Fierce Encouragement is for high performers who've mastered everything on the outside and are still waiting to feel it on the inside. Host Mark Walker, a performance coach, speaker, and facilitator for executives and leaders, brings useful, sharp tools from mindset work, meditation, and hard-earned experience, so you can stop grinding against yourself and start leading from within. Real stories. No fluff. Just the clarity you've been avoiding.
That relentless “driven” feeling might not be ambition at all. It might be a low-grade hum of anxiety, doubt, and unworthiness that follows you from meeting to meeting, turning every email into a crucible and every decision into a test of whether you belong. I’m Mark, and I built Fierce Encouragement because I know that struggle firsthand and because I keep hearing it show up in the leaders and high performers I coach.
We dig into how that hidden inner pressure doesn’t stay contained inside a leader. It leaks into the room, even on virtual calls, and it quietly shapes culture. When a leader is afraid they’re not enough, mistakes can feel intolerable, not because the work is broken, but because the leader’s identity feels on trial. The result is a team that stays off balance, avoids crucial conversations, hesitates to ask for help, and slowly burns out. That’s when growth stalls, trust drops, and turnover starts spinning like a revolving door.
Then I share a simple path forward that starts with three questions: Are you aware of what’s really going on under the surface? Do you understand the real results it’s causing for you and your team? Do you believe you have agency to take action instead of managing around it forever? I also offer one practical tool you can try this week: pick one meeting, name uncertainty out loud (“I don’t know” or “I got this wrong”), leave space, and watch what changes in trust and openness.
If this connects with you, subscribe, share it with a leader who needs it, and leave a quick review so more people can find Fierce Encouragement. What’s the strongest version of the “hum” you hear in your own head right now?
the ending plug for pause that matters on Sept 17, 2026.
For leaders who run on adrenaline. The Pause That Matters is a free live workshop on trading reaction for clarity. Seats are limited, and it fills from this list first. Get on the list: Click Here
Hey everybody, this is Mark, and this is the podcast called Fierce Encouragement. Thank you for being here. Just a quick check-in at the top. I created this podcast because I struggle. I struggled mightily. I still struggle here and there with positive or uplifting self-image. I'm really good at beating myself up. So that's why I created this. I'm a coach. I've worked in corporate IT for decades, and I've done everything from raise a family to help coach people towards showing up for themselves in a deeper, more consistent way, and especially in that mindset around who they are. So I do work with a lot of leaders. I do work with a lot of high performers, people who are running teams, people that are running companies, and people that are starting things, people running whole departments, even. And really underneath almost every conversation that I have, I hear some of the same talk and kind of this same low frequency vibration. So this episode might be tuned in more for people who are leaders. And this one could be parenting too, right? Like parents are leaders or leading and coaching on the athletic field. And really for anyone managing other people who also might be carrying some of the same difficulties themselves without maybe even knowing it. So let's jump into this. Here's
something I noticed kind of right at the top. Um, and this is in most every leader I get to talk to, most teams I get to uh have workshops with, and most people I get to train. And honestly, if I'm really bold and vulnerable here, I struggle with this mightily too. There's a hum or a low vibration running underneath every day. And so what do I mean by that? Well, it's a constant low-grade anxiety or doubt. It might even be kind of a speeding, frantic, energetic, overly energetic mind, kind of, I think people talk about the monkey mind always moving branch to branch. And some of the language that I have with myself around it is quote unquote, I don't have time for this, you know, unquote. I find myself that kind of voice and that energy in my head, kind of like that drill sergeant in my head. The one that's burnt out but angry, and the one that just wants to keep going and pushing that type of energy. That's what I'm talking about. So I don't know if you're familiar with that energy, but that's my kind of default mode. But we usually don't call it what it is for us. We might even call that in a cultural context, like uh somebody, a lot of people have called me driven. Um, people have called it being a high performer, right? People call it something like who, hey, he takes it seriously, they take it seriously, that's good. And it is good. It doesn't mean it's all bad, but I think underneath the drive and that push and the burnout for a lot of people is something quieter. And it's while it's hard to admit, it's a sense, it's a felt sense of unworthiness. This is kind of like a fear that if we slow down too much, somebody will finally call us out. Um people will start laughing and pointing, right? And maybe we actually think that there isn't um value in what we do and who we are. We're