Ripping the Band-Aid: Ouch! or Ahhh…
Our connection to one another helps us to live out the purpose for which we were created. So why do we cover up the vulnerabilities and painful experiences that, in the end, allow us to connect?
Leaders have a strong sense of pride and ambition. The very traits that help us move to the helm of an organization also can inhibit us from sharing the hurts, the imperfections, and the wounds that are part of the human condition. Always feeling that we must be the one with the answers or the one who “keeps their cool” in the heat of the moment can keep us apart from others who feel more free to exhibit fear, anger, and other emotions of the moment. Covering up authentic emotions with the Band-Aids of fearlessness and gameface confidence can make us appear aloof and overly self-assured—resulting in a lack of connection.
In my April 2020 blog, “The Five Mistakes Leaders are Making,” one of those five mistakes was not having a person, a group, or some other resource that enables us to show who we are, warts and all, and still feel accepted. The Band-aids we put over our wounds have been put there to protect us—but in the end, hide the very scrapes and abrasions that, when shared, can teach a lesson or light the path for someone else along the way.
As a leader, I was often told the following: “Oh, you are so professional!” and “You are always the one who keeps her head in a crisis.” Admittedly, two compliments a leader might want to hear. But I was also told, “I can’t ever read you,” and “I don’t ever know your feelings.” True, we can’t be all things to all people. But what those comments told me is that I hid my wounds with the Band-aids many leaders wear—never let them see you sweat, in the old school verbiage of things. My cover-ups hid the all-too-human emotions I felt and caused a disconnection with the people I most wanted to know and to know me. Interestingly, when the tearful day came that I had to admit to my staff that I would be entering treatments for cancer, even while I was caregiver for my mother who was going through chemotherapy at the time, I felt a kinship and support unlike any I had felt before as I lay open my wound and understood vulnerability in a way I had not allowed myself to experience before.
Try ripping the band aid off your wounds and let others see the real you. The next time you are feeling an honest emotion in your work or life, (we’ve never been in the place we are today in the workplace, have we?) share it instead of covering it up. Your authentic, real self is a gift uniquely yours. Sharing ourselves is the greatest gift we can give in the realm of leadership—it allows others to share their authentic selves, too, creating a culture of genuineness and appreciation. You may find that ripping off the Band-Aid results not in “Ouch!” but “Ahhh.”
