Intentional Leaders Podcast with Cyndi Wentland

Find Fulfillment & Purpose in Leadership with Dr. Sharon Spano

• Cyndi

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Ever feel like something's missing despite all your achievements? You're not alone. This conversation with Dr. Sharon Spano uncovers the fascinating connection between leadership effectiveness and human development that explains why even successful leaders can feel unfulfilled.

Dr. Spano, a strategist and thought leader who specializes in integrating leadership with human development, reveals how our relationship with time and money profoundly shapes our leadership capacity. She explains the twelve stages of adult development and why understanding your current stage is crucial for breaking through limitations. Most compelling is her observation that many high-achievers are unconsciously motivated by past trauma, creating patterns that limit their potential until addressed.

The discussion weaves through powerful distinctions between scarcity and abundance mindsets, showing how fear-based decision making differs from confidence-based leadership. Dr. Spano shares illuminating examples from her client work, including how seemingly small childhood experiences can dramatically impact leadership style decades later. Her approach doesn't dwell on past trauma but instead helps leaders make meaning from experiences to create transformative growth.

What sets this episode apart is Dr. Spano's framework for understanding leadership challenges through developmental stages rather than just skills or competencies. She offers practical insights on moving beyond "the emptiness of success" toward genuine fulfillment and purpose. Whether you're feeling stuck in your leadership journey or simply curious about how to reach your highest potential, this conversation provides a roadmap for growth that extends far beyond traditional leadership development.

Discover why witnessing yourself in the moment is the key to transformation—and how becoming your best self creates ripple effects that can change your organization, family, and ultimately the world. Ready to grow through leadership instead of just in it? This episode is your starting point.


Connect with Sharon: https://sharonspano.com/

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/sharonspano/


I'd love to hear from you! Send a text message.

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Speaker 1:

Welcome back to the Intentional Leaders Podcast. I am Cindy Wetland and I am the host of this particular episode where we are going to interview Dr Sharon Spano. She is a strategist, an author and a thought leader in the areas of integrating leadership, wisdom and human development. Integrating leadership, wisdom and human development Did you know that as adults, we can continue to evolve, develop and transform throughout our lives? Yet many of us don't consider what does that mean and how to do it. So Dr Sharon is going to share what it means to grow through leadership, not just in it, and how your relationship with yourself and also with time can either drain you or empower you. So let's talk about your purpose and the sacredness of work and how that may be an important shift for you to take right now. Let's dive into this really thought-provoking conversation. So today I am delighted to welcome Sharon to this podcast episode. Thank you for taking time to be here today.

Speaker 2:

I'm so excited, Cindy, and thank you so much. I'm so impressed with the work that you're doing and it's an honor to be here.

Speaker 1:

Well, thank you for that. And likewise, of course, we met previously and I got to stalk you and all the work that you're doing the amazing, incredible work that you're doing and I'm really excited to share that with the audience today how you think about leadership and how you think about work and purpose in life. So, before I dive into those questions, when you and I spoke, you told me a little bit about your journey to get where you are today with your philosophy and strategies on leadership. So just share with the audience a little bit about the journey to how you got to today and then we'll look at what are some of the principles and practices that you share with leaders.

Speaker 2:

Well, that's such a great question because it wasn't a path that I set out to. You know, really, be on. I think that often happens for us. If you listen to the universe, you know you kind of take the cues as to where you should go, should go. And I actually I started out in the early years doing advocacy work because I had a son, as you well know, that was born with a very rare metabolic disorder and from that evolved this speaking career that I also didn't realize I had a talent for.

Speaker 2:

But as I was advocating around the country on behalf of persons with disability, I became very much aware of systems and how they work, and that you know the long.

Speaker 2:

The short story is that morphed into doing more and more corporate consulting work and speaking around the country, and one of the things that I noticed very early on I mean literally by you know, 10 in the morning, I'd have several people at my desk, often in tears, talking about something they had gone through with a boss or someone in a managerial position, and at that point I was pretty much in 150 cities a year.

Speaker 2:

You start to see these themes and I became very passionate about leadership and so I started doing leadership development in and out of corporate and just really became very much committed to helping people be better leaders. And, of course, my doctorate work, my dissertation, as you well know, is at the intersection of leadership, human development, and I really explored how leaders at certain stages of human development, which I know, we're leaders at certain stages of human development, which I know we're going to talk about experienced wisdom, because not all leaders you know have the opportunity to be trained to be more effective leaders. Often, as you know, they maybe climb up a corporate ladder and sometimes the training's there, sometimes it isn't, and that's where I started to see the gaps.

Speaker 1:

Yeah Well, isn't it wonderful, though, that life brought you to this place today, and I think, those small little pieces of opportunity or, you know, noticing problems or challenges that people are having, where you can fill a need, a bigger need even than what you were filling, which was very significant for you, for your family, for your son, and then to think even more broadly, like how do I help people on a broader scale? I think that's really amazing and wonderful.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, it was. It was just and still is.

