending our time doing anything other than what we love with anyone other than who we love?  Take responsibility for the life we want and go for it.

“There are no dead-end jobs, just dead-end thinking,” Robin Sharma. Mindset is one of the core tenants to how we approach life.  It doesn’t matter what we are referring to here—work, personal relationships, goals, family, friends, health/wellness.  In all of those facets of life, how we feel and how we approach it often is the determining factor of the result.  The truth is no matter what the goal, the outcome is more often dependent on how we think about it and the resulting steps than what we look like while doing it.  Our actions are a result of how we feel and what we believe we can accomplish.  This mainly applies to limiting beliefs and the need to remove them in order to progress.  We can feel a certain way about the work we do, that it isn’t fulfilling or that it’s a waste of time, but what we have to know is that those feelings will translate into reality.  If we don’t think we will get anywhere, we will not get anywhere.  Operating in growth or working toward something bigger means controlling our mindset and focus.

It can take some time to accept the concept that we are where we are in life because of our own thoughts and actions.  Throw in a layer that much of what we think is recycled from previous generations and it’s even easier to play the blame game.  The problem with blaming is that we still don’t get anywhere.  Even if it truly isn’t our fault, we still have to accept accountability and even responsibility for where we go.  That can be a bitter pill to swallow because it can feel like we are framing what happened to us as our own fault.  The difference is subtle but important: while what was done isn’t our fault and we can’t change it, how we address it and move forward is our responsibility.  That doesn’t make anything easier or harder, it simply is what happened, an event in time.  We may have no control over what was done but we have control entirely over what happens next.

If we ever feel stuck we need look no further than our own thoughts.  We are where we are because of how we manage our thoughts and actions.  Feeling trapped or like we are stuck with the thoughts we’ve had is only a matter of perception.  There are opportunities everywhere and it is up to us to capitalize on them.  We need to retrain our brains to decide that we aren’t stuck, we have a choice and we can move.  Even if it’s an inch, we can move until we carve out a new way.  Nothing is a stop beyond what we make it.  It can be a pause or it can be where the road ends for us.  It can also be the beginning of something new entirely.  It can be the platform we learn to leap from instead of hiding under.  No, the past may not be fair, and it may not be our fault, but how we view ourselves where we are and where we want to go is entirely up to us.  Nothing can prevent us from achieving what we want if we don’t let it.  Don’t let a crappy thought be what prevents life from moving forward, from creating beautiful things, and from living a beautiful life.  Change our thoughts and a new way appears—there is no end.   

Today I am grateful for time with those I love.  We all know time moves on regardless of what we feel, think, or do.  We recently got some news about my father, and while it isn’t horrible, it brings to light the very real fact of time passing and mortality.  We go through these subtle changes in our lives where we are first one role, then multiple roles, then down to one role, and then our time is up.  We never know how much time we have with each other, how much time we have in a role, time we have to do the things we love.  There are a few things I understand differently: the person we will spend the most time with is ourselves so we need to make sure we are doing what we love or working toward what we love as often as we can.  The time we have with those we love is never guaranteed so we need to prioritize what we do and with whom.  Even though I am aware of the inevitability of our number being called, it can still be challenging when we are faced with that reality.  Live is too short to do anything other than what we love and with who we love.  Nothing is guaranteed so do not take it for granted. 

Today I am grateful for understanding that things aren’t meant to stay the same.  I’m in the middle of a challenging time in my marriage.  Between navigating my father’s issues, my health, being a mother, my career, my business, and my relationship with my husband, I’m seeing that in spite of all of our efforts, things sometimes just are what they are and people are how they are.  I know over the last 20 years I’ve changed significantly.  Perhaps more so in the last 3 years.  I wouldn’t expect anyone else to stay the same either.  I have a tendency to want things my way (I’m an Aries after all) but I see that there are just some things where I am fundamentally different.  Time and experience does that to us and I know the same is happening to those around me.  There comes a point where we accept who we are and how we feel about it.  And we need to allow the same for others.  As much as I preach evolution and allowing things to be how they are meant to be, the experience of it can be different because we often hope that people will change as we change given shared experience—but that isn’t the case.  There can be loss involved.  We just need to make sure that our growth isn’t hindered by the desire to keep things familiar.  Change is beautiful. 

