Trapped by the Leader Image Your Younger Self Created
Have you ever stepped into a leadership role, but stayed hostage to the leader image your younger self created years earlier?
Before we become leaders, most of us already decide what leadership should look like. We observe managers, directors, and CEOs around us. Some inspire us. Some disappoint us. And quietly, without even noticing, we start writing rules in our head: “If I am a leader, I will never do this.”, “A real leader should always do that.”, “When I’m in charge, I will be different.”.
At that stage, we are not leading yet. We are imagining leadership from the outside. We are forming these images without full responsibility, without accountability, without the weight of consequences. The image is built from idealism, personal pain, and partial observations, not from reality.
Then one day, the promotion comes. We become the leader. And this is where the hidden trap starts. We grow in experience, scope, and responsibility, but we keep trying to perform an old version of leadership, designed by a younger version of ourselves. Instead of updating the image, we become loyal to it.
Leadership in action quickly introduces things our younger self never modeled:
- Decisions where there is no “right” option.
- Situations where protecting one value means hurting another.
- Moments where speed matters more than perfection.
- Pressure that forces delegation, distance, and hard trade-offs.
Suddenly, leadership does not look like the clean picture we once imagined.
This is where many leaders start to struggle internally. Not because they lack skills, and not because they are not capable, but because they feel they are betraying an old promise they made to themselves: “I said I would never do this.”, “I said I would always be available.”, “I said I would always protect everyone.”.
And when reality proves otherwise, the inner dialogue becomes harsh: “Maybe I’m not a good leader.”, “Maybe I’m becoming what I once criticized.”, “Maybe I was wrong about myself.”.
Leadership growth often doesn’t fail because leaders stop learning. It fails because they don’t let go of who they thought they would be.
Maturity in leadership is not about becoming the leader your younger self imagined. It is about allowing yourself to evolve (without guilt, without shame) and lead from reality, not from an old image.
Sometimes, the most powerful leadership move is not improving your skills, but updating your identity.