Your identity includes your beliefs about what kind of person you think you are – your qualities – and often such things as your role in life and even your political and religious beliefs.

When a belief is part of your identity, you’ll be offended when someone suggests otherwise. You can become a walking fortress, an insecure self surrounded by heavy armament in the form of your beliefs. Your potential for real leadership is smothered in this kind of identity.

Role is a key part of many people’s identity. I know that for myself years ago I identified myself as a lawyer. Looking back, it’s hilarious: “lawyer” is an archetype – a form – that a person can inhabit. But there is and was a lot more to me than “lawyer.” True it was my profession and at the time it signaled status and recognition, but what made it toxic was that I took it as my identity. I had given myself a two-dimensional identity.

What roles define your identity to you? Husband? Wife? Mother? Father? Manager? CA? CM? MD? CFO? CEO? COO? Son or Daughter? As identities, roles are inherently constricting, no matter how important they are, because they are always partial. There is always so much more to you than your role.

Qualities are the other main part of self-definition: being effective, efficient, thorough, thoughtful, expressing of feelings or suppressing them, having a sense of humour – or not, being shy or outgoing, being open-minded – or not, being generous, kind, compassionate – or not. I believed myself a “good lawyer.” Anyone that challenged my honesty, integrity or skills was in some way attacking me. That is often an Achilles heel.

Your identity is where you’ll look for offense from others. That’s you taking things personally. Things taken personally are defined by our history and our conditioning and give life to the past, not the present. Leaders must live in the present.

Bishop Tutu’s famous phrase, ‘I am because you are,” describes a sense of we-ness that permeates real leaders’ thoughts, feelings and personal identity. If in my eyes you are just as important as me, you belong and I belong. We belong. We are safe in each other’s company.

And if qualities are something you strive for rather than something you claim, you welcome the observations of others that show you how you are seen allowing you to course correct.

Leaders seek out comment and observation looking for the kernel of truth in it. They take it in and chalk up the rest to imperfect expression – something we all share. If leaders see that something concerning them has caused difficulties, they address those promptly in ways that are respectful of others.

One of the most powerful phrases in your leader tool box is “you were right. I was mistaken about that.” It completely transforms your relationship, turning problem into a garden of opportunity. A mistake, once acknowledged, lets you move on while taking something as a hit to your identity keeps a knife twisting in your insides.

We all know, at some level, how we are being received. It may not be conscious, but our physiology always gets it. If you speak your mind to someone and they clench internally, it registers with you. If they are important to your life or career you will often begin to trim your sails with them – to withhold certain observations and be timid in presenting others. Instead, you can model real leadership.

Receiving criticism with no internal clenching – without taking offense – puts you and your organization far above the rest. When you feel negativity toward someone else for what they say about you or how they characterize you, you are making it less safe for people to tell you how it really is from their perspective. Instead, notice the clenching and find something in the exchange to be grateful for. That’s you becoming a real leader.