Courageous Leader BLUEprint™ – 16th edition
Welcome back leaders!
This is the sixteenth edition of our Courageous Leader BLUEprint™ newsletter.
Every three weeks, you’ll get quick, thoughtful leadership insights without the fluff.
Read time: less than 5 minutes
Our topic today is resilience.
Resilience is the courage to keep going despite the setbacks.
We love to hear inspiring stories about resilience. That is, until we’re the ones having to live it.
The truth about life is we will all face challenges.
For those who choose the mantle of leadership, you are choosing to accept even more challenges.
Resilience is not the absence of stress, it’s the capacity to respond to it
In 2025, I faced a difficult decision.
Nothing I did for my dissertation ever seemed good enough, and my chair was kicking it back to me with overwhelming, time-consuming changes.
Not once, but over and over again.
This, while I’m trying to be a good husband, managing a busy travel schedule, serving on a board, and continuing to build my business.
Despite five years of time and financial investment into the doctorate, I was ready to quit.
I had to weigh what I’d already invested with current competing priorities against what it would mean to finally earn the doctorate.
Thankfully, I did not make an emotional decision. And, I had close friends and mentors who served as sounding boards.
Ultimately, I made the uncomfortable, risky decision to continue with the dissertation and figure out how to manage it with many other competing priorities.
Because the doctorate is important to me – it’s worth it.
To be clear, while resilience is about responding to challenges, it is not about taking unnecessary risks or abuse.
What resilience is NOT:
Ignoring your emotions
Pushing yourself or others past capacity
Staying in a toxic environment forever
Pretending everything is fine
Sometimes resilience means staying. Sometimes it means wisely stepping away.
Courage helps us tell the difference.
Resilience is not about staying in harm
It’s about staying in the mission
Resilience is the courage to:
Face discomfort
Stay in the game when it would be easier to quit
Keep showing up, even when outcomes aren’t guaranteed
Resilience takes courage because it forces us to keep moving forward without certainty.
Resilience isn’t pretending you’re fine
It’s choosing not to stay stuck
Why resilience is hard:
Progress feels slow
Setbacks feel personal
Leadership can feel lonely
People depend on you while you’re still figuring things out yourself
Leadership guarantees adversity. Not necessarily because you’re doing something wrong, but because you’re responsible for things that matter.
Resilience is not reckless persistence.
Resilience is about:
Meaningful, thoughtful persistence
Recovering, learning, and continuing with wisdom
Responding and growing through these challenges
Practical ways leaders build resilience:
Treat rest and recovery as a strategy, not a reward
Focus on the meaning behind what you’re doing, not temporary motivation
Reframe setbacks as learning opportunities: “What is this here to teach me?”
Stay connected – do NOT revert to isolation
Focus on the next right step, not the entire mountain
This week’s courageous choice:
Identify one area where you’re tempted to quit emotionally.
Instead of quitting, choose the next right step.
To help you choose that step, here are some practical suggestions:
Take stock of how far you’ve come with this struggle
Make a pro/con list of quitting versus continuing
Talk it out with friends or mentors
Journal about how it will feel once you’ve overcome this obstacle
Decide how you will celebrate once you’ve succeeded