The Surprising Secret to Overcoming Inertia (It Has Nothing to Do with Willpower)

 

I want to tell you about something I discovered one morning while doing yoga in my cold house.

I’d been putting off my practice for days — weeks, if I’m honest. Every morning I’d wake up with good intentions, feel the temperature in the room, and decide that I’d start tomorrow. The conditions weren’t right. I needed to feel ready.

One morning I forced myself to get on the mat anyway.

I did a few slow, stiff movements. Everything felt hard. My body was resistant. My mind was making a compelling case that this was pointless. But I kept going. And somewhere in the middle of it, something shifted. My muscles warmed up. My breath deepened. The things that had felt impossible five minutes earlier started happening on their own.

The room hadn’t changed. The temperature was the same. The conditions were exactly as uninviting as they’d been when I’d been talking myself out of it for weeks.

I had changed.

And I thought: isn’t this always how it goes?

The physics of getting unstuck

There’s a principle in physics that states an object at rest tends to stay at rest — and an object in motion tends to stay in motion. We usually think of inertia as the problem (the thing keeping us stuck on the couch), but the same principle that keeps us still is the one that keeps us moving once we start.

The mistake most people make when they’re trying to overcome inertia is waiting for the right conditions before they begin. They’re waiting for clarity, or motivation, or the perfect moment, or enough time, or the right mood. They think that feeling ready is the prerequisite for starting.

It isn’t.

Readiness is a result of beginning. Not a condition for it.

What this looks like in real leadership

I work with executives who have important projects sitting in a drawer — things they know matter, things they genuinely want to do — that have been waiting for the right moment for months. Sometimes years.

The reason is rarely laziness. It’s usually that the project feels big, and starting feels risky, and not starting feels safer than starting badly.

But here’s what I’ve observed: the leaders who make the most meaningful progress are rarely the ones who waited until everything was perfectly aligned. They’re the ones who took a small, imperfect action and let that action create the momentum for the next one.

They got warm.

The question worth asking

When I’m stuck on something — a conversation I’ve been avoiding, a piece of work I keep circling around, a decision I can’t seem to make — I’ve learned to ask myself a different question than “What should I do?”

Instead, I ask: What’s the smallest action I could take right now that would get me into motion?

Not the perfect action. Not the complete action. Just the one that would move the needle from “still” to “in motion.”

Sometimes it’s writing one paragraph. Sometimes it’s making one phone call. Sometimes it’s simply opening the document and reading what’s there.

The moment you take that action, the game changes. Because now you’re in motion. And motion has its own momentum.

One small thing

Think about something you’ve been wanting to move forward on — a project, a conversation, a change you’ve been contemplating. You know the one.

Now ask yourself: what’s the smallest action I could take on it today? Not to finish it. Not to get it right. Just to get warm.

Then take that action. Before you read another article or have another meeting or check your phone again.

The environment won’t change. But you will.

 

I explore this idea, and the deeper patterns that keep high-achieving leaders stuck, in my book: The Pinocchio Principle: Becoming a Real Leader.

 

---

 

Want insights like this in your inbox every week?  →  Subscribe here.

 

 

 

Why Running on Autopilot Is Costing You More Than You Know

 

There’s a particular kind of exhaustion that has nothing to do with how many hours you’ve worked.

It’s the exhaustion of going through the motions. Of making it through your day – back-to-back meetings, decisions, emails, conversations – and arriving at the end of it feeling like you somehow weren’t really there for any of it.

If you’ve ever driven home and couldn’t remember a single thing about the drive, you know what I mean. Your body showed up. Your autopilot showed up. But you, the thoughtful, intentional, alive version of you, had checked out somewhere around 2 p.m.

I’ve been thinking about this a lot lately, because I keep hearing some version of the same thing from leaders I work with:

“I’m doing everything I’m supposed to be doing. So why does it feel like I’m disappearing?”

That question deserves a real answer.

What autopilot actually costs you

We tend to talk about autopilot as a productivity problem…  you’re not getting things done, you’re procrastinating, you’re distracted. And sure, those things show up. But what I’ve observed, both in my own life and in working with executives for over thirty years, is that autopilot is really an identity problem.

When you’re running on autopilot, you’re not actually leading. You’re reacting. You’re executing. You’re managing the inbox of your life. But the deeper, more purposeful part of you – the part that has vision, that asks “why does this matter,” that can read a room and feel what’s really needed – that part goes quiet.

And here’s what makes it so insidious: it happens gradually enough that you don’t notice it happening. One day you look up and realize the last six months were a blur. That you can’t remember the last time you felt genuinely excited about a project. That your best ideas stopped coming.

That’s not a scheduling problem. That’s a signal.

