Written by Mona Liza Santos, Award-Winning Children's Author & Emotional Literacy Advocate Mona Liza Santos is an award-winning children’s author and founder of World Love Press. She has written more than 40 books focused on emotional literacy, kindness, confidence, and cultural identity, inspiring families, educators, and young readers worldwide through heartfelt storytelling and meaningful life lessons. Have you ever thought about the one adult from your childhood who made you feel like you mattered? Maybe it was a parent, teacher, grandparent, coach, counselor, or simply someone who believed in you before you fully believed in yourself. Sometimes, one caring adult can make such a difference in the way a child begins to see themselves, especially during the years when confidence is still being built. As a mother and children’s author, I think about this often. We tell children to believe in themselves, speak up, follow their dreams, and be confident, but confidence does not simply appear because we tell them to have it. For many children, confidence begins with something much more basic. It begins with feeling accepted, understood, and safe enough to be themselves. If you would like to get to know me a little more beyond the books, you can also read my previous Monaco Muse interview, where I share more about my journey, the experiences that shaped me, and why this work means so much to me. Confidence does not always look the way we expect When people think about a confident child, they may picture someone who raises their hand first, makes friends easily, performs onstage, or walks into a room without hesitation. But confidence is not always loud or obvious. Sometimes confidence is the quiet child finally sharing an idea they have been holding back. It can be trying something new even though they are nervous, asking for help when something feels difficult, standing up for themselves, or making a mistake and still having enough belief to try again. That is why I believe confidence begins with belonging. Before children can truly believe in themselves, they often need to know there is at least one place and one person where they are accepted for who they are. When children feel that kind of acceptance, they have more room to discover their strengths instead of constantly wondering whether they are good enough. This idea of belonging has become a big part of the work I do, especially through Heritage and Heart Day, which encourages children and families to learn about their roots, celebrate who they are, and appreciate the stories and cultures of others. For me, confidence and belonging are closely connected. It is much easier for a child to believe in themselves when they do not feel as though they have to hide parts of who they are just to fit in. How one caring adult can build a child’s confidence Most of us probably do not remember every compliment we received growing up, but many of us remember the person who consistently made us feel important. It may have been a teacher who noticed something we were good at before we noticed it ourselves, a grandparent who always made us feel loved, a coach who encouraged us after a difficult game, or a parent who listened when we needed someone. Children often remember those moments because they remember how people made them feel. Simple words such as “I believe in you,” “Keep trying,” “I love hearing your ideas,” or “I am proud of how hard you worked” may sound ordinary to an adult. To a child who is questioning themselves, those words can mean much more. They can become proof that someone sees something valuable in them, and over time, children may begin to see that same value in themselves. Sometimes children borrow our belief first I believe there are times when children need to borrow confidence from the adults around them before they are able to build their own. A child may not believe they can do something yet, and that is when the encouragement of one trusted person can matter so much. We can remind children that mistakes are part of learning, that not succeeding the first time does not mean they should stop, and that effort matters even when the outcome is not what they hoped for. Children are constantly developing an inner voice from the messages they hear around them, often without adults realizing how much those messages stay with them. If a child repeatedly hears that they are difficult, too sensitive, too quiet, too loud, or not good enough, those words can slowly become part of the way they see themselves. The opposite can happen, too. When children regularly hear encouragement, patience, reassurance, and genuine belief, those messages can become part of their inner voice as well. Over time, “Someone believes in me” can slowly become “I believe in myself.” That message is also at the heart of one of my books, I Love Me Because I Am Who I Am. I wanted children to understand that confidence does not have to come from becoming someone different. Sometimes it begins with learning to appreciate the person you already are. Feeling seen is not the same as constant praise Making a child feel seen does not mean telling them they are wonderful at everything they do. Children can often tell when praise is not genuine, and sometimes the most meaningful encouragement is simply noticing them. It can be saying, “I saw how kind you were to that child,” or “I noticed you kept trying even when you were frustrated.” It can be recognizing that they looked nervous but still gave something a try, or noticing that they seem quieter than usual and asking if they are okay. Those small moments tell a child something very important: someone is paying attention. Children need to know that they matter beyond grades, awards, trophies, or accomplishments. They also need to know that they still matter on the days when things do not go well. That kind of acceptance can become one of the strongest foundations for healthy confidence. How emotional literacy helps children build confidence Emotional literacy is at the center of much of my work because I believe children become more confident when they begin understanding what is happening inside them. Young children experience many emotions before they have the words to explain them. A child may know that something feels uncomfortable, but they may not understand whether they are embarrassed, disappointed, nervous, jealous, frustrated, or afraid. Helping children recognize and name those feelings gives them a better understanding of themselves. Instead of thinking, “Something is wrong with me,” a child can begin to understand, “I feel nervous because this is new,” or “I feel disappointed because something did not go the way I hoped.” That understanding can also help children become more aware of other people’s feelings. A child who understands what sadness feels like may become more sensitive when a friend is hurting. A child who knows what it feels like to be left out may notice the classmate sitting alone. Emotional literacy does not only help children understand themselves. It can also help them develop empathy, kindness, and stronger relationships with others. Readers who would like to explore this part of my work more deeply can also read my earlier Brainz Magazine interview on children’s emotional wellbeing through storytelling. The quiet child deserves to be noticed too Some children naturally receive more attention because they speak the loudest or volunteer first. They may appear more confident simply because they are comfortable expressing themselves. But there are also children quietly observing everything around them who may have wonderful ideas they are afraid to share. They may be thoughtful, creative, funny, compassionate, or deeply curious, but they are still figuring out whether it feels safe to show those parts of themselves. Instead of asking a quiet child why they are so quiet, we can ask what they think. Instead of forcing them into situations that overwhelm them, we can give them opportunities to participate in ways that feel manageable. Sometimes the best thing we can do is become curious about what interests them, what makes them excited, and what helps them feel comfortable enough to open up. Confidence does not mean turning a quiet child into a loud one. To me, real confidence means helping a child become comfortable being who they already are. Representation can quietly tell children they belong Children also learn whether they belong by looking at the world around them. They notice who appears in books, movies, classrooms, advertisements, leadership roles, and the stories society chooses to celebrate. When children see people who look like them, families that resemble theirs, traditions they recognize, or experiences that feel familiar, it sends a quiet message that there is room for them too. This is one of the reasons cultural representation became so important in my own writing. When I wrote The Filipino in Me, I wanted Filipino children to recognize parts of themselves and feel proud of what they saw. At the same time, the message was never meant only for Filipino children. I want every child to understand that their family, culture, identity, experiences, and story have value. Children should never feel that they have to hide parts of themselves just to fit in. Belonging should not require becoming someone else. I explored this idea more deeply in my previous Brainz article, Beyond the Library and Why Stories Belong Wherever Families Gather, because understanding where we come from can play an important role in helping children develop identity, pride, and a stronger sense of belonging. Adults do not have to be perfect to make a difference One of the things I find comforting about this is that adults do not need to have perfect words or all the answers to positively influence a child. Sometimes we put so much pressure on ourselves to say exactly the right thing that we forget how much ordinary moments matter. Ask about their day and actually listen. Remember the name of their friend. Ask about the picture they drew. Show up when something matters to them. Celebrate effort, apologize when you are wrong, give them another chance after a difficult day, and remind them that they can come to you when something is bothering them. Children may not always tell us what those moments mean, but they notice. In many cases, consistency matters much more than perfection. Kindness can become part of a child’s inner voice With National Intentional Kindness Day coming up on August 24, I have also been thinking about how closely kindness and confidence are connected. Intentional kindness is not only about doing something nice for another person. Sometimes it is the way we speak to a child who has made a mistake, the patience we show when they are struggling, or the few extra minutes we take to listen when they are trying to tell us something. Those moments may feel small, but children notice how adults respond to them. When kindness, patience, and understanding become part of the environment a child grows up in, those experiences can influence the way they eventually learn to speak to themselves. That is one of the reasons I created National Intentional Kindness Day. My hope has always been to encourage people to become more aware of how their words, reactions, and everyday choices affect others, especially children. I also wrote more about this idea in my Brainz article, National Intentional Kindness Day Was About Human Connection, Not Just a Holiday. Behavior often tells us something Children who constantly feel criticized, ignored, compared, or misunderstood may begin questioning themselves long before adults notice it. Some children stop raising their hands because they are afraid of being wrong. Some stop trying new things because failure feels embarrassing. Others become overly focused on pleasing everyone around them, while some may act as though they do not care because caring feels too vulnerable. That is why I think it is important to remember that behavior often tells a story. Instead of immediately asking, “What is wrong with this child?” there are moments when it may be more helpful to ask, “What might this child be feeling?” That small change in perspective can move us away from judgment and toward understanding. Sometimes being curious about what a child is experiencing is exactly what helps them feel seen. Children need someone in their corner Life will eventually bring every child disappointment. They will lose, make mistakes, experience rejection, and face situations that make them question themselves. We cannot protect children from every difficult experience, and I do not think we should try to. Part of growing up is learning how to handle those moments. What we can do is help shape the voice they hear inside themselves when those moments happen. A child who has grown up hearing “Try again” may be more likely to understand that failure is not the end. A child who has heard “Your feelings matter” may feel safer asking for help. A child who has consistently heard “I believe in you” may eventually learn how to say those same words to themselves. That is why having one person in your corner can matter so much. Recognition has made me think more about where confidence begins As my own journey has grown, I have found myself thinking more about the people who encourage us before the rest of the world notices what we are doing. I am deeply grateful to have been named a 2026 TOFA Awardee. That recognition means a great deal to me, but it has also made me reflect on everything that happened long before anyone was recognizing the work. Before the opportunities, articles, events, milestones, and awards, there first had to be belief. There were people who encouraged me, and there were also moments when I had to keep going without knowing exactly where the journey would lead. Looking back, I realize how important both kinds of belief were. Children are still learning how to do that. They are developing the confidence they may one day need to pursue a dream that nobody else can see yet. Sometimes the encouragement they receive today becomes part of the courage they carry into adulthood, and that is why the adults around them matter so much. What children really need from us Children need guidance, structure, and adults who help them understand right from wrong. But they also need adults who make room for their emotions, ideas, personalities, differences, and dreams. They need someone who notices what is good in them, someone who does not define them by one mistake, and someone who reminds them that a difficult moment does not determine their future. This does not mean telling children that everything will be easy or that hard work is unnecessary. Confidence should never replace effort. Healthy confidence simply gives a child enough belief in themselves to begin. We never know which words a child will remember We rarely know which moments children will carry with them into adulthood. It may not be the long speech we carefully planned. Sometimes it is something we barely remember saying. A teacher may tell a child, “You are a really good writer.” A grandparent may say, “You have such a kind heart.” A coach may tell them, “You belong on this team.” A parent may remind them, “I will love you no matter what.” A caregiver may simply say, “Today was hard, but tomorrow we can try again.” Years later, those words may still be there. That is one of the beautiful responsibilities we have as adults when children trust us with pieces of who they are becoming. One caring adult really can make a difference When I think about what I hope children carry with them from my books, the answer is actually very simple. I want children to believe in themselves and their dreams. I want them to understand that their feelings matter, that they have something meaningful to offer, and that they should feel proud of who they are. Books can begin those conversations, but the people surrounding children help make those messages real. Every parent, teacher, grandparent, coach, counselor, caregiver, mentor, aunt, uncle, or trusted adult has an opportunity to become that person for a child. You may never receive recognition for it, and you may never fully know how much your encouragement mattered. But years from now, when that child is standing in front of something difficult and wondering whether they are capable, your voice may still be somewhere inside them reminding them that they can do it, that someone believes in them, and that they matter. Sometimes one caring adult really is all it takes to help a child begin believing those things for themselves. Join the conversation Think back to your own childhood. Was there one person who made you feel seen, capable, safe, or important during a time when you needed it most? Now think about the children in your own life. You may already be that person for someone without even realizing it. Confidence does not always begin with an accomplishment. Sometimes it begins with belonging, and sometimes belonging begins when one person chooses to believe in a child before that child has learned how to believe in themselves. To explore more of my work around children’s emotional literacy, confidence, kindness, cultural identity, and belonging, visit Mona Liza Santos and World Love Press, where you can find my books, free educational resources, community initiatives, and upcoming projects. Follow me on Facebook and Instagram for more info! Read more from Mona Liza Santos Mona Liza Santos, Award-Winning Children's Author & Emotional Literacy Advocate Mona Liza Santos is an award-winning children's author, publisher, and founder of World Love Press. She is the author of more than 40 children's books focused on emotional literacy, kindness, confidence, resilience, and cultural identity. Her work has been recognized by the Mom's Choice Awards for its positive impact on children and families. Inspired by motherhood, global travel, and her Filipino heritage, Mona creates stories that encourage children to embrace who they are and recognize their worth. Mona is also the founder of National Intentional Kindness Day and Heritage and Heart Day, created to promote empathy, inclusion, cultural pride, and meaningful human connection within schools and communities.

