I had a colleague ask me a question last week: “What’s the one thing you’d teach someone about being a better leader if you could only teach one thing?”
Here’s what came to mind. I don’t know if it’s the ultimate answer, but it rose straight to the surface in that moment.
Let’s be real—sometimes we want the win more than we want the relationship.
Not because we’re broken. But because we’re human.
Relational intelligence isn’t just about empathy and attunement to others.
It’s about being radically honest with ourselves—especially when the impulse to connect is tangled up with less-than-noble motivations.
Sometimes we want a win-win.
Sometimes we just want to look good.
Or not lose.
Or punish.
Or feel superior.
And yes, sometimes we want connection… but we also want control.
That’s the shadow side. And here’s the catch: pretending we’re always above it—insisting on unrelenting “positivity” or moral clarity—cuts us off from the very self-awareness we need to grow.
“What’s Water?”: The Challenge of Seeing What We Swim In
Carl Jung once wrote, “The shadow personifies everything that the subject refuses to acknowledge about himself.”
In other words, the parts we can’t—or won’t—look at often become the very parts that drive us.
David Foster Wallace once told a story about two young fish swimming along when they pass an older fish who nods and says, “Morning, boys. How’s the water?”
The young fish swim on for a bit… until one turns to the other and asks, “What the hell is water?”
That’s the thing about shadow—it’s often not hiding in the dark.
It’s hiding in plain sight.
When a pattern of thought or behavior has been with us long enough, it blends into the background. It becomes the water we swim in. The logic we don’t question. The subtle motivator behind the script we think is “just how we do things.”
The part of us that craves control but calls it “clarity.”
The part that fears being dismissed but calls it “standards.”
The part that wants recognition but frames it as “doing the right thing.”
This doesn’t mean our shadow is all of who we are.
It doesn’t mean every motivation is suspect.
It just means that part of us is harder to distinguish—because it’s always been there.
And here’s something we can’t say loudly enough: It’s okay.
It’s okay to have these impulses. It doesn’t make you a bad leader or a flawed human.
It just makes you… a person.
The work isn’t to eliminate every less-than-noble motivation. It’s to be honest about their presence, so they don’t run the show from the background.
If relational intelligence begins with self-honesty, then the first challenge isn’t confessing the shadow.
It’s learning to notice it at all.
That noticing is an act of leadership.
It requires slowing down, paying attention, and being willing to ask:
What assumptions am I swimming in right now?
What do I reach for when I feel unseen, uncertain, or unsafe?
You don’t have to fix it all in one moment.
But you do have to be willing to see it.
That’s where the conversation begins.
The Comfort of Plausible Deniability
Here’s where things get slippery.
Most of us don’t outright lie to ourselves about our motivations—we just blur the edges.
We reach for plausible stories.
Safe interpretations.
Reasonable-sounding justifications.
“I just wanted to make sure the project didn’t fail.”
“I thought someone needed to hold them accountable.”
“I wasn’t trying to look good—I was trying to uphold the standard.”
And while none of those are inherently untrue, they often mask a deeper, messier reality:
Sometimes, we just didn’t want to feel small.
Or wrong.
Or vulnerable.
Plausible deniability lets us sidestep the harder truth.
It gives us enough narrative distance to avoid reckoning with our shadow… while still appearing aligned with our values.
But here’s the cost: when we habitually use plausible deniability to protect our image—even to ourselves—we lose access to the real data of our inner world.
We can’t grow what we won’t name.
We can’t transform what we won’t admit.
At NinthEdge, we often say that better leadership begins with better conversations—and sometimes, the most important conversation we can have is the one we’re avoiding in our own minds.
The most emotionally intelligent leaders we work with at NinthEdge aren’t the ones who deny their shadow.
They’re the ones who make space for it.
Who name it without shame.
And who learn to hold it in healthy tension with their values.
Because if we can’t be honest with ourselves about what’s really showing up, how can we ever be honest with others?
That kind of self-honesty is the real work.
It’s messy.
And it’s essential.
What helps you create space to notice your “shadow” without judgment?
Where do you feel the tug-of-war between integrity and image?
And of course, shadow doesn’t always show up as dominance or control.
Sometimes it wears the mask of kindness.
Of helpfulness.
Of staying quiet “for the sake of the relationship.”
In our next conversation, we’ll explore that other side—the part of us that hides truth to stay liked, needed, or safe. Because just like the need to win, the need to please can quietly shape our leadership in ways we rarely examine.
