Weekend at Woodhull

This weekend I had the opportunity to attend Woodhull’s Young Women’s Ethical Leadership Retreat.  It couldn’t have come at a better time.  In my life I’m still adjusting to my transition from full time employee to full time student, a different apartment and roommate and all my own personal issues.  It came after I did something that wasn’t too ethical and was beating myself up over it and getting beat up over it by the person I did it to.  In short, I was kind of a mess.  I wasn’t exactly sure what to expect,  but Leah and my aunt had both told me it would change my life.  I was looking for a change and so I went open minded.

I had forgotten how empowering it can be to be in an all women environment.  I had forgotten how supportive we can be.  I had forgotten how amazing we can be.

I can’t give away everything we did.  But something that kept coming up is how we get in our own way.  How we constantly doubt ourselves.  How we can’t/won’t own our accomplishments.  How hard it is for us to ask for help. So one exercise was to create a superhero power to help you conquer what ever’s holding you back.  I had a few but the one that relates most to SASSY is this boot.  My superhero power was this boot that would come out and kick me in the butt to push me onto the next thing I have to go.  I get so scared of failing (or writing crappy posts) that I just don’t do anything.  Which in itself is a major #fail.  So what I’ve been doing when I’ve been procrastinating and talking myself out of doing what I need to do is imagining the boot coming out of (hrmm… hadn’t thought of exactly where it comes from, but someplace above – like inspector gadget) and kicking me square in the butt and then I start what I need to.  So far it’s been working.

SASSY ladies, I encourage you if you’re in a transitional period or just need some advice/encouragement/support about what’s next.  Go to Woodhull.  It’s more than some kumbiya session where you hug it out and paint pictures.  We also covered negotiation (a skill I desperately want to work on now), financial literacy, and public speaking (talk about shaking like a leaf).  It was also a lot of fun.  I’m sure that video of me killing “I Want You Back” will be hitting the internet very very soon.

Thank you Woodhull Insititue for Ethical Leadership.  Thank you Woodhull 72.

peace,
e.

Tagged as: good to know, woodhull

About the author

Eva

Eva Haldane, editor of Sassy Women Online and doctoral candidate at Columbia University. You can find her personal blog at evahaldane.com.