Power isn’t time or money — it’s energetic coherence.
When we begin our careers, our businesses, or even our lives as young adults, planning a future with so much enthusiasm and dreams plus a wonderous sense of adventure we have little awareness that we are also envisioning what type of leader we will become. Leaders in our homes and in our lives as well as in our futures. Leaders, however, are confined to whatever image that word conjures up.
Rarely, do we start with an awareness that every leader has a signature energy. An energy that will define how others see us. An energy that will also define how we see and experience ourselves. That energy governs us far more than our education, training, and specialty do. A really powerful aspect of self-awareness comes in knowing what your energy is broadcasting.
Do you know the message you’re sending? We may dream big but walk in an energy of struggle or overwhelm. We may be at a level of high success but walk in an energy of battle or exhaustion and distraction. Your energy can be so easily manipulated but you first need to know what it is. You need to experience it. The practice of mindfulness, reflection, or meditation makes all that far more possible. Each slows us down sufficiently enough to get a sense of how we feel, emotionally, spiritually, and physically. The next question is how do we want to deal with what we discover? Do we even want to deal with it or just keep pushing through figuring in time it will balance itself out? (It won’t.)
It may sound simplistic, but leadership is an energetic equation — your presence shapes outcomes. If you walk in looking defeated, you will be. If you walk in, comfortable in your own skin and ready to discuss any topic, you begin ahead of the game and with great credibility. Learning to recognize the message you are sending supports you in defining it. It gives you time to get it back to where it best serves you.
When it comes to your team, whether in a retail store or in the C Suite, misalignment drains your team, your health, and your intuition. It can also create stress, fatigue, burn-out, and even chaos. The price is high – too high. Knowing where your energy is before entering a room, a conversation, or a setting, allows you to be the leader you choose to be. It also allows you to be invisible if you choose that as well. There can be benefits in that…
When your energy is coherent, influence becomes effortless. Life becomes so much easier and far less stressful. You discover your joy, creativity, and connection to self. It’s a currency that you spend on yourself and those things you most want to invest in. Your relationships, dreams, and future. Spend it wisely and most importantly, know what you are spending and whether or not it is in alignment with who you want to be.
Reflection Prompt: “Where in my life am I spending energy I no longer believe in?” Why?
Take my Leadership Self-Assessment Tool and let’s talk if you want more.
