Time to read: 2 minutes. Regardless of your official role, you are a leader 24/7
Ten years ago I participated in a year-long leadership program that changed my life. During the first of four on-site retreats, our leaders said, "let yourself be shattered." They meant...move through the world open-hearted, let things touch you, when there's pain, feel it. Doing so builds empathy, compassion, resilience and trust.
Allowing yourself to be shattered builds your capacity to flow with life as it is and to lead others through inevitable ups and downs. (You are a leader 24/7 regardless of your official work role.)
The alternative is denial and resisting what's real. That's a recipe for exhaustion, hardness, and separation.
Volodymyr Zelensky's speech before the US Congress yesterday was shattering. Clients and friends have family and business colleagues in Ukraine. Events in the world impact you at work directly (your company has an office in Ukraine) and indirectly (your heart is broken).
What does it mean to be shattered on the path to powerful leadership?
- 1. Witness: The tendency is to look away when terrible things happen. To avoid eye contact when someone is escorted out of the office with their stuff or to avoid the news. It's important to witness what's real, even when you can't do anything about it. Seeing and acknowledging pain breeds connection and keeps you human. Witnessing isn't about punishing yourself with every detail. It's about knowing you have the capacity to help hold what's true.
- 2. Feel your feelings Become facile at experiencing your feelings. Let your emotions flow through you like the weather so you can release them. If you don't, they clog your energy and make it hard to move forward. I recommend doing this alone or with a close friend or partner. Experiencing your feelings is for yourself, not something to impose on others. **As a leader, you are responsible for your emotions. Unprocessed emotions come out as unintentional and often unhelpful reactions. Being facile with your emotions will make you authentic, trustworthy, and effective.
- 3. It's ok to be a mess: You hold up so many people - your spouse, children, employees, parents, friends. It's easy to feel that if you fall apart, they will fall apart. Give yourself permission to be a mess. The truth is, it won't last as long as you fear and the relief and freedom on the other side are worth it. **As a leader, moving through your shattering enables you to be clean in your decisions and relationships. Trying to be in control never works.
- 4. Live! A number of clients have said they feel guilty about what they have when people in Ukraine are suffering. Think about a time when something terrible happened to you. Did you want those around you to suffer, too? Would their suffering have alleviated your pain? Suffering and pain are an unfortunate reality of being human. It's imperative that you live or we just compound suffering on suffering to all of our detriment. **As a leader, you serve as a role model for others. What you do and how you do it matters more than your words. Show your people what it means to live, even in shattering circumstances.
**As a leader your job isn't to make everything pretty and positive all the time. It's to steer your people effectively through ups and downs. Build your capacity.
It's hard to know what to say in circumstances like this. I hope this is helpful.
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Be well.