Photo: Allef Vinicius Photography
We love featuring vital perspectives on the Luminary Blog from inspired and knowledgable women who are committed to cultivating vibrant health, leaning in for connection with themselves and others, and courageously sharing their own unique gifts in a world that needs their engagement and voice. This week we have an extra special treat for you! We are sharing a powerful piece of writing from Tara Mohr, an expert in women’s leadership, originally published on taramohr.com. Her work focuses on helping brilliant women share their voices and gifts with the world. We hope her words empower you, as much as they have us, to keep speaking up and doing your most authentic work in this world. With love, Cara & Amber
If the angels could have sat you down for a chat when you were on the way in to this life (among some other comments about love, fear, and your glory), they might have said this:
“Now, my dear, a little context: you are entering into a transitional time.
The past: A world led, designed and defined by men.
The future: A world led, designed and defined by women and men.
The present: The transition. Yes, we’ve put you on the transition team.
What’s so tricky to understand, dear one, is that as a woman of this transitional time, what is inside of you will be very different from what is outside of you. What you have to bring into the world will be very different from what you see before you as the status quo of the world. Yet what you have to bring forth is not crazy or wrong. In fact, it’s just what the world needs.
It’s as if the world is all purple and you — and your sisters — are going to bring in the yellow. Or as if it’s blue and you are going to bring in the red.
That means that whether you signed up for it or not, you will be a revolutionary. You will be a revolutionary whether you love that idea or whether you’d prefer to just do your thing quietly – to be a teacher, a nurse, a doctor, a businesswoman, an artist, a mom, a grandmother, a volunteer, an entrepreneur.
You will be a revolutionary because any woman who is being authentic in her work will bring forth ideas and ways of working that run counter to the status quo of her company, industry, community – a status quo defined by masculine values and masculine ways of working.
The angels might have added this:
“So if you ever start to doubt or hold back or silence yourself because the questions you have, the ideas in your mind, or the way you work are so different from the status quo, remember that difference is exactly what is meant to be. You are here to bring forth a different way.”
It’s the hard – and thrilling – work you get to do this time around. It’s the “women’s work” of our particular moment in history.
You don’t have do the whole work, but you are asked to do the slice of that work that has been given to you.
Now, before you exclaim that you just don’t know what that slice is, or panic because you don’t have time or bandwidth for anything extra, let’s remember: this isn’t work that takes additional time. This is work about how you live each moment of your life.
And this isn’t work you have to go find or discover. It’s the work that is right in front of you, in the ways you feel called to speak, to act, to reinvent, to heal – in the imperfect, messy situations you find yourself in right now. Your piece of the work is already whispering to you – if not talking to you loudly yet. It’s the ideas in your mind and heart right now.
You are only asked to not stop up those things in you that most want to be expressed.
If you let them flow forth, you will have done your revolutionary work, and you will have done it beautifully.
You don’t need to do it alone, though sometimes you might feel like you are alone. You walk on this path with a world of women who are surviving on the rocky ground of this world while also changing it to a richer, healthier soil. If you look for it, you will start to see all around you this shared path of the women in your midst, each working to bring forth a different way to some aspect of the world.
Know this: you are blessed in this work.
Every step of the path you walk in this work has been blessed and blessed and blessed again before you traverse it. The angels are giddy, for they love love, and they can see the world that you are enabling to come into being.
Love,
Tara
P.S. We’d love to hear from you in the comments below! What work are you feeling called to do right now in your life?
Tara Sophia Mohr is an expert of women’s leadership and women’s wellbeing. She helps women play bigger in sharing their voices and bringing forward their ideas in work and in life. Tara is the author of Playing Big: Practical Wisdom for Women Who Want to Speak Up, Create, and Lead, named a best book of the year by Apple’s iBooks and now in paperback. In the book, she shares her pioneering model for making the journey from playing small–being held back by fear and self-doubt–to playing big, taking bold action to pursue what you see as your callings. She is the creator of the Playing Big global leadership program for women, and the creator of the free guide, the 10 Rules for Brilliant Women Workbook – get your copy here. You can find more of her brilliant and inspiring work at www.taramohr.com.
