Last week? Leadership is heavy.
This week? Here’s what you can do about it.

When work, life, and the world feel heavy, it can be surprisingly hard to keep showing up for yourself and for your team.

And… this is when they need you the most.

In just the last three days, I’ve had so many conversations about this. The heaviness is impossible to miss. People are carrying a lot. There’s work pressure, responsibility at home, and the weight of a world that feels broken and fragile in soooo many ways.

Some leaders are even asking, “Should I be doing more outside of work?” while simultaneously trying to keep their teams steady inside it.

I’m not going to tell you all the ways you can get involved in all the causes that need you. I do think you should lean in, but for now, I’m going to focus on the ways you can keep showing up at work.

I want to help you to stay focused in uncertainty, care for the people who depend on you, and still show up as a steady presence for others.

It’s just a lot.

Let’s talk about how to create a little space so you and your people can show up more clearly.

Just a few small, human practices that make the load more bearable.

So many of my conversations lately have started with some version of:

“It’s really hard to hold it all together right now!”

When you are overwhelmed, it doesn’t just affect you.
It shapes tone, patience, and safety for your team too.

If we don’t have space to breathe, name what’s hard, and pause before reacting, stress spreads quietly through our organizations (and families).

But when we slow down, things shift. People feel safe. Conversations flow. Trust deepens. And teams become more resilient, not just more productive.

Here are five simple practices for you and your managers to try:

1) Breathe
Before a meeting, take 4 seconds in through the nose and 6 seconds out through the mouth. Invite your team to do the same for 30–60 seconds. It sounds small, but it makes a HUGE difference.

2) Listen (to yourself first)
Ask: “What’s one word for how I’m coming into this meeting?”
You don’t even have to talk about it. Just naming it is powerful.

3) Thank
Spend two minutes writing down what you’re grateful for. In meetings, try:
“What’s one thing or person you’re grateful for today?”

4) Pause
Finish meetings a few minutes early when you can. Encourage walking 1:1s. Give yourself 6 seconds before responding to a trigger, then 90 seconds to breathe.

5) Model
Say out loud what’s actually hard for you (in a real, not performative way).
A helpful question: “What would ‘good enough’ look like today?”

If you want one simple starting place to share with managers, try this:

“Before we dive in—let’s all take three slow breaths together.”

Across many different organizations, leaders are saying things like:

People want permission to be humans.
Leaders want tools that help them lead without burning out.

Final thought: This is the kind of work we spend a lot of time on inside Campfire — helping leaders build small habits that make leadership feel more sustainable, not heavier.

So, I’m curious:
What are you doing to lower the temperature for you and your team(s)?

Warmly,

Sent from Campfire—a hub for developing leaders at scale.