The three signs your leadership is on autopilot

1) You’re doing more, but feeling less. You’re technically more productive than ever – more efficient, more organized, more responsive. But something feels flat. You finish things and feel relief instead of satisfaction. The work has stopped feeding you.

2) You’ve stopped asking the question underneath the question. Leaders operating from their fullest capacity are always curious. They’re asking not just what needs to get done, but why it matters, who is affected, and what’s really going on beneath the surface. When you’re on autopilot, you stop going below the surface. You take things at face value because you’re moving too fast to look deeper.

3) Your relationships feel transactional. Not because you don’t care – you do. But when you’re in autopilot mode, interactions become things to get through rather than opportunities to genuinely connect. People can feel the difference, even if they can’t name it.

What I know to be true

There’s a part of you that is wiser, more creative, and more capable than the version of you that shows up on autopilot. I call it your Genius. It’s not some idealized fantasy of who you could be under perfect conditions. It’s actually more available to you than your autopilot self – it just requires that you show up for it.

The good news is that breaking out of autopilot doesn’t require a sabbatical or a personality transplant. It usually begins with something much simpler: noticing that you’re on it.

That noticing is the first act of real leadership.

Something to sit with this week

What is one thing you keep meaning to get to, one piece of work that feels genuinely important to you, that has been getting pushed to tomorrow for longer than you’d like to admit?

Don’t answer that question in your head. Write it down. And notice how it feels to let it land.

That feeling is information. It’s your Genius, signaling.

Want reflections like this in your inbox every week? Subscribe here 

 

---

If this resonates and you want to go deeper, I wrote an entire book about the journey from autopilot to authentic leadership: The Pinocchio Principle: Becoming a Real Leader

 

Why Strategic Thinking Isn’t Enough (and What to Do Instead)

 

Many executives understand the importance of being more strategic. Far fewer know how to actually practice it in the middle of real work.

Because strategy isn’t just a way of thinking. It’s a way of operating.

And if you don’t intentionally change how you operate, you’ll default right back into the pull of the urgent, the familiar, and the predefined.

Here’s what I see consistently in organizations:

Plans are created.
Best practices are adopted.
Processes are followed.

And then execution becomes the priority – often at the expense of questioning whether the plan still makes sense.

But in a shifting environment, a plan is only as good as your willingness to reevaluate it.

If the route you’re taking isn’t aligned with your desired destination, moving faster won’t help.

And relying on your plan to tell you where to go next won’t either.

Strategic leadership requires something different – something more intentional.

Here are five ways to start putting it into practice:

1. Make space to think (and protect it).

If you don’t create time to reflect, integrate, and assess, it simply won’t happen. Even a small, consistent block of time can help you recalibrate and ensure your actions align with your priorities.

2. Focus as much on the questions as the answers.

Instead of jumping to solutions, ask

• • • “Are we solving the right problem?”
    • “What might we be missing?”
    • “Is this a symptom of something deeper?”Better questions lead to better strategy

3. Connect the top and the front line.

Insight doesn’t live at the top or the bottom. It emerges when both perspectives come together. Create space for real dialogue around what’s actually happening on the ground.

4. Invite (and use) dissent.

When people feel safe challenging the current direction, blind spots shrink. When they don’t, risk multiplies – quietly.

5. Use discernment, not just information.

Not every best practice is best for you. Before implementing ideas, ask “Does this actually fit our context, or are we borrowing  someone else’s solution?”

At the end of the day, strategy isn’t about having the right answers.

It’s about staying connected to what’s actually happening, being willing to adjust course,
and creating the conditions for better thinking to emerge.

That’s what allows leaders to move from executing plans… to shaping the future.

 

How To Become a More Strategic Leader

 

 

One of the major challenges executives struggle to overcome is sacrificing the strategic for the operational. If you are falling into this trap, understanding and working through your resistance is the first step to freedom.

Operational is clean. It has defined edges and finite solutions. You can check the boxes and feel a sense of closure and control with an operational approach.

Strategic on the other hand is often messy. It involves stepping into uncertainty. There is usually no one right answer. It pushes you out of your comfort zone. And it requires that you slow down instead of speeding up, something that flies in the face of what we’ve been conditioned to do.

To avoid this discomfort, many executives prefer being busy to being strategic. It provides the illusion of being productive and a burst of adrenaline that is a nice (yet ultimately unsatisfying and addictive) placebo for real progress.

But busyness isn’t going to help you hit the target necessary to advance your business. Because until you slow down long enough to assess your environment and allow your intuitive mind to partner with your rational mind, you may not even realize what your true target is, let alone how to get there.

Malcolm Gladwell echoed the wisdom of Albert Einstein his iconic book Blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinking. He wrote, “The key to good decision making is not knowledge. It is understanding. We are swimming in the former. We are desperately lacking in the latter.”