Today I am grateful for a higher perspective.  This came out of nowhere. I recently had a second interview for a position at my 9-5 and it’s fascinating speaking with people at a different level.  The roles and their purpose operate differently even than they do at a management level.  There is so much freedom to operate with a more creative scope and there is a different focus.  From management and below it’s about getting a job done.  Above that it’s about creating that vision/goal.  I’ve been in the same industry with the same company for a long time so I was set in the belief that the roles were just set as they were.  Doing what we’ve always done got us nowhere so seeing the opportunity to change it is liberating and freeing.  There are other ways to think, other ways to accomplish things that go beyond the typical power plays in corporate roles.  When creativity and collaboration are forefront, amazing things can happen.

Today I am grateful for truth. No matter how hard it is to accept at first, truth is the thing that will at least set us on the right path.  We can’t move forward without resolving to understand how we are meant to move forward and that means understanding what we are meant to do, understanding what we are feeling—and understanding what others feel about us.  We can’t make people be who we need them to be.  We can’t make them feel a certain way about us.  We can’t change it when they change their minds.  But knowing the truth gives us the option to decide what works for us.  To decide what we want to do.  We are not reliant on other people’s needs especially if they do not coincide with our own.  Our lives are too short to spend it trying to be someone else or trying to make someone be someone else.  Know the truth.  Accept the truth.  It gets easier to move forward with practice. 

Today I am grateful for confirmation.  As uncomfortable as it is, I appreciate confirmation of the path I am on.  Knowing that the discomfort is simply part of growth is encouraging.  Things often look most fearsome when we are in the throes of change, learning to make the unfamiliar familiar.  We must simply press through it as long as there is no indication that something is wrong with the path we are on.  Sometimes all we need is a reminder that things are as they are supposed to be—it can be ugly, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t part of what we are supposed to do, what we are supposed to experience.  We may not understand it to begin with but knowing we are where we are meant to be is a relief. 

Wishing everyone a wonderful week ahead.

As we spoke about confidence we need to discuss how we get there outside of the feelings and how we embrace confidence instead of simply emoting it—we need to talk about the actions.  So this is what leadership means: the act of leading a group of people or an organization.  Sure, we can gain confidence from leading others but so often, especially in this society, leading others becomes an issue of ego and power.  We want a title or a position to be perceived as powerful, in authority.  But the most important facet of leadership, the thing that develops us into someone who has confidence to become who they are meant to be, is the ability to lead ourselves.  We all have the capacity to lead, but it takes discipline and a sense of self to lead effectively.  Discovering the leader within and understanding the role of leadership in our personal lives leads us to understand that we don’t need to hold a title/position in order to lead our lives.  We need to treat each aspect of our lives with leadership and accountability in order to progress where we want to be.

 I’m not talking about “seriousness” or perceived authority or even having it all together—I’m talking about owning the moment and taking responsibility for how we want to feel and how we want to approach what we want to accomplish. The real premise and idea of leadership is taking accountability for every facet of our lives and seeing it through. The following pieces are all from Robin Sharma’s The Leader Who Had No Title. That book is filled with gems—most of these came from the first few chapters but I could take snippets from the entire book.  The book is about taking responsibility for our lives and finding the inner strength to move forward, to take accountability for the way our lives are and getting to where we want to be.  It’s about using our voices to share what we know is right and to live how we feel is appropriate without harming others.  It’s making decisions that are right for us and following through on them.  It’s putting aside our sensitivities in favor of what is right for all.  It’s standing in the moment unafraid of what people say or think, secure in the knowledge that we can handle whatever comes our way. 

These are some musings as I’ve progressed from talking about decisions and then giving up on them when things don’t go quite right.  I’ve learned that we can’t just talk about what we want in theory because without practice we accomplish nothing.  That means making a decision and seeing it through even when things get rough.  It means that what we say, think, and feel may not be of the popular opinion but we see it through anyway because we know it’s right.  The world doesn’t always operate in absolutes or even with clearly defined right and wrong.  It’s up to us to navigate the labyrinth of work we create for ourselves and to identify if what we are doing is no longer working.  It’s up to each of us to let go of the fear of what people think, let go of the system, and create a different way to go.  Leadership is never about power, it’s about a common goal and an outcome achieved that benefits all.  Leadership isn’t a solo act, it’s a collaboration and a guiding force rather than a directive with only one outcome.  It’s an evolving thing and we need to understand the communal nature as well as our individual responsibilities.  Confidence and leadership are enough to change the world.