The Dragon I Didn’t Feed

Last week, I had a conversation that left me unsettled.

Not because someone yelled.

Not because anyone was cruel.

Not because I was powerless.

In many ways, it was an ordinary workplace conversation.

And yet, hours later, I could still feel it moving inside me.

The old dragon was awake. 🔥🔥🔥🐉

The dragon that wanted to defend.

The dragon that wanted to prove.

The dragon that wanted to gather evidence, screenshots, transcripts, and timeline.

The dragon that wanted to be right.

Twenty years ago, I would have fed it.

Not because I was a bad person.

Because I was afraid.

Afraid of being misunderstood.

Afraid of being judged unfairly.

Afraid that if I did not explain myself perfectly, someone else’s version of the story would become the truth.

So I learned to build cases.

I became very good at it.

I could reconstruct conversations with forensic precision.

I could identify inconsistencies.

I could point out assumptions.

I could demonstrate exactly where someone was wrong.

And often?

I was right.

That was the problem.

Being right rarely created what I actually wanted.

It did not create trust.

It did not create connection.

It did not create influence.

It did not create understanding.

It simply won arguments.

And sometimes, even that victory felt strangely empty.

The older I get, the more I realize that many conflicts are not battles between truth and lies.

They are collisions between different experiences.

One person experiences support.

Another experiences ownership.

One person experiences enthusiasm.

Another experiences interruption.

One person experiences directness.

Another experiences judgment.

One person experiences feedback.

Another experiences accusation.

Both leave the same conversation convinced they witnessed something completely different.

The younger version of me believed the solution was to determine who was objectively correct.

The older version of me has become more interested in understanding what happened inside each person.

Not because truth doesn’t matter.

Because human beings rarely change when they feel cornered.

They change when they feel understood.

And that is far harder.

People often imagine maturity feels peaceful.

It doesn’t.

At least not initially.

Sometimes maturity feels like sitting on your hands while every cell in your body wants to send a five-page explanation.

Sometimes maturity feels like resisting the urge to forward the transcript.

Sometimes maturity feels like choosing not to expose every flaw in someone else’s argument.

Sometimes maturity feels like allowing another person’s misunderstanding of you to exist without immediately correcting it.

That doesn’t mean becoming a doormat.

It doesn’t mean agreeing with things you don’t believe.

It doesn’t mean abandoning your boundaries.

In fact, I have discovered the opposite.

The strongest boundaries I have ever set were the ones that did not require me to convince anyone.

The strongest boundaries sounded like:

“That wasn’t my understanding.”

“I see it differently.”

“I don’t think that’s the role I agreed to.”

And then…

Stopping.

No courtroom.

No evidence file.

No cross-examination.

Just clarity.

The hardest lesson of all has been learning the difference between connection and agreement.

For most of my life, I unconsciously treated them as the same thing.

If we disagreed, connection felt threatened.

If I felt misunderstood, connection felt threatened.

If someone formed an unfair conclusion, connection felt threatened.

Now I am learning something different.

Connection is not agreement.

Connection is staying human with each other while disagreement exists.

Connection is staying present while boundaries exist.

Connection is remaining curious while your nervous system desperately wants certainty.

This realization sits at the heart of a session I recently created called The Impact Handshake.

The entire workshop revolves around a deceptively simple question:

Can I stay connected to myself while connected to you?

Not:

Can I make you agree with me?

Not:

Can I prove my point?

Not:

Can I win?

Can I remain connected to my values, needs, observations, and integrity while remaining connected to another human being?

That is differentiation.

And differentiation is far less glamorous than influence books make it sound.

Sometimes differentiation looks like speaking.

Sometimes it looks like leaving.

Sometimes it looks like holding a boundary.

And sometimes it looks like saying far less than you are capable of saying.

Last Friday reminded me that growth is strange.

The younger version of me would have walked away feeling victorious after proving her case.

The current version walked away feeling uncomfortable.

Grounded.

Still slightly frustrated.

Still unconvinced.

Still not entirely satisfied.

But also proud.

Because I didn’t abandon myself.

And I didn’t abandon the relationship either.

I stayed in the picture.

I stayed connected to my observations.

I stayed connected to my boundaries.

I stayed connected to my values.

And perhaps most importantly, I stayed out of right fighting.

Not because I had nothing to prove.

Because I finally realized that proving it was not the same thing as creating impact.

🐉 Dragon Wisdom

The dragon of being right is seductive because it promises certainty.

But leadership begins when we become more interested in understanding than winning.

Sometimes the greatest victory is not proving your case.

It is remaining connected to yourself while choosing not to make someone else wrong.