Are You Backing You? | Blog

A couple of years ago, I was working on a new project, one I felt genuinely inspired by.

I wanted to open up everything I’d learned over the years about working with businesses. How the essential nature of who we are, the intelligence of the mind, and our inner climate, all of it, shape the way leaders communicate, the way teams move, and the way cultures shift.

I was excited to offer the practical, the profound, and the behind-the-scenes truth of how this work actually lands inside companies.

And yet – I stalled.

Not because I doubted the material. Not because I lacked experience. It wasn’t about capability. I’d been mentoring practitioners and leaders for years one-on-one and in small groups.

But stepping into the identity of “trainer of practitioners” in a public way brought up all kinds of internal noise.

Part of it was that I love the diversity of my work and wasn’t trying to go into a new lane, but the louder internal noise sounded more like:

“This space is full.”

“Other people are already doing this, and they’re doing it well.”

“Would this just be another version of what’s already out there?”

It wasn’t loud insecurity. It was a quieter hesitation and, in a way, felt reasonable.

Interestingly, that was exactly when several people, unprompted, asked me why I didn’t teach more about my corporate work. It felt like I was being tapped on the shoulder. A gentle, “pay attention.”

So I got more open and let myself play with the possibility. I felt the creative excitement come back, and I started building the program.

As I was creating it, I would get into it, make progress, and then get stalled as I questioned, tinkered with the language, the date, the price, etc. I wondered if it was too much, too similar, too something.

Then, in a cosmic joke kind of way, right as I was getting ready to announce it, a series of emails hit my inbox. Colleagues and peers in my field were launching programs aimed at training practitioners.

My energy dropped. I thought, Well, that’s it. I missed my chance. As though, if I’m not first, it won’t work.

On the surface, I knew that wasn’t true. There’s space for everyone. Each of us brings something uniquely our own. People feel drawn to the teacher and person they’re meant to learn from, etc.

I knew all of that. But I still couldn’t hit the go button.

That’s always the giveaway: when we “know better,” but don’t move. Something deeper is at play.

One day, while out on a walk, I got quiet enough to feel what was really underneath all the hesitation. With no analysis. No fixing. No pep talk. Just honest looking.

And what surfaced was surprisingly simple.

“I’m afraid I won’t get picked.”

It pierced through all the noise.

I didn’t try to rationalize it. I didn’t dig for its origin story. I didn’t make it wrong. I didn’t try to tell myself, you know better.

I just sat with the truth of it.

And in the stillness of that, something new arrived:

“Have you picked you?”

In that moment, I could see it. The answer was no. No, I hadn’t.

Again, simple, clear, honest.

I had not fully backed my own wisdom. My own creativity. My own idea. My own desire to offer something that felt alive in me.

I had been half-in, conditional, waiting for reassurance, signs, guarantees, permission, validation – something outside myself to tell me it was safe to go all in.

That question, “Have you picked you?”, reorganized everything inside me.

I started to really see the setup I had going on inside.

I’ll back this idea if…I’ll follow through if…I’ll go all in if…

If it succeeds.

If people want it.

If it’s different enough.

If I know it’s “the right” thing to do.

If people will enroll.

All of this began to unravel, and in seeing it, without judgment, a deeper truth revealed itself in feeling, a knowing.

The real invitation wasn’t to create a flawless program that would stand out, or to be the first one to market.

It was to back myself.

To say yes to what wanted to move through me, whether or not it was received perfectly, seen as valuable, or even successful.

To pick me.

To go “all in” and let what was alive in me be expressed through me

To back me, regardless of the outcomes.

I realized that even if nothing “worked,” even if no one signed up, even if it wasn’t the “right timing,” choosing myself would still be the win.

It would still be worth it.

This shifted the “come from” and opened me up, and the hesitation fell away. From that place, creating felt different. Not easier, necessarily, but cleaner. More mine.

I kept moving and put together a training, a mastermind, and a library of videos and resources that reflect what I’ve learned, the insights I’ve gained, and the best practices that have helped me serve organizations, leaders, and teams for over 30 years.

Is it the best thing out there? By what measures?

Was it the first? Absolutely not.

Did it make me millions of dollars? Nope.

Did I go all in? YES!

Was it worth it? Absolutely!

Here’s why…

Backing ourselves is an act of alignment. An act of honesty. An act of self-love.

It’s choosing to support the creative impulse within you simply because it’s nudging, prompting, and alive.

Think about how we love people in our lives – how we stand behind their dreams without requiring guarantees first. We don’t demand certainty before we support them.

But with ourselves, we often require guarantees.

We don’t go all in unless we know it will be good, or successful, or accepted, or admired. We withhold our own backing until the world verifies our worthiness.

So, how about you? Are you backing yourself?

Not just the polished, confident parts of you. Not just the ideas with proven outcomes or the moves that feel strategic or safe.

Are you backing the part of you that feels the nudge, the whisper, the pull toward something new, alive, or meaningful to YOU?

Are you picking you when others are already out there doing it? When the timing feels off and the outcome uncertain?

So maybe the invitation and question for all of us is:

What would change if you backed yourself without conditions?
What would you share if you backed your own voice without knowing how it would land?
What would you create if you backed your own ideas without comparing them to others?
Where would you go? What would you say and what would you begin?

What becomes possible when you are your first yes?

Because the moment we do, everything reorganizes.

That moment on my walk continues to come forward for me when I need it. It didn’t just help me create that program; it shifted something more fundamental:

I saw that my life expands every time I “pick me” and follow the creative impulse within, regardless of outcome.

Every time I allow what is alive within me to be expressed and met, first by me, what unfolds is meaningful and reveals even more.

The program itself led to unexpected conversations, beautiful realizations, and outcomes for the participants, new collaborations, and eventually to the work I’m doing now with The Practitioner’s Path – none of which I could have predicted or planned for.

So, I invite you, what is calling you? Asking for you to go all in and to be backed by you first?