Author: Margaretha Montagu

Dr Margaretha Montagu – described as a “game changer”, “gifted healer”, “guiding light” and “life-enriching author” – is a certified transformational retreat leader who guides her clients towards their most meaningful and fulfilling lives, particularly when navigating life transitions – virtually, or with the assistance of her Friesian Horses, at their home in the southwest of France.
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The Unexpected Return of Imposter Syndrome: Life can Transitions trigger Self-Doubt

Major Life Changes can make even Seasoned Professionals feel like Anxious Amateurs

You’ve spent decades mastering your field, earning those battle scars of experience, and finally feeling like you belong with the best. Then suddenly, a seismic shift occurs – perhaps your company restructures and you’re managing a team half your age, or you’re diving into entrepreneurship after thirty years of corporate life, or maybe you’re navigating an empty nest that leaves you questioning your identity beyond parenthood. Like a dormant volcano awakening, these transitions can trigger imposter syndrome in even the most seasoned professionals.

The familiar landmarks of competence disappear, replaced by unfamiliar terrain where your tried-and-true compass seems to spin incoherently. It’s not just about learning new skills; it’s about recalibrating your entire sense of self. The expertise you’ve carefully cultivated over decades suddenly feels irrelevant or insufficient, and that voice you thought you’d silenced years ago whispers again: “Do I really belong here?”

The irony is that these transitions often come precisely when others view you as most accomplished – creating an even wider chasm between external perceptions and internal doubts. It’s as if life’s biggest growth opportunities come packaged with a complementary dose of imposter syndrome, testing not just our adaptability but our very understanding of who we are.

The Definition of Imposter Syndrome

Impostor Syndrome has a knack for messing with your head. It makes you second-guess your abilities, feel like a total fraud, and live in constant fear that someone’s going to “expose” you—even when all the evidence screams, You’re crushing it. It’s especially common among high-achievers who, instead of taking credit for their wins, chalk them up to luck, timing, or some fluke of the universe, rather than their own talent and hard work.

Key Characteristics:

  1. Self-Doubt: That little voice that makes you question if you’re really good enough, even when you have all the proof that you are.
  2. Fear of Exposure: The constant worry that someone’s going to “unmask” you and discover you’re not as smart or capable as they think (spoiler: you totally are).
  3. Attributing Success to External Factors: Instead of owning your wins, you credit them to luck, timing, or help from others—anything but your own hard work and talent.
  4. Overachievement or Procrastination: Maybe you overwork yourself trying to prove you belong, or you avoid starting because you’re afraid of falling short. Both are exhausting, right?
  5. Perfectionism: Setting sky-high standards for yourself, and then feeling like even your best efforts aren’t quite enough.
  6. Discounting Praise: When someone gives you a well-deserved compliment, and you brush it off like it doesn’t count. (It counts. Big time.)

Sound familiar?

The Five Most Prevalent Types

Fascinating, isn’t it? The 5 types were identified by Dr. Valerie Young in her research on imposter syndrome. People may exhibit characteristics of multiple types, but usually have one dominant form.

  1. The Perfectionist: You set sky-high standards for yourself, and when you don’t quite hit them (even though you’re probably closer than anyone else), you start questioning everything. Cue the endless cycle of over-planning, over-preparing, and overthinking—all in an effort to dodge mistakes.
  2. The Superhuman: You’re not just striving for success—you’re trying to conquer everything, everywhere, all at once. You push yourself harder than anyone else, thinking you need to justify your accomplishments, but the cost? That elusive work-life balance.
  3. The Natural Genius: You’ve always believed success should feel effortless, and when it doesn’t? Hello, self-doubt. Challenges make you wonder if you’re truly capable, and that doubt can keep you from diving into new experiences.
  4. The Soloist: Asking for help? Not an option. You’ve convinced yourself that doing things solo is the only way to prove you’re capable. But that “I’ll do it all myself” attitude can lead to burnout—and let’s be honest, it’s exhausting.
  5. The Expert: You know your stuff, but you feel like you don’t know enough. You’re constantly chasing more certifications, more knowledge, more validation—because even with all your expertise, you still feel like you’re one step away from being “found out.”

Recognising yourself as one of these is the first step toward unlearning these habits. With a little self-compassion, you can start to reframe these tendencies.

Do you have imposter syndrome and if so, which type of imposter syndrome do you have? Take the Quiz

The Incidence, especially under High-Achievers

Research shows that over half of graduate students, college students, nurses, and medical students wrestle with it—yep, we’re talking more than 55%. In fact, when researchers took a closer look at 62 studies, they found rates as high as 82% in some of these groups.

Interesting to me, as a medical doctor, research revealed that in medical education specifically, it’s even more striking: 82.2% of students reported feeling impostor syndrome to some degree—about 46% said they felt it moderately, while 36% experienced it frequently.

And it’s not just students. Across the board, around 70% of people will face impostor feelings at some point in their careers. It’s especially common among high-achievers, who, despite their clear track records of success, often struggle with that sneaky feeling of, What if I don’t actually deserve this?

So if you’ve ever felt this way, know this: you’re not alone, and it doesn’t mean you’re not capable—it means you’re human.

The Re-activation of Imposter Syndrome during Life Transitions:

The Expertise Erosion: This strikes when you move into new territory that doesn’t fully align with your established skills. Imagine a highly respected lawyer who transitions to running their own firm, suddenly grappling with marketing and staff management. Their legal expertise remains intact, but they feel like an amateur in these new domains, creating a cognitive dissonance between their established identity and new challenges.
The Legacy Trap: This surfaces particularly in older professionals taking on roles involving newer technologies or cultural shifts. A seasoned manager might find themselves questioning their relevance when leading younger teams with different work styles and technological fluency. Their wealth of experience paradoxically becomes a source of self-doubt rather than confidence.
The Identity Rupture: This occurs during personal life transitions. Empty nesters, for instance, often experience imposter syndrome not in a professional context, but in their shifting identity. After decades of defining themselves through parenting, they question their competence in rediscovering individual pursuits or rebuilding relationships outside the parent-child dynamic.
The Peer Pressure Paradox: This emerges when life transitions put you out of sync with your peer group. Perhaps you’re starting a new career while your contemporaries are planning retirement, or you’re entering the dating scene post-divorce while most friends are long-married. The deviation from expected life trajectories can trigger feelings of being an imposter in your age group.
The Achievement Shadow: This manifests when past success actually amplifies imposter feelings during transitions. The more accomplished you’ve been, the more pressure you feel to maintain that level of excellence in new circumstances. It’s particularly acute in career downshifts or voluntary simplification, where choosing a less prestigious path can feel like betraying your “successful” identity.
The Visibility Vulnerability: This occurs when transitions thrust you into greater public visibility. Consider an expert practitioner who moves into a thought leadership role. Despite deep knowledge, the shift from doing to teaching or public speaking can trigger profound imposter feelings.
The Competence-Confidence Gap: This widens during transitions where your actual competence is growing, but your confidence lags behind. It’s common in technological upskilling or when taking on broader leadership roles, where the learning curve is steep but necessary.
The Generational Bridge: This form emerges when trying to navigate between different generational expectations and values. It’s particularly relevant for those in sandwich situations, simultaneously caring for ageing parents and adult children, feeling inadequate in both roles despite extensive life experience.

Misconceptions about Imposter Syndrome:

  1. Imposter syndrome is a mental health condition: This is a myth. Imposter syndrome is NOT a formal mental health diagnosis, but rather a psychological pattern of self-doubt and fear of being exposed as a fraud.
  2. Imposter syndrome can be cured with a simple mindset shift: While changing thoughts and habits can help, overcoming imposter syndrome often requires a more comprehensive approach that includes addressing both mental and physical aspects.
  3. Ignoring imposter syndrome will make it go away: Suppressing emotions related to imposter syndrome can actually lead to burnout and more significant mental health issues. It’s important to acknowledge and address these feelings.
  4. Seeking help means you’re not good enough: This is false. Seeking support for imposter syndrome does not reflect on your abilities or potential for success. It’s about addressing limiting beliefs that hold you back.
  5. Working on self-confidence alone will beat imposter syndrome: While improving self-confidence can help, imposter syndrome often involves deeper, subconscious beliefs that require more targeted intervention.
  6. Imposter syndrome only affects high-achieving women: This is a myth stemming from early research, but imposter syndrome can affect anyone regardless of gender, career, or background.

By understanding these misconceptions, you can make more informed decisions about seeking help for imposter syndrome and approach treatment with realistic expectations.

Seeking Help

Seeking professional help, from a therapist, counsellor, coach or mentor for imposter syndrome has changed many successful professionals’ lives for the better. I have counselled and coached a substantial number of men and women with imposter syndrome, but after 30 years of experience, I find that I’m now best at mentoring.

Engaging a mentor to help you get rid of imposter syndrome offers several significant benefits. As your mentor, I will:

  1. Share What I’ve Learned: I’ve been there too, and I’ve picked up strategies along the way that can help you reframe self-doubt and see your strengths more clearly.
  2. Help You Challenge Negative Patterns: Let’s work on spotting those moments when impostor syndrome creeps in. Together, we can unpack those thoughts and ask, “Is that really true?”
  3. Tailor My Guidance to You: Everyone’s journey with impostor syndrome is different, so I’ll make sure my advice fits your specific challenges, strengths, and goals.
  4. Help You Dig Deeper: I’m here to listen, ask thoughtful questions, and create a safe space to explore where these feelings might be coming from.
  5. Share Practical Tools: Whether it’s celebrating small wins, journaling your successes, or finding ways to quiet your inner critic, I’ll help you build a toolkit for managing those tough moments.
  6. Boost Your Self-Awareness: I’ll help you recognize when and why those impostor feelings pop up so you can start shifting your perspective.
  7. Be Your Mirror: Sometimes, it’s hard to see our own strengths. I’ll reflect back what I see in you—your skills, your effort, and your achievements—until you start seeing it too.
  8. Encourage Self-care: I know impostor syndrome can bring a lot of stress and anxiety, so I’ll frequently remind you to take care of yourself along the way.
  9. Teach You Long-Term Strategies: I want to give you tools you can use long after our time together—like how to own your successes, practice self-compassion, and trust your abilities.
  10. Be Your Unbiased Cheerleader: I see the real you—your talents, your potential, and your effort. Even when you doubt yourself, I’ll be here reminding you just how capable you are.

By seeking professional help, you can effectively address and get rid of imposter syndrome forever.

Meet Dave: The Perfectionist Who Feared Being “Found Out”

Dave had a resume that read like the opening credits of a blockbuster movie. Ivy League grad. Fast-tracked promotions. Awards that gathered dust on a shelf because he was too busy earning the next one. From the outside, he looked like the kind of guy who didn’t just play the game—he wrote the rulebook.

But on the inside? Dave felt like a fraud. Every meeting was a minefield of potential exposure. What if they realise I don’t actually know what I’m doing? Every success was a fleeting high, immediately overshadowed by the looming dread of, What if this is the last one?

Six months ago, Dave had left his executive role. It wasn’t an epic blowout or a messy departure—just a mutual decision to part ways after his company was acquired. “Time to explore new opportunities,” he’d told colleagues. But as the weeks turned into months, “exploring” felt more like he had lost his way.

Dave should’ve been excited—this was his chance to finally try something new, build something of his own. But instead, he was stuck. Frozen by a relentless, familiar voice in his head:
“Who do you think you are, starting over at 52?”
“What if you’ve peaked? What if they see you don’t have it anymore?”

That voice wasn’t new. It had been with him since his first big promotion, whispering that he’d only succeeded because he worked harder than everyone else, not because he was actually brilliant. Now, without the corporate ladder to cling to, the voice was deafening.

So Dave played it safe. No big risks. No “out there” ideas. He stuck to the familiar, convinced that one wrong move would unravel the illusion of competence he’d built.

The worst part? It wasn’t the fear of failing itself that paralysed him—it was the fear of being seen failing.

When I met Dave, I gently called him out. “You’re not a fraud, Dave,” I told him. “You’re just out of practice at seeing your own worth.”

l didn’t have a magic solution, but I did have personal experience, encouragement, and practical advice. I helped Dave recognise that the skills he’d spent years honing wouldn’t disappear just because his title did. I showed him how to reframe his “failures” as steps toward reinvention. I reminded Dave that starting over wasn’t a sign of weakness; it was a sign of courage. With my guidance, he began to take small, purposeful risks—reaching out to new contacts, pitching ideas he’d been too nervous to share, and even allowing himself to fail without spiralling into self-doubt.

Little by little, Dave stopped seeing himself as someone who’d lost his way and started seeing himself as someone who was carving a new one. And for the first time in years, he didn’t just feel competent—he felt excited.

iNFINITE iMPACT

Imagine breaking free from that persistent inner voice that says, “You’re not good enough,” despite your accomplishments. That’s precisely what the iFINITE iMPACT mentoring program is designed to do. This transformative program equips you with practical strategies, mindset tools, and personalised guidance to tackle impostor syndrome head-on. You’ll learn how to reframe self-doubt, confidently embrace your achievements, and step into every opportunity with a sense of purpose and self-assurance. With a clear focus on empowering you to recognise and leverage your unique strengths, iFINITE iMPACT provides the tools you need to make the meaningful, lasting impact you’ve always been capable of. It’s time to leave doubt behind and engage your full potential!

Send an email to OpenLockedDoors@gmail.com and book a private 30-minute complementary consultation today, and we’ll explore how we can work together.

