Your Ambition should reach to these unknown places. Stop playing small. Stop minimizing yourself. And the missing connection.
Even when you don’t know what to do, do something. Anything. Write. Build. Move around. Record something. Take an action for a customer. Create value in peoples’ lives. Solve problems for them. It’s interesting how solving others’ problems helps you to solve your own. It gets you out of your own head and into the heads of others through connection. It gets us out of self indulgence and to peer into the life of someone else. Whenever we feel selfish or self-centered, we should immediately take action to help someone else out. Even the simple act of calling someone to check in on them matters a ton today because nobody’s very curious about anyone these days. Check-in on your friends. Check-in on your customers. Check-in on your people. Be there for them. Sometimes it is that the bar is low. Especially when the bar is low, check in. Connect. Ask. Ask. Ask. A lot of people feel like they’re getting their ass kicked. Let them talk it out.
What’s missing today are deep relationships and genuine connection with others. We’ve never felt more isolated despite our social tech. It’s because social tech isn’t enough — we’ve got to meet and see people! We’ve got to build community. We’ve got to connect with our friends, our customers, our families more frequently, more consistently. What’s missing is connection. It’s no wonder so many of us feel like something is missing! Something is. Genuine connection is.
We tend to forget that we’re primarily social creatures. We need other people. We have a strong sense of belonging to tribes. It’s a survival instinct. Banishment from the tribe meant possible death. Nobody wanted to be on their own. And yet here we are today, lonely AF at home. We’ve been told to disconnect. We’ve been told to stay away or stay home. We’ve been told to divide. None of these prescriptions are helping us with our sense of belonging. They’re far more divisive than anything else. It’s no wonder we feel the way we feel! We need to rebuild. We need to re-connect. We need to create again. We need to take actions to build up our relationships again, to make things better, to feel better, to breathe new life again.
How about having the ambition to build great relationships? How would that be? What would that feel like to prioritize them again? Having great relationships is a wonderful ambition for us all because strong relationships are a happiness signal. Strong relationships are a leadership strength. Strong, trusting relationships are the bedrock of strong companies. Strong relationships put people first — and mean it!
So many of us struggle with showing people who we really are, what we’re really all about, what we stand for. We’re scared of rejection. We’re scared of conflict. We’re just scared to leave the house! Yet standing up for our true selves, for what we believe, is key to congruence. It is how we know we’re master of our own ship vs. follower of someone else’s and simply doing their bidding. We know who we are. We know what we want. We are on the path to go get after it. It becomes a core set of strengths for us, a guiding beacon. Without it, we feel lost, adrift, which is probably why a lot of people feel this way today. They’re unsure of who they are now. And they’re trying to re-claim what they once had. They seek clarity on it through performance prompts and constant questions. They do it because they want to know! They want assurance. They want consistency. They want congruence. All high performers want these feelings of consistent, congruent action. They’re ready now.
It takes courage to speak your truth, to speak up for what you believe even if others don’t get you. Others won’t get you, and that’s OK. Be OK with that. Say it anyway. It’s good for you and your psyche. We need that as a release valve. Say it anyway. Seek out like minded others to build ideas and to create with them. Seek out shared goals and get stuff done through others. This is why relationships are so important! You can only do so much. We can get so much more done with other people working with us! Plus, it is more fun and better for your psyche!
We need to have the courage to show our true selves, who we really are, living in consistent congruence with what we feel is true for us. If we don’t, we’re hiding, scared, inconsistent. Not to mention we’re playing small. There is no need to play small in this life. There is no need to minimize yourself for others. If you walk into the room and you light it up, keep on lighting it up! Keep that light bright! We need your light now more than ever! We are all ready to soak it in. And if some people aren’t, that’s their problem, not yours. We need you playing your best, brightest game. We need your best and brightest contribution. We need your best creativity. We need your best problem solving. We need your best.
You playing small not only steals from yourself — you’re stealing your best from us, too! Did you think of that? What about your best for your friends and family? How are you showing up for them? What kind of a culture do you create for them? Why would you want to create a culture of smallness when you can be bold and bright and alight!? Nobody wakes up in the morning just hoping to play small that day. Bring out your boldest self. Bring out your brightest light. Bring out your best, most creative self. And then get to building. If you’re a high performer, that’s how you want to be known. You want to be known as bold, bright, goal-achieving, builder. That’s the reputation you want to create. You know where you’re heading. You know what you want. You know what you want to build, and you get after building it each day with boldness and with brightness and with generosity.
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