Knowledge is the product of absorbing information. Understanding is the product of insight. And insight comes from the integration of information with experience, from slowing down long enough to practice reflection and discernment. That’s an important key to successfully navigating the changing landscape of “business as usual”.

We live in an age of information. You can find an abundance of resources – articles, books, dissertations, webinars, workshops, best practices, etc. on any given topic. This information tends to be descriptive of what worked in the past to address challenges faced by people and organizations whose situations are rarely identical to our emerging challenges and opportunities.

Acting on information without discernment is like taking someone else’s prescription given for a diagnosis that you aren’t entirely certain matches your own.

Yet all too often we move full speed ahead with seeming solutions that don’t really address the underlying problems (and could make the problem worse). Ask yourself how many times you’ve overlooked or disregarded inklings that told you something is just not right.

To keep this pattern from hijacking your effectiveness, recognize and honor the importance of slowing down when you feel compelled to speed up. Take some time to check in with yourself and reflect on the changing nature of your environment. When you zoom out to see more of the big picture with an inquiry into what’s most important, you will likely recognize things you would have otherwise missed – and receive the insight necessary to know what needs to happen next.

To strategically blaze a trail into the future you must be willing to break away from the constraints of your past (including those you have unwittingly placed on yourself).

How to Get Yourself Out of a Funk – and Strengthen Your Leadership in the Process

 

We’ve all had one of those days where you wake up and just aren’t feeling it. Sometimes it’s harder to find your groove than others. This week’s video will give you three simple steps for moving through a funk with ease and grace – and in a way that will strengthen your leadership in the process.

Begin Again – How New Starts Supercharge Your Performance, Relationships, and Results

 

What if we leveraged the wisdom of “begin again” to the things we do every day? The projects we work so feverishly on? The relationships we nurture? The visions we create? The ideas we cling to long after we’ve realized they’ve outlived their relevance?

Nature shows us there is much to be gained by releasing what has come before to make way for what has yet to emerge. Each season gives way to the next. The brightness of each day is punctuated by darkness of the night, which in turn is dispelled by the light of the morning sun. We have periods of wakefulness followed by periods of sleep.

Each day is an invitation to begin again.

“Begin again” means knowing when it’s time to stop and put something down. Or to create a pattern interrupt – perhaps a point to assess our progress, to push pause, and go do something else for a while.

And then we return with new eyes that see from a wider perspective, and a refreshed mind that has been opened to a wider aperture. We find that we can see things differently as a result of seeing different things.

“Begin again” is about giving yourself credit for showing up and taking a stab at something. It’s refusing to satisfy the perfectionist’s mandate to have everything figured out and perfectly planned and executed and instead to just start moving in a direction (any direction), and see what happens.

Momentum is created and you begin to move. And if you realize you aren’t moving in the right direction, you can use that energy to simply turn and go a different way. “Begin again” is about picking up where you’ve left off with revitalized energy and a renewed focus – one that can take in things you previously screened out or just didn’t originally consider.

“Begin again” means giving yourself another chance, investing in what you could create. It means doing things for the experience itself and learning something in the process. It means approaching something knowing that the outcome you originally envisioned may not be the destination at all – it may just be the thing that got you in the car and willing to start something – anything.

“Begin again” is taking the lump of clay and seeing what it wants to become – giving it form and not getting too attached to what it’s supposed to look like. Realizing that at any point, you can mold it into something new.

“Begin again” is freedom from the tyranny we create when we lock ourselves into a process or a goal or a pursuit that just doesn’t seem to be working or moving forward.

Sometimes the obstacles we face – the hurdles that continue appearing, the walls we keep slamming into, the unforeseen events that interrupt our progress are there for a purpose. They are invitations to stop, do something else, allow insight and wisdom to land, give us new direction, new ideas, new energy – and to simply begin again.

How to Have Greater Influence in Meetings: 3 Tips for Speaking up and Being Heard

 

We’ve all been in meetings where you have something to say, but you’re just not sure how to go about it. You may open your mouth and wonder later whether you could have said it better. Or you may not say anything at all and then kick yourself for not speaking up.

Either way, you might wonder what it is, exactly, that gets people to really listen to you – and how to frame your thoughts in a way that opens the door to having true influence?

That’s what this week’s video is all about.

You do have something to say, and with the right approach you can say it in ways that people will not only hear, but understand and feel compelled to act on.

For more, check out The Real Leader Academy, where among other valuable resources, you can gain ongoing access to the Just In Time Coaching Library – a growing collection of tips, tools and approaches to help you deal with some of the most common challenges and opportunities executives face.

I couldn’t find what I needed, so I created it

 

It was summer of 2004. I had 3 kids under the age of 7. I was working full time. And I was under the illusion that I could be all things to all people. It was a “success formula” that had helped me get ahead for the majority of my life, and I had doubled down on it again and again.

But it wasn’t working anymore.

