For much of my life, I lived with inner conflict, between choosing for myself and then editing the choices based on others’ wants and needs. After years of coaching women, we see this is a pattern. So many of the choices we made weren’t entirely ours. They were shaped by expectations, survival, cultural codes, religion, and by the laws of the land. We are constantly given messages about what to wear, what work we do, how to be a woman. We absorbed them before we were old enough to question them. We also monitored them in others, by gossip, judgement, and internal bias.
You can probably hear the messaging in statements like, be a good girl, don’t be too loud, stop showing off, sit nicely, don’t be too ambitious, don’t wear that, don’t be too emotional, too selfish, smile more, be grateful…. It is how society works.
And the choice has always been yours. You chose to fit in, conform, to be included, because the alternative is rebellion, being a disappointment, being difficult, or exclusion.
It felt unsafe to choose differently, because choosing differently often comes with a cost.
Who hasn’t chosen careers because they felt sensible, or relationships because they felt expected? You have probably stayed silent because it felt safer than honesty and Self-sacrifice. After all, everyone else seemed to need us more.
Which is why one of the most powerful acts of leadership is forgiveness.
Forgive the younger woman who did what she needed to do.
Forgive yourself for following the rule book.
Forgive yourself for staying too long.
For saying yes when you wanted to say no.
For shrinking yourself.
For believing you had to earn your place.
For mistaking approval for love.
When you forgive yourself for making choices that were not truly your own, you release something we have been carrying. It might be regret, or shame, or anger towards others, society, or yourself. When you can release these negative feelings, suppressed for years, you get to choose with a new, cleaner, lighter, purposeful energy.
You get a choice, and a real choice, rooted in desire.
In coaching sessions, when we ask women “What do you want?”, the answers are usually more around what they don’t want. They sound like a list of complaints or dissatisfactions. We go deeper and ask, “What is the longing below the complaint?”
This is where the power of choice really comes alive, and is often the first time ever that women have ever been given permission to dream from a place of longing.
The biggest question comes, “What kind of woman do I want to become?”. It often comes accompanied by fear, because becoming that woman means making choices about the life you have created for yourself, and shifting the expectations others have about the woman you are.
When you begin to make positive choices about the woman you want to become, you choose every day how you dress, the words you use, the boundaries you put in place, the truth you speak. You may choose not to overgive, rescue, provide, or put others’ comfort ahead of your own.
You get to choose how to love, how to live, and how to lead.
Making choices for yourself can feel like rebellion. You may be criticised for changing. Others who once felt safe around you, now question what is happening. They may criticise you, rather than support your power to choose. Yet, the mental and emotional shift that is happening within you, the choice to be the woman you choose and long to be, is fuelled by courage and the discomfort of denying yourself anymore.
You begin to live and lead with purpose and living by your own values. It is the gift of midlife, and what we call the awakening of the Inner Leader.
She who matures through awareness, courage, and practice. She learns that confidence is from within, and rarely something we find by the judgements or validation of others. In fact, confidence rises each time we make the choice for ourselves, from the centred, all-knowing inner leader. It is a time of self-discovery, because let’s face it, a woman who knows herself leads differently. And you will find others who align with your powerful choices become attracted into your circle. You build trust, and that brings the right people into your life.
I wish this was an overnight transformation, or something that can be achieved after one coaching session. No, it takes time to uncondition the conditioning of your youth. The old adage, “Life begins at 40,” has some truth to it, but you won’t have it all figured out by 41. Your 40’s are a decade of learning who you are, what you long for, and the woman you want to be. Some of this discovery is done alone. A lot of it is done with others: a coach, a peer group, a community. You need it all.
At Wise Women Lead, we believe leadership begins long before the job title. It begins when you make choices for yourself with kindness, honesty, and courage.
Those choices may look small from the outside.
But they change everything.
We are here to support you in discovering who the leader within truly is and to help you make choices that support her in living fully.
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