Who is Brian McNamara, The Founder of the Grey Scale Mindset:

I used to feel lost, lost in a battle within me that I could not articulate. It was a turning point in a pivotal time in marriage counseling. My therapist’s words were peeling back layers, laying bare truths I had been avoiding for years. It was a top-five moment in my life—an awakening that led me toward deeper self-awareness and change.

It has not been a straightforward journey. I struggled with things that I didn’t seem to be able to overcome. I poured my energies into meeting outside expectations at the expense of inner peace. Then, personal and leadership difficulties prompted me to pull away and reconsider my place in the professional hierarchy and my relationship with myself. Performance was my idol, so everything felt like a competition. I expected perfection, used failure to define me, and hid from it.

But these trials were vital. They showed me how freeing it is to accept that not all will be perfect and that failing is often the best teacher. They taught me that rigid borders were infinitely foolish and that you must carve a natural, deep-rooted sense of self.

As the pandemic set in, a rare opportunity presented itself—the space to really look inward. I started to get to know and love who I am without the added expectations from others. I listened to my fears and acted despite them, understanding that it was not the end, but the beginning of wisdom, which is the greatest form of power.

I learned to be gracious and forgiving with myself and to experience the process of growing — at times messy and slow — as something I would grow to love over time. My relationship with that failure changed — it became a friend instead of an enemy. This change cast ripples in every direction of my life. One dramatic change was when I realized I had made peace with my ex-wife, not by pointing fingers but by recognizing and owning my feelings. A change in perceived reality transformed my process of seeing relationships and obstacles and even got to what winning has come to mean.

Now, I am all about helping others. Be it to navigate their journeys with the same resilience and authenticity that I’ve developed. Or getting joy from random moments of kindness where I believe strongly in paying it forward, helping others embrace vulnerability, and seeing the strength of vulnerability. I’m dedicated to leading people and groups towards their own breakthroughs and cultivating growing people, innovating ideas, and self-compassion in the process.

Through Grey Scale Mindset, my goal is to lift others up by sharing the tools and insights that have changed my life. I want to facilitate environments that allow people to feel seen, safe, and empowered to explore the colors, textures, and layers of possibilities beyond absolute truths, where people make that rite of passage between orientation and exploration, where people can live in the grey and thrive in a world where we are not perceived as entirely defined by black and white frameworks.