Gitanjali Trevorrow-Seymour

Don't get a tattoo that says "Fearless."

Unless you're also booking in to have your amygdala surgically removed.

Fear isn't a character flaw. It's a feature. That little almond-shaped bit of brain has kept our species alive and it isn't about to retire because we bought a motivational mug.

And yet, we're told: that on the other side of fear is a braver, better, bolder version of us. Push through. Feel the fear and do it anyway. Repeat until enlightened or exhausted. I know which one normally comes first.

I also know, as Mandela inspiringly said, that "Courage is not the absence of fear, but the triumph over it."

But how?! I like to ask in my imaginary conversation with Mandela.

How do we triumph over fear?

The answer isn't actually a 'doing', it's an undoing.

The triumph is when we undo a misunderstanding of what fear is.

Most audiences I speak to think that fear is the enemy, to be avoided, overcome or hidden. But fear is not the enemy.

Fear is doing exactly what it was designed to do. Whether it's that big presentation, that panel interview, that promotion, fear is telling us one thing.

Fear is telling us that we're using our thinking as a weapon not a tool.

The story we make up about the fear, that we stack on top of it ("I'm not ready," "I'm not the type," "I'll do it when I feel more confident") is the thing keeping us stuck. Not fear.

The triumph is ours for the taking when we catch the story, doubt the meaning and trust our Possiblist Intelligence™ to generate fresh thought - a new story.

That's when courage arrives.

Less "override the fear." More "understand our thinking, then stop believing every rerun it hands us."

We can't change behaviour by pep-talking the surface. We can change it by understanding the mind underneath.

✦

This week my newsletter peeps got a Possiblist™ Experiment on Untested Courage. The kind nobody hands out medals for. The kind that changes careers, relationships, and the occasional 10pm bedtime negotiation with small humans who are absolutely certain it's still daytime.

Comment 'experiment' and I'll send you the link to The Possiblist™ Playground newsletter so you don't miss future experiments.

Should is the filthiest word in leadership.

Have you ever drowned in a sea of 'shoulds'?!

Here's a list I collected today. From me. From clients. From friends. From family.

I should speak up more.
I should have better boundaries.
I should be more focussed.
I should embrace AI more.
I should spend more time with my kids.
I should be more patient.

And the one I hear the most: I should be more confident.

And don't forget the shouldn'ts:

I shouldn't have said that in the meeting.
I shouldn't second-guess myself.
I shouldn't have shouted at my kids.
I shouldn't be so indecisive.
I shouldn’t care what people think.

We're not exhausted from doing too much. We're exhausted from shoulding all over ourselves. Each "should" acts as a weight, an unyielding reminder of our perceived shortcomings. It places expectations upon us that rarely lead to inspiration or action.

Instead it highlights the gap. The gap between who we are and who we think we ‘should’ be. Should quickly becomes a background hum of not quite enough that we've mistaken for high standards.

I’ve learned that it's not about shunning ambition or lowering our aspirations. The Possiblist™ move isn't to try harder or aim lower. It's to notice faster when we're 'shoulding all over ouselves'. That's it. Noticing loosens the grip. Noticing interrupts the habitual hum. Noticing creates space for something far more helpful to emerge - fresh thought, inviting a newfound clarity that sparks creativity and growth.

"Should" is stagnant, an anchor tying us down. Fresh thoughts, flow like a river, welcoming expansion rather than constriction. One drains us, while the other powers us forward.

Try counting your shoulds today. Don't fix them (you don't need fixing), don't fight them (that amplifies them), don't feel bad about them (that's just another should wearing a disguise).

How many times did you should on yourself today?! I'll go first: four, including "I should post on social media more"!

♦

(From an Expert Session I ran on Possiblist Intelligence™ for Financial Advisors.)

My TEDx is live 🎉

Before I stepped on stage, my 11 year old son gave me some stern advice....

It was such good advice I quoted him in my talk.

Not sure he appreciated that...his chagrin/chuffed face is confusing.

Mommy, he said, please don't be one of 'THOSE' people....who nearly die and then tell other people how to live.

Yup!

Luckily none of my talks, let alone my first TEDx, involve telling anyone how to live.

