# Authentic Leadership and Emotional Impact: Diana's Success Formula and Insights

An episode of ["Mindset2Results" with Elena Apalkova](https://invisiblenetwork.ai/podcast/1739157956), 26 Jun 2026, 18 min.

Audio: https://dts.podtrac.com/redirect.mp3/media.podcastai.com/episodes/00uNPMqOHSy.mp3?u=1783310951

Elena Apalkova introduces the episode with an overview of a book that has influenced her thinking. She is joined by Diane Taylor, who shares her career journey and unveils her formula for success. The conversation delves into authentic leadership and the importance of developing a strong self-image. They explore how emotional and spiritual well-being can significantly impact personal and professional success. The episode concludes with a preview of the next episode, offering listeners a glimpse of what's to come. (0:00) Introduction, book overview, and Elena's insights (3:08) Diana's career and the success formula (7:27) Authentic leadership and self-image development (14:24) Emotional and spiritual impact on success (16:22) Preview of the next episode

## Transcript

[0:02] Hi, Diana.
[0:03] Congratulations on publishing your book.
[0:07] Tell us a little bit about it.
[0:08] What is the purpose of this book and, who it will help and with what?
[0:14] Absolutely.
[0:15] So, Elevate Potential, a conscious approach to success.
[0:21] I wrote this book after being in both the corporate world and my own business, helping
[0:28] leaders for the last 30 years.
[0:31] And what I've found is that when it comes time to promote people, people don't really
[0:38] understand what's holding them back.
[0:41] You know, there's a lot of external factors people point to.
[0:44] They think if they work really hard or extra hours or show how stressed out they are, or,
[0:53] you know, take those extra advanced, you know, degrees, that they will then, you know, get
[0:59] that promotion that they desire.
[1:02] But, really, success is about what lies within us.
[1:07] And, typically, when I'm at the table with decision makers around promotions, it's never
[1:13] about the person not having the qualifications.
[1:16] It's never about them not knowing how to do their job.
[1:19] It's there's never a question, are they working hard enough?
[1:22] There's something else missing, and it's there's it's it's a lack of ability to
[1:29] influence, or to create a great team environment.
[1:34] And what typically is holding us back is within us, our own, selves.
[1:40] So, you know, we we tend to point the finger to this, this, and this, but there's these 4
[1:45] fingers pointing back at ourselves.
[1:47] So in my book, I share my own story.
[1:50] And, then I walk through some, you know, ideas.
[1:56] And then the last third of the book is actually a process, a road map to help the reader walk
[2:03] through on their own, in their own, you know, with exercises to get to a place to really
[2:10] unveil what is truly holding them back so that they can break through and create the success
[2:17] that they truly desire.
[2:20] Wow.
[2:20] Amazing.
[2:21] You have such a big experience, 30 years, and this book should be so valuable to have all
[2:27] this your expertise and experience.
[2:30] And, I'm looking forward to read your book.
[2:34] Yeah.
[2:35] Yeah.
[2:35] Great.
[2:35] Thank you.
[2:36] It really I love, I love meet experts and, hear their stories and also read the books.
[2:45] So it is always wonderful experience to see who behind the book, and, we also launching circle
[2:53] of fame project to connect, experts together so they can know about each other, meet at panel
[3:00] discussion, also share their books, their knowledge.
[3:05] That will make me very excited.
[3:08] Yeah.
[3:08] That's wonderful.
[3:09] That's a wonderful purpose that you're doing.
[3:12] Yeah.
[3:12] You're most welcome.
[3:14] Tell us please a little bit about your experience.
[3:18] 30 years, it is long, long time.
[3:21] So how did you start, and, what did you what would be the biggest insight after this 30
[3:30] years, biggest insight, what really is behind the success?
[3:36] What drives the success, and what are those ingredients of the success formula?
[3:41] Yeah.