Written by Bre Bicknell, Perimenopause and Menopause Expert Bre Bicknell empowers women to age powerfully. She is a Certified Personal Trainer, Nutrition Specialist, Health Coach, and Menopause Coach. She delivers practical science-backed methods to gain muscle, boost brain health, and ignite purpose in the second half of life. Menopause has a meaningful purpose. It’s not just nature playing a tough trick on women. In fact, it’s an amazing evolutionary advantage given only to women. It represents our brain evolving us for the next exciting stage of life and a more powerful role in society. We end our reproductive years so we can become even more productive in other ways. Leading female brain researcher Dr. Lisa Mosconi and anthropologist Dr. Kristen Hawkes have shared scientific findings showing that menopause allows women to step into a bigger role in the second half of life. As estrogen levels drop, the brain remodels itself, and women begin to embrace new roles and purposes in society. Dr. Mosconi discovered that estrogen is present in the brain, not just in the ovaries. Thanks to her work, we now understand that perimenopause is a neuroendocrine transformation, not just a reproductive one. This means that during perimenopause, our bodies aren’t just winding down reproduction, our brains are also going through a major remodeling phase. Dr. Mosconi calls this process “neural pruning.” It’s a smart way for the body to save energy for the second half of a woman’s life. Since the hypothalamic pituitary ovarian (HPO) pathway is no longer needed, the female body starts a kind of spring cleaning in the brain to strengthen areas that are more important for society. Our brains change in ways that make us less reactive, more responsive, more empathetic, and filled with wonder and curiosity, qualities the world truly needs to grow. In her book, The Menopause Brain (p. 102), Dr. Mosconi asks, “What if evolutionary forces are still behind menopause, but this time, they favor women for once?” She then highlights the work of Dr. Kristen Hawkes, an anthropology professor at the University of Utah. Dr. Hawkes’ research shows that grandmothers in hunter-gatherer tribes were key providers of calories and support to their families and communities. Studies around the world confirm that grandmothers do much of the important work, even though they are no longer reproductive, they remain incredibly productive. This idea is called the “Grandmother Theory,” which suggests that older women have helped cultures survive and evolve. As a 47-year-old woman, six years into perimenopause, I find it so comforting to know that this phase of life isn’t my body working against me. Instead, my brain is doing a lot of work to prepare me for the next stage, a time when I’m less reactive, more empathetic, more purposeful, and better able to play a strong role in society. We, midlife women, are transforming from focusing on creating family and prioritizing others to becoming wise teachers and guides who serve society. We have a wonderful reason to stay strong and keep our minds sharp with a powerful sense of self! That’s why it’s important to recognize that women face a higher risk of age-related conditions like osteoporosis, muscle loss (sarcopenia), Alzheimer’s, dementia, and other neurodegenerative disorders. Since estrogen plays a protective role in our body and brain, we need to support ourselves with daily habits that help keep our brains sharp, our bodies strong, and our risk of disease low. Helpful ways to do this include Hormone Replacement Therapy (HRT), getting consistent, quality sleep, managing stress, engaging in high-strength training, enjoying activities that involve bilateral stimulation like dancing, skipping, or walking, eating brain-boosting foods, and staying connected with other women in our communities. This is why I created a 12-week online group support program for women over 40. My “Rock Menopause” Program starts this fall on September 28, 2026. Click here for details. I’m so excited to be on this midlife journey with you! Follow me on Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, and visit my website for more info! Read more from Bre Bicknell Bre Bicknell, Perimenopause and Menopause Expert Bre Bicknell is a perimenopause and menopause expert. After 20 years in the fitness industry, anxiety & depression hit her hard at age 44. After fighting to get on HRT, she dedicated herself to understanding the effects of perimenopause on the female brain. She leads women's groups and online training programs that help women gain muscle so they can age powerfully.

Written by Laura Mungioli, Parenting Coach Laura Mungioli is the founder of The Triggered Momma, where she helps overwhelmed and overstimulated moms understand their triggers and create lasting change through nervous system regulation, inner work, practical tools, and mindset. Her work blends lived experience with an empowering, shame-free approach to motherhood. Before I became a mother, I was successful. I had built two six-figure businesses. I was independent, driven, capable, and very good at figuring things out. If there was a problem, I solved it. If I wanted a different result, I worked harder, learned more, changed my strategy, and figured out what worked. Then I had children. Suddenly, I found myself in a world where I could do everything “right” and still have a baby who cried. I could research every sleep strategy and still have a child who wouldn’t sleep. I could plan the perfect morning and still be standing by the door with a toddler refusing to put on shoes. I could give motherhood everything I had and still walk away from a day wondering why something I wanted so badly felt so difficult. For someone who had spent her life believing, consciously or unconsciously, that effort created results, this was incredibly confronting. I knew how to work hard. I knew how to solve problems. What I didn’t know was how to exist comfortably in a role where working harder didn’t necessarily change the outcome. I now believe this is one of the least discussed challenges that successful women can face when they become mothers. Motherhood doesn’t suddenly make us incapable. It’s that many of the tools that helped us become successful were never designed for the emotional, neurological, and practical demands of raising another human being. When the strategies that made you successful stop working High-achieving women are often exceptional problem solvers. We anticipate, prepare, research, take responsibility, push through discomfort, and become more efficient. When something isn’t working, we find another way. These qualities can be incredibly valuable in a career or business, where effort, strategy, and persistence often have a relatively predictable relationship with results. Motherhood disrupts that equation. You can work harder, and your baby may still cry. You can create the perfect routine, and your toddler may still melt down. You can become incredibly efficient, and someone will immediately need you again. You can research an issue for hours and find five respected experts giving you five completely different answers. You can do everything you know to do and still not get the result you were working toward. The problem isn’t simply that these moments are difficult. For a high-achieving woman, they can begin to challenge the identity she has built around being competent. When you are accustomed to being the person who knows what to do, not knowing what to do can feel deeply uncomfortable. When effort has historically created progress, a problem you cannot immediately solve can begin to feel like a personal failure. That is where motherhood becomes more than a logistical challenge. It becomes an identity confrontation. The behavior may not be the whole trigger One of the most important distinctions I teach is that the behavior happening in front of us and the meaning we attach to it are not always the same. Imagine your toddler refuses to get dressed. The observable event is relatively simple. A small child does not want to put on clothes. But inside the parent, an entire cascade may already be happening. We’re going to be late. I’ve already asked four times. Why does everything have to be so difficult? Why won’t anyone listen to me? I should be able to handle this. I cannot do one more thing. Suddenly, you are no longer responding only to a child who doesn’t want to put on pants. You are responding to what that moment represents to you. This helps explain why two parents can experience the same behavior and react completely differently. One person hears whining and barely notices it, another feels an almost immediate surge of tension. One parent sees a mess and shrugs, another feels instant irritation. One hears “no” and recognizes a developmentally normal assertion of independence, another experiences the same word as disrespect, loss of control, or evidence that they are doing something wrong. The behavior matters, but so does everything we bring to it. For high achievers, this can become particularly interesting because parenting repeatedly places us in situations where our competence does not guarantee cooperation. A toddler does not care how productive you are, how well you prepared, or how efficiently you scheduled the morning. You are raising a separate human being with their own temperament, nervous system, developmental needs, preferences, emotions, and free will. That can be profoundly humbling. Motherhood finds the places achievement couldn’t Before children, many of us had far more ability to structure our lives around what worked for us. We could control our environment to some degree. We could finish a task. We could leave situations that overwhelmed us. We could work harder when necessary and, eventually, finish the work. Motherhood introduced me to a level of unpredictability that none of my previous accomplishments had prepared me for. More importantly, it exposed things in me I didn’t know were there. Motherhood has an incredible ability to reveal our relationship with control, our tolerance for uncertainty, our beliefs about productivity, our ability to rest, and our willingness to receive help. It can illuminate the expectations we place on ourselves and the meaning we assign to other people’s emotions. It can bring us face-to-face with what we learned growing up about anger, crying, mistakes, mess, obedience, conflict, and what it meant to be “good.” Perhaps most confronting of all, it can expose the distance between the parent we imagined ourselves becoming and the person who emerges when our nervous system is completely overwhelmed. I loved my children deeply. I also didn’t always recognize myself in my reactions to them. Understanding that contradiction became the beginning of my work. Why one-dimensional solutions often fall short When a mother tells me she keeps snapping at her children, I don’t believe the answer is simply giving her another parenting script. I also don’t believe every trigger needs to be traced back to childhood. Sometimes an old emotional pattern lies beneath a reaction. Sometimes the nervous system is overloaded. Sometimes a parent doesn’t understand that the behavior driving them crazy is developmentally normal. Sometimes the systems within the household are creating unnecessary stress. Sometimes a boundary needs to be established, a need has been ignored, or support needs to be requested. Sometimes we attach meaning to our child’s behavior that creates more distress than the behavior itself. Very often, several of these things are happening at the same time. This is why I developed my four-pillar approach to understanding triggers. Human beings are complex, and lasting transformation rarely comes from addressing only one piece of the person. Pillar one: Understand what you bring into the moment The first pillar looks at the patterns, experiences, and beliefs we carry into motherhood. This isn’t about blaming our parents or endlessly analyzing the past. It is about understanding why the present may affect us the way it does. What did you learn about emotions growing up? What happened when you cried, made a mistake, disappointed someone, or encountered anger? Did you learn to monitor other people’s moods? Was being successful, helpful, agreeable, productive, or “good” connected to approval? Did achievement become intertwined with your sense of worth or safety? For some people, childhood experiences are deeply connected to parenting triggers. For others, they aren’t. I think that distinction matters. I don’t believe every annoyance is evidence of trauma. Sometimes whining really is just annoying. The goal isn't to manufacture deeper meaning for every reaction. The goal is curiosity. Why does this particular situation create such a significant response in me? Once we understand that, we have somewhere useful to begin. Pillar two: Understand yourself in the actual moment of activation Insight alone is rarely enough. You can understand exactly why something bothers you and still lose access to that understanding when your child has called “Mom!” seventeen times, another child is crying, and you are trying to finish a task. There is a meaningful difference between understanding a trigger while sitting calmly and accessing that understanding while your nervous system is activated. This pillar is about learning to recognize your own activation. Perhaps your shoulders tense, your jaw tightens, sounds suddenly feel louder, or you experience an intense urgency to make the behavior stop. The earlier we become aware of these signals, the greater the opportunity to interrupt an automatic pattern and create even a few seconds of space between what happens and what we do next. The goal is not to become a perfectly regulated mother who never feels frustrated. The transformation is developing enough awareness and capacity that being triggered no longer automatically determines your response. Pillar three: Sometimes you need a better system, not more healing This is an essential part of my framework because motherhood can easily become one enormous self-improvement project. If every difficult moment is interpreted as evidence that we need to heal more, regulate better, or work harder on ourselves, we can accidentally create another impossible standard for women to meet. Sometimes the problem is practical. If every morning ends in yelling, perhaps the morning routine needs to change. If constant noise pushes you beyond your sensory capacity, perhaps reducing competing sounds or using headphones would make a meaningful difference. If you find yourself repeating the same direction twenty times, understanding your child’s developmental stage and changing the way you communicate may remove an enormous amount of unnecessary frustration. Sometimes you need more support. Sometimes you need a boundary. Sometimes you need rest. Sometimes the system you are trying so hard to function within simply does not work. That is not avoiding inner work. It is recognizing that our environment affects our capacity, and changing our environment can be part of the work. Pillar four: Decide who you are becoming This is where the work expands beyond triggers. For a high-achieving woman, motherhood can create an extraordinary opportunity to examine the identity underneath the achievement. Can I remain ambitious without measuring my worth through productivity? Can I tolerate uncertainty without immediately trying to control it? Can I receive help instead of proving I can handle everything myself? Can I rest before everything is finished? Can I trust myself without needing to get everything right? Perhaps the goal of motherhood isn’t to get back to exactly who we were before our children. Perhaps we are becoming someone new. The woman on the other side of this work does not have to become less ambitious, capable, successful, or driven. Instead, she gets to decide which parts of her previous identity still serve her and which patterns she is ready to leave behind. This is where personal responsibility becomes empowering rather than shaming. We cannot control every tantrum, every sleepless night, or every difficult season. We can become increasingly intentional about the meaning we give those experiences, the systems we create around ourselves, the support we allow ourselves to receive, and the person we choose to become within them. Motherhood didn’t make you less capable If you were successful before motherhood and have found yourself wondering why parenting feels harder than anything else you have done, I want you to consider another possibility. Maybe you didn’t suddenly become less competent. Maybe you entered an experience that requires skills your previous success never demanded. Motherhood asks us to exist alongside uncertainty. It asks us to influence without controlling. It asks us to remain grounded when another human being is not. It asks us to encounter problems that cannot always be solved immediately and emotions that do not disappear simply because we respond correctly. For those of us who built an identity around figuring things out, this can be one of motherhood’s greatest confrontations. It can also become one of its greatest transformations. The goal of my work isn’t to turn women into mothers who never get overwhelmed, angry, or triggered. It is to help them understand themselves deeply enough that those moments stop controlling their experience of motherhood. We can learn to recognize what belongs to the past, regulate what is happening in the present, change what is practically within our control, and intentionally decide who we want to become moving forward. You do not have to choose between being the ambitious woman you were and the grounded mother you want to be. You may simply be learning how to become both. Follow me on Instagram and visit my website for more info! Read more from Laura Mungioli Laura Mungioli, Parenting Coach Laura Mungioli is the founder of The Triggered Momma, where she helps overwhelmed and overstimulated moms understand what’s beneath their triggers. Drawing on lived experience and years of inner work, she shares a shame-free approach that combines nervous system regulation, healing, practical tools, and mindset. Her mission is to help moms stop simply surviving motherhood and start enjoying it—while raising kids who thrive.