just a role. And we can't really say that out loud in a performance review, can we? Maybe some amazing managers or HR people might. But for most of us, saying that out loud is the end of our career. So this sense of unworthiness kind of hums in the background all along the way, unspoken, underneath every meeting, every email, that nervous energy that you might approach some tasks at work with. All conditional. In fact, when I look back at some of my energy around my work tasks and my IT corporate work, it was this. I felt like I had to reread every email two or three times to make sure I didn't offend anybody, that I used um the proper words, that I didn't overstep my bounds, but that it didn't avoid any of the things that were asked of me. Every email felt like a do or die, like the crucible. And I guess you I'm wondering like that with you. Do you feel kind of this low-grade hum? Do you trust yourself deeply in what you do and how you show up to every meeting? I think this matters more than beyond um just our jobs and our roles and goals. I
think it's like our personal inner life. Because when we as leaders are running with that kind of low grade vibration or hum, and we feel a little bit disconnected from ourselves, our energy is a little low, our attitude and engagement's low. When we show up like that as leaders, it doesn't stay contained to us, the leaders. That energy, that vibration, in a sense, leaks into the room we occupy. People can feel it on virtual calls. It's true. Our team, our group, the people we work with, they do pick up the frequency of that without really naming it. So a leader who might be secretly afraid that they're not enough, well, they might kind of react that they can't tolerate others' mistakes, right? Because the other mistake feels like evidence about them not showing up as a leader. It isn't about the work. So again, let me share that again. A leader that might think um less of themselves won't tolerate mistakes in others because it presents evidence that they're not doing their job as the leader. And then it isn't about the work. This is about a leader who's never addressed their own felt sense of unworthiness. And this write this and chip this in concrete and stone. This leader will build, often they will build a culture where nobody else is allowed to be certain either. They will keep everybody off balance. They won't give people a safe place to work and experiment and grow. Everybody has to perform at a high-level competence all the time, and nobody can really even share what they don't know or what they're struggling with, or if they need help. That kills teams. That chokes off any growth. And I'll tell you what, this is expensive as hell. And it's funny how I see in places I go, they do this and then they just throw more leadership training and books and feigned interest into programs, but nobody practices it. This is the stuff that's super expensive. We hide behind it. It's the stuff that quietly drains our energy. And I'll tell you, this is the this is the stuff that causes turnover in a big deep way on a revolving door. I've seen it again and again in the teams I've worked with, and it's sad to see great people have to leave because one leader wasn't able to work on themselves and see that they are worthy. Here's
where I usually start with um leaders that I've gotten connect with on this and working kind of from the inside out. It isn't with a fix. It isn't with a quick fix, but it starts more with questions. Might even be that awareness. Like, are you even aware that this is kind of running in the background for you? Most high performers I get to work with do have an incredible amount of self-awareness around their calendar, right? Or maybe the numbers, or maybe an output uh spreadsheet or dashboard. But a lot of them, well, this is unfortunately true. A lot of them haven't stopped to ask whether there is that kind of unworthiness hum there, how they're working on themselves and what that's costing them. So here's three things I ask in order every time. Are you aware of your problem? Not the surface for surface problem, the up uh the problem up on the surface, but the deeper ones, the ones underneath it. Do you understand the actual results it's causing and in your life and and in your team? This isn't theory. This is specifics, this is data. Who left? What got avoided? What um crucial conversations never happened because it felt too risky? Do you have any agency here? Do you have any ability to take action? Is there any sense that there's a way to work with this instead of just managing around it forever? Truly that's it. Three questions. Awareness, results, and agency. If a leader can't ask these things honestly and sit with them, with their team, there is no tool. Let me say it again, there is no tool or any system I can hand them or anybody else can hand them that's going to stick. This is an honest assessment on what it means to show up as leaders. And these three questions, I think they model or make an example of how we can show up vulnerably as leaders because quality leadership is servant leadership, and servant leadership means vulnerable leadership. That does not mean oversharing, but it does mean admitting that there's places for you to grow and to understand and to see where there might be gaps in you taking action or helping support your team. And this