[3:42] So it's really about taking our power back and understanding that if we increase our
[3:50] consciousness, if we heal So human beings come into the world, we're born and we're perfect
[3:57] and everything is wonderful.
[3:59] And then life happens and life is hard.
[4:03] And we get wounds.
[4:05] We have trauma, whether it's little trauma, big trauma, and that impacts the way we then show
[4:12] up in the world and how we're triggered by certain things in our world and how we think
[4:19] about things, how we play small as a result of those things.
[4:23] So if we can go through a process of, first of all, understanding that and increasing our self
[4:29] awareness and increasing our consciousness, then success naturally flows.
[4:36] We don't have to go get it.
[4:39] We don't have to hustle.
[4:41] We create this space of, I am worthy.
[4:46] I'm here to serve, and success naturally flows in.
[4:51] So it's a process of creating balance within ourselves.
[4:55] It's a process of creating consciousness that will create the success rather than, you know,
[5:02] there's so much out there about hustle culture and you gotta go gat at it.
[5:06] And, like, I subscribed to that my entire corporate career.
[5:11] You know?
[5:12] I also burnt myself out incredibly doing that.
[5:17] So now I found a a better and easier way.
[5:22] Yeah.
[5:23] Amazing.
[5:23] Amazing.
[5:24] Yes.
[5:24] Insight that everything comes from awareness and raising consciousness and by becoming the
[5:30] person who you're meant to be.
[5:33] Yes.
[5:33] So it is not about chasing things which you are not.
[5:37] Because if you are not that person, it means that you will always will will chase and it
[5:44] will run out of you.
[5:45] But becoming the person, yes, and know who you really are, and it comes with study about
[5:50] yourself.
[5:51] Yes.
[5:51] And raising that awareness and consciousness, understanding that those results and how people
[5:58] see us is just reflection of what is going inside, how we see ourselves.
[6:03] Exactly.
[6:04] Exactly.
[6:05] Yeah.
[6:05] And I come from you know, I learned it the hard way.
[6:09] I, you know, suffered for a very long time with imposter syndrome and not feeling worthy and
[6:15] not feeling good, and had some big challenges to overcome to get where I am today.
[6:22] So I, you know, I come from a place of understanding and empathy and, you know,
[6:30] awareness of how difficult that can be.
[6:32] And unfortunately, we're not taught.
[6:35] And that's really what drove me to write a book is no one teaches us how to do that.
[6:40] You know, we're learning, you know, arithmetic and language arts and whatever else we're
[6:45] learning in school.
[6:46] We're not learning about ourselves.
[6:49] And often my students will say, your leadership program was the best I've ever taken because
[6:55] you put me as a topic of learning.
[7:00] Yes.
[7:00] Everything starts from within.
[7:02] And in order to become great leader, you should become a great follower.
[7:07] Yes.
[7:07] You have to learn yourself, understand who you are, where you are, where you want to be, and
[7:13] find role models.
[7:14] And so to have those role models when you can be great follower, then you can grow and become
[7:21] leader by example, yes, by doing certain things, by showing up in a certain way.
[7:27] Yeah.
[7:27] Yeah.
[7:28] But I also caution leaders with with the role model.
[7:33] What leaders tend to do is they find role models, and then they look at them and they're
[7:38] like, oh, I don't know if I can ever be that where take something from them, but rather than
[7:45] emulate someone else, take a little bit from that person and, oh, yes.
[7:50] I see myself in that person, and I see that.
[7:53] And then build your own authentic self.
[7:56] There's a lot of people out there that are emulating leaders, and they're not being
[8:02] authentic.
[8:03] And how that shows up is like a wolf in sheep's clothing.
[8:08] If we're being someone that's not truly our authentic self, it it doesn't come across well.
[8:14] Right?
[8:14] So I I work with a lot of what we would refer to as quiet leaders, and they have been told
[8:22] their entire life they have to be more charismatic.
[8:25] They have to be, more forceful.