Speaker 2:

I mean it's I feel very privileged to do the work that I do and work with leaders at high levels and help them. Basically, what I do now is really help them discover what might be holding them back so that they can be better leaders for themselves, their businesses and their families. Because even the very highest achiever, I find they're often hitting a wall, what I often call the emptiness of success. And they have the business going and they have, you know, maybe all the toys, the house, the cars, you know but then they hit a wall and something's missing and I really love helping them uncover what that is and then we do that deeper work so again they can be more effective in their lives.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, which is a beautiful journey, and a beautiful journey to take people on that aren't even aware, maybe, that they've hit that wall right. It's kind of I have all the trappings of success. Why don't I feel better or more successful? I think it's a great opportunity to explore that for each of us. So you and I know you do talk about uncovering the importance of uncovering purpose, and you mentioned to me earlier and I love the way you framed it you said we're all wired and gifted in living our purpose and yet a lot of people don't. And when you think of that gift of our purpose and exploring it, what does that look like in terms of leaders that you've worked with and what is the biggest barrier that you see to uncovering that?

Speaker 2:

Such a great question, cindy, because you know, what I'm finding through the years is that high achievers often and this was quite a surprise to me are often motivated by some form of trauma in their background. And when I say trauma, it's often, you know, it's all dependent on the individual capital T, lowercase T but often there's something that has happened in their background and they're inspired to achieve, maybe because their parents worked really hard to immigrate to the United States and they feel like they have to fulfill their parents' dreams. I mean, there's a whole host of things that occur. And so when we start to, you know, get into some of that my work is all trauma-informed then we can kind of, you know, get to the root of why you don't have a sense of fulfillment.

Speaker 2:

And another thing that was always surprising to me was how many people fall into doing something based on what other people think they should be doing my father was an engineer, or my father had a law firm or whatever and then they find, even if they're successful in it, again that missing hole within it.

Speaker 2:

So even if they're in a business that they love and they built it to great success, the purpose part is to me, really, really important to define Because, again, if they've hit that wall, then they start to realize well, it's not just about the money and building the company, there's something deeper that I want and I'm a big believer in personal mission statements. That goes back to the early Covey days and I was one that resisted them forever and I thought they were silly and you know just another gimmick. But depending on the client, I will take them through a process where they define that and what most of my clients really love is. It's a long process and I won't go into all that, but most of them, I'm finding, want to be seen and they'll say that I never felt so seen as through this work. But it's not only that I see them, it's that they learn to see themselves for who they truly are.

Speaker 1:

That's so profound and isn't that ironic though that? I mean, how do we not see ourselves? And yet, I mean, all the research on self-awareness is that we believe we're more self-aware than we actually are. And I think about those disconnects. A lot, and a lot of, I think, people believe like, oh okay, I'm not self-aware of all the development I have or all the things I'm not doing. But, to your point, I think sometimes people aren't aware of the gifts that they have and the things that they are doing too. It's not just like those things that I need to work on, that I'm oblivious to, but it is what am I really wired to do? Well, what gifts do I have, and do I know what those are? Am I able to talk about it?

Speaker 2:

So, so important, and I think that's where people like you and I come in, because we see them and I just feel like I'm a mirror. You know I'm holding up because I'm trained to see them and so, excuse me, you help them. You help them see them for themselves.

Speaker 1:

Yes, yes, absolutely, and what a what a glorious mirror to hold up. You know, when you get to be the mirror of all the beautiful things that someone has or does or has accomplished, or their purpose, I think that's really a wonderful mirror to be. It's a magical one, unlike some of the ones in Harry Potter which, you know, there was a stark side there dark side there.

Speaker 2:

So a lot of times people you know they have awareness of their faults or their deficits, or what psychologists often call the shadow side, but they don't understand how those things came to be about as a part of them. And even if they do, they don't understand how to move beyond them and use those shadow sides in more powerful ways. So that's a little bit of the harder work on my end is the mirror. It's always glorious, as you said, to show them you know the greater attributes, but then you also have to share the truth of you know what's holding them back, and that's a delicate matter. But I find the process. You know that I take people through, as I'm sure you do. You know we can do that with trained and delicate expertise so that people can receive it with grace and love and not be shamed or feel shamed by the work.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, yeah, you create that safety net for people to explore it, understand it, be honest and that it's okay. Yeah, I love that about what you're doing and when you think about people taking that pause to do that work. What typically prompts the people that you work with Like, if I'm envisioning people listening to this episode and thinking, is that me, Am I stuck? You know, do I need this kind of exploration? How does one go about knowing that they need this work to be done?

Speaker 2:

Well, let me I mean that's a great question. Let me let me preface it with kind of the depth of the work, if I could in a short, succinct way. Is you know that I am very much about this? 12 stages of human development. You know that I am very much about the 12 stages of human development.

Speaker 1:

Yes.

Speaker 2:

That was a game changer in my own life, because when I was doing leadership development across corporate.

Speaker 2:

One of the things that I was always perplexed by is, let's say, I was working with an executive team or middle management team and maybe you had, you know, 30 people going through the process and 29 would just have transformational growth like unbelievably so, and then there'd be one that was stuck and just couldn't get it. When I got into the human development work and realized there are 12 stages of human development and we say roughly 62% of the American workforce is at stage five or six, one stage isn't better than the other, but it does give you a richer experience of life as you move into what we call the later stages. So, to answer your question, then if I'm someone in the workforce and I'm at, let's say, what we call more commonly the achiever stage, which is where most of your entrepreneurs and business people are, I'm really in this mode of goal setting, goal setting, goal setting. I'm chasing time and money, you know, and all of that.

