When Did You Last Actually Feel Your Feet on the Floor?
A few years ago, I was sitting with a senior executive — a brilliant woman who led a team of hundreds, navigated complexity daily, and was widely regarded as one of the sharpest minds in her organization. We were about thirty minutes into our session when I asked her a simple question: "Where do you feel this in your body?"
She looked at me with genuine blankness. Not defensiveness. Genuine confusion.
"I don't think I feel things in my body," she said. "I think I feel things in my head."
She said it matter-of-factly, as though this were simply how she was built. But as we stayed with it, something shifted. She began to notice a persistent tightness across her upper chest. A shallow quality to her breath. The way she held herself slightly braced, as though always preparing for impact.
She hadn't lost touch with her body out of neglect. She'd lost touch with it out of devotion — to her work, her people, her sense of duty. And over years of overriding physical signals to meet the next demand, she'd simply... left.
This is one of the most common and least-discussed forms of leadership depletion I encounter.
We talk extensively about mental burnout. We talk about emotional exhaustion. We talk far less about what I'd call somatic disconnection — the gradual erosion of our relationship with our own physical experience. And yet the body is not separate from our leadership. It is the ground from which everything else grows.
The first dimension of A Fuller Cup™ is Embodied — and I placed it first deliberately.
Before we can access our authentic voice, before we can reconnect with our purpose, before we can make empowered choices or show up fully in a relationship — we need to be actually here. Present in our physical selves. Able to receive the information our bodies are constantly, quietly offering.
That information is more valuable than most leaders realize. The gut sense that something is off in a team dynamic. The physical lift that accompanies a decision that's truly aligned. The fatigue that signals not laziness, but a boundaries issue that needs addressing. The body knows. It has known for a long time. We simply stopped listening.
Reclaiming embodied awareness doesn't require a retreat or an overhaul of your routines — though both can be wonderful. It begins with smaller, more consistent practices. Pausing before you pick up the phone. Breathing before you respond. Asking yourself, once a day, "How does my body actually feel right now?" — and staying with the question long enough to get an honest answer.
These practices build a different kind of attentiveness. One that makes you not just a more sustainable leader, but a more perceptive one.
If you're curious where you stand across the five dimensions of A Fuller Cup™ — Embodied, Authentic, Purpose, Empowered, and Community — I'm offering a complimentary self-assessment and personal 20-minute debrief this summer, as part of Sage's 20th anniversary. Spots are limited to 30 leaders and available through August 30th.
The link is here: https://www.sagelead.com/anniversary-gift
Come back to yourself. It's where your best leadership lives.
Suze Shaner-Brodax integrates corporate leadership, executive coaching, and contemplative practice to help senior leaders move beyond barriers, act with clarity, and lead with purpose and impact. www.sagelead.com.