In fact, when you nearly die you don't get curious about how to live.
You get super curious about what it is to feel ALIVE.

I hope whoever watches feels that aliveness.
Even just for a moment. Even longer. Even at 3am when their head is loud and their heart is heavy. Especially then.

And if not, well I hope they'll laugh at their BMW (not the car!), ban confidence forever and fall in love with their piccolo.

And if none of that made sense it will in just 17mins! (when did that become long for a TEDx?!)

https://bit.ly/4xuVZaU

Wanna come be a Possiblist™ with me?

What is a Possiblist™?!

Whilst most are asking is the glass half full or the glass half empty. A Possiblist™ says wrong question….

The glass is full.

Full of water AND air.

One of them is invisible.

A Possiblist™ sees the invisible.

One part is where we normally look in uncertainty for answers.
The other part is quietly contributing without demanding any attention.

Most of life is shaped by things we can't immediately see: assumptions, patterns, potential, timing, courage, imagination.

The invisible has a remarkable habit of becoming visible the moment we start paying attention to it.

That is where possibility begins.

A small group of women decided I must have slept with someone senior to get the job.

And when I heard the rumour, a desperate voice inside me asked….

“Why would they think that?”

And my clever brain proceeded to fill in all the reasons why.

Because.. you have two unfinished degrees, you’re not smart, you’re a fraud. You’re not enough.

That’s insecure, habitual thinking in all it’s rapid response action.

BUT…The brain isn't a truth-seeking missile. It's a familiarity-seeking spaniel. It runs back to the nearest old story, drops it at your feet, and looks very pleased with itself.

The neuroscience is simple. The default mode network, the bit that lights up when we're ruminating, prefers a familiar feeling to a true one. Even when the familiar feeling is "I'm not enough."

BUT familiar does not equal fact.

And I know that the sick to my stomach feeling I had wasn’t coming from the gossip. It was coming from my thinking.

Not from the rumour. Not from those women. Not from the circumstance.

And the great news… If we’re in a feeling of our thinking not of our circumstance then that gives us the ultimate freedom.

Free to create our experience of life not be at the mercy of circumstance.

Our experience of life, of uncertainty, of change is an inside job. Always has been.

You’ll either read that and feel completely liberated or completely doubtful. You choose what comes next.

🔔 Follow Gitanjali | Chief Possiblist™ for a fresh take on Change, Mindset and Performance (spoiler: confidence not required). Get in touch for keynotes and executive coaching 🎤

🎥 For the full sordid story, my conversation with the brilliant Dominic Colenso is linked in the comments.

The one word I use more than any other, in keynotes, workshops, exec coaching is….

No, it’s not Possiblist™! It’s…

…Notice.

We spend alot of time in organisations taking notes. When we start taking notice, things change.

Change doesn’t begin with doing more. It begins with noticing more.

Noticing has the power to change everything.

Not because the moment we notice something our life magically transforms overnight.

But because most of us are living inside patterns we no longer question.

The same reactions.
The same emotional loops.
The same stories about ourselves, our children, our boss, our team.
The same familiar thoughts dressed up as facts.

We call it “just who I am.”
But often it’s just who we’ve practised being for so long we’ve forgotten that’s not all that is possible for us.

✦

You know I’m as obsessed with modern neuroscience as I am with ancient wisdom!

And one of the many fascinating things about the human brain is that it prefers the familiar over the possible.

Even when the familiar is exhausting.
Even when it’s limiting.
Even when it hurts.

Why? Because familiar feels safe.

So we stay inside thought patterns that shrink us.
We replay old insecurities like they’re documentaries instead of opinions.
We keep interpreting life through the same tiny window and wonder why change feels hard.

✦

Awareness is powerful because once we see through the false logic of an old pattern, we can see something fresh.

The old behaviour no longer feels automatic.
The old narrative no longer feels entirely true.
The old version of us or of ‘them’, starts loosening its grip.

Not through force.
Not through shame.
Not through “fixing” ourselves.

But through 'Conscious Choice' as I talk about it in the book.

✦

Growth through uncertainty is not about becoming someone new.

It’s noticing what was never truly you to begin with.

✦

Less notes, more noticing today, I dare you.

I wonder what you’ll see differently as a result.

