Centered Leadership

1. Centered Leadership: A Holistic Path to Impact

Centered Leadership is no magic potion, but something even better—a way of leading and living.

Unleash full potential. Centered Leadership is a proven approach, used by Fortune 100 companies, that teaches you to manage your thoughts, feelings, and actions to unleash your full potential. It's about leading with purpose, clarity, and positive impact, becoming a leader who is well-grounded, hopeful, adaptable, results-oriented, and eager to learn. This framework helps leaders gain greater self-awareness and self-reflection, leading to more conscious choices in thought and action.

Five interconnected dimensions. The Centered Leadership model is built on five interconnected dimensions: Meaning, Framing, Connecting, Engaging, and Energizing. These dimensions work synergistically, building on and reinforcing each other to create lasting impact. While focusing on one dimension can bring incremental improvements, using all five in concert leads to profound and sustained transformation.

Embrace the "and." Centered Leadership encourages embracing the "and" within oneself, integrating masculine and feminine sides, power and vulnerability, practicality and vision. This acceptance of polarities is crucial for becoming centered, enabling leaders to navigate uncertainty, adapt to opportunities, and achieve results while embracing continuous learning.

2. Meaning: Anchor Your Leadership in Purpose

Meaning is what happens in moments when I feel at one with the universe—when I feel love for everyone and everything around me, including myself.

Deepest fulfillment. Meaning is the anchor of Centered Leadership, carrying five times the clout of any other dimension. It begins with long-lasting happiness, or fulfillment, which comes from actively engaging in activities that truly matter to us and allow us to use our core strengths. This deep engagement inspires conviction, courage, and confidence.

Discover your purpose. By knowing what truly matters, you can discover your purpose, which becomes your calling. This purpose inspires vision, helps reframe challenges as opportunities, fosters deep connections, encourages risk-taking, and exudes positive energy. It's about understanding what you stand for, regardless of your professional or personal context.

Peak experiences reveal meaning. Reflecting on peak experiences—moments of high performance, passion, and engagement—often reveals underlying meaning. These are times when you felt part of something bigger than yourself, stretching to achieve significant contributions. While not always "fun," these moments are deeply fulfilling and energizing, highlighting what truly drives you.

3. Framing: Master Your Mindset to Transform Challenges

What we accept we can transform.

Recognize triggers. Framing is about understanding how your perception of a situation influences your behavior, especially in challenging moments. Our amygdala, designed to protect us, can hijack our responses, blurring the line between physical and emotional threats. This leads to habitual, often unhelpful, reactive patterns.

Learn to pause. The key to reframing is learning to pause in the heat of the moment. This "time-out" allows your executive brain to re-engage, expanding your awareness and enabling you to choose a different, more resourceful response. Pausing can be as simple as deep breathing, grounding yourself, or asking a self-reflective question.

Shift your mindset. Once you pause, you can consciously choose to adopt a new mindset, replacing fear-based reactions with curiosity and compassion. This shift in belief naturally leads to new behaviors, expanding your range of actions and transforming your experience of the situation, making it less stressful and more productive.

4. Connecting: Build Trust and Community for Collective Impact

A community is when you bring life to a network.

Beyond a Rolodex. Connecting is about transforming relationships from transactional to trust-based, fostering genuine community. A network is merely a list of contacts, but a community is where relationships are activated through support and interaction, scaling leadership visions and fostering a sense of belonging.

Four elements of trust. Trust, the foundation of strong relationships, depends on four elements:

• Reliability: Doing what you say you will do.
• Congruence: Aligning your words, beliefs, and actions.
• Acceptance: Suspending judgment and seeing others as doing their best.
• Openness: Being transparent about your thoughts, feelings, and intentions.
  Understanding and strengthening these elements in yourself and others is crucial for building meaningful connections.

Mindsets drive connection. Our underlying mindsets significantly influence how we build relationships. Shifting from a mindset of self-protection or competition to one of generosity and collaboration can profoundly change how you connect. When you genuinely share your strengths and vulnerabilities, you foster deeper trust and inspire others to do the same.