Speaker 2:

But what happens then when we do hit perhaps that wall or we start to feel like, you know, I'm not as fulfilled as I thought I was going to be, when I the company to this piece or whatever is often and this is what's so exciting, cindy, is people don't realize that they're actually feeling that sense of unfulfillment because they're leaning into, quite possibly, another stage of development. It's the easiest way to think about it. It's what we used to call in the old days like it could feel like a midlife crisis. Oh sure, there's an identity shift, of what I wanted, or thought I wanted, and who I thought I was no longer is fulfilling. So then, who am I?

Speaker 1:

if I'm not the.

Speaker 2:

CEO or I'm not the head of whatever, and that is why I'm so passionate about the work, because when you can help people see that they're actually leaning into a richer, more robust experience of life and you can create the path for them to get there and then I actually see them start to get there it's just so rewarding for me and for them.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, absolutely Well, and there's there's kind of irony there that it takes that discomfort to go into and, leaning into that discomfort to say, what do I do? And I don't fix it with external things. You know, let's move, let's go on a vacation, let's buy a car, let's do all these things. Let's rather look inward and decide where to go next. That the discomfort is coming from who we are, not what we have, and that's a whole different experience to walk into, but awkward. So yeah, I know you do some wonderful work around human development theory and for those that are new to that idea or aren't understanding what it is, how would you describe that and how would you describe it relative to what we traditionally think of as leadership development?

Speaker 2:

Oh, that's such a great question. When I did the research, one of the things that surprised me was that leaders who I thought you know in my own mind just from interviewing them would be later stage, actually showed up to be earlier stage. Later stage actually showed up to be earlier stage. And so the easiest way to think about it is we break the stages down into tiers of four. So the first four everybody's familiar with, because that's birth to roughly adolescence. Even though we say it's not, none of it correlates to age per se, because you could have people in their 50s that are very early stage as well and that when that happens, that is often due to some form of trauma, you know, being brought up in environments where you're not safe. You know our prisons, to be honest, are full of people who are very early stage.

Speaker 2:

They just didn't get the opportunity, they didn't have the resources to develop higher levels of consciousness or ways of thinking. So the first we say are very concrete you know, for a child water is wet, you know, and that's that. And then, as you move into the next four, we start to develop different levels and different ways of thinking, and those are often more abstract ways of thinking. When you get into the later stages, the motivation changes entirely, where I'm not as driven to achieve or by goals, but more interested in humanity. How can I serve the greater good? My money is spent differently. As you know, I wrote a book on the pursuit of time and money.

Speaker 2:

And I looked at that in the context of how do the different stages experience time and money, because they experience it very differently, because the motivation is different. So, like in the earlier stages, it's instant gratification. I have no sense of time. I told my parents I'd be home at 10. I'm saving for a car. Now I just blew it all at the you know local movie theater on the girl that you know. Whatever the latest brand of jeans I don't. You know, it's instant gratification. And then, as I said, when you move into the next four, it's more about goal orientation and acquisition. And then later you know I don't even care about money as much, but if I do, I'm maybe more philanthropic or interested in world hunger. You know how to save the planet, things of that nature. And it's not that people in the earlier stages don't care about those things. You know they may still participate in those things, but they're also more interested, let's say, in the goal achievement and more concrete opportunities to use their time and money in ways like that.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, so when, and I do, and I haven't read it yet, but it's right here, your book, like right on my pile. I was like I got to read this. This is, and we're going on vacation next week, so I'm taking it along.

Speaker 2:

I don't know if it's a good vacation read, but it is trust me. Well, you have people like you and I. These are, we're geeks, right? So we read those kind of books on vacation.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, I know my mom's telling me, read fluffy books, books, and I'm like, oh, the pursuit of time and money. Yes, please, this is Sharon's book. So I, and I think so. One perspective is the time and money aspect of development. How do you see? You know again, look at a professional environment and a leader being a little stuck. What does that stuckness look like as a leader within an organization? How do you, how would they? You know again, how did they kind of know that they're stuck? And you mentioned this. I'm not fulfilled with what's around me. Where are they? Where do you see that they need to get to? And is that the purpose?

Speaker 2:

Well, you know what we say about. Because we want to be careful. We talk about the stages that we're not making people feel like you're less if you're an earlier stage, you're not a person yes, absolutely um, typically that's their big question is how do I get to a later stage, right, right, um?

