Become your most confident and empowered self

I am a 35-year-old, neurodivergent mother of two who took a very long and roundabout way of figuring out her life’s purpose. Many years ago, when I was just starting college, I had only two real goals in my mind: I wanted to live far away in an exotic place, and I wanted to help people. I did end up living many different places throughout my 20s and early 30s, but I was left wondering how I could fulfill the goal of helping others when I didn’t really even feel like I could help myself. 

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In 2019, I found myself in an abusive marriage of 7 years, filled with stress and anxiety and trying to figure out how to raise a child recently diagnosed with autism while living in a foreign country. This is precisely the type of pickle I’ve found myself in over and over throughout my life. That same year, my beautiful daughter was born, and this sparked in me a need to really deal with my hang-ups, knowing I would now have a little girl looking up to me. I started rethinking everything from the way I was being treated in my marriage to the way I talked about my body or my ‘frizzy’ hair. Turns out my daughter did inherit my loose curls—and they are beautiful on her, so they must be beautiful on me, too. 

 

Women as a whole seem to deal with insecurity—not more than men, necessarily, but in a particular way. We are often told we are ‘too much’—too emotional, too big, too loud, too boisterous, too talkative—and the list goes on. We are socialized to please others, to always be pleasant, and to be submissive. We are told to ‘tone it down’.I grew up with Cinderella and other Disney princesses—and the message is usually the same: you must wait patiently, enduring hardship while remaining chaste, pure-hearted and submissive—and one day, when the powers that be decide you are deserving, a prince will come and sweep you off your feet. But my favorite Disney ‘princess’ has always been Mulan—because she actually took control of her situation, going out and becoming a literal warrior. We are able to take control of our lives, actively pursuing the things that we want without asking for permission, and don’t have to wait for a mythical hero to come and save us. 

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I want to help you to find the courage to go hop on that steed yourself, take the reins and run with fervor toward your goals. Though I don’t know you (yet)—I can tell you a few things: you are strong. You are fabulous. You are beautiful. You are fire. And you are titanium.