“I am an experienced medical doctor – MBChB, MRCGP, NLP master pract cert, Transformational Life Coach (dip.) Life Story Coach (cert.) Stress Counselling (cert.) Med Hypnotherapy (dip.) and EAGALA (cert.) I may have an impressive number of letters after my name, and more than three decades of professional experience, but what qualifies me to excel at what I do is my intuitive understanding of my clients’ difficulties and my extensive personal experience of managing major life changes using strategies I developed over many years.” Dr M Montagu

References

Bravata, D. M., Watts, S. A., Keefer, A. L., Madhusudhan, D. K., Taylor, K. T., Clark, D. M., Nelson, R. S., Cokley, K. O., & Hagg, H. K. (2020). Prevalence, Predictors, and Treatment of Impostor Syndrome: a Systematic Review. Journal of General Internal Medicine, 35(4), 1252-1275.

Thomas, M., & Bigatti, S. (2020). Perfectionism, impostor phenomenon, and mental health in medicine: a literature review. International Journal of Medical Education, 11, 201-213.

Mak, K. K. L., Kleitman, S., & Abbott, M. J. (2019). Impostor Phenomenon Measurement Scales: A Systematic Review. Frontiers in Psychology, 10, 671.

Jaremka, L. M., Ackerman, J. M., Gawronski, B., Rule, N. O., Sweeny, K., Tropp, L. R., Metz, M. A., Molina, L., Ryan, W. S., & Vick, S. B. (2020). Common Academic Experiences No One Talks About: Repeated Rejection, Impostor Syndrome, and Burnout. Perspectives on Psychological Science, 15(3), 519-543.

Cokley, K., Smith, L., Bernard, D., Hurst, A., Jackson, S., Stone, S., Awosogba, O., Saucer, C., Bailey, M., & Roberts, D. (2017). Impostor feelings as a moderator and mediator of the relationship between perceived discrimination and mental health among racial/ethnic minority college students. Journal of Counseling Psychology, 64(2), 141-154.

Kumar, S., & Jagacinski, C. M. (2005). Imposters have goals too: The imposter phenomenon and its relationship to achievement goal theory. Personality and Individual Differences, 40(1), 147-157.

Quiz from Colorado State University

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Time is Your Most Valuable Resource

Don’t Spend It, Invest It.

Harry sat in his sleek, glass-walled office overlooking the city, the rhythmic clicking of his Montblanc pen against the desk filling the sterile silence. The faint scent of leather from his chair mingled with the sharp tang of fresh coffee cooling by his side, untouched. His gold wristwatch, a treasured trophy of his success, gleamed under the warm LED lights, but its ticking now sounded like a slow drumbeat mocking his accomplishments. He stared at the endless lists of appointments in his planner, his chest tightening as a hollow ache settled in his gut. Outside the window, the sun sank behind skyscrapers, casting elongated shadows that crept toward him like spectral hands. In that moment, the realisation hit him with the weight of a thunderclap: every meticulously planned second was steadily slipping through his fingers, and for all his success, he had no idea how to cope with the life transition that he’s facing: handing over his business, his precious brainchild, to the next generation and starting his “well-deserved” retirement.

Introduction

You are successful. After all, you’ve mastered time management, haven’t you? Your calendar is a testament to efficiency, your achievements speak for themselves, and you’ve gotten where you are precisely because you know how to use time well.

But here’s the uncomfortable truth: Success often creates a peculiar form of temporal blindness. We become excellent at managing time within the framework that brought us success, while remaining oblivious to how that very framework might be failing us as we contemplate making changes in the way we live our lives.

Time is the great equaliser.

John C. Maxwell captured this truth perfectly: “Time management is an oxymoron. Time is beyond our control, and the clock keeps ticking regardless of how we lead our lives. Priority management is the answer to maximizing the time we have.”

The Unexpected Struggle

If you’re feeling unmoored at this moment, you’re not alone. Life transitions—big changes in our current circumstances—have a way of pulling the rug out from under us. They expose cracks that might not have been apparent until you decide to make a significant change in the way you live your life.

Suddenly, the very skill that helped you succeed – is now standing in your way. The very strategies that built your success are starting to feel like a straitjacket rather than a superpower. Whether you’re contemplating a career pivot, recovering from a personal upheaval, or simply feeling that subtle urge for change, your relationship with time might be due for a fundamental reset.

It’s a tough pill to swallow: you’ve spent decades controlling every aspect of your life, your business, your finances. But time? It doesn’t care about your KPIs. You can’t slow it down, you can’t bank it, and no amount of optimisation will create more of it. The only power you have is deciding how to spend it.

The emotions that accompany transitions can be disorienting. There’s the nagging fear of irrelevance, the guilt over missed family dinners, and perhaps a twinge of regret about opportunities passed up in favour of professional pursuits. These feelings aren’t weaknesses—they’re invitations to reevaluate and realign.

The Success-threatening Shift

You’ve likely encountered the classic time management matrix: urgent versus important. You’ve probably read about morning routines, productivity hacks, and the value of delegation. But here’s what these systems don’t address: the profound discomfort of realising that, on the threshold of a major life change, your relationship with time needs to fundamentally change as well.

Let me share a story about Michael, a former CEO who decided to switch careers at 45. “I kept treating my transition like another project to optimise,” he recalls. “I created timelines, set milestones, scheduled informational interviews. Six months in, I realised I was so focused on ‘making progress’ that I hadn’t allowed myself to truly explore what I wanted.”

This is a common pattern. We treat transitions like problems to be solved rather than experiences to be lived. We apply our proven formulas for success, not realising that we’re trying to navigate new waters with an old map.

“The past is a foreign country; they do things differently there,” wrote L.P. Hartley. Your past success is exactly that: a foreign country. The way you valued and used time there might not serve you in your new territory.

The Solution

Here’s the game-changer: stop trying to manage time. It’s futile and frustrating. Instead, focus on managing your priorities. This isn’t just semantics; it’s a mindset shift that can make an enormous difference to how you live.

1. Time Is a Finite Resource

No matter how wealthy, smart, or resourceful you are, you can’t make more time. You have exactly 24 hours a day, just like everyone else. What sets people apart isn’t how much time they have—it’s how they use it.

Warren Buffett once remarked, “I can buy anything I want, but I can’t buy time.” Yet successful people often act as if they can. We postpone joy, defer relationships, and delay exploration, believing we’ll have time for it all later. We treat time like a renewable resource when it’s actually more like Bitcoin – finite, increasingly valuable, and impossible to mine more.

2. Priorities as the only Currency

But here’s where the analogy breaks down: Unlike Bitcoin, time becomes more precious not because of market forces, but because of the diminishing window of possibilities. Each passing year closes certain doors while opening others. The question isn’t whether you’re using time efficiently, but whether you’re using it in alignment with what matters most to you now.

Think of your time as an investment portfolio. Every hour spent is a trade-off, an allocation of a finite resource. Are you putting your time into activities that yield the highest returns—happiness, fulfilment, connection—or squandering it on obligations that no longer serve you?

3. Eliminate Blind Spots

Success creates specific blind spots about time:

First, there’s the “perpetual preparation” trap. You’re so good at preparing for the next thing that you forget to experience the current thing. You treat life like a series of dress rehearsals for some grand future performance that never arrives.

Second, there’s the “productivity paradox.” The more efficiently you can pack your schedule, the less space you leave for serendipity, insight, and genuine transformation. As Brené Brown puts it, “We are a culture of people who’ve bought into the idea that if we stay busy enough, the truth of our lives won’t catch up with us.”

Third, there’s the “achievement addiction.” You’ve become so accustomed to measuring time in terms of outcomes that you struggle to value it for its own sake. This becomes particularly painful during transitions, when the outcomes are unclear and the metrics for progress are ambiguous.

Managing priorities begins with knowing what they are. This is the moment to ask yourself hard questions:

  • What truly matters to me now?
  • What do I want to be remembered for?
  • How can I align my actions with my values?
    Clarity isn’t just empowering—it’s liberating.

Practical Strategies to Manage Priorities

So what’s the alternative? Here’s a radical proposition: What if you started treating time not as a resource to be managed, but as a resource to be explored?

This means instead of asking “What should I accomplish today?” consider “What do I want to experience today?” Replace “Is this a good use of my time?” with “Is this true to who I am becoming?” Perhaps the greatest achievement is learning to value time differently when life calls for it.

1. Start by conducting a Priority Audit

Take a hard look at where your time is going. Is it aligned with your values, or are you stuck in the inertia of old habits? Categorise your commitments into three buckets:

  • Essential: Activities that align with your core values and goals.
  • Delegable: Tasks that don’t require your direct involvement.
  • Deletable: Obligations that drain your energy and that no longer serve you.

2. Redefine Success

What does success look like now? It’s not about more deals or accolades—it’s about living with intention. Maybe it’s spending time with family, mentoring the next generation, or pursuing a passion you’ve sidelined. The key is to define success on your terms, not by someone else’s metrics.

3. Invest in Relationships

At the end of the day, relationships are what give life meaning. No one looks back on their life and wishes they’d spent more time in meetings. Relationships are the true currency of a meaningful life. Prioritise deep, quality connections over superficial interactions. This isn’t about quantity; it’s about quality. Whether it’s family, close friends, or a trusted mentor, investing time in these relationships pays dividends far beyond the present moment.

4. Protect Your Time

Time is your most valuable asset—guard it fiercely. Learn to say no (kindly but firmly), and resist the urge to fill every moment with activity. You don’t have to say yes to everything. Protecting your time is an act of self-respect. Set boundaries around your availability, and don’t be afraid to decline invitations or commitments that don’t align with your priorities. Remember, every “yes” to one thing is a “no” to something else and a busy life isn’t necessarily a fulfilling one.

5. Embrace New Interests

Transitions are a golden opportunity to hit the reset button and rediscover (or uncover) what lights you up. Have you always wanted to learn Italian, start painting, or volunteer for a cause close to your heart? Now’s the time. Pursuing hitherto neglected interests isn’t just a pastime—it’s a way to infuse your life with energy and purpose.

The Legacy of a Lifetime Well-Spent

At this stage, it’s not just about how you spend your time—it’s about the legacy you leave behind.

When your priorities reflect your values, your actions become a testament to what matters most. Whether it’s mentoring the next generation, contributing to your community, being present for loved ones, strengthening your family bonds, or championing a cause, you’re leaving a legacy that transcends time.

Success in this new phase isn’t about accumulating more accolades or wealth. It’s about living authentically, intentionally, and with purpose. It’s about making peace with the past, cherishing the present, and crafting a future that feels meaningful.

Conclusion: Time Waits for No One

Return to Michael’s story. His breakthrough came when he stopped treating his career transition like a project and started treating it like an exploration. “I realised I was rushing through a process that actually needed time to unfold,” he says. “Once I gave myself permission to not know the destination, I started discovering possibilities I couldn’t have planned for.”

This doesn’t mean abandoning the skills that made you successful. Rather, it means developing a more nuanced relationship with time. It means understanding that different phases of life require different ways of valuing and using time.

As Seneca wrote, “It is not that we have a short time to live, but that we waste a lot of it.” The question for successful people in transition isn’t about wasting time versus using it productively. It’s about recognizing when our ingrained ways of valuing time no longer serve us.

Your time is indeed your most valuable resource – not because of what you can accomplish with it, but because it’s the medium through which you experience your life. In transitions, the art is learning to value it accordingly.

Time is indeed “the great equaliser.” It doesn’t care who you are, how much you’ve achieved, or what you still hope to accomplish. It marches forward, relentless and impartial.

But here’s the good news: within its constraints lies an incredible power. By shifting your focus from managing time to managing priorities, you can make every moment you have count.

Is it time for a Conversation about what Success means in this Next Chapter of your life?

I mentor successful professionals who are ready to shift from time management to time mastery – from merely optimising their schedule to creating purposeful, meaningful, fulfilling lives and lasting legacies.

Together, let’s design a life for you that aligns with your values, your vision, and your actual priorities using my iNFINITE iMPACT progam.

Send an email to OpenLockedDoors@gmail.com and book a private 30-minute complementary consultation today, and we’ll explore what’s possible when you reimagine your unique relationship with time.

“I am an experienced medical doctor – MBChB, MRCGP, NLP master pract cert, Transformational Life Coach (dip.) Life Story Coach (cert.) Stress Counselling (cert.) Med Hypnotherapy (dip.) and EAGALA (cert.) I may have an impressive number of letters after my name, and more than three decades of professional experience, but what qualifies me to excel at what I do is my intuitive understanding of my clients’ difficulties and my extensive personal experience of managing major life changes using strategies I developed over many years.” Dr M Montagu

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Do You Need a Mentor?

“If I have seen further it is by standing on the shoulders of giants.” — Isaac Newton

Potential clients often ask me what happens during an iNFINITE iMPACT mentoring consultation. Below, I share an example of such a consultation, entirely hypothetical, to give you an idea of what to expect and decide if mentoring would be a good choice for you at this time. Let’s start by looking at what exactly is a mentor:

What Is A Mentor?

A mentor is an experienced and trusted councillor who guides and supports a less experienced person (often called a mentee or protégé) in their personal or professional development. The relationship typically involves sharing knowledge, providing feedback, offering emotional support, and helping the protégé navigate challenges and seize opportunities.

Key aspects of mentorship include:

  • It’s a two-way relationship – while mentors guide and advise, effective mentorship involves mutual trust, respect and open dialogue
  • It’s based on experience sharing – mentors pass on their insights, acquired through personal experience, and lessons learned from their own journey
  • It often involves role modelling – mentors demonstrate personal and professional behaviours and standards through their own example
  • There is a narrow focus on personal development – mentors help their clients identify and work toward their goals while mastering new skills and revealing hidden talents and strengths

Why Mentoring?