is really the reframe for leaders. I do want to offer something really specific here. If this is waking something up in you, I feel myself energized right now because I don't think this is about leaders becoming softer or coddling or just creating cultures where we pat each other on the head and give each other trophies. That's bull crap. And that is even more abusive to the teams and the people on the work. I think it's the opposite of that, actually. A leader who has looked honestly at their own sense of unworthiness, that whatever modality is on autopilot, when they know it's there, when they know what they're working with and they aren't ashamed of it, that they see it clearly, they're working on it actively, they become someone else that um their team can actually trust. This doesn't come bestowed. It isn't in a role, it isn't in a salary, it doesn't come from HR. And it certainly doesn't happen because they're flawless now, or they're exonerated, or they're pretending not to be something. No. But also, this isn't a personal flaw. This is just that system issue as a leader. There's patterns in leadership and thinking and mindset that they picked up along the way somewhere that's running on autopilot, and it's actually just a mistake. And so often it can be mistaken for a personality. So that might be true for you as a leader as well, and it also might be true for anyone else on your team. I think it's important to have that reframe on this because the leaders I see and I respect the most aren't the ones without um problems or that background hum of unworthiness, that trance. The leaders that I know that are great ones, they're the people that show up and know it's there, and they've learned to manage, not manage around it, but manage to work with their team with it in a sense, without hiding it, sharing what's working for them and how they might need a little help and how they can support each other as a team. And again, inviting people back to what the main mission is, getting people excited about it. I think a tool here, again, just a really practical, tactical tool for you if you wanted to run with this this week or two, or give this a month with your team. But this
is the practical thing you can actually try to work with this next week. So pick one meeting. It does not have to be a big one. Somewhere in it, I want you to model that uncertainty out loud. Um, you might say something like, I don't know, if you don't know. Or even say, like, I got this wrong if you did get it wrong. Don't make things up. Or even share something like, you know, I'm not sure if this is the right call yet. And leave some space. Instead of performing certainty, just perform with space and openness, see what other people share. And then this is what I want you to do. I want you to sh shut up. I want you to watch what happens in the room. And this happens in families, it happens in teams, it can even happen in a group of friends. But most of the time it's this. It doesn't make people um trust you less when you do this. It's actually the opposite. I don't know. Um, I got this wrong. Things like that. This gives people around you permission to stop performing too. That's the whole damn experience experiment right there. One meeting, one moment of dropping any performance you might be enacting, and watch the room change. It's magical and it's simple all at once.
And so if you are leading people, um, I want you to hear this really clear. You are worthy of that role you are in. You worked hard to get there. And even with um that um that insecurity, that lack of fierce encouragement, the wondering how you're gonna get through this. Yeah, that low trance of unworthiness that might be behind you. Well, what is that's what I was going after, the imposter syndrome. That's one I ha hear a lot, the one I've talked to myself a lot about. But this unworthiness, this imposter syndrome. Well, this low hum isn't proof that you do not belong there. And it isn't. It's actually proof that you're a human being doing a hard job, maybe raising a family and managing life as best you can, just like every other person on earth, just like every other leader who sat where you sat, and just like every leader who sat where you're sat and made progress. You're going through it. So your team doesn't need you to have everything all figured out. Ooh, shocking, right? I do think they need you to be more honest and vulnerable about what you don't have figured out yet. That's the actual job. That's the work. So, hey, thanks for being here uh on this episode. And truly, if you do lead people and that hum and that uh imposter syndrome and gravity of feeling unworthy is familiar to you, I do want you to know that naming it isn't a weakness. It's actually the first real move toward leading yourself to somewhere even better, to somewhere even more balanced and steady, to where people are showing up and just loving working with you. So if
a conversation might help you in this season, especially around how this all might be showing up in your team or in your own personal leadership, there is a link in the show notes. I'd love to connect with you. No pitch, no sales, just an honest conversation about what's actually going on for you. So until next time, thank you for listening to Fierce Encouragement. Stay fierce, encourage yourself, encourage your teams, and know that you're doing a great job and you are worthy. Have a great day, have a great evening wherever you're at. Take care now. Bye bye.
