In my earlier years of starting businesses, I was fixated on doing things right.
Everything I did had to be perfect.
Business cards had to be perfect.
The website had to look great.
I obsessed over doing a great job with every customer, every time.
I never understood why I did this while I was doing it, but I did it for years.
I wish someone would have slapped me.
This is my attempt to smack you if you struggle with this.
I hear too many stories of business founders/CEOs that don’t sound pleasant, enjoyable, or desired.
Founders who are very unhealthy. Terrible diet and overweight.
Founders who used to be in a relationship and have a family. Now they’re divorced and only see their kids on weekends.
Or how about the CEO who micromanages everything (obsessively)?
Look, I get it.
These stories can be told dozens of different ways.
“But people depended on me and I couldn’t let them down.”
“But my business was taking off and I had no time for family or healthy diets.”
“But I want this to be perfect.”
“But I want to make sure my employees did things right.”
Listen, if you like being controlled by your subconscious, then forget about what I am about to say.
I'm not saying these things to provoke fear. I'm saying them to describe a behavior that no one is talking about. Increased awareness allows us to be more proactive.
The question is, how do you want to write your story?
How do you want to live your legacy?
No one truly desires to be unhealthy, get a divorce, or spend way too long on perfecting and controlling everything.
Every second, we are doing the best we can, with what we've been given, with where we're at in the journey.
And then one day, you go to that doctor, and he says, “If you don’t get things in order, you’re not going to see your kids grow up.”
Or how about coming home to a letter from your partner saying they’re done and they can’t handle it anymore. They’re leaving you.
... I think you get my point by now. Is this the story you want for your life? Doubtfully.
Again, everyone can rationalize why things turned out the way they did. We can always blame something or make excuses.
Or maybe we own our mistakes and actually do something about it.
I’m going to share a side of the story no one is talking about. It is an illness.
It is an unhealthy condition. It is a poor mindset. It is a sickness.
It is part of our humanity if we do not proactively put in the effort to strengthen it.
So, what is it?
One word.
One very simple word that many don’t understand they naturally do. (Well, everyone except sociopaths)
SHAME.
There, I said it. The subconscious CEO illness no one is talking about is shame.
Shame researcher, Brené Brown, defines shame as the “intensely painful feeling that we are unworthy of love and belonging.”
Shame is, “I am a failure.”
Guilt, the healthy mindset, is, “I have failed.”
Shame is focus on self.
Guilt is focus on behavior.
CEOs, business founders, and leaders alike, get so caught up with perfection, and their work, that they begin to associate their identity with what they’re creating.
Then they became a slave to their creation.
Because they’re afraid to be associated with anything less than perfect or great or huge or epic or world-changing.
Understand this dynamic and grab the reigns of your life.
Again, this is instinctively human. Why?
At HX Works, we serve through the lens of HX, the human experience.
And guess what?
The human experience is about connection.
It is about being connected to our family and friends and to our world.
Shame is the fear that we are not capable of connection... and that frightens us.
We crave connection. Usually at the subconscious level.
How many people participated in the ice bucket challenge because they wanted to be a part of something? To do what others are doing? To give back? To play along? Yeah, one word: connection.
Listen, connection is great... early human tribes would not have existed if they didn’t connect with one another and work together to fight off threats.
The difference lies in our ability to intentionally seek out healthy connection versus being controlled subconsciously by connection and living the legacy you don’t want.
This truth is a muscle.
The more you read this, the more you understand, the more you mindfully pay attention, the greater you will become at living the legacy you want for your life.
How do you make the unconscious conscious?
Catch yourself.
Be mindful of the instinctive human characteristic, connection.
Understand that you are not the things you do.
Learn how to disconnect from your business so that you can gain clarity and see things objectively.
The question is, what legacy do you want to live for your life?
Live it consciously.
Did this truth resonate? Learn about our introspective experience.
