105. Why Accomplished Women Hold Back in Powerful Rooms—and How to Speak Up
You know you have something valuable to say. So why do you hold back?
Have you ever walked into a room knowing you had something valuable to say, but held back because you worried people wouldn’t care or your idea wasn’t smart enough? You wanted to speak up, contribute, and be heard, but you were scared.
In this episode, I’m sharing why accomplished women often hold back in powerful rooms and why the real issue may not be confidence, but internal safety. When you’re afraid of being judged, dismissed, or misunderstood, it’s easy to override your emotions and shrink back instead of speaking up. But you don’t have to eliminate fear before you take action.
Tune in this week to learn how to recognize your emotional and personal truth, understand what you’re afraid might happen, and find one thought or feeling that can help you move forward. You’ll learn how to stay connected to yourself, your authority, and your voice so you can speak up even when the stakes are high.
learn more about command here
What You’ll Learn from this Episode:
Why accomplished women hold back in powerful rooms and how internal safety affects their ability to speak up.
How to identify your emotional and personal truth when fear makes you want to shrink back.
Why acknowledging fear is different from letting it decide how you act.
How to identify what you fear might happen and find a thought or feeling to help you move forward.
How to stay connected to yourself, your authority, and your voice when facing judgment or uncertainty.
How to take personal responsibility without suppressing your emotions or rushing into action.
Four questions to ask yourself when you notice you’re holding back.
Listen to the Full Episode:
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Episodes Related to Accomplished Women And How to Speak Up:
101. Assertive Authentic Communication: How to Say What You Mean Without Losing Connection
102. How to Be Heard: Why Brilliant Women Go Quiet in High-Stakes Rooms
104. Lost Your Confidence? How Accomplished Women Can Reclaim Their Power
Full Episode Transcript:
Have you ever walked into a room knowing you had something valuable to say and still held back? You told yourself, "They don't really care what I think," or, "It's not worth saying," or maybe, "I don't even care enough about this problem to share." But later, you replayed the moment. You thought about what you should have said. And the truth was, you did care. You did want to speak up. You were scared. That distinction matters because this is not simply a confidence problem. It is what happens when you lose connection to your own power because somewhere in that room, you do not feel safe. Safe to be wrong, safe to be disagreed with, safe to be judged, safe to be seen as direct, ambitious, emotional, difficult, or even too much.
And when you do not feel safe, your brain gets incredibly creative at creating reasons to hold back. In this episode, I'm going to show you how accomplished women reclaim their power by telling the truth about what they feel, what they want, and what they are afraid will happen. Then I'll show you how to create enough internal safety to move anyway, to decide to show up. Not by forcing confidence, not by pretending the fear is not there, but by learning how to stay connected with yourself, your authority, and your voice when the stakes are high.
Welcome to The Balanced Leader, hosted by Yann Dang, a Leadership and Life Coach with over 20 years of corporate experience. Drawing from her journey as a former global finance leader and second-generation immigrant, Yann understands the unique challenges women face in male-dominated workplaces.
Each episode offers insights on balancing masculine and feminine energies, mastering soft skills and building emotional intelligence. Join us to transform frustration into empowerment and unlock your authentic leadership potential.
Hey podcast listeners, welcome to today's episode. I'm going to really talk to you about why you hold back, the real reason you are holding back in powerful rooms. It is not a confidence problem with most of the women that I meet. It's more of an internal safety problem. And when I say internal safety, it means you do not feel safe. And when we do not feel safe, I'm going to share a little bit about attachment models and what it is, and this is the psychology behind what I coach people on because it is so important to understand ourselves and to understand when we feel safe in the world, how we are showing up, and how powerful we are.
And what happens to a lot of people is that we walk into a room with powerful people, people more powerful than us, and we start not feeling safe inside of ourselves. We start feeling a lot of fear and we start really outsourcing our own sense of safety to the people in the room. And we start looking at the people and we're wondering, are they going to be safe with me or am I going to have to be scared of them? And if you feel a lot of fear, what you're going to do is you're going to start detaching from the room. You're going to start seeing yourself very differently. You're going to start creating distance between you and people in the room, and your mind is going to start telling you that you need to shrink back and hold back because this room with very powerful people, it is not safe.