5. Engaging: Cultivate Presence and Courage to Act

Engaging is where it all comes together—when you choose to cross an invisible line from being a person to whom things happen to becoming a person who makes things happen.

Align for presence. Presence is achieved when your intention (what you want to create) aligns with your attention (where you focus) and your emotion (the feelings you convey). This alignment makes you appear calm, curious, and connected, allowing others to truly see and hear you. It's about being fully "in the moment."

Storytelling mobilizes. Stories are powerful tools for engaging and mobilizing others, especially when leading change. By framing your message, conveying a relevant incident with sensory detail, stating a clear point, and highlighting a benefit for the audience, you can elicit understanding, conviction, and commitment. Personal stories, infused with emotion, make your message memorable and relatable.

Face fears with hope. While fear can be a powerful fuel, hope allows you to envision possibilities beyond limitations. Balancing one-third fear with two-thirds hope can propel you into the unknown, expanding your comfort zone. This courage enables you to take risks and act, transforming challenges into opportunities for growth and impact.

6. Energizing: Sustain Performance Through Deliberate Renewal

Burnout destroys intention and purpose, no matter how noble.

Energy, not time, management. Sustaining high performance requires managing your energy, not just your time. Burnout, fueled by negative emotions like stress and anxiety, depletes talent and spreads contagiously. Recognizing your four sources of energy—physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual—is the first step to conscious renewal.

Shift your mindset on recovery. Many view recovery as a sign of weakness or a luxury, but it is integral to sustained performance. Shifting your mindset from "working to exhaustion" to "recharging to perform better" is crucial. Regular, even brief, recovery practices throughout the day prevent energy drain and boost vitality.

Integrate renewal daily. Just as athletes build recovery into their training, leaders must integrate renewal into their daily lives. This includes consistent practices like:

• Waking-up rituals: Setting intentions before distractions begin.
• Nighttime rituals: Reflecting on gratitude to calm the mind for sleep.
• Micro-breaks: Short activities (e.g., a quick walk, mindful breathing, gratitude lists) to replenish energy during the workday.

7. Self-Awareness is the Foundation of Growth

What I could not see at first was my role in creating my invisibility and emptiness. I was the problem and I am the solution.

Inner journey. The Centered Leadership journey begins with deep self-reflection and self-awareness. Understanding your own thoughts, feelings, and actions is the first step to unlocking your full potential and making a positive impact. This involves recognizing your patterns, triggers, and underlying beliefs.

Uncovering your "iceberg." Much of what drives our behavior lies beneath the surface, like an iceberg. Exploring your feelings, thoughts, values, priorities, and deepest needs helps you understand why you react the way you do. This deep dive, though sometimes uncomfortable, is essential for gaining clarity and choice.

Continuous learning. Self-awareness is not a destination but an ongoing journey. It involves continuously observing yourself, seeking feedback from others, and being open to learning from every experience, especially difficult ones. This continuous process allows you to adapt, grow, and lead from a more resourceful and authentic place.

8. Embrace Vulnerability to Unlock Potential

When you respond with love, you learn to receive and accept what life brings.

Courage to be conscious. Embracing vulnerability is a courageous act that allows you to face your fears and unmet needs head-on. Instead of hiding imperfections or struggles, acknowledging them opens the door to self-acceptance and transformation. This courage comes from the heart, enabling you to receive and accept life's challenges.

Vulnerability builds trust. When leaders show their vulnerability, they demonstrate authenticity and humanity, which inspires trust in others. It creates a space for genuine connection, allowing colleagues and team members to feel seen and understood. This fosters a more supportive and collaborative environment.

Liberating self-acceptance. Letting go of the need for perfection and accepting all parts of yourself—both strengths and perceived weaknesses—is profoundly liberating. It frees up immense energy previously spent on maintaining facades or self-criticism, allowing you to be more present, effective, and joyful in your leadership and life.

