Maria was pushing ahead, everyone knew how engaged she was and how much she wanted her project to succeed. She was sharing with everyone how great it would be, how important it was, and how much she wanted everyone to participate.

She was selling her project. She had an idea of what it should become and wanted everyone to adhere.

In her enthusiasm she couldn’t stop herself from talking, presenting, and persuading.

Not only that. She was so engaged that she was also seeing what everyone else should do, and how to move on. She was the momentum.

Together with her, there was the team, the ones who had decided to join her.

To intervene, they were watching out for the few moments during which she had to catch her breath.

Maria had done a great job to get the project started, finding others who could join her, and establishing a first network as well as a task that would move the project forward.

It was her baby, her pet project and she wanted everything to be right. It made it difficult for her to see how much the people around her wanted to join in nor that they were searching for a place from which they could contribute.

She had forgotten to switch roles.

In her initial role, her task had been to establish a first vision, discover how it could happen, and create the first connections. That’s when her energy to make it something almost personal was well spent and allowed her to keep the movement.

But now her role was a different one. She had assembled people who were willing to help her, and she needed to discover how the group could function together. The group needed to discover it too. In that meeting, her task was to facilitate the creation of the group. That is, open a path so that it may eventually become a team.

After having been personal, her vision now needed to become a shared one. A challenging moment, as it meant that she might have to let others intervene with her way of seeing it, possibly transforming it. It meant allowing herself to hold her idea lightly after having had to hold it strongly.

It’s a situation in which believing that her path is the right one, also means that she has to defend it, to make sure others understand how she is right. It’s continuing to hold on strongly to her idea.

A way to allow herself to hold her vision lightly without disrupting it was to pay attention to her role and the task that comes with it. It was helping her to see the task to facilitate team creation. And to see it not as a contrast to persuading others of her project but as a way to have them join forces. It was enabling her to discover what it is that would allow everyone to settle into her project.