But I want you to know that this is something a lot of people go through. And this is an issue that I coach so many women on. And so I want you to know, in this episode, I'm going to walk you through how to identify where you don't feel safe, how you can tell yourself the emotional and personal truth that you are feeling, and how to find one thought or feeling that will help you bridge that gap between fear and action. Not so that you can force yourself to be fearless, but so that you can stop abandoning yourself when fear shows up. Because you don't need to become someone completely different to speak in powerful rooms, but you do need to learn how to stay with yourself inside of them.
All right. Let me dive into actually a coaching because I think this sometimes can feel a little abstract, right? What is this internal safety? How does this work, right? But if you think about it, when you come into a room where there are warm faces, where there are people that are like you, you're just automatically feel safe. You start sharing about yourself, and you start sharing about your ideas and you feel like they're going to be welcoming. So you show up as this confident person who has these great ideas and you're willing to share them, right?
So I was coaching a client around this exact same thing. She is accomplished. She's brilliant. She's smart. She is strategic, even though she would tell me, "I'm not strategic." I’m like, "You are." She's totally capable. And she has important, powerful things to say. But in certain rooms, especially where the stakes feel higher, she gets scared to speak up.
And what was interesting was not just the fear, it was what her brain did with that fear. So she would go into having these thoughts: "They don't care what I have to say. It's not very smart. It's not really strategic. I don't really care to share," right? But obviously, we're talking about this in our coaching session, so she cares because she cares enough to bring this to our coaching session.
So now I want you to notice what both of those thoughts do. If I tell myself, "They don't care what I have to say," then I don't have to risk speaking and possibly being dismissed or judged or rejected in any way. If I tell myself, "I don't care to share," then I don't have to admit that I actually want to do something, that I do want to contribute, that I do want to be heard, that I do want to have an impact on this group of people that I'm not really sure is accepting of me. And wanting something can feel vulnerable, especially when you don't know the outcome, right?
Sometimes we feel like we know the outcome because the room is warm and because we are around people that care about us. And so we're much more willing to tell the truth in that room because of that. And I'm not saying to not read the room and understand where you are, but I want you to be super disciplined at listening to what your brain has to offer you, especially when you're feeling lots of emotion, right? Because when we feel a lot of emotion, our brain will oftentimes, especially if it's fear, tell us to not speak up, to not tell the truth.
So the deeper truth was not that she didn't care and it wasn't that the people in the room didn't care because actually we don't know if the people in the room care or not because she didn't say it. The deeper truth that she was really confronted with is, "I want to share and I'm scared. I'm scared of being abandoned. I'm scared of being dismissed. I'm scared it won't land with people." This is a very different place to work from.
And this is where I want to talk about personal responsibility. Because personal responsibility is not just, "What am I going to do?" right? This is where a lot of high achieving women end up beating themselves up. We go, "I'm going to be super responsible," and you go straight to action. That's where high achievers go. I know, I do it too. "Fix it, do something, push through, take action." But personal responsibility starts earlier than that. It starts with truth. What is emotionally true? And what is personally true?
The emotional truth might be, "I'm scared. I'm intimidated. I don't feel safe. I'm worried they'll judge me." And the personal truth might be, "I want to be heard. I want to speak up. I want to contribute. I have something to say. I want to be seen. I want to influence. I want to lead."
You can hold both. You can hold, "I'm scared and I want this." That is powerful. That is emotional and personal truth at the same time. And oftentimes in this very masculine world, what we see is people taking action, massive action, massive responsibility, but what we don't see is where they're actually having this conversation with themselves about their emotional truth and their personal truth. Because if you can be truthful with yourself, that is super powerful.
Personal responsibility starts with understanding yourself. And this is where a lot of people bypass themselves. They don't understand themselves and they go straight to the goal and they go straight to suppressing their emotions because they don't want to feel not vulnerable, right? So a lot of people hear the word personal responsibility and they think, "Stop complaining, get over it, take ownership, do something." And yes, action matters. But action without emotional truth can become another form of abandoning yourself. "I'm going to action my way through it. I'm not going to feel my feelings. I don't like to feel my feelings, so let's just go."
