Category Archives: Inspirational

Are ambitious women are less feminine?

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Ambitious womenI’ve been stewing about this for a week now.  I’m writing today in defense of ambition.  Specifically, in defense of ambitious women.  (Next week I might tackle defending perfectionism!)

Here’s why…

Last week, a close friend of mine spoke to me about his nephew, who is about to graduate from law school.  “I’m so proud of him.  He’s smart, he’s ambitious and he’s going to have a great career ahead of him.”  

The next day, a woman friend confided she felt troubled by hitting a speed bump in her career path.  “I think some of my co-workers – especially the women — didn’t like me because I am ambitious.  And because I’m not petite, they felt intimidated.”

Between her ambitions and her stature, she actually ended up feeling less feminine.  Her revelation was like a knife in my heart.  This woman is lovely, inside and out.  She’s competent, smart, and yes, she’s ambitious.  She’s also very feminine.

Her ambition makes her passionate about doing a good job, about doing what she was hired to do, and doing it to the best of her abilities.

Why do we admire ambition in men, but not in women?    

I’m curious…if someone described you to a friend and said, “She’s ambitious,” would you consider that a compliment?  Or would it make you feel less feminine?  Would you rather others describe you as pretty?

It’s time to rethink the stories we tell ourselves about ambitious women.  What is the source of our beliefs?  Is it time to challenge our own assumptions?

It’s time to realize that we will only be comfortable with the ambitions of other women when we get comfortable with our own ambitions. 

It’s time to be honest, too.  (This might hurt!)  Women have always been ambitious.  In years past, we just projected that ambition elsewhere.   We proudly chose ambitious spouses and felt pride in their career advancement and financial success.  We were ambitious about our children’s accomplishments.  We were ambitious about our material possessions — our homes, the clothes and jewelry we wear.

It’s time to embrace our own ambitions.

We don’t need to live out our ambitions through others.  You might have big career ambitions.  You might be ambitious about your creative gifts.  You might be ambitious about your community service.  Good for you!  We don’t all have to be alike.

As for me, I am nothing short of profoundly grateful for all the ambitious women who have changed the world, one small step at a time.  Ambitious women like:

  • Sara Blakely, founder of Spanx.  She began the company with $5,000 of her personal savings and launched a global company, providing thousands of jobs.  She’s now the world’s youngest self-made female billionaire.  Are we going to hold that against her? 
  • Frances Perkins, our first female cabinet secretary, serving as Secretary of Labor from 1933 to 1945.  Before she left her mark, our country had no child labor laws, no social security system, no unemployment insurance and few safety laws.  Without Frances (I feel like I should call her Ms Perkins) our country might still have labor conditions like we see in Bangladesh, where people are forced to work 12 to 14 hour shifts in unsafe buildings.
  • Candice Lightner, who founded MADD — Mothers Against Drunk Drivers — after her 13-year-old daughter was killed by a drunk driver.  Thanks to her ambition, estimates show that drunk driving has been cut in half. 
  • Serena Williams…enough said!

These ambitious women have each changed the world in their own unique way. 

I believe ambition is a strength, and any strength overused becomes a weakness.   Ambition becomes dark when the source of that ambition is purely ego or personal gain.  Ambition turns sour when we use or abuse other people for our own gain.

But ambition fueled by a desire to live out our full potential or born from a longing to serve the greater good is an admirable quality, for both men and women.

As we celebrate International Women’s Day on March 8th– a global holiday honoring women and the contributions of women around the world – let’s all celebrate the accomplishments of ambitious women! 

Celebrate by telling an ambitious woman you admire her!

No, I don’t believe being ambitious makes you less feminine.  I believe it can make you MORE feminine.

My hope for you is that you will proudly embrace your own ambitions, whatever they are, and use them for the greater good.

“A (wo)man’s worth is no greater than the worth of his (her) ambitions.”  ~  Marcus Aurelius

Take care,

Darcie Harris

 

P.S.  Do you need a jump start to help you get comfortable with your own ambitions and embrace your full potential?  If so … you might like my e-course The Alpha Mare: Embrace the Grace of Power.  Check it out!

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The Alpha Mare: Women and Power

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Women and powerAs women, we want others to see us as understanding, compassionate and fair, right?

Powerful?  Don’t go there.