I was the lead on several prime projects – stuff I’d always dreamed of working on. I’d been given a promotion to do high profile work. I was blessed with a happy marriage and beautiful, healthy children who I love more than anything in the world. By all appearances I was successfully juggling a multitude of balls in the air and seemed to have it fairly well handled.

What most people could not see is that I was struggling… working harder than ever but not really getting anywhere.

I was exhausted. My mind felt dull. Everything took longer. Decisions were harder. And the work I once loved began to feel like a giant burden that was sucking the life out of me.

I didn’t know what to do about it.

As a lifelong learner, I sought solutions that would help me out of my funk. The traditional leadership development resources not only failed to deliver but made me feel worse. I became even more compelled to keep digging the hole that I feared would completely swallow me up.

It’s been said that sometimes you need to create what you most want to be a part of.

I didn’t realize what I was experiencing back then was the precursor of what my life’s work would ultimately have me doing. I had to find guidance in less obvious places and learn to mine my experiences for the insights that would ultimately become keys to my freedom.

And since that time, I’ve had the distinct honor and privilege of working with multitudes of high-achieving executives who are having (or are on the verge of) soul sucking experiences just like mine – and those who want to proactively keep that from happening altogether.

Reflecting on what I’ve seen in my own life and those of the people I’ve been blessed to work with over the years has led me to a realization that becomes stronger each and every day…

The time has come for us to find and institute a better way of living, working, and leading.

That truth has guided me in developing my most recent offering, The Real Leader Academy. I filmed a 6-minute video about it that you can check out below. Be sure to watch the last half as that is where you’ll get all the details and a peek inside the Academy.

It is possible to do great work, enjoy your life both on and off the job, and lead in ways that inspire others to rise to new levels along with you.

Here’s to your success!

Diane

P.S. For more details on the Academy, go to www.RealLeaderAcademy.com.

Life is meant for more than checking boxes…

 

Can you remember the last time you were so excited about something that you could feel the hair on your arms or the back of your neck stand up? Or the giddiness of a five-year-old at the prospect of visiting an amusement park?

Maybe it got you out of bed in the morning or put a little spring in your step.

When the promise of a future state brings a smile to your face or makes your heart beat a little faster, lean in. Give yourself to the dream – and the dream will give itself to you, taking on a life of its own in ways that will surprise and delight you.

Author, philosopher, and civil rights activist Howard Thurman once said, “Don’t ask what the world needs. Ask what makes you come alive and go do it. Because what the world needs is people who have come alive.”

I couldn’t agree more.

Over the last couple years, I’ve been working on a passion project of my own – a career’s worth of seemingly disjointed but synchronistically connected experiences that have come together in delightful ways. You can check it out here.

What is calling to you right now? And how can you make the space necessary for it to reveal itself to you in all its grandeur?

Here’s to pouring some life into your passion projects!

 

Why SMART Goals are Often Dumb

 

Goals are something we are encouraged to stick to. But sometimes the goals we set for ourselves no longer match the direction we find ourselves wanting to go.

Early in my career I (like many driven professionals) was prone to setting SMART goals. You know, “Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Relevant and Timebound”. It’s the conventional teaching we have all heard before.

But after time I came to realize that this approach leaves much to be desired – that in fact, it can actually keep us from getting where we most want to go.

When a goal no longer serves you and you stop wanting to pursue it, you may feel as though you’ve failed. However, the real failure might well be what happens when you stick to a goal that is no longer a fit with what you want, who you are, and the person you are becoming.

Getting where you want to go requires that you have an intense desire to get there. The pleasure and satisfaction of your destination — and your journey — needs to be greater than the pain and discomfort you will endure to get there.

What might start out as a very compelling goal may lose its appeal when your priorities change, and your very preferences and passions begin to change and evolve as well. Sometimes goals that were relevant and appropriate at one point in time will no longer serve you at another.

People grow and evolve at a pace that may not be aligned with the time frames identified in a SMART goal. When you lock yourself into achieving a particular goal, it can become a blinder that keeps you from recognizing and acting on a course of action that is far more aligned with who you really are and want to be.

If you are someone who regularly sets goals, take a moment to determine whether your current goals are working for you. Do they reflect what you really want? …how you are evolving as a person? Do they inspire you — or constrain you?

And whether you have set goals or not, consider the essence of what you most want to achieve, create, or become. Perhaps it is not yet concrete, but rather an inkling of something that is calling to you.

There is wisdom in your desire, even if you cannot yet quantify it, break it down in tangible ways, or even articulate it. In fact, sheer inklings and aspirations can become powerful seeds for the most innovative and ground-breaking accomplishments.

If you’d like more on how to gain the clarity necessary to envision and chart a path to your desired future, download my special report, “Why Real Leaders Don’t Set Goals (and what they do instead)”.