He pulled me aside after class. Just a sociology professor, I thought. What does he want?

"You seem worn out," he said. Then: "Do you need an education or do you need a degree?"

I didn't have an answer. I wasn't even sure I understood the question.

He sent me to five men with gray hair who actually cared about me. My dad. My pastor. A few others. I asked all of them the same question. They all said the same thing, and none of them said what I expected.

That conversation in 1991 is still the way I think about what I do in a room with a client. Not trying to deliver the answer. Trying to create the conditions where someone can see themselves clearly enough to find their own.

I fail at this. I hone in on being right when I should be holding up a mirror. I've watched clients go quiet after choosing a different direction, as if they'd done something wrong. They hadn't. That departure is often the recognition, not the failure of it.

My direction was never the point.

Their clarity was.

🎧 No Stage, Just a ChairA podcast for people figuring it out as they go: building honest brands, real decisions, and work that feels like theirs.

Before You Listen:

What would change in the conversations you're avoiding if your job was to help someone see, not to land the answer?

Is there someone in your life right now who needs a question from you more than they need your opinion?

If recognition is the goal and not agreement, what does that change about how you show up today?