Becoming antifragile is not simply about coping with change. It’s about using change to become stronger and more valuable — so that every setback, as well as every success, clarifies your priorities, builds your enthusiasm, and increases your ability to achieve the goals that matter most to you.
We can’t achieve this simply by managing ourselves differently: we have to lead ourselves differently.
Management looks outwards. It’s about measuring what we did yesterday, doing what needs to be done today, and anticipating the issues that might arise tomorrow. The focus of management is outwards.
But before we can know what actions to take, we need to decide what matters most: we need to choose between conflicting priorities and decide which direction to head in. This is the task of leadership.
A leader has no one else to ask what to do: a leader must choose for themselves. And the only way they can do that is by knowing what matters to them. The focus of leadership begins by looking inwards.
This means that if we want to become antifragile in this time of change, our first step is both deceptively simple and incredibly important: it is to improve our ability to bring ourselves back to a state of inner calm, connected strongly with who we are at our best and what matters most to us, no matter what is happening around us.
Like the roots of a tree, the deeper we build this connection with ourselves, the better we will remain upright during the storms and the better we will survive during the droughts. And when times are calm, the depth of our inner ‘roots’ will determine how far we are able to spread out the ‘branches’ of our influence into wider challenges and roles.
Our first step to becoming antifragile is to look inwards and know ourselves more deeply. This lays the foundation for everything else that follows.
In a crisis, how good are you at remaining calm, strongly connected with what matters most to you and who you are at your best? How easy do you find it to choose between conflicting priorities? Would it be useful for you to deepen your roots and strengthen your connection with the priorities that matter to you and who you are at your best?
Adapted from Inner Leadership: a framework and tools for building inspiration in times of change.
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