When You’re Not Calm: Leading as a Library Manager in Unsettled Moments

We talk often about calm leadership. About steadiness. About modeling composure.

But what happens when you are not calm?

What happens when you are frustrated, discouraged, exhausted, or mentally stuck in a negative space?

This is not a theoretical question for me. It is lived experience.

There was a period in my leadership when I was not psychologically healthy. I was carrying frustration. I was replaying conversations in my head. I was attributing blame outward. I was convinced that the problem was everyone else — the culture, the structure, the system.

And in that headspace, I could not lead.

Not effectively. Not responsibly. Not in a way that created psychological safety for my staff.

It took time — and external perspective — to recognize that I was not creating the space my team needed. This post is about that realization and what I learned from it.

Leadership Requires Psychological Health

To be an effective library manager and leader, you must be psychologically grounded.

Your staff need:

• Stability

• Emotional predictability

• Mentorship

• Room to grow

• A leader who is not reactive

If you are dysregulated, constantly irritated, or operating from a place of resentment, your team feels it. Even if you think you are masking it.

Leadership is not about suppressing emotion. It is about regulating it.

When we are mentally stuck in negativity:

• We interpret feedback as attack.

• We personalize institutional challenges.

• We magnify slights.

• We default to defensiveness.

• We create tension instead of trust.

Psychological safety begins with the leader. If you are not a safe internal space for yourself, you cannot be a safe professional space for others.

The Echo Chamber of Internal Feedback

One of the most dangerous places a leader can stay too long is inside their own internal narrative.

When I was in a negative leadership space, I sought validation internally. I replayed events. I talked with trusted colleagues who agreed with me. I built a case.

And what I was really building was an echo chamber.

Internal-only processing often leads to:

• Reinforcing your own version of events

• Blaming others for systemic frustrations

• Avoiding difficult self-examination

• Deepening resentment

The more I stayed in that loop, the less effective I became.

I wasn’t mentoring. I wasn’t developing staff. I wasn’t strategically thinking. I was surviving.

And survival leadership is not sustainable leadership.

Your Staff Can Feel Your Headspace

Even if you don’t raise your voice.
Even if you don’t openly complain.
Even if you think you are “being professional.”

Staff read energy.

If you are cynical, they become cautious.
If you are defensive, they withhold.
If you are discouraged, they shrink.

Mentorship requires emotional spaciousness. It requires a leader who can sit with someone’s growth, mistakes, questions, and aspirations without projecting their own stress onto them.

If your internal space is crowded with anger or insecurity, there is no room left for your team.

That was a hard realization for me.

The Turning Point: Seeking an External Voice

What shifted things for me was not more internal analysis.

It was external perspective.

Association work.
Professional service.
Conversations outside my institution.
Writing.
Engaging with colleagues who were not inside my immediate environment.

I needed voices that were not part of my local dynamic.

External engagement gave me:

• Broader perspective on leadership challenges

• Exposure to different institutional cultures

• Affirmation without reinforcement of negativity

• A reminder that growth is possible

• Space to see myself more clearly

When you are inside a difficult institutional culture, everything can feel personal. External work reminds you that leadership challenges are often structural, not individual — and that you still have agency.

It pulls you out of the tunnel.

Vulnerability Is Not Weakness

Let me be clear: I was not my best leader during that period.

I was tired.
I was frustrated.
I was mentally looping.

Acknowledging that does not diminish my leadership. It strengthens it.

We do not talk enough about the mental health of library managers. Especially in small or under-resourced environments. Especially in cultures where overwork is normalized.

But if we do not tend to ourselves, we pass our dysregulation down the line.

That is not equitable leadership.
That is not inclusive leadership.
That is not psychologically safe leadership.

DEI work begins with emotional regulation. You cannot interrupt bias, foster inclusion, or cultivate growth if you are leading from a reactive place.

Signs You May Not Be in a Healthy Leadership Space

Ask yourself:

• Am I replaying conflicts repeatedly in my head?

• Do I assume negative intent quickly?

• Do I feel defensive before I feel curious?

• Am I mentoring less and managing more?

• Do I feel isolated?

• Have I stopped seeking outside perspective?

If the answer to several of these is yes, it may not be your team that needs adjustment first.

It may be you.

And that is not shameful.

It is human.

Practical Steps to Regain Leadership Grounding

Here is what helped me — and what I recommend to other library managers.

1. Seek External Professional Engagement

Join a committee.
Write.
Present.
Volunteer in an association.

External work widens your lens and interrupts institutional tunnel vision.

2. Separate Reflection from Rumination

Reflection asks:

• What can I control?

• What is my role in this dynamic?

Rumination asks:

• Why are they like this?

• Why is this happening to me?

One moves you forward. The other keeps you stuck.

3. Build Psychological Safety Internally

For yourself.

Consider:

• Therapy or coaching

• Structured reflection practices

• Leadership development programs

Healthy leaders are not self-contained. They are supported.

4. Recenter on Mentorship

Ask:

• Who on my team needs development right now?

• How can I create space for their growth?

Focusing outward in a constructive way can recalibrate your leadership energy.

5. Interrupt the Echo Chamber

When you notice yourself seeking only validation, pause.

Look for:

• Constructive challenge

• Diverse viewpoints

• Honest, not just affirming, colleagues

Growth requires friction — but healthy friction.

Leadership Is a Discipline, Not a Mood

We cannot always control how we feel.

But we are responsible for how we lead.

Being upset does not disqualify you from leadership.
Staying stuck in upset does.

There will be seasons when you are not calm.
There will be seasons when the institutional weight feels heavy.
There will be moments when you are not the healthiest space in your own head.

What matters is whether you recognize it — and choose to do the work.

Your staff deserve a leader who is regulated enough to mentor them.
You deserve to be that leader.

And sometimes, the first act of leadership is stepping outside your own echo chamber and choosing growth over grievance.

That choice changed my trajectory.

It might change yours too.