Fearful of perceptions and stereotypes, even the strongest women sometimes perceive power as being negative.   Anxious we’ll be labeled as demanding or hard to please, we often feel hesitant to assume appropriate power.

I’ve seen women walking on eggshells with their staff, or nearly held hostage by employees, fearful of articulating responsibility and expecting accountability.  I’ve seen women make excuses for employees who do not live up to expectations, don’t produce enough or simply do mediocre work while the company suffers and the bar gets lowered for everyone on the team.

I’ve seen women taken advantage of by vendors, contractors, even clients who are tough negotiators.

We’re raised to be nice girls.  We don’t want to make waves.  The result?  Because power can be scary, we abdicate and give away our legitimate power in ways we can’t even see.  We struggle with setting limits, expressing expectations and taking care of own needs.

I think we develop this negative association of power from what we see in movies, literature, television or in the news.  Power is dramatized or heightened to get headlines and top ratings.  We only notice power when it’s overused, misused or abused.

When power is appropriately used, it’s often invisible.  

So we avoid our power, until we come face to face with the reality that we have given away our genuine power, settled for someone else’s version of what we should or shouldn’t do, or behave as though we have no choice.

When we abdicate our power, we create a vacuum of leadership, without recognizing that our team members and staff would respect a more assertive, confident position.

What’s the answer?  My best lessons about authentic, appropriate power didn’t come from business books or business training.  My best education about power came from … horses!

When I finally learned to ride, at the ripe age of forty, I learned that in every herd of horses, there is a dominant horse, the horse recognized to be in charge. This horse is always a mare.  She’s known as the Alpha Mare.

Her duty is to tend to the safety and well-being of the entire herd.  She signals the entire when to move, sleep, eat, drink or run for safety.  She disciplines unruly youngsters, teaching them respectful behavior.

The Alpha Mare has a great responsibility; the herd depends on her to make wise choices and enforce reasonable rules. The entire herd looks to her for leadership, structure and discipline.

Alpha Mares don’t squirm over their legitimate power and they don’t worry about what the other horses think of them.  They certainly don’t try to avoid or give away their power.

They embrace their power.  They lead. 

How can we be more like the wise Alpha Mares?

First, we can to shift our perception of power from negative to positive.  We can and let go of the fear of what others think of us, express our expectations and get comfortable setting limits and boundaries.  We can use our power to lead.

As business leaders, we have the power to facilitate teamwork, to inspire employees to discover their talents and pursue their dreams. We have the power to influence others, to lead others to achieve what they might not accomplish otherwise.  We have the power to create jobs and to improve our communities.

Power isn’t bad — abuse of power is.

It’s an honor to be like the Alpha Mare!  Embrace your power and use it for the greater good.

I did everything wrong first…

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LilGirlDrinkingWaterGravity is an excellent teacher.

I learned that the hard way as a three-year old.  Lying on the living room floor, watching Disney on a Sunday night, I decided to drink a glass of water.  Lying down.

I’d never even heard the word “gravity” but that abstract concept quickly became very real (and wet!).

Gravity strikes women entrepreneurs too.  In spite of all the warnings, we try to ride our bikes down the porch steps.  We fly a little too high on the swing. We carry too heavy a load and get worn out.

We can avoid some of these painful bumps, bruises and broken bones when we learn from others’ encounters with gravity.

So I thought you’d enjoy learning from a few of my own scrapes and pulled muscles (caused by my own wrong turns), and hopefully you won’t make the same mistakes!

  • Publishing — I just completed a new book for women entrepreneurs, and once it was finished, I decided to publish it as an e-book too (I hope you’ll read it!).  It wasn’t until I read two 50-page manuals that I realized the text formatting for e-books is completely, totally, one-hundred percent different than for the print version.  Translation: hours of extra work to strip out the formatting and do it correctly.

Lesson:  Look before leaping.  As women entrepreneurs, we’re action oriented, we get things done.  Sometimes we get excited about a project or a new endeavor and just launch in (typical entrepreneurial behavior!).  But you can save tons of time and money if you’ll think your projects and plans all the way through.  Gather the facts.  Read the instruction manual.  (I know, how boring!)

  • Branding — After a couple of years in business, I hired a fabulous branding firm that produced beautiful results.  It wasn’t until I printed business cards, letterhead and personalized note cards that I found out that my company name was ineligible for a federal trademark.  Hit the reset button.

