Dear Penny: I sold my soul to the devil

Dear Penny,

I’m sorry, that was rather dramatic of me. I haven’t sold my soul to the devil… yet. I just haven’t written anything for a while and felt like I needed a decent hook to get your attention again. If you’re here, hello. I’ve missed this.

In all seriousness though, one of the hardest parts of my career has been maintaining who I am as I navigate the corporate world. Have I sold my soul to the devil and completely left behind who I was in order to fit in? Not quite. Have I flirted with him on occasion? Yea. He’s pretty damn attractive when all you want is to feel successful.

The tides of life have been shifting a bit for me lately and I’ve been doing some serious thinking about authenticity and the role it plays in our journey through life and work. As a woman in the corporate world, I’ve felt some serious displacement at times. And the higher I climbed, or the harder I pushed to climb higher, the more complex and pronounced the displacement became. 

Now don’t get me wrong. I love a good challenge and I love ‘sticking it to the man’. So to begin with, this space was enjoyable for me. I loved it. I loved turning up and playing the ‘game’. I could flex my masculine energy, I could unleash my voice, I could dress like a boss and I could walk the walk. And over time, I got pretty good at it. I became more strategic and more considerate with my words. I learnt how to read a room. I learnt how to command one too. But what I recognise now is that I also lost a bit of myself. I hardened. I became colder, more guarded, less empathetic, less creative, less excited, less me. The game I thought I was winning, I was actually losing.

Does this ring any bells for you? Have you ever felt yourself fading a little in order to succeed or fit in? 

What I had done in those moments (and years) was inadvertently shift the battle from an external one to an internal one. The person I was fighting to fit in with was myself. I was straying further and further away from my authentic self. From the values that made me me. From the morals that made me me. And from the quirks that made me me. Those were the moments I was flirting with the devil and his delicious looking version of success.

What I came to realise over time, was that the things I was trying to suppress, were actually the things that would make me stand out. The things that actually make me a good leader. And the things that actually make me successful in anything that I do. My empathy. My fast brain. My warmth. My bluntness. My caring nature. My relentless determination. My uncomfortable level of honesty. My excitement and energy when I struck a good idea. My awkward pauses when I was connecting dots and recognising patterns in the moment. My ability to learn new skills at lightning speed. My need to question everything, twice.

When I stopped trying to mirror those in the room and what I thought leadership and success was, it started to click. When I spoke in my voice and upheld what I valued and believed in I was happier and the results always showed it. My internal arguments slowly resolved and the devil dare I say it, started to give me the ‘ick’.

The more I read and hear about AI and the future of technology, the more convinced I become that authenticity is one of the most valuable things we as humans and leaders have. Our quirks, our stories, our views, our lived experiences, our understanding of life, our contradictions, our pain, our humour, our perspective, our softness, our edge, and our imperfectly perfect way of showing up… these are the things that cannot be replicated. 

This is our advantage and this is what we should leverage moving forward. Whether it's in leadership, marketing, personal brand, as an entrepreneur or in our relationships. Be authentically you. Not the version of you you think the world needs. Be the real you. The one that’s a bit awkward. The one that's a bit too passionate. The one that cares a bit too much. The one that has too many ideas. The one that is not a copy-and-paste version of what the devil says success is.

We need diversity of thought. We need people who are willing to think differently, lead differently and live differently. That is where the power is. That is where better businesses, better leadership and better relationships come from.

So no, I haven’t sold my soul to the devil. I just got close enough a few times to know that he was never actually offering success.

Until next time, be weird, be wonderful, be unapologetically you.