9. The Power of Choice in Every Situation

You have to decide, ‘Am I gonna get out today or not?’

Freedom to choose. Even in the most challenging or fear-inducing situations, you have the freedom to choose your attitude and how you experience the moment. This realization is hugely empowering, shifting you from being a victim of circumstances to the conscious creator of your own experience.

Break reactive patterns. Our brains often default to habitual, fear-based reactions. By becoming aware of these "amygdala hijacks" and learning to pause, you can interrupt the automatic response. This pause creates a crucial window for your executive brain to re-engage, allowing you to make a deliberate choice about your next thought and action.

Create desired outcomes. Choosing a new mindset and behavior doesn't guarantee external results will change, but it fundamentally alters your internal experience. By consciously choosing how you show up, you can approach situations with greater confidence, creativity, and resourcefulness, leading to more positive personal and professional outcomes.

10. Cultivate Sponsors and Pay it Forward

Sponsors choose you—but you cultivate the relationship.

Beyond mentorship. While mentors offer wisdom and guidance, sponsors are powerful individuals who actively advocate for your career and are willing to take risks on your behalf. They see your potential, believe in your capabilities, and have the influence to open doors to significant opportunities.

Earn sponsorship. You don't ask for a sponsor; you earn one through consistent performance and by actively helping them succeed. Strategies to get noticed include:

• Excitement creator: Share positive results and successes.
• Counsel seeker: Ask for advice on specific issues.
• Great questioner: Engage with insightful questions.
• Unsolicited helper: Offer relevant support or ideas.
• Steadfast helper: Consistently deliver in direct work with senior leaders.
• Upward coach: Provide honest, constructive feedback.

Understand sponsor archetypes. Sponsors come in different archetypes (e.g., Visionary, Sage, Relentless Coach, Hero, Godfather, Caregiver, Connector/Navigator), each with unique strengths and limitations. Understanding their primary archetype helps you tailor your approach, ask for what you need, and influence how they show up for you.

11. Stories: The Key to Engaging and Mobilizing Others

Leaders who tell great stories seem more present and alive—electric.

Stories are integral to leadership. Stories are not just for entertainment; they are powerful tools for leadership, especially in driving change. They captivate imagination, ignite learning, and create shared experiences, making messages memorable and inspiring others to action.

Crafting compelling narratives. Effective storytelling involves:

• Aligning intention, attention, and emotion: Ensuring your message, focus, and feelings are congruent.
• Engaging the senses: Bringing the story to life with vivid details, like a movie.
• Making it personal: Connecting the story to your own experiences to build authenticity and relatability.
• Clear structure: Framing the story, conveying a relevant incident, stating the point, and articulating the benefit for the audience.

Beyond facts and figures. While data and logic are important, stories appeal to the heart and spirit, eliciting understanding, conviction, and commitment in ways that mere facts cannot. They help people connect emotionally with a vision, making them more likely to buy in and mobilize for change.

12. Recovery is Not a Weakness, But a Necessity

If you can’t choose somewhere in the seven or eight range or higher, go find something else to do.

Prioritize well-being. Ignoring energy management is a short-sighted strategy that leads to burnout, draining intention and purpose. Leaders must recognize that their physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual well-being are foundational to sustained high performance and positive impact.

Shift your mindset on rest. The belief that constant busyness or suffering leads to success is detrimental. Instead, embrace the mindset that regular recovery and renewal are essential for accessing creativity, focus, and emotional balance. This shift allows you to integrate restorative practices without guilt.

Daily rituals for sustained energy. Implement simple, consistent rituals to manage your energy throughout the day and over the long term. This includes:

• Morning intention-setting: Starting the day with clarity and purpose.
• Mindfulness practices: Brief moments of focused attention to calm the mind.
• Nighttime gratitude: Reflecting on positive experiences to promote restful sleep.
  These practices, even in small doses, accumulate to create a self-renewing well of energy.

Last updated: August 10, 2025