Leading So People Will Follow

Managing Your Self-talk

Pretty much everyone has a continuous mental monologue running through their mind, like the “crawl” at the bottom of a TV screen. Sometimes what we say to ourselves is pretty benign (“I love oranges,” “Great shoes,” “It’s hot today!”), but often it’s not. Too often our mental monologue consists of unhelpful and inaccurate statements about ourselves and others (“That guy doesn’t know anything,” “I’m going to blow this presentation,” “She hates me”).

Learning to gain more control over how you talk to yourself is powerful for anyone, but especially helpful to leaders who are trying to build their leader capabilities. Managing your self-talk is particularly helpful in assessing the obstacles to your vision (farsightedness), ...