At this point in my life, mentoring is undoubtedly the most effective medium to share my knowledge, training and extensive experience with major life changes and transitions. Coaching and Counselling, the other two modalities that I hold qualifications for, have limitations that hinder my ability to give my very best to my clients.

To get back to the hypothetical consultation I mentioned…it usually starts like this:

“So, why would someone like you – already crushing it by most standards – seek out a mentor?

The client answers.

I understand: You’ve hit all the conventional markers of success. Corner office? Check. Impressive portfolio? Done. The kind of LinkedIn profile that makes recruiters swoon? Obviously.

But something’s nagging at you. Maybe it’s that subtle feeling that despite all your achievements, you’re operating at 70% of your potential. Or perhaps you’ve mastered the ‘what’ of success but are grappling with the ‘why.’

Here’s what I typically hear from high-achievers like yourself:

  • ‘I’m successful by everyone else’s metrics, but I’m not sure they’re my metrics anymore.’
  • ‘I’ve climbed to the top of what I thought was my mountain, only to realise it might well be the wrong mountain.’
  • ‘I’m great at optimizing systems and leading teams, but I’m not sure I’m optimizing my own life.’
  • ‘Everyone comes to me for advice, but who do I go to when I need to pressure-test my thinking?’

Clients explain their specific challenges.

Indeed, having a mentor at your level isn’t about basic career guidance – you’ve long since figured that part out. It’s about having someone who can be your thought partner in exploring uncharted territory. Someone who can help you:

  • Challenge your assumptions (even the ones that got you this far)
  • Spot your blind spots (especially the ones your success has hidden from view)
  • Question your questions (because you’re probably asking yourself the wrong ones)
  • Navigate the intersection of extraordinary success and genuine fulfilment (because they don’t always overlap naturally)

Think of it as having a sophisticated GPS for your life’s journey – one that doesn’t just show you the fastest route, but helps you figure out if you’re heading to the right destination in the first place.

What made you start thinking about mentorship at this specific time?

Clients share their reasons.

I know exactly how that feels. You’ve built something impressive. The kind of career trajectory that makes for compelling business school case studies. Board meetings, strategic decisions, and maybe even a few industry awards gathering dust on your shelf.

And yet… there’s this persistent void.

I hear this more often than you may think.

High-achievers who’ve mastered the external game but are now facing the internal one. It typically shows up as:

  • ‘I’ve spent twenty years building this empire, but lately I’m wondering – who am I building it for?’
  • ‘My team sees me as this unshakeable leader, but privately, I’m questioning everything I’ve built.’
  • ‘I can solve complex business problems in my sleep, but I can’t seem to crack the code of personal fulfilment.’
  • ‘The things that used to excite me – closing big deals, quarterly wins, industry recognition – they just don’t hit the same way anymore.’

Let’s be honest – this isn’t about needing guidance on how to be more successful. This is about something deeper. It’s about:

  • Redefining success on your own terms (not just the terms that looked good in your 30s)
  • Finding purpose beyond performance metrics
  • Creating a legacy that matters to YOU, not just to shareholders
  • Discovering what sets your soul on fire (when your brain’s already proven all it needs to prove)

Clients describe their unique situations.

When did you first notice this disconnect between your external success and your internal fulfilment?

What was the moment that made you stop and think, ‘There has to be more than this’?”

Let’s discuss this fascinating intersection of peak achievement and personal renaissance. It’s quite different from the challenges you faced building your career – more nuanced, more internal, and ironically, often more challenging for people used to solving everything with strategic thinking.

Let’s break down the iNFINITE iMPACT approach:

  1. First, we need to give ourselves permission to question everything – yes, even the success metrics we’ve internalised. It’s remarkably difficult for high-achievers to do this. You’ve spent decades building a reputation for having answers, and now you’re entering a phase full of questions.
  2. Next, we have to cope with the identity shift. This is where it gets interesting. You’re not just the CEO, Managing Director, or whatever title you’ve earned. You’re a human being in transition. The challenge? Expanding your identity without dismantling what you’ve built.
  3. We need to develop metrics for meaning – and no, not the kind that looks good on a quarterly report. We’re talking about measures of fulfilment that would make your MBA professors scratch their heads:
  • How often do you lose track of time doing something that lights you up?
  • When was the last time you felt truly, deeply challenged at a personal level?
  • What percentage of your decisions are driven by ‘should’ versus ‘want’?

Clients talk about their insights.

4. Next is the question about leaving a legacy. This is where we move from ‘What do I want to achieve?’ to ‘What do I want to give?’ It’s no longer about adding to your impressive resume – it’s about writing a different story altogether.

The opportunities? They’re extraordinary:

  • You have resources most people dream of
  • Your pattern recognition skills are razor-sharp
  • You know how to execute once you set a direction
  • Your network is likely vast and valuable

The challenges? Equally significant:

  • Letting go of control (your old friend)
  • Embracing uncertainty (your old enemy)
  • Learning to measure success in ways Wall Street would never understand
  • Building authentic relationships when everyone wants something from you

Clients explore their unique opportunities and challenges and often want to talk about identity issues.

The key is recognising that this isn’t a crisis – it’s a calling. It’s your sophisticated mind telling you it’s time for the next great challenge. And unlike the challenges of building a career or running a company, this one is deeply personal.

Think of your identity like an operating system that’s been running exceptionally well for decades. It’s sophisticated, highly optimised, and gets incredible results. We’ll call it ‘Achievement OS 4.0.’ But now you’re trying to run new programs it wasn’t designed for.

Typically, successful people struggle with:

  1. The Identity Anchor Effect – Your achievements have become your anchor points. When someone asks ‘Who are you?’ your mind automatically runs through your professional highlight reel. The challenge? Learning to separate your worth from your work without losing your edge.
  2. The Social Identity Trap – Everyone in your orbit – board members, team, family – has you firmly categorised as ‘the successful one,’ ‘the problem solver,’ and ‘the person who makes things happen.’ Their expectations have become invisible strings pulling at your identity. Breaking free without breaking relationships? That’s the art we need to master.
  3. The Competency Paradox – Your high competency in your professional role can actually block personal growth. Why? Because you’ve mastered being the person with answers, but this journey requires becoming comfortable with questions.
  4. The New Identity Integration – This is about expansion, not replacement. Think of it like adding new rooms to a magnificent house rather than tearing it down. You’re not losing the CEO, you’re adding the explorer, the learner, maybe even the beginner at something new.

Key Moves in this Shift:

  • From ‘I am what I achieve’ to ‘I am who I am becoming.’
  • From ‘What will others think?’ to ‘What feels authentically right?’
  • From ‘I should have this figured out’ to ‘I’m curious about what I don’t know.’

Here’s a question that often creates breakthrough moments: What part of yourself have you put on hold while building your success? Maybe there’s an artist, a philosopher, or an adventurer in there somewhere, waiting for permission to emerge?”

A Purely Hypothetical Conversation

Each mentoring consultation is unique, just as each client and their circumstances are unique. No two consultations follow the same pattern – the example above is just an introduction to the iNFINITE iMPACT mentoring process, to help you decide if it will be a good fit for you.

If this resonates, on one or on various levels, please send me an email at OpenLockedDoors@gmail.com to book your complimentary 30-minute consultation.

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Why Life Changes/Transitions Make Us Question the Meaning of Our Lives

Turning Points and Existential Questions

Life transitions: they’re the moments when the universe taps you on the shoulder and says, “Time for a Change.” Whether it’s a career pivot, the starting/selling of a business, part- or full retirement, the loss of a loved one, or the sudden quiet of an empty nest, these shifts have an uncanny way of dumping us into the deep end of the philosophical pool. You might find yourself staring blindly at your reflection on a Zoom call or walking through a silent house thinking, What now?

Transitions, as unsettling as they are, don’t just disrupt our lives—they shake the very foundations of our no-longer-rock-solid identity. And while this might sound dramatic, it’s also an unexpected opportunity. These moments, though challenging, force us to pause and consider the meaning behind the madness.

What have I done with my Life?

Enter Existential Angst

It’s a universal truth: humans are creatures of habit. We find comfort in routine, in knowing what’s next, in being able to predict our tomorrows. Then comes a life transition—a promotion, a cross-country move, a personal loss—and suddenly, that cosy cocoon feels more like a prison cell. Psychologists have a term for this kind of upheaval: disequilibrium. It’s the disorienting state when our old way of being no longer fits, and the new one hasn’t quite taken shape yet.

Consider Erik Erikson, the psychologist who mapped out the stages of human development. He argued that every phase of life comes with its own identity crisis, from “Who am I?” in adolescence to “What have I done with my life?” in older age. Transitions bring these questions to the forefront because they challenge the scripts we’ve so diligently been following.

The result? A cocktail of uncertainty and desperate introspection. Even the most confident among us can feel adrift when the familiar becomes unrecognisable. You might chuckle at the stereotype of a midlife crisis—someone buying a sports car or taking up skydiving— beneath the surface, it’s often a desperate and profound yearning for a more meaningful, fulfilling and purposeful life.

Why is This Happening to Me?

Life transitions disrupt our sense of stability and identity, creating a space where questions about purpose and meaning naturally arise because of:

1. The Loss of Familiar Roles and Structures

Many aspects of our identity are tied to our roles (e.g., spouse, parent, business owner) and the routines of daily life. When a transition—such as a career change, divorce, or children leaving home—occurs, these roles and routines shift or disappear completely. This disruption can leave us feeling unmoored, leading to a need to redefine ourselves.

2. The Need for Coherence

We have a natural desire to make sense of our lives. Transitions often mark the end of one chapter and the start of another, which can feel chaotic or fragmented. To regain a sense of coherence, we reflect on our experiences and seek meaning in what has happened and what lies ahead.

3. Our Heightened Awareness of Mortality and the Passage of Time

Significant transitions, especially those involving loss or ageing, often remind us of life’s impermanence. This awareness can lead to questions like, “Am I spending my time on what truly matters to me?” or “What legacy do I want to leave behind?”

4. The Destruction of Our Comfort Zones

Change forces us out of our comfort zones, making us confront aspects of our lives that we might have avoided or taken for granted. This discomfort often triggers a deeper examination of values, goals, and priorities.

5. Strangely enough, the Opportunity for Growth

Transitions create a psychological space where old habits, beliefs, and assumptions are challenged. While this can be unsettling, it also provides fertile ground for personal growth and self-discovery. We often reevaluate our purpose to align with who we are becoming, not just who we were.

Who Am I If I’m Not Me Anymore?

Life transitions don’t just change circumstances, they often force us to confront the elaborate narratives we’ve built about ourselves.

The truth is, much of our identity is tied to the roles we play and the labels we wear. The job title on your email signature, the relationships you nurture, the routines that shape your day—when these shift, it’s like losing a piece of the puzzle that forms your sense of self.

Transitions can also magnify societal expectations. In a world that celebrates perpetual motion and achievement, stepping off the treadmill—even for a moment—can feel like failing. But the real challenge isn’t external. It’s internal: reconciling who you were with who you’re becoming.

And yet, this discomfort is where growth begins. Because as disorienting as it is to ask, Who am I now?, it’s the first step toward answering, Who do I want to be?

What really Matters to Me Now?

Disruption and Discomfort

It’s often in the quiet chaos of transitions that life sneaks in its most profound questions. Change disrupts the rhythm of our days, creating space for reflection—whether we’re ready for it or not. That’s why these moments can feel so overwhelming.

Philosophers have long argued that meaning arises in moments of disruption. Take existentialism: thinkers like Jean-Paul Sartre and Albert Camus believed that life’s inherent uncertainty is what drives us to seek purpose. Transitions, then, are like tiny existential invitations. They remind us that nothing is fixed, that the story we’re living can take a turn, for better or for worse, at any time.

Modern culture doesn’t always make this easy. We’re told to “keep hustling,” to measure success in milestones and metrics. But transitions defy that logic. They ask us to pause, to consider whether the ladder we’ve been climbing is leaning against the right wall.

Sometimes, the questions that transitions force upon us—What really matters to you now? What’s next?— can lead to breakthroughs. Many of history’s great innovations and creative works came after significant life changes. The discomfort of transition, it turns out, is fertile ground for reinvention.

How can I Get Through this?

From Breakdown to Breakthrough

While transitions often feel like endings, they’re also beginnings in disguise. They strip away the familiar, leaving behind a blank canvas—a chance to redefine what fulfilment means to us.

The first step is to embrace the questions. Instead of resisting them, lean in. What do you value now that you didn’t before? What kind of life feels worth living at this stage? These aren’t easy questions, but they’re essential ones.

There are also practical ways to navigate these existential detours:

  • Reflection: Journaling, meditating, or simply taking long walks in nature can create space for clarity.
  • Connection: Seek out others who’ve navigated similar transitions. Sharing experiences can make the journey feel less isolating.
  • Humour: Don’t underestimate the power of laughter. As absurd as life’s twists can seem, finding the humour in them can be a saving grace.

Ultimately, transitions remind us of life’s impermanence—and its possibilities. By letting go of who we think we should be, we open ourselves to who we might become.

What’s the Point of It All?

Transitions, for all their chaos and uncertainty, have a purpose: they force us to recalibrate. They remind us that life isn’t a straight line but a series of chapters, each with its own challenges and opportunities.

So, the next time life hands you a transition—a promotion, a breakup, a milestone—take it as a nudge from the universe. Let it push you to ask the big questions, even if the answers aren’t immediately clear. After all, questioning the meaning of life isn’t a sign of failure; it’s a sign of growth.

