Are you a professional woman, barely coping with a mental, emotional or medical crisis? Have you been showing up each and everyday for everyone else except yourself? Are you tempted to simply walk away from everything and everyone because it seems to be the only option left to save yourself?
What if I told you the key to unlimited love, hope and energy is resolving the internal conflict you have been avoiding?
I will never forget the most insulting “compliment” I ever received. My baby brother had just passed away. It was only nine months prior to his death that I lost my mother. I was not even 40 years old yet, and every other member of my childhood household was now dead. Like Arya Stark, I had to face the world as the lone survivor of my house.
It was surreal. I was still numb, in denial that my brother was gone. I didn’t know what else to do, so I went to work the next day. I didn’t tell anybody. I didn’t want to cry in front of anyone—refused to let anyone see me cry. At the end of the work day, I notified my manager of the bad news.
The custom in our office was to send office gifts in times like this. So when one of my colleagues heard the news, she came over to my office to express sympathy. And in that moment, what she wholeheartedly meant as a compliment, was the deepest insult that completely changed my life.
“You have got to be the strongest woman I know.”
On survivor’s autopilot, I smiled back at her with a dismissive “thank you.” And then I yelled at her within my thoughts. What the hell? No, ma’am. I’m a damsel in distress—just like you. And none of ya’ll go out of the way to help me because you only see my strength.
Her inadvertent insult forced me to confront myself. Then I realized the truth: I was at fault for this. I began to take inventory of other women in my world. I recognized that I never saw my own mother cry. Ever. And that is when I understood that somehow, from some lying book of folklore, that black women are supposed to be strong. And on that day, I decided I would never be “strong” again.
Our workplaces are full of professional damsels in distress. They are conflicted between the necessity of performance and the expectation of strength. It’s almost like some type of convoluted “world of magical negroes” fantasy or something. But the reality is that the professional black damsel in distress does not have a superpower. She has been conditioned for generations to just keep going. Recognizing this societal conflict and embracing the professional woman’s humanity is a very powerful key to saving sanity, restoring marriages, and even preventing premature deaths.
I began opening up to other women about resolving this conflict with myself and how liberating it was. A Latina woman opened up and shared with me that her grandmother warned her, “you better not cry while giving birth to your baby.”
A Jewish lady responded, “Heck, I’m a strong Jewish woman.”
Even still, the Korean lady said, “I better be strong. Nobody gave me permission to be a damsel in distress, either.”
I travelled the world of survivors, discovering the professional damsel in distress in every corner of the Earth. She is the woman who just spent 20 minutes crying in the parking lot. She came into the office, composed and ready to take on the world. She is black, brown, yellow and white. She was placed in survival mode, and appearing weak can be fatal for her.
If you are a professional damsel in distress, I’m talking to you. There is a limited amount of time before your pain exposes you to the world. Like lava, deep beneath the surface of the earth, the perfect pressure and build up will create an eruption. For some, it’s an uncharacteristic display of negative emotion with a client or colleague. For others, it’s a panic attack or mental health crisis. Still for others, it’s a chronic medical diagnosis. It’s all burnout. And burnout is inevitable when we remain in a state of unresolved internal conflict.
Pain is not here to be hidden. Pain requires processing. And when you are a damsel in distress, hidden in plain sight of everyone around you, you are long overdue for a mediation with yourself. Who are you? What motivates you? What is your reason for living?
It’s easy to focus on the dark side of grief. But for me, there was another beautiful side to that coin. It was the type of pain that forced me to question everything. It was the type of affliction that could only be justified once I wrestled with truth. It was the type of sorrow that created tremendous courage. Pain pushed me into courage to only be myself and do only what I was created to do. This process released me from a prison of expectation, liberating me into an oasis of endless opportunity.
And I’m here to promise you that it is the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. What you hide will find you. What you work so hard to cover up will be exposed. Doesn't it make sense to get ahead of it, resolve it, and avoid a crash-and-burn?
I pray you find courage to be honest with yourself today. That you listen closely to your thoughts. I pray you unlock wisdom to no longer argue against yourself—to act only according to what is truly aligned with who you are. I pray you find the strength to admit weakness, and that you no longer feel it necessary to suffer alone. I pray for peace, healing and comfort and that you find the truth your heart has been longing for.
Be blessed and encouraged,
Judge Char
Human connection disclaimer: This post is 100% human curated and is not generated by Ai.
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