Mastering the Mindset
Mastering the Mindset
You Don't Need All the Answers to Make a Difference
You don’t have to have it all figured out to be a leader. You are exactly what real leadership looks like — and you’re already leading, even if you don’t realize it yet. Whether you’re a parent, friend, entrepreneur, manager, or simply someone on a personal growth journey, people are watching how you move. They see you showing up, and they’re being inspired by your example — even in your imperfections.
Stepping into your role as a leader is not about having all the answers — it's about sparking something inside others. Leadership isn’t about giving people a checklist. It’s about becoming the best version of you so others are empowered to become the best version of themselves. If you’ve ever questioned your influence, felt like a fraud, or held back because you didn’t feel “ready,” this episode will shift your mindset and help you lead with confidence.
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Losing myself and finding my strength, came to the conclusion that I want it all, feeling that pressure of trying to do better. I want to reach heights, but too scared to fall, too scared to fail. You're way more scared of feeling regret. I'm not even trying. That's terrifying. I understand that. Chasing my goals are burying my clocks because it take time. I gotta go. I already know if I want to grow, you reap what you sow. That be the case. Planting my seeds and watering my base. Yeah, I made mistakes. Yeah, I know you grow in your garden, but watch for the snakes.
Speaker 1:The people that act like you crazy but trying this, they far away. They don't think it's possible. I think it's possible. That is just hate, yeah, hate, yeah. They hate themselves. Cause they on the shelf why you create a life that you love, a life that you love, yeah, loving the fact you improving yourself, decided that you would not settle, decided that you got the drive to do it. The road got bumping your foot on the pedal. You go up a level. You turn up whenever it's time for you to go. Put in that work. I know my worth. I know it ain't gonna be easy. I know it hurt my fingers for sure. Yeah, until they put me in this earth, before I ride in that hearse, I'm chasing my goals. I'm chasing my goals. Yeah, loving the fact you improving yourself, decided that you would not settle. Decided that you got the drive To do what you go, got, pump and get you're going to do. I'm chasing my goals.
Speaker 1:All right, and welcome back to another episode. Thank y'all so much for being here. If you are on youtube, go ahead and like and subscribe to my channel. If you are listening on a podcast platform, be sure to leave me a review. Also, become a supporter of the show. You can choose the monthly amount. It can either be three, five, eight or ten dollars. You can cancel at any time. Why would you ever do that? Let's go ahead and dive in.
Speaker 1:Today we're going to talk about how you can empower people around you, and I know there are a lot of you out there who are leaders in some sort of way and, whether or not you feel like you are a leader or not, you are leading people with basically everything you do. You might be leaders in your business. You might be an account manager or have people under you. You might have friends or colleagues who look up to you, your family members. You might be a very successful person in your career, whatever it may be, and you have people that you are inspiring. You might have a spouse that looks up to you, your children, right.
Speaker 1:So the thing I want to empower each of you to realize is that you are a leader in life in some capacity or another, and that there are people who look up to you for guidance or looking at you to see what you're doing and are getting inspiration from what you do. There are people out there looking at you, watching you, and they see the things you do and who you are and how you may even look just like them or doing the same thing they want to attempt to do, but don't have the courage to do it yet. They see you and by you going on your journey, you better believe you are empowering people. You are leading, and the sooner you realize this that you are a leader, the sooner you'll be able to a step into that position and grow yourself and be able to help the ones around you grow as well, and one of the things I'm learning that holds people back from stepping into their shoes as leaders, which is something I used to let hold me back and I still struggle with is folks think that to be a leader, to empower somebody else, you have to have it all figured out, that you have to have it all together, that you have to reach a certain milestone, or that you have to quote, unquote make it before you can be a leader or inspire other people. Right? Have you ever heard that before? Felt that before? Right?
Speaker 1:A lot of people think this way, like, oh no, I'm not a leader yet, or I can't be a leader yet. How can I? I don't have it all figured out. They're going to think I'm a fraud. We think we need to have it all figured out and for it to be perfect before we can be a leader. We feel like we don't have all the answers to give somebody and honestly, even though here I am with this damn podcast and giving you these episodes to help you on your journey, even I struggle with this, even now, because what I used to say or how I used to think was that this podcast was basically started because of the pandemic and we all went through our own mental stuff back then. We all had to deal with our mental well-being and, up until like a year ago, my mindset the way I would describe this podcast was like oh well, I'm just showing folks what helped me get out of my own mental, the hole that I was in mentally, or, you know, I'm just showing them the things that I found for myself so they can use it In my mind.
