Stop Being a Grumpy Leader

In reality, none of us can Leave It At the Door, when the “it” is heavy baggage from our history. Mid-month, long-form reflection as a scaffold shelf to pause for self-awareness and integration. Off-load old patterns that are no longer working and climb lighter.

What if leadership happiness is real? Not illusory, not something you have to chase after, pursue, or reach for, but solid, sturdy, and right there.

Celebratory, positive leadership never requires a quest of discovery.

Likewise, a culture of joy and vitality never demands blind optimism. Don’t lie to yourself to stay happy as a leader. Everything will definitely NOT be okay. And I promise that everyone who hears you say that definitely knows it’s a lie.

Positive leadership requires neither imitating Anne of Green Gables’ dogged efforts to transform others, nor adopting Pollyanna‘s sunny disposition. You needn’t muster fierce enthusiasm for each moment nor thrill at every task, like Sponge Bob.

Confidence isn’t optimism or pessimism, and it’s not a character attribute. It’s the expectation of a positive outcome. ~Rosabeth Moss Kanter, co-founder of the Harvard University Advanced Leadership Initiative

Leadership happiness and the templates for joy-filled organizational culture are already here. They are right beside you, waiting for your notice.

Leaders bring knowledge and skills to the table; and the more the better. They also bring dispositions that either favor their success or limit it.

Over a few decades, I gained substantial knowledge about board management as a significant responsibility for a CEO. Starting early, my career brought opportunities for strong skill development in that arena, too.

Then, one day, I woke up to a new disposition. After a long career as a Hermione Granger-type leader, I morphed into more of a Luna Lovegood.

My new disposition quickly overrode my skills and the wisdom of my knowledge and experience. Because I consciously chose to stop caring at the level of grasping need and attachment…

My personal development evolved, and my leadership followed. Some of my board members were not fans of my shift.

But for me the transformation was profound!

I suddenly “got it!” My constant striving to always be first, smartest, and best at everything was actually a decades-long stress response. A painful mixture of reactive FIGHTing and FAWNing carried me high into leadership in my profession, despite several FLEEing acts of self-sabotage.

And that life of rising and striding into greater “success” was not always a favor to me. Neither was my endless stress an indictment of or testament to the folks who hired me, oversaw my inputs, and assessed my outputs and outcomes.

In my earliest roles, I was probably a puzzle for some of my upline. Before organizational supervision became “trauma-informed” and “trauma-sensitive,” I’m sure I looked a bit crazy sometimes. (No details here, but think “self-harm-Lite.”)

I coped with the rigors of leadership every day from inside a disposition that was anxious, emotionally sensitive, and fearful. So, supervision was often difficult for me, too. Passive aggression, gaslighting, shaming, secret-keeping … all “management” triggers for my massive store of trauma.

Management is the set of skills that can help get things done. Unfortunately, its practice is too often a bag of manipulative tricks to advance someone’s own interests, which creates cynicism. ~Frances Hesselbein, former CEO for Girl Scouts of American

So, can a leader change her disposition, turning her temperament toward joy?

Is it possible for a leader who lives with a few tons of Complex Post Traumatic Stress stored in her nervous system, muscles, and organs to choose to be less anxious and reactive?

Yes. Absolutely.

In fact, this one choice makes the drama of the trauma endurable, in my opinion. And here’s how I did it.