LEADERS UNMASK FOR THEMSELVES AND THEIR TEAMMATES

This past Friday adults and children throughout the country celebrated Halloween. For millions of people, this is a fun holiday that brings together neighbors, siblings, friends, and parents with their kids.

On our street in Rockville, Maryland, there are two families which go all out for this holiday. One family, who owns a party store, goes all out to decorate their home and their property – the roof, the garage, the trees, the bushes, the front door, the windows and every ounce of grass. People come from miles around to see this house.

This year we have new neighbors who also have gone to the extreme – in a good way. Their home and property are filled with major decorations and, at night, every inch of their property lights up with beautiful purple lights.
As we welcomed trick-or-treaters to our front door, I was struck by the number and variety masks kids wore: Disney princess masks, Zombie masks, ghost masks, goblin masks, and skeleton masks.

This experience with so many masks Friday night reminded me of one of my favorite quotes, one that I used to read to my “Seven Habits” participants at the conclusion of those four-day workshops. As you read this quote – from that famous author “Anonymous” – please reflect upon your own leadership journey and each of the teammates you have the privilege to lead right now.

“Don’t be fooled by me. Don’t be fooled by the mask I wear. For I wear a mask. I wear a thousand masks – masks that I’m afraid to take off – and none of them is me. Pretending is an art that is second nature to me, but don’t be fooled.
I give the impression that I’m secure, that all is sunny and unruffled with me, within as well as without, that confidence is my name, and coolness is my game; that the waters are calm, and I‘m in command and I need no one. But don’t believe it. Please don’t.

My surface may seem smooth, but my surface is my mask – my ever varying and ever concealing mask. Beneath lies no smugness, no coolness, no complacence. Beneath dwells the real me – in confusion, in fear, and loneliness. But I hide this; I don’t want anybody to know it. I panic at the thought of my weakness being exposed. That’s why I frantically create a mask to hide behind, a nonchalant sophisticated façade to help me pretend, to shield me from the glance that knows.

But such a glance is precisely my salvation – my only salvation. And I know it. It’s the only thing that liberates me from myself, from my own self-built prison walls, from the barriers I so painstakingly erect. But I don’t tell you this. I don’t dare. I’m afraid to.

I’m afraid your glance will not be followed by love and acceptance. I’m afraid that you’ll think less of me, that you’ll laugh, and that your laugh will kill me.

I’m afraid that deep down inside I’m nothing, that I’m just no good, and that you’ll see and reject me. So I play my games – my desperate pretending games – with the façade of assurance on the outside and a trembling child within. And so begins the parade of masks, the glittering but empty parade of masks. And my life becomes a front.

I idly chatter with you in the suave tones of surface talk. I tell you everything that’s really nothing. Nothing of what’s crying within me. So when I’m going through my routine, don’t be fooled by what I’m saying. Please listen carefully and try to hear what I’m NOT saying… what I would like to be able to say… what for survival I need to say, but I can’t say. I dislike the hiding. Honestly, I do. I dislike the superficial phony games I’m playing. I’d really like to be genuine.

I’d really like to be genuine, spontaneous, and me; but you have to help me. You have to help me by holding out your hand, even when that’s the last thing I seem to want or need. Each time you are kind and gentle and encouraging, each time you try to understand, because you really care, my heart begins to grow wings – very small wings, very feeble wings, but wings. With your sensitivity and sympathy, and your power of understanding, I can make it.

You can breathe life into me. It will not be easy for you. A long conviction of worthlessness builds strong walls. But love is stronger than strong walls, and therein lies my hope. Please try to beat down those walls with firm hands, but with gentle hands, for a child is very sensitive, and I AM a child.

Who am I? You may wonder. I am someone you know very well. For I am every man, every woman, every child… every human you meet.”

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Please read this quote slowly.
Then read it again.
Then share it with people you care about and work with.

Have a good week!

If you believe this content would resonate with a friend or colleague, please feel free to forward it along!

-Larry