What Are You Noticing This Summer?

One of the best things about summer is that it can pull us out of our normal patterns just enough to see differently.

Even when work is busy, many of us move through these weeks in a slightly different way. We may get outside more, take a trip, spend time with family, head to the beach, or step away from the desk long enough for something that felt stuck to finally loosen up. It is rarely a full slowdown, but even a small shift can create enough space to see a problem, a pattern, or ourselves a little more clearly.

That idea is a big part of my new book, Inspired by LIFE: Redefining the Future of Leadership. Over the next few months, I will be sharing more of what inspired the book and some of the leadership lessons behind it. The larger idea is that leadership inspiration is everywhere when we are willing to notice it, learn from it, and use it.

I have always been drawn to connections that may not seem obvious at first. I can look at something happening in sports, nature, teaching, parenting, coaching, or even a frustrating everyday moment and find something useful about leadership in it. Over time, I realized this was more than a quirk in how I think. It became part of how I coach, teach, and help leaders see new possibilities.

A couple of years ago, I wrote a newsletter about leadership lessons from fantasy football. I did not see it as a major moment at the time. I just followed the idea because something about it felt useful. Looking back, it helped me put language around something I had probably been doing for years: finding leadership insight in places many people would never think to look.

That is the spirit behind a lot of the book, and summer feels like the right time to start talking about it more directly. The season naturally pulls many of us out of our normal patterns. The routines are different. The environment is different. We may be around different people, in different places, or in a different state of mind. Those changes can help us notice things we might normally rush past.

A walk can clear up something that felt complicated at your desk. A family trip can teach you plenty about communication, patience, expectations, and control, sometimes whether you wanted the lesson or not. A few hours outside can remind you that growth has its own timeline. A conversation that stays with you may be pointing to something you need to understand more deeply.

Some moments do not seem like much when they happen. Then you find yourself thinking about them later.

For leaders, those moments are worth noticing. A moment that catches your attention, a story you keep thinking about, or a pattern that keeps returning can change how you see a challenge. And when you see a challenge differently, different options start to become available.

I see this in coaching all the time. A leader comes in with something that sounds straightforward, like a communication issue, a difficult team member, a group that is not aligned, or a decision that keeps getting pushed off. The first instinct is often to solve what is visible by being clearer, pushing harder, getting people in a room, or creating more accountability.

Sometimes that helps. But often, when we slow the issue down, something else appears. The communication issue may be tied to trust. The difficult team member may be reacting to unclear expectations. The delayed decision may have more to do with fear than process. The alignment problem may be the result of a conversation people have been avoiding.

A leader who only pushes harder on the visible problem can miss what is actually driving it. A leader who steps back, gets curious, and looks at the situation through a different lens has a much better chance of seeing what is really going on.

That feels especially relevant now. Leaders are navigating changing technology, stretched teams, anxious employees, heavier expectations, and uncertainty about what comes next, often while still sorting through their own version of that uncertainty. There is a lot coming at people at once, and it is easy to get pulled into reacting to whatever is loudest.

In moments like this, the obvious issue is rarely the whole issue. Leaders need to notice when energy has changed, when trust is thinning, when people are holding back, when the same tension keeps returning, or when an old way of working is starting to lose its power. That awareness comes from paying closer attention to what people are showing us, not only what they are saying.

Summer can help because it gives us more chances to step outside the normal noise. I am not suggesting every vacation, walk, beach day, or family moment needs to become a leadership exercise. The shift in routine can simply help us hear and see things we may have been too busy to notice.

You may realize what restores you. You may see more clearly what keeps frustrating you. You may notice where you feel more energized than you have in a while. You may find yourself replaying a conversation because something about it still feels unfinished. You may step away from a work issue for a little while and come back seeing it in a completely different way.

Those moments can reveal what you need more of, what is no longer working, where you are forcing something, or where you may need to bring a different kind of leadership to the moment.

That is one of the reasons I am so excited to share more from Inspired by LIFE. The book is built around the belief that leadership does not grow only through formal development. It grows when we learn from life as it is happening and then do something useful with what we learn.

That action is where the growth happens. A good idea can feel powerful in the moment, but if we never apply it, it usually fades. When we bring it into how we lead, it can change a conversation, a decision, a relationship, a team dynamic, or the way we see ourselves.

As we move through the middle of summer, give yourself a little room to notice what you are noticing. Pay attention to the conversation you keep replaying, the moment that gave you energy, the frustration that keeps returning, the place where you felt more like yourself, or the pattern you are starting to see in your team, your work, or your life.

There may be a leadership lesson there, even if it did not come from a place that looked like leadership development. And if something keeps getting your attention, use it.

That is what I love about this work and what I am excited to share more of in the months ahead. Leadership inspiration is all around us. The real opportunity is to stop rushing past it and start using it to lead with more awareness, curiosity, and purpose.

If you are ready to see your leadership, your team, or your next challenge through a clearer lens, I’d love to have a conversation.