EP 148 | Putting Your Ego Aside to Really Feel Alive

Have you ever had a moment where your pride got the best of you?  In this week’s episode, host Lisa Tarkington dives into a topic not usually talked about - our egos and how they can hold us back. Drawing from personal experiences, Lisa reflects on moments where her ego got in her way and shares her insights and tips to help you let go of yours and reach your full potential!

Tune in to discover how letting go of your ego can empower you to embrace confidence!

Chapters:

• 00:00 - Intro
• 06:10 - What is Ego?
• 8:47 - How Lisa Let Go of Her Ego 
• 19:18 - Checking Your Ego for Personal Growth
• 24:50 - Key Takeaways & Outro

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Transcript

Lisa Tarkington: 0:00

I want you to talk about yourself here, right, like it's so easy to point out all everybody else's stuff, but it's about noticing, like, well, how am I showing up with my ego sometimes? How am I allowing myself to not get comfortable with the uncomfortable, get out of my own way? How do I allow other people to succeed? And if I want to start a new venture, how do I be okay and humbled that I don't know at all, and that's okay. Welcome to the Confident Podcast. I am Lisa Tarkington, your host of this podcast. If you found yourself hitting play on this podcast, it means it was meant for you. My goal is to help empower and guide you to become a better version of yourself through conversation, advice and tips that are real, vulnerable and authentic. I am excited to have you join this journey with me, so let's get started.

Lisa Tarkington: 0:49

Hey everybody, welcome back for another episode of the Confident Podcast. I am your host, lisa Tarkington, and we are gonna be talking about some new content that I've never talked about on this show before, so I'm really excited to dive into that today. So, when you're thinking about making decisions in your life or things that maybe held you back, I want you to think of the word that we don't always think about, and that word is ego. Sometimes our egos get in the way of us reaching our full potential, following our dreams, allowing ourselves to step back and smell the flowers and a variety of other things. So it's gonna be really great to tune in and stay, because all about this ego stuff is really gonna show up today, talking about my own experience of when my ego got in my own way, but also tools and tips to help you with your ego, because, man, I do not want that to be the reason why you miss out on being the most confident self that you could be. But before we dive into all of this about ego, like I always say, I'm so honored to be here, I'm honored to be the host of this podcast and to be talking to you about all the things to really help you gain confidence.

Lisa Tarkington: 2:02

Right before I got on here to record, I actually had a mom reach out already asking hey, I have some other questions about how to gain confidence for my kid. I had four people call me yesterday asking as well, and so if you have not thought about coaching when it comes to confidence, I highly recommend it. It is really important that we take our confidence seriously, and I say that because the more that I talk to leaders within organizations, people that work in HR, that seems to be the one constant conversation that comes up is my employees do not have confidence, or they are struggling here or they came from a place where someone kind of brought them down. I need help having them kind of re-energize that confidence from within. So if you've never thought about coaching, please consider it. I am a coach, along with so many amazing other coaches in the world, so there are so many people out there that can help you whenever you're struggling. And with that, it's been really cool to see my own confidence grow in everything that I'm doing. I've talked a lot on this podcast about my own struggles, about things that I'm lacking, and it's been really interesting for me to see the evolution of myself over time, seeing where my confidence shines. And it's really whenever I'm doing a workshop, whenever I'm keynoting, whenever I'm coaching, and it's so fun to see myself get energized over those things. So if you haven't thought about like, well, what am I the most confident in, I want you to think about those things. That kind of like light you up and get you excited throughout the day. So for me, whenever I do like a keynote or something, it's a lot of energy, right, it takes a lot out of me, but on the back end I'm always just so much more uplifted because I know that I'm truly confident in what I do. I'm living out my passion and my purpose, and that's what I want for all of you guys tuning in.

Lisa Tarkington: 4:02

A couple of weeks ago, I shared on this podcast that my word of the year was discipline, and it is still my word. It's still something that I continue to do. I actually have it on my bracelet. I have discipline written on it because it's a reminder of me, of the word that I picked for the year and also what I really want to hold for myself. It's funny yesterday, or maybe it was a couple of days ago I actually read this quote about discipline and self-love and how all of it relates, and it couldn't be more true. And so for me, sticking to that word and reflecting on that has been really important, having check-ins with myself when I noticed that I'm kind of going off that word or going off discipline. I have to have that check back in with me, and that actually happened last week I was going to run some errands for my organization and I was like I'll just do that later and it kind of like reminded me of, well, I don't want to work all my weekends anymore.