Speaker 2:

irony, irony with respect to here's, let me just give you a couple examples of how you'll see it play out. So, at the expert stage, which is often, even though it's not directly correlated to industries, but that's where we'll often see financial advisors, attorneys, engineers, I mean they are experts in their field and so if they're in a leadership role, you know and again I'm being a little stereotypical here but where you might see some stuckness is if they land. You know, when I wrote the book, we did some work around looking at the spectrum between scarcity and abundance. Yes, so what was interesting was the moderate scarcity and the moderate abundance, because they looked very similar in terms of the actions that the leaders took. The difference was moderate scarcity decisions were made based on fear. So I might be afraid, for instance, to think about expansion of my business when COVID hits yes, where someone at moderate abundance would say, oh, this is opportunity, because when this blows over, I need to be positioned to pivot and take off. So that's kind of a nuanced example there. There's a fear-based decision-making component when you're in the earlier stages that often isn't present. And again, those nuances are played out even more if you're in a corporate environment versus an entrepreneurial environment, because entrepreneurs naturally they're just going to get out there and pivot and do what they need to do for the most part, but they're often again at that achiever stage, which is one of the expert stage With respect to time, one of the things that I've seen there and I'll go back to the example of, like an engineer, they often are so focused on being efficient.

Speaker 2:

Yes, they won't be as effective. So I've got two partners right now that are on in that. You know one is an expert, almost, you know a brilliant strategist and you know, wants to count every penny and make sure they make every decision, but then he can't make decisions because he's overthinking it. The other guy is more of an entrepreneurial visionary. Let's just go for it, we'll figure it out along the way. If we need to create more money, we will. So you know they have to understand those differences because they both bring valuable aspects of who they are to the table. But sometimes it can get a little muddy because you know one doesn't understand why the other one is slower to make decisions.

Speaker 2:

The other one, the other's flying by the seat of his pants.

Speaker 1:

You know that kind of thing.

Speaker 2:

Does that answer your question?

Speaker 1:

to give you an example, yeah, it's a great example and it also is so interesting because you're comparing and contrasting like two people or two different perspectives, and I think a lot of times what we do is we judge each other rather than reflecting on's their person right, like what are they? And your whole concept and I do love the concept both with time and with money combined. Again, I'm excited to read. But when you talk about scarcity to abundance, just in general, there's probably a lot of people who don't understand that concept. How would you, you know how? How would you describe what that looks like? Because you're talking about scarcity is fear. I'm holding back. What is an abundance mindset look like and what would that? How would that show up?

Speaker 2:

Yeah, first let me say that I I decided to look at time and money together because obviously there's a lot of books out there about time and money. But what I began to realize in working with leaders was they either had a lot of time and no money because they didn't have the work so they had all this time but no money, or they had a lot of money and no time because they were working so much and I began to see that these two resources I mean, if we think about it throughout our entire day we are making decisions.

Speaker 2:

Often, you know, even at a subconscious level Do I have enough time and money to do this or go in that direction? Expand my team, you know. Take on a new product, you know, whatever it is. So then back to your question. I feel like, well, scarcity showed up literally as total fear. The things people would say is I never have enough money, I never have enough time. They feel hopeless and trapped. I'm never going to be able to have the life I thought. They have no sense of control over their own lives, and I would say that's probably a big part of our American population. For people that are, you know, in the workforce or the opportunity or the resources, it's natural that you would feel afraid, particularly with the ups and downs in our economy and the uncertainty in our world. Most of these things, though, these premises, come from our early childhood narratives. So, like, one of the questions we asked is what did you learn about time from your parents? What?

Speaker 2:

did you learn about money from your, your mother or father, and most people can tell you right off you were always late. My mother was always pushing us because she never thought, you know, we should be late. You know, or you know it was pressure in some form.

Speaker 2:

And then to the moderate. As I've said, moderate, they may be doing the right things, but with a fear undertone, fear-based undertone. So the example I like to use, cindy, is I interviewed a man who actually lived in the Orlando area and he was saving for retirement. Like that's a very responsible thing to do. That's one of the things we looked at. That I talk about in the book is our sense of responsibility. But he had probably 30 years more, you know 30 years plus before retirement, but he wouldn't take his kids on vacation or even to Disney, because he's saving for retirement.

Speaker 2:

Yes, so now I'm not living my life right Because I'm in fear all the time that there isn't enough. Now I'm doing responsible things where in a scarcity thing, I probably don't have the resources to even save for retirement or think that far out. Because the other thing that is interesting with respect to time is in the early stages people literally can't see beyond two years. You know they're not looking at 10 or 15 years out. So and then when you look at the moderate abundance, again we're doing the responsible things but we're not afraid.

Speaker 2:

And then abundance is the other extreme. My husband lives in abundance, no fear, you know, whatever the economy is doing. He just gets out and creates. He never worries about the ups and downs and we've been through many recessions, like most of us, and we've had our highs and lows he just dusts himself off and gets out and creates. So the abundant mind always feels a sense of confidence and control that I can create that which I need for me, my family, my team, whatever. It doesn't mean it always goes perfectly, but, for instance, with my husband, he's a land developer, so if he comes home and says I'm looking at X, y, z pieces of property and this and this, and if I say, well, what's your plan B? He goes what do you mean?

Speaker 1:

Right, Because he doesn't have a plan B. Don't be silly, Sharon.

Speaker 2:

He knows plan A is going to work, but if he doesn't, he pivots so fast that plan B feels like plan A to him.

