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In my previous article, The Invisible Hand, I guided you to recognize and understand your internal saboteurs - the invisible yet powerful voices undermining your leadership and limiting your effectiveness. By now, you might have noticed already—the greatest leadership challenges rarely come from outside.
Often, your toughest opponents live quietly inside one’s mind, sabotaging decisions, slowing down actions, and blurring clarity precisely when is needed most. These inner saboteurs are subtle but relentless, convincing you that caution is wisdom, fear is prudence, and routine is safety.
Recognizing these saboteurs is the crucial first step. But what comes next? What if, within you, there were also powerful inner allies, ready to counteract every sabotaging thought, decision, or impulse?
These allies are what Positive Intelligence® (PQ)* calls your Sage Powers. Unlike saboteurs, your Sage Powers thrive in clarity, empathy, creativity, and decisive action. They quietly wait for you to call upon them, providing intuitive wisdom precisely at the crossroads of uncertainty and choice.
When fully activated, your Sage Powers transform uncertainty into exploration, hesitation into innovation, conflict into empathy, confusion into clear navigation, and inertia into confident activation.
Imagine what your leadership could look like if you consistently tapped into these innate, empowering resources. Your impact would deepen. Your decisions would sharpen. And your team would notice—and follow.
So, are you ready to awaken and harness your Sage Powers?
Inside every successful leader exists a core set of mental powers—a team of internal allies ready to replace reactive impulses with intentional, clear-minded decisions. These powers—Empathize, Explore, Innovate, Navigate, and Activate—are always available, awaiting your conscious choice to bring them forward.
Empathize allows you to connect deeply with yourself and others, dissolving conflicts before they harden. It is your bridge to genuine understanding, compassion, and trust—essential ingredients that turn groups into cohesive teams and tensions into opportunities for growth.
With Explore, curiosity takes centre stage. Rather than instantly seeking solutions, this power encourages you to ask meaningful questions first. It invites discovery, openness, and the ability to uncover hidden potential, transforming obstacles into intriguing puzzles worth solving.
Innovate pushes you beyond routine thinking. When facing complex situations, innovation allows you to see beyond the obvious, to imagine bold solutions that others haven’t even considered. Innovation turns challenges into platforms for creativity, ensuring your leadership remains relevant and impactful.
To Navigate is to trust your inner compass—clarifying your true priorities, deepest values, and strategic vision. Navigation cuts through confusion, helping you make confident, purposeful decisions even amid uncertainty. It provides a steady guide for yourself and the teams you lead.
Lastly, Activate propels intentions into decisive, meaningful action. This power energizes your leadership, clears mental distractions, and ignites the momentum necessary to implement your most critical initiatives without delay or hesitation.
Used together, these five Sage Powers represent a profound shift, from reactive, limited thinking toward intentional, powerful leadership. Cultivate them consciously, and watch your impact multiply, your effectiveness deepen, and your leadership thrive.
Michael, the project manager of a research project, found himself repeatedly ignoring a persistent conflict between two of his team leaders, assuming it would "fix itself". Michael felt his team leaders had more scientific and technical competence than him, and being afraid to not upset them, he avoided dealing first-hand with this growing tension. In our coaching session, he identified the Avoider Saboteur at play, recognising that avoidance only amplified tension and eroded trust. We worked together to shift Michael toward empathy. As a result, he invited both leaders to individual, confidential discussions, genuinely listening and validating their perspectives. Then, he facilitated a joint meeting, guiding them toward mutual understanding rather than blame. His newfound empathetic approach fostered openness and trust, healing the division. Michael’s empathic approach opened thus the path to resolution. The entire experience taught him a vital leadership lesson: avoidance prolongs or makes conflicts fester; empathy resolves them.
Faced with sudden market changes, Andrew typically responded by exerting tight control, driven by his Controller Saboteur, seeking immediate yet superficial solutions. In our coaching, Andrew saw how his controlling impulse stifled his team’s creativity and increased their frustration. Embracing exploration instead, he began asking open-ended, curiosity-driven questions. He paused his impulse to control outcomes and instead invited his team into exploratory brainstorming sessions, openly questioning assumptions. Together, they identified innovative, sustainable approaches. This coaching-inspired approach enabled his team to explore innovative pathways, turning market shifts into opportunities. Andrew learned that curiosity-driven exploration unlocks deeper insights and durable solutions, even amid uncertainty.