  • “Who am I now?” – When roles or identities shift, people may grapple with a sense of loss and seek to redefine themselves.
  • “What truly matters to me?” – Transitions often highlight what is missing or unfulfilled in life, prompting a reevaluation of priorities.
  • “Am I living authentically?” – Life changes can bring a heightened awareness of whether one’s choices align with their core values and passions.
  • “What is my next step?” – A transition can feel like standing at a crossroads, needing clarity to move forward.

And if you’re lucky, you might just find that the process of asking—messy, uncomfortable, and unpredictable as it is—is where the meaning lies.

These questions can feel overwhelming but are also an opportunity for growth, self-discovery, and realignment with a deeper sense of purpose. While the process may be challenging, it often leads to greater clarity and fulfilment over time.

This happens because transitions are both challenging and transformative. With the right support—like the guidance you offer With my iNFINITE iMPACT Mentoring program—people can use this time to rebuild their lives with more intention and meaning.

“I am an experienced medical doctor – MBChB, MRCGP, NLP master pract cert, Transformational Life Coach (dip.) Life Story Coach (cert.) Stress Counselling (cert.) Med Hypnotherapy (dip.) and EAGALA (cert.) I may have an impressive number of letters after my name, and more than three decades of professional experience, but what qualifies me to excel at what I do is my intuitive understanding of my clients’ difficulties and my extensive personal experience of managing major life changes using strategies I developed over many years.” Dr M Montagu

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When Success isn’t Enough

Why Successful Professionals Secretly Question Their Accomplishments (And What They Can Do About It)

Part of the #12 Strategies Collection

Introduction

In my years of working with the impressively accomplished, I’ve observed that many of them (though not all, mind you – some remain perfectly content orchestrating their empires) eventually find themselves peering into their trophy cases with a puzzling sense of “Is that all there is?”

These titans of industry often find themselves wrestling with an unexpected existential itch that no amount of professional achievement seems to scratch. This quest for meaning isn’t triggered by failure – quite the opposite. It tends to bubble up precisely when everything is going swimmingly well.

I have never been a titan of industry, but I know this feeling well – that peculiar emptiness that comes when external achievement doesn’t quite fill the internal void. When an insidious disease that threathens my sight put an end to my medical career, As a former I had to reinvent my entire identity and I’ve experienced firsthand how success can suddenly feel like the wrong answer to the right question.

The pattern is as predictable as it is profound: successful professionals, and accomplished business owners, who’ve expertly navigated the complexities of their professional worlds, suddenly find themselves fumbling with questions that their MBA programs somehow forgot to cover.

I’ve noticed that a number of key realisations tend to ambush my most successful clients:

  1. The Achievement Hangover – Many successful people discover that reaching their financial goals doesn’t deliver the sustained satisfaction they expected. They find themselves asking “Is this all there is?” after attaining the positions, wealth, or status they worked years to achieve.
  2. Hedonic Adaptation – High-achievers frequently experience an intensified version of the hedonic treadmill. Each success – whether it’s a promotion, bonus, or award – provides diminishing emotional returns, pushing them to seek sources of fulfilment beyond external accomplishments.
  3. Success Isolation – Their position often creates distance from others, leading to a form of loneliness that material success can’t address. Many find themselves surrounded by transactional relationships rather than authentic connections.
  4. Identity Integration Challenges – Many struggle to reconcile their successful professional persona with their deeper personal values and desires. They may feel trapped performing a role rather than living authentically.
  5. Existential Time Pressure – High-performers are often acutely aware of time’s value and finite nature. This can create anxiety about whether they’re spending their limited time on meaningful pursuits rather than just accumulating more success markers.
  6. Legacy Concerns – Beyond financial inheritance, many wonder about their broader impact on the world and future generations. They question whether their achievements contribute to something larger than themselves.
  7. Skill Transfer Gap – The same analytical and strategic skills that brought professional success often don’t translate directly to building a meaningful life, creating a need for new approaches and frameworks.
  8. Authenticity Deficit – Many realise they’ve been living according to others’ definitions of success rather than their own, leading to a desire to reconnect with their authentic interests and values.
  9. The Comparison Trap – High-achievers often find themselves in social circles where external markers of success are the norm, making it harder to find role models for meaningful living rather than just successful living.
  10. Purpose Evolution – As basic needs and traditional goals are met, many naturally evolve toward self-actualisation and transcendent purposes, seeking to apply their capabilities to more meaningful challenges.

Define “a Meaningful Life”

Ah, a meaningful life – that elusive quarry that has philosophers turning in their graves and self-help authors turning handsome profits. Let me offer a definition that doesn’t require spending a weekend at a wellness retreat or purchasing a specific selection of essential oils:

A meaningful life is one where you’ve mastered the art of giving a damn about the right things. It’s the sophisticated juggling act of caring deeply while maintaining enough ironic distance to laugh at yourself – rather like hosting a dinner party where existential dread is invited but not allowed to monopolise the conversation.

More specifically, it’s about:

Creating ripples that outlast your splash – whether through relationships, work, or that experimental novel you keep threatening to write. The goal isn’t to be remembered forever (let’s leave that to the pharaohs), but to have your existence matter to something larger than your Instagram following.

Finding what the Germans would probably call “Lebenskunst” (the art of living) – that sweet spot between being uselessly idle and insufferably productive. It’s about crafting experiences that make you forget to check your phone, pursuing work that occasionally makes you forget to eat lunch, and building relationships that make you forget to maintain your carefully curated social media presence.

Developing the capacity to be fully present in moments both magnificent and mundane – from watching your child’s first steps to appreciating how the barista made a slightly wonky heart in your latte. It’s about finding poetry in the prosaic without becoming unbearably precious about it.

Crucially, a meaningful life involves contributing to the world’s complexity rather than its chaos. It’s about leaving things marginally better than you found them, whether that’s the planet, your community, or simply the mood in a room.

The ultimate irony? A truly meaningful life often comes from stopping the relentless pursuit of meaning and instead engaging fully with whatever stands before you – even if it’s just a slightly overripe banana that needs to be transformed into banana bread.

Think of it as playing a game where the rules are unclear, the scoring system is mysterious, and the only certainty is that you can’t take your points with you – but somehow, the playing itself becomes the point.

In essence, a meaningful life is one where you’ve discovered how to take things seriously enough to make a difference, but not so seriously that you become insufferable at dinner parties. It’s about crafting a narrative that’s worth telling, even if the only audience is yourself on a quiet Tuesday evening.

Closer to Home

The profound transformation in my life came at a moment few high-achievers choose to face voluntarily. Having built my identity and social world around being a medical doctor, the encroaching eye disease didn’t just threaten my career – it challenged my entire sense of self. The cruel irony of being a healer who could no longer heal in the way I’d mastered was particularly poignant. My situation illustrated how our most meaningful transformations often come not from scaling new heights, but from adapting to unexpected descents.

The existential pressure of my threatened sight created a stark clarity about time and identity that most people only glimpse occasionally. This crisis of professional identity – where the carefully constructed scaffold of “being a doctor” began to crumble – forced me to confront the deeper question of who I am beyond my achievements and role. It’s a powerful reminder that sometimes our most profound search for meaning begins not at our lowest point, but paradoxically, when we’re forced to step away from the peak we worked so hard to reach.

The 12 Strategies

Over the years, with the much-appreciated input of my clients, I have collected 12 unconventional strategies (some lighthearted, some serious) that can help you live a more meaningful, fulfilling and rewarding life:

  1. Practice “Productive Discomfort” – Deliberately seek situations that make you mildly uncomfortable but help you grow. Take different routes to work, strike up conversations with strangers, or try activities you’re not naturally good at. This builds resilience and expands your comfort zone organically.
  2. Create Your Own Rituals – Rather than following prescribed routines, design meaningful personal ceremonies for important moments in your life. This could be a special morning reflection practice, a monthly solo adventure, or a unique way to celebrate your achievements.
  3. Embrace “Existential Nostalgia” – Instead of seeing nostalgia as mere sentimentality, use it actively. Regularly revisit old photos, journals, or memories not just to reminisce, but to extract lessons, recognise patterns, and better understand your personal evolution.
  4. Practice “Reverse Bucket Listing” – Rather than focusing on future experiences you want to have, regularly document meaningful moments you’ve already experienced. This shifts perspective from constant seeking to grateful recognition of life’s richness.
  5. Adopt “Micro-Adventuring” – Transform ordinary days by treating regular activities as mini-adventures. Take your laptop to work in a cemetery, have breakfast for dinner in formal wear, or explore your own city like a tourist. Small novelties can create lasting meaning.
  6. Use “Strategic Incompetence” – Deliberately remain bad at certain things to focus your energy on what truly matters. Being mediocre at social media or house cleaning might free up resources for deeper pursuits.
  7. Practice “Joy Tracking” – Instead of traditional goal-setting, keep detailed notes about when you feel most alive and engaged. Look for patterns and actively design your life around these moments, even if they seem impractical or unconventional.
  8. Embrace “Power Procrastination” – Rather than fighting procrastination, channel it into other meaningful activities. When avoiding one task, tackle something else important instead of scrolling social media. This transforms “wasted” time into purposeful action.
  9. Create “Life Experiments” – Treat major decisions as experiments rather than permanent choices. Try living in a new city for three months, test a career shift through volunteering, or sample different lifestyles without full commitment. This reduces pressure and increases learning.
  10. Practice “Deep Noticing” – Instead of mindfulness meditation, develop extreme attention to specific aspects of life. Become an expert in cloud formations, local bird calls, or human facial expressions. This focused attention creates unique connections to the world.
  11. Develop “Skill Stacking” – Rather than pursuing mastery in one area, deliberately combine several unusual skills or interests. Being good at both gardening and public speaking might lead to unique opportunities that neither skill alone would provide.
  12. Create “Legacy Projects” – Instead of focusing on personal achievement, regularly create something specifically for future generations. Plant trees that will mature in 50 years, write letters to unknown future readers, or start projects that will outlive you. This extends meaning beyond your immediate experience.

These strategies work because they challenge conventional wisdom about what makes life meaningful. They focus on the active creation of meaning rather than the passive consumption of experiences and emphasise personal authenticity over societal expectations.

iNFINITE iMPACT Mentoring

INFINITE IMPACT Mentoring recognises that many high-achievers face profound identity and meaning crises, particularly when external circumstances force them to reimagine their lives. Through my experience, I understand how disorienting it can be when success and identity collide with unexpected life changes. What sets my approach apart is that we don’t just address the surface-level challenges of career transition or success redefinition – we dive deep into the core questions of identity, purpose, and meaningful impact.

I help clients transform their perceived limitations into unique advantages, showing them how their accumulated wisdom, skills, and experiences can be channelled in new, often surprising directions. For example, a doctor who can no longer practice medicine might discover that their deep understanding of healing and human vulnerability makes them uniquely qualified to mentor others through their own life transitions, as I did. This isn’t about finding a “backup plan” – it’s about uncovering layers of impact you never knew were possible. I specialise in helping high-achievers pivot from conventional success to profound significance, turning personal challenges into platforms for meaningful contribution.

Using my structured mentoring program, I help clients move beyond the constraints of traditional professional identities to discover new ways of creating value and meaning, often finding that their greatest impact lies in unexpected directions.

If you would like to know more about iFINITE iMPACT, please email me at OpenLockedDoors@gmail.com

“I am an experienced medical doctor – MBChB, MRCGP, NLP master pract cert, Transformational Life Coach (dip.) Life Story Coach (cert.) Stress Counselling (cert.) Med Hypnotherapy (dip.) and EAGALA (cert.) I may have an impressive number of letters after my name, and more than three decades of professional experience, but what qualifies me to excel at what I do is my intuitive understanding of my clients’ difficulties and my extensive personal experience of managing major life changes using strategies I developed over many years.” Dr M Montagu

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When a Corporate Titan Took a Timeout on the Camino

Anthony didn’t do breaks. Vacations, maybe. But they were the carefully curated kind—five-star hotels, perfectly chilled martinis, and assistants who’d answer his emails faster than he could order room service. He wasn’t the sort of guy who meditated, journaled, or stared at the stars searching for existential truths. Why bother? He already had everything he wanted. CEO of a wildly successful tech company. A house so big the cleaning staff used walkie-talkies. A calendar so full it had to be colour-coded by his personal productivity consultant.

But one morning, while staring at yet another award plaque on his desk, Anthony felt it: a hollow ache where satisfaction should have been.

His assistant Lorraine, ever the practical oracle, handed him a brochure: “From Troubled to Triumpant: A Camino de Santiago Hiking Retreat in the Southwest of France.”

“Three days of walking the Camino?” Anthony snorted, scanning the itinerary. “Me? You must be joking!”

“It’s potentially life-changing!” she replied. And because Anthony’s life had started to feel like a LinkedIn feed come to life—polished, predictable, and just a little soul-dead—he booked it.

Day 1: The Arrival (a.k.a. “Meeting Your Fellow Pilgrims”)

The retreat began in a postcard-perfect French farmhouse: half-timbered walls, surrounded by sprawling vineyards,and ancient woods, all lovingly curated to look effortlessly chic—like the backdrop of a très exclusive desres ad. Anthony was greeted by the hostess, who handed him a glass of chilled rosé as if she’d known his taste for understatement all along.

The group was intimate: two other high-achievers seeking a “reset,” a world-famous yoga guru named Bella who spoke about “chakra alignment” as if it were a quarterly KPI, and Henri—a fellow CEO with a wiry frame and a French accent so rich it felt like a masterclass in luxury branding just to hear him speak.

