My first job out of college was at a major investment bank in New York City. I worked at this place for several years. I spent three months in London and six months in Tokyo. I had over six different managers in that time. When I decided to move departments a few years into my job, I had decided that choosing the right manager was important to my happiness at work. What I realized a few months later was that my manager wasn't just important, he was crucial to the success of my career.

The manager I worked for in London was wonderful. He liked me and thought highly of me and encouraged me constantly. He had me work with intelligent people and I learned a lot working for him. He's the sole reason I was willing to live apart from Jake for six months to take a position in Tokyo. The manager I worked with before him in New York was totally the opposite and always yelled at me, never made positive remarks about my work and constantly complained. The situation got so bad that I was dreading going to work each and every day. I figured the manager in London (and then Tokyo) was as good as it got.

Until I moved to another department at the bank. When I moved back from Tokyo, I was ready to be done with the company but at my manager's request, decided to look around internally before I quit. I met with several departments, all of whom were only willing to hire me for menial jobs since I had decided to work three days a week. One department, however, seemed to have an interesting project and they really wanted me on board. The head of the department, let's call him Carl, met with me and asked me when I'd be willing to start. The original offer was to support and fix a specific piece of software that was honestly built wrong and broken all over the place. After a few weeks and many meetings, I was suddenly put in charge of rewriting the software altogether. I spent the following two years or so, managing a team of six in London, Tokyo and New York and working only three days a week. What's amazing about this isn't that I was a phenomenal worker. I hadn't really changed all that much from the previous year and my skills hadn't improved that drastically.

But my manager had. Carl believed in me and he told me so daily. Even though he was a Managing Director, he met with me several times a week and congratulated me regularly. He brought me along to meetings with partners and other important people. He asked my opinion in public and in private. He made sure I got all the credit for all my work. He gave me all the resources I asked for and was there to answer all my questions. He truly supported me in every way. More significantly, he believed in me. Everyone thought working three days a week would be a career suicide but he put me in charge of a project and he promoted me to Vice President.

Carl made me believe in myself. He made me feel like I was capable of doing all that he was asking me to do. And, amazingly, I became capable. I rose to his expectations. I became the person he saw me as.

A few years ago a friend told me to be careful about statements I made out loud. She said that if I constantly complain about being fat, people start thinking I am fat even if they didn't previously think so. I believe in the power of saying something to make it happen. Carl believed in me, he supported it and I rose to his expectations. If I say something out loud often enough, other people believe it and start treating me as such and then I become that thing. Obviously, this happens all the time in abuse cases. Someone tells you you're trash often enough, you start believing it. Soon you forget what your personal thoughts were and you just see yourself through other people's eyes. That can cause a lot of damage depending on the people around you.

It can also help you become a better person. It can help you have faith in yourself. It can help you become the person you have the potential to be. The person you already are.

It's all about whose eyes you get see yourself through.