Written by Kirsten Welsch, Founder & Master-Trained Color Analyst Kirsten Welsch is a certified 23-season color analyst and founder of ATX Color Studio near Austin, Texas. She also runs Business of Color Analysis, where she helps new color analysts build and market their businesses with confidence. You finally find out your color season, get your palette, go home, look at your closet, and suddenly think, “Wait, am I allowed to wear any of this anymore?” This is where color analysis can go a little sideways. Knowing your best colors should make getting dressed easier. It should help you shop with more confidence, understand why certain makeup colors have always worked for you, and make your wardrobe feel more intentional. It should not make you scared to wear the “wrong” color. What your season actually means When I do a professional color analysis, I am looking at much more than whether someone is simply warm or cool. I am looking at undertone, intensity, value, and contrast to see which colors create the most harmony with that person’s natural coloring. That is how we get to a color season and, ultimately, a personalized palette of colors that work really beautifully on you. But here’s the important part. Your palette is a guide. It is not a rule. I think people sometimes get so excited about learning their season that they accidentally turn their palette into a giant list of rules. Suddenly, they are thinking, “I can’t wear that anymore,” or “This color isn’t in my palette,” or “Is this green warm enough?” That is not the goal of color analysis. Don’t become obsessed with being perfect I have seen people become so focused on whether every single item is technically in their season that they start second-guessing everything. They compare two almost identical shades of green for ten minutes. They start looking at pieces they have loved for years and wondering if they should get rid of them because the color is not “perfect.” At that point, color analysis is making getting dressed harder instead of easier, and I do not think that is helpful. Your palette is meant to give you direction. It helps you understand what kinds of colors tend to flatter you most so that you can make better decisions. That does not mean every single thing you wear has to be a perfect match. Stop matching every single swatch Your color palette is not supposed to work like a paint deck. There are thousands and thousands of colors you can wear. The colors included in your physical or digital palette are not the only colors available to you. They are there to help you recognize the color families that are most harmonious with your coloring. You do not need to walk through a store trying to find a shirt that perfectly matches one tiny square in your swatch book. Instead, you want to ask yourself, “Does this belong in my color family?” What I really want my clients to learn is the overall characteristics of their colors. Are your best colors warm or cool? Are they bright or muted? Are they lighter or deeper? Do you tend to shine in higher contrast combinations, or do softer combinations work better for you? Once you understand those characteristics, you can recognize thousands of colors that work for you, even if you have never seen that exact shade on your palette. For example, if you know you look best in colors that are warm, clear, and bright, you do not need to find the exact coral from your swatch book. There are many different shades of coral that can fall within your color family. Your palette gives you examples and a point of reference. It is not meant to represent every single color you can wear. Even the way we perceive a color can change depending on factors such as the lighting around us, which is another reason I do not recommend obsessing over tiny differences between two very similar shades. That is a lot more useful than obsessing over whether something is a 100% exact match. The goal is to learn your color family well enough that you can recognize it when you see it, not to chase perfection. Your personal style still matters This is one of the biggest things I want people to understand. Color analysis and personal style are not the same thing. Color analysis answers, “Which colors are most harmonious with me?” Personal style answers, “How do I actually want to dress?” Two people can have the exact same color season and have completely different wardrobes. One True Spring might love bright pink dresses, bold accessories, and lots of color. Another True Spring might prefer warm neutrals and dainty gold jewelry. One Winter might love dramatic color blocking, while another prefers a really minimal wardrobe. Neither one is doing color analysis “wrong.” Your season does not decide your aesthetic. It does not decide your personality. It definitely should not make you feel like you suddenly have to dress like everyone else who shares your season. Your colors should support your personal style and self-expression, not replace it. Keep the things you love Finding out your season does not mean you need to go home and completely overhaul your closet. Please do not throw away half your wardrobe because you had a color analysis. You bought those pieces for a reason. Some of them fit beautifully. Some of them are practical. Some of them have sentimental value. Some of them you just really love. That is enough. Black is a perfect example. I recently wrote about why black isn’t universally flattering and five neutrals that work better, but that does not mean someone who finds out black is not one of their best colors suddenly needs to get rid of every black dress, handbag, or pair of shoes they own. You can understand that another neutral might flatter you more and still decide that you love wearing black. Both can be true. Color analysis gives you the information. You get to decide what you do with it. You can still wear trends Knowing your season also does not mean you have to sit out every color trend that is not technically in your palette. Fashion should still be fun. Instead of asking, “Can my season wear this color?” ask, “What version of this color works best for me?” That is a much more useful question. There are warm reds and cool reds, muted greens and bright greens, soft pinks and vivid pinks, and light blues and deep blues. So if burgundy becomes the color everyone is wearing, you do not have to decide that burgundy either works for you or does not. Look for the version of burgundy that falls closest to your color family. That is how I like to use color analysis. It helps you adapt trends to you instead of trying to make yourself fit the trend. Not every outfit needs to be perfect There are also plenty of times when wearing your absolute best colors is just not that important. Maybe you are going to a football game and want to wear your team color. Maybe you are in a wedding and the bride has chosen the dress. Maybe you own a vintage dress you absolutely love, and it is nowhere near your season. Wear it. There is a big difference between knowing which colors flatter you most and feeling like you are required to wear those colors every single day. If I am helping someone choose an outfit for professional headshots, a speaking engagement, a big event, or something where they really want to look their absolute best, then yes, I would definitely pay attention to their strongest colors. But grabbing coffee on a Saturday morning does not need to turn into a full color strategy session. Context matters. Your palette should make life easier At the end of the day, I want color analysis to simplify things. I want you to walk into a store and have a better idea of where to start. I want you to understand why that one shade of blue always gets you compliments. I want you to know why one lipstick makes your entire face light up and another one makes you feel washed out. I want you to feel more confident when you shop. Eventually, I want you to get to the point where you are not constantly pulling out your palette because you start recognizing your color family naturally. That is the goal. You learn the principles well enough that they become second nature. Color analysis should give you freedom Color analysis is not about building a perfect wardrobe. It is not about never wearing a color outside your palette again. It is definitely not about following a million rules. It is about understanding yourself better. Your palette can help you shop more intentionally, create a wardrobe that works together more easily, choose makeup and hair colors with more confidence, and recognize the colors that make you glow. But you are still allowed to experiment. You are still allowed to follow trends. You are still allowed to wear a color simply because you love it. Yes, you are absolutely allowed to break the “rules.” Your color season should give you more freedom in your wardrobe, not less. Find your best colors If you are ready to stop guessing and understand which colors work best for you, a professional color analysis can give you a personalized palette along with the tools to actually use it in your everyday life. At ATX Color Studio, I offer 23-Season Color Analysis both in person at my Bee Cave studio outside Austin, Texas, and virtually for clients around the world. Once you know your season, the goal is not to follow more rules. It is to finally understand your colors well enough to know when the rules matter and when they really do not. Follow me on Facebook, Instagram, and LinkedIn for more info! Read more from Kirsten Welsch Kirsten Welsch, Founder & Master-Trained Color Analyst Kirsten Welsch is a certified 23-season color analyst and the founder of ATX Color Studio in Bee Cave, Texas. After years of designing luxury weddings in Costa Rica, she discovered color analysis and realized the power of wearing the right colors firsthand. That experience inspired her to help other women feel that same confidence. She now offers in-person and virtual color analysis sessions and runs Business of Color Analysis, where she mentors aspiring color analysts on marketing, social media, and building a successful business. Her mission is helping women stop guessing and start glowing.

Written by Regena (Rosa Celeste) Ozeryansky, Inner Peace & Transpersonal Guide I empower leaders to identify what’s secretly holding them back. The self-sabotage, the blocks, the patterns running on repeat so they can rewire from the inside out and finally access lasting peace, unstoppable productivity, and a life fully aligned with their purpose. Leadership is often measured by what happens around us: results, revenue, productivity, team performance, and growth. But some of the most important leadership decisions happen before we ever speak, respond, send the email, enter the meeting, or make the call. They happen inside us. When pressure rises, deadlines tighten, conflict appears, or uncertainty takes over, your nervous system enters the conversation before your leadership skills do. When you are dysregulated, even the most experienced leader can become reactive. The question is not whether you experience stress. You will. The question is: Who is leading when stress shows up? What does it mean to be a regulated leader? A regulated leader is not someone who is calm all the time. That would be unrealistic. Regulation is the ability to recognize what is happening internally, remain connected to yourself, and consciously choose your response instead of automatically reacting from stress, fear, frustration, or overwhelm. This distinction matters. Reactivity says, “I need to fix this now.” Regulation asks, “What does this situation actually require?” Reactivity moves from urgency. Regulation moves from awareness. Reactivity often protects the ego. Regulation protects the mission. A regulated leader can still be decisive, powerful, direct, and even intense. Regulation does not make leadership passive. It makes leadership intentional. Your nervous system is in the boardroom Many high-performing leaders have spent years developing strategy, communication skills, operational systems, and professional expertise. Far fewer have been taught how their nervous system affects those abilities. When your system perceives a threat, whether the threat is physical, emotional, relational, financial, or professional, survival responses can activate. You may fight. You may avoid. You may shut down. You may overfunction. You may become controlling, defensive, impatient, overly accommodating, disconnected, or hyperproductive. From the outside, some of these behaviors can even look like leadership: working harder, taking control, making fast decisions, demanding answers, and handling everything yourself. But high performance and regulation are not always the same thing. Sometimes what we call drive is actually survival mode wearing a very expensive suit. Reactivity is expensive A reactive moment may last thirty seconds. Its consequences can last considerably longer. A poorly worded email can damage trust. An impulsive decision can create unnecessary problems. An emotionally charged conversation can affect an entire team. Constant urgency can create a culture where employees feel they must remain on alert even when there is no true emergency. Over time, leaders unknowingly teach the people around them how to regulate around their dysregulation. People begin monitoring the leader instead of focusing on the work. What mood are they in? Is today a good day to bring this up? Should I say something or stay quiet? Will this become a problem? That is not psychological safety. It is emotional weather forecasting. Leadership creates an atmosphere, and nervous systems communicate long before job titles do. Regulation does not mean avoiding difficult conversations One misconception about inner peace is that it means becoming endlessly agreeable. It does not. Some of the most regulated responses are uncomfortable: setting a boundary, saying no, holding someone accountable, changing direction, having the difficult conversation, or ending something that no longer works. Regulation allows us to do these things without unnecessarily adding anger, fear, ego, or emotional charge. You can be compassionate without becoming passive. You can be direct without becoming destructive. You can hold standards without humiliating people. You can disagree without turning disagreement into war. That is mature leadership. The pause is a leadership skill There is enormous power in creating space between stimulus and response. Before sending the email, pause. Before answering the criticism, pause. Before making the decision from fear, pause. Before assuming someone's intention, pause. The pause does not need to take an hour. Sometimes sixty seconds is enough to interrupt an automatic response. Try asking yourself: What am I feeling right now? What story am I telling myself about this situation? Am I responding to what is actually happening or to what I fear might happen? What outcome do I want to create? Who do I want to be in this conversation? These questions shift us from unconscious reaction into conscious leadership. Regulation starts with awareness You cannot regulate what you cannot recognize. The first step is learning your patterns. Some leaders become louder under pressure. Others become quieter. Some micromanage. Some disappear. Some overexplain. Some become hyperindependent and stop asking for help. Some immediately move into problem solving because sitting with uncertainty feels unbearable. None of these patterns automatically make someone a bad leader. They make them human. But patterns become dangerous when they remain unconscious. Awareness gives us choice. Choice changes leadership. Your body often knows before your mind does Many people try to think their way out of stress. But stress is not only cognitive. It lives in the body. You might notice your jaw tightening. Your breathing becoming shallow. Your shoulders rising. Your stomach contracting. Your heart rate increasing. Your thoughts speeding up. These signals are information. Instead of ignoring them, learn to recognize them as your internal early warning system. Sometimes the most productive thing a leader can do before a difficult conversation is remarkably simple: Slow the breath. Feel the feet on the floor. Relax the shoulders. Notice the body. Create space. Then respond. This is not weakness. It is self-mastery. Regulated leaders create regulated cultures Leadership does not happen in isolation. Teams respond to what leaders model. When leaders consistently operate from urgency, employees often adopt urgency. When leaders normalize burnout, organizations normalize burnout. When leaders avoid conflict, teams learn avoidance. But the opposite is also true. When leaders demonstrate thoughtful decision-making, healthy boundaries, accountability, emotional awareness, and appropriate recovery, they give others permission to do the same. Regulation becomes cultural. People can think more clearly. Communication improves. Conflict becomes easier to navigate. Creativity has room to return. People stop spending unnecessary energy protecting themselves and can redirect that energy toward meaningful work. From reaction to response Regulated leadership does not require perfection. You will still become frustrated. You will still get triggered. You will occasionally say the wrong thing. You will have days when your capacity is lower than usual. The goal is not perfection. The goal is awareness, recovery, and responsibility. Notice sooner. Regulate faster. Repair when necessary. Choose differently next time. Leadership is not about never losing your center. It is about learning how to return to it. The future of leadership begins inside We spend enormous amounts of time teaching leaders how to manage businesses, employees, strategies, money, and performance. But before we can effectively lead others, we must develop the capacity to lead ourselves. That begins internally. When leaders learn to recognize their patterns, regulate their nervous systems, and respond from clarity rather than reactivity, something powerful changes. Decisions become cleaner. Communication becomes more intentional. Relationships become stronger. Success becomes more sustainable. Leadership stops being driven entirely by pressure. The most powerful person in the room is not always the loudest, fastest, or most forceful. Sometimes it is the person grounded enough to remain present while everyone else is reacting. That is the regulated leader. That kind of leadership can change much more than a business. It can change the people inside it. Ready to lead differently? If success on the outside has come at the expense of peace on the inside, it may be time for a different approach. Through Internal Peace Now, I help high-achieving leaders identify the unconscious patterns driving stress, regulate their nervous systems, and create Peace & Aligned Success in business and in life. Follow me on Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, and visit my website for more info! Read more from Regena (Rosa Celeste) Ozeryansky Regena (Rosa Celeste) Ozeryansky, Inner Peace & Transpersonal Guide A bestselling author, conscious entrepreneur, yogi, and transformational speaker, Regena blends spirituality with strategy to help individuals and organizations access radical inner peace while creating external success. As the founder of Internal Peace Now™, Regena guides high-achieving professionals and purpose-driven leaders to break free from overwhelm, heal from burnout, and align with their higher mission. Her groundbreaking approach revolutionizes inner peace by merging mindset mastery, energy alignment, and conscious accountability. This dynamic method helps position her clients and students as powerful change-makers and her as the go-to voice in the personal growth and inner space arena, aka conscious business spaces.

