Compassion is a Necessity for Great Leadership
"But what will I motivate myself with?"
When I ask my hard on themselves, high-performing clients what they are afraid will happen if they have some compassion/grace/kindness with themselves ...
... they often respond with something like "But what will I motivate myself with?"
They have a belief that if they have compassion for themselves they won't end up doing anything. That somehow compassion will turn them into a waste of space and they will never achieve anything.
*side note, we are more than what we do or do not produce. the world just conditions us to think that we have to produce to matter. That's crap.*
So instead they keep using a verbal stick to push through.
Which, I can tell you from years of personal experience, feels terrible, undermines our humanity and only gets us so far.
It also make it hard to have GENUINE compassion for others.
I intentionally use genuine here because saying you can understand and have compassion for something is different than having the level of compassion that keeps your resentment and frustrations at bay when other people's humanity is on display.
If you have a high-bar, no one escapes it.
(there is nothing wrong with a high-bar. if you want to lead in a way that celebrates people's humanity and doesn't frustrate you, you will need to be conscious of when that high-bar raises and when that high-bar deflates).
The more capacity you have to be kind to yourself when you perceive that you are not performing at the bar you hold yourself to, the more kindness you can have with the people you lead and the people you love.
What that means is that not only is compassion a necessity for great leadership, it's also needed for you to enjoy it.
To practice something different outside of the verbal stick, ask yourself:
What could I use to fuel me instead?
What would source me here?
What kindness could I show this person, that perhaps I could also show myself?
And let's remember, the bar is made up anyway.