Lesson:  Think global first.  You may think your business is now-and-forever local, but     you may surprise yourself.  Once you are locally successful, you’ll see a bigger horizon.        Think big from the beginning (and check the federal trademark register!).

  • Employees  — Like many small business owners, I didn’t have a big budget to work with when I hired for a new position.  I met a smart, energetic young woman who did a great job of selling herself.  Though she never worked in a position similar to the one I was hiring for, she had a degree in adult education, which lined up well with my business model.  I could see all kinds of possibilities.  She would start in the position I had open, learn the business and grow into more.  She had potential!  That’s not exactly how it worked out.  Six months later…well, let’s just say we parted ways.

Lesson:  Don’t hire based on “potential.”  Look for proven track record in potential employees, vendors or virtual outsourcing resources.  Whether you’re hiring a web developer, a social media consultant, a lawyer, a CPA, no matter what — hire people who can prove demonstrated success getting the results you are looking for.

  • Software decisions — I can only laugh here, because I’ve made so many bad software decisions.  The common denominator in all of them is that the process of researching software is so unpleasant for me that I rushed into a decision, just to get it over with. Then ended up with something that didn’t do what I needed.

Lesson:  Invest the time to develop a full understanding of your own needs.  That same lesson is true whether your decision is about software, a new employee, a vendor, or anything else!  As women entrepreneurs, time is in short supply.  It’s grueling to carve out time to make lists of what we need and do the necessary research.  But if we don’t we have one of those painful collisions with gravity.

  • Growth strategy — After two successful years with my peer advisory groups for women entrepreneurs and executives, my clients encouraged me to expand.  Based on the business skills needed, I thought franchising would be the best business model.  I developed a business plan and ran it past a couple of “experts” — then promptly ignored their wisdom.  I should have just stuck a fork in my eye.  It only took a few months to discover I had seriously underestimated the marketing costs.  It took another two years to admit that as a franchisor, I couldn’t make a move without an attorney or an auditor.

Lesson:  Ask for advice…then listen! — I fell in love with my own idea and dismissed all the cautions.  When you ask for objective input, it’s a good idea to listen!  Be objective and be willing to subject your ideas to scrutiny.

These “mistakes” barely scratch the surface of all the wrong turns I’ve taken.  But guess what?  I’m still here!

From strategy, to branding, to hiring, to technology, we women entrepreneurs make hundreds of decisions every week.  We’re entitled to a few misguided decisions, imperfect choices and, uh, shall we say…bonehead mistakes.

Gravity will catch up with us.  We’ll crash land from time to time.  I call it “getting a PhD in business.”

But here’s how I look at it:  if you aren’t making mistakes, you’re not trying hard enough!  Mistakes are a normal (unless you keep repeating them!).  What’s important is to learn from them.

Here’s what really matters:  don’t let your wayward decisions cause you to lose confidence.  Pick yourself up, dust yourself off, and start all over again.

Be intentional about doing a “post mortem” and analyze where the wheels came off the wagon.  Get input from others (NOT your best friend who would never say anything to hurt your feelings).  Get honest, objective opinions from business people you trust.

Learn something.  Then…declare a victory and move on!

Get Out of Your Own Way

 

P.S. My new book affirms the heart of women entrepreneurs, while teaching them new self-awareness and business skills. 

Because every woman entrepreneur deserves to achieve her version of success! 

Pick Up Your Drum & Dance

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The text message arrived early New Year’s day.  “N’attends pas que les événements arrivent comme tu le souhaites.  Décide de vouloir ce qui arrive…et tu seras heureux.” 

This was a New Year’s wish from a long-time client, a native of Switzerland, who enjoys sending messages in French as much as I love untangling them.  This one translates as, “Do not expect that events arrive as you want. Decide you want what happens … and you shall be happy.”   

In other words, choose happiness.

What makes the quote even more meaningful is that the original words were spoken by Epictetus, a Greek philosopher, who began life as a slave.  (He’s perhaps best known as the guy who said, “We have two ears and one mouth so that we can listen more than we speak.”)

