Me the problem? Really?!
Debbie here and wanted to share a moment, a moment that I realised I was the problem and the solution.
There is a point in life where you stop blaming the world for how it treats you and start noticing how you treat yourself.
For a long time I did not want to see that. It was easier to keep moving. To fill the day with action. To stay ahead of my thoughts. To make it look like I was holding it all together.
I was not.
I was good at survival. I had built an entire identity around being strong, being capable, being the one who could handle anything. It worked for years. Then one day it stopped working. What used to protect me started to exhaust me. What once kept me safe began to keep me stuck.
That is the moment you realise something deeper has to change.
The day everything cracked
It was not dramatic. No big explosion. No music in the background. Just a quiet Tuesday and a conversation that started the same way it always did with Dave , me trying to prove a point and Dave trying to defend his. The words were not the issue. The energy was. I could feel it rise in me like static. I could hear the tone, sharp and certain, like I was fighting to win rather than to connect.
I was most definitely not doing what I coached, that makes me feel very uneasy.
Then, in the middle of that sentence, I heard myself. Really heard myself. Not the words. The pattern.
It was like hearing an echo of someone I thought I had outgrown. I could feel the heat in my chest and the pull in my stomach. I knew that feeling. It was the old version of me. The one who learned that power was protection. The one who believed if I lost the argument, I lost myself.
I stopped mid-sentence. Silence filled the space. I looked at Dave and we stood in silence.
That was it. The moment.
I realised I was not reacting to him at all. I was reacting to me. To my history. To my pain. To every version of myself that had not yet learned another way to feel safe
The relief and the shame came at the same time.
Relief because it made sense. Shame because it meant I had to own it.
Seeing yourself without the filter
We love to say “own your story” as if it is easy. It is not.
It means seeing yourself without the filter of justification. It means looking at your behaviour and asking, what is mine in this?
For years I believed awareness was enough. I read the books, did the courses, wrote the notes in neat journals. Awareness feels good. It looks like progress. Yet awareness without ownership is still avoidance. It is a clever disguise for staying the same.
When I heard my own voice that day, I understood what ownership really means. It means you stop explaining why you are the way you are and start choosing who you want to be instead.
I had to face the truth that the patterns I blamed on my past were now being recreated by me. No one was making me feel angry or unheard. I was choosing to respond that way because it felt familiar. Familiarity feels safe even when it hurts.
That realisation broke something open. I cried. Not the polite tears you wipe away quickly. The deep, heavy kind that come when your body finally catches up to the truth. It was grief and relief and freedom all at once.
Responsibility is not blame
Taking responsibility is not the same as taking blame.
Blame keeps you small.
Responsibility builds you back up.
It says, I did that, and now I can do something different.
Once I understood that difference, everything changed. I stopped waiting for apologies that might never come. I stopped needing people to behave a certain way so I could feel at peace. I started choosing peace myself.
That is leadership. Not leading others yet leading yourself.
It is not glamorous. It is not a moment of enlightenment where the sun shines and you suddenly float into awareness.
It is messy.
It is uncomfortable.
You fall back into old habits more than you would like to admit.
Yet every time you catch yourself and reset, the pattern loses power.
Every time you choose awareness over reaction you build strength. Not armour. Strength. The kind that feels quiet and rooted.
The illusion of control
I spent years trying to control outcomes. Control made me feel safe. It gave me the illusion of certainty. I controlled time, conversations, emotions, even silence. I filled every moment with activity so I did not have to feel the emptiness that follows when you stop.
Control is a clever trick. It hides fear. It whispers that if you plan enough, prepare enough, work enough, you can stop bad things from happening. Yet control also stops good things from arriving. It shuts the door on possibility because possibility requires trust.
When you start letting go of control, you learn how to trust again. Not in others first, in yourself. You begin to see that safety is not built by perfect plans. It is built by the ability to handle what comes next.