Speaker 2:

Because, what he doesn't realize is that when he's going after whatever he's going after, he's already building contingencies. Okay yeah, because in his he just does it like seamlessly, in a way that it doesn't look like a stop and start and there's not much. I very rarely see him disappointed. If a deal falls through, he'll just go oh well, I wasn't supposed to have that one, I'll go look at the next one. I don't have that because I'm a poverty family. I brought up where there wasn't literally enough food, and so I'm one that you know. While I have the entrepreneur spirit of I can create, there's also another part of me that's always worried Well, what if it doesn't work out? That's kind of a battle and something we kind of laugh about between us. Does that give you a sense? An example Absolutely.

Speaker 1:

It's a beautiful example, and it's a beautiful example too of that abundance mindset To me. I'm moving towards it, I would say, and I too grew up we didn't have towards it. I would say, and I too grew up, we didn't have a lot of money growing up and it was all those things right. So so I see scarcity in my whole family showing up in different ways. And when it comes to that abundance mindset, what it really looks like and feels like and sounds like like, if you could bottle that, how joyous would that be. You know, there I'm sure there's some challenges with that, but from his perspective there isn't, because he has, as you said, that confidence, that control that it's all going to be fine. And if it isn't fine, I'll go over here and it'll be fine. I just I, I admire that so much and I aspire to more of that right, to getting to more of that. I think that's a very joyous way to live.

Speaker 2:

I think it is, and we've had some real setbacks in our lives. You know we his company at one point was a joint venture company and someone embezzled everything. You know we really like lost everything back in the day and again, again he he looks at it it didn't, it didn't give him, um, there was none of the why. Didn't I see this coming? And you know I was not a good leader, I was not. It was like okay, what?

Speaker 2:

And this is crucial to development if we ask ourselves what did I learn from this? Because how we make meaning from something is what allows us to develop further rather than sit in the negative. You know aspects of oh my gosh, I failed and I should have seen. You know all the shoulds, all that stuff. We can make meaning from it. And that takes skill and talent to learn how to ask those questions and then really reflect. And that's when I think again, if people have had a significant setback, they need someone to walk alongside of them to help them. See, you know the opportunity in even. You know that loss or that, you know perceived failure.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, absolutely. And I think what's what is challenging about that, from from an outside view, is the reframing, the asking of the questions, the stepping back to say what do I learn? I think some people perceive oh, you're just trying to, you know, be be too optimistic. Oh, you're just trying to sugarcoat it, you're just trying to do this. And I think some people perceive that experience of going through it, reflecting, reflecting on it and, as you said, making meaning of it somehow feels like it's I don't even know the word to use not superficial or that it's not, it's not going to matter, that it doesn't matter, because they're so entrenched in what they believe the meaning of that thing is.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, yeah, and I always say because I think there's a grieving period when we have a loss or, you know, again, a perceived failure. So it's sort of like you know, you feel what you feel and you should allow yourself to experience those feelings, but then you just don't want to stay stuck too long and dwell on that, because if we don't make meaning from what happens, there's a very good chance we're going to repeat the same scenario. Yeah, and we don't want to. You know, it's sort of like you know the old joke that the guy that you know had the horrific marriage and then he keeps marrying the same type of woman over and over and over again. It's like, okay, it didn't work the first time and yet you're doing it again and again. And you know, but he can't see it's the same type of woman. He thinks it's a new experience because he didn't do the work to figure out what happened in the first marriage.

Speaker 2:

You know that's maybe not the best example, but I see that a lot in leadership as well. You keep hiring the same people, you keep attracting the same partners or the same vice presidents or whatever, and it's like I'm looking for people maybe just like me when I really need a more diverse team to see the things that I'm not good at or that I don't see.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, absolutely yeah. That's a great way of describing it and a great way of you know again, from the outside, looking in, you know what needs to shift and evolve in that human growth and development. My way of framing things needs to evolve. It needs to get more sophisticated. I need to be more introspective, in a way that's constructive and helpful and helps me go forward and eliminate some of those challenges that made my minute pattern of staying stuck in and without beating yourself up. Is there a point in that?

Speaker 2:

You know, I always tell my clients clients like you, you can call it whatever you want, and I call it my nerdiness. So it's up again like I'm, for whatever reason. I'm dealing with quite a few people right now that are struggling with comparison. Oh, and, you know, I think it's something that achievers struggle with and I was telling a client the other day, because I'm a new, relatively new golfer, I'm learning the game and it's a hard game and it's easy for me to go out on the course and start comparing myself to my co, you know, my, my other women that I'm playing with, but there's no point in that because all it does is take the energy away and the focus away from my own game. So you know, there's two ways to look at it.

Speaker 2:

I could use it to catapult me, you know, to be better, which is what I try to do. But then when I find myself you know someone, for instance, that started what I did is now doing better than me and I fall into that trap I'll just say, oh, my nerdiness showed up again. Yeah, that's the lower or earlier stage, sharon the achiever. Sharon, you know competitive Sharon, and you're not serving me right now. So step aside, let me go to my higher self and just hit the darn ball.

Speaker 1:

I love that and self-talk is important. I mean, that's how it shows up right to us. Is that self-talk? What are all the voices in our head and are you even paying attention to what you're saying to yourself and the effect of that? So I love that you're consciously labeling it and telling yourself like move on, hello, yeah, go this direction.