[8:28] They have to be more regimented and strict where they're they're more their approach is
[8:34] authentically more kind or empathetic.
[8:38] You can still be an exceptional leader if you step fully into that and you learn how to step
[8:45] forward.
[8:47] So it's important to take our gifts and light those on fire rather than try to say, well, I
[8:54] need to be or I should be.
[8:56] That's not a healthy way to, you know, grow as a leader.
[9:01] Yes.
[9:01] Exactly.
[9:02] We shouldn't compare ourselves with anyone.
[9:05] Right.
[9:05] So our brain think we think in pictures.
[9:10] Yeah.
[9:10] So we have to have image of something or somebody.
[9:13] So we're not comparing ourselves with that person.
[9:17] We just pick up, as you said, we we pick up the features which we like in that person because
[9:22] what we like, it means that it is what resonates with us.
[9:26] Yes.
[9:27] And what we want to be aligned with our big goal.
[9:32] So so we see we, like, pick up the features which we would like to develop in ourselves and
[9:39] we stay like, we keep our personality and authenticity.
[9:44] And, we can create the new self image.
[9:48] Yes.
[9:48] Like, we can see, like, I'm the person who do this this these things this way or do that this
[9:54] way.
[9:55] Yes.
[9:55] And we are building the new identity, new personality, or new self image, which will
[10:01] start, controlling things because our self image, how we see ourselves controls the most
[10:08] of things, how we think, how we dress, how we meet in good people, what we do.
[10:13] Yes.
[10:13] There's so much control by self image, our habitual behavior.
[10:18] And when we have big goals and really want to be those effective leaders, yes, and lead
[10:25] people by examples that we every day, we we build our new self image.
[10:31] We build our identity, and, we choose what is, like, what we like in other people.
[10:38] This is what I mean.
[10:39] Role model what we like.
[10:40] Because it is not that one person will do everything as we like.
[10:46] Yes.
[10:46] We can pick up from 1 person.
[10:48] Like, I like how she's, for example, like, how she is in business.
[10:54] So another person, I can pick up how good mother she is.
[10:58] Yes.
[10:58] How she deals with children or with another person, maybe how she is so fit.
[11:05] And so we can get those different features and put in our self image and create our new script
[11:14] to the person how we want to show up.
[11:17] Right.
[11:18] But I would even go deeper and say that we are not able, as human beings, to look at someone
[11:24] else and identify something good about them unless it's in ourselves already.
[11:31] So by doing that and making awareness like, oh, Elena, she's so well spoken and professional
[11:38] and kind.
[11:40] I wouldn't be able to identify those things in you if they weren't somewhere in me.
[11:46] And a lot of people don't understand that by seeing you emulate that, you know, that is
[11:52] coming from within and it's just finding it within ourselves and lighting it up.
[11:59] It's not like I want to be that.
[12:01] I am that.
[12:02] And it's coming to a place of, oh, yes.
[12:05] That's something that I need to bring out from myself more.
[12:10] So the gifts are already there.
[12:12] If we can name them or see them in someone else, they're already within us.
[12:17] And it's just, like, they're they may be dormant or we're not claiming them fully.
[12:25] But when I see someone, you know, that I can name something positive about them that I
[12:31] appreciate or enjoy, it's already there and it's finding that within ourselves and and
[12:36] bringing it forward and really illuminating all of our own gifts and, treasures.
[12:44] Yes.
[12:45] Exactly.
[12:46] Everything is in us already.
[12:49] These all features we have, but they are buried under so many different viruses such as doubts,
[12:56] maybe somebody told us who we were, right, and when we were small, and we believed that
[13:02] without that person, not another person.
[13:05] Right?
[13:06] So, really, we have such a huge potential and perfection in us, and everything is with the
[13:12] everything comes from within.
[13:14] Yes.
[13:14] Like, even something that we want, what we desire, what we dream about, this is we have
[13:22] that because we have potential in us be we would never wanted something that we something
[13:28] that we couldn't achieve.
