In our latest Growth HotSeat session, we confronted a challenging psychological hurdle that affects highly experienced leaders. We frequently operate under the belief that our peace of mind is directly tied to the speed at which we achieve our goals. We tell ourselves that we must have a strict plan, a clear timeline, and constant forward momentum to validate our efforts. However, our discussion highlighted that heavily relying on these rigid structures to dictate our internal state merely keeps us running on a treadmill of constant anxiety.
The conversation opened by dissecting the neuroscience behind how we perceive our business reality. Science demonstrates that we process a microscopically narrow slice of the world around us. Within the visual cortex, the brain sends significantly more information downward as predictions than it receives upward as incoming sensory data. This means that a vast majority of what we see is simply our brain talking to itself, constructing a simulation based on our past experiences. We act as the projector, while the people and events in our business are simply the screen. When we feel frustration over a delayed project or a lost client, it is a clear signal that our internal projection is flawed.
One Member, who has successfully operated a family farming enterprise for many years, illustrated this dynamic perfectly. He is currently navigating a major life transition, actively downsizing his operations and selling off five generations of accumulated farming gear. As a natural planner who is used to mapping out breeding cycles years in advance, he openly shared his current struggle. He feels a strong internal prompt to simply wait and do nothing else until the physical move is complete. He honestly admitted that sitting back and watching his accounts decrease while waiting for the next step is highly uncomfortable, breaking years of established behavioural patterns.
The group unpacked the cognitive illusion hidden within this discomfort. It is a natural leadership assumption that we must always be taking action. However, the farmer shared a beautiful realisation that emerged from his quiet periods. Years ago, he made the difficult choice to put the growth of his business on hold to focus his energy on his family, specifically supporting a child with special needs. While looking at the financial cost of that decision could induce stress, his internal guidance recently provided a sense of deep encouragement, confirming that keeping his family together was the right call. Letting go of the disappointment surrounding his business allowed him to appreciate the success of his relational choices.
This theme of releasing expectations extended deeply into how we manage quiet periods in our operations. Another Member, running a successful consultancy, shared his experience of having zero new business inquiries during the first quarter of the year. He noted that an older version of himself would have panicked, created unnecessary motion, and mistaken that frantic activity for progress. Instead, he recognised the danger of treating his intuition and faith like a vending machine; pushing a button and expecting a specific external reward to instantly drop out.
Rather than attaching an emotional meaning to the quiet quarter, he focused entirely on maintaining his daily discipline. He went to the gym, ate well, and slept properly, ensuring he remained highly available and regulated for whenever the next opportunity arose. By refusing to label the lack of inquiries as a bad event, he stayed completely calm. This grounded approach yielded incredible results, as the second quarter brought a surprising flood of new board-approved business that he navigated with ease.
A third Member, scaling a mortgage brokerage and launching a new educational course for first-home buyers, resonated with the challenge of timelines. He admitted his own frustration regarding the speed at which his new initiatives were generating income. The discussion circled back to the concept that temporal events have no inherent meaning. We explored how rain on a Saturday is viewed as a tragedy by a bride having an outdoor wedding, yet viewed as a financial blessing by a local farmer. The event itself is neutral; the suffering or joy is entirely dictated by the meaning we choose to apply.
This Member then shared a powerful application of this principle within his own home. He recognised his ingrained habit of finding faults in his children’s daily routines, such as failing to pack away breakfast or brush their teeth. Recognising this negative projection, he made a conscious choice during his morning reflection to find fantastic instead. While the mechanical requirement for his children to brush their teeth remained, his internal tone shifted completely. By projecting a positive expectation, he immediately removed the friction from his household, proving that a simple shift in our internal stance changes the entire external experience.
We learned that navigating the complex reality of running our companies supports us in embracing the discipline of waiting. Instead of forcing our preferred timelines onto the world and suffering when they do not materialise, we can actively choose to remain open and available. This does not mean we ignore our responsibilities; it means we maintain a consistent state of clarity and discipline without needing an immediate external reward. By continually letting go of our rigid plans and trusting our intuition to guide our pacing, we strip away the unnecessary friction of leadership.
“Life is a series of natural and spontaneous changes. Don’t resist them; that only creates sorrow.” – Lao Tzu