Lisa Tarkington: 4:55

The point of having this discipline was to have more structure, to be more disciplined within my day and not just piling everything up later. And so just a reflection or reminder to you that if you have thought of a word for yourself this year, how's that going? Check in with yourself, have that reflection. I think so many times we said all of these things but we don't reflect on them, and that is basically a game changer. When you think about your confidence, when you think about where you wanna go, making sure that you are checking in, having those reflections, and it's okay to move right, like our journeys are always up and flowing, and that's what I want for all of you to know that it's okay to not move forward with something that doesn't work for you anymore, but as long as you're not copying out of it, right, and so for me, discipline continues to work for me. I just have to be true to it.

Lisa Tarkington: 5:49

Same thing with the goals that I set for myself this year. I actually have them all written out on my office wall. I have four post-it notes and they're all sectioned off based off topic and I have some that I actually do end of March and it's been really cool to be able to check them off. So I have one, one and a half goals left to go, but it's really cool to have that visual for me to remind myself like these are my priorities, these are the things that matter, and it's been really cool because I'm watching them just kind of flow into happening right, like I'm setting out for them, but at the same time, it's been really cool to see the ease and flow of them and which I want for all of you when you're setting your goals.

Lisa Tarkington: 6:34

So we're gonna dive into this topic. We're gonna dive into putting your ego aside to really feel alive, and so recently I was talking to a few different clients and just some professionals in general, and one of the things that continues to come up is their ego, or other people's egos as well. And so I read this headline the other day when I was like really thinking about this and being like okay, like why do egos show up for people? And it said ego is the enemy of good leadership and I read that and I spent some time reflecting on that and thinking about my own journey when it comes to ego and how that really comes into play.

Lisa Tarkington: 7:16

And many times when we kind of move up in the ranks of an organization, we kind of get quote unquote a little bit more power, right. And so with that, more people are coming to us trying to stroke our ego a little bit, kind of do more things for us and kind of in the sense, like you should be delegating, not telling people what to do, but having those conversations. And so a lot of times people are kind of like tickling our ego a little bit, and what that happens is, if that you don't have your ego in check, it's really easy to get caught up in it, in not being able to get out of your own way. And so when you're thinking about it, thinking about an inflated ego, it's when we start to treat people disrespectfully, when we don't allow other people to take control of something because we wanna hold on to it, and a lot of these things cause us to lose perspective of leadership and it kind of loses our perspective of why we moved up, why we were trying to become a leader and what our purpose is. And I see this more and more with individuals across the board when their ego kind of gets in the way of what truly matters. And that also can happen when something is not needed for us anymore, when it's not important for us anymore, but we don't know how to let go because our ego is so wrapped up into it. And so I'm gonna share with you guys some pretty vulnerable times where my ego has taken over. So it's gonna be some that were years ago and then some that have been probably in the last two years, probably because I have a lot more self-awareness, I realize how much my ego need to be checked. But I'm gonna start with high school.

Lisa Tarkington: 9:02

So high school is a time of my life where people probably thought I fit in. I did not feel like I fit in, but I think that sometimes, when you don't think you fit in, people are seeing you over here with this group and this group and they think that you do. But for me, I just really always felt like I wasn't fitting in. But at the same time I think I had a bigger big of an ego issue as well when it came to certain things I wasn't really open to some people's ideas. I was very much different levels, like I was VP of student council and things like that of my class, and I always just felt like leadership was. In a way, I was probably a little bit more bossy than I should have needed to be and I wasn't really a team player sometimes. Now there were other times where I was, but I think I wish someone would have checked my ego A long time ago when I was in high school, because I didn't understand that the difference between having an ego and what real leadership looked like.

Lisa Tarkington: 10:06

I was the one that was leading because I was really good at delegating, I was really good at bringing people together, but at the same time, I also probably didn't listen to everybody's opinions. I probably didn't look at people's strengths versus their weaknesses. I probably didn't lift people up like they needed to and I kind of lost the perspective of why I was doing what I was doing and also my ego kind of was there of what can I put on my resume to look really good to colleges, and so I lost the viewpoint and the perspective of why I was there, and so if you have a child, that might be having the same ego issues that I'm having or I had when I was in high school. I highly recommend having a conversation with them, teaching them the difference between a good leader and a bad leader, maybe some of your own experiences of when ego has gotten your way or when other people's ego have kind of made you feel a specific way.

