The Positive Energy Workplace

A couple of weeks ago I shared a word cloud that represented responses from a group of senior and executive leaders in one of my LinkedIn groups - "The Design & Innovation Leaders Network: A Private Community Building Creative & Authentic Cultures". The actual query was "What do you consider to be the #1 most important quality in leadership?"

What do you consider to be the number 1, most important quality in leadership? If you could have only one quality, take only one quality "with you", what would it be? No right or wrong answers here, just curiosity. Whatever is true for you is what makes you...you.

A friend of mine came to my office today for a session to work on her business. We had 2 hours, she was 40 minutes late. When she got here she was harried, stressed, completely pressurized. When I asked her why she was so late (my irritated presence and energy doing nothing to help her), she burst into tears.

One of the trickiest things to do in these beautiful lives we lead can be the simple act of honoring ourselves. "Trusting our intuition." "Going with our gut." These phrases are tossed around with great popularity. The spouters of such wisdom being hailed as gurus, wise sages, and teachers pointing us to that bottom line truth within us that we know to be true, but so easily forget or too often override. Hearing people talk about this, it seems easy, an "of course!" Doing it, is a whole different animal.

It takes commitment and choice to honor intuition. It is an active process.

It creates impact. Impact that is too important to ignore.

I've been observing the differences between intuition vs. fear vs. comfort zones a lot lately. It seems the more sophisticated my business gets, the bigger the game becomes, and the more people I meet who are up to big things...the harder it becomes to discern between intuition and fear. I grapple with this, and I see others grapple with it as well in their own unique way. And I've learned this has a cost; emotional, time, energetic, and yes, financial. The amount of money I've spent, just over the last 3 years alone, when I've ditched my intuition is significant. (Yes, I added it up.) I've decided I can be horrified by this, or I can now claim my honorary PhD in "honoring your intuition" and use my new found powers for good. I'm going with Dr. Anese.

All this being said, all costs aside, I think the financial cost is the least of it. I believe that the biggest cost of not honoring our intuition is in the spiritual cost, the energetic cost, and the cost to the impact we're meant to have on this planet as leaders in our lives and organizations. This is a very big deal.

How do you tell the difference between fear and intuition? How do you honor yourself, stay true to yourself at all costs, and create the impact you're meant to create?