There are days when leadership feels less like a calling and more like carrying a mountain on your back. In those low points, when you want to quit, it's not a sign of weakness; it’s a signal to pause. I use a simple two-question practice: 1. "Whose thought is this?" Is it my inner saboteur, "Annie," who is the source of my internal drains, or my authentic voice? 2. "What would my 80-year-old self tell me?" This practice, an Ensō Pause to check for alignment, has carried me through countless storms, including leaving the corporate world when Annie's voice was loudest. It’s a framework for choosing courage over comfort and ensuring the story you write is one you'll be proud of...

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Ask yourself this: When someone asks why you do what you do, do you speak with ease—or do you find yourself justifying it?

If it’s the latter, your truth is still under construction.

And that’s okay. That realization, between needing to explain and the knowing, is where real alignment begins.

When your "why" is fully from the heart, it flows out of you with ease. You speak it and everyone in the room feels its truth. Why is that you wonder? Because it's anchored in your emotional truth. You don’t need a script—YOU become the message.

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Last week, I hit the ebb. The wave I’d been riding—the ideas, the energy, the progress—started to fade. I felt stuck. Not broken, but heavy. Like I was paddling hard with no momentum behind me.

Instead of forcing my way forward, I did something I rarely used to: I paused. I listened. I looked at the data, my rhythms, and what nature always teaches—after the swell comes stillness.

In Japanese philosophy, there’s a word: 間 (Ma). It’s the space between things—not empty, but full of possibility. The kanji shows a gate, with sunlight shining through. It’s the pause that lets the light back in.

This week, I remembered: you don’t lose progress in the pause. You find your power there. Read More…

My journey with the Ensō Mindset began with the quiet presence of my Jiichan, my Japanese grandfather. Though I never watched him practice calligraphy, I can imagine his brush moving across the canvas, creating bold strokes in his shodō paintings—an artist and a businessman shaping the world with deliberate, intentional movement. His art, now in my hands, became the inspiration for how I understood leadership, resilience, and ultimately, how my own brain worked.

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