The Inner Game of Leadership - and Life

“The inner game runs the outer game” - William Adams

This quote neatly captures my philosophy on potential.

Whatever is happening inside of us is reflected on the outside. We can only rise to the level of our inner awareness.

The ceiling on our worldly endeavors is directly related to our understanding of how our minds work for and against us.

Our potential — in work, athletics, relationships and in life itself — is determined by how well we perceive, calibrate, and continuously upgrade our inner operating system.

The beauty of this journey is that there is no limit to what we can accomplish.

But we have to be willing to unlearn so much of what we’ve taken as gospel.

The paradox is that real growth begins when we question our long-held assumptions and accept just how little we truly know.

This is the crossroads we face at midlife.

Perhaps it’s what Robert Frost referenced when he chose “the road less traveled by — and that made all the difference.”

A recent experience and shift in my approach to work prompted this reflection.

Leadership

No place discourages examination of the inner game — yet requires it more to thrive — than work, and especially leadership.

Emotional Intelligence was not a prerequisite for success under the 20th-century model of command-and-control, top-down management.

Workers did what they were told, motivated by the carrot or the stick.

Bosses weren’t held accountable for their emotional shortcomings.

But the 21st century has ushered in a new era, where cooperation and collaboration are the foundational skills of success.

Today, leaders must model a new level of self-awareness.

And this is hard.

It’s counterintuitive to everything we’ve seen modeled in culture — and likely experienced in our own careers.

It’s hard because it’s an affront to the ego — the ego that stands sentinel at the entrance of the path to discomfort and uncertainty.

But all great things happen on the other side of discomfort.

Recently, I received feedback from a team member that closely resembled feedback I’ve heard from my wife: that I had a way of being overly critical and judgmental, making people I care about feel less than.

Oof.

My instinct was to deflect and defend. But I’ve learned to regulate that first emotional wave.

And I knew — it hurt because it was true.

Though never my conscious intention, it was a pattern. One that was unhelpful at best, hurtful at worst.

Through a process of self-exploration, I located the bug in my subconscious source code. I saw the connection to my formative experiences in life.

And I’ve started to patch it. I’m in the process of upgrading.

And it is a process.

This type of change doesn’t occur overnight. We’re often undoing a lifetime of behavioral conditioning.

But with effort and intention, we make progress.

Finding the Motivation

Adversity almost always reveals this new path to us. When disaster strikes, we’re given no choice but to reexamine how we show up in the world.

But disaster need not strike to begin this journey.

Sometimes we simply find ourselves curious about what we are really capable of.

Midlife often entreats us down this path. Despite outward success and accomplishment, inwardly, we feel something missing.

That’s the radar beacon pinging off in the distance.

That’s the whisper of your soul.

This is why cultivating practices that embrace stillness — meditation, prayer, walking in nature — are vital.

They help us attune to this faint but constant signal.

At first, it’s easily drowned out by the noise and dopamine hits of modern life.

But once we locate it, we can return to it.

We don’t know where it’s leading — but somewhere deep inside, we begin to trust that it’s where we are meant to go.

I’ve found it’s a continual process of drifting away and returning back.

Over time, we drift less — or realize we’re drifting faster — and return more easily.

This is the process of rewiring your mind — formally known as neuroplasticity.

The expansion of new pathways into the limitless potential within you.

Inner Worlds and Outer Worlds

The exhilarating realization, at (soon-to-be) age 49, is this:

There is no ceiling on growth.

We each contain a vast, endless constellation of inner mysteries to reveal until our final breaths.

In many ways, our inner world mirrors the vastness of the universe itself.

It might sound radical, but the world of quantum mechanics suggests exactly this.

In The Dancing Wu Li Masters, Gary Zukav writes:

“The philosophical implication of quantum mechanics is that all of the things in our universe, including us, that appear to exist independently are actually parts of one all-encompassing organic pattern, and no part of that pattern is ever really separate from it or from each other.”

Pulling on this thread invites us into a deeper exploration of consciousness itself — one that challenges our everyday lived experience, and even our very notions of reality.

For most of us, it’s enough to simply create awareness of this possibility.

To stand, even for a moment, in awe and wonder at how little we truly know.

To realize that our accomplishments — money, status, success — pale in comparison to the joy and beauty of tapping into the deeper mysteries of existence.

Sure, these vessels we ride in will slow down and evolve.

But embracing that inevitable process reveals new potential.

When we loosen our grip on the outer game. When we shift more energy toward inner expansion, we step into our true power.

And we begin to realize our real potential.

-Coach Kris