That is leadership too. The confidence that you can meet life as it arrives. Not because you have controlled it, yet because you have trained your mind to stay open.
The day I realised I was the problem was also the day I began to rebuild trust in myself.
How the mind repeats what it knows
The brain loves repetition. It keeps you alive. It repeats patterns because they feel predictable. When you understand that, you stop judging yourself for being stuck. You start working with the pattern instead of against it.
I began noticing how often my body would react before my mind even caught up. A look, a tone, a pause in conversation, and suddenly I was back in an old story. My shoulders tight. My words fast. My breath shallow.
That was not weakness. It was wiring.
So I began to practice slowing down. Sitting with the reaction. Asking myself, what is happening right now? Is this real, or is it memory? That question saved me many times.
Neuroplasticity tells us the brain can change. Experience proves it. Every time you pause and choose a new response, you build a new pathway. You are literally rewiring your leadership.
That is what we teach through and. It is not theory. It is daily practice.
The turning point
After that day, small things started to shift. I began listening more. I stopped trying to fill silence. I allowed myself to be wrong without falling apart.
The people around me noticed it before I did. They said I felt calmer. More grounded. The truth is I was still learning to sit with discomfort. I was still scared at times. Yet I was no longer controlled by fear.
I was not trying to be perfect. I was intentionally being present. That is what made the difference.
It is strange how life starts to align when you stop fighting it. Conversations that used to drain you become lighter. Decisions that used to feel heavy become clearer. You realise leadership is not about knowing everything. It is about knowing yourself well enough to stay steady when things get uncertain.
Lessons that followed
Since that day I have learned a few things I wish I had known sooner.
Awareness without action keeps you stuck.
Knowing the problem is not enough. You have to move. Even a small step counts.
Control is not strength.
Strength is flexibility. It is the ability to bend without breaking.
Silence is not weakness.
It is space for clarity.
Apologies are powerful when they start with you.
Sometimes the only forgiveness you need is your own.
You cannot lead what you will not look at.
If you refuse to see your patterns, they will lead for you.
These truths are not comfortable. They are real. And real is what leadership requires.
What happens next
When you stop blaming the world you start changing it. The smallest shift in awareness ripples out into every conversation and every choice. You notice where you have been living on autopilot and where you can begin again.
This is why at and. we talk about
(and. )Action. Now. Different/ Difference
It is not a slogan. It is a process. You act because awareness without movement is waste. You act now because waiting is another disguise for fear. You act different because repeating what hurt you will not heal you.
The moment I took responsibility for my reactions was the moment I began to lead my life instead of reacting to it. It did not happen overnight. It still does not. Growth is not a one-time event. It is a daily decision to see yourself clearly.
When you are the problem you are also the solution
This truth has shaped every part of my life and work.
It taught me that self leadership is not a destination. It is a relationship. You learn to trust yourself. You break trust. You rebuild. You learn again.
It is easy to stay in victimhood. It keeps you right. It keeps you safe from the weight of change. Yet it also keeps you small.
When you realise you are the problem, it is not a punishment. It is permission.
Permission to take your power back.
To stop waiting for someone to rescue you. To start leading yourself from the inside out.
The greatest freedom you will ever feel is knowing you are responsible for how you show up. You cannot control what happens to you. You can control how you meet it.
That is the work. That is the rewiring. That is leadership.
Final reflection
Every day since that Tuesday I still practice the same pause. When I feel the tension rise or the story start, I stop. I breathe. I ask myself if this is real or if this is memory patterns.
Sometimes I still react. I still fall into old patterns. The difference now is I notice. I come back faster. That is progress.
Leadership is not about having no triggers. It is about knowing your triggers so well they no longer drive you. It is about staying conscious when the easy choice is to shut down. It is about choosing awareness over ego.
That is why I know I was the problem and also the solution.
Everything changed when I stopped running from that truth.
And if you are reading this and it feels close to home, take that as a sign. Not of failure. Of readiness.
You are not broken. You are you being real.
