Talking to Yourself: What’s The Truth You’re Not Telling?
“Sometimes, to bring about the changes we want on our teams, in our companies, for our relationships, we must start with ourselves. Actually, we always have to start with ourselves.”
Recently, I was feeling frustrated by some of the conversations I was having with my long-term clients. We’ve got great, high-trust relationships, and we’ve known one another for many years. I was feeling like the advice, ideas, skills, and support I was giving them was the same, almost every year. I wondered if I’d lost my edge, as there seemed to be a gap between knowing and doing for them. Why weren’t they implementing my perfectly good advice, especially when I just knew it would work?! Especially when I knew it would help them progress, find relief, succeed, be better than they had imagined? In one situation, I thought to myself, maybe I’m done here. Maybe I just don’t have anything left to give them, and I should move on.
It's customary for someone being mentored or coached to move beyond their mentor or coach. It’s the way it should happen. When working with someone who sees and believes in your potential, who holds the best idea for you before you can hold it for you, it makes sense that you get to stand on their shoulders to reach for what’s next. Things should evolve. I am never upset by this threshold of a coaching or teaching relationship.
When I look back at my college teaching years, so many students grew way beyond me. One woman, Janet, was an incredible student in my English writing class. She was a single mother, about my age, and when I asked her what she was doing, what her plans were, she said, “I think I’ll get my degree in accounting. I can get a job.” It was a practical answer. It was an answer that would likely get her quick results. But it wasn’t what she really wanted. Eventually, Janet went on to get her bachelor’s and master’s degree, in English, from the same university I had attended. She had my same teachers.
She came back to the college where we had met years earlier, as I was transitioning to my new career. She essentially, eventually, got my job! And then, she went on to get her Ph.D., something I’ve never done, became a department chair (I didn’t do that, either). She created a thriving career for herself that she loved. She went beyond my teaching and mentoring and coaching. Though we remain connected, she didn’t need me in the same way she had in those beginning days. That’s what’s supposed to happen.
But this client's stuckness felt different. I began having doubts. Maybe I just wasn’t as good as I thought I was? Maybe my insights and methodology weren’t shiny and new? Rooted in technology? Snazzy? With aging and gaining of wisdom, wouldn’t I have even more insight and deeper understanding, in order to contribute to the work of the world?
I have a coach. I hadn’t worked with one in several years, and I hadn’t evolved my business model for longer. When I began sharing with her that I felt like maybe it was time to let certain clients go, that maybe, after all, I wasn’t meant to have these long, wonderful relationships. Maybe I’d become a known fixture, rather than a trusted provocateur? My coach wasn’t having it. When I said, “I’m just not sure what to do!” She smiled and said, “You know exactly what you should do!”
“I do?” wondering how she could possibly have the magic answer to restore my confidence and my enthusiasm for my work.
“You need to do what you do. You need to have a courageous conversation with yourself. You need to tell the truth.”
Sometimes, to bring about the changes we want on our teams, in our companies, for our relationships, we must start with ourselves. Actually, we always have to start with ourselves.
The truth was, I wanted my clients to have the benefits of challenging themselves in different ways. I wanted us to move toward a more creative edge, a place where innovation thrives. A place where we bust our own myths about work, progress, and balance. A place that I knew might eventually lead to them moving beyond my good teaching and counsel, but that we would co-create together.
I had to get right with myself first. What about you? What’s the truth you’re not telling yourself right now, that’s at that threshold edge of what’s to come?
