Humble Keeps You Hungry. And ‘Enough’ Never Comes

I want to tell you about a moment that happens in almost every coaching session I run with a senior leader.

I ask them a simple question: what are you celebrating?

And they go quiet.

Not thinking-quiet. Uncomfortable-quiet.

Some look away. Some laugh nervously, as though I’ve said something slightly inappropriate. A few, and these are people leading thousands, making decisions worth millions, sometimes billions, look genuinely alarmed.

This is the moment I know we have work to do.

Praise Is Teflon. Criticism Is Velcro.

Here’s what I’ve observed across 18 years of coaching C-suite leaders, MDs, Founders and VPs.

Compliments, praise, acknowledgment – it lands like Teflon. Slides straight off before it’s even registered. Someone says something genuinely kind about your leadership and within seconds you’ve found a reason to discount it. They’re just being nice. Anyone would have done the same. It wasn’t that impressive really.

But criticism? One piece of negative feedback. One meeting that didn’t go the way you wanted. One moment where you felt you fell short. Velcro. It sticks. It replays. It’s still there at 2am.

This isn’t a personal failing. It’s neuroscience. The brain is wired to scan for threat and error, it kept us alive for thousands of years. But that same wiring is quietly eroding the confidence of some of the most capable leaders I know.

Humble Keeps You Hungry. And ‘Enough’ Never Comes.

You’ve been told to stay grounded. Not to get too big for your boots. To let the work speak for itself. Humility is a virtue. Celebrating yourself is arrogance.

And here’s what I want you to understand before I say anything else: the people who taught you this believed it completely. Your parents instilled this in you because their parents instilled it in them, and it was passed down with genuine love and good intentions. The thinking was: keep your head down, stay hungry, don’t get complacent, always strive for more. It wasn’t ill-intentioned. It came from care.

But that belief has had its day. And it is still running the internal narrative of otherwise exceptional leaders – quietly, persistently, and at considerable cost.

Because here’s what actually happens when you live by it. You hit the target and immediately move the goalposts. You achieve something significant and find a reason it doesn’t quite count. You lead well and focus on the one thing that didn’t go as planned. The feeling of ‘enough’ is always just out of reach. Not because you’re failing – but because the belief system you’re operating from has no arrival point built into it.

I also want to name the false choice that keeps so many leaders stuck here. Most of the people I work with genuinely believe the only alternative to humility is arrogance. That if they start acknowledging what they’re good at, they’ll become the kind of person who thinks they know everything and stops growing. That is not what happens. That has never happened with a single client I have worked with.

There is a whole lot of space between humility and arrogance. It’s called accuracy. And that is what I am asking for.

Acknowledging what you are genuinely brilliant at is not arrogance. It is an honest, clear-eyed appraisal of the skills and qualities you bring. And that kind of self-knowledge is one of the most powerful things a leader can have.

People Just Want to Feel Seen.

At the most fundamental level, underneath all the strategy and the performance and the results – people just want to feel cared for and cared about. That is true of you. And it is true of every single person in your team.

Abraham Maslow understood this. In his hierarchy of human needs, esteem – the need to feel valued, recognised and appreciated – sits at the heart of what drives us. It is not a nice-to-have. It is a core human requirement.

Recognition, at its simplest, tells someone: I see you. I value what you contribute. You matter here. That message – delivered consistently and genuinely – changes how people show up. And with the youngest generations now entering the workforce, this has never been more important.

This is not about handing out gold stars or telling people they’re wonderful when they’re not. It is about building an environment where people feel genuinely seen and valued and where their strengths are noticed and named as often as their development areas.

The leaders who do this well don’t have less drive. They have more. And so do their teams.

The Five Drivers Underneath It All

In my international bestselling Screw Meditation! How to switch off a busy brain, be more productive and enjoy life! I explore five psychological drivers identified by psychologist Taibi Kahler that keep high achievers overworking.

Be Perfect. Hurry Up. Please Others. Be Strong. Try Hard.

Every single one is rooted in the same belief: I am only good enough if I am perfect, fast, accommodating, strong, relentless. In other words – I am not enough as I am.

This is the engine of overwork. Not ambition. Not passion. The quiet, persistent conviction that you haven’t quite earned your place yet. Sound familiar?

Here is what I see consistently when leaders begin to genuinely acknowledge and celebrate what they already are, not what they’re working towards, but what they already are, the grip of those drivers loosens. They don’t stop working hard. They stop needing to prove it. That is a fundamentally different, and far more sustainable, way to lead.

The Two-Minute Daily Practice

I start every coaching session by asking clients what they’re celebrating. At first, most of them hate it. By the end of our work together, it’s often the part they value most.

Here’s the exercise I give them. Two minutes. Morning and evening.

MORNING: Ask yourself – what am I celebrating? Choose three qualities that are true for you today. Write them down or say them out loud. Don’t worry if you feel uncomfortable or don’t fully believe them yet. That discomfort is exactly the point. I am brave. I am committed. I am clear-headed.

EVENING: Think of one thing that happened today – good or challenging. Ask yourself: who was I being in that moment? Then complete this sentence: I was being [quality]. Therefore I am [quality].

That second step matters. You’re not just noticing. You’re building evidence. A body of proof, accumulated day by day, that rewires the story you tell about yourself.

One Last Thing

You are not going to end up on the sofa watching Netflix because you started acknowledging what you’re good at. I promise you.

That fear, that if you stop being hard on yourself you’ll lose all drive, is the old belief system talking. The same one that told you to stay humble, keep pushing, never quite arrive.

What actually happens when leaders do this work is the opposite. They become more focused, more decisive, more present. They enjoy the work more. They lead better. They get more done, with significantly less internal noise.

The question isn’t whether you deserve to acknowledge yourself.

You do. The evidence is everywhere. The question is whether you’re willing to start letting it in.

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