Dinner was equal parts decadently delicious and disarming. As the hostess invited the group to share introductions, Anthony—well-versed in boardroom banter—found himself uncharacteristically brief. “I’m Anthony. I run a company,” he offered, omitting the finer details of yachts and vintage cars that usually seasoned his introductions.

Henri, who’d walked the Camino before, gave him a knowing smile. “By ze end of zis week, Anthony, you will find… whatever it is you are looking for.”

Anthony wasn’t sure he’d lost anything. But he raised his glass of Côtes de Gascogne rosé anyway—just in case clarity was waiting at the bottom of the bottle.

Day 2: First Steps on the Camino (or, “These Boots Were Not Made for Walking”)

Anthony traded his usual Italian loafers for hiking boots—clunky, stiff, and about as natural on his feet as a Formula 1 car in off-road mode.

Henri, effortlessly twirling his sleek Nordic walking sticks like a maestro with a baton, smiled over his shoulder. “Ze Camino,” he declared, “is not just a walk. It is a conversation wiz yourself.”

Anthony resisted the urge to roll his eyes and said nothing.

The group set off, winding through the sun-drenched hills of the French countryside. At first, Anthony tackled it like a corporate takeover, surging ahead with his signature competitive edge. But within an hour, the wheels started to come off. His legs burned, his lungs protested, and his shirt clung to him in awkward, damp defiance. When Bella chirped, “Feel the earth’s energy!” he briefly considered whether that energy might manifest as a rideshare.

By lunchtime, they stopped in a postcard-perfect village square. Each unpacked a simple picnic of baguettes, cheese, and ripe fruit. Anthony, accustomed to kale smoothies and artfully plated power lunches, devoured his meal with abandon. It was rustic, unpretentious, and life-affirming—the kind of meal that tastes better when you’ve earned every bite. Or maybe it was the first one he’d actually savoured in years.

Day 3: Blisters and the Art of Slowing Down

The second day of walking hit differently. Anthony’s body protested with every step, but it wasn’t the kind of ache that demanded an ice bath—it was the good kind, the kind that whispered, Hey, remember me? I’m your body, not just a chauffeur for your overclocked brain.

As the group moved through the countryside, Anthony began to notice things he would have normally brushed past in a blur of notifications: the sweet tang of apple blossoms riding the breeze, the satisfying crunch of gravel beneath his boots, the rhythmic ebb and flow of Bella and Henri’s conversation as they swapped stories. Bella shared tales of transformative retreats, while Henri recounted his first Camino with such reverence that even Anthony had to admit the man-made silence sounded like a TED Talk waiting to happen.

Midway through the hike, Henri slowed the group. “Let us walk wiz no talking,” he suggested, his tone gentle but firm. “Just listen. Ze Camino will speak.”

Anthony bit back a smirk. He wasn’t here for spiritual epiphanies or existential whispers from a gravel trail. Still, he played along, falling into step behind the others as the group dissolved into quiet.

At first, the silence felt awkward, like a boardroom with no agenda. But as they moved in unison, something in him softened. Without the constant ping of emails, the relentless tick of deadlines, or the unspoken pressure to dazzle an audience, Anthony’s mind began to unfurl like a map he hadn’t consulted in years.

Memories bubbled to the surface—late nights coding in his college dorm, fueled by ramen and sheer ambition; standing in front of strangers pitching his scrappy startup with nothing but a dream and a deck of slides; the electric thrill of building something from nothing. It wasn’t just nostalgia. It was a reminder of who he used to be before success turned into spreadsheets, projections, and quarterly targets.

Somewhere along the trail, it hit him like a gust of fresh spring air: when had he stopped being the creator and become the operator? When had his life shifted from passion to process?

He didn’t have the answers yet, but for the first time in years, he felt the pull to find them.

Day 4: Anthony’s Discovery

By the third and final day of walking, Anthony was—dare he admit it—enjoying himself. Yes, enjoying. The man who once considered a “break” five minutes spent skimming emails on a treadmill wasn’t checking his phone. He wasn’t even wearing his Apple Watch. Time, for once, was measured in footsteps, sunlight, and the easy rhythm of conversation.

Henri proved to be excellent company, dispensing his unique brand of French-accented wisdom like confetti on a parade route. “Zis path,” Henri said, gesturing to the Camino ahead, “it teaches us to let go of ze baggage. Sometimes, we carry too much—old fears, old beliefs, old goals. We must make space for ze new.”

Anthony nodded, the words landing deeper than he expected. His mind wandered to the metaphorical luggage he’d been dragging through life: the relentless pursuit of more. More success. More prestige. More zeros stacked neatly in his accounts. But Henri’s words posed a simple, startling question: what if more wasn’t the point?

That night, back at the farmhouse, they gathered for a celebratory dinner under strings of golden fairy lights. The hostess brought out bottles of local wine, the kind that felt like the earth itself had been bottled. Bella, radiant as ever, suggested a round of reflections. “What did the Camino teach you?” she asked, with the air of someone expecting answers to rival Rumi.

Anthony, uncharacteristically, didn’t rush to speak. He listened as Bella shared how she’d reconnected with her purpose and Henri mused about the joy of simplicity. When it was finally his turn, he raised his glass, his words slower and more deliberate than usual.

“It taught me…” he began, pausing as the room leaned in, “that sometimes, the most productive thing you can do is… nothing at all.”

The table erupted in applause. Bella dabbed at misty eyes, clearly moved. Henri, ever the sage, raised his glass with a knowing smirk, as if to say, Finally, he understands.

And for the first time in years, Anthony wasn’t thinking about the next big thing. He was just there—present, content, and strangely light.

Day 5: Back to Reality (with New Priorities)

The retreat ended over a farewell breakfast of flaky croissants and strong coffee, punctuated by heartfelt goodbyes. Anthony exchanged emails with Bella and made a vague promise to Henri to “stay in touch.” (They both knew he probably wouldn’t, but the sentiment felt right.)

On the flight home, Anthony noticed something subtle but undeniable: he felt… lighter. Not in a clichéd, I found myself in the French countryside kind of way, but in a quieter, more grounded sense—like he’d hit a mental reset button he didn’t even know existed.

Back at work, the changes started small but rippled outward. He delegated more, trusting his team instead of micromanaging every detail. He left the office at a reasonable hour—not as a reward for finishing the day’s tasks, but as a rule. Meetings became walking meetings whenever possible, the fresh air adding a clarity the boardroom couldn’t replicate.

And every now and then, he’d catch himself smiling. Not because of a quarterly win or a big deal closed, but because he remembered the crunch of gravel under his boots, the tang of apple blossoms in the air, or the way the sun had warmed his face on those endless trails.

The Camino hadn’t handed him all the answers on a silver platter. It wasn’t magic. But it had done something far more valuable: it shifted his perspective. It nudged him to ask different questions—the kind that didn’t fit neatly on a spreadsheet.

For a man who’d once equated success with never slowing down, learning to pause felt like a breakthrough. And in his world, breakthroughs were never small.

Epilogue: Anthony’s Notes

Back at his sprawling corner office, overlooking a skyline that once filled him with pride, Anthony began to see things differently. His old ways—the relentless pace, the obsessive need to achieve—felt like wearing a suit that didn’t fit anymore. Something about those three days on the Camino had shifted his priorities, not in a dramatic, sell-it-all-and-live-on-a-goat-farm kind of way, but in subtle, powerful ways.

One night, while flipping through an old notebook from the retreat, he jotted down a few principles—guidelines, really—that the Camino had quietly handed him. At first, it was just for himself, but eventually, he found himself sharing them with friends, colleagues, even his board of directors.

Here’s how it went:

  1. The inbox is a black hole—don’t get sucked in.
    “Your inbox will never be empty,” he explained to his assistant one day with a wry grin. “It’s like chasing a finish line that moves every time you blink. Decide what really matters, and let the rest go.” From then on, Anthony made a point of closing his laptop at a reasonable hour. He discovered that the world didn’t fall apart if he responded to an email the next morning—and, shockingly, neither did his business empire.
  2. You don’t need to climb every mountain in a sprint.
    The Camino had forced Anthony to slow down, literally and figuratively. He’d learned the value of a steady pace—of appreciating the path, not just the destination. He began applying this principle to his life: spending time with his family without checking his phone every two minutes, pausing to enjoy a conversation instead of rushing to the next meeting, even taking up the utterly unproductive habit of sitting on his balcony and staring at the stars.
  3. When in doubt, eat that baguette.
    This one started as a joke but turned into a mantra. During the Camino, a simple picnic had reminded him how much joy could be found in life’s small pleasures—a perfectly crusty baguette, a good bottle of wine, or a quiet sunset. “It’s not always about the big wins,” he’d tell people, laughing. “Sometimes, it’s about letting yourself savour the little things. Life’s too short to skip the carbs.”

These principles didn’t turn Anthony into a completely different person. He was still ambitious, still loved a challenge, and still occasionally fell into old habits of overworking. But now, he recognised the signs. He knew when to step back. And for a man who used to believe success was about running harder, faster, and longer than anyone else, this was revolutionary.

And every so often, when the demands of the world crept back in and his calendar started looking like a game of Tetris on steroids, he’d grab his hiking boots. Maybe it was just a stroll through the park, or a day spent walking the hills near his vacation home, but it was enough to bring him back to the lessons of the Camino: slow down, enjoy the view, and remember that life isn’t just a race to the next milestone.

Anthony didn’t need the Camino to change his life entirely—just enough to make him feel like he was living it again. And if that meant occasionally ditching the suit for hiking boots, well… even titans of industry need a little fresh air from time to time.

From Troubled to Triumphant

The Camino de Santiago walking retreat Anthony attended was one of my From Troubled to Triumphant Camino de Santiago retreats—a carefully curated experience for high-performers who are ready to hit pause and reconnect with what truly matters to them. These retreats aren’t about “roughing it” or chasing yet another trophy for the shelf. They’re about stripping back the noise, giving your overworked mind and body the space to breathe, and finding clarity in the simplest, most unexpected moments.

This isn’t just about rustic indulgence—it’s about intentionality. My retreats are designed to provide a perfect balance: enough structure to guide you toward self-discovery, and enough freedom to let you (re)define what “triumph” means for you. Whether it’s the peaceful rhythm of your boots crunching gravel or the unexpected insights shared over dinner with your fellow travellers, every detail is engineered to inspire connection—with yourself, with others, and with the life you’re truly meant to lead.

If you’ve mastered the art of “more” but are ready to explore te meaning of “enough,” these retreats offer a rare chance to reset, because the road to living a meaningful, impactful and fulfilling life doesn’t have to be paved with compromises.

iNFINITE iMPACT

After returning from the retreat, Anthony felt a shift he couldn’t ignore. The grind that once fueled him now felt hollow, and he found himself craving something deeper—more meaningful, more impactful. Inspired by the clarity he’d found on the Camino, he signed up for my iNFINITE iMPACT mentoring program, ready to channel his newfound perspective into action. This wasn’t about abandoning his success; it was about redefining it—building a life and legacy that aligned with his values and lit him up from the inside out. With tailored guidance, bold strategies, and a touch of that Camino magic, Anthony began turning his epiphanies into tangible, transformative and longterm impact.

For more information about the T2Tretreats and/or iNFINITE iMPACT, send an e-mail to OpenLockedDoors@gmail.com

“I am an experienced medical doctor – MBChB, MRCGP, NLP master pract cert, Transformational Life Coach (dip.) Life Story Coach (cert.) Stress Counselling (cert.) Med Hypnotherapy (dip.) and EAGALA (cert.) I may have an impressive number of letters after my name, and more than three decades of professional experience, but what qualifies me to excel at what I do is my intuitive understanding of my clients’ difficulties and my extensive personal experience of managing major life changes using strategies I developed over many years.” Dr M Montagu

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12 Unconventional Strategies for Creating a Unique Legacy

Live Your Legacy

Part of the #12 Strategies Collection

Introduction

You’ve mastered the art of achievement. The corner office, the strategic acquisitions, the industry recognition – you’ve checked all the traditional boxes of success. But in quiet moments, a persistent question emerges: Will any of this truly matter in fifty years?

The most influential leaders in history didn’t just leave behind impressive balance sheets or prestigious titles. They engineered ripple effects that transformed lives for generations. While your peers focus on traditional metrics of success, there’s a more sophisticated approach to crafting a legacy that outlasts quarterly earnings reports.

This isn’t about adding another accolade to your LinkedIn profile. This is about architecting lasting change through methods that most high-performers overlook – methods that can multiply your impact exponentially while others remain trapped in conventional thinking.

So forget about naming buildings after yourself or stockpiling gold bars for your grandkids. The most powerful legacies often come from the unexpected – the quiet revolutionaries who reshape lives through unconventional wisdom, the strategic mischief-makers who inspire change through creative disruption, and the masterful mentors who plant seeds of transformation in surprising ways.

Define “Legacy”

“The greatest purpose of life is to live it for something that will last longer than you.” William James

Most people think legacy is about leaving things behind – money, buildings, or that embarrassing high school yearbook photo that somehow made it onto the internet. But real legacy is about sending things forward. It’s the invisible software updates you install in the world’s consciousness, the behavioural patches you deploy in your community, and the inspirational bugs you intentionally introduce into society’s status quo.

A legacy isn’t just the stuff that ends up in your Wikipedia entry (or these days, your ChatGPT knowledge cutoff date). It’s more like a complex algorithm of influence that keeps running in the background of humanity’s operating system. It’s the ideas you released into the wild that went viral in real life, the minds you helped reshape that went on to reshape others, and the changes you set in motion that took on lives of their own.