Written by Andi Saitowitz, Business Psychologist and Professional Coach Andi Saitowitz is a passionate bettermaker, helping people rise through change, reconnect to themselves and lead with greater courage, confidence and purpose. Blending psychology, strategy and soul, she is known for her bold authenticity, thought-provoking insights and powerful ability to turn everyday struggles into meaningful transformation. I didn't grow up a runner. I grew up playing sport, the kind with a ball, a team, and other people to carry you on the days you didn't feel like showing up. Running was never the plan. It became the new revised plan when my body made the decision for me, and the sports I'd enjoyed for years were suddenly no longer an option because of an injured shoulder. So I started training for my first half marathon. The thing nobody tells you about a new goal is that there's not necessarily a team on the start line with you at 6 am, meaning there's no one else's motivation to borrow when yours hasn't shown up. There's just you, the plan you wrote on a calm Sunday, and a Wednesday morning that doesn't feel calm at all. That gap, between the person who writes the plan and the person who has to execute it, is where so many goals quietly die. Sunday you is rested, clear and certain. All fired up for a new week ahead. Wednesday you is tired, distracted, behind on something, and has rarely met Sunday you's confidence or energy. You don't necessarily fail your goals. Sometimes, you simply get outvoted by a version of yourself who hasn't yet aligned with them. The honest part Most advice about motivation quietly assumes you're the exception, that with the right routine, enough discipline, or sufficient desire, you'll become the person who never has an off day. You won't. None of us will. Not because we lack discipline, but because we're human. Our mood changes. Our energy changes. Our priorities compete. Our memory fails. Motivation comes and goes without asking our permission. A plan that only works when you feel the way you did when you wrote it isn't really a plan. It's a hope with a schedule attached. The goal isn't to become someone who never struggles. The goal is to build something that still holds when you do. That something is a system. A system that removes unnecessary decisions. Accountability that makes a commitment harder to quietly abandon. An environment that makes the right action easier. Rewards that reinforce progress. People who carry some of the weight on the days you can't carry it alone. Not memory. Not mood. Not willpower alone. Structure, and the people standing inside it with you. What that looks like when training is hard, and life is loud Training for a half marathon taught me this faster than almost anything else. Some weeks I was busy. Some mornings I was exhausted before I started. Some days I simply wasn't in the mood, and no amount of telling myself, "You'll feel better once you start," changed how heavy the door felt. What got me out the door wasn't some extraordinary reserve of willpower. It was a few decisions I'd already made before I needed them. The decision was made in advance, not negotiated fresh each morning. Running on Tuesday, Thursday and Sunday at 6am wasn't a question I asked myself every day. It was already answered by a calmer version of me days earlier. Tired me didn't have to decide. I just had to follow the instructions left by someone with a clearer head. The environment did some of the remembering for me. My kit was laid out the night before. My shoes were by the door. Everything was ready. There was nothing left for a foggy 6am brain to remember because I knew that brain wouldn't reliably show up. A missed run was allowed to just be a missed run. The expensive part was never the day I skipped. It was the story I could have told myself about it. One missed session can become, "I've fallen behind." Which can become, "I'll never catch up." Which can become, "I might as well stop." The rule was simple: Don't miss twice in a row. A lapse is an event. It only becomes an identity if you let it. Other people carried some of the days I couldn't carry myself. Telling people I was training turned a private intention into something bigger than me. If I quietly dropped it, someone might notice. On the mornings when my own motivation had nothing to offer, that external commitment mattered, not because I was afraid of judgment, but because a goal that exists outside your own head is simply harder to abandon than one that only ever lived inside it. Running with others makes a huge difference. What that looks like professionally The same gap shows up at a desk, not just on a running route. I write a monthly column as an Executive Contributor for Brainz, and a monthly deadline is deceptively hard. It's far enough away to feel optional right up until it isn't, and close enough that "I'll write it when I'm inspired" is a plan that fails almost every single month. What actually gets the piece written isn't waiting to feel inspired. It's the same things that got me through training. I decide in advance when the writing happens rather than negotiating it fresh each week. I remove as much friction as possible from sitting down and beginning. I lean on the accountability that's already built into the commitment: an editor expecting the draft, readers who've come to expect the column, and a deadline that exists whether or not I feel like meeting it. I don't have to manufacture motivation on the day. The structure is already doing some of that work for me. This is something I see repeatedly in my coaching work. People often don't need another motivational speech. They need a clearer vision of where they're going. A stronger connection to who they're becoming. A reason and values that matter enough to them. Then, crucially, systems that turn that intention into behavior when motivation inevitably fluctuates. As we learn from all the best research on solid habits, we don't rise to our intentions consistently. We often fall back on the systems we've built. So build systems that are designed for the real you, not the imaginary version of you who is always energised, focused, disciplined and perfectly on time. Build for Wednesday you You are not going to feel ready every time. That's not a warning sign. It's part of being human. The tired mornings, distracted afternoons and "I really don't feel like doing this" moments aren't evidence that the goal is wrong. They're the moments the system was designed for. So stop measuring your commitment by how motivated you feel today. That number was never going to stay high enough for long enough anyway. Measure it by something more useful: Do you have a clear picture of where you're going? Do you know why it matters? Do you know who you're becoming in the process? Have you created systems that make the desired behavior easier? Have you built accountability and support around the commitment? Have you made room for setbacks without turning them into stories about who you are? Because the goal was never going to be carried by the person who felt inspired on Sunday. It was always going to be carried by whoever actually had to show up on Wednesday. Build for them. Follow me on Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, and visit my website for more info! Read more from Andi Saitowitz Andi Saitowitz, Business Psychologist and Professional Coach Andi Saitowitz is a Business Psychologist, transformational coach, and powerful voice in personal development, leadership, and human potential. Through her coaching, speaking, Radio & Podcast Show Life & Lattes, and growing Positive Recharge community, she inspires people to navigate change with courage, resilience and purpose. Known for her bold authenticity and deeply relatable insights, Andi blends psychology, strategy and soul to help people grow personally and professionally. She is the author of the Rise & Shine Personal Development Journal, proud mom of three, and passionate believer in meaningful growth, community, fitness, faith, and living fully.

Written by Dr. Jessica Herbert, PCC, Executive Coach Dr. Jessica Herbert, PCC, has held every seat: investigator, cyber manager, data scientist, academic, nationwide consultant, and executive coach across 36 states, 100+ communities, and four countries. She writes about leadership, people, and technology from the inside, never from theory. Proven. Not Promised. Many organizations do not fail at purchasing technology; they fail at the subsequent digital transformation activities: how the workflow changes, whether staff have the skills to adjust and perform with the new technology, and whether there is documentation to help train new staff. These failures don’t happen at once. They occur in a handful of quiet decisions made months earlier: who was put on the project team, who was still on it by phase three, which leaders were told this one was not theirs to own, and whether anyone funded the work of teaching people how the job itself was about to change. Those four decisions belong to leadership. What is digital transformation? Digital transformation involves the integration of technology or digital tools into how an organization operates and delivers its services. Inherently, the adoption of technology and tools transforms processes, culture, and customer experience. The Columbia University Press description of David L. Rogers’s The Digital Transformation Roadmap similarly emphasizes that digital transformation requires organizational change, not simply new technology. Digital transformation is not the purchase of a system or tool itself. It is a change to how work gets done: who does it, in what order, with what documentation, under what policy, reviewed by whom, and measured how. The software or hardware is the visible part. The workflow, the policy, the approval path, and the quiet redistribution of expertise are the actual change. I watched this play out in a local government office replacing its records management system. Leadership described it, honestly and in good faith, as a technology upgrade. But staff were not simply learning new screens. The way information was entered changed. The report narrative standards changed. Supervisory review steps changed. How quality assurance audits were conducted changed. How information was shared with other stakeholders changed. Three months after the system went live, the office had a beautiful system and a workforce quietly maintaining a shadow process on the side because the new way had never been explained as a way of working, only as a tool. When the tool didn’t work, staff created workarounds. Why the odds are what they are The numbers on this are not encouraging, and they are worth sitting with. Boston Consulting Group analyzed 70 BCG-supported digital transformations alongside a survey of 825 senior executives and found that only 30% of digital transformations met or exceeded their target value and resulted in sustainable change. The rest either created some value without meeting their targets or produced limited value without sustainable change. Two findings inside that research matter more than the headline number. The first: only one in four organizations cleared BCG’s threshold for deploying high-caliber talent. The second: three out of four executives believed they had good leadership engagement. Only one in three actually had committed engagement from middle management, the people whose buy-in determines whether anything survives contact with the floor. The distance between believing you are aligned and being aligned is where transformations go to die. Here is the part that should encourage you. The same research found that organizations addressing all six of its success factors could move their odds of success from about 30% to more than 80%. That is not a rounding error. That is the difference between hoping and playing to win, and the four priorities below are the ones squarely inside a leader’s control. What are four decisions that determine success? 1. Staff the team on fit and strength, not rank and role The default is assignment by organizational chart. Whoever holds the seat, whoever has the rank, whoever is available. It feels fair. It is also the single fastest way to put a capable person in a role that will exhaust them. Transformation work rewards two very different profiles. Some people are energized by ambiguity. They generate options, tolerate unfinished things, and move comfortably before the picture is clear. Others are energized by structure. They build the process, write the documentation, close the gaps, and make a thing repeatable. Both are indispensable. Neither is more valuable. They are simply not needed at the same moment, and they are rarely productive in the same room at the same stage. I worked with an agency that put its commander with the strongest process discipline in charge of the discovery phase. He was excellent: meticulous, respected, thorough. The group spent four months exhaustively documenting the current state and never got to imagining the future one. That was not a competence failure. It was a fit failure, and the leader who made the assignment could not see it because he was staffing by reputation rather than by strength. At Asbatra Coaching, we use the Predictive Index to map behavioral drives across a project team, so a leader can look at a phase and ask a better question than "who is available?" The Predictive Index describes its Behavioral Assessment as measuring natural behavioral drives and needs and provides tools for mapping behavioral strengths and needs across teams. The better question is: what does this specific phase demand, and who on my bench is built for it? There is a compounding effect here that leaders consistently underestimate. People placed inside their strengths do not just perform better; they generate energy that others catch. Put three people in their sweet spot on a project team and the meeting changes character. That is the contagion you want running through a transformation. 