Lisa Tarkington: 11:02

Other areas I used to work in corporate, I would probably say a lot of times my ego got in the way a little bit. Sometimes you're supposed to be known as the expert in a certain area and so I took that and I took that to heart and I think sometimes I missed out on that inclusive piece. Now, I was really good at making people feel seen and heard, but at the same time, I was really good at contradicting that which is saying like well, we're just gonna do it this way, right, and verse like really looking at people's strengths and bringing them together. The other thing is is I remember this very like. I just remember it very clearly I was in a meeting and we all had these priorities we were working on, and my leader at the time was talking about some priorities, cause he saw the big picture and I was very narrowed vision on something that I was working on and he was talking about something he's like Lisa, we're gonna have to move yours down the list, and I was not okay with it.

Lisa Tarkington: 12:02

Now I'm all about speaking up when you need to, but I didn't check my ego at the door. I didn't look at it from a whole team perspective. I was looking at it from a tunnel vision perspective and I remember speaking up and saying like I don't agree with that, blah, blah, blah. And he was not happy with me and afterwards he had a conversation with me about the difference between looking at it from a whole viewpoint verse just like kind of like tunnel vision and my ego got in the way because I thought my stuff was the bees knees and it was great, right. But I also think I was not thinking about the whole view and what really leadership looks like when you're bringing in all of the different pieces and how that comes together, and that's something that probably has come up a lot of times.

Lisa Tarkington: 12:48

Also, sometimes when I received feedback from people, I would play that victim mindset of oh well, they don't know X and they don't know X and that's not true, when really a lot of it was true. Now looking back, but I had my ego a little bit higher at a younger age and so much of me wishes someone would have sat down with me and had like a conversation. I also think I don't know how I would have handled it, because I don't think I was mature enough to prepare to hear such feedback and really understand what that meant. But I think it's the difference between understanding where the ego kind of gets in play and like how then? How do you overcome that? And then I think another area is really in the last couple of years and it's very different now than what it was. It's not me being rude or not understanding, it's more of I built an amazing organization that I'm proud of, and so when you do that, your face is kind of the face of it. You're the one that people look to, and I liked that. I liked being, I guess, needed in a way right, like I liked knowing that people were coming to me.

Lisa Tarkington: 14:02

But what that did, had I not checked my ego at that time, I probably would have hurt my team a good amount, and it probably did sometimes too, when I didn't check it at the door, because I would say like I got this, I got this, I got this and I wasn't giving people opportunities to show their strengths, and I own that completely, because I look back and I give myself a lot of perspectives now that I'm a coach and I look at okay, how would I feel in those shoes if my leader wouldn't have allowed me an opportunity because she wanted it for certain reasons, right, and so I really had to focus on that over time. The other pieces is in order to grow, you have to check your ego at the door, and that's something that I had to learn too, right, like I had to learn that in order to grow, you have to be very humble, which I thought I was and I still think I am, but there's parts of me that maybe maybe it wasn't. I had to ask a lot of questions. I had to really kind of like humble myself down versus feeling like I know it all, because I definitely didn't. I would say through the process of building an organization, I became very humbled with how much I had to learn when I was rejected or declined by people, also understanding how people give feedback, and so recently one of my staff members told me that I'm one of the people that receives feedback better than anybody that she's ever met, and I really took that to heart in a good way, because I didn't.

Lisa Tarkington: 15:30

A long time ago, my ego wasn't checked at the door, and so as I'm going through this process, I learned a lot about myself of the bossiness that can come off sometimes with leadership, the not understanding that can come from it, the not being seen and heard that people feel kind of like, the selfishness that kind of can come into play. So when you're thinking about being the leader that you maybe wanted, think about the things that maybe your leader did that you didn't enjoy. How did their ego get in the way, or did you feel like when going to a meeting, you had to stroke their ego and what did that look like, so that you don't have to do that for other people, because no one wants to play those games right, like everybody just really wants to be seen and heard. They want to know that their strengths are being utilized and that you're together as a team, and so that is something. All of those things is something that I've had to learn a lot of, and I think the only way that I learned them A was by really growing in my own confidence and growing in my own self-awareness and mindfulness. But I also think it's because when you hear the same thing over and over again, you can either take it and do something about it or you can continue to hear about it and I think after a few times it's like okay, I need to do something about this. And it shocks me sometimes that I was like that for so long. I don't think I ever met cruel intention by having an ego with certain things. But now I look at it as how do I bring us all together? What is the vision, what is the purpose? How do I utilize my strengths? How do I be the expert in what I'm doing? But then how do I do that for others as well? And so it's all coming full circle. And I think the other thing is I really learned how that I need to be in my zone of genius, which is coaching and teaching, all about confidence while being in leadership. And the more that I'm in those realms, the more that my ego has become checked at the door, because there's other areas where I'm like, yep, I'm not good at that, and just telling myself and being okay with that and knowing that it's okay to not be good at everything, but it's okay. It's really important to be in your zone of genius and utilizing your strengths.