In its purest form, a legacy is what continues to grow, evolve, and impact others even when you’re too busy haunting your great-grandchildren to manage it directly. It’s the difference between leaving footprints in the sand (which wash away with the next tide) and teaching others how to build sandcastles that inspire future architects.

Closer to Home

“The only thing worse than being blind is having sight but no vision.” Helen Keller

Life has a way of rewriting our carefully planned scripts. At the height of my medical career, when most would say I had “made it,” fate introduced an unexpected plot twist. As a doctor who had dedicated years to helping others manage stress, I found myself facing a deeply personal battle with an insidious eye disease that threatened to steal not just my vision, but my entire professional identity. The irony wasn’t lost on me – the healer now needed healing. But what initially felt like an ending became the catalyst for something far more profound. In that moment of forced reinvention, standing at the crossroads of who I was and who I needed to become, I began to see my legacy through a different lens. It was no longer about the patients I could treat in my lifetime, but about creating ripples of impact that could touch countless lives, even without my physical presence in a consultation room.

Here are 12 delightfully different strategies I have considered myself, that will ensure that your impact on the world extends well beyond your browser history. Whether you’re 25 or 85, it’s never too early or too late to start leaving your unique mark on the world.

The 12 Strategies

  1. Document your failures openly and thoughtfully. Create a “failure resume” or journal that shares not just what went wrong, but what you learned and how it shaped you.
  2. Become an “experience collector” rather than focusing on material achievements. Deliberately seek out diverse life experiences and document them – whether through writing, photography, or recordings. Then share these experiences and the wisdom gained with others.
  3. Create “wisdom time capsules” by writing letters to be opened at specific future dates by loved ones or even strangers. Include your perspectives, advice, and hopes based on that moment in time, creating bridges between generations.
  4. Practice “reverse mentoring” – actively seek to learn from those younger than you while sharing your own knowledge. This two-way exchange creates ripple effects of learning and challenges age-based hierarchies.
  5. Start a “living library” of skills where you systematically document and teach others the unique abilities you’ve developed throughout your life, from practical skills to problem-solving approaches. This makes your knowledge accessible even after you’re gone.
  6. Develop a personal “giving curriculum” – instead of just donating money or time randomly, create a thoughtful framework for how you can best serve others based on your unique combination of skills, resources, and experiences.
  7. Create “connection projects” that bring together different groups who wouldn’t normally interact. This could be across generations, cultures, or beliefs. Document these interactions and their impacts to inspire others to bridge divides.
  8. Practice “future archaeology” by deliberately creating artifacts that tell your story in interesting ways – not just photos and videos, but objects with meaning, letters explaining their significance, and the context that made them important.
  9. Build “idea lineages” by tracking how your thoughts and approaches influence others, who then influence more people. Actively document these chains of impact and encourage others to build upon your ideas while crediting their origins.
  10. Create “legacy challenges” that inspire others to take specific actions or achieve certain goals, with clear guidelines for how to participate and share results. This turns your legacy into an active, growing movement rather than a static memorial.
  11. Develop a “wisdom garden” – systematically plant ideas, projects, or initiatives that are designed to grow and evolve after you’re gone. This could include organisations, scholarships, or community projects with built-in mechanisms for adaptation and renewal.
  12. Practice “legacy mapping” by regularly reflecting on and documenting the invisible impacts you have on others – the small moments, conversations, and actions that might seem insignificant but have profound effects. Share these observations to help others recognize their own subtle but important influences.

Each of these strategies moves beyond traditional approaches to legacy-building like financial success or professional achievements. Instead, they focus on creating lasting positive impact through connection, learning, and the deliberate sharing of wisdom and experience.

The Benefits of Creating a Legacy

Why crafting a thoughtful legacy matters:

  1. Fulfillment and Meaning
    Beyond the ego boost, designing a meaningful legacy satisfies our deep human need for transcendence. It transforms success from a personal scorecard into a contribution to humanity’s broader story. When you know your actions create lasting positive change, it adds a profound sense of purpose to your daily decisions.
  2. Amplified Impact Through Time
    A well-designed legacy acts like compound interest for influence. Rather than your impact ending when you step away, it continues to grow and evolve. Your ideas, methods, and values can shape decisions and inspire actions decades or even centuries after you’ve introduced them.
  3. Cultural and Social Evolution
    By intentionally crafting your legacy, you help shape the direction of society itself. You’re not just solving today’s problems – you’re influencing how future generations will approach challenges and opportunities. This creates a form of immortality through persistent positive influence.
  4. Knowledge Transfer Across Generations
    A strategic legacy preserves and transmits crucial insights that might otherwise be lost. It creates bridges of understanding between different eras, ensuring valuable wisdom isn’t lost to time. Your hard-won insights become stepping stones for future innovation.
  5. Network Effect of Influence
    When you deliberately design your legacy, you create cascading effects of positive change. Each person influenced by your legacy can go on to influence others, creating an expanding network of impact that grows exponentially over time.
  6. Increased Resilience
    Unlike achievements that depend on specific circumstances, a well-designed legacy can adapt and remain relevant as the world changes – because it will. It’s like creating an evolving organism rather than a static monument.
  7. Enhanced Decision-Making
    Thinking about your legacy brings long-term thinking into present-day choices. It helps you make decisions that aren’t just good for the immediate future but will stand the test of time.
  8. Creation of Living Systems
    Rather than just leaving behind static resources or ideas, a well-designed legacy creates self-sustaining systems that continue to generate value. These might be educational frameworks, methodologies, or organizations that can evolve to meet future needs.
  9. Cross-Pollination of Ideas
    Your legacy can serve as a bridge between different fields, cultures, and perspectives. This cross-pollination often leads to breakthrough innovations and fresh approaches to persistent challenges.
  10. Personal Growth Acceleration
    The process of designing your legacy forces you to distil your experiences into transferable wisdom. This reflection and synthesis process accelerates your own development and understanding.

iNFINITE iMPACT: Where Exceptional Achievement Meets High-Altitude Impact

In a world obsessed with immediate gratification, true visionaries understand that enduring influence operates on an entirely different wavelength. At iFINITE iMPACT exceptional achievers become architects of generational change. Here, we decode the algorithms of lasting influence, helping you to design a legacy that continues evolving and expanding long after its inception.

Think of iFINITE iMPACT as your personal legacy accelerator, where we transform your success from a simple headline into a multi-generational story worth telling. We take your already-impressive achievements and teach you how to amplify them into waves of influence that keep rippling long after you’ve moved on.

This isn’t merely mentoring; it’s a masterclass in exponential influence. While others focus on climbing ladders, my clients learn to build elevators that lift entire communities. I operate at the intersection of strategic brilliance and societal transformation, where your accumulated wisdom becomes the catalyst for cascading positive change.

Are you ready to use your experience, insights, and aspirations to create a legacy that transcends traditional measures of success?

If so, let’s talk. Send an email to OpenLockedDoors@gmail.com to book a complementary 30-min consultation.

“I am an experienced medical doctor – MBChB, MRCGP, NLP master pract cert, Transformational Life Coach (dip.) Life Story Coach (cert.) Stress Counselling (cert.) Med Hypnotherapy (dip.) and EAGALA (cert.) I may have an impressive number of letters after my name, and more than three decades of professional experience, but what qualifies me to excel at what I do is my intuitive understanding of my clients’ difficulties and my extensive personal experience of managing major life changes using strategies I developed over many years.” Dr M Montagu

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The Rise of Healing Organisations: A New Business Paradigm

Summary

Healing organisations prioritise stakeholder well-being while pursuing sustainable success. This model challenges traditional profit-centred approaches by integrating compassion, non-judgemental support, purpose, and environmental stewardship into core business operations.

Introduction

This morning my stepbrother, knowing that I would be fascinated by anything that would help my Camino de Santiago Walking retreat guests get more from their hiking adventure, sent me a link to a website called Walking Well. It’s a shop window for a book called “Walking Well: A New Approach for Comfort, Vitality, and Inspiration in Every Step” by Michael J. Gelb and Bruce Fertman.

Sally Helgesen, author of “The Female Advantage” and “Rising Together” said of this book, “Walking Well helped me to relearn a fundamental skill that’s been diminished by multiple surgeries over the past two years. This has improved my confidence and balance while offering me a pathway to more robust health. I especially love the animal imagery — so vivid and practical. “

Definitely a book I need to read.

A Revelation

I scrolled down the home page and at the very bottom, I found a short 5-minute video called “The Healing Organisation” – about how we can make a difference by helping organisations cultivate a higher purpose.

It resonated so loudly that it literally knocked me for SIX.

It’s about another book, “The Healing Organisation: Awakening the Conscience of Business to Help Save the World” by Raj Sisodia and Michael J. Gelb.

Deepak Chopra said of this book, “The Healing Organisation is based on a simple, profound revelation: Businesses that operate from love and make human flourishing their first priority will enrich the lives of all their stakeholders, generate more sustainable abundance, and can help solve many of our current crises.”

On the point of upgrading my business in this very direction, I could not have come across the video at a better time.

The role of business owners has evolved. It’s no longer just about achieving financial success or dominating your industry. Today, it is also about making a lasting impact, having the influence to inspire positive change, and enjoying the financial rewards that come from authentically leading with integrity.

In my humble opinion.

What exactly is a “Healing” Business?

A “healing” business or entity that prioritises the well-being, growth, and support of its employees, customers, and the broader community as a core mission. It strives to create a positive impact on people’s lives and the environment while pursuing sustainable success. The term often refers to businesses that integrate values of kindness, compassion, and purpose into their operations, challenging traditional profit-centred models.

Key Characteristics of a Healing Business

  1. Purpose-Driven Leadership
    Business owners focus on making a meaningful difference, prioritising service to others over purely financial metrics.
  2. People-Centered Practices
    Policies are designed to nurture owners’ and employees’ physical, emotional, and mental well-being. Examples include flexible work arrangements, mental health support, and personal development programs.
  3. Ethical Operations
    Decisions are guided by moral and ethical considerations, including fair labour practices, sustainability, and transparency.
  4. Community Engagement
    Healing businesses actively support their communities by addressing social challenges, contributing to public well-being, and facilitating inclusivity.
  5. Environmental Stewardship
    These businesses are committed to protecting the environment through sustainable practices and reducing their negative ecological impact.
  6. Systems of Support
    They increase their employees’ and clients’ resilience by providing tools, resources, and a supportive environment that generates growth during challenges.

By being a healing organisation, a business can achieve sustainable success while deeply enriching the lives of its customers and stakeholders and contributing positively to society.

Examples of Healing Organisations

Some suggested real-world examples of companies that have successfully transformed into healing organisations, as described in The Healing Organization by Raj Sisodia and Michael Gelb or related sources:

  1. LifeGuides – A Public Benefit Corporation that connects people in need with those who can help, fostering healing and support for individuals.
  2. FIFCO – A Costa Rican beverage company that shifted its focus to sustainability and social responsibility, making bold commitments to reduce water, carbon, and waste footprints.
  3. IFlatiron Health – A healthcare tech company organizing cancer data to improve patient care and accelerate research.
  4. Patagonia – A leader in environmental sustainability, focusing on reducing its ecological footprint while promoting employee well-being.
  5. DTE Energy – Transformed its business model to focus on renewable energy and community engagement, creating a positive impact on stakeholders.

Starting with Sustainability

I have made sustainability a cornerstone of my Camino de Santiago walking retreat business right from the start, opting to run smaller retreats that would cause less damage to the environment, especially on the Camino, while at the same time contributing to the local community’s economy.

Also, I feel more like the custodian than the owner of my little French farmhouse here in the southwest of France – I feel very privileged to live here. As its custodian, my intention is to look after it to the very best of my ability and to preserve it for generations to come. In the meantime, I share the exceptional natural beauty, the rich cultural heritage and the nurturing tranquillity of my house with my guests without harming the natural environment and helping environmentally aware local producers at the same time.

How Can a Solopreneur Build a Healing Organisation?

Yes, even a one-person business can become a healing force! It’s all about your approach and the heart you put into your work. Now that I’m starting my Infinite Impact Mentoring program, my plan is to make it a healing force by focusing on the following key aspects:

  1. Creating a clear mission statement with the clear purpose of helping others overcome major life challenges: Mission Statement Infinite Impact Mentoring: “To empower clients to transcend success, discover their purpose and add meaning to their lives. Through tailored mentoring, I guide them to align their ambitions with their values, cultivate resilience, and create an impactful legacy that resonates far beyond personal achievement.” Still working on it
  2. Prioritising authentic human connections by creating opportunities for meaningful interactions with clients and by using technology to facilitate connections rather than replace them.
  3. Offering transformative services and products that promote holistic well-being. This will include courses, coaching, mentoring and digital products aimed at personal development.
  4. Practising regular self-care and mental health awareness by acknowledging the importance of my own well-being. I learned this the hard way.
  5. Supporting my community I have chosen to work with and donate to charities close to my heart: the L’Association Française de Thérapie Assistée par l’Animal (AFTAA) which promotes animal-assisted therapy, including equine therapy, to support individuals facing psychological and emotional challenges, I am a member of the board of Les Amis de Abbaye de Flaran, which works to valorise and maintain this 800-year-old Cistercian abbey on the Camino de Santiago de Compostela, and I am a volunteer at the local branch of the Order of Malta in France which provides comprehensive humanitarian services including healthcare, social assistance, emergency relief, food aid, and support for vulnerable populations, managing numerous facilities and mobilizing over 12,700 volunteers nationwide.
  6. Continuously educating myself, learning from experience, keeping abreast of the latest developments in my field and adapting my approach to better serve my clients.
  7. Aligning my business practices with my values: The plan is to ensure that all aspects of my business, from marketing to delivery, reflect my mission and ethical standards.