Speaker 1:Because I stumbled on this self-development journey right, that I started and I started implementing the things in my life that I found that anybody can do it. That, just because I did it, then anybody should be able to do it. And to a certain extent, that is true. Right, I ain't the first person to find my self-development journey and technically, you could have found it without me. But, like I said, I had to realize that there are people out there that need to see me specifically do it. They need to see Darius Dodge do it. I had to come to the understanding that there are people out there that I am inspiring and I have people who believe in me and that this work I'm doing is actually really important and I am a leader. And no, dodge, you ain't just telling them the info you found. No, you are actually putting in, putting it all into practice and leading by example.
Speaker 1:And the biggest moment and I mean the biggest moment that made me feel like a leader and a beautiful reminder to myself, is I booked my first client as a life coach and it's been something I've been wanting to start and get it off the ground eventually. And they're just. There's this artist in town, very well known, very well known and highly accomplished and literally somebody I look up to and I look at him and the career he done had and all the knowledge he has, and I made a post about it for all those who you don't know. His name is T Michael Rambo, a Twin Cities legend, and he reached out to me one day and told me he wanted to hire me as his life coach and my jaw damn near dropped. Like me as much as this man done, I feel like, if anything, I should hire him to be my life coach and honestly, to be honest, three, four years ago I probably would have told him that I didn't feel ready because honestly, I don't. But one thing I've been doing and I see it a lot on here is I'm stepping outside my comfort zone more and more. So I accept it and I officially have my first life coaching client. I'm nervous about it, about what I'm doing, but I'm doing it, and it reminds me of another situation that I turned down.
Speaker 1:I was so I've been acting professionally since 2009, but I've never actually directed a play, and I was given the opportunity to direct and they wanted me to direct Black Nativity and, if any of y'all know, that can be a really big show, especially for my first one, and I'm thinking, man, you know, I ain't never direct before, I want to try directing, but Black Nativity, that's too much for my first one. And I turned it down and I'll be honest, I wish I would have done it, because would it have been hard? Probably it would have been my first one. Would I have felt lost at times? Hell yeah, but would it have stretched me? Stretched me in ways that I could build off of? Would I have gained some knowledge and experience and got my feet wet with working with actors in that capacity? Would it have pushed me to do things I've never done before? Yes, yes, and that's what growth is, and the fact that they asked me to do it means they saw it in me. I just needed to see it in myself, all right.
Speaker 1:So the first thing you have to do is identify yourself as a leader, as somebody who is in a position to empower other people, understand that you're in this position and use that mindset to go out there and change people's lives. Because the thing is, you can't become a professional at anything without doing whatever that thing is. You want to be a professional basketball player? Well, it ain't going to happen by just watching a bunch of basketball. No, you have to go, step out on that court and start playing. And so if you want to be a leader at some point or be in a position where you can be someone who people follow or look up to, you have to step into that mindset, into that position, that mental position, and start seeing how it fits you and to start improving yourself, improving all the things you do.
Speaker 1:And the quote that keeps coming across that I keep coming across and I think is true, and it says leaders create leaders the biggest thing someone in leadership can do is to have somebody that they are leading be inspired to go on the journey or to start seeing success and be even better than them, to surpass them, to get that person to step into their own leadership. That is the ultimate flex of being a leader getting somebody that is inspired by you to do greater things than you did, and you better believe that's what I want for you. I truly want you to be great, to do great things, and as leaders, you should want the same thing, and I know that you do. I know you can, and so the question that I have for you is how do we get somebody to step into their own leadership, into their own greatness or higher self? And the answer is don't try to give them the answer. Lead them to the answer. What I mean by that.
Speaker 1:So for the most part, most of what I say on this podcast, it ain't nothing new. For the most part, the things I say on here, we've all either heard about it, heard it, saw it, saw some meme or some status or post, or heard a voice clip, or just had the understanding already in our brains. It was already there. We just hadn't brought it to the front of our minds, to our consciousness, yet Right.
