When a Lemon is Just a Lemon
When life hands you lemons, make lemonade right?
Fuck that.
I’m in the business of helping people be better leaders. In order to do this effectively, I believe that you need to reflect just enough and glean meaning from your past experiences so that you can architect and realize your best possible future—one that is not only exciting and attainable, but transforms your past experiences, successes, failures, and missteps into strategic learnings that will propel you and your business forward.
This is your story as a leader—the story of where you’ve been and ultimately where you’re going. And I want you to own your story rather than have other people write it for you.
But there are times when you don’t feel good as a leader. And this makes you feel like a bad leader. And you just can’t process or gain meaning from an experience so that you can build energy for moving forward—either it’s too soon or there’s just nothing to learn and more importantly nothing you can do.
A global pandemic?
Lemon.
Your company in tatters because of the economic fallout?
Lemon.
Your toddler and baby home because schools and daycares are shut?
Lemon.
Your team is is panicked, unproductive, sick, or…worse.
Or you just don’t feel good for no f-ing reason.
All lemons.
But…but! Aren’t great leaders supposed to stay positive for their teams? And aren’t great leaders supposed to help their teams stay positive?
What about the bright side?! Shouldn’t you be thankful for what you have, you ask? Positive about the future? Reframe negative thoughts into positive?
Aren’t your kids cute? Isn’t it a blessing that you get to reimagine your entire business model?
I’ve seen a lot of memes and diagrams circulated online imploring you to reframe your negative thoughts into positive ones. To look at the bright side. To stop stewing in your sadness and instead serve others. Many of the leaders I work with in my leadership coaching practice have internalized these messages (even if they know these messages don’t feel right, it’s hard to shut out all the noise).
Fuck that.
***
Here is the thing about human psychology….
If you think back to high school physics, you might remember Newton’s Third Law: for every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction. The human brain is much the same. If you don’t feel good and you try to feel good, you will exert a lot of energy fighting yourself. It may or may not work in the short term, but it’s also unlikely to sustain over time. And that’s a waste of energy. Psychologists call this The Paradoxical Theory of Change.
How do you show up as a leader and make an impact when you team, organization, or world at large needs you there and needs your help?
There are different takes on this, but the gist of it is that when you accept what is and come to total awareness and accept what you’re feeling and doing—good or bad—you’ll mobilize energy towards moving forward. You will feel empowered rather than embattled.
Some psychologists call this movement from acceptance to energy to action the Gestalt Cycle of Experience or Cycle of Change:
When the grief is acute, as is the case for many of you (and me) right now, the cycle might look more like Kubler-Ross’s Grief Cycle (there is an excellent article about this from the Harvard Business Review that some of you might have read recently):
Above: a narrative arc diagram from my book, The User’s Journey.
And if this was an adventure tale, you could just call this a story.
In every story, things start off at equilibrium. Something happens. Things are not great. A hero tries a few things, learns a few things, runs into more challenges, and ultimately learns enough to move forward towards a different future.
Great leaders are like great heroes in great stories. They are not cardboard cutouts of strength or knee-jerk positivity. They are humans who feel and do things. From feeling comes strength and the stronger you and your team are, the more you’ll be able to make the impact you want to and need to make…when the time is right.
When you are on the front lines or in a dire situation of this or any other crisis (essential workers, extreme financial difficulties), that arc will need to be short out of necessity. And if you’re not on the front lines and have more slack, that arc will be as long as it needs to be…and that’s OK.
***
Special thanks to Pete Berridge, MAPP, PCC and Jennifer Peterson, PhD, PCC for their perspective and insights on positive psychology as it relates to grief and acceptance.
