“People become what they want to become.“ Liberian proverb
Leaders, as all human beings, go through a process of human conditioning. We become the product of our own development, shaped by our families, societies, culture and experience, by the feedback from the world around us about what we should do and by our experience of what works. Our behaviours are guided by the consequence of previous actions. This self- adapted learning process results in the formation of habits.
“Over time, emerging patterns of behavior become embedded as habits; we can think of our particular accumulation of habits as the basis of a unique personality. Habits are part of who we are in the world, and the nature of a habit is that we no longer have to think about them. … They are defaults, learned over years, that shape how we interact with others and respond to what life offers. Without a conscious decision to do something else, we nearly always act consistently with these habits.“ (Silsbee, 2008, P.40)
Habits are based on behaviours we have developed to get what we want. To justify our habits we develop emotions and interpretations of the world which produce our story of the world. Ultimately, this process leads to the formation of our identity. We tend to set up situations and circumstances in our lives to reinforce this identity, making us feel competent and accepted in the world. In this way we self- perpetuate our identity and thus our behaviours. At the same time the habits often start to limit our effectiveness and get in the way of our growth. (Silsbee, 2008, P.43/44)
Habits range from simple routines such as brushing our teeth in a particular way to leadership habits such as: communicating things with unnecessary detail; continuously engaging in finding solutions for others; avoiding confrontations; and setting unrealistic targets for us and others.
Self – awareness is the first step towards change. Once we are aware of what we are doing, we have options. Often, self- awareness about something we tend to do repeatedly is sufficient to take action to change it. Sometimes, we may be are aware of it but we may not be sufficiently aware to do something about it. Awareness comes in different forms. It may build up gradually over time or it may hit us from one moment to the other, providing an ‘a-ha’ moment. Awareness includes awareness of sensations, feelings, actions, wants, beliefs and habits.
As I mentioned on a few occasions, I used to have a protracted habit of perseverance. In a way this was a good thing but I tended to go to all lengths in persevering to reach an objective or rescue a situation even when there was clearly no hope left in it. The growth for me was to let go of something at the right moment. A friend of mine had a habit of asking for affirmation after he had done something. Every time he did this, he took away the grace from what he did!
So how do we heighten our self-awareness? There are many ways of doing this. Getting feedback from others is important, since they can hold up a mirror to us. There are also many self-observation exercises that one can practice. Once we observe ourselves in action, we can distance ourselves from the habit, become more mindful and ultimately make more conscious choices about our behaviour.
References: Silsbee, D., (2008). Presence-Based Coaching, San Francisco: CA: Jossey-Bass