Speaker 1:What I talk about on here is not foreign, and one of the coaches I follow he says that it's your enlightened self that already has the knowledge Right. And if you think about that, your enlightened self, every now and then that enlightened version of yourself pops out. It pops out, it pops out from time to time and it gives you that little piece of wisdom or that motivation or that perspective that you need, and you know what I'm talking about. You ever been struggling with something or you've been wasting your time with something and a little voice in your head give you some encouragement or perspective that you need to get you through it, or a little voice put a little fire under your ass to get things done. That's what I mean by your enlightened self. We've all been there, and so when I say don't try and give them the answers, what I mean is getting that person to type into their own enlightened self, to lead themselves into having that light bulb moment, to having that light bulb turn on. And it ain't that you're telling them exactly what to do, step by step, thing by thing. It's when they get that spark from within themselves to do things.
Speaker 1:So you have had a bad job. When will they give you and everybody else the same task, the same ways to complete it, the same generic things to do every single day? Like a McDonald's, my first job. There was literally only one way to do every single job in that building and it was all typed up step by step, task by task, and all you had to do was read the damn instructions and do what it tells you to do. Even mopping the floor, even down to mopping the floor, it had directions posted. That job wasn't making leaders, that job wasn't enlightening anybody. That job just told folks what to do for a paycheck.
Speaker 1:And that's the opposite of what we, as leaders, are trying to accomplish, and that's the opposite of what we, as leaders, are trying to accomplish. And this is why being a leader is actually more realistic than a lot of people realize, because we're not trying to tell folks what to do. We're trying to get their enlightened selves to have that breakthrough and to do the great things that they already know they can do, allowing them to find the answer. Like. For me, the biggest reason I do this podcast excuse me is because I want all of you to be empowered to take action, not because I told you to, not because I guilted you into doing it, but because that voice inside you, that voice that really has always been there, told you to. That's where the magic is. As a leader, that's what you should want from people who are inspired by you. And, finally, the biggest thing we can do is to show up as the best version of you, to bring out the better in those around you.
Speaker 1:So let's say you have a family member who is overweight, instead of saying, hey, auntie Deborah, you should start working out. The best thing to do is to start taking care of your own body more, to eat healthy and work on yourself, and eventually what's going to happen? People around you will start to notice and ask you like hey, so you know what you've been doing? How do you look like this? Or how do you stay motivated to go to the gym? Or they'll say you know, I need to start working out myself too. I can't tell you how often that happens to me Self, too. I can't tell you how often that happens to me. My fitness journey inspires folks to want to be healthier.
Speaker 1:By showing up at the best version of yourself, not only are you benefited from it personally, but now all the folks around you. You showing them a path that they can take to so showing them that is possible, you become a lighthouse for those people, and that goes for several aspects in life. Maybe you want to read more or take more care of your mental health or invest in things, whatever it may be. The point is to be an example. How can you empower those around you to be better? What can you do? What can you do for the folks around you to see in order for them to be their best? What can you do for the folks around you to see in order for them to be their best? And finally I know I said it already, but finally, what people also need is for you to believe in them. You have to let people around you know that you believe in them as you empower them to work on their own belief that they can actually do something great with themselves, instead of doing the opposite, right Like that job at McDonald's and giving them a checklist and micromanaging.
Speaker 1:That ain't empowering. That makes people feel like they are incapable. If somebody knows that you believe in them and that you see them taking action and showing up as the best version of themselves and you're guiding them to the enlightened self, that will make a world of difference for them. Think about the times when you know somebody believed in you. Didn't that make you feel good? Didn't that make you want to keep going? Didn't it light a fire inside you. So think about that and think about what that will do for those people around you. Think about those people close to you and think about the ways you can empower them and how you can be a light, that inspiration, and also to understand that you are the person who can, because you are the things you do in a life, the choices you making. You are that person that can and will inspire and empower people around you, and when you do, it'll push you to do even more. It'll push you to be even better, to keep empowering people and, as a result, you'll keep elevating and getting higher and higher. So that's what I got for you today.
Speaker 1:If you like this video, please go ahead and share this to your social media. Please share with somebody who you think would benefit from this message. Also, support the show. You can choose the monthly amount. It can either be three, five, eight or ten dollars, and you can cancel at any time. Why would you ever do that? So let's go ahead and get to this music. Uh, I'm not sure if y'all been following me on social media, but I've been making a lot of posts about my latest singer that came out and I did shoot a music video and, like I said, y'all will always get what I put out first on here because I appreciate y'all being part of my little community. So there's going to be a link in the description for the music video. Y'all get to see it first. Please don't share it until the actual date that's going to be released. It'll be on the video as well. All right, thank y'all, and let's ride out.