Because if your internal dialogue is, "I shouldn't be scared. I need to get over this. I know better than this. Why am I still struggling with this?" You are not actually taking responsibility. You are rejecting your experience. You are rejecting your emotions. Personal responsibility is being able to say, "Of course I'm scared. This matters to me. This room matters to me. This person has authority. I care about how I'm perceived. I want to get this right." That is emotional validation.
And emotional validation does not mean emotional obedience. The distinction is important. "I'm scared" does not have to become, "So I won't speak." It can simply become, "This is what I feel." And when you can name what you feel, I've shared this before, right? If we can name it, we can tame it. There's a lot of research on this about how naming feelings can actually calm our whole nervous system down.
And then you can decide who you want to be with that feeling present. This is one of the most important things I teach. You can validate the feeling without giving the feeling authority over your life. You can say I'm scared and still speak. You can be disappointed and still lead. You can be angry and still choose. You can feel uncertain and still move. You do not have to make the feeling disappear before you take action.
This is why I think the language around this internal safety of what I'm talking about is so important. Internal safety is not about making the room safe. It is not about making sure nobody disagrees with you. It's not about making sure that everything is perfect because the reality is things just aren't, right? It is not about knowing exactly how people will react. I think sometimes people think, "Oh, I got to read the room and then I got to say this thing and then it'll land perfectly." It doesn't work that way. This is life. There is unknowns. There's uncertainty all the time.
Internal safety is your ability to stay with yourself when there is risk, uncertainty, judgment, disagreement, or discomfort. It sounds like this: "I can handle being disagreed with. I can survive being misunderstood. I can say something before I have every answer. I can stay grounded even if someone more senior challenges me. I can trust myself if this gets uncomfortable. I do not have to abandon my authority because someone else has more positional power."
This is very different from trying to manufacture confidence. Confidence says, "I know I can do this." Internal safety says, "Even if this gets messy, I can stay with myself." That's just so much more truthful because things are going to get messy. Listen, I coach a lot of women in high stress, high stake situations, and we never know the outcome, but we know and we get to decide together how she wants to show up. And sometimes this is more useful than any goal, right?
So here's the question I want you to ask: "Where don't I feel safe in this room? I don't feel safe disagreeing with my boss. I don't feel safe challenging someone more senior. I don't feel safe being seen as difficult. I don't feel safe saying something unless I'm 100, even a thousand percent sure. I don't feel safe being the only person in the room with a different opinion."
And then ask, right? Of course, take this one step at a time because this is really important to stay with yourself and not just overwhelm yourself with questions, right? Or reasons why you don't feel safe. Really pinpoint where you really don't feel safe. And then ask, "Why? What do I think will happen? What is the story underneath the fear?" Because usually our brain is going to this gloom and doom because we don't feel safe and we feel scared.
And instead, "If I disagree, they won't like me. If I'm wrong, they'll question my competence. If I'm direct, I'll be seen as aggressive. If I speak and nobody responds, I'll feel embarrassed." This is the real work. Because once you understand what your system is trying to protect you from, you can work with it instead of shaming it, instead of overriding it, instead of trying to move past it with all these actions, right? You can actually have a real conversation with yourself.
I've given this example before, but it's so important. When I give my child an ice cream cone, right? And I say, "Here you go," and they literally the ice cream falls off the cone and then they start crying. And then you're like, "No, no, no. I've got a new scoop. I've got a whole carton of ice cream. Let me give you a new scoop." They have to cry and mourn the ice cream on the floor, even if they're getting a new one, right? They know how to be with themselves. They know how to express their emotions. They don't override themselves like we adults have learned to do. And I'm not saying you have to throw yourself a pity party. I'm not saying you have to be super emotional and be a victim. I'm just saying you need to validate your emotions. We so often just override ourselves and then we create a story, "I don't know why I didn't speak up. I just don't feel confident."
I want you to go deeper than that. I want you to understand the real reason you hold back because when you can understand that and when you can understand what are the thoughts and feelings in your mind, this is where you can interrupt the pattern. But if you don't even go there and you just kind of give it a big, "People don't care anyway," or, "I'm just not confident enough," that's just a way to ignore yourself and to just say there's something wrong with you.
