What is "Proving Energy?" And Why Should You Knock it off NOW!

When one bad moment turns into someone quietly deciding you’re not ready, it can send you into overdrive trying to prove them wrong. In this episode, I break down “proving energy” and how it shows up in your work, your confidence, and your leadership. More importantly, I share how I got out of it and what changed when I finally stopped performing and started leading as myself. 
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Transcript

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Welcome back to We Lead Anyway. I'm Noelle, senior leader, career coach, and your host. Okay, I need to start today with a little confession. There was a moment in my career where I was so far up in my own head about what I needed to prove and to whom and by when that I completely lost myself. Like full personality transplant. Okay, gone. I was reenacting this version of me that I thought other people needed to see. And honey, the reviews, not great. Okay. We're gonna talk about that today. We're gonna talk about proving energy. What is it? What does it cost you? And how I learned that very hard lesson that the moment you stop trying to prove yourself is usually the exact moment you actually do. So, first of all, if you've been here since season one, thank you. I love you. You are the real ones. And if you listened to that episode early in the season where I talked about fumbling a presentation, you already know part of this story. This really made an impact on my life. But I want to come back to it today because it really is the foundation of everything that I want to say and kind of the rebirth of who I am. So here's what happened: I was presenting in front of leadership, people who I respected, people whose opinions mattered for where my career was going. And I got tongue-tied-like, not a little stumble, but I mean like I was up there and my brain and my mouth just oh, they broke up, like they stopped talking, completely fell apart in the moment. Okay. Now, anyone who has ever stood in front of a room when that happens knows the feeling. Time slows down. You become hyper-aware of every single person in the room. You are simultaneously trying to remember what you're going to say and managing the voice in your head that is just absolutely roasting you. Okay. It's a special kind of torture. But I recovered. I finished the presentation. I walked out of the room. And I genuinely thought, like, okay, that wasn't my best, but it was fine. I got compliments. I know this material. They know I know this material. We good. We were not good. What I found out later was that my leader at that time used that presentation as evidence. Evidence that I wasn't ready for the next step. One moment of getting tongue-tied, and I suddenly was being written off. The feedback didn't come as a conversation. It came as this door that I just saw quietly closing. And I didn't even know it was happening until I was already standing on the wrong side of it. And I wanted to sit with that for a second because I think this happens more than people talk about. You don't always get a meeting. You don't always get a performance improvement plan or a warning. Sometimes people just decide something about you, and that decision starts showing up in what you don't get invited to, what you don't get considered for, what just stops coming your way. Okay. Now, here's what I'm going to say as a leader, as a colleague, as a human, if I witnessed a direct report or even a peer that just crap the bed during a presentation and I know what their normal, their typical work looks like, I'm going to check in with them. I'm going to say, hey, homie, you good? Did you have a bad day? Is there something that I can help you with? Can I help develop you? Whatever the case is. My leader did not have the wherewithal. So I'm just going to leave it there. So what did I do? What any ambitious-driven, slightly unhinged professional does, I went into full proving mode. So let's define this because I think we've all been there, but not everyone has words for it. Proving energy is what happens when external doubt becomes your internal operating system, when someone's opinion of you starts driving every single decision you make, or some of the decisions that you make when you're no longer doing the work because you love it or because you're good at it, but because you are desperately trying to convince somebody that they were wrong about you. And here's the crap part, okay? It feels like motivation. It disguises itself as drive. They're not the same thing. Motivation that comes from confidence and purpose feels expansive, almost liberating. Proving energy feels like you're running on a hamster wheel in a burning building and you're moving fast and you're working hard and you're absolutely going nowhere. So I want to give you three real examples because I want you to be able to recognize this in yourself. Because this is what this is all about self-reflection right now. So the first example is you have become the over-explainer. You send a three-paragraph email for something that needed three sentences. You add context, nobody asked for. You pre-justify your decisions before anyone has even questioned them. You think you're being thorough, you're not. You're not. You are managing the perception of your competence in real time. And I think deep down we know this, right? So proving energy looks like shrinking your ideas into a defensive crouch before they even leave your mouth. Example two, the volunteer for everything. Your hand is up before the ask is finished. You're on every committee, every project, every initiative, not because you're passionate about all of it, because nobody's that happy about work. You're just terrified of what people will think if you're not visible enough. You're confusing exhaustion with effort, and your results are actually getting worse because you're spread just impossibly thin. So proving energy looks like performing busyness instead of doing meaningful work. And then the third example is the second guesser. You've done this a hundred times. You know exactly what to do. But now someone is watching, or you think someone is watching, and suddenly you're paralyzed. You're rereading your own work, like you've never done this before. You're asking for feedback on things that you've never needed feedback on before. You've outsourced your confidence to people who did not ask for that responsibility. And proving energy looks like doubting the expertise that you actually have and that you've been relying on up until whatever point. Okay, so now you know what it looks like. And I want to talk about how to get out of it because I'm not here to just name the problem. That's only half the work. All right, so there's some shifts that we have to make. One, we need to audit whose voice is running the show. This is super important. When you notice you're operating from proving energy, stop and ask yourself, whose voice is this? Is this me leading from what I know, or is this me trying to manage what someone else thinks? Which is halfway impossible, very exhausting work, by the way. And most of the time, the person whose approval you're chasing has already moved on. They're not thinking about you, but you are still completely reorganizing your behavior around a standard they set and then forgot about. So name the voice, separate it from your own, and then choose which one gets to drive. Some of you know that I have diagnosed OCD. I've named my OCD Clarence. Clarence is an a-hole, but it really does help me separate what's driving my behaviors or why am I making decisions? Is it because the OCD has me overthinking and my