By implementing these strategies, any solopreneur can create a business that not only provides valuable services but also contributes to the overall well-being of clients and the broader community.

At the end of the day, being a solopreneur doesn’t mean you can’t make a big impact. With the right mindset and actions, your business can be a place where real transformation happens—not just for your clients, but for you and your community as well.

Examples of Solopreneurs’ Healing Businesses

Some suggested real-world examples of solopreneurs with healing organisations:

  1. Sara Jones, founder of Sparkle – Sara transformed her digital marketing agency into a healing organization by incorporating energy healing practices. She offered regular healing sessions and workshops for employees, boosting morale and performance while attracting more clients and increasing revenue.
  2. David Lee, co-founder of InnoTech – David applied energy healing techniques to his software development process, visualizing outcomes and tapping into intuition. This led to breakthrough products, awards, and a culture of innovation within his company.
  3. Lily Chen, founder of Bloom – Lily used energy healing to overcome personal challenges and launch a successful online platform connecting women entrepreneurs. She offers free healing sessions and workshops to support her community members.
  4. Tim Emerson, founder of Kwan Yin Healing – Tim created a niche “Healing for Healers” program, offering targeted support and tools for other healers. This approach led to significant growth in his client base, online engagement, and media coverage.
  5. Pieter Levels – While not explicitly focused on healing, Levels’ solopreneur journey demonstrates the power of experimentation and adaptation. His project Nomad List became a successful platform supporting digital nomads worldwide.

These examples highlight how solopreneurs can integrate healing practices into their businesses, leading to personal growth, increased success, and a positive impact on their communities.

FAQ about Healing Organisations

How can customers support Healing Organisations?

By choosing to buy from businesses that demonstrate ethical practices, sustainability, and a commitment to societal well-being. Their purchasing power encourages more businesses to adopt healing principles and drives broader change across industries.

Can a Healing Organisation still be profitable?

Yes, Healing Organisations are often more profitable in the long run because they inspire loyalty, creativity, and trust among employees and customers. By aligning their purpose with the greater good, they create a sustainable model of success that results in financial health while contributing to societal and environmental well-being.

Can small businesses or startups become Healing Organisations?

Absolutely. Healing Organisations are not defined by size or industry but by their intent and actions. Small businesses can implement healing principles by creating a purpose-driven culture, treating employees and customers with respect, and actively contributing to their communities.

How can a Healing Organisation measure its success beyond profit?

Success in a Healing Organisation is measured through a broader lens, including metrics such as employee well-being, customer satisfaction, community impact, environmental sustainability, and the organisation’s contribution to alleviating societal suffering. These indicators show how the business positively transforms lives.

What challenges do Healing Organisations face?

Challenges include resistance to change, balancing short-term financial pressures with long-term purpose, and overcoming scepticism from traditional business leaders or shareholders. However, clear communication of the benefits and demonstrating success through small wins can help overcome these obstacles.

How can a business transition to becoming a Healing Organisation?

The transition begins with a commitment from the business owner to embrace purpose-driven change. Steps include redefining the organisation’s mission, creating a caring workplace culture, aligning policies with healing principles, and engaging all stakeholders in co-creating a vision for positive impact.

Final Thoughts

Whether you’re running a Fortune 500 company or working solo from your home office, you can make a real difference while building a thriving enterprise. The key isn’t in perfect execution, but in taking that first step – maybe it’s offering mental health support for your team, switching to sustainable suppliers, or simply restructuring your services to better support your clients’ wellbeing.

I’m looking forward to seeing more businesses embracing this model. As it becomes clear that purpose-driven companies outperform their peers while making a positive impact, the question isn’t whether to become a healing organization, but how soon to begin the journey.

Ready to join the movement?

“I am an experienced medical doctor – MBChB, MRCGP, NLP master pract cert, Transformational Life Coach (dip.) Life Story Coach (cert.) Stress Counselling (cert.) Med Hypnotherapy (dip.) and EAGALA (cert.) I may have an impressive number of letters after my name, and more than three decades of professional experience, but what qualifies me to excel at what I do is my intuitive understanding of my clients’ difficulties and my extensive personal experience of managing major life changes using strategies I developed over many years.” Dr M Montagu

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Are You an Analytical, Functional, Intuitive or Personal Communicator?

What is Your Communication Style and why is it Crucial to Determine This?

During any major life change or transition, whether it is personal or professional, it is crucial to communicate clearly—both with yourself and others. Life changes can be overwhelming, filled with uncertainty, and often lead to misunderstandings. Whether you’re processing the end of a significant chapter in your life, navigating a career shift, coping with a deteriorating relationship, or moving to a new country, expressing your thoughts, feelings, needs, and boundaries with clarity is vital.

Clear communication not only helps you articulate your emotions and intentions but can also create stronger connections with the people who support you during these times. When you learn to communicate effectively, you invite understanding, collaboration, and a sense of control back into your life—even when everything else feels chaotic.

What is YOUR communication style? Personally and professionally?

In this post, we’ll explore why clear communication matters so much during life transitions and look at the various styles of communication to help you discover yours.

Communication styles have been categorised according to various classification systems:

Personal Communication Styles: Passive, Aggressive, Passive-aggressive, Assertive and Manipulative

  1. Passive Communication: Characterised by avoiding conflict and not expressing one’s own needs or feelings. Passive communicators often defer to others and may struggle to make eye contact. Example: “I’m okay with whatever you want to do” while avoiding eye contact.
  2. Aggressive Communication: Involves expressing oneself forcefully, often at the expense of others. Aggressive communicators may dominate conversations, use intense eye contact, and speak loudly. Example: “This is what we’re doing” or “Get over it”combined with crossed arms, eye rolling and finger pointing.
  3. Passive-Aggressive Communication: Combines passive and aggressive elements. Passive-aggressive communicators appear passive on the surface but subtly express anger or discontent through indirect means, such as sarcasm or giving the silent treatment. Example: Saying “Sure, I’ll do it” but not following through and spreading rumors.
  4. Assertive Communication: Considered the most effective style, it involves direct and honest communication while respecting others’ feelings and needs. Assertive communicators use “I” statements and maintain good eye contact. Example: “I feel… when you… and I need for you to do…” accompanied by eye contact, straight posture, and relaxed gestures.
  5. Manipulative Communication: Used to influence others covertly in the speaker’s favour. Manipulative communicators may use subtle tactics to guide others’ actions. Example: “I wonder if it’s good enough” while using subtle tactics to influence others.

Professional Communication Styles: Analytical, Functional, Intuitive and Personal

  1. Analytical Communication Style: Analytical communicators represent a methodical and data-driven approach to communication. If you are an analytical communicator, you prioritise facts, evidence, and logical reasoning in your interactions. You typically approach conversations and decision-making processes with a systematic mindset, carefully examining every detail before forming conclusions. In professional settings, analytical communicators are known for their precision and thorough research, often asking probing questions to gather comprehensive information. Their communication is characterised by a preference for quantitative data, statistical evidence, and structured arguments. They tend to be more reserved in emotional expression, focusing instead on objective information. When presenting ideas, they will likely use charts, graphs, and detailed reports to support their perspectives. While this approach ensures accuracy, it can sometimes make them appear distant or overly clinical in interpersonal interactions.
  2. Functional Communication Style: Functional communicators are process-oriented individuals who excel in structured environments. If you are a functional communicator, you prioritise clear, step-by-step instructions and well-defined processes in your communication. You are most comfortable when you understand exactly how something should be accomplished, preferring detailed guidelines and specific timelines. Your communication style is pragmatic and focused on implementation. You ask “how” questions to understand the precise mechanics of a task or project. Functional communicators value consistency, reliability, and systematic approaches to problem-solving. In team settings, they are often the members who ensure that plans are meticulously executed and that every detail is carefully considered.
  3. Intuitive Communication Style Intuitive communicators are visionary thinkers who focus on broad concepts and future possibilities. Unlike your analytical counterparts, you are less interested in minute details and more excited by overarching ideas and innovative potential. You communicate using metaphors, analogies, and big-picture perspectives. Your communication style is characterised by creativity, forward-thinking, and a tendency to challenge conventional thinking. Intuitive communicators quickly identify patterns and trends, often making connections that others might miss. They become impatient with excessive details and prefer discussions that explore potential outcomes and transformative ideas. In professional environments, they are often the strategic thinkers who inspire teams with their visionary approaches.
  4. Personal Communication Style: Personal communicators prioritise emotional intelligence and interpersonal relationships in their interactions. You are deeply attuned to the feelings and emotional states of those around you, making you exceptional team builders and conflict mediators. Your communication style emphasises empathy, diplomacy, and maintaining positive group dynamics. You excel at reading emotional nuances and creating supportive environments. Personal communicators are skilled listeners who can intuitively understand underlying team tensions and work to resolve them harmoniously. While their approach is relationship-focused, they can sometimes be perceived as overly emotional or indirect by more task-oriented communication styles.

Both Personal and Professional: Verbal, Non-verbal, Visual and Written

Communication can be delivered verbally, non-verbally, visually, and written communication. Verbal communication involves spoken words, whether in person, over the phone, or via video, and it relies on tone, clarity, and language to convey meaning. Non-verbal communication includes body language, gestures, facial expressions, and even silence, which often reveal emotions or intentions that words alone cannot. Visual communication uses images, symbols, charts, or videos to present ideas, often simplifying complex concepts or making them more engaging.

Finally, written communication involves text-based messages like emails, letters, or reports, providing a permanent record and allowing for careful crafting of ideas. Together, these forms of communication interact and complement each other to ensure clear and effective exchanges in different contexts.

Verbal communication can further be subdivided into intrapersonal communication and interpersonal communication. Intrapersonal communication refers to the internal dialogue or self-talk that occurs within an individual. This type of communication involves reflecting on thoughts, feelings, and experiences, allowing for personal insight and decision-making.

Interpersonal communication is the direct interaction between two individuals. This face-to-face communication can be informal or formal and is essential for building relationships, resolving conflicts, and exchanging ideas.

By recognising and respecting different communication preferences, professionals can create more effective and inclusive communication strategies.

Identify your own Communication Style

  1. Self-reflection: Consider how you typically approach problems, express thoughts and feelings, listen to others, handle stress and conflict, and adapt to different situations. This introspection can provide insights into your natural tendencies.
  2. Self-assessment tests: Take a communication style quiz or assessment specifically designed to determine your primary style. These tests often categorise styles into four main types, such as Passive, Aggressive, Passive-aggressive, Assertive and Manipulative, ex. the VeryWellMind Quiz Or take the Analytical, Functional, Intuitive and Personal Quiz
  3. Seek feedback: Ask colleagues, friends, or family members for their observations on how you communicate. They may notice patterns in your communication that you’re not aware of.
  4. Analyse your preferences: Reflect on the types of messages you prefer to receive. Your preferred style of receiving information often aligns with your own communication style.
  5. Observe your behaviour: Pay attention to your typical communication habits, such as your tendency to ask questions or make statements, your comfort level with small talk versus getting straight to the point and your natural inclination towards assertiveness or passivity.

By combining these methods, you can gain a comprehensive understanding of your primary communication style. Remember that most people use a blend of styles, with one or two being more dominant. Understanding your style can help you capitalise on your strengths and address any weaknesses, ultimately leading to more effective communication.

How Understanding Your Communication Style Helps You During Major Life Changes

Your communication style can be a powerful tool when navigating life transitions.

Most of us don’t stick to just one communication style in every situation—we adapt depending on the context. But being self-aware about how you naturally communicate can make a big difference in handling transitions effectively.

Step 1: Get to Know Your Style

Are you Analytical, Functional, Intuitive, or Personal?

  • Recognise Your Strengths and Weaknesses: If you’re Analytical, you probably thrive on data and details during transitions—but don’t forget to check in on your emotions. On the flip side, Personal communicators might lean into their feelings but could benefit from adding a little structure.
  • Adapt to Others: Not everyone speaks your “language.” Learning to adjust your approach—whether that means softening a logical tone or grounding emotional expression—can facilitate even the trickiest conversations.
  • Speak Your Needs: A support network can’t help if they don’t know what you need. Nail down how to communicate your wants effectively, and you’ll find people showing up for you in the best way possible.

Step 2: Strengthen Relationships

Transitions can strain even the strongest connections. Knowing communication styles helps you navigate interactions with a little more finesse—and way fewer misunderstandings.

  • Navigate Different Styles: Your Intuitive friend might want to dream big about the future, while your Functional partner wants a step-by-step plan. Adapt to their communication style, and you’ll both feel heard and understood.
  • Keep Conflict Low: Stress can make everyone snippy. By understanding how others communicate, you can avoid accidental tension and smooth over any bumps before they become roadblocks.
  • Ask for (and Give) the Right Support: Need emotional check-ins or practical advice? Understanding your style—and theirs—means you can give and receive help that truly resonates.

Step 3: Build Coping Strategies That Actually Work

Your communication style doesn’t just shape how you talk—it’s your compass for navigating tough situations. If you’re an Analytical communicator, you might find comfort in research and cold, hard facts. Gathering data about your situation or creating charts and spreadsheets can help you feel in control. Functional communicators, on the other hand, thrive on structure. They’re the planners who find calm in detailed, step-by-step action plans.

Intuitive communicators see the big picture and focus on future possibilities, which can be a powerful way to reframe challenges as opportunities. Meanwhile, Personal communicators turn to their emotional connections, finding strength in sharing their journey with friends, family, or a trusted confidant. By leaning into your natural tendencies, you can create coping mechanisms that not only work but also feel authentic to who you are.

