Is your inner 5-year-old running your life?

(Or: Four Steps to Conscious Leadership)

We are all leaders. If not in the workplace, then perhaps as a parent/aunt/uncle etc. You are a role model and therefore a leader. Or perhaps you are a leader amongst your community, or you are someone whose choices are modelling a different way to live. Others will be following your example, and this makes you a leader even if you are unaware of the fact.

But if you are fulfilling this leadership role without putting too much thought into it, then your childhood conditioning, behaviour patterns and emotional responses could be taking over: your inner 5-year-old is running the show!

In this article, therefore, I want to outline the four simple steps to becoming more conscious as a leader. But before I start, why would you want to become more “conscious”, and what does that even mean?

Conscious Leadership means waking up to the conditioning that you received in your formative years, and being able to notice your own thoughts that are leading to your emotional responses and patterns of behaviour.

Once you are aware that you can raise your consciousness, you are in a position to make new choices in your life; you can consciously create an existence that brings you joy and fulfilment. Now, isn’t that worth working towards?

If you think your inner 5-year-old could be holding you back, here are my four steps to conscious leadership:

1)     Notice what you don’t like in your life and what you’re struggling with, what you’ve not yet created that you’d love to create.

2)     Now, take responsibility for having unconsciously created what you currently have e.g. not enough money, an unhealthy relationship, a sense of failure etc.

3)     Get external help to work out what your unconscious conditioning was – what beliefs and feelings are running your behaviours and patterns.

4)     Have the courage to make new choices for your life.

I was a top student, I turned down a place at Cambridge University, became a lawyer, moved into coaching and consulting. A success story on the outside! However, my personal relationship history read like a disaster movie. It was dramatic, it was so bad it was funny, but there it was, showing me where I hadn’t gone through those 4 steps to Conscious Leadership.

Now I have developed my own consciousness, acknowledged those mistakes and behaviours, and made positive choices, I know that my purpose is to be a guide for those who want to wake up, become conscious and lead their lives, their organisations, teams, careers, from that place run by 5-year-olds, to a place of openness, courage and insight. A place of consciousness and maturity!

If you’d like some help along this journey, feel free to get in touch.

• NEW: My online course starting 12th October – “Leading a Coaching Culture” – will help leaders develop consciousness and move from ‘doing’ the work to ‘leading’ and ‘inspiring’ others.