You have to get laser focused if you actually want to take personal responsibility and make changes. And when I say laser focus, that means emotional and personal truth. You have to actually ask yourself, "If I did feel safe, how would I move? If I felt like I belonged in this room, what would I do?" This is so important. "What is one thought that would help me move forward?" This is where your thought work will help by really understanding, "If I had my own back, how would I show up?"
So maybe the thought is, "I can be uncomfortable and still speak. My truth matters. I don't need everyone to agree with me. I can trust myself to handle what happens next." One sentence is enough, right? "I don't have to sound perfect to be valuable." This is super important. And then what is the feeling that can help you move forward? Is it curiosity? Is it groundedness? Is it willingness? Is it courage? Is it conviction?
Sometimes you do not need more confidence. You just need to feel a little bit more willing to put yourself out there, to expand, and to grow your identity and to be able to be heard in these powerful rooms by actually taking that step, taking that calculated risk. And the more you do it, the better your muscle is. This is about reps. This is what we do in command. We are building reps and muscle. But we can't do that if you're not emotionally truthful to yourself, if you're overriding yourself.
So here is the practice. These are the four questions. The next time you notice yourself holding back, ask yourself four questions: "What is emotionally true here? What am I feeling? Fear, hurt, anger, sadness? What is that? Uncertainty? And then what is personally true? I do want to speak up. I do want to be heard. I want to be seen. What is that truth to you? I want to matter. I want to make an impact. And then third, if I felt safe, how would I move forward? What would I say? What would I ask? What would I stop doing? And then lastly, what is one small thought or feeling that would help me bridge that gap? I can handle discomfort. I'm willing to try. I'm curious. I can trust myself."
This is not about forcing yourself. It's about creating enough internal safety that you stop abandoning your own voice. So with my client, we actually created a mantra, "Speak truth. Speak truth." Her mantra is to speak truth. And as she speaks more and more truth and as she gets more and more pushback and as she gets more and more affirmation for speaking truth, she's going to start learning how to trust herself and trust the room. This is the work.
The goal is not to become so confident that you never feel fear. That is not being human. It is a human thing to feel emotion. It is human to feel fear. The goal is to become the woman who can say to herself, "I know I'm scared. I know what I want. And I know how I want to move." This is personal responsibility. This is internal safety. This is self authority. This is self command. This is what I do in my groups with my people.
And I want to leave you with this. You do not need to stop feeling fear before you stop holding back. You need to stop abandoning yourself when fear shows up. And this becomes even more important when you are surrounded by people you perceive as more powerful than you, more senior, more experienced, more connected, more confident, more certain. Because if your internal safety disappears the moment someone else's power enters the room, you will start shrinking before you even realize it.
All right. That is today's episode. I want you going to school on yourself. I want you noticing yourself, and I want you to get to the heart of the real reason you hold back in powerful rooms. If you do this work, I promise you will get better and better and better at speaking up and at showing up and understanding yourself. It starts with your relationship with yourself.
All right. Let me know how this episode lands with you. I want to hear from you. Feel free to connect with me on LinkedIn. Feel free to leave a review for today. And please feel free to share this with someone that you know could really use this message.
All right, have a beautiful day and I will see you soon.
Thank you for being a part of The Balanced Leader community. We hope you found today's episode inspiring and actionable. For more resources and to connect with Yann, visit us at aspire-coaching.co. Until next time, keep leading with confidence and purpose.
And when you do not feel safe, your brain gets incredibly creative at creating reasons to hold back. In this episode, I'm going to show you how accomplished women reclaim their power by telling the truth about what they feel, what they want, and what they are afraid will happen. Then I'll show you how to create enough internal safety to move anyway, to decide to show up. Not by forcing confidence, not by pretending the fear is not there, but by learning how to stay connected with yourself, your authority, and your voice when the stakes are high.
Welcome to The Balanced Leader, hosted by Yann Dang, a Leadership and Life Coach with over 20 years of corporate experience. Drawing from her journey as a former global finance leader and second-generation immigrant, Yann understands the unique challenges women face in male-dominated workplaces.
Each episode offers insights on balancing masculine and feminine energies, mastering soft skills and building emotional intelligence. Join us to transform frustration into empowerment and unlock your authentic leadership potential.
