People love saying women are great at multitasking. As if we’re circus performers keeping a dozen balls in the air while smiling for applause. But I don’t think that’s what we’re doing.
We’re not just juggling.
We’re strategizing with a toddler on one hip. We’re giving feedback while remembering the milk is about to expire. We’re managing egos in boardrooms and bedtime stories at home. We’re leading—with empathy, without apology. And doing it all while resisting the pressure to smile too much or too little.
We don’t juggle. We build the whole damn tent.
Leadership, the kind I believe in, isn’t about barking orders or being the loudest voice in the room. It’s about showing up fully—even when you’re tired, even when the laundry isn’t folded, even when your marriage is fraying at the edges and the promotion came with more politics than power. It’s knowing that being a leader doesn’t mean having it all together—it means having the integrity to admit when you don’t.
Somewhere along the way, we were sold this clean-cut version of success: the perfect job, the glossy marriage, the spotless home, and six-pack abs tucked neatly under a sari or a pantsuit. But no one tells you that holding all that up at once can make your arms go numb.
So let’s say it out loud: real leadership isn’t tidy. It’s messy. It’s navigating your personal storms while steering others through theirs. It’s calling someone out with love, not shame. It’s mentoring without pretending to be perfect. And it’s knowing that mentorship only works when the other person is willing to ask—because guidance doesn’t just fall from the sky; it’s earned, invited, and built brick by brick.
If I could tell my younger self anything, it would be this: don’t wait for someone to pick you. Don’t wait for things to be fair. The door isn’t going to swing open by itself—you’re going to have to put your shoulder to it and push. And while you’re at it, make room for someone else behind you. Especially another woman.
Because here’s the raw truth of it: the system was designed to make us compete. Scarcity was built into the architecture. One seat at the table. One woman on the panel. One token voice in the room.
But I’ve seen what happens when we stop playing that game.
I’ve seen women pull each other up mid-fall. I’ve seen them fight—really fight—for one another, not just for themselves. I’ve seen the quiet power of two women choosing to work through years of resentment with compassion instead of throwing grenades. And I’ve seen how those choices ripple—how they shape what the next generation will expect, tolerate, or transform.
Let’s be clear: we can be demanding, assertive, and relentless, without being unkind. Those aren’t mutually exclusive traits. The happiest women I know have edges. But they also have softness, humor, forgiveness—and a war chest full of wisdom they don’t gatekeep.
I’m not interested in perfect women. I’m interested in whole ones.
The kind who admit when they’re wrong. The kind who delegate without guilt. The kind who know when to lead and when to step back. And above all, the kind who refuse to be pitted against each other—because they know that when one of us rises, she doesn’t block the sun. She becomes the light.
We don’t need to be better than men. We need to be fully ourselves—and support each other while we do it.
That’s how you hold many things at once:
not by being invincible, but by building something bigger than yourself.
A new structure. A real sisterhood. A legacy.
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