2. Change the roster when the project changes phase This is the one leaders resist, and I understand why. In most organizations, being moved off a project reads as a demotion. So leaders leave people in place long past the point of usefulness, and the person who was brilliant in discovery grinds themselves down through eighteen months of implementation detail they were never built for. Build your success from the start. Announce that this is a phased assignment, that the roster is designed to change, and that rotating off is a completion, not a removal. When you name it in advance, the rotation stops carrying stigma and starts carrying credibility. Then honor it: hold a real handoff, and give public credit to the person leaving as they leave. Public safety leaders should find this familiar. Specialty assignments occur based on perceived strengths and abilities. The rotation into an assignment is acknowledged as beneficial, but the rotation out is often unclear or not articulated. Rotation out of these assignments happens for many reasons: to prevent burnout, to build organizational depth, and to keep the work fresh. Transformation projects deserve the same discipline and for the same reasons. The secondary benefit is bench strength. Every rotation moves transformation literacy into another part of the organization. By the end of a well-phased project, you have not just a new system. You have two dozen people who understand how change actually gets made here. 3. Align the entire leadership table, not just the sponsor The most common alignment failure I see is also the most understandable. The division or unit that owns the project engages. Everyone else waits their turn and sometimes even criticizes from afar. The logic seems sound. It is not my system, not my phase, not my budget line. But true digital transformation does not stay in one lane. It reaches and impacts all parts of an organization, whether as the doer, receiver, manager, or budget justifier, just at different times. When a leader taps out because it is not theirs yet, two things happen. Their people arrive at their phase with no preparation, and the leader has to perform a fluency they never built. Both are avoidable. This is precisely the middle management gap in the BCG data, and it is the reason so many executives are surprised to learn their alignment was thinner than it looked. BCG found that three out of four executives felt they had good leadership engagement, while only one in three had committed middle management engagement. What alignment actually requires is more specific than a briefing: Articulate, division by division, what changes for them and roughly when, even if their phase is nine months out. Vague timelines are not kindness; they are a deferral of preparation. Put leaders who do not own the project in the strategic checkpoints, not just the status updates. Being in the room where tradeoffs get made is what builds ownership. Make the transformation a standing item on the leadership agenda rather than a periodic project report. Standing items signal permanence. Project reports signal that this will pass. Know that engagement travels. When a leader in one division asks substantive questions in a transformation meeting, their supervisors start asking substantive questions too. Disengagement travels exactly the same way, just faster. 4. Fund the reskilling, not only the technology Look at almost any transformation budget and you will find the same line items. Licensing, implementation, hardware, vendor support, contingency. Then, somewhere near the bottom and often added late, a modest line for training, usually meaning a series of demonstrations of the new tool. That budget is built for a software installation. It is not built for a change in how people work. The scale of the need is well documented. The World Economic Forum’s Future of Jobs Report 2025 found that employers expect 39% of workers’ core skills to change by 2030. Its findings also indicate that 59 out of every 100 workers are expected to need training by 2030, while 63% of surveyed employers identify skills gaps as the biggest barrier to business transformation. Above culture. Above capital. Above regulation. Here is the encouraging part, and it comes from Paul Leonardi and Tsedal Neeley’s work in The Digital Mindset. Their thirty percent rule suggests that people do not need mastery to be genuinely effective with technology; they need roughly 30% fluency. Leonardi compares this with learning a language, where about four thousand words can provide working competence compared with roughly twelve thousand for mastery. Nobody on your team needs to become a data scientist. They need enough fluency to ask good questions, spot when something looks wrong, and use the new workflow with confidence. Thirty percent is a target you can budget, schedule, and measure. That is a far more useful goal than "training." One more thing, and it is where most training plans fall short: be specific about what is changing beyond the tool. Which policy is different? Which documentation standard is different? Which approval now routes elsewhere? People do not circumvent new systems out of stubbornness. They circumvent them when the reasoning was never made clear and the old way still works well enough to get through the shift. Five moves to make in the next thirty days if you are planning for digital transformation Map the phases and staff them separately. Write down what each phase actually demands: divergent thinking, process discipline, stakeholder negotiation. Then name people to phases rather than to the project as a whole. Say the rotation out loud at kickoff. One sentence, in front of everyone, establishing that the roster is designed to change and that rotating off is completion, not removal. Put every division head on the record. Ask each one to state what changes for their people and approximately when. The ones who cannot answer have just shown you where your alignment gap is. Fund the thirty percent. Separate the training budget into tool fluency, workflow change, and policy change, and protect the time for people to actually use it. Define what "done" looks like for people, not just for the system. Adoption, proficiency, and the retirement of the shadow process, not the launch date. None of these five necessarily requires new technology, though several require leaders to dedicate time and resources. They require leaders to make decisions centered on people with the same rigor they already apply to vendor selection. The part worth remembering Every transformation I have watched succeed had the same underlying quality, and it was never the sophistication of the platform. It was that leadership treated its people as the strategy rather than as the thing the strategy would be done to. You are not managing a system implementation. You are asking a workforce to change how it does the work it built its professional identity around. Staff that intentionally. Rotate people before they break. Keep the whole leadership table in the room. Pay for the learning. Do those four things and you are not hoping to land in the 30%. You are playing to win. Call to action If you are in the middle of one of these projects right now, or about to be, I write about the human side of organizational change every week in Leading Through Change. Subscribe and you will get the frameworks, the failure patterns, and the questions worth asking before your next phase begins. Follow me on Instagram, LinkedIn, Substack, and visit my website for more info! Read more from Dr. Jessica Herbert, PCC Dr. Jessica Herbert, PCC, Executive Coach Dr. Jessica Herbert, PCC, has spent 27 years at the intersection of public safety, data analytics, and organizational change, not as a theorist, but as the detective in the networks, the orchestrator behind the analytical team, the scientist building the models, and the consultant and coach leading change across 36 states and 100+ communities in the United States. She is the founder of IDEA Analytics and Asbatra Coaching, companies that bring leadership, people, and technology together to find their path to high performance. Her work is built on a simple conviction: data helps us think and behave differently, but lasting change requires transforming both the system and the people running it.

Written by Sandra Merula, Mental Health Coach & Neurodiversity Mentor Sandra Merula is a Mental Health & Life Coach, author of “ADHD and Autism: The ‘Together’ People,” working as a mentor with autism, Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD), and co-occurring autism and ADHD (AuDHD), as well as trauma and narcissistic abuse recovery. Known for her direct yet unique approach with cat-assisted philosophy, she combines professional expertise with lived experience and a bit of magic. When a sociopathic, narcissistic mother raises you, you grow up entirely devoid of an identity. “You wouldn't last an hour in the asylum where they raised me!” (Taylor, please, I just started typing, but you go, girl!). You don’t learn what love is, you learn what survival and obedience are. Add in a late diagnosis of Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (AuDHD), and you have the perfect neurological storm. Anxious and Avoidant: Toxic or Impossible I was hardwired to develop every single trait that starts with the word anxious. I didn't just learn to navigate the dark, I learned to crave that sick, ticklish, electric feeling in my chest. I couldn't live without it: disappointment, self-blame, not good enough, do it better, harder, now shut up, why aren't you talking? What is wrong again? What's with the face? You have everything! So, who should not know anything about toxic and only crave healthy? I want to be brutal this time and tell you guys all of this as my feelings about anxious attachment style, me, and the avoidant attachment style. His name is Puddin. Dude, know your audience. I warned you: anxious attachment, late AuDHD diagnosis, depression, very short-tempered, single mom of an AuDHD teenager, masculine, quite good with words? Big mouth (pain to your brain), big palm (pain to your face), and here you are: avoidant? Really? Do you like to suffer too? Do you like pain? What is the matter with you? Damn, poor thing. Y'all can imagine the dynamics, right? Wrong! Puddin is a.k.a. Joker. So here we go! Joker: Question. Would you die for me? Harleen: Yes. Joker: That’s too easy. Would you. Would you live for me? Harley: Yes. Joker: Careful! Do not say this oath thoughtlessly. Desire becomes surrender, surrender becomes power. Do you want this? Harley: I do. Joker: Say it, say it, say it. Pretty, pretty, pretty. Harley: Please. Joker: God, you’re so good. She jumps willingly into a vat of chemical waste or acid at ACE Chemicals to prove her absolute love and devotion to the Joker, transforming her mind and body into the unhinged villain Harley Quinn. A rebel. An icon. People look at her, and they see a badass. I look at her, and I see the ultimate tragedy. Harley isn't a hero, a villain, or the Joker's Queen, and God forbid someone disrespects the Queen. She is a deeply broken, anxiously attached woman named Harleen who took a blowtorch to her own identity. “'Cause darling, I'm a nightmare dressed like a daydream” (Taylor, I swear I am not stupid, let me at least try to write my own metaphors!). She was a brilliant doctor who changed everything: her looks, her mind, her ethics and beliefs, her entire soul, all to become the creation loved by someone who kept running away from her, only to later chase her. But then. I could not help but be absolutely crushed by the avoidant. In a way, he wanted to leave Harleen in that vat of acid, but didn’t. Why? He knew she would be perfect, and him being avoidant might mean feeling the pain again, the pain she promised she would never cause him. Toxic, I must say! Can I even start to imagine how hard it must be? What those people must have been through to run away from something that had not even started yet. I'll get there in a minute. Is it me in the photo? Yes. Would I do that for anyone but myself? The change? No way! Pretending to be an entirely different someone to be acceptable to the avoidant partner, or any other human being for that matter, is simply impossible. Or better, it is the saddest illusion in the world. “I know my love should be celebrated, but you tolerate it” (Okay, Taylor, that one actually felt like a personal attack, let’s at least share the spotlight, no?). Also, changing your fundamental architecture for another human being isn't devotion. It is a crime. The actual suicide. It is the agonizing deleting of messages one by one because the silence is too triggering to look at. I question my every move. I question their every word. Then I spiral so deep that I start questioning my questioning. My internal support system? Oh, it is a comedy show. The moment the anxious trigger gets pulled, the conversation in my head goes exactly like this: Self-esteem: "Alright, this is getting pathetic. I'm out." Me: "Wait, what? We just got left on read! I need you!" Self-esteem: "Ta ta! Palm trees are way prettier than this pity party." Self-respect: "Hey, wait for me, sis! I'm not staying for this either. Good luck, babes!" (Doors slam. Silence.) Guilt & shame: "Oh, hi! Are we early? We brought the backlog of everything you've ever done wrong!" Every time! I don’t jump into the vat, but damn, I become stupid. You are left entirely alone amid overwhelming panic, eventually breaking down to the core question: Am I even built for a relationship at all? “Who could ever leave me, darling, but who could stay?” (Yes, Taylor, exactly that, thank you!) Maybe I am just