ILLUSTRATION BY DAVID SWANN

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Be your own
best friend

Leading by example includes learning
how to take care of yourself

Simply re-recording positive messages over old tapes won't change our self-talk. Counter arguments to the contrary--self-spoken or from a friend-- "You are so good!" "You should look at your achievements!" "Stop beating up on yourself!"--are no more effective. Indeed, they can often be heard as yet another form of "chastisement," albeit delivered via a velvet glove.

So what is this bold new approach we said was required if we were to be successful at making up our minds to change the make-up of our minds? To become capable of being more successful at the inside job of leadership self-development?

The answer lies in a paraphrased version of one of the Buddha's words of wisdom [the word hate was in the original]: "In this world, [self-deprecation] never dispelled [self-deprecation.] Only love dispels [self-deprecation.] This is the law, ancient and inexhaustible."

The implications of this 'inexhaustible law' are quite simple to articulate -- and incredibly demanding to put into operation. In order to meaningfully change negative self-talk, in order to increase self-confidence, we must learn to do several things.

In other words, the only way to successfully counter a self-unfulfilling prophecy over the long term is to befriend it. Not out run it! Not "override" it.

Who is this "we" we've been highlighting? Ultimately, it is each of us as individuals.

We need to learn how to be our own best friends.

Not because it is a nice 'touchy-feely' luxury. No, quite the contrary. Because the single most important quality in most studies of successful leaders is their ability to "care for others as human beings." And, we don't need Buddha to remind us that we must first care for ourselves as a precondition to caring for others.

But, to develop this ability to create and sustain increasing levels of self-confidence, we have to face an inevitable Catch-22 --and there is always a Catch-22 in any human challenge of any substance: A coach may be necessary to start, especially a coach who is good friends with him or herself, and who is capable of exhibiting the patience, understanding, and empathy essential to being a good friend to their client.

Let me be very clear: I am not taking that position as a way of touting the value of good coaching in leadership development. I am stressing it for two reasons.

One, it is the very quality of our self-perception that needs sharpening and honing when our self-confidence is at stake. To try to do so alone would be akin to an optometrist grinding him or herself a new pair of lenses for their glasses, while wearing the old glasses that were giving him distorted vision in the first place!

Two, the process of having to reach out to someone else, to learn to trust them, to be willing to be vulnerable -- to confide in them -- involves challenges that give us the humility and grace to inculcate new tapes of lasting value -- tapes that remind us "Only Gods are perfect," tapes that remind us that "Admitting a failing is not only not a sign of weakness, it is a sign of strength."

These are the tapes that help to strengthen our humility, our tolerance, and our acceptance of ourselves and of others, our self-confidence.

Leading by example and walking our talk are two frequently referred to challenges and pillars of leadership development.

Underlying both of them is the challenge of self-talk, of learning how to be our own best friends.