Your business will only grow as far as you can feel.

I laugh a little when I hear business leaders who still think that their emotional state isn’t tied to their business growth. After working with me, they laugh too! Most leaders avoid this truth bomb. Your business, your vision, your impact – can only grow to the level you’re emotionally available for. It’s a hard realism, and one that held me back too – that’s why I can laugh at it now. 

Strategy feels safe because it’s measurable and professional. We can write it up on a little tick sheet and pretend that we are following it. However, if the emotional structure isn’t there underneath, then we just don’t complete it. It’s our emotional strategy that really runs the show, and most leaders aren’t brave enough to confront this side of themselves because, frankly, they know it isn’t working. Sometimes they have tried to solve it with a coach or therapist and that didn’t work. I get it – that’s why I kept looking for the right resolution myself, because like you, I had almost given up trying to resolve my own issues. Luckily I found the right solution. You can too. Don’t give up. 

The reality is simple: if you avoid discomfort, you avoid growth. You can hire the consultants, build the team, automate everything in sight, get AI to tell you how wonderful you are, but if you can’t hold the emotional weight of bigger stakes, deeper intimacy, or sharper feedback, you’ll unconsciously sabotage the very growth you’re chasing. Because some part of you doesn’t feel safe with it. 

This is what leadership coaching and executive therapy reveal over and over again. Leadership isn’t just about what you know. It’s about what you’re willing to feel. I trained as a therapist because when I was just a coach I thought, hang on – these leadership issues aren’t skin deep, they are childhood deep. Sadly, many high performers quietly avoid the very things that would move them forward. They avoid clearing up their own baggage, and this means that they avoid conflict, feedback, tough conversations. They are simply afraid of being wrong, rejected, or truly seen. 

Those emotional walls you build to stay safe? They become cages. The culture flattens. Innovation slows. People feel the holding back even if they can’t name it. They leave. 

Every bottleneck in your business mirrors an emotional edge you haven’t crossed. Micromanaging, anxiety, undercharging, can’t delegate, no strategy, missing a skill set you can’t admit you need. I bet there is someone in your team or family who knows exactly where you trip up, and they may have tried to tell you but you got cross. 

The way through isn’t more strategy, it’s more emotional honesty and capacity. Healing your nervous system so you can tolerate discomfort, visibility, uncertainty, being wrong – the whole range of difficult emotions. This is what deeper work through executive therapy and leadership coaching makes possible. 

Because the bigger the dream, the deeper the work. Are you ready to lead your own change?