The Hotel Lobby Conversation

The Hotel Lobby Conversation

I met a woman in a hotel lobby late one evening after a leadership event.

She had just finished delivering a keynote that earned a standing ovation. Her posture said confidence. Her voice was steady. Her smile was practiced. Her eyes told a different story. Exhaustion. The kind that doesn’t come from travel, but from holding a version of yourself together for too long.

We were waiting for our rides, making small talk, when she laughed and said something that stopped me.

“It’s funny,” she said. “I just spent an hour telling a room full of people to live authentically, and I don’t even know who I am offstage anymore.”

She wasn’t fishing for sympathy. She was telling the truth out loud for the first time.

She told me she had built her life on performance. Always showing up as the version people expected. A good leader. A good mom. A good brand. The reliable one. The composed one. The one who always had it together.

Somewhere along the way, she stopped being herself. Not dramatically. Quietly. Gradually. One expectation at a time.

I asked her a simple question.

“When no one’s clapping,” I said, “who are you?”

She didn’t answer right away. She stared down at the marble floor, as if it might offer something back. The noise of the lobby faded. For a long moment, she just stood there.

Then she said, “Honestly? I don’t know. I’ve been the character for so long, I forgot who the author was.”

Just then, her car pulled up.

She gathered her things, took a breath, and smiled. Not the polished smile from the stage. Something softer. Something real. Like someone who had just caught herself mid-mask.

“Maybe it’s time I find out,” she said, and walked out into the night.

Your Turn to Write

The world rewards performance.
Your soul only responds to truth.

Who are you when no one is watching?
When there’s no applause, no role to play, no expectation to meet?

If you stripped away every title, every label, every version of yourself that was built to be accepted, would you recognize the person standing there?

This is where the work begins.

Not with goals.
Not with habits.
But with authorship.

The 10-Year Letter isn’t about becoming someone new. It’s about remembering who you are, and consciously choosing who you are becoming.

If that question is following you right now, don’t ignore it.

That’s not discomfort.
That’s an invitation.

If you’re ready to step out of performance and start writing from truth, explore the 10-Year Letter process at 10YearLetter.com.

This is where authorship begins.