Team,

I want to tell you about a sticky note (yes, a STICKY NOTE) that fundamentally changed how I show up as a leader.

When I first started leading my very first company, I had no idea what I was doing.

I was 23. And I wore my heart on my sleeve and just desired to be a good leader more than anything (and also make sure everything went PERFECTLY)

If something pissed me off in a meeting, my face showed it. If I was stressed, everyone knew it. If I was having a bad day, the whole team felt it.

People would constantly ask me: "Are you okay? Is everything okay? Is something wrong?"

Here's what I didn't realize: I was being selfish.

By letting my feelings dictate how I showed up, I was dictating how THEY felt when they were around me.

My team was walking on eggshells, wondering "Is she in a good mood or bad mood today?"

One day, after yet another meeting where someone asked if I was okay, I'd had enough. Not of them… of myself.

I grabbed a sticky note and wrote two words: BE NEUTRAL.

I stuck it on my computer where I'd see it during every virtual meeting.

For the next three weeks, that sticky note stared at me.

When someone delivered bad news that made me want to scream, I'd see it: be neutral.
When something went wrong that stressed me out, there it was: be neutral.

I wanted to be levelheaded. Steady. A rock for my team. 

Because here's what I realized: The best leaders you've ever had -the ones you absolutely rely on..they're not emotional roller coasters. They're consistent. They're the people who don't dump their emotions on you.

You know why the best ship captains supposedly wore red shirts and brown pants?

So their crew couldn't see if they were bleeding or shitting themselves.

Because the team's mood is dictated by the leader's mood. If the captain panics, the whole ship panics. If the captain bleeds fear, the crew drowns in it.

But here's where most people get this wrong...

They think being neutral means suppressing your emotions. That's not it at all.

If I was off, I'd acknowledge it. But I wouldn't make it their problem.

Three sentences. That's it.

What happened? My team stopped walking on eggshells. They stopped wondering if my mood was about them. They stopped trying to read my face for clues about whether they'd screwed up.

Instead, they started bringing me real problems. Hard conversations. The stuff that actually mattered.

Here's the framework I use now:

Because here's the brutal truth:

Success isn't based on how you feel. It's based on what you do, regardless of how you feel :)

There are days I don't want to do what's required. Days where everything feels hard. Days where I want to cancel everything and curl up in my bed under the blanket. Shit, I didn’t feel like writing this today!

But I think about what story I want to tell about this moment 6 months from now. A year from now. A decade from now.

Do I want to say I let my feelings dictate my behavior? Or that I showed up anyway?

The irony is this:

The more transparent I became about having feelings, the less those feelings controlled me.

When you hide that you're struggling, your team knows anyway. They just don't know WHY. So they assume it's about them. They assume they've failed. They assume you don't trust them.

But when you say "I'm exhausted today but let's get this done," you permit them to be human too.

You show them that having feelings is normal. Following through anyway is what makes you exceptional.

I still have that sticky note. Not on my computer anymore - I don't need it there. But I keep it in my desk drawer as a reminder of who I used to be and who I chose to become.

Because learning to be neutral didn't make me emotionless. It made me unstoppable.

F*ck your mood, follow the plan - LFG.

Have a great week 🙏🏼

-Leila