When my client, Grace, came to me, she had one major goal:

 

Regain her confidence after experiencing years of microaggressions in the workplace.

 

After years of being constantly questioned, gaslit, and undermined, she was:

😡silent and anxious in meetings

😡holding back her great ideas for fear of judgment

😡struggling to create and sustain boundaries because she was worried about pushback

 

Grace wanted to show up more confidently, and like her true self in the workplace, but she had been in the shadows for so long, she was completely lost as to how to get back to herself.

 

I bet you’re in a similar situation right now.

 

How do I know?

 

Because pretty much every single one of my 1:1 clients comes to me in the same damned place.

 

Since we’re a community, and gatekeeping is for scarce, white coaches, I’ll share with you what I shared with her.

 

There’s two things you need to do to regain your confidence and show up like yourself in the workplace.

 

🔥 You need to figure out who you the hell you really are when you’re confident🔥

 

This one is huge, because typically when a client comes to me, they’ve been playing small, feeling insecure and in survival mode for so long that they can’t even remember who they truly are.

 

Here’s why that’s a problem:

 

It’s impossible to know if you’re making progress in your goal of showing up more as yourself in the workplace if you don’t even know what you’re aiming towards.

 

As a slightly type A leadership coach, it’s important to me that all of your goals are super tangible and that we are constantly checking in to ensure you’re on the path to achieving all of your goals.

 

That’s why before we work on your confidence, we have to know…

 

…when you’re feeling confident, safe, and self-assured, are you typically outspoken? Playful? Intuitive? A clear communicator? Clearheaded? Creative?

 

We HAVE to know what showing up as “you” really looks like so that we know how far off you are now – and if you’re moving towards or away the ways you want to show up.

 

Once we have a clear answer to the above 👆🏿👆🏿👆🏿 we then move onto step two:

 

🔥You have to PRACTICE showing up as the true, confident you🔥

 

This might seem counterintuitive, because we think of confidence as this natural frame of mind.

 

The truth is, however, is that confidence is simply a muscle that a white supremacist world has taught you it’s unsafe to exercise.

 

When you’ve let this muscle atrophy for so long, it’s not enough to do the internal work to feel more confident…

 

…you have to intentionally practice showing up a little more confidently, or a little more like you, each and every day.

 

This doesn’t look like taking big, anxiety inducing leaps.  It looks like practicing being 5% more outspoken that day.

 

It looks like being 5% more playful around folks who feel safe.

 

It looks like approaching your work 5% more confidently that day.

 

And once that 5% feels easy, you stretch it to the next 5%.

 

It can feel like a slow process, but this is why my 1:1 clients experience so much success when it comes to getting their confidence back.

 

It’s because we’re crystal clear about what being more confident looks like, and then we take small, sustainable steps forward that don’t make them feel anxious, backslide, or avoid the work.

 

I understand the truth of being a leader of color – you’ve experienced years (sometimes decades) of workplace trauma, and sometimes are truly in unsafe spaces.

 

We need to move slowly, and in a strategic way, to help your nervous system feel safer being confident, and to ensure that you don’t experience more workplace trauma at the hands of whiteness along the way.

 

If you’ve been searching for a coach who really understands what you’ve navigated as a leader of color, and how to help you overcome the workplace, systemic, and racialized trauma that impacts you in the workplace every day, then you should schedule a time to chat with me re: 1:1 coaching.

 

During 1:1 coaching, I’ll support you to feel more confident than you’ve felt in years – and even better yet, I’ll teach you how to feel more confident and feel safer on your own, so that when we’re done working together, you no longer need me.

 

Want to learn more? You can check out more information here.

 

I can’t wait to chat with you.

 

You deserve to finally feel like yourself in the workplace.

 

xx,

Gieselle