Hey podcast listeners, welcome to today's episode. I'm going to really talk to you about why you hold back, the real reason you are holding back in powerful rooms. It is not a confidence problem with most of the women that I meet. It's more of an internal safety problem. And when I say internal safety, it means you do not feel safe. And when we do not feel safe, I'm going to share a little bit about attachment models and what it is, and this is the psychology behind what I coach people on because it is so important to understand ourselves and to understand when we feel safe in the world, how we are showing up, and how powerful we are.
And what happens to a lot of people is that we walk into a room with powerful people, people more powerful than us, and we start not feeling safe inside of ourselves. We start feeling a lot of fear and we start really outsourcing our own sense of safety to the people in the room. And we start looking at the people and we're wondering, are they going to be safe with me or am I going to have to be scared of them? And if you feel a lot of fear, what you're going to do is you're going to start detaching from the room. You're going to start seeing yourself very differently. You're going to start creating distance between you and people in the room, and your mind is going to start telling you that you need to shrink back and hold back because this room with very powerful people, it is not safe.
But I want you to know that this is something a lot of people go through. And this is an issue that I coach so many women on. And so I want you to know, in this episode, I'm going to walk you through how to identify where you don't feel safe, how you can tell yourself the emotional and personal truth that you are feeling, and how to find one thought or feeling that will help you bridge that gap between fear and action. Not so that you can force yourself to be fearless, but so that you can stop abandoning yourself when fear shows up. Because you don't need to become someone completely different to speak in powerful rooms, but you do need to learn how to stay with yourself inside of them.
All right. Let me dive into actually a coaching because I think this sometimes can feel a little abstract, right? What is this internal safety? How does this work, right? But if you think about it, when you come into a room where there are warm faces, where there are people that are like you, you're just automatically feel safe. You start sharing about yourself, and you start sharing about your ideas and you feel like they're going to be welcoming. So you show up as this confident person who has these great ideas and you're willing to share them, right?
So I was coaching a client around this exact same thing. She is accomplished. She's brilliant. She's smart. She is strategic, even though she would tell me, "I'm not strategic." I’m like, "You are." She's totally capable. And she has important, powerful things to say. But in certain rooms, especially where the stakes feel higher, she gets scared to speak up.
And what was interesting was not just the fear, it was what her brain did with that fear. So she would go into having these thoughts: "They don't care what I have to say. It's not very smart. It's not really strategic. I don't really care to share," right? But obviously, we're talking about this in our coaching session, so she cares because she cares enough to bring this to our coaching session.
So now I want you to notice what both of those thoughts do. If I tell myself, "They don't care what I have to say," then I don't have to risk speaking and possibly being dismissed or judged or rejected in any way. If I tell myself, "I don't care to share," then I don't have to admit that I actually want to do something, that I do want to contribute, that I do want to be heard, that I do want to have an impact on this group of people that I'm not really sure is accepting of me. And wanting something can feel vulnerable, especially when you don't know the outcome, right?
Sometimes we feel like we know the outcome because the room is warm and because we are around people that care about us. And so we're much more willing to tell the truth in that room because of that. And I'm not saying to not read the room and understand where you are, but I want you to be super disciplined at listening to what your brain has to offer you, especially when you're feeling lots of emotion, right? Because when we feel a lot of emotion, our brain will oftentimes, especially if it's fear, tell us to not speak up, to not tell the truth.
So the deeper truth was not that she didn't care and it wasn't that the people in the room didn't care because actually we don't know if the people in the room care or not because she didn't say it. The deeper truth that she was really confronted with is, "I want to share and I'm scared. I'm scared of being abandoned. I'm scared of being dismissed. I'm scared it won't land with people." This is a very different place to work from.
And this is where I want to talk about personal responsibility. Because personal responsibility is not just, "What am I going to do?" right? This is where a lot of high achieving women end up beating themselves up. We go, "I'm going to be super responsible," and you go straight to action. That's where high achievers go. I know, I do it too. "Fix it, do something, push through, take action." But personal responsibility starts earlier than that. It starts with truth. What is emotionally true? And what is personally true?
The emotional truth might be, "I'm scared. I'm intimidated. I don't feel safe. I'm worried they'll judge me." And the personal truth might be, "I want to be heard. I want to speak up. I want to contribute. I have something to say. I want to be seen. I want to influence. I want to lead."
