Chinyere Oparah offers tips to conquer anxiety about the upcoming year and inspires leaders to take bold and creative action.
What will 2025 bring? It is tempting to start the year by scanning the horizon in search of threats to be mitigated and challenges to be overcome. But if we take that approach, we will inevitably adopt a defensive and fear-based stance that stifles our natural potential for joy and creativity.
Perhaps you are thinking: I have every reason to be cautious, if not downright terrified. I just don’t know what this administration will do to higher education, health care, funding for the arts and sciences, and sorely needed public services. The backlash against DEI continues to threaten leaders of color and all those who care about equity. And with more cherished institutions closing than ever before, I don’t even know if my job is secure!
Yes, these are fearful times. And in such times, it makes sense that you may want to shrink a little, put up the armor and hunker down. The field of affective neuroscience helps us to understand that these instincts are hardwired into our subconscious in a sort of “survival intelligence” that has us constantly scanning for and responding to perceived danger. These processes often happen below the level of awareness. Look for signs of fight (throwing yourself at your to do list, or snapping irritably at loved ones), flight (feeling avoidant about the work ahead or fantasizing about quitting) and freeze (finding it hard to get started, procrastinating) in yourself and those around you as we re-renter the workplace post holidays.
So, evolution has gifted us an incredible ability to predict and thus hopefully avoid harm. But this system also tends to hijack our energy and attention, preventing higher level cognitive processes, like creativity, connection, humor and reflection.
The paradox is this. When things are difficult, complex and unscripted, our survival intelligence is triggered and goes into hyperdrive. But in reality, this is precisely the moment when our fear-based responses are the least useful.
Thankfully, we are not victims of our neurobiology and we have the power to make different choices about how we think and act. And the first step is making a choice. You can choose to scan the horizon for the dark looming clouds, or you can scan for the amazing possibilities that lie ahead. You can focus on anticipating legislation that will defund and disempower those you serve, or you can celebrate the resilience and power of those same communities.
And then you can make the most radical choice. The one that changes everything. You can choose to act from a place of courage not from fear.
Let me dispel a few misconceptions about courage. First, courage is not a personality trait. Feeling anxious and fearful is not the opposite of being courageous, it is simply a sign of being human. We all experience fear, and noticing it is evidence of your ability to get in touch with your inner emotional weather. Like weather, emotions change and this ever shifting inner life is a beautiful and necessary part of our humanity.
I am not inviting you to become an unfeeling robot or even superhuman. But I am inviting you to recognize the power of your intentions. If you set the intention of behaving boldly and courageously, share that intention with others for accountability, and take action, then chances are that is how you will show up.
So ask yourself now: What would I do now if I were not afraid?
If you were not afraid of losing funding or losing your job, not afraid of the enrollment cliff, not afraid of closures and mergers, not afraid of what the T administration has in store; add your own fears to this list.
What are you not doing because you are afraid?
What would you be free to do if that fear were gone?
Would you pull a group of brilliant people together to design something powerful and new? Write the book you’ve been putting off? Quit your job and start a business? Talk to a search firm about becoming a college president? Go trekking with mountain gorillas? (My personal bucket list goal for 2025).
Your heart knows the answer.
Ask yourself that question. And when you get the answer, go and do it!
And if that seems overwhelming, build a support team around your bold and courageous action. Get a coach. Take it to a support and accountability group. Talk to your spiritual advisor.
What will 2025 bring? The most empowered and limitless version of you! Confident, creative, courageous, and joyful. Doing what only you are uniquely here to do.
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Chinyere Oparah is an executive coach, strategist and educator. She has served in senior leadership roles in the nonprofit and higher education sectors, including dean, provost and vice president for academic affairs for over three decades and is the founder and CEO of the Center for Liberated Leadership.
About the Center for Liberated Leadership
The Center for Liberated Leadership connects and supports BIPOC, women, LGBTQ and equity-oriented leaders so that they can lead with authenticity, purpose and joy. Executive coaching helps leaders navigate complex contexts and relentless workloads. Sign up for a free consultation to learn more here.
Image courtesy: https://mindfulambition.net