Super U Podcast | Brené Brown on Courage

Our new episode of the Super U Podcast is live! The Super U Podcast delivers curated tips from top performers and thought leaders to help unlock and unleash your inner superpower. This week’s episode features tips on courage from the bestselling author of Daring Greatly and Braving The Wilderness, Brené Brown. Click here to subscribe to the Super U Podcast. Need a sneak peek? Below are the main takeaways from the episode.

Super U Podcast | Brené Brown:

[1:57]  Be Intentional, Be Authentic.

“It’s so hard I thought doing this research. I thought going into it there were authentic people and inauthentic people. I did not find any evidence of that at all. What I found is authenticity is a practice. And you choose it every day, sometimes every hour of every day. And it’s a practice. It’s not ‘I just like having ham’ authentic. It’s that when you walk into a meeting, you have to make the choice. Am I going to show up and let myself be seen? Am I going to if I can raise my hand say, “While y’all look super excited, I don’t know what in the hell you’re talking about.” You know, that’s a choice. Yes.”

[3:04] Accept Yourself to Achieve Big Things

“I don’t think you can truly change for the better in a lasting meaningful way. Unless it is driven by self-acceptance. So I think be the shit out of yourself for performance, which you know, I work with a lot of sportspeople now, like it works. And if all you have to do is pay someone for one season, or all you do is one game, or one whatever you’re okay. But lasting, meaningful change has to be driven by self-acceptance.”

[4:38] Invite Your Critics to the Table

“The thing is, I don’t care what people think. I don’t worry about the critics in the arena, sends a huge red flag for me. We’re hardwired for connection. When we stop caring what people think, we lose our capacity for connection. When we become defined by what people think, we lose our capacity to be vulnerable. Not caring what people think is its own kind of hustle, trust me. So, rather than locking these folks out from the arena, what I’m going to invite you to do, this way maybe is reserve seats for them. Which doesn’t seem like a good thing to do. But I have 13,000 pieces of data. And I’ve done this work for 12 years. And what I have found, and what I have learned from these folks, and then try to apply it in my own life that has changed my life, is to reserve a seat, to take the critics to lunch. And to simply say, what I’m trying to do something new and hard and original, I’m trying to be creative, and I’m trying to innovate, to say, I see you, I hear you. But I’m going to show up and do this anyway. And I’ve got a seat for you. And you’re welcome to come. But I’m not interested in your feedback.”

[7:27] We’re All Capable of Being Leaders

“I think when we think leader, we think like pinstripes and shoulder pads and the C-suite office. And the truth is, I’ve been in those offices and couldn’t find a leader to save my life. And I’ve been around everyday people that would never identify as a leader and been surrounded by them. So I define a leader as any person who holds themselves accountable for finding the potential and people and processes and has the courage, the guts to develop that potential. And that’s all of us. I mean, I recently asked Jon Meacham, I said, “What would you say to people who don’t think they’re leaders?” And he said, “Then you don’t understand democracy, we all have to lead.” And so I just I loved that. I think we’re all leaders.”

[8:38] Learn How to Rise

“I’ve been doing this work for 20 years, the last seven years really looking at courage and leadership specifically for skill sets. Can you rumble with vulnerability? Can you stay in tough things when they get uncomfortable and awkward? Or do you tap out to? And this is a hard one living into your values. Are you clear about what your values are? And have you operationalized those into behaviors? Do you know what behaviors support your values and what don’t? Braving trust – can you build trust and be trustworthy? And the last one, which I think was really interesting, was learning how to get back up. Learning how to rise, because we found that people are more willing to be courageous upfront if they know how to rise.”

[10:14] Have An Attitude of Gratitude

“This is this should be a pedagogy of itself. What is the one variable, that person who can really lean into joy share in common? It is part of vulnerability, but it’s actually practicing gratitude. The only variable that really separates men and women who cannot lean into joy, who start dress rehearsing tragedy. And the reason we dress rehearse tragedy is so we can beat vulnerability to the punch, because what we do is like, “Oh, this great things happening, I’m going to start picturing worst-case scenario, so that when I get hurt, and it happens, I’m all prepared for it.” Right? But how many of you think we can actually prepare for that? You cannot 50% of people in this room have probably experienced the thing that we dress rehearse, and they could come up here one at a time and tell you, you can practice that all you want. That will do nothing to help you. When that moment comes, the only thing you’re doing is squandering the joy that you need, that builds a reservoir for when hard things happen. So as it turns out, our bodies really neurobiologically experienced joy as vulnerability and threat. And they show that we quiver. And so some of us use the quiver as a warning sign to start thinking about terrible things. And others use that quiver as a reminder to be grateful.”

[12:18] Live Like There’s No Tomorrow

“This is the developmental milestone of midlife from the late 30s to probably your 60s. This is the question. Yeah, this is when the universe comes down, and puts her hands on your shoulders and pulls you close, and whispers in your ear. I’m not fucking around, you’re halfway to dead. The armor is keeping you from growing into the gifts they’ve given you. That is not without penalty. Time is up. So this is what you see happen to people in midlife. And it’s not a crisis. It’s a slow, brutal unraveling. And this is where everything that we thought protected us, keeps us from being the partners, the parents, the professionals, the people that we want to be.”

Connect with Brené Brown:

Twitter: @brenebrown

Instagram: @brenebrown

Website: https://brenebrown.com/

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The Super U Podcast is hosted by #1 bestselling author and Motivational Speaker Erik Qualman.