meant to be a loner. Where is the difference between five days and five years together if nothing changes? If the pain of not being enough, being too much, or any other shit I was told randomly thinks for a second, or the whole vocabulary of crap going around in that head won't go away? If Puddin is the avoidant, doesn't want to work on the relationship absolutely every single day, talk every day, reassure every day, well, technically be a pro of "being in a relationship with an anxious style," having their life on a shelf, I will still find reasons to pick a fight or create drama if I "want to." Or better, pull the "I knew it" card (my life, guys, my favorite toy!). Who would want that? Today it is their tone, tomorrow it is them wanting to see a friend. All those things, even if it goes well and the avoidant is magically not so avoidant anymore if they trust and believe they are safe, the problem is me. I become the "needy" one. The "jealous" one. The insane one, desperately waiting for something to be anxious about, even though my emotional backlog is already full. Because I only appreciate the relationship when it is over. What's the point? Why? Because when everything comes down, I can see the pretty moments. I can look back and appreciate their effort, my effort, and see that the clingy and needy was actually something to chase after, rather than something that made me chase someone who would only run faster. It is tiring, scary, cruel, and completely unbearable. The worst part is that I know exactly what I need to stop doing it. I know the steps to protect my sanity. But I will admit the ugliest truth: I choose not to take them. Knowing what to do doesn't give my AuDHD brain the dopamine it craves. Self-sabotage is my middle name. “I should not be left to my own devices, they come with prices and vices, I end up in crisis” (Okay, Taylor, loud and clear, thank you!). Playing the victim provides the chemical hit I need. They did this to me. They don't respect me. It is a difficult, addictive loop that both the anxious and the avoidant absolutely adore, just for entirely different reasons. Yep, it is time. I wanna start the part about the avoidant attachment style by sharing a thought I heard last night that made me delete an already finished article and rewrite it. It goes something like this: If, for a second, you think that a person with avoidant attachment left you crying on the floor because they got bored or annoyed by you and thought, fuck it, turned around, and flew with the gods? Don't be fucking stupid. 'Cause that is not avoidant or any other attachment. That is animal behavior. But an avoidant can do something like that, or at least it might seem like it. I must add, at the end of the day, no one will come to tell you to stay or to leave, to be or not to be. But I will tell you one thing: Are you avoidant or anxious? Do not change for anyone. If you feel there are things to improve, great. No one is coming to save you, so you get your shit together and change. Search for help to know how. Make a list of how you have it now and how you want it to be. It depends. But don't you dare change for a person because they asked, they want it, or they showed interest. what the fu**, man? This photo of me, gorgeous, huh? Sorry, but this photo of me represents everything that is wrong with "what if I?" It speaks more than a million words combined. No, not even for reasons that are super difficult for both to swallow, like this: You actually are on the floor crying because you are so overwhelmed. They are the same, or possibly much more overwhelmed, by what they see, by your emotions. They don't know what to do, and so self-preservation turns on. It is not an "I don't give a fuck, and I'm not watching this" kind of leaving. It is running from something unknown, scary, and heartbreakingly painful, as nothing good starts in a getaway car. “You were drivin' the getaway car, We were flyin', but we'd never get far, Don't pretend it's such a mystery, Think about the place where you first met me! (Taylor is officially co-authoring this article at this point, I swear to all the gods, so sorry if you ain’t Swifties, guys!). Know the difference. I know. Had to try both to speak from experience. So if you let me, I’ll also present the avoidants, talk about the pros and cons of such a relationship, and add a little punch at the end that you already know you'll get! When the volcano meets the tornado Let’s talk about Puddin. Because honestly? I am actually sorry for the Joker. I really am. Have you ever stopped and really looked at him? Sitting on the floor, surrounded by hundreds of knives objectively? It is kinda hot. But the green hair, the chaotic makeup, that aggressively loud style, the silver teeth. Put on your psychological X-ray glasses for a second. The more we change ourselves on the outside, the more we put on (I would know), the more it gives away the absolute, heartbreaking fact that we are desperately hiding something real and pure. He doesn't truly love himself. Not even close. He does look like a scary idea or state of mind. That can be trauma talking. Yet, he falls in love with Harley, whom he created, in his own twisted, broken way. Watching him, in those rare, unmasked moments, genuinely willing to live or die for her is it is something. It rips your heart out. Because that is exactly what it is like to chase an avoidant. I am writing this from a hurting heart that is trying its absolute best to understand the avoidants, to understand Puddin, and to actively try not to destroy the bolter (Thanks, Taylor!), who is just running around terrified of his own shadow. But mostly, it is a deep shame I feel about myself, as only I know the full story in all its glory, and only an anxious style – very stupid someone would be bothered by what I am bothered about, or my ego, for that matter. We bleed in front of the world, laughing like no one is watching. Still, underneath the laughter, we are just trying to decode the madness. So, what actually happens when the volcano (the Anxious) meets the tornado (the Avoidant)? What are the pros and cons of this specific brand of neurological warfare? The pros: The chemistry is electric. It is magnetic, undeniable, and intoxicating. When the Tornado sweeps you up, you feel like the only two people in the world. They can be incredibly observant and sharply intelligent, and when they turn their focus on you, it feels like the sun is shining directly on your face. You see the scared, beautiful human beneath the silver teeth, and you want to hold them into healing. The cons: The sun disappears without warning. The Volcano erupts because it needs warmth, and the Tornado scatters because the heat is too intense. When your avoidant partner suddenly goes cold, leaves you on read, or physically walks away again, it feels like a targeted attack. But remember what we established: it is not necessarily cruelty. It can be a survival mechanism. They may be drowning in the very intimacy they secretly crave. The closer you get, the more their internal alarms may scream that they are about to be destroyed. Are these relationships doomed from the beginning? Should we drag them straight into couples therapy on the first date? (That is, the anxious ones can always use it, so practical!) Oh, what a nightmare! The anxious partner would feel as if they were willingly attending an interrogation, while the avoidant would shut down, deflect, or run. You have to heal the individual before you can ever hope to heal the dynamic. So how do we navigate it? Or better yet, how do we not? You can have empathy. You can understand exactly why a traumatised grown man would put on the mask, outside and in, and surround himself with hundreds of knives. You can see the tragedy of his architecture and admire him for the artistic survivor he is. But empathy is not an instruction manual for self-destruction. You do not jump into the vat of acid for Puddin. You do not bleach your own skin, fry your own brain, and abandon your own needs just because you understand why they are broken. You can offer a safe harbor, but if they choose to stay in the storm, you let them. You stand your ground, you keep your brilliant, chaotic, neurodivergent heart completely intact, and you let the Tornado spin. Because at the end of the day, no matter how perfectly you understand the avoidant, it is not your job to be their collateral damage. The “dead pigeon” public service announcement: Do not mix up the shores Let’s come back to something I said earlier. I told you that when an Avoidant leaves you, it’s usually because they are 100 times more overwhelmed by the intimacy than you are. But I need you to hear an example of what it looks like when they aren't overwhelmed by intimacy. When they don’t, in fact, even close, give a ‘flying dead pigeon’. Here is a little behind-the-scenes reality. Because AuDHD likes company (we do not!), my brain decided to wake up my dear dear friend Type 1 narcolepsy (T1 narcolepsy). When an attack hits, I don’t just fall asleep (I fucking wish I would, but that’s “for kids”). I am awake, walking unidentified flying object (UFO), doing and saying things only I understand. The system misfires. The behavior goes rogue, the walls drop, and anyone who actually pays attention knows it is the neurological equivalent of a system override. "She would've made such a lovely bride, what a shame she's fucked in the head" (See, I can do it, Taylor!). I haven’t told this for some reason, but Puddin lives a decent day-or-two's walk away, so the closest it can get to conversation is a (not video) call. “You call me up again just to break me like a promise”. (but you do it so much better, Tay!). One fine day, he decided to stir up some chaos, push some buttons, and make the decision of “No calling today” himself, as with all the other decisions, and watched what’d happen. Drama with that dude is inevitable, and you never know when. Actually, it is when you least expect it! But here is the thing about playing with a Volcano: eventually, it erupts. I was having a day, and with all combined, my system crashed. The narcolepsy attack started. Just for the perfect picture: This isn't an anxious girl crying over unread messages. This is a clinical medical episode. A moment that requires peace, zero stress, and if there is someone around, act like I’m not a nuthead and get me to bed, or if you are on the line, I don’t know, maybe don’t leave, for a change! Anyway, I was at the absolute peak of the attack in a very different way this time, aggressive and nasty, whereas usually I talk nonsense. What did the great avoidant Puddin do when faced with real, raw, terrifying reality? When finally made to look at the actual madness? Being a Joker making a perfect joke! He didn't run away in an existential panic. He didn't have an avoidant emotional overload. He literally just got pissed and went to sleep “so casually cruel in the name of being honest” (Yep, there it is, thanks, Taylor!) He left me in the middle of a neurological storm he had helped create. Embarrassing story, I know. He had no idea what narcolepsy was, what was happening, or what to do. Instead, he chose to go to sleep because my medical episode was “annoying” him. “You're on your own, kid, you always have been” (You’ve outdone yourself, Taylor). Ah, yeah, I was protecting him a bit too much, so he was never there when the attack would hit, but of course I told him thousands of stories about the illness, the process, the attacks, my attacks. Someone was being a great listener! “Look what you made me do!” That isn't a tragic, misunderstood anti-hero protecting his fragile heart from the big bad intimacy. That is just a dead pigeon. A boy who likes the aesthetic of the fire but unplugs the smoke detector when it actually gets hot. So, “If my boy only breaks his favorite toys. (Oh, come on, Taylor, this is too genius!) I’m out of his playpen, telling you guys to be aware of the difference between Avoidant Attachment Style traits and the behavior patterns of empty cowards and liars who care only about themselves. So, let's not mix up the shores. If someone is totally stressed out, but caring for you deeply, but doesn’t know what to do. There is Google for that, or common sense: stay! “Well, it could've been easy, all you had to do was stay” (I see someone got carried away a bit, no? The last one is mine tho, Taylor!). But they don't leave you alone in the unknown at the highest peak of a medical episode because it ain’t pleasant. Act like nothing’s wrong the next day, feeding you false promises that have a 12-hour expiration date! Let's be cautious! Let's not change for anyone but ourselves if we want to. Never let anyone tell you twice that they don’t care for you. First time is their trauma. Second time it’s Yours! “But I got smarter, I got harder in the nick of time, Honey, I rose up from the dead, I do it all the time, I got a list of names, and yours is in red, underlined. I check it once, then I check it twice, oh (Told you I’ll be fine, thanks for being best therapy, Mrs. Kelce!) P.S. Maybe I don’t have a solution for every problem, but I have a Taylor Swift song for every situation! Follow me on Facebook, Instagram, and visit my website for more info! Read more from Sandra Merula Sandra Merula, Mental Health Coach & Neurodiversity Mentor Sandra Merula is a Mental Health & Life Coach, author of “ADHD and Autism. The ‘Together’ People,” working as a mentor at the intersection of Autism, ADHD, trauma, and power dynamics. A neurodivergent thinker herself, she challenges rigid diagnostic narratives and explores identity beyond labels. Her work blends structure with intuition, psychology with depth, and clarity with unapologetic honesty. Through her writing and cat-assisted philosophy, she invites individuals to rebuild identity consciously, not obediently.