Step 4: Decode the Flood of Information

During major transitions, you’re bound to be bombarded with advice, options, and decisions. How you process all this noise often comes down to your communication style. Analytical communicators zero in on the details, preferring to sort through information systematically to ensure nothing gets overlooked. Functional communicators excel at breaking down that same information into manageable steps, making it easier to act.

Intuitive communicators, however, tend to focus on patterns and overarching themes, piecing together the big picture to guide their decisions. Personal communicators approach information through the lens of relationships, paying close attention to who is delivering the message and how it makes them feel. Understanding your natural approach to information processing can help you stay focused, avoid overwhelm, and make decisions that align with your needs and values.

Step 5: Say What You Need (and Mean It)

Life changes stir up a whirlwind of emotions, ideas, and decisions—and knowing your communication style makes expressing all of that much easier. When you understand your strengths, you can articulate your needs clearly and confidently. Analytical communicators often prefer to stick to the facts, presenting their concerns in a logical, straightforward manner. Functional communicators are great at breaking down their thoughts into a clear plan of action, ensuring nothing gets lost in translation.

Intuitive communicators often gravitate toward the big-picture impact of what they’re expressing, focusing on long-term goals and implications. Personal communicators shine when sharing emotions and building deeper connections, which helps them express vulnerability in a way that fosters trust and support. By embracing your natural style, you’ll find it easier to communicate your concerns, choose the right method (whether that’s writing or talking), and frame your messages in a way that others understand and respond to positively.

The Bottom Line

One specific communication style is no better or worse than another—it’s all about using the right one for the situation. If you pick the wrong style for your audience, whether you’re talking to one person or a whole crowd, it can make it harder for your message to be absorbed. By staying flexible in how you communicate, you can adjust your approach to match what works best for your audience. That way, your message is more likely to get through.

Big life transitions don’t have to be uphill struggles. By understanding and leveraging your communication style, you can navigate life transitions more smoothly, maintain stronger relationships, and develop effective coping strategies tailored to your natural tendencies. Consider it your secret superpower—one that helps you thrive in even the messiest moments.

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Why SMART Goals Might Not Be So Smart After All

A Fresh Perspective

Introduction

At the beginning of this new year, many of us are making plans and setting goals for the year ahead. Whether it’s career ambitions, fitness targets, or personal development objectives, we aim to map our paths to success. To make it easier, you may have been advised to set “SMART” goals. But before you start crafting perfectly specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, and time-bound objectives, let’s pause for a moment. This popular framework might not always be the smartest choice.

Ever found yourself hitting every target but still feeling like you’re missing the mark? You’re not alone. While SMART goals have become the darling of corporate boardrooms and self-help gurus, this widely embraced framework might actually be holding us back in ways we hadn’t considered.

I have been setting SMART goals for more than a decade, sometimes successfully, other times not so much. Sometimes they’ve helped me achieve exactly what I set out to do – like completing the Amsterdam marathon or creating my nail-your-life-purpose course. Other times, they’ve felt like handcuffs, constraining my creativity and limiting my ability to adapt to changing circumstances. I have discovered that while SMART goals can be powerful tools, they’re not always the answer to every challenge.

These seemingly foolproof objectives might sometimes be outsmarting themselves. In fact, their limitations might surprise you.

The Hidden Limitations of SMART Goals

The Measurement Trap

SMART goals can inadvertently prioritise easily measurable outcomes over meaningful ones. Imagine a teacher who sets a SMART goal of “increasing test scores by 10% this semester.” While this fits the SMART criteria perfectly, it might lead to teaching to reach test scores rather than teaching creative, engaging lessons that spark lifelong learning. The question becomes: are we measuring what matters, or just what’s easy to measure? – Aghera A, Emery M, Bounds R, Bush C, Stansfield RB, Gillett B, Santen SA. A Randomized Trial of SMART Goal Enhanced Debriefing after Simulation to Promote Educational Actions. West J Emerg Med. 2018 Jan;19(1):112-120.

Tunnel Vision and Missed Opportunities

The framework can also create tunnel vision. When we’re hyper-focused on specific, measurable targets, we might miss unexpected opportunities or creative solutions that fall outside our predetermined path. A startup founder rigidly pursuing a SMART goal of “acquiring 1000 new users per month” might overlook valuable feedback suggesting their product needs fundamental changes. SMART goals can act like blinders, for example:

In Business

  • A retail manager focuses solely on hitting quarterly sales targets, missing crucial customer experience issues that later drive away loyal customers
  • An investment firm sticks rigidly to its “10% annual return” goal, passing up innovative but unconventional investment opportunities that could yield better long-term results
  • A software company maintains strict sprint velocity goals, forcing developers to choose quick fixes over necessary architectural improvements

In Personal Development

  • A writer determined to write 2000 words daily ignores feedback suggesting their story needs structural revision
  • An athlete so focused on specific strength metrics overlooks mobility issues that later lead to injury
  • A student fixated on achieving a perfect GPA takes only “easy” classes, missing out on challenging courses that could better prepare them for their career

In Professional Growth

  • A designer pursuing specific certification goals misses emerging design tools and methodologies that could give them a competitive edge
  • A middle manager focused on efficiency metrics fails to notice growing team burnout and cultural issues
  • A freelancer strictly pursuing income targets turns down lower-paying projects that could lead to valuable portfolio pieces and industry connections

In Innovation and Research

  • A research team so focused on meeting grant-specific milestones overlooks unexpected findings that could lead to breakthrough discoveries
  • A product development team adhering to rigid feature delivery schedules misses crucial user feedback suggesting a pivot in direction
  • An environmental organisation focused on specific conservation targets overlooks innovative community-based solutions that could have a broader impact

The “Achievable” Paradox

By emphasising realistic, achievable goals, we might set our sights too low and miss breakthrough innovations. We might even be programming ourselves for mediocrity. History’s greatest innovations – from the Wright brothers to breakthrough medical treatments – often emerged from pursuing what seemed “unrealistic” at the time.

The Environmental Mismatch

Rigid Goals in a Fluid World

Today’s rapidly evolving landscape demands adaptability, yet SMART goals assume a relatively stable environment. A goal that was relevant when set might become obsolete before it’s achieved. A company might set a SMART goal to optimise its retail strategy, only to find consumer behaviour dramatically shifting due to unexpected events . A five-year business plan in certain industries might be disrupted by new technologies. Career goals in professions might not exist in another decade.

The Creativity Conundrum

Time-bound deadlines can sometimes be counterproductive, especially for complex creative or innovative work – it fundamentally misunderstands the creative process. Imagine telling Mozart to “compose three symphonies in the next quarter” – the pressure of arbitrary deadlines might have stifled his creativity rather than enhanced it.

The Human Factor

Perhaps most importantly, SMART goals can overlook the human element. They don’t necessarily account for personal growth, learning processes, or the intrinsic motivation that often drives meaningful achievement. A person might successfully hit their SMART goal of “reading 52 books this year” but miss out on the deep engagement and joy that comes from truly savouring and reflecting on what they read.

SMART goals often overlook the psychological elements that drive true achievement:

  • Intrinsic motivation versus external metrics
  • Personal growth and learning processes
  • The role of passion and purpose
  • The importance of flexibility and adaptation

Meeting quantitative targets doesn’t always translate to qualitative success. Ter illustration, allow me to introduce you to Trevor Scribblesworth.

The Tale of Trevor Scribblesworth, the Word Count Warrior

Once upon a time in the bustling city of Procrastinopolis, there lived a writer named Trevor Scribblesworth. Trevor was a seasoned wordsmith with a sharp wit and an even sharper deadline. His editor, Ms Punctuality Prose, had set him a daunting task: write exactly 1,500 words per day, every day, for the lifestyle blog “Living Your Best Life (But Better).” It was specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, and time-bound. Perfect! His productivity app gleamed with green checkmarks. His word-count spreadsheet was a thing of beauty. His writing… well, that was another story.

Monday’s post: “10 Ways to Drink Water More Effectively”
“Water is very wet,” Trevor typed furiously. “It’s also quite liquid. Some people drink water every day, which is interesting because days happen all the time. Speaking of time, did you know that fish swim in it. But not all fish. Some fish are actually in the sea, which is like water but bigger and saltier, kind of like potato chips, which make you thirsty, which brings us back to water…”

Tuesday’s post: “How to Breathe Like a Pro”
“Breathing is essential for living your best life,” Trevor began, eyes fixed on his word counter. “In fact, most successful people breathe multiple times per day. Here are some places where you can practice breathing: inside, outside, upstairs, downstairs, in a box, with a fox, in a house, with a mouse…”

By Wednesday, he was really struggling. “5 Signs You’re Actually Alive”
“Being alive is trending right now,” he wrote desperately. “You know you’re alive when you can read blog posts about being alive, just like this one, which you’re reading right now, which proves you’re alive, unless you’re not, in which case this is awkward and you should probably seek medical attention immediately or possibly yesterday…”

Thursday’s masterpiece: “Why Chairs Are the New Standing”
“Chairs have been around for literally several years,” Trevor typed, watching the word count tick up with relief. “Some chairs have four legs, while others brazenly display three or even five legs, which really makes you think about life and its many mysteries, speaking of which, did you know that chairs often support sitting? This is a fascinating development in the chair community…”

Friday’s piece de resistance: “The Ultimate Guide to Looking at Things”
“Looking is a crucial skill,” Trevor declared, madly hammering at his keyboard. “Without looking, how would you know where your coffee is? Or your cat? Or your coffee-drinking cat? Some experts suggest opening your eyes while looking, though this is still debated in certain circles, particularly among professional nappers and people who walk into walls…”

His posts hit the required word count every single day. His metrics were perfect. His engagement stats, however, told a different story. Comments ranged from “Did an AI write this?” to “Are you okay?” to “I’ve read fortune cookies with more depth.”

By Saturday, Trevor’s editor finally intervened. “Trevor,” she said gently, “I notice you’ve met every single word count goal this week.”

“Thank you!” Trevor beamed. “I’m crushing it!”

“You wrote three paragraphs about how shoes are ‘foot clothes.'”

“But it was exactly 1,500 words!”

“And yesterday’s post was just the word ‘nevertheless’ repeated 375 times.”

“It was about persistence!”

Ms Punctuality Prose sighed. “Maybe we need to rethink these goals.”

Trevor gasped. But before he could respond, he had to go write his next post: “The Revolutionary Art of Existing in Space While Time Continues to Move Forward (A Comprehensive Guide).”

Some say he’s still out there somewhere, hitting his word counts with the precision of a Swiss watch and the depth of a puddle. But at least his spreadsheet looks amazing.

Rethinking Goal Setting

SMART goals can help you meet deadlines, but they won’t guarantee depth, quality, or relevance. Instead of abandoning the structure entirely though, consider these alternatives:

  1. Combine SMART objectives with flexible, adaptive frameworks
  2. Include qualitative measures alongside quantitative ones
  3. Build in regular review and adjustment periods
  4. Allow for serendipity and unexpected opportunities
  5. Focus on process goals alongside outcome goals

Research

Looking at the research done on the effectiveness of setting SMART goals, I found that it has yielded mixed results. Some studies have demonstrated positive outcomes, while others have found limitations or no significant benefits:

  1. Creative Performance: SMART goals were found to be no more effective for creative performance than do-your-best goals or non-specific, exploratory ‘open goals’ -Pietsch, Simon & Riddell, Hugh & Semmler, Carolyn & Ntoumanis, Nikos & Gucciardi, F.. (2024). SMART goals are no more effective for creative performance than do-your-best goals or non-specific, exploratory ‘open goals’. Educational Psychology. 44. 1-17.
  2. Quality of Goals: A study examining SMART goals set by Australian community pharmacists found that the majority of goals were classified as poor quality, with 81% scoring two or fewer points on a quality assessment scale – Stewart V, McMillan SS, Hu J, Collins JC, El-Den S, O’Reilly CL, Wheeler AJ. Are SMART goals fit-for-purpose? Goal planning with mental health service-users in Australian community pharmacies. Int J Qual Health Care. 2024 Feb 21;36(1):mzae009.
  3. Job Satisfaction: Research by Leadership IQ suggests that people who set SMART goals are less likely to love their jobs and may be less likely to achieve great things or maximize their full potential.

While SMART goals have demonstrated effectiveness in certain contexts, their universal applicability and superiority over other goal-setting methods remain subjects of ongoing research and debate.

Moving Beyond SMART Goalsetting: A Balanced Approach

The solution isn’t to abandon SMART goals entirely but to use them as one tool in a more comprehensive approach to achievement. Consider setting “direction goals” that define a clear heading while allowing for course corrections and unexpected discoveries along the way.

What really matters is creating a goal-setting framework that acknowledges both the measurable and immeasurable aspects of success – one that leaves room for growth, adaptation, and the fundamental unpredictability of meaningful achievement. After all, the most important outcomes in our lives rarely fit neatly into a five-letter acronym.

What’s your experience with SMART goals? Have they helped you succeed, or have you found yourself checking all the boxes but missing the bigger picture? Perhaps it’s time to get smarter about how we set SMART goals.

“I am an experienced medical doctor – MBChB, MRCGP, NLP master pract cert, Transformational Life Coach (dip.) Life Story Coach (cert.) Stress Counselling (cert.) Med Hypnotherapy (dip.) and EAGALA (cert.) I may have an impressive number of letters after my name, and more than three decades of professional experience, but what qualifies me to excel at what I do is my intuitive understanding of my clients’ difficulties and my extensive personal experience of managing major life changes using strategies I developed over many years.” Dr M Montagu

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