Stepping Into My Power: A Women’s Entrepreneurship Day Reflection

I didn’t grow up imagining I would be an entrepreneur.

I didn’t picture myself signing leases, building programs from scratch, leading teams, or sitting in board rooms advocating for trauma-informed care like my life depended on it. I didn’t picture any of this — not because I wasn’t capable, but because women are so rarely taught to imagine themselves as leaders, visionaries, builders, or CEOs.

We’re taught to nurture.We’re taught to soften.We’re taught to support other people’s dreams — not build our own.

So when Women’s Entrepreneurship Day came around yesterday, I found myself thinking about this version of me: the woman who said “Okay… I’ll do it myself.”

The woman who never waited to be chosen.

The woman who built her own table.

The woman who didn’t step into power because she felt ready — but because she was tired of pretending she wasn’t.

How My Journey Actually Started (The Real Version)

People see the highlight reel now — the titles, the private practice, the clinical director role, the website, the networking events, the future IOP. But none of this started with confidence.

It started with a therapist salary and a dream. It started with sitting in a dark office late at night rewriting treatment plans because I knew there was a better way to deliver care. It started with “I think I could do this differently,” and the quiet whisper: “I think I could do this better.”

It started with trauma, honestly.

Women who grow up navigating chaos often become entrepreneurs because we’ve always been the ones who figure things out.We’re used to solving problems no one else wants to name.We’re used to being resilient, adaptable, resourceful, visionary.

We’ve been CEOs of our survival long before we ever filed for an LLC.

Entrepreneurship as a Woman Feels Like…

✨ Having a dream so big it scares you

✨ Being underestimated — and letting that be your fuel

✨ Working twice as hard for half the credit

✨ Carrying the weight of your vision on your back

✨ Being both the frontline and the backbone

✨ Telling the doubting part of you, “Watch me.”

It also feels like reclaiming your voice. Reclaiming your story. Reclaiming every version of you who was told to stay small.

It’s healing work. It’s ancestral work. It’s leadership work. It’s profoundly personal and wildly public all at once.

Becoming the Woman My Younger Self Needed

When I think about Women’s Entrepreneurship Day now, I don’t think about the big picture first. I think about the little girl version of me who had big dreams but didn’t have the safety or the support to name them out loud.

I think about how proud she would be.

I think about how she would look at my life now and say,“You mean we get to help women heal? We get to create spaces where they don’t have to carry everything alone? We get to build programs and communities and businesses that make people feel safe?”

Yes, baby girl. We do.

And we did it on our own terms.

To Every Woman Dreaming of More

If you’re reading this and you’ve been feeling the pull — the idea you can’t shake, the business you keep picturing, the vision you’ve been gaslighting yourself about — this is your sign.

You don’t need to feel ready. You don’t need to be perfect. You don’t need permission.

You just need the courage to start.

Women are powerful in ways the world still underestimates.We build while healing. We rise while exhausted. We transform entire industries by following the part of us that whispers, “There has to be a better way.”

And if you’ve felt that whisper? You’re already an entrepreneur. The rest is logistics.

Here’s to the Women Building What They Needed

To the women rebuilding their lives. To the women following the calling. To the women creating something that didn’t exist before they stepped into the room. To the women doing this while navigating trauma, grief, anxiety, ADHD, mothers, partners, caretakers, full-time employees, or all of the above.

You are not “too much.”You are becoming. And you belong here — in the spaces you’re creating, in the conversations you’re leading, and in the future you’re building.

Happy (belated) Women’s Entrepreneurship Day. Here’s to us — the women who aren’t waiting anymore.