My soul hurts a little today.

I had a meeting with 8 women, and something happened.

Actually, nothing happened. No one started the meeting. We sat in silence and stared for a full minute before I was like … “so…”

(internal anxiety: wait was I supposed to start the meeting **blank stare**)

Every time someone had something they wanted to add to the conversation they would qualify their statements:

“I don’t know if this could add to the conversation, but <insert awesome and valid idea here>”

“I don’t know a lot about this topic, but I was thinking <insert new and interesting perspective here>”

“Maybe it could be better if we <insert correction here>”

And my least favorite…

“Don’t mind my stupid question, but I was just wondering <insert valid question>”

There are a lot of excellent articles on the subject. Check out this one from Forbes. (https://www.forbes.com/sites/bonniemarcus/2011/12/09/do-you-sabotage-yourself-by-using-weak-language/)

That article is from 2011, this is 2017.

We are awesome. It’s past time to own it.