Power is not given to you you have to take it
[Music]
i grew up
with destiny’s child and spice girls
cards
and dancing to britney spears in the
afternoons
i had a wonderful childhood i had tons
of friends
i had a steady home and i was good at
both school
and sports but somehow
i felt misplaced i felt
like a misfit i had such big dreams and
goals for my future self
but i had no one to share it with
you have to be realistic my father said
every time i shared my grand visions and
thoughts with him
and in the media i was portrayed with
female role models
only such as tv stars and pop idols
and at schools i was presented with
various options for my future
lawyer doctor nurse
entrepreneurship wasn’t one of them
looking back i now realize i had no
place or no one to turn to to mirror
myself i still had hope though
i wanted to lead a happy life on my own
terms
experiencing lots of different things
meeting lots of different
people and being an inspiration
i just had no idea what kind of job
that could be i only saw pop idols doing
many different things
but that wasn’t on my to-do list for
career creation for years
i thought i only had two options
either i had to choose one of these
boxes that school presented to me
lawyer doctor etc or i had to be
discovered that someone was going to
come
and discover my amazing talent and just
give me knock on my door and give me the
opportunities
that i wanted but
both of these options seemed rather
impossible
and not only that there was a catch 22.
i was even scared of my own ambitions
and i was scared of my capabilities and
wants
why couldn’t i just want a regular job
like it seemed like everybody else
wanted and was there even room for me
in this world
i was also so scared of failing
myself that i even didn’t want to try to
find
a solution because what if i try to go
after what i wanted in life
and didn’t succeed what a huge
burden that would be to carry for the
rest
of my life no thanks
why couldn’t just someone come knocking
at my door and discover
my amazing talent well not gonna happen
but during studies some friends of mine
created their own
venture and they asked me to join and as
i was
in university which made me still feel
like
a misfit i decided to join at that time
i hadn’t heard
of the word startup it was back in 2012.
i dove in to the startup community and
met
like-minded people and i had lots of fun
at work i found hope
but still something was
missing where were the people who wanted
to take over the world
in the startup community there was some
rumors about san francisco or silicon
valley being
the place where the future were invented
perhaps that’s the place where i
could belong people called me brave
for quitting my job packing my bag and
just head over to san francisco without
knowing
anyone or any got anything there to do
but to me it felt like i didn’t have a
choice
either i could just end up feeling like
a misfit or
i could just at least try to see if this
were
maybe where i could belong
coming to san francisco i was quickly
amazed
i was met with people who chased and
invented
their dream jobs and not only that but
they
actually believed that they had what it
took
to change and make the world a better
place
and meeting them they also saw
my potential
san francisco was a game changer to me
because all my life i had believed that
someone was going to
come and give me opportunities
give me permission to do what i really
wanted to do
but these people weren’t sitting around
waiting for someone to
give them permission or give them the
opportunities
i realized that i had to give
myself permission i had to
try to believe in myself enough
and allow myself to feel worthy so i
could do the same coming back
i had to take action but
where to start and with what
i felt very overwhelmed but at least i
knew i had to do everything myself
what would make me happy what was i good
at
how can i have the biggest impact and
how could i earn
money on it i realized that
role models had been a very very
important factor in my life
so i wanted to create a platform
every women woman with a dream could
reflect
herself i heard something about
podcasting
that’s more than two years ago and i
thought i’d jump
on the wagon before it became too
popular and power ladies
was born two years later
i now realized that if you set out with
clear goals
and intention and will to achieve
and some patience and continuity
nothing can stop you when i started
power ladies
i had one goal which was to quit my day
job within a year
which i managed but the thing that gives
me the most joy with what i do
is the weekly messages i get from women
who started their own company
or started investing or
asked for a leader position
not i’d not only do this for the women
i still do it for myself
because i need to keep my confidence
level
hi i also learned along the way
that luck is just a myth
the people that are called lucky are the
people who actually
go out create opportunities and seize
opportunities
when they come that are being called
lucky
so luck is a matter of hard work meeting
opportunity and what do all these
hundred plus
successful women have in common that i
have interviewed in my podcast
they don’t sit around and wait
i was being realistic as a child
and there was room for me in this world
i just had to break the barriers that i
and the people around me had set as a
limit
in our brain and i had to make
myself space so my biggest lesson
in life is my message to you today
power is not given to you
you have to take it
you