I often say you cannot please everyone, that being authentic is what it is all about. A decision I had made, ever since I was a little girl.
Ever wonder why some people are referred to as a stubborn?
Well I was stubborn through and through, it seems I born like that. Over the years I had learned to mellow but one things was for sure, I always knew my own mind. If something was not to my liking, I would not hold back. If you were a fiend of mine and did something to upset me, I let you know straight away. This had it's pros and cons, like anything people often called me KALLEH SHAGH, (Stubborn or blunt), There are many references to this in my diaries from my school days where I often would ask my classmates to draw a picture and give me feedback or write me a piece. The book would circle around and I made sure every one of my 30 classmates got a chance to give me feedback. What became apparent, was their perception of me being kind with a major flaw and that is that I did not respect my elders.
Being brought up in Iran, we are asked to do this. Despite the behaviour. I on the other hand has a major issue with this. It was not the age of the person that made them worthy of me wanting to respect them. It was their action and manersims that stood out.
They were either worthy of this or I would go to extreme lengths to let them know, often going ENTJ, albeit not in words but by banging on my desk or being dismissive of them.
Which reminds me of a saying, like water off a ducks back.
I wrote about the incident that took place in my classroom when the teacher asked me to write something 100 times. That seemed to resonate with many, I also questioned education but not only that. I talked about what makes someone worthy of respect and even took it upon myself to define the word respect and many others terms like What is Value, Why do we study what we do and what is education and when does it start. I talked about when the foundation of bullies are made and I concluded it is somewhere we are asked to go in day in day out to learn to stand in a line.
I also talked about choices and how having more than 3 can create confusion. I shared many poems that I had written over lock down. A topic I was passionate about talking about was Entanglement. I wrote my CVs in 3 parts,
It was written in a poetic fashion and although one part was 8 minutes, the kind of feedback I was getting, highlighted that people appreciated my style of writing.
I soon learned that making use of hashtags draws in the crowd related to that topic. I even went hashtag mad to the point it was starting to get tricky to read what I had written., You guessed right I would hashtag my posts and not only that even the articles I was given access to by someone called Allen Martin who insisted I tag him in most of my posts. I recall one of his comments said, Zahra Wow. Make sure you tag me tomorrow, I don't want to miss what you write.
I soon became known. as what is called a Change agent and was invited by Gary Ross to join him and his wife Mel Ross in Leading 4D. Mel was kind and gentle. A passionate human being with a patient of a saint who often interviewed leaders in their own right.
I became a regular attendee in her Tuesday afternoon weekly sessions. Mel held my hand in some of the challenges I faced and in return, I took to promoting her and her endeavour. I then signed up to my very first course with her. Investing in myself?
I must admit although I attended those lessons, I was rather distracted when it came to performing the homework. To this day I have not completed all the tasks she set for me though my overall understanding was we are in the era of 4D digital transformation. How the 3D Forbes model had failed. There was talk of Elon Mask and many others.
Some that I had to google.
Mel was very well read and and an experienced Leader with many years under her belt. Having transitioned from the corporate world to now helping others in leading positions in Government operations, adapt to the new world and explaining the curve ahead,. What curve am I referring to? In answer to your question it is how we are incorporating Data in to our daily lives. How aware are we about how much data is being collected. The 4D was one of the first system thinking that I was introduced to.
Link to Mel's profile: https://www.linkedin.com/in/melross1
The 4D of Data, Digital, Disruption and Design. This period was to last until 2023 although with the introduction of Covid we were to expect to have already semi entered the 5D digital.
Not knowing my intangible driver back then which is a Server Exhorter which means I am often running years ahead of most, I decided to stick to what my intuition was telling me to do and that was to ignore any offers relating to money and stick with my gut feeling which was value exchange. Of course many arrived to tell me I had a money block.
Value Exchange was a currency not quite understood by others. Perhaps another reason people perceived I had gone mad.
The reality was that being a stay at home mum and having been kept away from most things intellectual, having so much to learn in such a short time, meant that I wanted to make use of every minute when my family was either sleeping or occupied with other tasks.
I was not longer the little caterpillar bending and shifting, later feeling overwhelmed curling in to a ball at the end of the night. You could say 10 years of being in my cocoon was enough, I could not help but wonder why us women are expected to take the brunt of everyone's problems and bend and adapt and fill in the gaps. Why was it that we were going all out, and allowing ourselves to feel overwhelmed or accepting that we must justify the gap in our CVs after that?
