Follow Your Inner Spark - Don’t Let Doubt Put It Out

What if your next opportunity isn't a fully developed strategy, instead it's just a spark, an idea, a curiosity, or maybe a little nudge that just keeps showing up, but you keep shutting it down or squelching it out? I wonder what might happen if you allow it to flicker just a little longer. I think a lot of good can come from that. Stay tuned.

Welcome to CEO on the Go, the show about personal and professional growth for busy leaders like you. I'm Gail Lance, and I'm here to help you think differently, solve big problems, and inspire change. It's tough to do on your own and even with a team, but it is possible. So let's get started.

Welcome back to CEO on the go. This is the Independence Day holiday episode airing in early July. And I hope that you listened to the last episode on mid-year reflections. I included a downloadable resource that you can find at workmatters.

com forward slash rebuild. It's called the Mid-Year Rebuild, and it's designed to help you think about what you might need to rebuild, reconstruct, or reinvent as you look at the second half of the year. It was inspired by all the rebuilding that I've had to do personally over the past year. And I hope that you've got exciting plans for the July 4th holiday.

The holiday itself is about freedom and possibility and beginnings and, of course, fireworks. So I'm thinking about sparks. And I know I did another episode a couple of years back called Watching Sparks Fly about this time of year. It was all about sparking something new.

And this episode isn't really about starting something new or making any kind of big leap. It's about trusting and following the smaller signals that show up in our lives. So think about the sparks that may have been quietly flickering inside you that are ready to be explored. I know I have a few of my own.

And if you're familiar with Marie Kondo's work, you know that she likes to ask the question, does it spark joy? You know, when you're trying to clean out your closet and decide what you want to keep, that kind of thing. But maybe the better leadership question is, what is this spark inviting me to explore? And I think it's interesting to see that a spark is often irrational at first.

You know, a lot of the ideas don't come with a business plan all mapped out. They just show up as thoughts like, oh, I wonder if or what if I tried that or I keep thinking about or I'm just drawn to fill in the blank. Or sometimes they come from other people. Someone else might suggest an idea and they'll say things like, oh, you should meet so and so.

Or have you ever thought about doing this kind of service or this kind of project? The logical mind immediately says oh that unrealistic or that not possible or all these excuses could be you know oh you too old you too young you don know enough, what if it fails, those kinds of thoughts. But a lot of the best things in our lives really start as just a fleeting thought that made little sense initially. That was kind of, you know, I talked about it a lot, but how this podcast started years ago didn't make sense initially, but I jumped in anyway.

You know, another example in business might be the leader that says, what if I stop having status meetings and I'll let my team run the meetings that they need to? Initially, it feels risky or irrational. But I encourage you to kind of pay attention to those thoughts that are running through your mind that you might want to pay a little bit more attention to. And like I said, following the spark doesn't mean that you have to make a huge leap.

leap. You don't have to quit whatever you're doing and do something that's radically different. It just simply means a small action like researching an idea or having one conversation or making an introduction, taking a class, sketching out your idea, maybe testing it out on a really small scale that's not too risky. So it's an invitation, not a command or a directive.

And I think it's important that you can create your own sparks too, because sometimes they seem to come out of nowhere. But sometimes I think you can create them deliberately. And I'll explain what I mean by that. Because I like to think of spark as a verb, as a way to override something that's negative, to bring a little light, so to speak, to something that could be a darker situation, which could be any kind of problem that's consuming you.

And I know there may be many problems to choose from. But instead of thinking about, you know, what is this problem that's consuming me? I invite you to consider the question, what do I want to spark instead? It's kind of a creative and effective leadership reframe to be thinking about that question.

What do I want to spark instead? Maybe you're dealing with a toxic employee. I know a number of you listening are. You might have an employee who's constantly negative or complaining, and you might start dreading interactions with that person or venting to other people or just spending excessive mental energy trying to fix the situation.

Whereas if you paused and asked, what am I really trying to spark here? It can shift your thinking to something that might be in the area of I want to build more accountability or more ownership or more optimism or better communication or more constructive communication. So instead of, you know, thinking about the problem, you're focused more on solutions. And if something isn't working, you can challenge people to come up with one or two possible approaches.