Lisa Tarkington: 17:51

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Lisa Tarkington: 19:18

As a host of this podcast, I wear many other hats, including an ACC coach, which stands for Associate Certified Coach through the International Coaching Federation. I have gone through extensive learning and have been coaching individuals for years. I have had a front row seat at watching people transform, grow in their careers, take control of their careers and become intentional, gain confidence and more. I believe in the transformative power of self-discovery and personal and professional growth. If you are ready to grow either in your personal or professional life, break through limiting beliefs and step into a life of confidence, I would love to support you. As a certified coach through ICF, I have the knowledge and expertise to coach you and help guide you on your journey. To work directly with me, visit lisaTarkingtoncom slash coaching Again. That is lisaTarkingtoncom slash coaching. To sign up for your free consultation. I can not wait to help you become a better version of yourself.

Lisa Tarkington: 20:20

So if you are listening to this and you're like, yeah, that person's feeling that way, that person in my life, I can see that I want you to talk about yourself here, right. Like it's so easy to point out all everybody else's stuff, but it's about noticing like, well, how am I showing up with my ego sometimes? How am I allowing myself to not get comfortable with the uncomfortable, get out of my own way? How do I allow other people to succeed? And if I want to start a new venture, how do I be okay and humbled that I don't know at all and that's okay. So the first thing is managing your own ego.

Lisa Tarkington: 20:55

Take self-awareness Self-awareness is like huge. For me it's reflection and intentional practices. So when we think about this, I think this last couple of months I've talked about self-awareness more than I ever have in my entire career. I think it's kind of just like flowed with things. But the more that I hear these things and the more that I have been coaching, ego and self-awareness go hand in hand.

Lisa Tarkington: 21:20

Because when you don't have that self-awareness of what's going on, our ego gets in the way. We become defensive, we become competitive and overall we kind of become a little self-centered more than we want to, and so one of the things, one of the tools that I swear by is journal prompts Is journaling, and every time I teach this, I always ask my audience no-transcript, do you guys like to journal? And I always get maybe a few hands and we were like, absolutely not. And so one of the tools that I always recommend is put three questions down on a sheet of paper, time yourself for two minutes and ask and self-reflect on those questions, and so maybe it's what brought me joy today, what challenged me how did I utilize my strengths? How did I help other people see their strengths right? And it's just about reflecting on how you, how you were living out your purpose, how you're living out your impact, and also having that awareness of how did I show up today, what kind of behaviors and changes do I need to make as well, and sometimes it's just writing it down on paper and noticing those things, and other times it's putting it into action.

Lisa Tarkington: 22:28

Other times, or other things, is really being humbled, embracing humility. This is something that I struggled with for a long time, because I didn't always want to admit that I didn't know what I didn't know, and now I feel like being vulnerable and being open and honest about it. I've allowed so many other people strengths to come alive and I know also that I love when people come to me as an expert in certain areas, so I want that for other people. So, really knowing that you don't have to have all the answers, you can learn from other people regardless of your position and status. Right, as we move up, we sometimes quote, unquote get more power, like I said earlier. But what does that mean? Right, and how do we make sure everybody is voices being heard and that you're being open-minded to utilizing people's voices and strengths?

Lisa Tarkington: 23:20

Other areas is to focus on for tools is celebrating other success. This is huge for me. I am all about. Let's all do this together to make the world a better place. And so if you are allowing your ego to show up, where you are not celebrating someone's out success because you're envious, because you're jealous, because of whatever, I want you to really check that out the door and I mean that in the kindest way possible. But that is missing out on a great opportunity to really just smile and have fun with people we all it doesn't matter if you're working in the same feel, this someone or whatever. We're all working on a greater purpose together, and so the more that we can celebrate other people's successes, the more that it does humble us, and it also is like showcasing like hey, we're all in this together, like let's do this.

