How do you show up as a leader when the old playbook no longer works?
That was the heart of my latest conversation on Impactful Teamwork with transformational coach Sheila Belanger, and honestly, it felt like opening a door many leaders know is there, but have not yet had the courage to walk through.
Because let’s be honest.
So much of the way we have been taught to lead is no longer fit for purpose. The pressure, the pace, the noise, the endless strategic thinking, the over-reliance on logic, all of it can leave leaders disconnected from the very wisdom that would help them lead more clearly.
In this episode, Sheila and I explored what it really means to resource yourself as a leader, especially when you are navigating uncertainty, change, reinvention, or the messy in-between space where the old way has stopped working but the new way is not yet fully formed.
And that matters because leadership does not start with your team.
It starts with you.
That idea sits at the centre of everything I believe about leadership too, that leadership is an inside-out job, that business is an ecosystem, and that the way we lead has to move from control and siloed effort towards connection, collaboration and shared responsibility.
We do not need more strategy alone, we need deeper self-leadership
One of the most powerful ideas Sheila shared was this, leaders need to activate ways of knowing that sit underneath the strategic mind.
Not instead of strategy.
Alongside it.
She spoke about three powerful sources of intelligence that many leaders have been conditioned to ignore:
- heart wisdom
- gut instinct
- imagination
That landed deeply with me.
Because for years in business, leaders have been rewarded for being rational, polished and in control. But being hyper-strategic while being disconnected from your body, your intuition and your emotional truth is not wise leadership. It is often just sophisticated self-abandonment.
And the cost of that is high.
You lose presence.
You lose discernment.
You lose your ability to sense what is really happening in the room.
In my own work with horses, this is exactly what gets revealed. Horses respond to what is true, not what is polished. They do not care about job title, authority or performance. They respond to congruence, presence and clarity. If you are scattered, guarded or disconnected, they know. If you are grounded and authentic, they know that too.
Before you lead others, get back into your body
One of the simplest but most important practical takeaways from this conversation was this, before you can access your deeper knowing, you need to get back into your body.
Sounds obvious.
Yet most leaders live from the neck up.
They rush from meeting to meeting, react to emails, carry stress in their nervous system, and call it productivity. Meanwhile, their body is waving red flags they are too busy to notice.
Sheila’s invitation was beautifully simple:
Pause.
Breathe.
Feel your feet on the ground.
Notice your body.
Connect with the earth.
This is not fluffy. This is foundational.
Because when you are back in your body, you are no longer leading from panic, performance or pressure alone. You are leading from presence.
And presence changes everything.
It changes the quality of your decisions.
It changes how safe other people feel around you.
It changes whether your team experiences you as reactive or resourced.
This is also why I believe so strongly in experiential work. Real leadership growth does not happen just because you heard an idea in a webinar. It happens when you embody it, experience it, and feel the shift in real time. That is where deeper learning lives.
Your inner team matters just as much as your external one
This was another mic-drop moment from the episode.
Sheila talked about the importance of stewarding your inner team.
In other words, noticing which part of you is leading right now.
Is it your grounded, wise, steady self?
Or is it your wounded inner child, your triggered rebel, your exhausted over-functioner, your fear-based controller?
So many leadership challenges are not just outer team problems.
They are inner leadership problems.
You can build the most talented senior team in the world, but if the part of you holding the keys is the scared, overstretched, hyper-vigilant version of you, then you will still create drama, confusion or drag.
This is why self-awareness is not a luxury for leaders. It is a responsibility.
When we ignore our inner ecosystem, we hand the wheel to parts of ourselves that were never meant to lead the whole show.
And that is where burnout, poor decisions, over-control and unnecessary conflict begin.
Leadership on the edge requires resourcing, not more force
Sheila described her work as helping people navigate the edge.
I loved that phrase.
Because so many leaders are on the edge right now.
The edge of reinvention.
The edge of identity change.
The edge of growth.
The edge of no longer being willing to run their business, team or life in the old way.
That edge can feel destabilising. You know something is over, but you do not yet know what the new form is.
And this is where most people retreat.
They go back to what is familiar.
Back to overwork.
Back to control.
Back to the version of leadership that looks acceptable from the outside but quietly drains the life out of everyone involved.
But the answer is not to force your way through the unknown.
The answer is to resource yourself enough to stay with it.
To breathe.
To listen.
To regulate.
To stay open.
To let the wiser part of you lead.
That is where real reinvention begins.
And frankly, it is one of the reasons I have long believed that the future of leadership has to become more nature-led. Nature does not force everything into a straight line. It works in cycles, rhythms, adaptation and intelligent response. Business needs more of that too.
Trust starts with how you show up
Another beautiful thread through this conversation was trust.
Not trust as a slogan.
Trust as an energetic reality.
In horse herds, trust is what keeps the herd safe. It is built through presence, consistency and clear signals. Human teams are not so different. Trust grows when leaders are authentic, calm, congruent and emotionally present.
If you say one thing and your energy says another, people feel it.
If you ask your team to be brave, but you punish honesty, they feel it.
If you want initiative, but micromanage everything, they feel it.
This is why the way you show up matters so much.
Leadership is not just what you say.
It is what people experience in your presence.
The real invitation from this episode
This conversation was not really about ancient wisdom, energetics or elements in isolation.
It was about remembering.
Remembering that you are not a machine.
Remembering that leadership is relational.
Remembering that your body carries intelligence.
Remembering that your team do not just need your intellect, they need your grounded presence.
Remembering that self-care is not indulgent when other people rely on your steadiness.
And remembering that in a world obsessed with speed, the most powerful thing a leader can sometimes do is pause long enough to hear what is true.
Key takeaways from this episode
1. Leadership starts with self-leadership
If you cannot regulate, resource and lead yourself, you will struggle to lead others well.
2. Strategy is not enough
Great leadership also requires emotional intelligence, body awareness, instinct and imagination.
3. Your body is giving you data all the time
Breath, tension, fatigue and nervous system signals all matter. Ignore them and your leadership suffers.
4. Your inner team shapes your outer impact
Notice which part of you is driving the car before you make important decisions.
5. Trust is built energetically, not just verbally
People feel your congruence, your steadiness and your authenticity before they believe your words.
6. Reinvention requires resourcing
When you are on the edge of change, forcing harder is rarely the answer. Supporting yourself better usually is.
Your next step
So here is my invitation to you.
Pause for a moment and ask yourself:
Who is driving the car right now?
Is it the part of you that is grounded, wise and connected?
Or is it the tired, reactive, over-functioning version that has been holding too much for too long?
This week, choose one small act of self-resourcing before your next important conversation or meeting.
Breathe.
Step outside.
Feel your feet on the ground.
Put your hand on your heart.
Look out of the window.
Slow down long enough to come back to yourself.
Because the future of leadership will not be built by people who can just do more.
It will be built by leaders who know how to come home to themselves, trust what they sense, and lead in a way that creates more steadiness, more truth and more life in the system.
And that is a model of leadership I am very happy to stand for.
If this conversation has stirred something in you, listen to the full episode of Impactful Teamwork and start noticing what your own inner ecosystem might be trying to tell you.
Show Notes
00:00 Why Leadership Must Change
01:39 Meet Sheila Belanger
03:12 Beyond Strategic Thinking
05:09 Practical Body Heart Tools
09:12 Animal Instinct and Horses
11:42 Steward Your Inner Team
14:40 Elemental Spiral Seasons
18:49 Edge Work in Uncertainty
22:36 Self Care and Maintenance
26:21 Resources and Closing Takeaways
Connect with Sheila and take the free elemental spiral quiz. https://ontheedgesofchange.com/
