"I knew I was good. I just didn’t know I was good enough."I grew up a smart and sensitive kid who was creative and kind, and I learned to be good at everything I needed to do (ie. good at being a son, a brother, a friend, a student). What I did not know growing up was how I had unconsciously learned to work for the approval and acceptance of others.As a gay man in Singapore, being queer was and is difficult. While I worked through my own understanding and acceptance of how I was different from other people in the way I loved, I started unknowingly hiding aspects of myself that could potentially out me to others.I hid my heart. I hid my sensitivity. I hid my voice. I hid my ideas, my creativity, my ability to innovate and influence and lead. I hid the most precious parts of myself.And this carried on long into my corporate career. I remember clearly in each and every role how I would push myself to go beyond what others could and would do. I felt like I needed to prove myself; and if my performance had anything to say about who I am as a person and what I was worth, I would make sure I gave my 200%.I was a competent consultant and facilitator for leadership and organization development and worked with teams across the healthcare, public, and nonprofit sectors. I was invited to be a director on a few charity boards by age 28, and an influential voice for people-centric change. It seemed that I was on the pathway to greatness and making a big difference.What people saw on the outside was a determined executive and a high-potential leader. What they didn’t see was how on the inside I was scared and insecure and empty.Through a major reckoning in my life between 2018-2019, I found myself fired twice. Serendipitously, both with the same underlying message: we love your work contribution but you are not who we want in the team.It gave me the fuel and wreckage to stop: I knew that if I were to make it out, and if I were to survive and thrive from this, I had to face everything that I was running from for over 20 years. To face myself and know who I truly am on an intimate level, and to know deeply that I never needed to prove my worth to belong - my worthiness is innate, even if I am gay and queer and different.Now I am on a renewed journey of living, loving, and leading authentically, contributing to the world as myself: with nothing to prove and everything to experience and offer. And the vision and mission of authenticLEADERS glow brightly and guides me forward… for a new generation of LGBTIQ leaders in our world.