Ep#111 | Being Stuck in the Gender Box

The Change Makers Podcast

I love deep conversations. Conversations that leave you thinking differently about your world and the situation one is in.

The other day, in a conversation with a girl-friend of mine we started to talk about the women leaders in this world. What got them there? What was different about having a woman leading a team, business, community or even a country.

Then my friend started to reflect on her own journey in life. She shared with me, that she had always dreamt about having her own company. She told me about her old dream business and I noticed as she was sharing her old dream how her face lit up. She looked like a little girl again, full of excitement and love for life.

Then she got real quiet and looked at me and said: "Rúna, have I ever shared with you what effect your talk about being in boxes had on me?" I was quite surprised to hear her mention this, as she normally didn't pay any attention to what I'm doing in my world (or so I thought) -

"No", I said "I don't have a clue what effect my passion for opening up and unpacking peoples boxes have had on you - please share"

"Rúna, I just recently realised that I never went ahead with my business idea was because I thought to be a successful business owner I would be seen as a bitch"

"WHAT!!!" I said: "Why?"

"Well, in order to be successful business owner, you've got to be ambitious, and I just realised that word was a big NO-NO word for me, I was deeply afraid that if I would pursue my passion I would be judged, seen and talk about like a bitch"

I looked at my friend and asked:

"What would you have done if you had known, you would not be judged?"

She smiled and nodded "I would have gone ahead with my dream"

What box have you been putting your dream in?

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In this podcast episode, I wanted to share with you, my thoughts around the gender box.

• What happens when you spot your gender box isn't serving you?

• Who would you be without your hardwired gender box?

I do this with my hope, that you'll start to think about your own box and how it's working for you. Which part of your gender box is good - which is bad and which is even ugly?

Some great takeaways from Runa:

• Step up and step out of your box. It’s all in your head anyway.

• Getting your joyful space in life

• Choose freedom for yourself, for others and for the planet.

• Be aware of the voice in your head, it’s just a voice - not you!

• Unpack your box and take a look at it. Is it really serving you?

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The Change Makers are doing a fundraiser for their #NoMoreBoxes Online Training and Collaboratory Center. A platform designed to teach you how to create safe space for deep-dive conversations that open up for the conscious and unconscious bias behaviours, placing ourselves and others into boxes, that places our focus on what separates us as human beings, not what unites us.

Your help is highly appreciated.

Just go to www.Patreon.com/NoMoreBoxes today!

Or grab a copy of their book; The Story of Boxes, The Good, The Bad and The Ugly.

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My best

Runa