Leaders own their magnetic personality
When I started my business, I was terrified. The first time I walked into a large networking space filled with people eating and talking, I gripped stacks of freshly printed business cards, hoping someone familiar would approach me.
For the first time, I’m representing me, my business. Not a university, nonprofit, or corporation, but me. This awareness paralyzed my inner being.
I thought: will anyone be interested in learning more about what I have to say? Will I land new clients?
Will I be liked?
All these crazy questions whirling around in my head affected how I showed up in the space. Instead of the fun, passionate, connected, and confident leader who’s open to new experiences, I suddenly found myself feeling pessimistic and anxious, lacking self-trust rather than being in my being: my magnetic self.
Why or how did I allow this behavior happen?
Why wasn’t I just being me?
You get to choose what you want the communication to be.
How freeing is it to be yourself?
First, prior to communicating and entering the space, I asked the wrong internal questions, which altered my state of mind and personality.
Instead of being interested, I was trying to be interesting.
Instead of going with the intention to connect with others, I was concerned about gaining clients and growing my business.
Instead of being me and trusting myself, I was altering into an insecure people-pleasing mode, trying too hard and feeling heavy energy, a burden rather than joy.
Similarly, I remember one of my clients mentioning the disconnection to herself every time she introduced her name and business at any networking event. After coaching her for three months, a fellow colleague noticed something had changed her introduction. My client’s words and overall presence felt more confident and her personality traits of being thoughtful and trusting shined through.
To be magnetic, it requires balancing the connection we have with ourselves and our personality traits, the ones we’re born with, to the given circumstance.
The core questions become the following:
How does this transformation/evolution happen?
What powers up this change, so we can present ourselves in our most magnetic way, making it noticeably more impactful than before?
Instead of embracing what isn’t; it’s embracing what is…knowing and understanding our predisposition to certain innate behaviors, ways of being, and communication styles and preferences can help us capitalize on our current strengths rather than weaknesses.
It’s like Amy Cuddy said, “Sometimes you have to get out of the way of yourself to be yourself.”
In my book, Discovering Our Magnetic Speaker Within, I’m sharing stories and strategies to discover our own authentic style, that it starts from within.
How do you stay anchored in your way of being when you speak?
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