Befriending and Leading the Self
How we must lead ourselves before we can best lead others.
I think being someone’s friend makes you more willing to be led by them. And them to be led by you. But I know true leadership evolves from the ability to lead oneself, so that will be my focus.
I realize I have an innate desire to be friends with most everyone I come into contact with. I’m conflict averse and can lean into people pleasing, but it’s only a detriment if it leads to resentment. Resentment from not speaking up for myself, or from other people making decisions I don’t agree with. Otherwise, acting in a way to keep the peace is beneficial for me and the collective. Ultimately, I cannot make everyone my friend, but I can be friendly with everyone and let the chips fall where they may.
This brings me to leading the self, being one with the self, keeping peace with the self, being friends with the self. We espouse the benefits of befriending others, but what about befriending ourselves? The grace and compassion we show friends should also be shown internally.
How do we befriend ourselves? Well, how do we befriend others? Being nice to them, spending time with them, being honest, vulnerable, openly and honestly communicating, making them laugh, planning activities, helping them in times of need, giving them advice, listening when they speak, honoring their freedom to choose, etc.
We must extend these same things to ourselves. The base of friendship is time and effort. Spending time and making the effort to understand and show compassion for someone by honoring their human experience. This is how we make friends. We befriend ourselves by spending time alone and making the effort to understand who we are by honoring our own human experience.
How to go about this process? Well, we must realize our unheeded thoughts are not the whole of our being, but a part of us we need to remain aware of, “Thoughts think themselves”. Many thoughts pop into our brain unheeded, we did not beckon them in consciously.
In “Subconscious” by Leonard Mlodinow, he says the brain is multitiered, with the subconscious mind constantly working, but under the threshold of conscious awareness. Then the thought’s energy becomes strong enough to leave the subconscious and become a noticeable thought. Noticeable, but still not brought on by conscious thought.
To aid in befriending yourself, you could think of unheeded thoughts as a part of you needing friendliness from your conscious awareness aka the part of you that thinks on purpose.
You recognize this other part of you and you hear it out, listen to it, and do your best to understand it.
A real friend recognizes not only when to get the mind off something with fun, but also when to tell the unpleasant, but necessary truth. Knowing the truth can be harsh enough on its own, there is no need to add insult to its revealing. There’s no need to beat our friends or ourselves up by how we tell the truth. We should try to make it as palatable as possible to increase the odds that its accepted. But ultimately, we just need to let truth be known. “The truth is like a lion. Let it loose and it defends itself”
To befriend oneself, you can look to create a partnership between the subconscious and conscious brains. By recognizing and appreciating what the subconscious has to say, you bridge the gap and build the internal friendship necessary for our mental wellbeing. This increases our ability to lead ourselves.
Recognizing and appreciating a perspective does not mean we have to agree. We can be aware of a perspective and appreciate the information it provides. Appreciating something does not imply approval or agreement. So rather than having our thoughts
Many of the thoughts that pop up form our subconscious will start off appearing negatively. Especially when we haven’t been consciously aware of our subconscious mind. But they can also be neutral, they can also be positive. Really, they aren’t inherently anything. They are thoughts to be recognized, appreciated and then gleaned for information so you can learn more about your friend, learn more about your deeper mind. Always leading with compassion and care, not with judgment.