Hi everyone, I’m Saralyn Hodgkin. And this is the podcast to practice your leadership.
The stories we tell ourselves, this is an important one. When we stand in a place of doing our inner work, right, of exploring, who am I, I mean for me, there are stories that we tell ourselves that have been constructed over our lifetime. That helps source for us our own identity, and what our identity is, for many people, maybe it’s even singular. But as we dive deeper, of course, we see that identity is actually identities, plural. And that there are stories that we construct and narratives and a whole entertainment that goes on in our head, heart and mind that around this, who I am, what’s my identity. Look at me, tell me, tell myself this story.And, of course, the question is, when you’re in a place of practicing your own inner work to explore your leadership and your agency, what are my stories? What is my identity? What are my identities? Are they serving? And so what are the questions I need to ask myself to explore those stories? And am I ready? Do I have readiness to see some of those stories? Because I may not like them. They may be really hard. If I crafted a cool story around, I’m not good enough. Why? Where’d that come from? How does that then play out? In my leadership? Do I armour up? What are the effects on my leadership around that? How do I attune to my own self awareness to see the disconnection of how I’m trying to lead out loud in the world? And the stories I’m actually telling myself? Are they? Are they helping me walk in alignment with what I want? How I want to be? And how do I play with the power dynamics that I explore within myself that I experience out in the world? How is that playing into my stories? And how can I explore some of the stories in a way that helps me recraft them to serve me? Can I see some of these stories even as a place of, of medicine, finding healing parts, where I can create new stories, or where I can see potential in pain that I’m feeling? Or I can see some of the storytelling that I do just within myself much less to others that, hold on a minute. That’s, that’s not what I mean anymore? How can I explore myself so that I reveal the stories within me and reveal the identity and identities in a way where I can nurture myself into being who I want? And strive to be now? Do I have that clarity of what that looks like? Can I stay in spaces long enough to find these new ways of being and these new stories I want to craft? Because there’s going to be resistance in myself, there’s going to be resistance, when I start leading out loud from those stories. There are going to be some people in my life that don’t really like that very much. But my days of apologizing for who I am, are done. And I have hard work to do to reveal the stories I tell myself and the intersectionalities of my identity in order to stand in a place that serves my energy, my leadership, the very foundation of my why. And I’ll tell you all, as I personally play with my identities and my stories. It can, it’s obviously highly personal work and it can be lonely, invisible work, and exhausting. One thing is for sure is that it’s worth it. Thanks all. I’m Saralyn. You can find me at holonleadership.org. I walk alongside you as you practice your leadership.