I was touched by my client’s thoughtfulness and a bit surprised.  This particular client is perhaps the most driven, most determined I’ve ever worked with.  He (my only male client!) is a perfectionist, with very high expectations.   I actually like that about him (most of the time), because he epitomizes what I so often try to teach women.  Think big, and do not apologize for your ambitions.

Twenty-four hours later, I smiled with joy from start to finish as I watched the movie Sweet Dreams, set in Butare, a rural village in Rwanda.  The country has made tremendous economic progress since the tragic genocide of 1994.  Yet 85% of the people are subsistence farmers, so the struggle to survive and provide persists.

The movie tells the story of Rwanda’s first and only female drumming troupe, Ingoma Nshya.  Dancing and drumming are beautiful traditions of the Rwanda’s people, but drumming was for men only — till now!

The drumming troupe is open to women from both sides of the genocide — the orphans, widows, wives and children of both victims and perpetrators.

The only requirement?  They had to leave the categories of the past at the gate.

Kiki, the leader of the drumming troupe, tasted ice cream in another country.  No such sweetness was part of Rwandan life!  She decided to form a co-op and open Butare’s first ice cream shop.  They named the shop Inzozi Nziza (Sweet Dreams).

I wish you could see how these women work together, side by side, making all decisions together.  But more than anything I wish you could see the joy on their faces as they drum and dance.

These remarkable women have made a choice.  They chose forgiveness.  They chose happiness.

These two random events — the text message from a client and the movie the next day — had a powerful effect on me as they worked their way through my mind and my heart and wove themselves together.

Just last week I grumbled about having to pay the plumber $250 to fix leaky faucets.  The prior week I whined about losing tree limbs in the ice storm.  And yet I have a comfortable, warm home, plenty to eat, more clothes and shoes than I can wear in a year and the freedom to choose what I want to do and how I feel.

So the universe offered me a little gift of serendipity this year, saying one thing:  choose happiness.

Feel all your feelings, but don’t get stuck there.  It’s okay to feel disappointed, but move on.  It’s okay to feel discouraged, but try again.  It’s okay to feel angry, but let it go.  Choose happiness.

So as we enter this shiny new year, join me in remembering the former slave who used his experience to become a philosopher.  Join me in learning from the women of Rwanda who left the past behind and now blaze new trails together.  Join me in forgiving and feeling grateful.

Let’s choose happiness.  Pick up your drum and dance.

Take care,

Darcie

 

 

This Thanksgiving I’m thankful for women

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I love Thanksgiving! It puts me into a spirit of gratitude, which is “health food” for the soul. (And I love Thanksgiving dinners too!)

Thanksgiving gratitude for womenFor most women I know (let’s be honest here), it’s often a lot of work!  My guess is that you’re not focusing Thanksgiving week on what we might call “self-care.”  Thanksgiving launches a season of caring for others, sometimes to the point of exhaustion. 

So I just want to take a few minutes and personally thank you for taking care of all the people (and pets!) in your world. 

Thank you for bringing empathy, compassion and forgiveness into a world that’s hungry for genuine feelings. 

Thank you for all those times you listened to a friend when she was sad or frustrated.  Thank you for celebrating her promotion or pregnancy.

Thank you for the dress you loaned her for that black tie event.  For being honest when she asked, “Do these jeans make me look fat?”  For telling her she’s beautiful at the very moment she looks her worst. 

Thank you for showing up with food after a funeral, with gifts at wedding and baby showers.  Thank you for being there with warm hugs after her marriage failed, when her boss was unreasonable, when her child was diagnosed with a learning disability.    

Thank you for all those canned goods you donated to the food bank, for all the nonprofit fundraisers you attended (and hosted, and chaired!).  Thank you for serving on boards of directors and committees, for providing your leadership and wisdom. 

Thank you for all those delicious Thanksgiving dinners you cooked!   For all the Christmas presents you wrapped with care and all the Christmas trees you lovingly decorated.  For all the Easter eggs you hid and all the Halloween costumes you made or admired. 

Thank you for showing up at all those soccer and t-ball games, all the gymnastic or wrestling meets.  Thank you for staying up late, to make sure your teenager came home safe.  And here’s a huge thank you for footing those college tuition bills!

Thank you for teaching your employees teamwork and the power of a shared vision.  Thank you for encouraging them to aspire, to learn, to grow and embrace their full potential. 

