Okay, so here’s the deal.

This episode is not for managers. It’s not even for “leaders,” really. It’s for humans who are tired of playing roles at work. Tired of pretending. Tired of talking about psychological safety while avoiding real conversations. Tired of holding their breath in teams that say “we value feedback” but can’t handle it.

In this episode, I sit down with my friend Joppe, a coach, and fellow question-asker, to explore what happens when leadership becomes a form of presence, not control. We don’t talk about KPIs or frameworks. We talk about:

• What teams actually need (hint: it’s not clarity, it’s honesty)
• Why fake listening is worse than no listening
• How we gaslight ourselves out of knowing what we want
• The subtle pressure to perform

And how maybe, just maybe, we’re all trying to lead each other home, if we’d only drop the masks.

We also talk about why feedback loops are often bullshit, how values become weaponized, and what it means to stop managing people and start listening like you mean it.

At the end: a meditative pause. An invitation to stop. To ask: what do I actually want right now? Let's go!

After listening, take five minutes to sit. Close your eyes. Ask yourself: what do I want, really? Let it land. Then act from there. And if you feel brave, tell me what came up.