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🔔 Follow Gitanjali | Chief Possibilist™ for a fresh take on Change, Mindset & Performance (spoiler: confidence not required).

🎤 Keynotes | Executive Coaching | Transformational Conversations

We’ve built an entire industry around a problem that might not exist.

Confidence.

Too little? Build it before taking action.
Too much? Tone it down before speaking.
Lost it? Find it before anyone notices.

Watch it carefully… like a sour dough starter (having never made sour dough but I hear it's tough!)

It’s the only game where the target keeps moving-
and somehow, we’re always the ones who need adjusting.

Sitting in rooms where “confidence” is the diagnosis.
Downloading frameworks. Rehearsing sentences.
Waiting to feel ready before we move.

(Still waiting, by the way.)

But here’s the slightly inconvenient thought:

What if confidence is just… a con?

A beautifully packaged distraction
that keeps us focused on fixing ourselves-
instead of noticing that nothing fundamental was missing in the first place.

Because underneath the noise, the overthinking, the mental commentary…
there’s something far more stable than confidence.

Something that doesn’t rise and fall
based on how the meeting went
or how stupid we sounded in hindsight.

And it’s already here. For all of us.
Not when we’ve earned it. Not when we’ve perfected it.
Just… here, now.

A knowing we can trust regardless of the state of our sourdough/confidence!
A knowing that isn't esoteric.
It arrives not with a loud certainty but a clear curiosity. A sense of courage.

So let’s test it.
What's one thing you've been quietly postponing until you feel confident enough?

Now instead ask: What am I genuinely curious about when I think about that one thing?
Follow that, trust that.

And let's ban the word confidence from now on.
Replace it with curiosity and courage and let's see what we see differently from that place.

Shall we?

🔔 Follow Gitanjali | Chief Possiblist™ for a fresh take on Change, Mindset and Performance (spoiler: confidence not required). Get in touch for keynotes and executive coaching 🎤

My answer when Dom asked me this somewhat surprised me!

Because I used to LIVE in the *regret machine*. You know the one…

“I should have said yes.”
“I should have said no.”
“I should be further along by now.”

Round and round. For years. Churning out 'shoulds' left, right and centre.
I was, frankly, prolific. If only I'd been this productive at literally anything else.

In Possibilist™ Land we have a technical term for this: "Should-ing all over yourself"

👉 Stop should-ing all over yourself. It’s a filthy, dirty habit.

Because what I see clearly now is:

Should isn’t wisdom. It’s noise.

It sounds true. It feels real.
It's not.

At best it's an innocent reminder to self:

"I should have picked up milk last night" (literally me this morning!)

At worst it's putting us on trial for a past that no longer exists:

"I shouldn't have lost my patience" (literally me this morning!)

Either way - it robs us of this moment, now.
And the moment we notice, the machine quiets.

Not everything that didn’t land was a mistake.
Not everything that got away was meant to stay.

Sometimes… it simply wasn’t part of this version of our story.

Same life.
Very different intelligence in the room.

PS: My newsletter peeps get a Possiblist™ Experiment to stop shoulding. 12:05pm today. Join in here: http://highdefinitionyou.com/join-our-community/

🔔 Follow Gitanjali | Chief Possiblist™ for a fresh take on Change, Mindset and Performance (spoiler: confidence not required). Get in touch for keynotes and executive coaching 🎤

There’s something quite extraordinary about stepping into a TEDx space.

Not just the stage…
but the people.
The conversations in between.
The energy that sits quietly behind every idea waiting to be shared.

Because what you don’t always see are the moments before and after—
the deep breaths,
the unexpected connections,
the laughter in corridors,
the shared understanding that every single person there
is holding something that matters.

For me, it’s never just about delivering a talk.

It’s about being in a room full of possibility.
Where stories are not just told…
they’re felt.

Where ideas don’t just land…
they ripple.

And where you’re reminded—
that when people come together with openness and intention,
something shifts.

Not just on the stage,
but far beyond it.

Grateful to have been part of this experience.



🔔 Follow Gitanjali | Chief Possiblist™ for a fresh take on Change, Mindset and Performance (spoiler: confidence not required). Get in touch for keynotes and executive coaching 🎤