Episode 9: Certainty

The idea for this episode was inspired by the West-Central Forage Association's Leveling Up Leadership Workshop in January 2022. If you have the time check out the replay on YouTube.

Hello my friends, thanks for joining me today. I recently attended a workshop called up leveling leadership that was hosted by the west central forage association and at the end they had a question-and-answer period and one of the questions that was posed to the panned of speakers was If you could give a piece of advice to male leaders what you would say…and be honest.

One of the speakers – Wendy Schneider from Unstoppable Conversations gave an unexpected and quite interesting answer.

She said “Not be so certain.”

Now this struck a cord with me because I recall once being coached on a situation where I was certain. And to be honest I cannot recall all the details of the situation but I do remember the coach pointing out to me that I was feeling certain in the situation and the result of that certainty was not serving me at all.

Certain I had the correct answer to the situation.

Certain that I knew what needed to be done.

Certain that others just needed to agree with what I was saying and we all needed to go to work.

That certainty was completely limiting my ability to see the situation in any other way.

That certainty was limiting me from listening to any other suggestions.

That certainty was creating disconnection and contention with others in the situation.

Certainty is an incredibly interesting emotion.

It feels so strong.

It feels so complete.

It makes sense that we love the feeling of certainty.

And our brains hate change because it’s work for them. Its new neural pathway construction for them. And they love to be right so certainty always makes them right.

But what in our lives is actually certain? So very little.

Things we thought would never change sometimes change in an instant.

So if we go back to the speaker's comment where she said that for men to help women in agriculture they need to not be so certain.

It's because certainty turns us into a bull in a china shop.

We have our own agenda and we don’t care who we run over in the process.

It's so similar to my coaching call.

When we approach situations with certainty, we are blocked from seeing the situation any other way.

For women or minority groups or others to advance in industries that they typically have not before – we need others in the industry to not be so certain.

Not be so certain that you are viewing yourself correctly -ie the old boys club, that others experience of you is what you think it is (you think you are listening but what others do not experience you that way, you think you are including others but they are not experiencing it, appreciation – you think you are expressing appreciation and acknowledging others but that is not their experience of you.

Not be so certain that things have to be done a particular way.

Not to be so certain that stature equals ability.

Not to be so certain that something is impossible.

Not to be so certain that there is only one way to do something.

Not to be so certain that they have thought of all the problems or issues.

Not to be so certain that they are not open to new or different ideas.

I do believe that Certainty has its place in our lives as does every emotion. But certainty is one of those emotions that we need to check in on every once and a while just to be sure it’s not running the show.

Certainty can bring conviction and motivation that is unmatched by many other emotions. We can bring certainty to our belief in ourselves and our abilities. Certainty that we can figure out any situation and have it be a benefit to us. But we need to watch that we are not using it as a security blanket to prevent change and to keep things as they have always been.

So, the only way to check is to see what certainty is creating for us?

Is it creating connection?

Is it creating productivity?

Is it creating inclusion?

Is it creating openness and expansion?

Is it creating disagreements?

Is it creating distrust?

If we see that certainty isn’t creating the things we want, what do we do?

Find an emotion which we can replace it with that allows for more inclusion on our teams in our industry.

My favorite is curiosity.

Curiosity listens.

Curiosity questions

Curiosity is open.

Curiosity dreams.

Curiosity allows for mistakes. Curiosity doesn’t live in I told you so when something goes wrong. Curiosity grows and learns from mistakes.

Curiosity leaves a seat at the table for everyone.

Where can you leave a little bit of your certainty behind and cultivate a bit more curiosity in your life?

It will be fun.

Have a wonderful week.