Self Leadership: The Hardest Person You’ll Ever Lead Is Yourself

At times I have been praised for leadership, and at other times I have felt the crushing weight of it. But nothing I have ever done has compared to the work of leading myself.

Leading myself has been the most relentless and revealing leadership journey I’ve ever been on.

It isn’t about goals or KPIs or performance reviews. It is about facing my own patterns, the ones that quietly run the show when I am too tired or too afraid to be intentional. It is about noticing when I default to overcompensating, when I hide behind busyness, or when I let fear set the pace for my decisions.

For me, the real work has been asking questions I would rather avoid:

• Am I living in alignment with what I say I value?

• Do my daily actions reflect the life I claim to want?

• Where am I leading from congruence, and where am I leading from survival?

  
  

Self leadership is not about sheer discipline. It is about being congruent. By that I mean living in a way where my choices, my words, and my actions are in alignment with what I know matters most to me. It is the daily practice of matching the life I build with the truth I claim.

Decision making becomes the crucible for this work. Every choice, large or small, reveals whether I am acting from the parts of me that seek comfort, avoidance, or approval, or from the grounded self that knows what truly belongs. Internal Family Systems has shown me that the voices within are not adversaries but signals. The angry one, the cautious one, the perfectionist — each has something to say. Congruence is not about silencing them. It is about listening, discerning, and then choosing in a way that honors the whole rather than letting one part drive the entire course.

The paradox is this: when I do the hard work of leading myself, I have more capacity to lead others. When I face my own anger, grief, and fear with honesty, I stop projecting it onto those I serve. And when I take responsibility for my own patterns, I can finally offer the kind of leadership that creates trust, belonging, and hope.

This is where decision making comes full circle. If I can pause long enough to notice which part of me is pulling on the wheel and ask whether the choice in front of me reflects what I know matters most, then congruence becomes possible. And when I practice that kind of self leadership, I am no longer led by fear or habit — I am led by presence.

The hardest person you will ever lead is yourself. And that is exactly where leadership must begin.