Lisa Tarkington: 24:13

Other areas is developing a support system. So this is something that I think I talk a lot about on the podcast and it just kind of goes right into your ego. Is I have really great support systems in my life now? Now, I didn't always have that right. Like in support system doesn't always mean like they are cheering you on and telling you everything that you need to hear. Sometimes that means they're cheering you on and telling you all the things that you don't wanna hear and they're giving you feedback that you can use. They're helping you to become a better person.

Lisa Tarkington: 24:43

When I started down this realm of confidence and leadership and wellbeing and teaching these things, I had some great individuals in my life who kind of like supported me, but they were very honest with me about my growth and what I needed to do and how to support me, and I thank them all the time for that, because instead of having an ego and telling myself I know it all and completely just coming out not very good when I soak about these things. I really am grateful for that support system, especially when things get tough sometimes too, and that kind of goes right into seeking feedback. What do I need to do to get better? How do I make myself a better person Instead of feeling like you know it all and that you have it all together? I will tell you right now. If I, tomorrow, if people were to give me a performance review, I know exactly the feedback that I would be giving because I'm trying to work on those things right now. I also know the areas that they would probably tell me that I improved on, because I received constructive feedback before that has helped me become a better person.

Lisa Tarkington: 25:47

And all of these things are extremely important when you're trying to check your ego at the door, because so many of us we live in this world where it's instant gratification right. It's very easy to kind of feel like, oh yeah, oh yeah, but it's okay to look around and be like, okay, that person knows this. How do I utilize their skill set? I also am just thinking about this podcast as we talk about it. If I would have allowed my ego, I can just figure it out, I would not be having the opportunity to really grow in this podcast, and I think about that a lot is.

Lisa Tarkington: 26:22

Sometimes our egos allow us to miss out on opportunities, and I really don't want that for you guys. I do not want your ego to stop you from missing opportunities, because when people are thinking about moving people up to levels or different job things or anything, they're having conversations about you, whether you want them to or not, but they're having conversation of who would be the best fit and why. And if they think that you have a major ego that's probably not going to work for XYZ, they might not want to work with you. Now, I'm not saying that for everybody, right, but I will say that that is something that I hear a lot of is that the personalities have to fit, that they have to fit in with the culture, that I want them to be supportive and lifting of other people, and that's really where a lot of the cultures are going. So if you aren't checking your ego at the door, you are missing out on a really good opportunity for yourself, but also for many other people as well.

Lisa Tarkington: 27:18

So, again, it's self-awareness, it's seeking feedback, it's reflecting regularly on your growth and what you need to do it's developing a support system. It's all of these amazing things, as well as staying grounded. So remembering your values. I actually taught a workshop the other day where we talked about values, and it was so intriguing how a lot of people couldn't even answer their top three values. So what are yours? How are you going to stay grounded when things come up? Or maybe you become a little like TikTok influencer popular in some way, or maybe popular within your workplace, Like, how are you going to stay grounded in all of those areas?

Lisa Tarkington: 27:54

So my action for all of you guys listening in today is to do some self-reflection on how you can continue to be the best version of yourself and also think about what are the opportunities that you want to have and how your ego might stop you from reaching those goals. Sometimes we go down a path because we're really good at something and people have been stroking our egos. That doesn't mean that we always have to stay on that career path. Maybe you want to switch over, and if so, it's very humbling. I'm one of those people that changed their careers. It's very humbling to do that, but it's also very rewarding because I'm doing what I love, even with, I would say, the learning curve that came with it, but it teaches you a lot about who you want in your life, what you want in your life, and now that my ego is more checked than ever at the door, I will say I've never been more happy and confident in my life, and that is what I want for all of you guys. So, as I always say, continue to spread love and kindness to everybody that you meet and have a great day.

Lisa Tarkington: 29:03

Thank you for tuning into the Confident Podcast. If you enjoyed today's episode, don't forget to subscribe, leave a review, follow the Confident Podcast on Instagram and TikTok and share it with those who might benefit. Also, if you are looking to work one-on-one with me, message and follow me on Instagram at Lisa Tarkington official. Stay confident, stay inspired and until next time, keep striving to be the best version of yourself. Take care. See you guys later.