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As a servant, you are driven by your desire to do things that benefit those around you. You are deeply compassionate, humble, and incredibly generous in how much of yourself you give to lift others up. You prefer to put others before yourself, often dismissing your own needs in favor of giving rather than receiving.
As a leader, you value the growth and well-being of people and the communities to which you belong. You build strong teams with members who are satisfied both personally and professionally and who contribute high quality work that helps your company succeed. Your leadership style promotes an inclusive environment because you value the opinions of everyone on the team, encouraging them to share those opinions and to actively contribute to the team regularly. You thrive in creating a culture that encourages collaboration and engagement.
You are a hardworking and valuable member of any team. You posses humility that allows you to complete tasks that others may refuse; you are not afraid to take on less glamorous responsibilities if doing so will benefit another. You work tirelessly to lighten the workload of your peers and those close to you, and you love to see the relief on their faces when you shift some of their burden onto your own shoulders. You find purpose in your work when you can improve the lives of the least privileged in society and look for ways for them to benefit (or at least not be further deprived). Your kindness and generosity are greatly valued by those around you.
You feel it is your duty to meet the needs of others. Seeing that someone close to you is struggling tugs at your heartstrings like a puppet master, urging you to do anything you can to take some of their burden away. Enhancing the lives of others is your primary goal in every aspect of your life. You believe that when members of your team feel personally and professionally fulfilled, they work more efficiently with outcomes that are higher in quality, so employee satisfaction and collaboration are very important to you.
You fear not being good enough, not being loved, and acknowledging your own power. Fear is a healthy emotion that alerts us when it is time to get prepared. Fear alerts us to the fact that something needs assessing. When you live in the space of fear it can become paralyzing and confusing. The feelings of anxiety and overwhelm can present themselves as guarded and tense. The opportunity is to embrace the fear as your friend. Shift the shallow breath to a deep breath and ask yourself, “Is this fear justified?” If so, “What do you need to prepare for?” It is also an opportunity to shift your story. Are you telling the story of personal affirmation vs external validation, hardworking vs overextending, or self-love vs self-sacrifice?
So, before you read the shadow side, I invite you to see this as an opportunity for growth. Feedback is often not your friend as your inner critic can unfairly twist it into something that is not worthy of love. Your intentions are pure, yet they can create discord in your collaboration.
When the servant is not driving you to be your best, your constant desire to take on the problems of those around you can stem from your desire to ignore painful situations in your own life. It may seem much easier to dive headfirst into easing the emotional burden of a friend than to acknowledge something that is weighing heavily on your own heart. Ignoring the balance of your inner peace and wellbeing to instead exhaust yourself in service to others is not sustainable in the long run. You may overcommit in your responsibilities at work, spreading yourself thin to the point that you cannot possibly accomplish everything that you agreed to do. If you say yes to too many things, you may find the quality of your work slipping in an attempt in favor of quantity over quality, which can frustrate your peers who may misunderstand and begin to think that you are unreliable.
Because you are exceptionally empathetic, you are in tune with the needs of everyone around you at all times. This awareness of what others need is a gift that drives you to be a powerful force of good for people around you, but it can also be a heavy burden. You feel guilty when you think that you are not doing enough to help, and putting a constant focus on the needs of others can subconsciously make you believe that your wellbeing is not worth as much as the wellbeing of others; this is not fair to you. Furthermore, undervaluing your own unique talents and strengths can dim them, preventing you from bringing the full force of your gifts to the world.
If the servant is doing you a disservice, you may find that your gift of giving to others is an attempt to gain external validation from others if you are unable to know your worth for yourself. This can manifest in excessive worry about those around you, and constantly asking to help or involve yourself in a peer’s workload can start to feel overbearing for them or make them think you find them incompetent, which is certainly not your goal.
Life is not always easy for the servant. Your empathy weighs heavily on your heart and can be very overwhelming, leaving you emotionally and physically exhausted as you work hard to try and help as many people as you can. You feel as though you are not entitled to the space you inhabit, and that you have to give to others in order to be worthy. Relying on others to define your worth is a risky business, as something as small as a change in their mood can leave you on shaky ground when you do not have your own foundation of self-acceptance.
Servants make good nurses, social workers, personal assistants, clergy, and teachers.