Speaker 2:

It's very helpful. I mean, whatever works, you know, whatever techniques we need to bring us to our highest potential, you know there's why not use them yeah, 100.

Speaker 1:

so you and you have um, you have resources for people, you have, uh, experiences for the leaders that you work with and describe a little bit of that. So, let's say, some of this is resonating with people who are listening to this episode. They're like, oh, this sounds interesting, or maybe I am stuck, or you know what are things that you offer that that I could access? That would be helpful, even you know. In addition, again, I haven't even read this, but I know it's going to be awesome. So I always like people reading books because I think it gives a good sense of some of the underpinnings and the foundations of the things that you're doing from a development standpoint, and everyone has challenges in thinking well, not everybody, but a lot about time and money and time and money together.

Speaker 2:

So I appreciate you mentioning the book, so one of the things that we created, because people always ask me how do I know what stage of development I'm at?

Speaker 2:

They're very intrigued about that, because we don't talk about it a lot out in the common workplace. We talk about other assessments, and the assessment there's there's several out there that were created by thought leaders through the years, and the assessment, though, is a little expensive because of the way that it's coded, and so you know there's ways to do that. But what we did was we created a simpler quiz that focuses on the six main stages that we would find people in in the workplace, and it's on my website. And for your people, because we're going to have an appearance page specific to your show, all they have to do is go to Sharon Spanocom forward slash intentional leaders, and they can access it's called the leader's edge, and then they'll get a report. It's all free. That will give them a sense of where they are Most of the time, what we call the center of gravity, because we move up and down in this little ladder of achievement, as I said, we like to talk about.

Speaker 2:

We can grow into higher ways of thinking, but then something happens I'm under stress, I have a loss.

Speaker 2:

We can also slip back down, and none of that is wrong, but there's usually two to three areas that we kind of move in and out of, and your primary one is what we call the center of gravity, where you are most of the time, and that's what the assessment will tell you.

Speaker 2:

So that's one thing, and the other thing I would say when you're asking me a bit about the process is what I've done is I've developed a hybrid of all my years of training and experience in corporate America Excuse me and so that's a 12-week process called Potential Unleashed. There's more about that on the website, but it's a one-on-one opportunity to work with me over the 12 weeks and we meet every week. It's very, very intense work. We're looking at where you are again, where you may be stuck. We're looking at it through these developmental lenses. Again, if there's trauma in the background and that can be anything, because trauma, again, is relative it can be something as simple as and believe me, I run into this a lot my, my father, died at seven and we never talked about him again.

Speaker 2:

Well for a boy that affects who you are in life. Or my parents got divorced when I was a teenager and we moved, and then I wasn't able to go to college because there was no money, you know, and so I became this achiever, you know. So there's all kinds of scenarios. None of them are wrong. They're just part of the human experience. But the beauty is exploring how that is translating into who you are in the here and now more familiar with trauma and the effect of trauma.

Speaker 1:

You said big T, little T. Can you just explain that for people who aren't familiar with that terminology, what that means? Because I think again similar to what you just said. I might have a lot of little T's in my life but I don't even think of them as trauma, I don't recognize the effect that they have. So just describe the difference so people can kind of understand that relative to themselves.

Speaker 2:

That's a great question because achievers often see even the big T's as little T's. They just move on. It'll come back to you later. It'll show up in your life later, if not earlier. So little T might be some of the things and again it's relative to the individual but little T might be some of the things I mentioned divorce my parents moved, I lost all my friends but I moved on and I didn't realize the impact of it. Like I have a client right now who is really still dealing with and didn't realize how much it impacted her that when she was in third grade one of the kids in school wasn't even her best friend got hit by a car and was killed and it's had a dramatic effect on her. So we're working through that. But then a big T might be the more obvious. You know I was a victim of incest.

Speaker 2:

You know I've had that with a client or I was raped, you know you know those are the ones that we're, we're, you know, we're more familiar with in our society that we know really impact people and most of the time, if people have had something like that happen you know not always, because sometimes even those things we don't ever talk about, but most of the time we know those are serious things we need to go get psychological help for and there is a time and a place for that. But I think to acknowledge that if there's something in your background and what I tell people is, you know, pay attention to your memories, because what comes up in your memories are are there for a reason. Yeah, you know, like I remember my parents getting a divorce and but it was. I was so young, it wasn't a big thing. But what I remember more importantly oddly as it sounds is my father not showing up at school for a father-daughter dance.

Speaker 2:

I was all dressed for. My grandmother made me this beautiful Valentine, you know, velvet dress, shoes and the whole thing, and my father, who was a functional alcoholic, forgot and never he just didn't show up. So that was a trauma for me in terms of my relationship with him, because it really told me you don't matter, you're not seen, and those are things that I had to work through, you know, later in life. So you know it might sound like a silly memory, but when I realized that memory is when I was starting to write one of my books, I was like, wow, this is still prevalent in my life, like I need to do some work around that.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, yeah, and I I just think that I feel strongly that honoring those and being transparent with those memories and recollections and then processing them in a healthy, helpful, supported way is vital to us. You know again, learning from them and shifting to, and I don't know, it's not. Is it forgiveness? Is it what is it that you would call that experience of looking at that trauma, understanding it and moving on from it? Or do we move on from it?

