Hey Reader,
I still choose Solopreneurship. Especially in light of recent events.
Because I can’t stand having one more “traditionalist” attempt to tell me how I should shape my career, minimize myself to make others feel comfortable, or sacrifice my career for family or family for career.
I have been procrastinating on this newsletter for two weeks. At first, I felt I had nothing of direct value to give you regarding how to build and monetize yourself and your business online. But I’ve been in this game too long; I knew I had to call *bullshit* on myself. There’s ALWAYS something to say and something to share.
So, after forcing myself to take pen to paper and write a stream of consciousness in my notebook, I realized I had the opposite problem. I have too much to say. And what I have to say is highly opinionated, and I could polarize a portion of my audience.
But that right there is a diabolical lie that has been ingrained in me, and so many women like me, from the moment we popped out of the womb:
I should withhold my thoughts and opinions to protect my likability and appease the masses.
It’s a default setting that I can’t shake, even though I am entirely unbothered if people don’t like me. After all, there are plenty of people I don’t appreciate, so why would I be so self-centered to assume everyone I come in contact with will love and adore me? It’s unrealistic, and there are better places to focus my energy.
Like sharing my personal experience when a privileged, multi-millionaire tells women their primary vocation is being a homemaker. Yup. I’m lookin’ right at you, Harrison Butker.
Now, I’m not here to spark a debate about every little point he said and how one should interpret it. You can see this Instagram post to read exactly how I feel about having another man in a position of power attempt to belittle and nullify the significant contributions of an entire gender unless it’s within the confines of breeding and homemaking.
These beliefs, both conscious and subconscious, are precisely what drove me to solopreneurship in the first place.
The diabolical lie is that women can’t contribute as equally as men in the workplace.
Here are five different scenarios I faced as a working mother and female in corporate America:
- I wasn’t given a promotion at an agency because I “was about to go on maternity leave, so what’s the point?”
- I was called into a Director’s office, completely unprovoked, to be told to be mindful of how I spoke about the company and always to present it positively because I was “an extremely influential person” in the office. When asked if I did anything to offend or misstep, I was told no and that it was just a “personal observation.”
Translation: “We’re underpaying and overworking these fresh-out-of-college kids. Don’t do anything to ruin that for us.”
- I shared feedback and ideas with another vendor of a mutual client a copious number of times only to have them discredit me in the boardroom and present those thoughts and ideas as their own to the entire client organization. The next time they approached me to ideate, I presented them with a proposal for a consultation fee. They ghosted me.
- Now, let’s talk about the company veteran. Everyone’s got one. The one everyone knows has a record of inappropriate conduct, but he’s been there for twenty-plus years, so he’s basically invincible. He openly insinuated that I was sleeping with my superior because, after all, I couldn’t possibly have the brains to back up my position of authority.
- The fifth came on the heels of number four when it was suggested that I dress more conservatively and do my best to avoid attracting attention. Did I mention I was working in the beauty industry at the time? For a company that stresses the importance of “looking the part” and coming “hair and makeup ready every day?”
I guess that means
“look the part as long as you don’t look too good because you might distract the manly men from doing the manly things like selling beauty products to WOMEN.”
There are so many additional points of unnecessary power struggle, fragile egos, and subconsciously fueled gender politics that I realize choosing to grind day in and day out to take control of my career narrative became of utmost importance. Channeling the time and energy it took to attempt to battle those archaic operations doesn’t serve me.
It’s negating these unnecessary time and energy vampires that open up solopreneurs to double and triple their incomes.
This is why I take issue with Harrison Butker’s speech. Especially when it comes to female equality in the workplace, he may have thought he was highlighting and respecting the importance of motherhood and homemaking (which should always be done).
But the majority of the world heard, “A woman’s place is in the kitchen and nowhere else.”
Whether he intended to or not, Harrison Butker publicly reinforced these behaviors, mentalities, and actions, undoing years of battles and challenges (much larger and more complex than mine) women have endured in an attempt to give them an identity outside of the home.
But if this results in more women stepping away from the toxicity, betting on themselves, and building their careers on their terms – societal expectations be damned – then let me extend a preliminary thank you to Harrison Butker. Empowering women to choose what's best for them and watching them create and succeed on their own terms will be the greatest result of continued attempts at oppression from diabolically dangerous messages like his.