Written by Connie Ng, Holistic Practitioner, Quantum Healing Facilitator & Transformational Coach Connie Ng is an international speaker helping people overcome chronic pain, mobility issues, and complex health challenges, especially when conventional approaches fall short. Integrating Five Elements philosophy, vibrational medicine, and mind-body coaching, she empowers clients to reclaim their health, reconnect with who they truly are, and create lasting transformation. Your friend steps out of an ice bath looking annoyingly refreshed. You step out, wondering why on earth you voluntarily paid to be refrigerated. Same cold plunge. Very different response. This is where biohacking becomes genuinely interesting to me. We spend plenty of time debating whether fasting works, whether cold exposure improves recovery, whether a particular supplement sharpens cognition, or whether the latest protocol can squeeze another few percentage points out of our performance. I would ask something else first: Does this actually suit the person doing it? Your body is not a blank template waiting for the internet’s latest optimisation protocol. It comes with a history, a current state, and what traditional health systems would describe as a constitution. Personalised data is useful. Knowing yourself is better. Biohacking is becoming increasingly personalised. We can track sleep, glucose, heart rate variability (HRV), recovery, temperature, and an impressive collection of other biomarkers. I like data. Used well, it tells us useful things. What I question is the leap from personalised numbers to personalised health. Someone swears intermittent fasting changed their life, so we fast. A podcast guest credits an elaborate supplement stack for extraordinary concentration, and suddenly six bottles have appeared in the shopping cart. Somebody posts enthusiastically about cold exposure, and apparently, we all need to develop a close personal relationship with a tub of ice. Maybe. But personalisation should mean more than gathering information about yourself. It should mean knowing yourself well enough to interpret that information. That idea sits behind my earlier article, Why I Look Beyond Symptoms to Understand Chronic and Complex Health Conditions. Before deciding what might support someone, I want to understand the person living inside the body we are trying to optimise. I grew up with the idea of “constitution” before I knew the word I probably notice this differently because of how I grew up. I am Singaporean Chinese, and long before I trained as a Five Elements Coach, studied the mind-body relationships within Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) Five Elements theory, and trained in acupressure, my grandparents and parents were already teaching me how to live with the body in mind. I had asthma as a child and was prone to coughs, colds, and phlegm. Covering my neck and shoulders, wearing socks, and keeping my legs warm at night were simply part of everyday life, even in humid Singapore with a fan or air conditioning running overnight. Within the TCM-informed wisdom I grew up with, this was preventative. Protect the body from excessive “wind” and cold rather than wait for problems to appear. Due to my constitution, I was also largely barred from icy drinks and sugary foods. This wasn’t a wellness trend in our household. It was simply how we looked after the body. I didn’t know the word constitution. To me, it was common sense. My asthma has long since resolved, and I am a healthy adult today. Yet something still fascinates me when I consult highly experienced TCM practitioners for ailments completely unrelated to my childhood respiratory health. Using their own traditional diagnostic observations, some have noticed signs in areas such as my ears or hands and asked whether I had asthma as a child before I had told them. Experiences like that stay with you. Within that traditional framework, my current body is not viewed as though its history began this morning. To me, the body keeps a record. A condition may no longer be active, but our constitutional tendencies and the story of where the body has been do not necessarily become irrelevant simply because the obvious symptoms are gone. So, knowing my own history, would I personally jump into an ice bath because cold plunging is fashionable and someone tells me it will optimise my performance? Hell no. That does not mean cold exposure is bad. It means I already know something about my body. Cold exposure is simply not a good fit for mine. Why would I disregard years of information from my own constitution just to copy somebody else’s biohack? My body’s history is also biofeedback. It just happens not to arrive on a screen. When “healthy” stops making sense for the body in front of you Years ago, during my corporate days, I remember watching someone with a chesty, phlegmy cough repeatedly drink icy orange juice because it contained vitamin C. The vitamin C wasn’t what puzzled me. It was the common sense or, to my mind at the time, the lack of it. Within the Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) principles I had grown up around, an icy, sugary drink was hardly the obvious choice for someone already struggling with a phlegmy cough. Traditional Chinese Medicine observes cold, dampness, and phlegm very differently from simply asking whether a food contains a desirable nutrient. But even without knowing any TCM theory, I remember thinking: If your throat already feels clogged with phlegm and something cold seems to send you into another coughing fit, isn’t your body giving you information too? That experience sparked a much bigger question for me: How many of us actually feel into our bodies before deciding what is supposedly “healthy” for them? We can become so persuaded by a nutrient, a health claim, or someone else’s successful protocol that we stop noticing the response happening right underneath our nose. I had a similar conversation years later with a parent whose ten-year-old had asthma. He had never really considered whether temperature, foods, or his child’s individual patterns might be worth observing. That was when I began appreciating that much of what I had absorbed as ordinary body awareness growing up was not common knowledge at all. Traditional Chinese Medicine later gave formal language to ideas my family had already taught me intuitively: observe the person, the environment, the season, and the patterns the body keeps showing you. In When the Body Speaks: Decoding Mental Health with the Five Elements, I explored how that same way of thinking can extend into emotional patterns, organ systems, and physical symptoms. Ancient constitutional medicine and modern personalised health are obviously not the same system. What interests me is the question they can both encourage us to ask: How is this individual actually responding when a physical condition arises? The high performer trap This is where biohackers and high performers can get caught. Discipline is usually one of their greatest strengths. It becomes less useful when discipline quietly turns into permission to override every signal that interferes with the plan. There is a difference between challenging the body and bulldozing it. If I wake feeling warm, strong, and well-rested, a demanding workout may be exactly what I need. If I am depleted, chilled, and fighting something off, I am not convinced that proving my mental toughness to an ice bath deserves a medal. The same principle applies to fasting, stimulants, restrictive diets, intense exercise, or whatever performance protocol is currently having its moment. Something can be a perfectly respectable biohack and still be completely wrong for you today. My first biohacking article, The Biohacking Blind Spot: Are You Optimising the Extras Before Understanding Your Body?, challenged the tendency to add another intervention before asking what the body truly needs. This article takes that thought a step further. If we insist on using the word “biohacking,” perhaps one of the most useful things to “hack” is our ability to understand our own biology. Perhaps body awareness is the original biofeedback For all the remarkable tools we now have, I remain rather fond of paying attention. I notice how my energy changes after certain foods, how relentless work affects my sleep, how stress shows up in my digestion, and which environments leave me restored rather than depleted. I pay attention to the seasons too, because the body I inhabit in the middle of winter is not necessarily asking for exactly what it wanted in summer. None of that makes me anti-data. A wearable may help confirm something I have noticed, and that can be genuinely useful. The problem begins when technology replaces the conversation rather than contributing to it. Otherwise, we risk outsourcing body awareness to a dashboard. If my tracker announces that I am fully recovered while every fibre of my being is begging for another hour with a pillow, I would at least like to investigate the disagreement before obediently marching into the gym. The machine has information, but so does the body I have been living in for decades. That mind-body conversation is something I explored from another angle in Can Your Emotions Be Causing Your Skin, Gut, and Respiratory Issues?. It also connects with another question I explored in What Future Has Your Diagnosis Quietly Persuaded You to Stop Imagining?. Our present state matters, but it does not necessarily have to become the only future we imagine for ourselves. For me, the interesting question is therefore not whether technology or intuition should win. It is whether we can become wise enough to use both. Biohack wiser Perhaps genuinely personalised biohacking requires something less glamorous than another device: discernment. Health changes. Workloads rise and fall. Emotional states shift. Seasons come and go. An intervention that served you brilliantly six months ago may be unnecessary, or simply wrong for your body today. Experiment, stay curious, and track what genuinely helps. But another person’s enthusiasm is not evidence that their intervention belongs in your body. Nor does choosing recovery over another performance challenge automatically mean you lack discipline. Sometimes it simply means you noticed what was happening before a machine had to tell you. The most sophisticated biohacker in the room may not be the person doing the most. It may be the person who knows themselves well enough to recognise when something works, when it doesn’t, and when today calls for something completely different. Your constitution is not someone else’s protocol. So, before copying the latest supplement stack, fasting schedule, cold exposure routine, or performance ritual, I would ask one decidedly unsexy, low-tech question: What does my body actually need today? If we can answer that with greater honesty, intuition, and body awareness, perhaps we are finally beginning to “hack” something genuinely worthwhile: our own biological needs. That, to me, is how we stop biohacking harder and start biohacking wiser. ` Book a complimentary 15-minute Clarity Call here. Follow me on Facebook and Instagram, and visit my website for more info! Read more from Connie Ng Connie Ng, Holistic Practitioner, Quantum Healing Facilitator & Transformational Coach Connie Ng is a Multi-Disciplined Holistic Practitioner and Quantum Healing Facilitator who specialises in helping clients overcome chronic physical and emotional conditions by addressing their root cause at the energetic level. Blending Five Elements wisdom with Star Magic Healing, vibrational medicine, and holistic counselling, she facilitates deep transformation for those who feel stuck despite trying everything. Connie is the founder of The Salt Therapy Clinic & Sanctuary and works with clients both in-person and remotely.

Written by Joanne Angel Barry Colon, Wholistic Personal Trainer, Intuitive Healer & Cosmic Energy Reader Joanne Angel Barry Colon has 30+ years in the health, fitness, and wellness industry. She is the Wholistic Fitness owner located in Queens, New York, a certified holistic personal trainer, intuitive healer, cosmic energy reader, student of Astrology, Master of Numerology, and Creator of Chakra Balance Numerology Cosmic Energy Forecast Deck. As women move through their 40s, 50s, 60s, and beyond, maintaining muscle strength, bone health, balance, and mobility becomes increasingly important. One fitness tool receiving more attention among women in midlife is the weighted vest. A weighted vest is designed to distribute additional weight around the upper body while allowing your hands to remain free. When appropriately incorporated into a walking or strength-training program, it can add resistance and create a new challenge for the body. However, more weight does not necessarily mean better results. A weighted vest should be introduced gradually and based on the individual woman's current strength, posture, joint health, movement patterns, and fitness level. The benefits of a weighted vest One potential benefit of weighted-vest training is the additional weight-bearing stimulus placed on the body. During midlife, hormonal changes associated with perimenopause and postmenopause can contribute to changes in bone density. Walking while carrying additional resistance may increase the mechanical demand placed on the bones. A weighted vest can also make your regular walk more challenging without requiring you to start running. Because your body is carrying additional weight, your muscles must work harder to move and stabilize you. Your cardiovascular system may also work harder compared with walking the same route without additional resistance. Another benefit is progressive overload. Progressive overload means gradually increasing the demands placed on the muscles so they have a reason to adapt and become stronger. A vest can be incorporated into exercises such as squats, step-ups, lunges, calf raises, and certain walking workouts. Because your hands remain free, some women may also find a vest more comfortable than carrying weights while walking. Weighted-vest training may support functional fitness as well. Everyday life requires us to carry groceries, climb stairs, lift objects, maintain our balance, and move our bodies against resistance. Training with appropriate additional resistance can help prepare the body for these daily demands. The cons and precautions Weighted vests are not appropriate for every woman or every workout. Adding too much weight too quickly can increase stress on the knees, hips, ankles, feet, and lower back. A poorly fitted or excessively heavy vest can also change your walking mechanics and posture. You may begin leaning forward, shortening your stride, or compensating through other areas of your body. Pelvic-floor health should also be considered. Women experiencing pelvic-floor weakness, urinary leakage, pelvic pressure, or prolapse symptoms may find that additional downward pressure aggravates their symptoms. Women with osteoporosis, previous fractures, significant joint concerns, balance difficulties, or other medical considerations should speak with their healthcare provider and an appropriately qualified fitness professional before beginning weighted-vest training. How I would introduce a weighted vest Before introducing a weighted vest to your walking routine, schedule an assessment. An assessment allows your fitness professional to evaluate your posture, balance, gait, mobility, strength, core stability, current exercise program, and any movement limitations. It provides a starting point for determining whether adding external weight to your walk is appropriate for your body. I would not begin by simply putting on a heavy vest and completing your normal walking distance. For a healthy woman who has been cleared for weighted-vest exercise, I would generally begin conservatively, often around 5% of body weight or less, depending on her assessment and training experience. A 160-pound woman, for example, would have 8 pounds representing 5% of her body weight. Begin with approximately 10 to 15 minutes of walking and observe how your body responds. Pay attention to posture, breathing, balance, joint comfort, pelvic-floor sensations, and how you feel later that day and the following day. Progress gradually rather than increasing weight and duration simultaneously. Most importantly, a weighted vest should complement, not replace, a comprehensive strength-training program. During midlife, our goal is not simply to burn more calories. We are training to preserve muscle, bone strength, balance, mobility, independence, and confidence as we move through the Wise Woman years. The weighted vest can be another valuable tool in your wholistic fitness toolbox when it is introduced with intention, proper assessment, progressive overload, and respect for your body's individual needs. Follow me on Facebook, Instagram, and visit my website for more info! Read more from Joanne Angel Barry Colon Joanne Angel Barry Colon, Wholistic Personal Trainer, Intuitive Healer & Cosmic Energy Reader Joanne Angel Barry Colon has 30+ years in the health, fitness, and wellness industry. She is the owner of Wholistic Fitness located in Queens, New York, a certified holistic personal trainer, intuitive healer, cosmic energy reader, student of Astrology, Master of Numerology, and Creator of Chakra Balance Numerology Cosmic Energy Forecast Deck. She is the Host of Joanne's Healing Within TV Show, Joanne's Cosmic Energy Radio Show, and Author/Self-Publisher. Joanne's mission is to help women (men by referral) release issues from their tissues as they release emotional weight and fall in love with themselves while witnessing their transformation into the best version of themselves.

Written by Davian Bryan, Self-Confidence Coach Davian Bryan is the author of Vulnerable Soul (published in 2025). Through Storytelling Power, he helps brands strengthen their storytelling with creative communication. As a self-confidence coach at Dare Your Lifestyle, he empowers introverts to embrace their God-given confidence. Is being introverted a bad thing? No. Introversion is a normal personality trait, not a flaw that needs fixing. The important question is whether your choices come from genuine preference or fear. You can love quiet, enjoy solitude, prefer smaller groups, and still work on confidence, communication, and courage when needed. For years, I heard the same things. You are too quiet. You need to socialize more. You need to put yourself out there. After hearing it enough times, I started wondering if everyone else had received instructions on how to be a person and mine somehow got lost. So I tried to change. I worried about how quiet I seemed. I questioned why I enjoyed my own company. At work and socially, I sometimes felt that being noticed meant talking more, smiling more, and always being “on.” But constantly performing a personality that does not feel like yours gets exhausting. Eventually, I stopped asking, “How do I become less introverted?” I started asking, “What actually needs changing?” That question helped me much more. Is being introverted a bad thing according to psychology? No. Psychology generally treats introversion and extraversion as parts of a personality spectrum rather than two rigid boxes. An Oxford Academic overview of introversion and extraversion explains introversion and extraversion as personality dimensions within major personality models. In everyday language, some people naturally lean toward more social stimulation, outward enthusiasm or frequent interaction. Others may prefer quieter environments, smaller groups and more time to think. Neither automatically tells us whether someone is confident, intelligent, friendly or capable. You can be quiet at work and still lead, prefer your own company and still love people, dislike crowded events and still be socially confident. Your personality is part of you. It is not a verdict on you. Why introversion can feel like a problem Sometimes the real issue is not introversion. It is pressure. Outgoing behaviour is often easier to notice. The person who speaks first in the meeting gets heard first. The person working the room may appear more confident than the person thinking carefully before speaking. Over time, quieter people can start wondering if they are doing something wrong. Research published in the Journal of Happiness Studies examined 349 adults and found that many participants viewed extraverted qualities as more socially desirable. The study also found that wanting to be more extraverted was linked with lower feelings of authenticity and well-being among more introverted people. You can read the study on introversion and authenticity. That finding makes sense to me. There is a difference between learning a skill and spending years trying to become someone else. Being quiet is not the same as being afraid This is the distinction I wish I had understood earlier. Ask yourself, "Do I genuinely not want to do this, or do I want to do it but feel afraid?" Those situations can look exactly the same from the outside. You stay home either way. But the reason matters. Preference: You turn down an invitation because you genuinely want a quiet evening. You make tea, get comfortable, and feel good about your choice. Fear: You really want to go, but you start thinking: What if nobody talks to me? What if I sound awkward? What if people judge me? So you cancel and spend the evening wishing you had gone. That is different. The American Psychological Association's discussion of shyness and introversion explains that introversion is not the same as fear-based social withdrawal. You can also be introverted without having social anxiety. The National Institute of Mental Health explains that social anxiety disorder involves strong fear of being watched, judged, or rejected, often enough to interfere with daily life. That is more than simply enjoying quiet. A quick check-in Ask yourself Preference Fear Why am I saying no? I genuinely do not want to go I want to go but fear judgement How do I feel afterward? Peaceful Disappointed or frustrated Does it limit my life? Usually not Sometimes Who is making the choice? Me Fear This is not a diagnosis. It is simply a useful way to notice what may be driving your choices. Stop turning introversion into a superpower The internet sometimes overcorrects. Suddenly, introverts are described as automatically smarter, deeper, more creative, wiser, and better listeners. We do not need that either. You should not have to prove that your personality gives you special powers before you are allowed to accept yourself. Maybe you are an excellent listener. Maybe sometimes your mind wanders halfway through a conversation because you remembered you forgot to buy bread. You are human. Acceptance means learning what is true about you, not swapping one stereotype for a more flattering one. How I learned to embrace being introverted Once I stopped treating my quieter nature like evidence that something was wrong with me, I noticed what I actually liked. I like my own company. I like having space to think. I like not filling every silence. I like smaller conversations that actually go somewhere. Embracing introversion can mean: leaving space between social plans choosing smaller gatherings enjoying alone time without guilt speaking when you genuinely have something to add building relationships where you do not have to perform saying no without writing an apology essay afterward But self-acceptance does not mean letting fear control your life. You can still learn to speak up. You can still attend the event. You can still introduce yourself. You can still build confidence. The goal is not to become louder. The goal is to become more honest about what you prefer, what you fear, and what kind of life you actually want. Your introversion does not need an apology So, is being introverted a bad thing? No. Keep the quiet parts that genuinely belong to you. Challenge the fear that keeps shrinking your life. Learn the skills that help you grow. Stop judging your confidence by how much noise you make. You do not have to become an extrovert to become stronger, more confident, or more visible. You do not need to become louder to become more of yourself. Follow me on Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, and visit my website for more info! Read more from Davian Bryan Davian Bryan, Self-Confidence Coach Davian Bryan is a freelance creative specializing in brand storytelling and communication strategy, and the author of Vulnerable Soul (2025). After overcoming insecurity and rebuilding his confidence through faith and discipline, he now helps introverts embrace their God-given confidence through Dare Your Lifestyle. He operates Storytelling Power, where he supports brands with strategic content creation and communication systems. His mission: Build clarity. Build confidence. Build something that lasts.

