Are you looking to other people to show you how to be? In a coaching session with a female executive who had tremendous success and was at the top of their organization, they were trying to reason the “right” way to do something at their company. The more we talked, the more we realized that they were looking to find “the example” of how you were supposed to do it which, frankly, didn’t exist. What did exist? The way everyone had always done it.
Looking to others to figure out the right way to lead or looking to your friends for what to wear may have some attraction and benefit in the beginning. After all, you get to fit in, to belong, to be part of something. But we need to stretch further.. We need new outcomes, new possibilities, new visions, creative both/and thinking solutions, new ways of engaging, and new ways to support all kinds of people.
The good news?
I strongly believe we can express uniquely express ourselves while holding a shared vision with different ways to do things.
The bad news?
Our tribal instinct to “just survive” by fitting in will definitely try to get in our way.
Maybe you heard the classic Oscar Wilde quote: “Be yourself. Everyone else is already taken.”
I couldn’t agree more. Sure we can learn from how others lead. We can let our friends show us stuff we haven’t seen, but at the end of the day, to create a better world, we need to do things in our own way.
And if you say… “I don’t know how to be me.” No worries. No one does. Most people are either faking it or just keep doing what they have always done.
The best way to find your own way to do things is to try new stuff. And I don’t care if you’re 25 or 55, the same thing hotels true. Try what you like and then ask yourself afterward, did I like that? Did it work? If you didn’t like it or it didn’t work, just try another way. See what happens. You might be pleasantly surprised.
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