After all a skill is a skill and once you have gained experience in a field, that experience cannot be given back?
Just like the caterpillar that turns in to a butterfly!
As the by product of my activity and being vocal, many ended up entangled with me. They wanted to know if I was real.
Some found their way on to my WhatsApp and started asking me for my photos. .
What caused this? Where they bored or was there something I was doing?
I put a up a post about my smile. I even changed my photo to one of a photo I had taken of an unfinished self portrait of my graduation. That did not help either. I started getting DMs about how they had fallen in love with the Robe I was wearing. That Robe was hired?
You can see what happened as the result of posting that photo at .027 of this video
Was it the stories I posted or was it the fact I shared my taste in music. Could it be that I made it interactive? Or was it the fact I posted about culture (mainly Iran) and questioned narratives we tell ourselves as a society or could it be that people found me approachable?
What would drive someone to WhatsApp a married women and ask for her photos? One thing was sure, and people could not believe I was real. I even had the linkedin Police and secret Services check me out!
You see up to this point,
I had only been posting about my past and everyone wanted to see a more recent photo. Why?
What I did not know back then, was what men really want and it seemed I was deemed as the total package!
So I guess that freedom of expression did come with a price tag. One that resulted in me losing many hours responding to tags and having to deal with all those WhatsApp calls that arrived.
No amount of introducing others to each other seemed to be working, after all the majority of my followers were introverts and they only knew me.
I was receiving comments on my post. Zahra whatever you do, do not leave your husband! Why were they even saying something like that?
It is true that I made time for others and helped many married men even reconnect with her wives or try and understand what they had to go through. I gave them tips in how to approach their wives after a long day at the office. I suggested they sat in the car until they were over the office stress. I suggested they arrive home with a smile, greet her, take a few things off her shoulder, Help with the child! Allow her to have a few minutes to herself. Maybe even half a bath!
To this day, I am receiving messages from married men who are unhappy with their wives. Why" Because when a man loves you, your happiness is the only thing that matters to him!
Men are from Mars and women are from Venus, was the first book that helped me understand it from their perspective. This video takes this understanding it to a whole new level and even explains the cave thing.
Do we need more women in Leadership or is this about understanding your body and the masculine and feminine energy?
What I am I talking about? We have all seen the result of two men arguing. When this occurs it is often as one is trying to assert themselves. Perhaps it is when the Alfa male is looking to compete.
Unfortunately, the result of that type of interaction reduces both men's masculinity. Especially when they are both seen shouting.
Which reminded me of the saying bitch fight. Why am I talking like this?
According to John Gray the author of Men are from Mars and Women are from Venus, When men get stressed, they produce more Oestrogen. When this occurs, they show up with their feminine energy. We need a balance of both feminine and masculine energy. With more men in board rooms these days, this poses a concern, especially when they are not properly equipped or have had the training. I refer to them understanding their mind and body.
As we know women have 5 thought process and men have the one which helps men with focusing.
However there is a downside to all this and having women in positions where they are asked to use their masculine energy, can also have the negative effect when it comes to having a baby.
Perhaps why so many female executives opt to leave their workforce or face the the demise of their marriage.
Should we be encouraging women to embrace their feminine energy?
Should we expect women to be involved in earning their keep or should they take the back seat?
++++++
Why I think it is imperative this time round, to take it slow and get those workshops going so we do not experience a repeat of this second time round! There are lots of them and only one of me?
Being a women in business does come with it's challenges and men having the one thought process makes things more complicated than if I were dealing solely with women.
As a server Exhorer that I am, My how is fixed and having to pretend to be someone else is going to drain my energy levels, Another reason why I prefer to keep things to my blog and not be consistent. Having learned my lesson, this time round I am mindful of the pitfalls, Still, I believe Transformation cannot take place unless we include the male force after all those are the ones running the majority of the corporations.
Having watched the video "That's not real love" It does pose the question, do we really need more women in leadership roles or should women take the backseat?
Trademark
®Trade Mark No: UK00003778364 Mark: iandyoumatter (Figurative) Owner: iandyoumatter ltd Class(es): 35,38,41,45
Comments