Written by Cortne Lee Smith, Emotional Wellness Advocate Emotional Wellness Advocate specializing in corporate culture and community development, helping organizations and individuals navigate grief, resilience, and growth. I equip leaders and communities with tools to foster healing, connection, and sustainable well-being. Every leader is evaluated by performance, strategy, decisions, and outcomes. But what is rarely evaluated yet deeply felt in every boardroom, team dynamic, and leadership decision is the emotional architecture that the leader is operating from. Because leadership does not begin in adulthood. It begins with the experiences that teach us what safety, communication, conflict, connection, rejection, and belonging feel like. I use the term “inner child” to describe the emotional imprints, learned expectations, and protective patterns we can carry from earlier life experiences into adulthood. If that inner child was shaped by environments where emotions were dismissed, communication was unsafe, conflict was met with silence, or connection was withdrawn, those patterns may continue to influence how the adult responds under pressure. They can evolve. They can become leadership behaviors. But they do not have to become our permanent identity. The leader you see is not the whole story Most leadership development focuses on skill enhancement: Communication training Conflict resolution Emotional intelligence Productivity systems Strategic decision-making All of these matter. But beneath the skills is another question, "What happens emotionally when the leader is triggered?" If the child learned to shut down instead of speak up, the adult may struggle with avoidance. If the child learned that expressing emotion led to rejection, the adult may suppress vulnerability. If the child learned that conflict was unsafe, the adult may withdraw or cut people off rather than engage in repair. These are not necessarily personality flaws. They can be learned protective responses. Research supports the broader principle behind this framework. A 2023 systematic review examined 37 peer-reviewed studies involving more than 2,000 participants and found significant associations between attachment representations and adult emotion regulation. Secure attachment was consistently associated with more balanced regulation, while insecure patterns were associated with different forms of emotional dysregulation or deactivation. That does not mean childhood determines who a leader becomes. It means our early relational experiences can become part of the emotional blueprint we carry into adulthood, and awareness gives us an opportunity to change how that blueprint operates. The origin of emotional breakdown in leadership Most emotional breakdowns in leadership do not necessarily begin in the present moment. Sometimes they can be traced to learned behaviors formed much earlier: “Don’t talk back” can become silence in leadership meetings. “Go to your room” can become emotional withdrawal during conflict. “Stop crying” can become emotional suppression under pressure. “We don't talk about that” can become an avoidance of difficult conversations. Over time, these patterns can create a leadership style that looks composed on the surface while avoiding emotional engagement underneath. When pressure increases, familiar protective responses can become stronger. This is where communication gaps begin. Not necessarily because leaders don't know what to say, but because earlier experiences may have taught them that emotional expression, disagreement, or vulnerability was unsafe. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention notes that adverse childhood experiences can have lasting effects on health, well-being, education, job opportunities, relationships, and stress-response systems well into adulthood. The question, therefore, is not simply, “What’s wrong with this leader?” A more productive question may be, “What did this person learn about safety, conflict, communication, and connection, and is that learning still serving them today?” When communication is replaced with disconnection One of the most common learned responses to emotional discomfort is disconnection. Instead of communicating through conflict, individuals may: Withdraw Shut down Over-control outcomes Cut people off emotionally or relationally Avoid direct conversations Delay necessary truth-telling These behaviors can sometimes function as protective responses learned earlier in life. Research on attachment and emotion regulation offers another lens for understanding this. Attachment patterns are associated with differences in how adults regulate distress and respond to emotional stress. Understanding the origin of a behavior does not excuse its impact. It gives us an opportunity to change it. Continued disconnection, however, can have organizational consequences. Teams may feel emotionally unsafe. Miscommunication can increase. Trust can erode quietly. Conflict can be avoided instead of resolved. Culture can become reactive instead of relational. Leadership without emotional awareness can become functional but disconnected. The inner child in the boardroom The “inner child” is the language I use to help people recognize the emotional history that can accompany them into adulthood. It often becomes most visible in moments of criticism, conflict, rejection, high-pressure decision-making, feeling unseen, feeling unheard, experiencing loss or sudden change. In these moments, the adult brain is not operating in isolation. The nervous system also responds to the present through the lens of past experiences. This is one reason two leaders can face the same situation and respond completely differently. One may pause, assess, communicate, and repair. Another may defend, withdraw, control, or disconnect. Without awareness, we may simply label the difference as personality, leadership style, temperament, or stress tolerance. But sometimes a deeper emotional history lies beneath the behavior. The goal is not to diagnose ourselves. The goal is to become curious enough to recognize the pattern. The cost of unhealed patterns in leadership When emotional patterns remain unacknowledged, leadership can carry invisible costs, including difficulty sustaining healthy professional relationships, inconsistent emotional regulation under pressure, overreaction or emotional shutdown during conflict, difficulty receiving feedback, trust issues within teams or partnerships, and repeating cycles of breakdown and rebuild. These patterns don't stay contained within the leader. They can influence the environment around the leader. Because leadership is relational. The way we manage ourselves becomes part of the experience other people have with us. This is where emotional intelligence becomes more than a personal-development concept. A 2022 meta-analysis examining emotional intelligence and employee outcomes found positive relationships between emotional intelligence and organizational commitment, organizational citizenship behavior, job satisfaction, and job performance, while emotional intelligence was negatively related to job stress. In other words, the ability to understand and manage emotions has relevance not only to personal well-being, but to the workplace experience. The bridge: Awareness without judgment Healing does not begin with fixing behavior. It begins with awareness without self-judgment. When a leader can say, “This is not just how I am reacting. This may be how I learned to survive,” something changes. The statement creates distance between identity and behavior. You are not the pattern. You learned the pattern. What was learned can be examined. This is where emotional intelligence deepens into emotional integration because awareness creates choice. Choice interrupts repetition. The role of the intentional pause in inner child healing This is where the Intentional Pause, introduced in Daily Execution of The Intentional Pause, becomes more than a productivity practice. It becomes a moment of emotional recalibration. The pause creates space between the trigger and the response. Instead of immediately reacting, the leader can ask: What part of me is reacting right now? Is this response current or familiar? Am I responding to what is actually happening, or protecting myself from what something reminds me of? Am I leading from clarity or from protection? The Intentional Pause does not ask leaders to ignore their emotions. It gives them permission to recognize them. That distinction matters. The goal is not to push emotions down, push past them, or push through them. The goal is to create enough space to recognize what is happening internally so the present-day adult can make the next decision. The pause interrupts the pattern long enough for the present self to lead. That is where transformation begins. Not in perfection. In interruption. Rewriting leadership from the inside out True leadership transformation is not necessarily about becoming someone new. It can be about reclaiming access to the parts of ourselves that were silenced, disconnected, or overprotected. When leaders become more emotionally aware, they can develop greater emotional clarity, stronger communication during conflict, greater tolerance for discomfort without avoidance, more authentic connection with teams, more intentional responses under pressure, and greater capacity for repair. Leadership becomes less about protection and more about presence. This is where personal healing and organizational development meet. From fragmentation to integration This is the same pattern explored in my article “How Grief Causes Fragmentation, The Emotional Impact of Compartmentalizing Pain, Identity, and Healing.” Unprocessed emotional experiences can create separation within us. We compartmentalize. We perform. We keep moving. We become one person at work, another person at home, another person in relationships, and eventually wonder why we are exhausted. But healing moves us toward integration. Where there was once silence instead of communication, avoidance instead of engagement, and control instead of connection, awareness can begin instead of reaction, dialogue instead of disconnection, alignment instead of fragmentation, and repair instead of permanent separation. This is not simply emotional healing. It is leadership restoration. What the research tells us The research does not tell us that every adult behavior can be traced directly to childhood. It does not suggest that our past determines our future. What it does show is that early relational experiences, adversity, attachment patterns, and emotion regulation can influence how people navigate stress and relationships across the lifespan. That distinction matters. Our history may help explain a pattern. It does not have to become our permanent identity. Research on emotional intelligence gives us another important piece of the picture. Emotional capabilities matter in the workplace, including performance, satisfaction, commitment, and stress. That means understanding ourselves is not separate from leadership. It is part of leadership. Final reflection The leader you are today is not separate from the child you once were. They are connected by experience, memory, and emotional patterning. But they are not fixed. What was learned can be unlearned. What was adapted for survival can be transformed for leadership. What was once protection can become presence. Because when the inner child is acknowledged, the adult leader gains an opportunity to lead from a more integrated place. Wholeness is where true leadership begins. Call to action If your organization is ready to develop emotionally aware leaders who can recognize patterns, regulate responses, communicate through difficult moments, and lead from alignment rather than survival, explore The Align Experience. Explore the team journey/corporate experience. Because when leaders heal internally, they transform everything externally. Break the cycle: Support the next generation Healing does not stop with today's leaders. It must extend to the next generation. Through the Childhood Grief Initiative, we are helping children and youth understand emotional language, process big feelings, and build emotional intelligence early, before survival patterns become leadership limitations. Our first book, The Villains Amongst Us, and the Grief Heroes YouTube series create age-appropriate opportunities for children and families to talk about the emotions that are often difficult to name. Join us in shaping emotionally aware future leaders through storytelling, education, and engagement. Explore and subscribe to the Grief Heroes YouTube Channel. When we teach children to understand their emotions, we have an opportunity to break cycles earlier and help build emotionally intelligent leaders for the future. Follow me on Instagram and LinkedIn for more info! Read more from Cortne Lee Smith Cortne Lee Smith, Emotional Wellness Advocate Cortne Lee Smith is an Emotional Wellness Advocate focused on transforming corporate culture and strengthening communities through healing-centered strategies. Her work bridges grief, resilience, and leadership, equipping individuals and organizations with tools for sustainable emotional well-being. As the visionary behind the 1 Million Hearts Reconnected Community, she creates spaces for restoration, connection, and growth. Cortne is also the voice behind the Grief Heroes movement, empowering the next generation of leaders to understand and harness the power of their emotions. Through her writing, speaking, and programs, she helps others turn life’s challenges into purposeful impact. Research references: Eilert, D. W., & Buchheim, A. (2023). Attachment-Related Differences in Emotion Regulation in Adults: A Systematic Review on Attachment Representations. Brain Sciences, 13(6), 884. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. (2026). About Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs). Doğru, Ç. (2022). A Meta-Analysis of the Relationships Between Emotional Intelligence and Employee Outcomes. Frontiers in Psychology, 13, 611348.