You can hold both. You can hold, "I'm scared and I want this." That is powerful. That is emotional and personal truth at the same time. And oftentimes in this very masculine world, what we see is people taking action, massive action, massive responsibility, but what we don't see is where they're actually having this conversation with themselves about their emotional truth and their personal truth. Because if you can be truthful with yourself, that is super powerful.
Personal responsibility starts with understanding yourself. And this is where a lot of people bypass themselves. They don't understand themselves and they go straight to the goal and they go straight to suppressing their emotions because they don't want to feel not vulnerable, right? So a lot of people hear the word personal responsibility and they think, "Stop complaining, get over it, take ownership, do something." And yes, action matters. But action without emotional truth can become another form of abandoning yourself. "I'm going to action my way through it. I'm not going to feel my feelings. I don't like to feel my feelings, so let's just go."
Because if your internal dialogue is, "I shouldn't be scared. I need to get over this. I know better than this. Why am I still struggling with this?" You are not actually taking responsibility. You are rejecting your experience. You are rejecting your emotions. Personal responsibility is being able to say, "Of course I'm scared. This matters to me. This room matters to me. This person has authority. I care about how I'm perceived. I want to get this right." That is emotional validation.
And emotional validation does not mean emotional obedience. The distinction is important. "I'm scared" does not have to become, "So I won't speak." It can simply become, "This is what I feel." And when you can name what you feel, I've shared this before, right? If we can name it, we can tame it. There's a lot of research on this about how naming feelings can actually calm our whole nervous system down.
And then you can decide who you want to be with that feeling present. This is one of the most important things I teach. You can validate the feeling without giving the feeling authority over your life. You can say I'm scared and still speak. You can be disappointed and still lead. You can be angry and still choose. You can feel uncertain and still move. You do not have to make the feeling disappear before you take action.
This is why I think the language around this internal safety of what I'm talking about is so important. Internal safety is not about making the room safe. It is not about making sure nobody disagrees with you. It's not about making sure that everything is perfect because the reality is things just aren't, right? It is not about knowing exactly how people will react. I think sometimes people think, "Oh, I got to read the room and then I got to say this thing and then it'll land perfectly." It doesn't work that way. This is life. There is unknowns. There's uncertainty all the time.
Internal safety is your ability to stay with yourself when there is risk, uncertainty, judgment, disagreement, or discomfort. It sounds like this: "I can handle being disagreed with. I can survive being misunderstood. I can say something before I have every answer. I can stay grounded even if someone more senior challenges me. I can trust myself if this gets uncomfortable. I do not have to abandon my authority because someone else has more positional power."
This is very different from trying to manufacture confidence. Confidence says, "I know I can do this." Internal safety says, "Even if this gets messy, I can stay with myself." That's just so much more truthful because things are going to get messy. Listen, I coach a lot of women in high stress, high stake situations, and we never know the outcome, but we know and we get to decide together how she wants to show up. And sometimes this is more useful than any goal, right?
So here's the question I want you to ask: "Where don't I feel safe in this room? I don't feel safe disagreeing with my boss. I don't feel safe challenging someone more senior. I don't feel safe being seen as difficult. I don't feel safe saying something unless I'm 100, even a thousand percent sure. I don't feel safe being the only person in the room with a different opinion."
And then ask, right? Of course, take this one step at a time because this is really important to stay with yourself and not just overwhelm yourself with questions, right? Or reasons why you don't feel safe. Really pinpoint where you really don't feel safe. And then ask, "Why? What do I think will happen? What is the story underneath the fear?" Because usually our brain is going to this gloom and doom because we don't feel safe and we feel scared.
And instead, "If I disagree, they won't like me. If I'm wrong, they'll question my competence. If I'm direct, I'll be seen as aggressive. If I speak and nobody responds, I'll feel embarrassed." This is the real work. Because once you understand what your system is trying to protect you from, you can work with it instead of shaming it, instead of overriding it, instead of trying to move past it with all these actions, right? You can actually have a real conversation with yourself.
