Leadership Insights From A Kidney Stone

Let me tell you something I didn’t expect to say this year: a recent kidney stone taught me more about leadership than any offsite, book, or podcast ever has.

Yes, a kidney stone.

It hit me out of nowhere - no warning, no heads-up, just pain. Sharp, relentless, and impossible to ignore. And as I lay there, curled up in a ball of agony, I couldn’t help but think: this is leadership. Not the glossy kind with TED Talks and LinkedIn posts, but the raw, unfiltered kind - the kind that hurts.

Here are four insights that emerged from that painful episode, and how they apply to leading teams and organizations:

1. Disruptions Come Without Warning

Kidney stones don’t send calendar invites. They don’t ease in with a gentle nudge. They arrive unannounced and demand your full attention.

Leadership is no different. One moment, everything’s humming along. The next, a key hire quits, a product fails, or a competitor launches something that makes your roadmap look like a napkin sketch. The best leaders aren’t the ones who avoid disruption - they’re the ones who respond with clarity and urgency when it hits.

2. Small Things Can Cause Big Pain

A kidney stone is tiny. Minuscule. But it can bring down the strongest among us. In organizations, it’s often the small things - unresolved tension between team members, a misaligned KPI, a neglected customer complaint - that fester and explode.

Ignore the small stuff at your peril. Great leaders sweat the details not because they’re micromanagers, but because they know that small cracks become fault lines.

3. You Can’t Skip the Pain

Whether you pass the stone naturally or need surgery, there’s no shortcut. You have to go through it.

Leadership is the same. When a problem arises, you can’t delegate it into oblivion or bury it under a motivational quote. You have to face it, own it, and work through it. Painful conversations, tough decisions, restructuring - none of it is fun, but all of it is necessary.

4. Pain Makes Peace Sweeter

After the stone passed, I felt euphoric. Not because I was suddenly stronger, but because I had survived. The absence of pain became its own kind of joy.

In leadership, the aftermath of a crisis often brings clarity. Teams bond. Priorities sharpen. You appreciate the calm not because it’s easy, but because you’ve earned it. And that gratitude fuels resilience for the next storm.

Final Thought

I wouldn’t wish a kidney stone on anyone. But I wouldn’t trade the insights it gave me either. Leadership isn’t about avoiding pain - it’s about learning from it, growing through it, and leading others with the wisdom it leaves behind.

So the next time you’re in the middle of a painful leadership moment, remember: it might just be your kidney stone moment. And on the other side of it? Peace, perspective, and maybe even a little pride.