Coaching Metta Blog

“I didn’t even realize that I wanted this promotion until someone else got it.” That came up when I was talking with Brittanni Hendricks on Midlife Remix, and she hears some version of it regularly from high performers. I keep coming back to it because it names what happens to the executives I coach, who have managed their own wanting for so long that, when it surfaces, someone else is already in the role.

While I was loving Kade without any expectation of who he would become, I was not doing the same for my oldest child. I was doing what a lot of parents do, especially parents who have achieved some professional success and are still carrying their own unresolved stuff. A lot of my ambition and struggles have been driven by trying to prove my worth to my parents, and, without realizing it, I was passing that same dynamic on to my own kid. Our children don't learn from what we

Thomas had that question forced on him in the most extreme way possible. In 2021, he was six months from the exact age his father was when he died, and his grandfather before him. When he had a heart attack.

Most of the leaders I work with aren't stuck because they lack strategy. They're stuck because busyness has become the thing that keeps them from noticing what's actually driving their decisions — and it doesn't feel like avoidance. It feels ike responsibility.

For twenty years, I did what most driven leaders do: I worked harder, earned more, rose higher, and assumed I’d eventually arrive at a life that felt right. And by most measures, it worked. I had the career I’d been building toward since my twenties. 

Joao Viana left a successful corporate career and created something that didn’t exist before. He called it Walking Mentorship. He walks alongside people for seven days through places like the Camino de Santiago. Not as a guide. As a thinking companion. And what he’s found after hundreds of walks is that the insights that change people aren’t dramatic. Slowly, one day at a time, until you look back and realize you’re facing a completely different direction.

The behaviors that got you here, the control, the drive, the need to be the one with the answers, didn't just become habits. They became how you understand your own value. So when something asks you to let go of them, it doesn't feel inefficient. It feels like a threat to who you are.

That response is cortisol—a hormone designed to help us escape predators. Tens of thousands of years ago, when a sabertooth tiger chased us, cortisol flooded our system, shutting down digestion, immune function, and anything else that wasn't essential for survival. The system was built for threats that resolve in minutes. When cortisol stays elevated for months, it stops protecting us and starts breaking us down.

He shared that leadership teams increasingly recognize that inner work is closely tied to high performance. He also offered insights on noticing when you’re avoiding feelings, blaming instead of taking responsibility, clinging to being right instead of staying curious, and developing awareness through meditation—all of which transformed not only my perspective on leadership but also how I engage day to day.

You have established credibility, effectively led your team, and achieved steady results. However, if you aim to advance further, whether as a CEO, in any executive role, or to gain true enterprise influence, the same strategies that brought you success could now be limiting. Constant execution and the need to be involved in every detail, fueled by a desire to demonstrate your value, might become obstacles to your growth.

In a recent podcast conversation, I spoke with contemplative psychotherapist David Redish about how psychedelics and meditation can support people navigating these midlife transitions. Not as escapes, but as tools for awareness and reflection.

In my coaching practice, I work with capable, emotionally intelligent leaders who are often overlooked, not because they lack results, but because they don’t dominate meetings or make everything about themselves. Many of them work for narcissistic bosses, leaders who avoid responsibility, take credit for others’ work, and care more about optics than outcomes. 

What happens when the life you've built starts to feel disconnected from the person you're becoming?

I don’t know how this past year was for you, but for many of us, it was unsettling. Tumultuous in ways we didn’t expect. The kind of year that looks at your carefully constructed life and asks us questions on who we are, what we value, and what’s no longer working.  And while that kind of year can leave us feeling disoriented, it can also open up space to reflect, to learn, and to grow in ways we never would have chosen, but apparently have to deal with anyway. 

At some point in our 40s or 50s, a question begins to surface: Is this really it? We’ve played the roles, built the career, supported the family, stayed the course. But at some point, the math stops adding up. That was true for me in 2025. And as I talked with others this year, clients, friends, and guests on The Midlife Remix, I realized just how many of us are navigating the same issue. This year, I wanted to step back to reflect. To look closely at what shifted for me,

In midlife, many of us begin to feel a tension between seeking comfort and security—staying with what we know and what feels predictable in our work and lives. Another part of us desires growth and change, not just for novelty but to live and work more in line with who we truly want to be. What seems responsible is often simply what feels safe. The real challenge is recognizing when responsibility shifts from a genuine choice to a way of choosing security over alignment.

Most people don’t walk away from a powerful title and a big paycheck. And even fewer talk openly about what comes after. That’s why this conversation with Paul Hatch felt so important. If you know Paul, you know he’s always been sharp, driven, and steady under pressure. But the honesty he brought into this episode surprised me. It’s the kind of clarity that comes only from hitting a few walls, learning from them, and choosing a different way forward.

We’re living through a moment where the systems many of us relied on, work, institutions, routines, and expectations, feel less stable than they once did. The shift isn’t personal; it’s structural. Technology is accelerating everything, institutions are strained, and the traditional indicators of security no longer apply in the same way. People feel this in their careers, their identities, and the choices they’re being asked to make in midlife.

We hear the word 'midlife'  and immediately think 'crisis' . The sports car, the divorce, the panic that life is over. But what if midlife isn't about falling apart, but about finally understanding what is important to you in life? Over the past year on the podcast, I’ve spoken with people who’ve done precisely that. In this episode, I feature conversations with Larry Kihlstadius, Paul Hatch, Kim Mustin, and Mike Ma.  They stopped pursuing someone else’s idea of success and s

Gordon Gekko speech from Wall Street At some point in your career or your life, you start asking different questions. Not How do I get ahead? But What am I building? Not How do I lead others? But Am I leading in a way that actually feels like me? This shift rarely happens overnight. It develops gradually, often through fatigue or underlying restlessness: There’s got to be more than this. You might know the feeling. You’ve done the work, built the resume, and earned the respec