10.26.24 | Teaching Bravado

"I can’t want it more than the people above me."

My BFF casually mentioned this in a conversation and it struck a nerve with me. So much of my work as a strategist has been about empowering others to acknowledge and embody their potential, against their own self-sabotage. I’ve always felt like I’ve wanted their success more than them…more than my own.

"Maybe it’s a trauma response" is always how I talk myself out of emotional overwhelm because something in me felt a need to justify my worth through output. But therapy has healed so much and working with young adults made me see how much of a great mom I would have been.

In that experience, and in the same breathe, it also shows me how much further I still have to go with healing an inner wound of validation.

I don’t toot my own horn as much as I should and when I do, it’s with people who haven’t gone through the journey of embracing their own power. So it comes off as arrogance, bravado, and pretenciousness which leads to a one-way ticket to “unlikeable-landia.”

The more I work with people the more I realize how much I avoided conflict and mediocrity. I don’t like working with people who don’t have the desire or competency to contribute in a meaningful way. I think about clients I’ve worked with who didn’t want to do the work and see the similarities with co-workers who skirt accountability.

I’m leaning into a space where I am singularly focused on my own growth potential and success journey. Not as a petty response to conflict but as an acknowledgement that my magic needs to be audacious in it’s expression, devoid of ego and distractions.

I can take on the responsibilities of others or I can focus on shining my own light without permission or fucks to give.

I can center the shortcomings of others as my own or I can allow others the space they need to figure it out for themselves. I can go out of my way and spend hours building someone else’s brand and business or I can shift gears and advocate for my expertise.

We all choose who we want to be by the choices we make on a consistent basis and confronting the ways we shrink to allow others to expand is not altruistic. Self-sacrificing is selfish because it devalues the contributions we are beyond capable of contributing.

I can’t want others to thrive more than me.

Here’s to honoring a season of bravado.