How do we empower others?
How do we, as coaches, teachers, guides, parents, bosses, and managers, help those we interact with, find their way?
Do we give them all the answers?
Do we tell them all that we have learned?
Or do we guide them to find the answers within themselves?
Handing someone the answer to a challenge they are facing may feel good to use, yet if the person we are trying to help does not learn to find the answers on their own, we have only disempowered them, not empower them.
Being a real guide, a true mentor, means learning to ask the questions that allow them to realize what the correct path is for themselves.
We may think we know the answer.
We may think we have the solution to their issues.
Yet if all we do is share our opinion with them, they have not learned how to access their own inner wisdom.
We have not taught them that they do have the power to resolve their own issues.
We have not given them the gift of our presence and allowed them to use their creativity and trust themselves more.
It does not matter whether the person we are working with is our partner, our lover, our child, our employee, or our co-worker.
It does not matter how important or unimportant the situation may be.
We are only enticing the people around us to find their own path through their own efforts, or we are taking that opportunity away from them.
When we create dependency for others, we create slaves.
When we create the atmosphere for independent thinking, we allow people to grow.
What do you want to create? Follower or fellow leaders?
~ Sam Liebowitz, The Conscious Consultant
