I wrapped up recently with someone I have been working with for about a year now.
As senior and as accomplished a professional as you can get in his field, and still with a lot of runway left.
Yet he felt something was missing. He wasn’t inspired by his approach or his impact, he didn’t feel anyone else was either.
He lacked a sense of connection, to himself and to others. He felt he was too transactional in work and in some of his closest relationships. He wanted to change.
“How do I find what’s missing?” he asked me.
Not a bad question for someone at that level to be asking.
What struck me throughout our work together was his honesty. Genuine openness to change. Real intent. Real commitment.
And yet.
Behaviour is stubborn. What seems straightforward to change becomes incredibly sticky once we start.
Even when you want to change, even when you mean it, old patterns have a way of reasserting themselves.
- A difficult moment at work.
- A restructure.
- A period of grief or loss.
And suddenly you are back where you started. Transactional. Head down.
Pouring yourself into execution because that is what you know, and what you know feels safe.
Changing your own behaviour is hard enough.
Letting other people’s perception of you shift is something else entirely. They remember who you were.
And it takes time, and patience, and consistency, before they start to see who you are becoming.
He asked how my father was getting on. I had moved one of our sessions because Dad hadn’t been well for a stretch.
That conversation led me to the fridge.
My parents’ kitchen has a built-in cabinet around their fridge freezer. The fridge has been on its last legs for the better part of a year.
My sister, phoning in from Sydney with characteristic efficiency, sent a very clear set of instructions.
The cabinet is built around the fridge. They don’t make fridges that size anymore.
Step one: get the carpenter in. Make room. Then get the new fridge. Then build the rest of the cabinet around it once it’s in.
Dad, who I say this about with pure affection and zero judgment because I am exactly the same, is not a practical man. Never has been. DIY is not in his repertoire, nor mine. He approached things in a different order.
Mum and dad now have a fridge sticking out into the kitchen, waiting for someone to come along and sort it out properly.
We are all wired differently. We all have things that come naturally and things that quietly drain us. Dad’s gifts are many. Getting a fridge to fit inside a cabinet was never going to be one of them. Same goes for me.
And maybe that is the point.
Change, real change, often requires making room first.
Clearing something out before you expect the new thing to fit. That applies to kitchens. And it applies to how we lead, how we show up, and who we are becoming.
You can’t always force the fit. Sometimes you need the carpenter first.