A Feminine Leader On Bootstraps, Shoestrings and Tightropes

Remember the old stories men of a half century ago told about the woman who repaired her car with panty hose, chewing gum, and a bobby pin? When we hear it today, we roll our eyes and say, “Yeah, right.” But when we hear another woman say she’s “bootstrapping it,” “on a shoestring,” or “walking a tightrope,” we say, “I hear you, girlfriend.”

Notice these different versions tell the same story of a woman a whole lot like us, who’s trying to get from where she is to where she needs to be without the resources she needs.

We haven’t come a long way, have we baby?

Today, women make up more than 50% of the work force, but we still earn about $10,000 less on average than a man doing the same job with all other factors being equal. And when it comes to following our dreams, we don’t notice the creativity it takes to create solutions available to us from where we stand right now. We don’t notice the inspiration it takes to weave a web of support for our business out of recycled threads of conversation, business bootstraps, social media shoestrings, and tried-but-not-true-for-us tightropes.

The old patriarchal way of working has us spending huge quantities of time putting things in writing and securing funding in advance of making our move. The sheer scope of what’s “required” is daunting, so we put our dreams on hold until we can “afford” them.

The new way of feminine leadership holds that we can no longer afford to put our dreams on hold. That it is possible to create what we need, monetarily and otherwise, to bring our dream into reality. Our ability to source what we need through our divine feminine gifts of intuition, nurturance, creativity and service are the main things we need – not external approval, a huge lump sum in the bank, or the “right” time.

Many of you know that when I created Professional Moneta, I walked the thready tightrope of the Ben Franklin School of Bodacious Bootstrapping. I’m a do-it-yourselfer at heart. But the fact is, sooner or later I had to ask for help integrating the new pieces of my business, and it was one of the best investments of my life. But even before that, there was something else I had to understand.

Before getting in touch with our “big why,” we first need to get acquainted with “so what if.” So what if… we need help figuring out technology, or marketing, or how to leverage our expertise. We can get it. So what if…instead of hoarding for “someday,” we break our vision into tiny little conscious bite sized pieces. There’s help for that. So what if…dreams come true one step at a time. There’s help for that, too.

That’s just how feminine leadership works – women helping other women co-create a better reality. We can choose to tie ourselves up in knots with all those old strings, or we can web a new web of our choosing.

Which way is yours? Are you ready to weave the web which will support you and your business growth? No matter where you are in that process, ask yourself if you  need help. Simply reach out with your “ask,” and I’ll help you find what you need.