Thank you for providing jobs for people, for paying your share of taxes and benefits, even when it hurts. 

Thank you for taking care of your customers, for making their needs important to you. 

And finally, thank you for being a fantastic role model for all the young women who are inspired by you (even if you didn’t realize they’re watching), and who will look back one day and tell a friend, “I learned so much from her!”

And (at the risk of sounding like your mother), please do find a few moments in the midst of this holiday season to take care of yourself. 

Thank you.  The world needs all the passion and power in you! 

Happy Thanksgiving!

Darcie Harris

P.S.  If you can find twenty minutes to yourself this holiday season, enjoy my little gift of gratitude for you – a free podcast called Create a Better Life for You and Yours – which is all about living intentionally and creating your Personal Vision. 

Share the love and send this to women you know who need to hear, “Thank you!” or post it to your favorite social media account.  

A roller coaster of emotions

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Inspired.  Frustrated.  Angry.  Joyful.  Helpless.  Excited.  Encouraged.  Anxious. 

smileThat’s a short list of the emotions I’ve experienced in the last few weeks.

Sound familiar?

Here’s a quick rundown — I felt:

 

  • Inspired — listening to Sister Rosemary Nyirumbe give a talk about St. Monica’s Girls Tailoring Center — her school for girls in war-torn Uganda.
  • Excited and energized — when she told me she would welcome me to travel there and volunteer (I have a call in to their organizer now!).    
  • Grateful — when eight men friends showed up to support the Oklahoma Women’s Coalition “One Voice” luncheon.  (I volunteer as a table host and this year I filled my table with…men!  Because the issues facing women aren’t “women’s issues.”  They are everyone’s issues!)
  • Encouraged — when I facilitated a strategic planning session for a long-time client and clearly saw the progress they made since our last session in May!
  • Angry — when an airline refused to reimburse me for additional travel costs that their customer service rep assured me would be reimbursed.
  • Helpless — when I discovered my YouTube account was hacked and the video for one of my e-courses had been replaced with some strange guy selling online marketing.
  • Frustrated — when an essential software program I use was behaving badly — for hours!.  Okay, throw in “helpless” for this one too!
  • Anxious — when I had to drop everything and respond to an immediate service request on top of an already packed day.

angry womanWhy should my “emotional diary” be important to you?  Because it’s really not about me, it’s about helping you discover something about yourself.  

Take a closer look at my list and you’ll see a pattern, a theme, emerge. 

The situations that generated positive emotions all involved being closely connected with people and doing something meaningful and helpful to others.

The situations that generated negative emotions all involved technology (or airline customer service – guessing I’m not the only one!). 

Woman on ComputerOur emotions are vital clues that deserve both our attention and our action. 

When we take the time to reflect on what makes us happy, joyful, excited or inspired versus anxious, frustrated, or even angry, we gain critical information about how to prioritize and organize or lives.

We’re not just wallowing in emotion for the sake of … well… wallowing.  We can use what we notice about our emotions to strategize. 

Of course we can’t avoid every unpleasant task or situation.  But we most definitely can notice – and what we notice helps us know ourselves deeply enough to intentionally construct a life that is more rewarding, more meaningful. 

When we are happier doing what we love, we are more productive.  Work doesn’t feel like work.

Don’t just take my word for it.  Two people smarter than me said something very similar. 

  •  Maya Angelou once said, “Success is liking yourself, liking what you do, and liking how you do it.”
  • Confucius said, “Do what you love and you’ll never work another day in your life.”

frustrated_womanOf course, no matter how fulfilling your life is, it’s just not possible to be happy one hundred percent of the time.  (That might even be boring.)  But we can use noticing and strategy to reduce the worst and increase the best. 

What did the emotional roller coaster of your life look like in the last month?  Take just a few minutes to recall the ups and downs, to write them down.  Then look for the patterns and themes. 

I used my information to outsource a few responsibilities that are unpleasant to me, so I can spend more of my time doing what I love – speaking, teaching, training and connecting. 

What does your information tell you?  And how can you use it to reorganize your tasks, your responsibilities, and your life?

I hope you’ll let me know! (in the comments section)

P.S.  If this subject resonated with you, I bet you’ll enjoy this free e-course, “Working Harder is a Trap.”  You’ll get specific questions and a really amazing template to help you rewrite your own job description!