Leadership Lessons: When Shrinking Shows Up

Leadership Lessons is a reflective writing series exploring what it looks like to grow into leadership in real time. These entries are drawn from lived experience, community work, and the internal shifts that happen while building, leading, and learning in public-facing roles.

There is a quiet moment that many leaders experience that rarely gets named.

You walk into rooms that feel bigger than you.
Spaces filled with people who seem more established, more confident, more certain.
And suddenly, without realizing it, you begin to shrink.

Not because you are incapable.
Not because you are unqualified.
But because comparison creeps in.

Last week, I spent a lot of time reflecting on what it means to feel small in spaces where you actually belong.

Leadership can be disorienting. There are many paths, many models, many people moving in different directions, and sometimes in the same direction as you. That is often where self-doubt enters. You start measuring your pace against someone else’s. You question your voice. You wonder if you are doing enough or if you are enough.

That is when imposter syndrome shows up.

It sounds like:
You are not ready yet.
You are not experienced enough.
Someone else is doing this better than you.

And eventually, that voice tries to convince you that you cannot do it at all.

But here is what I am learning.

That voice is not truth.
It is pressure.
Pressure created by proximity.
Pressure created by visibility.
Pressure created by comparison in environments that were never meant to be competitive.

Leadership does not require you to disappear just because others are present. It does not require you to shrink because someone else has a larger platform, a longer resume, or a louder voice.

The truth is, I am good enough.
Not because I am flawless.
Not because I have everything figured out.
But because I am doing the work.

And leadership is not about moving in the same direction as others. It is about moving in alignment with your purpose, your values, and your responsibility to the work you have been called to do.

Shrinking does not protect you.
It only delays your impact.

The lesson I am holding right now is this:

If self-doubt shows up, it is often a sign that you are standing at the edge of growth, not failure.

Leadership asks us to stay visible even when we feel uncertain. To keep moving even when comparison is loud. To trust that our presence in the room is not accidental.

So if you find yourself feeling small in big spaces, let this be your reminder.

You are not behind.
You are not lost.
You are not unqualified.

You are becoming.

And leadership does not require perfection.

It requires presence.