Lead from Within: First Steps to Your New Leadership Style

Posted on 10. Jun, 2010 by Lolly Daskal in Wake Up & Shake It Up

Today Lolly Daskal is our guest blogger for the Wake Up & Shake It Up blog series.

Lolly has helped thousands of business people identify and optimize their innate leadership. A logical and energized writer, speaker, teacher, and coach, her clients have praised her wisdom and compassion. She specializes in leadership development, peak performance, and business strategy.

Leadership, based on what you know to be true, comes from within. What makes you different from other leaders is that you want to be guided by your truth.

What’s interesting about truth is that it doesn’t necessarily wave banners, have temper tantrums, or even yell a lot. In fact, truth can be simultaneously quiet and dangerous. That’s how it has managed to live among us for so many centuries.

The greatest leaders living among us have drawn the truth from within themselves. Leading from within is not always easy, but it’s certainly doable, and it’s definitely rewarding—not only for you, but also for those with whom you come in contact.

Here are a few first steps for discovering and using your truth as a leader:

Live with intention. Leading from within is not an excuse to abandon reason. Living with intention will show you the difference between what you feel and what is. Use your intellectual rigor to ask the right questions when you’re facing a challenge.

Listen hard. Listen to your questions as you ask them. Are you scaring people into telling you what you want to hear? If that is your truth, then you will hear lies—not because your people are liars, but because they are responding to your truth. When you ask for and receive the truth, listen. Hard. Because you, a leader, have just received a gift from another leader.

Walk to the edge. Be willing to endure—even enjoy—the extremes of emotion that challenge and creative thinking generate. But don’t jump off!

Practice wellness. You have two voices inside your head. The monkey brain won’t shut up. Trying to get your attention, it constantly spews nonsense. The truth is silent and willing, but it uses words sparely. The monkey brain wants to own you. The truth wants you to own it.

Choose with no regrets. Test. Take baby steps. Allow for messing up. Explore the nature of error. Is “error” really the right name for what happened? Ban “woulda/shoulda/coulda.” Leading from within does not include might-have-beens.

Play with abandonment. This means abandon your work when it is done. Continuing to think about work when it is time to have fun is a direct invitation to the monkey brain to set up shop and drive you crazy. Leading from within means that the monkey brain remains unemployed 24/7.

Finally, take a leap of faith and believe that you have the right and the responsibility to lead from within.

Read more of Lolly’s thoughts about uncommon leadership Blog

Meet Lolly Daskal, The creator of Lead From Within

Lolly designs methodical yet creative programs for refining and optimizing her clients’ unique leadership skills. Her hands-on involvement ensures her clients achieve measurable personal and professional success. Lolly’s new six-week program is titled Branding Your Story™

Tags: 1 Leadership, art of the question, business strategy, courage, peak performance, servant leadership, Truth, Wake Up & Shake It Up

11 Responses to “Lead from Within: First Steps to Your New Leadership Style”

Mike Henry Sr.

10. Jun, 2010

Lolly, great point about truth. It doesn’t have to shout at us or try to entice us. The truth is the truth. It is what it is. Many times the loudest and most compelling reasoning for decisions and strategies come from public opinion and fads. The truth doesn’t shout. It is. Great reminder. Thanks.

Mike…

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Lolly Daskal

10. Jun, 2010

Mike,

You are a great example of Leader who lives his truth. Thanks for your comment.

Lolly

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Monica Diaz

12. Jun, 2010

Authenticity is a true leaders greatest asset. And there is no authenticity without the soul-searching you so masterfully lead us to in your first steps here. As always, Lolly, your post is truthful and to the point. Thank you.

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Shawn Murphy

12. Jun, 2010

My favorite part of your blog is the questions asked and hearing how they are asked. The art of the question is so powerful when used to invite a conversation and not sound flip, accusatory, or judgemental. Good stuff.

Reply to this comment
Lolly Daskal

12. Jun, 2010

Monica,

Leading From Within is to invest in yourself.
Being authentic is about knowing who you are.

If you are not grounded through your values and beliefs, and credible through your judgment, or if you are not emotionally mature to analyze yourself. How will you grow as a leader? How will you connect with others? How will you generate change?

The process of authenticity is soul searching, Monica, just as you stated above…..

It is all about Leading From Within. Being Authentic and in the process becoming a Great Leader of Change.

As always Monica, your comments are right on.

Reply to this comment
Lolly Daskal

12. Jun, 2010

Shawn,

Anyone who knows me or has worked with me- has been through my process—as you beautifully called them “The art of the question” I call them– having courageous conversations with oneself.

All my questions are about wanting to go deeper, it feeds the impulse within you that wants to grow and to expand, and it allows you to embrace your largest possible self, to make your largest contribution to the world.

Awesome work Shawn, I admire all that you do.
Your BIGGEST fan.
Lolly

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Wayne McEvilly

10. Jul, 2011

Lolly
Elegance, simplicity, profundity, wit, wisdom, practicality, usefulness, luminosity, all meet and sparkle in this marvel of a post.
It is so short and yet so potent.
I love it, and I thank you for it.
Wayne

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- Shawn Murphy
  
  10. Jul, 2011
  
  Hi Wayne,
  I know that Lolly would be grateful for your comments. I’ll be sure to let her know that you stopped by to share your response to this post.
  
  Shawn
  
  Reply to this comment
- Lolly Daskal
  
  10. Jul, 2011
  
  Dearest Wayne,
  
  Where you go I shall follow… because you bring music to my soul.
  
  What you see in others is a mere reflection of your own beauty.
  
  You are a man of Elegance, simplicity, profoundness wit, wisdom, practical usefulness, and you do illuminate any space you occupy. Thanks for all the wonderful ways I can describe you.
  
  i Cherish you always.
  Lolly
  
  Reply to this comment
mckra1g

18. Jul, 2011

The truth is SO symbiotic with trust in oneself (as I’ve found out over the year prior). To have the confidence in flux, flex and (apparent) uncertainty requires such a faith in oneself.

I cannot articulate it fully because it’s one of those truths that just is. You’ve had to look into the gaping maw of “No Way Is This Going To Happen and You’re Crazy”, tell the echo of that monkey brain, “Yes, it is,” and then live it in order to understand.

Thank you so much for being a lodestar to those who are just starting to hear their own voice, and for the companionship along the road for those who have begun to lead from within. My best, M.

Reply to this comment
- Shawn Murphy
  
  18. Jul, 2011
  
  Hi Molly,
  I chuckled when I read your comment about the monkey brain. It’s such a nuisance, right!?
  
  I’m in total support of helping employees have respectful, transparent interactions. And as you so aptly point out, it takes faith in oneself and confidence to ask those difficult questions.
  Here’s to helping people give sound to their voice.
  
  Shawm
  
  Reply to this comment