Speaker 2:

Well, here's the thing. Another aspect of my work is grounded in systems, not the typical systems. We all know the concrete systems, financial systems, whatever but human systems, yes. So human systems are alive and they tell their own story, and I do something called constellation work, which is a much bigger conversation, but it's a way that we map out the dynamics in the system. So it's very important to your point to lay down whatever is in that background, with respect to more specifically your parents.

Speaker 2:

We don't heal that relationship where actually part of us, half of us, is cut off, numbed, angry. You know there's all kinds of scenarios that come out of it. We talk about the four underlying loyalties often in my work because there's principles around human systems that I teach my clients. So when you can see, oh wow, this is. You know, in my case, as an example, I experienced what felt to me like rejection of a parent.

Speaker 1:

Yeah.

Speaker 2:

Therefore I rejected the parent. Yes, of course. Yeah. So then that has to be healed and there's many ways that we do that. But part of that was learning. It's not even because sometimes it's not appropriate to ask somebody to forgive a parent that that in itself can upset the system. Yeah, there's a lot I could be said about, could be said about that. But let's say, you're a victim of incest. There's no rhyme or reason for you to forgive the parent. But there is an opportunity to at least acknowledge the parent as the father or the mother, as someone important in the system, so that you yourself can heal. And that's a very deep and profound work. So there's very specific ways that we do that in the systemic mapping process or the constellation process, to help the individual see what's going on in that relationship, parent or otherwise, so that you can put that down. Because the only way that something new can emerge in a system is if we put to rest that which has been unsettled or disrupted.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, yeah, oh boy.

Speaker 2:

It's a lot. It's a lot to think about. It's the greatest joy of my life when I help someone discover that this is still a part of what's holding you back. Like I had a client last year that realized he had anger issues, but they weren't really anger issues for the typical reasons. They were coming from kind of like coming up out of nowhere. Issues for the typical reasons they were coming from, kind of like coming up out of nowhere. Then he realized they were attached to embarrassment because his parents didn't speak English. You know they were kind of dramatic people that used to embarrass him at school when he was a young kid and then he'd get angry. And so when we discovered it was really more about embarrassment, then we can talk about well, where are you getting embarrassed at work?

Speaker 2:

And then it's translated into anger Now he has a bigger understanding of himself in the context of human dynamics, such that he can make more you know, healthy choices.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, oh, sharon, your work is just fascinating, it fascinates me. Oh, sharon, your work is just fascinating, it fascinates me. And so so here's where my brain is going. How would someone know, like I want to work with Sharon because I think she can help me and get help me, get unstuck I'm. These things are coming up for me and I don't know where to turn. What would be, how would you characterize the work you do relative to a psychologist or psychiatrist?

Speaker 2:

characterize the work you do relative to a psychologist or a psychiatrist. Well, I think there's, as I said, a time and a place for psychologists and psychiatrists, and I purposely chose not to go into those fields because in my work the simplest way to say it is we don't dwell on the past.

Speaker 2:

We look backwards at that chapter just long enough again to make meaning from it so we can move forward. Yeah, and I'm not saying that there isn't a time, you know, to dwell on it. You know therapy is therapy, but we are learning, with more and more research, that talk talk therapy. In and of itself, one has the potential to re-traumatize a person to keep them stuck, because I go every week and I just talk about, oh, my victimization or whatever it is I mean.

Speaker 2:

I'm a big proponent of therapy and psychotherapy. I just told someone today that they needed to find a psychotherapist for someone in their family, but I don't know that it's always necessary. I think we're a society that wants to get the medication and the therapy. It's kind of a trend right now. I think of what I do as more about helping people develop to their highest potential. I mean, that's what all of my work is about, and so what I typically do is people go on my website. They can schedule a discovery call.

Speaker 2:

We talk first to see what's going on and is it a fit, the work a fit for you? And then, if it is, then we start the process of doing the deeper level intake. And then I go back and I develop a customized program. I have a. You know, the 12 week is a structure, but everything is customized to the individual. And then we begin from there where we meet every week and there's a whole process where I'm helping the client really learn to witness themselves in the moment.

Speaker 2:

Most of us have awareness after the fact and then we go into guilt and shame about oh, why did I say that in a meeting, or why did I say that to my boss or whatever. The key is to learn to witness yourself in the moment, so that you can self-correct in the moment. Then eventually, we don't even do those nerdy things again because we have such heightened awareness. That's where the whole transformation comes in. I'm now a different person who no longer gets angry when I'm embarrassed, or who doesn't even get embarrassed over silly things anymore, because I understand that that's a trigger for me and I don't even need to go there.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, yeah. The work you do is so profound and what I've enjoyed learning about you through our couple of discussions and I know I will continue to learn from you is that you know you've been on a journey, you've seen pain points, you've seen opportunities, but then you explore it like, hey, what's going on here? You know what happened, what didn't happen. How do I lay the groundwork to help people reflect on very, very complicated issues that can feel like maybe sometimes out of nowhere, they just show up Like I'm not happy, I need a new job, or I need to change my profession, or you, nowhere. They just show up Like I'm not happy, I need a new job, or I need to change my profession, or you know, whatever it might be, and they don't realize like, oh, there's a history and there's an exploration of self that needs to happen to move forward, to achieve a greater purpose and more fulfillment. And you're figuring all that out, which is just I love it.

