Most of the people I work with are good at exactly one thing nobody applauds for: holding it together in front of everyone who needs them to.

That skill gets you very far. It also quietly empties the tank, because the better you get at performing fine, the less anyone around you thinks to ask if you actually are.

I spent three decades inside global cybersecurity convinced the tank would refill itself. It doesn't. It just goes quiet until it doesn't.

A founder told me last month his board thinks he's never been better. His sleep says otherwise. We didn't talk strategy. We talked about the gap between those two facts.

Another client realized the hardest part of stepping back wasn't trusting his team. It was admitting he'd built a role for himself that nobody, including him, actually needed anymore.

Identity isn't one thing. When one piece cracks, people assume the whole structure is failing. Usually it's just the one piece, and it's fixable.

A short, optional recurring slot, one book, article, or talk Kenny found useful that week, framed personally rather than as a generic recommendation. (Placeholder for now, e.g.: "Re-reading a chapter this week on identity collapse after major life transitions. More on this once I've sat with it longer.")

Takeaway: Treat email like a product: clear promise, consistent cadence, single CTA per send.