Harry Potter and Leadership

YOUR FEAR RADAR

Whether you intend to or not, you navigate your world in a way that will keep you safe.?(And this is a good thing! Or, you wouldn't be reading this!)

That means, you have a radar for danger.

When your radar senses danger, it alerts you to it by triggering your fear response.

Your fear radar steers you clear of the danger.

It's a great system!

But what happens when those fears steer you clear from thoughts and actions that aren't mortally dangerous and will help you make better decisions as a leader?

For example:

• Fear of failure keeps you from moving forward with a new project.
• Fear of upsetting others keeps you from having difficult conversations.
• Fear of losing money or not being good enough creates stress that seeps into all your communication with your team or your company culture.

Then that radar for fear that keeps you safe is not serving your best interests!

If you were a nail, then you’d see everything as if it could be a hammer about to strike.?

As a human, you may not fear a hammer, but you are still using your fear radar to monitor your environment for what could hurt you.?

Imagine if nails had a fear response how they'd be acting every time they saw something that looked like a hammer?

Your fear is in the way of your best leadership.?

So what can you do?

THE BOGGART

In the world of Harry Potter, there is a shape shifting Boggart that takes the shape of the students’ fears in the world of Harry Potter.?

• When a student who fears a mean teacher faces the Boggart, the Boggart takes the shape of the mean teacher.?
• When a student who fears spiders faces the Boggart, the Boggart takes the shape of a spider.?
• When a student who fears mummies faces the Boggart, the Boggart takes the shape of the mummy.?

In Harry Potter, the professor teaches the students the spell for disarming the Boggart. It is the same spell we can use to overcome our fears.?

It is the Riddikulus spell.?

Here is how it works:?

The student imagines something that makes what they fear look ridiculous.?

• The mean teacher dressed like a grandmother.?
• The spiders in rollerskates
• The mummy unraveling.?

Bringing amusement or any positive emotion forward in your mind is a wonderful antidote to fear.?

Positive emotions are magical!?

CREATING YOUR RIDDIKULUS SPELL

You have already experienced a human version of the “Riddikulus spell” somewhere in your life.?

Maybe it was when you were in a boring math class with the teacher droning on. Then someone made a surprising joke out of nowhere that made the class laugh. The class gave attention to the joke cracking student which changed the whole atmosphere of the class.?

Or when you’ve been in a room and someone else bursts into it with wonderful news. Beaming, excited and full of joy with news of a wedding engagement, a baby on the way or a new job.?

There has been a time when you were having a bad day, but then you had lunch or hung out with some friends who made you laugh and you felt a lot better.?

Typically, we think the environment affects our emotions.?

We completely underestimate our own power to use the Riddikulus spell to elevate our own emotions and disarm our fears.?

DEMENTORS?

The most powerful example that the world of Harry Potter gives us as to how we can overcome our darkest fears is through the story of the dementors.?

Dementors are dark creatures that suck all the happiness of life from a person and leave them only with their fears and darkest emotions.?

Harry fears the dementors most of all.

He fears fear itself.?

The spell for driving away the dementors is the Patronus charm.?

The Patronus charm elicits a bright white light and an animal form that protects against dementors.?

CREATING YOUR PATRONUS CHARM

And how do you conjure a Patronus charm??

By bringing to the foreground of your mind your inner love and joy.

Think of a time when you were so elated that bad news couldn’t bring you down. You were too high on whatever amazing joyous thing had just happened that you didn’t register or care that much about the negative thing.?

It takes practice to be skillful at creating the Patronus charm. Both in the world of Harry Potter and in real life.?

It’s about finding memories, stories and people that bring you joy, love and inspiration and bringing them to the front of your mind again and again.?

The good news is that the better you get at it, the easier it is to access that energy when you need it and the powerful the energy becomes.?

MAKE THIS WORK FOR YOU?

What is the? greatest source of happiness in your life??

What memories, current things, stories, events, people, or places.??

And, what will you do to cultivate your Patronus powers so you can be powerful in the face of your own fears??

The next time your fears slow you down from moving forward with a new project, having difficult conversations or fear generates stress that is sabotaging your leadership, remember the Riddikulus spell and the Patronus charm.?

For more practice cultivating your Riddikulus spell and Patronus charm join me for my next Masterclass: Leading with Impact on Sunday, February 26th at 10am PT

Click here to register: https://www.dhirubhai.net/video/event/urn:li:ugcPost:7018734741671604224/ .