“Just a flesh wound…” The Black Knight, Monty Python and Search for the Holy Grail

When a player was limping by my high school football coach would ask…”are you hurt? or are you injured”….what he really was asking was is this something you can play through and not make it worse, like a bruise (hurt) OR is this something that you will actually exacerbate a big issue if you keep trying to play (injured).

I have to commend my coaches that they never encouraged anyone to play injured…but sometimes we all did because we didn’t want to appear weak or let the team down by admitting that we were “injured”. Now decades later we feel the consequences of those decisions when we get out of bed in the morning…and some in more dramatic ways.

I’m amazed when I work with clients how many of them do the same thing, often with their emotional and mental health…and sometimes with their physical health. Only now it isn’t impacting a game…their families count on them, their friends count on them, their co-workers, customers and vendors all count on them to be at their best. The stakes are much higher now, yet so many leaders still neglect themselves…and we all know the first step to fixing a problem is admitting that you have one.

Are you ok? …before you answer that, use these two questions to help determine if you are being honest with yourself…

1) What would your spouse or significant other say if I asked them if you were OK?

2) How would you answer if your best friend was in your same situation?

…Now that you are honest with yourself what are you going to do about it?…have that hard conversation? Hire for that position that you have been putting off? Talk to your accountant about what your options are? Go see a counselor?

When you embrace your reality then you can make the hard decisions that make you a leader worth following.