Speaker 2:

And thank you for that summation because I truly feel privileged to do the work. It's like nothing was wasted all the stuff I did in my earlier careers down here. I'm not the most fun at cocktail parties because I'm always watching all the systems in the restaurant working and not working. I have to, you know, kind of control myself now, but I think what I would love everyone in your audience to know is that whatever is going on again, nothing is wasted and it's never too late for you to reinvent yourself.

Speaker 2:

Yes, that's, that's just the beauty of life, I mean, every day counts, every day is a new moment, every day is a new opportunity, and we just when we train ourselves to see it that way. Life is so exciting and it's not perfect, but it is more robust and meaningful absolutely Absolutely.

Speaker 1:

I was reading a I don't know what book it was, but it was about a gentleman in his 90s and he was reflecting on his ability to feel his emotions and he'd been cut off for them for you know his whole life and decided to explore that and went into that journey of transformation and how it affected his family and his relationship with his wife and and his whole feeling and purpose about his life.

Speaker 1:

And so I agree with you that it doesn't matter how old you are, it doesn't matter what you're doing, where you're at. That that deeper sense of fulfillment and purpose is available to all of us, of fulfillment and purpose is available to all of us and are we willing to do the work? And I you know my personal opinion is it's really hard to do that work on your own. But having a trusted partner, having someone who can explore it with you, and the qualities that you mentioned earlier around safety and grace and love and there's no shame in it is such an important part of having someone trusting to walk alongside you and that journey and support you in it. So I just honor what you're doing.

Speaker 2:

That's so true and I would add one more thing that the world needs us to be our highest self.

Speaker 2:

There's so much suffering and pain and chaos and every day it seems to look worse and worse. So the only way that we can make the world better is by each of us being our best self, because then we're touching all these other lives. I feel that when I work with a leader and one of the greatest compliments I ever got Father's Day one of my clients boxed me and said I'm a better father because of your guidance. That that means everything to me, because I want it to be a great. You know he's built this huge company and he's an effective leader. And, yeah, we can work on those things and how to help you even be more effective. But if I can help someone be a better parent or a better friend or, you know, a better spouse or significant other that you know there's, I mean you're talking generational shifts, because I'm very much about you know, I'm very aware of generational trauma and the impact of that, and so, if we can be, I always tell my clients you can be the change maker.

Speaker 2:

We need you to be the change maker, and that's just so powerful when you can see that start to happen in a business as well as a family.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, what a beautiful story to share. To that email, I'm sure was was very profound, I'm sure. Yeah, so Well, and I appreciate and honor what you're doing, as I mentioned, but thank you for taking the time to be with me today. Really, I've loved getting to know you. I will, of course, be stalking you.

Speaker 2:

I think we have a lot in common.

Speaker 1:

Yes, I think we do as well. I think we do as well and I just I've got goosebumps this whole time as I'm writing things down that you said, that I want to remember and I want to reflect on, not just for the work that I do, but for myself as well. So thank you for touching my life and allowing me the opportunity to just push a little bit of pause and think about those transformations for me, because then I can show up as my best self, and that's really what my purpose is. Thank you for that.

Speaker 2:

Yes, thank you so much, cindy. I appreciate your great interview and you asked really good questions and I appreciate the opportunity to talk about my work with you. It's very special. I'm honored, thank you.

Speaker 1:

Wasn't that an interesting discussion. I wrote down so many words as I was trying to take notes and listen to Dr Sharon, passionate, motivated by trauma, defining our purpose people wanting to be seen. We need to look back in order to move forward, all these kinds of aspects of human development. And are you developing? Are you stuck and do you know? And I think so many of those questions are so important for us to explore for ourselves and as a leader and coach for other people as well. So I hope that this podcast episode prompted you to think a little bit about that, for yourself, but also for others that you work with.

Speaker 1:

And when she talks about scarcity versus abundance, are you mindfully and are you consciously aware of what you are choosing and I think that's something that you can observe for the next week or two weeks is when do you operate from a sense of scarcity that isn't even that hard to say and I've been there right Like, oh, there's not enough time, oh, there's not enough money, there's not enough resources, I need to protect what I have, versus opening yourself up to abundance and saying there's always enough time, there's always enough resources, there's always enough money to do what I want to do or I figure out how to get more, and that's available to me.

Speaker 1:

I love that mindset and the difference between scarcity and abundance because it affects how we live our life and how we operate at work every single day. So lead into that in the next week. Think about your intentionality with scarcity, with purpose, with abundance, and just noodle around, observe other people and things that you see, or hear them, and start characterizing that right. The more that we can observe it, not with judgment, but with understanding and compassion and kindness and interest and curiosity, that can be a great place to be. All right, if you liked this episode, please, please, please, share it with others, leave a review, leave a comment, and that's an opportunity for us to get these messages out to more people and create more intentional leaders in the universe, and that's my goal. Until next time, take care of yourself and be intentional.