[13:30] Like, the fact that we're thinking about something and seeing that picture and, want to
[13:37] achieve big goals those big goals, they're all unique to us because we have that potential
[13:43] within us, and we have to study ourselves.
[13:46] And as you said, the ray raise to raise, level of our awareness about who we are and all
[13:54] starts from studying who you really are because everyone is not who we were told by other
[14:00] people, even by parents, by teachers.
[14:04] We have to go through self discovery and understand, like, the human potential as human
[14:11] being who we are and as well as individuals.
[14:16] Yeah?
[14:16] How everyone is so unique and has so unique talents and gifts, to bring to the surface.
[14:24] Yeah.
[14:24] Absolutely.
[14:25] And, you know, I think it's difficult for us because, you you know, in in a lot of our
[14:31] cultures nowadays, we're so focused on what is in the physical and what is in the mental.
[14:37] You know, one of the biggest compliments someone can give you is like, oh, you're a
[14:41] thought leader.
[14:43] Well, that's our mental realm.
[14:44] But I work in all four realms of the physical, mental, emotional, spiritual.
[14:49] And where we're really held back is when we get into that emotional spiritual where someone
[14:56] said something to us when we were small or, you know, even into our early 20s.
[15:03] And we took that on, and we held on to that, and it's somewhere stored in some part of us.
[15:11] We need to go through a process of going deeper and letting those things go so that we can then
[15:17] find these true gifts and emerge stronger and, back to that, you know, perfect being that we
[15:24] were created.
[15:25] We go through a process of being perfect and then being, you know, wounded, and then, you
[15:32] know, we come into this finding ourselves again and stepping into our true power and stop
[15:38] giving our power away, and then we create this greatness again.
[15:41] It's sort of like a cycle.
[15:44] Yes.
[15:44] Yes.
[15:44] Exactly.
[15:45] Exactly.
[15:46] This is the understanding that we have everything, all potential, all gifts, to live
[15:54] the best life which we can just dream about.
[15:56] Just have to study ourselves, bring this into the surface, find what really, drives us, find
[16:03] that big goals because those big goals will be like a fuel which give us that excitement and
[16:11] the power to move forward, step into unknown, to grow every day, and achieve results.
[16:18] Yeah.
[16:19] Absolutely.
[16:22] Thank you so much.
[16:23] So, we will meet next time for our main episode.
[16:28] So what you would like to speak about in our main episode?
[16:35] Like, we could talk about some some of the you know, we could talk about, you know, what my
[16:41] background is, you know, even my story.
[16:47] And then, you know, we could talk about in you know, I talk about in one of my chapters about
[16:54] letting go, when I have a story about, you know, that an analogy of of skydiving that is,
[17:02] about letting go.
[17:03] We could talk about that.
[17:09] We if you wanna talk about, like, the the business space or or the corporate world about,
[17:14] you know, what are the myths?
[17:16] What do people think they need to do to get promoted?
[17:19] And, you know, when what are decision makers really talking about when when it comes time to
[17:27] promoting people and why they're not really getting that and how to overcome that?
[17:30] We could talk about that.
[17:33] We could talk about the book or my leadership programs or, you know, speaking, any of those
[17:39] things.
[17:41] Yeah.
[17:41] Let's speak about letting go.
[17:43] I think this is, yeah, of course, definitely.
[17:46] I would like to know about you more and your story.
[17:49] And, yeah, let's speak also about letting go.
[17:53] It is so important, yeah, for everyone.
[17:56] Yeah.
[17:56] No.
[17:57] I have a significant portion of my book about letting go and let it like, how to let go in
[18:03] the physical, mentally, emotional, and spiritual realms.
[18:06] So yeah.
[18:07] Yeah.
[18:08] It would be great.
[18:09] So I'm looking forward to our next episode.
[18:13] Oh, great.
[18:14] Okay.
[18:14] So will we

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