I've given this example before, but it's so important. When I give my child an ice cream cone, right? And I say, "Here you go," and they literally the ice cream falls off the cone and then they start crying. And then you're like, "No, no, no. I've got a new scoop. I've got a whole carton of ice cream. Let me give you a new scoop." They have to cry and mourn the ice cream on the floor, even if they're getting a new one, right? They know how to be with themselves. They know how to express their emotions. They don't override themselves like we adults have learned to do. And I'm not saying you have to throw yourself a pity party. I'm not saying you have to be super emotional and be a victim. I'm just saying you need to validate your emotions. We so often just override ourselves and then we create a story, "I don't know why I didn't speak up. I just don't feel confident."
I want you to go deeper than that. I want you to understand the real reason you hold back because when you can understand that and when you can understand what are the thoughts and feelings in your mind, this is where you can interrupt the pattern. But if you don't even go there and you just kind of give it a big, "People don't care anyway," or, "I'm just not confident enough," that's just a way to ignore yourself and to just say there's something wrong with you.
You have to get laser focused if you actually want to take personal responsibility and make changes. And when I say laser focus, that means emotional and personal truth. You have to actually ask yourself, "If I did feel safe, how would I move? If I felt like I belonged in this room, what would I do?" This is so important. "What is one thought that would help me move forward?" This is where your thought work will help by really understanding, "If I had my own back, how would I show up?"
So maybe the thought is, "I can be uncomfortable and still speak. My truth matters. I don't need everyone to agree with me. I can trust myself to handle what happens next." One sentence is enough, right? "I don't have to sound perfect to be valuable." This is super important. And then what is the feeling that can help you move forward? Is it curiosity? Is it groundedness? Is it willingness? Is it courage? Is it conviction?
Sometimes you do not need more confidence. You just need to feel a little bit more willing to put yourself out there, to expand, and to grow your identity and to be able to be heard in these powerful rooms by actually taking that step, taking that calculated risk. And the more you do it, the better your muscle is. This is about reps. This is what we do in command. We are building reps and muscle. But we can't do that if you're not emotionally truthful to yourself, if you're overriding yourself.
So here is the practice. These are the four questions. The next time you notice yourself holding back, ask yourself four questions: "What is emotionally true here? What am I feeling? Fear, hurt, anger, sadness? What is that? Uncertainty? And then what is personally true? I do want to speak up. I do want to be heard. I want to be seen. What is that truth to you? I want to matter. I want to make an impact. And then third, if I felt safe, how would I move forward? What would I say? What would I ask? What would I stop doing? And then lastly, what is one small thought or feeling that would help me bridge that gap? I can handle discomfort. I'm willing to try. I'm curious. I can trust myself."
This is not about forcing yourself. It's about creating enough internal safety that you stop abandoning your own voice. So with my client, we actually created a mantra, "Speak truth. Speak truth." Her mantra is to speak truth. And as she speaks more and more truth and as she gets more and more pushback and as she gets more and more affirmation for speaking truth, she's going to start learning how to trust herself and trust the room. This is the work.
The goal is not to become so confident that you never feel fear. That is not being human. It is a human thing to feel emotion. It is human to feel fear. The goal is to become the woman who can say to herself, "I know I'm scared. I know what I want. And I know how I want to move." This is personal responsibility. This is internal safety. This is self authority. This is self command. This is what I do in my groups with my people.
And I want to leave you with this. You do not need to stop feeling fear before you stop holding back. You need to stop abandoning yourself when fear shows up. And this becomes even more important when you are surrounded by people you perceive as more powerful than you, more senior, more experienced, more connected, more confident, more certain. Because if your internal safety disappears the moment someone else's power enters the room, you will start shrinking before you even realize it.
All right. That is today's episode. I want you going to school on yourself. I want you noticing yourself, and I want you to get to the heart of the real reason you hold back in powerful rooms. If you do this work, I promise you will get better and better and better at speaking up and at showing up and understanding yourself. It starts with your relationship with yourself.
All right. Let me know how this episode lands with you. I want to hear from you. Feel free to connect with me on LinkedIn. Feel free to leave a review for today. And please feel free to share this with someone that you know could really use this message.
All right, have a beautiful day and I will see you soon.
Thank you for being a part of The Balanced Leader community. We hope you found today's episode inspiring and actionable. For more resources and to connect with Yann, visit us at aspire-coaching.co. Until next time, keep leading with confidence and purpose.
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