perfectionism is showing up? Or is this really something that I need to care that much about? So name it. Shift number two is return to your evidence. Listen, you have a track record, you have receipts. Before you spiral into questioning yourself, go get the evidence. What have you actually built? What have you solved? Who have you led or developed or impacted? Proving energy thrives in a vacuum. Okay, but when you fill that vacuum with facts about what you actually have done, it has a lot less room to operate. And your history is data. So you got to use that data. And then the last thing that we'll go over today is do one thing from your real self. So, what do I mean by that? Well, you don't have to overhaul everything at once. Just do one thing today, the way you would have done it before doubt crept in, before you thought someone was paying attention to you, before you got that feedback that you didn't quite understand, but you really, really, really, really want to get better on. Okay. So send the shorter email. Say the direct thing without the disclaimer. Make the decision that you already know is right without asking for three rounds of validation. One action from your grounded, confident self is a data point that your nervous system can hold on to. And then you do it again tomorrow. That is how you rebuild. So I want to tell you what happened after I left that environment. And I want to be very clear about the timeline here because it matters. So first I left by choice. I made the decision that the place I was in was not a place that could hold who I actually was. And I walked away. Good. Now I'm not going to pretend that it was easy or that I was certain that it was the right call, but it absolutely was the right call. And I know that. So slowly after I left, something started to come back. I started to remember who the heck I was before someone's limited read on me became the story I told myself, right? That proving energy started to quiet down. It got my mojo back. Didn't happen all at once. It was piece by piece, but I started leading from myself again instead of someone else's doubt. And it was in the season of reclaiming myself that I was selected to give the commencement address at my graduation. So out of 350 graduates that applied to give the commencement speech, they chose me. And I was absolutely honored. Now I want you to understand what was different this time because I don't know if any of you know this, but I really have wanted to be a public speaker for a very long time. And I set the intention to get on a stage in January. I said, I will be on a stage in 2026. And there you go. I was selected to give the commencement address. I was shook because I thought, okay, well, the last time I was in front of a group of people, this is what happened. All right. So I want you to understand what was different this time. I was not in proving mode anymore. I was not trying to manage how I came across or crafting myself into something I thought they needed. I was just me, the version of me that had done the work that could draw from my experience. I told my authentic story, and I had done the work to come back home to myself. And that speech came from a completely different place, more different than anything I had produced during those months of proving energy, right? I spoke from what I believe. I use my real voice, the one that gets a little too passionate sometimes, the one that's sarcastic or makes jokes, the one that doesn't always have a perfect landing, but is always, always honest. And it connected. And people came up to me afterwards and they told me that I inspired them. I got a standing ovation. They told me that it hit different, that it was exactly what they needed to hear. I have people reaching out to me on LinkedIn still. And I stood there thinking, this, this is what was missing. Not more preparation, not a better performance, just me, just operating from a place of who I am, what I know, and what I carry. And the graduation speech did not happen in spite of everything I went through. It happened because I did the work to come out the other side as myself. And here is what I want you to take from this. And I want to say it plainly so there's no way to misread it because this is so important. It really knocked me off of my game for months. Your expertise is not contingent on someone else validating it. Okay. You don't need permission to know what you know. You don't need somebody's approval to trust yourself. Just trust yourself. When someone makes a sweeping decision about your readiness based on one moment, one stumble, one bad day, they are not giving you data about your capability. They are giving you data about their capacity for nuance and to coach and develop. And those are two very different things. The leader who decided I wasn't ready because I fumbled the presentation. That said something about how they evaluate people. It said they don't have a very sophisticated lens. Because any leader worth following knows that a bad presentation does not equal a bad leader. It equals a bad presentation. That's it. That's all. But I let that one person's limited read on me reshape how I showed up, how I felt about myself, how I then performed in subsequent interviews. And you know what? That's on me. That's on me because I handed them the keys to my confidence and they drove that thing into the wall. I said I was gonna stop cursing so much. So the graduation speech taught me that when I operate from a place of I know who I am and what I bring to the table, I'm undeniable. Not perfect, not untouchable, but undeniable. Because there's no version of me or you that is more compelling than the real one. You are undeniable. And when you operate from proving energy, when you let someone else's doubt become the fuel, you become a worse version of yourself every single time. So the work is this, and it's actually work. I'm not gonna pretend it's simple because I'm it took me months. When you feel proving energy start to creep in, you have to ask yourself, whose voice is driving right now? Is this me leading from what I know? Or is this me performing for an audience that may not even be paying attention anymore? Because half the time, the person who planted the doubt has already moved on. Set it and forget it. Okay, they're not thinking about you. You, you're still out here rearranging your entire personality trying to prove something to someone who forgot that they ever questioned you. They have moved on. Just think about that for a second. So I want to close with this. You were selected, maybe not out of 350 people for a speech, but you were selected, chosen, hired, promoted, trusted with something at some point in your life. Someone saw something in you and decided that's the one right there. That's the one. And that person was right. And when the self-doubt comes, and it will come. When someone makes you feel like you have to earn back ground you've never actually lost, I want you to remember that you already have a track record. You have evidence, you're not starting from zero. You kidding me? Just because somebody decided to see you that way or to give their ill advice or opinion? No. You get to decide who you're leading from. Prove it energy or power energy. And I promise you, the people in that room can tell the difference. So I recommend you come back to yourself every time. That is where good work lives, and that's where your sanity will stay. All right, that's today's show. If you have a topic you'd like me to discuss, email me at noelleadsanyway at gmail.com. And if you're interested in personal or professional coaching or development, please visit leadwithnoel.com. And until then, go take up space.