Welcome to Friday 411, issue #143. In 4 minutes, with 1 insight and 1 action, you’ll discover the five thoughts every leader has when they feel leashed — and the one decision that changes everything.
1 Insight
Every leader feels the leash. Not every leader decides to escape it.
I (Garland) walked into my first day in my new position feeling great. That ended 30 minutes later.
Back in 2002, a successful family had hired Dorothy to run part of their foundation, with me assisting while I finished my Masters. Now Dorothy was stepping back to be more available for our firstborn. It was my turn as director.
I knew the work. I had done it before while she was on maternity leave. My abilities matched the responsibilities I was given. For about 30 minutes in my new role, everything made sense.
Then my boss walked in.
“Garland, we want to take this program to a new place. We don’t know exactly what we want it to be. We want you to help us figure that out. Here’s what we do know: new mission, new vision, new core values, new programming. We want to start from the ground up.”
In two minutes, I became the definition of a leashed leader: someone whose responsibilities exceeded my abilities.
A few months later, the family had settled on a direction. They wanted Dorothy and me to create a leadership development program. There were only two problems: (1) Dorothy and I were 27 years old. We had little professional leadership experience. And (2) we had never intentionally developed another leader. To say we were under-qualified is like saying a fish isn’t qualified to run a marathon. The gap between our responsibilities and abilities grew even further.
If you’ve ever been handed something bigger than what you signed up for — a new role, a restructured team, a project that no one else wanted — then you know exactly what happened next. Almost every leader we’ve worked with over the last twenty-five years goes through the same five thoughts. These five thoughts will determine if you stay leashed or get unleashed.
Thought 1: “How Am I Going to Do This?”
The first thought is pure overwhelm. Your mind starts races.
How am I going to do this?
I don’t know anything about this.
How am I supposed to complete this?
It’s that sinking feeling when the gap between what’s expected of you and what you know how to do becomes painfully obvious. You’re not calm. You’re not strategic. You’re panicked.
Thought 2: “What Were They Thinking?”
Almost immediately, the focus shifts. Instead of looking at yourself, you start looking outward.
What were they thinking?
Are they crazy?
Why are they doing this to me?
I remember my exact thought when my boss told me the plan. I stayed calm on the outside, but my thoughts were not polite. My boss didn’t drink. Not a drop. But in that moment, I thought: I think you might be drunk. You question the people above you because it’s easier than questioning yourself.
Thought 3: The Inner Voice
You might question their sanity for a few minutes. Then your inner voice kicks in. And it is not kind.
You’re never going to figure this out.
You’re not that smart.
You’re pathetic, you idiot.
We’ve never met a good leader who naturally has a kind inner voice. Not one. Some have cultivated it, but none naturally have the ability to routinely speak kindly to themselves. As anxiety rises, your inner monologue tells you everything you’ve ever feared about yourself, and it speaks with absolute certainty.
Thought 4: Catastrophizing
Once the inner voice gets going, your mind does what minds do. It spirals. Fast.
Here’s what happened to me in a span of about three minutes:
You’re a horrible leader.
They’re going to fire you.
You’re going to lose your home.
Dorothy’s going to leave you.
She’s going to marry someone handsomer and richer and smarter. Someone who could have figured this out.
Your kids are going to want to live with that family. You’ll only see them on the weekends in your tiny studio apartment. And they’ll hate every minute of it.
They’ll grow up and write a memoir. The title will be “Why My Life Was So Much Better Without My Dad.”
It took me three minutes to go from my new assignment to believing that I would lose my whole family. All because my responsibilities outgrew my abilities.
Sound familiar? Maybe your version is different. But the spiral is the same. One fear feeds the next until you’ve built an entire disaster movie in your head. And none of it has actually happened.
But it’s the next thought that matters most.
Thought 5: The Decision
After the overwhelm, the blame, the inner voice, and the catastrophizing, you arrive at a fork in the road.
You have two options.
Option A: You decide to stay leashed.
You allow yourself to believe these thoughts. You give up. You keep your head down. You do just enough to go unnoticed or not get fired. You play it safe, protect your ego, and hope nobody asks too many questions. A lot of leaders choose this path. It feels safer. But it’s a slow fade. It diminishes the gifts you have and the impact you make.
Option B: You decide to get unleashed.
You acknowledge that you don’t know much, but you know you can learn.
You accept the discomfort as a sign that you can grow.
You admit that your responsibilities exceed your abilities. That you’re leashed. But you decide that it doesn’t have to stay that way.
In our book, Unleashed Leadership, we teach three stages every leader goes through to get unleashed. The first one? Decide. And you just did.
There are two more stages: Discern and Deliver. Dorothy and I captured the framework in book form so you can work through it on your own time.
And right now, you can get the audiobook free — no catch. It’s normally $15 on Audible, but we’d rather get it into the hands of every leader who’s ready to make the decision to get unleashed.
Grab your free copy here: advanceleadership.live/freebook. And if you know a leader who’s stuck in Thoughts 1 through 4? Send it to them. Sometimes the nudge to choose Option B comes from someone who’s already made that choice.
1 Action
Which of the five thoughts are you stuck in right now? Name it. Then make your decision: Option A or Option B. If you choose B, grab your free copy of Unleashed Leadership at advanceleadership.live/freebook and send it to another leader who needs it.