Second Half Calibration: Sharpen Your Sound

These next five conversations will help you realign and focus on a greater second half. You will fight the arrival mentality, do not settle, protect the sound of your leadership and resolve to stay focused.

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Transcript

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Hello, hello. This is Yvonne Messella, and welcome back to the Restore to Rise podcast where we talk all things emotional, spiritual, and leadership health. And I'm so happy to be back with you again. And people, this is 2026 July, and so we are in the second half of this year, and today my conversation is going to be around that. I had a talk on my other podcast, but I just want to drop this year because this is where I want to speak to us really as leaders. You know, I don't need to repeat myself, but wherever you have space, and I I feel so strongly about this again, and I want to encourage you if you're an entrepreneur, a CEO, a mother, a father, educator, pastor, whatever space you have or forum you have that you have been entrusted with. People, this is a privilege. And your well-being, your leadership health is so important to your team and so important to the people that you lead. So you cannot be at ease. We need to continue. So today, my theme is do not settle. So whatever you've accomplished for this over the first in the first half of the year, just praise God for that. We thank God for that. And just say, I'm not going to, I'm not going to stay in the state of ease or any arrival mentality, anything where people feel like they're retiring now. We never retire. We never retire when it comes to kingdom work. So I want to encourage us today to be able to say, whether you feel like you've made made it your priorities, you've actually achieved all of the stuff that you've set out to do in the beginning of the year. If you did not do that, or maybe your target is off, just keep it, just push it away and say, okay, that is that. But I'm gonna stay there, I'm gonna keep going, and I'm gonna just align, realign, recalibrate. And if you've done very well, continue to celebrate, but move forward because we want to end well, we want to end strong. What I was very challenged by and really encouraged by was again the World Cup. I'm sure most of you watching the World Cup and you know, some of my teams, you know, I I have uh I it I was like, you know, we had this game with Bafana Bafana, which is the South African team, played against Canada, Canada, and I was saying, oh no, this is these are my two countries, you know. I'm a citizen of both countries, and I want both countries to win. But because Bafana Bafana is my you know, South Africa is my country of origin, I wanted them to win. And you know what? They lost, they conceded a goal in the last minute of the game, and so many other teams conceded in the very last minute of the game, and so the game isn't over until that final whistle blows. So we cannot just be at ease, we cannot say, okay, now we've done this because we want to end well in life and also with the assignment that God has given to us. I'm gonna say it again. We want to end well and want to be committed to the assignment that God has given to us, and it is a privilege, it is a huge privilege that we have that you have to lead, to impact, to influence the people that God has assigned you to do that, and your life is so important, your heart is important. So, me in like you know, that my heart is for your internal structures, for your internal health, and so make sure if you haven't yet, I trust you had moments where you were quiet enough just to evaluate where am I going? What are the three top priorities that I need to end that I need to focus on for the next six months? Or what is the how do I break it down? The tasks and the goals maybe per week, per day, and and just pause. The main thing I want to say, and I'm gonna say it again, is today I just want to talk to us is not to settle, not to let the arrival mentality, our successes, or even our so-called failures rob us of our destiny or our destination. And um just this this year, we we I do believe that the and I want to speak it over each one of us, that the the latter part of this year will be greater than the first. I do believe that we can grow from strength to strength in our spirits, in our mindsets, in our passion, in our capacity. We're gonna speak it that we want to to speak life-giving words over our lives and over the people that we lead or that we impact. I had the beautiful opportunity to be quiet in a nice place where I was able to walk in nature, and I felt safe enough to do that. And you know, I was listening to so many beautiful sounds. I was quiet enough to hear the birds, the animals, there were cows, there were different animals around, and it was soothing to my heart to hear those sounds. But even within the midst of all the different sounds, I could understand and identify the distinct differences, the differences between the different animals because I was quiet enough to hear. And so, what I want to say is, and I asked myself, am I quiet enough to hear my sound? What is your sound? Do you know your sound? Are you in alignment with your sound as you move into this month, into the second half, or are you compromising your own sound? That is your uniqueness. What has God given to you? What is the flavor that you carry when you speak, when you teach, when you show up without any words? I was able to identify the the names of those animals, or the, you know, just by just hearing, listening to the sound. So the sound is that internal. I wrote an article on that, you can have a look at on my LinkedIn uh bio or here, the post is there, and it's more like a detailed article, but I just wanted to highlight that, and it really spoke to me that if I'm if I'm off, and all of us will know when the when people the notes or the voices or the sound is off, and then we are not in alignment, so maybe be calibrated, recalibrate the sound, that uniqueness that you have that only comes from a deep place in your heart, and so be quiet enough to hear that and to make sure that you have sharpened your your sound. Because if that sound is not sharpened, then the people around you will know that. Your teams, your partners, the people they will know when you're offbeat. And so take the time, be quiet enough, take the time to listen and don't be too distracted by the noise so that you cannot hear your own sound. You know, there's even a verse, a beautiful verse in scripture that talks about if the trumpet, how will we know? I will the how will the army know that they must go for war if the trumpet makes a sound that is not recognizable, if they cannot decipher the sound of the trumpet, so your your sound, the correct sound, will cause uh people to take action, the proper action. So your sound is important. And so these are things that I uh so to not settle, to not settle. May take time to say, okay, I have this responsibility, and I want to I'm speaking because I I I've I've seen so, and I speak from my own to my own heart too. We have responsibility with presidents of countries, whether you're president of a whatever leadership role you take, make sure that you're well because your well-being and you're committed to your own process and your growth has that has an impact on your team, and we don't want to rob our teams, we don't want to sell ourselves short, we don't want to live below what we can become and be and do. And so today I want to encourage us in the second half of the year, take courage, be bold, be strong, take time to listen to your sound, take time to re realign your priorities and make time for your heart and your mind and exposure vitality. And so I just want to bless you. May God continue to strengthen the work of your hands, may the second half be greater than the first. May you have clarity where you feel discouraged or despondent, get up, we move forward. Will you feel you had great successes? Let the successes be there, but don't let the success uh rob you of anything to finish well, to be strong and to do well. Have a wonderful day, have a wonderful week, and I will be back with another episode of Alignment Conversations for the second half of 2029. Oh, 2026, 2029. Have a wonderful day, bye bye.