The employee may not make immediate changes, but you've shifted from fighting against negativity to creating conditions for more solution thinking So if you ruminating over a tough decision maybe that involved someone else in your organization try asking that question What am I really trying to spark here It just a different way of thinking about things and I think more effective in so many ways. Maybe you've got team conflict going on. Two team members aren't getting along. So you're consumed with that and trying to figure out who is right.

What do I need to do? Again, your question, what am I trying to spark? Maybe it's better understanding or respect or collaboration. So instead of trying to figure out the argument, you're in a position where you're saying something like, I want to better understand each other because we need to work together well.

What might help us work together more effectively? So the conflict may still exist, but now you as the leader are building something instead of just trying to manage a problem. Or another example might be that your team seems burned out. So you keep focusing on how disengaged they are or morale and how bad that is.

What do you want to spark instead? Maybe it's more energy or connection or appreciation or hope. So there are things that you might do as a result of coming from that place, maybe recognizing wins, sharing positive experiences that people on your team have been having, creating more opportunities to help each other, asking people what they're looking forward to. Those are just some examples.

So again, the problems don't just magically disappear, but the team starts experiencing a different kind of emotional climate. that can set the stage for positive change. So I know that you're often in firefighting mode, we spend so much time staring at what's burning, and we forget that the real job is to create sparks, positive sparks. So if you're consumed by a difficult person or a situation, keep going back to that question about what you're really trying to spark, because what you focus on tends to grow, and sometimes the fastest way through a problem isn't to just stare harder at it and work harder at the problem, it's to be more deliberate about what you're trying to ignite instead.

You know, fireworks are spectacular because they create a lot of light in the darkness. And that's what you can do too, especially when circumstances are tempting you to focus only on what's going wrong. And keep in mind, you don't have to know where it leads. Human beings, leaders included, want certainty before they move.

But sparks rarely provide certainty. They're just energy. So the spark doesn't illuminate the whole path for you. It just gives you enough light to see the next step.

So I encourage you to follow that spark unless or until it doesn't make sense to do that anymore. You're just following the energy. Some sparks won't become anything. And that's okay, too, because the exploration itself has value.

Even if the idea doesn't become a positive change for the team or a new business or major life change, it may lead to a new connection or a relationship, or it might teach you something or give you a new insight that can be really helpful. or reveal another opportunity that you haven even noticed before or just reconnect you with a neglected part of yourself So the first spark isn the destination it just the match that lights something else. So I hope that this has been just a short, encouraging episode for you, and it might be worth sharing with someone else you know who has a spark that they've been squelching, or someone who's not feeling particularly motivated right now.

You know, I want to acknowledge that there are some people who feel no spark right now. Many leaders are exhausted. They are uninspired or they're depleted. And I know that that could even be you.

So don't try to force a spark. Just create conditions for one. Get some rest, change your environment, read or watch something different, talk to interesting people, know that you can work through this at your own pace. So you shouldn't feel pressure to spark anything.

Sometimes your job is simply just to stay open enough to notice when a spark appears. So just to recap some key points for today, notice the spark by paying attention to ideas and curiosities and recurring thoughts especially. Protect the spark by not extinguishing it immediately with your fear or doubt or the practicality that often gets in the way. And then follow the spark again to the extent that it makes sense to do that, taking one small action and just being open to seeing where that leads.

So as we celebrate the 4th of July and watch fireworks light up the sky, I think the most important spark isn't the one in the sky. It's actually the one within us. If something keeps nudging you or calling to you or energizing you, don't dismiss it too quickly. Follow it, explore it.

Don't push it away until next year, which is so easy to do. Trust it enough to just see what happens. You never know what one tiny spark might ignite. I hope it will be something awesome for you as you do the work that matters to you.

Thanks for tuning in. And as always, be sure to share this episode with someone else who might benefit or leave a review. You can join my email list by going to workmatters.com so you don't miss an episode.

And there you can learn more about ways we serve mission-driven leaders like you. If there's a challenge you want to discuss, I'd love to hear from you. In the meantime, keep growing as a leader, inspiring change, and doing the work that matters to you. Thank you.