(This article was originally posted on The Voice Nook on Substack.)

Hi friend,

Two weeks ago, I co-facilitated a leadership workshop with a colleague of mine. We discussed the importance of self-awareness and awareness of others as key leadership tools. We explored how these tools drive psychological safety, motivation, and engagement, along with offering some ways to practice weaving more of both into daily work lives.

What I always find striking when I step outside of my InnerVoice Studio bubble is how new it is to so many people that both self-awareness and awareness of others are skills that can be practiced—and that when they are practiced, there are immediate and tangible positive results.

Conflicts resolve, collaboration improves, turnover reduces, and loyalty increases.

Even with all these affirming outcomes, it can still be difficult to recognize and incorporate these practices.

I think that’s because there is another significant element that precedes any sort of awareness-building practice: self-responsibility.

There are a range of complex and justifiable reasons why people may not step into self-responsibility for building self-awareness and awareness of others, including things like general unwillingness, resentment, inability, lack of support, fear, socio-economic location, or structural power imbalances, to name a few.

Self-responsibility is difficult.

Self-responsibility requires energy and effort.

Self-responsibility requires a belief that new things can be possible for the person claiming it.

That last statement is a vital piece because very often we’ve been programmed to believe that even if we are aware—of ourselves, each other, or the situation, there is nothing we can do anyway.

We feel we have no authority, we won’t be believed, we don’t have the tools, etc.

There are many things in this world we cannot personally change or impact.

At the same time, there are many things we can.

When I speak of self-responsibility, it is not a moral demand to ‘fix yourself to fix the world’. Rather, it is an invitation back to the truest and most loving form of self—a reminder that we belong to ourselves first.

Our inner world belongs to us. The way we show up in relationship with others belongs to us. When we reclaim this knowing, we reclaim our agency and sovereignty, and thus we reclaim our ability to impact our own lives and our surroundings.

This is where the conversation gets a little bigger, because the impact of self-responsibility, self-awareness and awareness of others doesn’t stop at the individual level. Rather, it starts there.

The communities and institutions that we live within are shaped by the ways we show up within them.

According to Miranda Fricker, “social power is a capacity we have as social agents to influence how things go in the social world” and “any operation of power is dependent upon the context of a functioning social world — shared institutions, shared meanings, shared expectations, and so on.”*

We, as social agents, have social power.

When we take responsibility for ourselves, we influence the larger systems.

This is not to imply that self-responsibility alone replaces structural change.

Structural change does, however, require self-responsible people to participate in it.

Our influence begins in the most immediate place: ourselves. We have an active role to play in the process. Understanding ourselves — and how we uphold or disrupt the systems we live in — is an essential element of contributing to change.

Going back to the workshop, if it’s true that each of us becoming a little more self-responsible and aware creates meaningful improvements in the workplace, what might it accomplish in our communities?

We are who we are wherever we go. This means that what we practice and embody in the workplace or at home will scale to how we show up in the world at large.

This is where inner work becomes civic work.

Thomas Ehrlich, a highly respected scholar of civic engagement and civic education, offers this perspective**:

“Civic engagement is working to make a difference in the civic life of our communities and developing the combination of knowledge, skills, values, and motivation to make that difference.”

Thomas Ehrlich

Through the lens of self-responsibility, self-awareness, and awareness of others, I see it like this:

Inner level = How I relate to myself.

Relational level = How I relate to you.

Civic level = How we relate as a collective.

Let’s break that down a little more:

Inner level:

The first question in any kind of change work is, “how am I showing up in this?”

This gives me greater agency because a clearer understanding of what I’m doing and why allows me to modify, learn, unlearn, evolve, and change my beliefs and behavior as necessary.

Relational level:

Doing inner work helps me understand how what I am saying or doing may be a specific reaction to what you are saying and doing, which gives me more choice in how I show up—if, of course, I’m willing to take responsibility for myself.

It also reminds me that you are also a ‘self’ with your own inner drivers, which opens me up to empathy, connection, and constructive dialogue.

Civic level:

When we do all this, we change our relational patterns.

When we repeat these new relational patterns throughout the different areas of our lives, we influence the relational culture within them.

All this work builds the knowledge and skills needed to make that difference in the community in ways that align with our values — if we choose to step into that responsibility.

This is what I return to whenever I feel powerlessness or overwhelm creeping in.

It’s also what I commit to when deciding where to focus my intention and creative energy. I start by reclaiming my agency in myself and my corner of the world, shaping the parts I can into what I hope to see in the wider world.

One final important note: self-responsibility doesn’t require perfection.

It requires courage and curiosity.

What are your thoughts?

In what ways are you already practicing these things? In what ways would you like to improve?

Reply to this message to reach me privately. Or book a call here, if you’d like support exploring any of this more deeply in your own life. ❤️

Thank you for being on this path together!

*Fricker, Miranda. Epistemic Injustice: Power and the Ethics of Knowing. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007.

**Ehrlich, Thomas, ed. Civic Responsibility and Higher Education. Phoenix: Oryx Press, 2000.