Sometimes you can’t put your finger on exactly what you want.

You’re trying to make a decision, or determine a direction, or make some kind of change for the better. You search deep inside yourself for clarity, but what you want seems elusive, murky, out of reach. However, you’re very clear about one thing: You know what you don’t want. In fact, you might have quite the list: problems, people, situations—stress of all kinds. Feelings of frustration, anxiety, or sadness. You just don’t want any of that anymore.

If you’re a leader in today’s world, you might have come to a place within yourself where leadership feels like the same difficult grind, day after day, a mix of stress, overload, and exhaustion. You wonder what could change to make it better. Is change even possible?You ask yourself if this is what leadership is and will always be.

There is an alternative. It’s called leading lightly.

THE BASICS OF LEADING LIGHTLY

The funny thing about leading lightly is that in many ways, it’s easier to explain what it’s not than what it is. That’s because leading lightly is a particular way of being—a mood, an energy, a frame of mind—that is quite rare in leadership and among people in general.

Yet, it is very attainable. And it is my sincere hope that leading lightly will turn out to be exactly what you want.

So, let’s start with what leading lightly is not. It is not crashing through your day or just going through the motions in suboptimal states of stress, overload, anxiety, or frustration. It is not struggling through ongoing feelings of heaviness, burden, resignation, or burnout. It is not carrying your stress home with you or taking it out on your innocent significant other. It is not fantasizing about quitting your job and running away forever.

What does it mean to lead lightly?

Leading lightly means that no matter what happens during your day, you have the capacity to approach everything with enduring ease and clarity. It is a state of being that naturally arises when you have learned to let go of your internal noise and emotional clutter.

If you think about light or lightness, or moving lightly in any context, you can taste a little of the flavor of leading lightly: It’s being light on your feet. Light in your mood or lighthearted. Looking from a well-lit perspective. Having a light touch.

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