What Would You Do If You Weren’t Afraid?

By Javacia Harris Bowser, See Jane Write Magazine Founding Editor

What would you do if you weren’t afraid?

That’s the question Sheryl Sandberg posed to women in the audience during her keynote talk at last month’s BlogHer ’13 conference in Chicago.

Placed in the center of the tables at which we attendees were seated were sheets of paper with the same question printed at the bottom. Sandberg wanted us to write down our answer, take a picture holding our written declarations and then leave ready to go after our dreams.

Despite the fact that Sheryl Sandberg is the kind of woman that really makes you feel like you can do anything, I just took one of the sheets and slipped it into my bag. I couldn’t figure out what to write!

Last year this time, without a second thought, I would have written: “Start my own magazine.” But on July 1 I conquered that fear and launched this site.

I thought about writing: “Be a feminist blogger.” I spent much of my time at the conference kicking around the idea of re-launching my personal blog as one that focuses solely on feminism instead of one that mostly focuses on the world of writing from a woman’s perspective. But then during her talk, Sandberg said that she wants to be unapologetically a business executive and unapologetically a feminist. And I knew exactly what she meant.

I am a feminist and proud to say so. But I also want to be a well-respected writer; I want to be known as a social entrepreneur who strives to empower women to find their voice and share their stories. I refuse to choose between writer and feminist. I am both and my personal blog should be a reflection of that.

A few days later while thinking about Sandberg’s best-selling book Lean In and the theme for See Jane Write Magazine this month my answer came to me. If I weren’t afraid I would “TAKE THE LEAD.”

Let me explain.

Lean In showed me that most of my life I’ve been acting like a little princess, but not in the way people typically mean when they say that. In her book, Sandberg talks about the “Tiara Syndrome,” a term coined by Carol Frohlinger and Deborah Kolb, founders of Negotiating Women, Inc. The “Tiara Syndrome” is where women “expect that if they keep doing their job well someone will notice them and place a tiara on their head.”

Guilty as charged.

I am a worker bee. Give me a task and I will work on it from dusk to dawn if that’s what it takes to get the job done and get the job done well; and I won’t even ask for overtime pay. This is exactly what I did at my previous newspaper job and I thought all this hard work would automatically lead to the promotion I wanted. When it did not I was devastated, but I had only myself to blame. I didn’t aggressively go after the position I coveted. I thought it would land in my lap, I thought the tiara would be placed on my head simply because of all those long hours. And I was wrong.

As Sandberg writes in her book, “Hard work and results should be recognized by others, but when they aren’t, advocating for oneself becomes necessary.”

And so I am taking the lead. I am drafting a new bucket list, constructing a new vision board and instead of waiting for opportunities to be handed to me, I’m going to create the opportunities I desire. Instead of waiting for my metaphorical prince to choose me, I choose myself. I will aggressively go after every goal and I will not apologize for my ambition.

In August many of our articles will celebrate women who are taking the lead in their careers and in their communities.

My hope is that their stories will inspire you do to the same.

And it’s OK if you’re afraid. Being courageous is about feeling the fear and pressing on in spite of it.

What would you do if you weren’t afraid?