If you’ve been around me for long, you know one of the most powerful lessons I’ve learned in life and leadership is how to give myself (and those around me) the space, grace, and permission to feel.
And this is especially true when life and work throw us a plot twist.
Whether personal or professional, we all have very real feelings about what is going on in our world. While it can be tempting to push our emotions down, it’s critical we allow ourselves to feel them out so we can move beyond them. That’s the key to boosting resilience and leading with emotional intelligence during change and challenges—allowing yourself to feel.
I call this the You Are Allowed mindset.
When you grasp it and understand how to apply it in your professional life, it will not only transform your leadership approach, but it will also give you the space and grace to thrive in every personal relationship and situation.
You Are Allowed is a profound resilience and change management tool with a personal story
Over 21 years ago, I grappled with the news no woman wants to hear: “You have breast cancer.”
At first, I was in shock. And denial. I had just turned 30 and was healthy with no family history. How could cancer happen to me?
Life shifted in an instant, as those four small words bounced around in my head—while a two-year-old bounced on my hip.
My diagnosis was a very aggressive, Stage 3 breast cancer with limited treatment options. Multiple surgeries and an equally-aggressive chemotherapy regimen later, I’m grateful to share that I’m cancer-free to this day.
That difficult experience changed my life in so many ways. One of the most profound shifts, though, wasn’t the chemo or the recognition that health is fragile and life is fleeting.
It was a kind gesture from my friend, Patti, who gave me a simple handwritten card that began with “You are allowed.”
Her three-word phrase helped save my life—and became a mantra for grace, courage, and resilience for me for over two decades. I now use a version of that card as a key change management tool in my proven Unstoppable Momentum Framework for adaptable leaders and teams facing challenges, changes and obstacles.
Patti lost her own battle with breast cancer at the age of 29. But to this day, her legacy lives on in every lift-shifting phrase on the You Are Allowed card.
On one side, the card is a declaration, freeing you with words like YOU ARE ALLOWED:
… to feel overwhelmed.
…to be tired.
…to be frustrated.
…to feel anxious
…to wonder “What if?”
The other side of the card energizes you with words like YOU ARE ALLOWED:
… to be grateful
…to feel that you are not alone
…to find your grit
…to ask for help
… to realize you’re stronger than you ever thought
This powerful card is brimming with Patti’s words of wisdom plus a few additions and personal reminders of my own from years of building personal and professional resilience.
To date, I’ve given this card to hundreds of thousands of leaders around the world as a key change management tool in the Unstoppable Momentum framework. Because I believe the You Are Allowed principle is the foundation for fostering resilience and emotional intelligence during times of change and challenge.
Click here to download your own You Are Allowed card—and start embracing emotionally intelligent, feelings-aware leadership.
Emotional Resilience Requires Real Adaptable Leadership Skills
Even as an adaptable leader, it’s easy to forget that You Are Allowed.
When things are uncertain, we mistakenly equate resilience with denying or burying how we feel. Or worse, we run right over our team’s feelings in pursuit of efficiency, productivity, or innovation.
And this rarely works in the short OR the long term.
By adapting a You Are Allowed mindset, you can practice the adaptable leadership skills that build the emotional resilience and intelligence every team needs.
Here’s how:
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- Make your mind a “judgment free” zone.
When emotions arise, give yourself the space and grace to acknowledge and accept what arises. Care for your well-being, so you can give your team members the space to care for theirs. - Be grateful for your ability to feel a lot at once.
Our feelings are not mutually exclusive or sequential. It’s OK to feel angry and grateful, joy and sorrow, scared and excited, hope and loss, the need to cry and laugh all at the same time. It’s more than OK—in fact, it’s necessary for your mental and emotional health—to FEEL IT ALL. Wherever you are and whatever you feel, just remember that YOU ARE ALLOWED. - Embrace and empower vulnerability. Show others—especially those you lead—that it’s safe to express their feelings by sharing your own. Understand that navigating complex emotions takes patience and a growing vocabulary—give yourself and others the patience to develop self-awareness and the ability to articulate what they feel and need. The goal here is to free your emotions from guilt, shame, and judgment—and this includes freeing emotions from the labels of “good” or “bad.” Understanding that emotions are signals—not facts, character flaws, or personality traits—will make it so much easier to go through the hard and not around it, and help you come out of each change and challenge stronger than before.
- Meet others where they are. When you act from a place of grace and permission, you can hold space for those still processing their feelings. One of the most powerful adaptable leadership skills you can practice is replacing judgment with curiosity. If you’re using the You Are Allowed principle as a change management tool, encourage your team to share where they are on the card, even encouraging them to physically point to where you can meet them. This not only creates the safety and space to be vulnerable, but gives you the opportunity to meet them there. Where else might you create spaces for them to feel valued, seen, and heard?
- Make your mind a “judgment free” zone.
By embracing the mindset of You Are Allowed, and prioritizing these four actions in times of change, we can build the emotional agility and intelligence it takes to be truly resilient in the face of uncertainty—and create truly thriving teams and cultures in the process.
Give yourself (and your team!) the permission and power to feel.
Grit without grace is not sustainable. Wherever you are, give yourself the permission, space, and grace to stop, pause and acknowledge and feel whatever it is you need to feel and be wherever it is you need to be.
Because YOU ARE ALLOWED.
It’s okay to feel what you need to feel during change. It’s okay to refuel and recharge instead of powering through at all costs. It’s okay to redefine resilience as vulnerability and emotions as power. That’s what will allow you—and those you lead—to build Unstoppable Momentum no matter what.
If you haven’t already, download your own You Are Allowed card here. While you’re at it, send me a message and tell me: How are you giving yourself the space and grace to feel what you need to right now?
About Kim Becking:
The driving force behind the Unstoppable Momentum Movement, Kim Becking is changing the way we think about change and resilience. An award-winning motivational keynote speaker, consultant and change expert, Kim has helped Fortune 100 companies and organizations around the world empower their leaders, teams, and communities to be more adaptable, more resilient, and better equipped to own what’s now and embrace what’s next with a deep breath and a big cup of Bring It On. Follow Kim on LinkedIN and subscribe to her Momentum Boosts for more tips and strategies to ignite Unstoppable Momentum.