Cristina had always relied on past successes, comfortably repeating familiar strategies due to her hidden Stickler Saboteur, which insisted on perfection and discouraged experimentation. In our sessions, Cristina realized that sticking rigidly to previous methods was limiting her team's growth and morale. Encouraged by coaching, she actively challenged herself to seek unconventional ideas and to welcome them. She organized several creative workshops, explicitly encouraging what she previously would have called "unrealistic" proposals. Surprisingly, this openness led her team to develop fresh strategies that reignited performance and motivation. Her shift toward innovation broke through stagnation, re-engaged her team, and revitalized results. Cristina discovered that breaking perfectionism unleashes creative potential, drives growth and renews team energy.
When choosing between short-term profits and long-term strategic growth, the young entrepreneur Radu typically succumbed to the immediate pressure driven by his internal Pleaser Saboteur, eager to instantly satisfy the expectations of his very few clients, at the expense of following his deeper strategic insights. During our coaching conversations, Radu recognized this sabotaging pattern and saw the damage he inflicted on his business. With clarity gained through coaching, he leveraged his power of navigation, aligning his choice with the company's long-term purpose and personal values. By resisting short-term pressures and complying with Client approaches outside his values, Radu confidently moved toward decisions that foster sustained, authentic success.
Eleni’s planning excellence frequently stalled at execution, her progress paralyzed by a strong internal Hyper-Achiever Saboteur, demanding certainty for success before taking action. Coaching helped Eleni clearly identify how this saboteur prevented her from implementing meaningful growth plans. We explored strategies to activate decisive action through incremental steps and clear timelines. With renewed self-awareness and accountability, Eleni shifted quickly from procrastination to tangible results. As actions replaced delays, results quickly followed. Eleni discovered that activating intention into disciplined action transforms planning into tangible achievements and builds personal credibility. Her key lesson from our coaching: deliberate activation transforms careful plans into impactful outcomes.
The power of your leadership doesn’t come from controlling every outcome or anticipating every challenge. Instead, genuine strength emerges when you consistently activate these five Sage Powers: empathizing deeply, exploring with curiosity, innovating boldly, navigating wisely, and decisively activating your intentions.
Sustaining this mindset means regularly pausing to notice when you're being guided by saboteurs - reactive impulses, fear-based patterns, or habitual caution - consciously shifting toward your inner Sage. Each intentional step reinforces your mental fitness, deepens self-awareness, and magnifies your positive impact.
The invitation is simple: practice noticing, choosing, and acting through these powers each day. Gradually, this deliberate approach becomes second nature, elevating your leadership from effective to extraordinary.
Your Sage Powers are always within reach. The choice and the transformation it brings are entirely yours.
Share this article with a colleague who values growth. Remember, in management, strong and knowledgeable allies matter. If this resonates with you, you're already inviting powerful transformation into your leadership. Book your discovery call now—I'm here to support your journey to mastery.
Until next time, keep thriving!
* Positive Intelligence® (PQ) is a research-based methodology developed by Shirzad Chamine that helps individuals build mental fitness and overcome self-sabotage. By strengthening your inner Sage Powers, you enhance leadership effectiveness, personal fulfillment, and overall well-being. Discover more at PositiveIntelligence.com.
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Summary:
Leaders often face internal saboteurs blocking their effectiveness. By consciously activating the five Sage Powers—Empathy, Exploration, Innovation, Navigation, and Activation—managers can replace reactive impulses with clear, intentional actions.
Through practical examples drawn from coaching experiences, managers learn to spot their saboteurs, shift their mindset, and cultivate lasting positive change, driving sustainable success for themselves and their teams.
Discover the thinking patterns influencing your perception and approach of the world. Evaluate your automatic response tendencies, find explanations for questions you have always put! Learn to recognize self-sabotaging narrative and to intercept it!
Based on POSITIVE INTELLIGENCE® | www.positiveintelligence.com | Alina Florea is a POSITIVE INTELLIGENCE COACH
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