EP127 Don’t Just Be Good: Be Known

So many women are exceptional at what they do… and yet still feel invisible.

In this episode, I walk through the quiet, deeply ingrained pattern many high-capacity women live in; which is being competent, capable AF, relied upon… AND still unseen.

This isn’t a confidence conversation. It’s an identity conversation.

If you’ve ever felt like:

• You’re respected, but overlooked
• You’re brilliant, but still waiting to be recognised
• You’re doing everything “right” yet feel like the best-kept secret in your own life

This episode will be a hit.

I break down:

• Why being “good” is often a survival strategy, not a personality trait
• The real difference between capability and authority
• Why visibility isn’t about being louder….it’s about being felt
• How women unconsciously edit themselves to stay safe, agreeable, and palatable
• What it actually takes to shift from being competent to being known

This is for the woman who’s done shrinking. Done over-functioning. Done being quietly impressive.

You don’t need to become someone else. You just need to stop abandoning who you already are.

Listen in (and let it land)

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Transcript

Hello, my love. Welcome back to the reinvention era podcast, and if it's your first time here, hola and welcome today, I want to talk about something I see all the time with a brilliant, amazing, super capable as fuck women. And that is the difference between being good, really good at what you do, and letting yourself be known for it. You don't need to take notes for this one. We're not at school. Just listen up, because I think this one might just hit so I see this a lot, again and again and again and again with women just like you. It's usually not dramatic at all. There's no huge breakdown, there's no big life implosion. It's much, I suppose, quieter than that. It's that is that sort of time where you might be sitting somewhere totally ordinary, you know, like the car outside the house, or the kitchen after everyone's left in the morning, or the shower, where you finally get five minutes piece. And this thought drops in that feels, well, inconvenient. Quite frankly, I ain't got time for this rude just entering my head. But anyhow, the thought goes something like, I know, I fucking know I'm good at what I do, so why does it still feel like I'm completely invisible, and then because you're competent, because you're emotionally intelligent, because you're used to holding shit together, you brush the thought aside again, you give yourself a mini pep talk, and you tell yourself, Oh God, I shouldn't need recognition. Oh, I don't want to look like I'm showing off. I just need to keep my head down and do the funding work. It will speak for itself. But you know what? I think the truth is, being good is no longer enough, and it's exhausting pretending that it is. And that's exactly why today I wanted to talk about this very real difference between being good at what you do and letting yourself be known for it. This isn't, you know, a branding conversation or something. It's not confidence tips. It's not putting yourself out there. This is an identity conversation. And if you've been living in what in what I call identity limbo, competent, capable, respected and also unseen. This episode is made for you, and it's actually been prompted by several conversations I've had lately from incredible, incredible women who just don't feel they get the credit for jack shit, and that's not a confidence issue at all. They just feel undervalued. Let me describe the average woman that's talked about this with me and see if you recognise yourself in it. She's the one who people rely on, the one who gets shit done, the one who stays calm when every other fucker panics. She's good at her job. She's good with people, good under pressure. She is good at holding the emotional weight of rooms, of teams, of families of kids. She doesn't need external praise in order to function. She's not chasing validation. She's not trying. To be the loudest voice in the room, and yet there's this low level feeling that she can't quite put a finger on it. Can't quite name what it is, because no matter how competent she is, she still somehow feels overlooked, underestimated, slightly behind the scenes of her own damn life. And that's not because she isn't capable, but because she learned really, really early on that being seen, being visible, wasn't safe. Don't want to be too much for people, do we? Oh, my goodness, no. So she became useful instead. And for me, this is the issue with it. I think for a lot of high achieving women, being good air quotes, good wasn't a personality trait. It was a survival strategy. You learned that being easy made life easier smoother for everyone else. You learned that being capable made you valuable. You learned that being low maintenance kept you loved. You learned that being impressive, quietly impressive was safer than being expressed loudly. So you you mastered this goodness, you mastered excellence, but you muted your expression, and now that's the part of you, the version of you that is starting to feel too damn small because we are made to feel like being air quotes good is somehow a compliment. Except I don't know, I don't know for me, it feels more like a bloody cage, because she's good is often code for she doesn't make anyone else feel uncomfortable. Being good keeps you agreeable, reliable, palatable, non threatening, and that's why the world rewards it, but it doesn't remember it does it being good rarely leads to recognition, to authority, to impact, to leadership, to magnetism, And not because you don't deserve all of those things, but because you're not being fully in the room as yourself, you're present, yeah, you're polished, you're professional, absolutely, but you're muted, you're edited down. And the identity level shift that most women resist is that being known requires you to be felt, not just respected. And that's fucking terrifying when you've spent years perfecting control. Most women think the reason they're not more visible and out there is a lack of confidence. It's not it's that you're not feeling safe in your body to be able to be you, because letting yourself be known for your amazingness might mean being seen before you're ready. It might mean being perceived without managing the narrative. It might mean you being judged without defending yourself. It might mean being misunderstood and staying rooted anyway. None of this is a confidence issue. It's an identity and energy issue.

Sarah Elizabeth  10:02

Because your system learned a long time ago that being noticed could lead to criticism, standing out could lead to rejection. It's that too much thing again, isn't it? We don't want to be too much, so let's learn to be not enough. Instead, your system learned that expressing yourself could cost you belonging and acceptance. So you did the whole sensible thing. You became excellent, but invisible, and now your soul is bored, A F, and that's where, for me, the difference comes in between capability and authority. And I think this is important. So listen up, because I do think this is important, because capability says I can fucking do this. I can do this. Authority says, I own this. You can be capable and still waiting for permission, you can be capable and still hiding behind credentials. You can be capable and still deferring to louder, but much less experienced people. Authority is, not about volume. It's about your self trust being made visible. And this is where my edit code comes in to support women just like you in doing this. E, energy, rehab, d do the damn thing. I identity, Alchemy and T thought, detox. But we say, do the damn thing you don't step into being known, being seen by forcing action and just doing the damn thing. You do it by shifting your identity, your energy and your thought patterns first, so that the actions are aligned with who you are being. So from an energy rehab perspective, if people aren't responding to you the way you expect, the way you deserve, it's rarely about your skill. It's about your energy. When you're still carrying this people pleasing residue, these over functioning habits, the you know, don't rock the boat, conditioning don't be too much. Your Energy says, I'm here to be useful, not to be experienced like this unspoken cartoon bubble above your head. People unconsciously respond to that kind of energy. Energy rehab is about asking yourself, where am I still shrinking? Where am I making myself easy to consume instead of powerful to encounter? Where am I playing it safe instead of exuding presence when you regulate your nervous system and stop bracing yourself for rejection and criticism and bullshit, your presence changes. You speak differently. You pause. You stop with the over explaining bullshit. You let silence do some of the work. Your Energy says it for you, and people feel that. They feel it. And from an identity alchemy side, getting your identity strategy sorted is the real fucking work, the real shit that takes you from being the woman that's good to the woman that is known, powerful in her authority, that's the real work. Because you don't become known and seen and visible by adding confidence. You become known and seen and visible by losing the old identities that don't fit you anymore. Think about it. Who did you have to be to survive? Who did you have to be to be liked, to be accepted? Who did you have to be to stay safe? And then ask yourself a more dangerous question, Who am I ready to be now? Because the woman who lets herself be known, she doesn't wait to be chosen, she doesn't soften her edges to be digestible, manageable, palatable, whateverable. She doesn't apologise for taking up fucking space. And she's not louder. This is not the whole extrovert, introvert thing going like, I'm an introvert. I can't be like that. It's not about being loud. It's not about being the loudest person in the room who says the most. It's about being truer to your inner power. It's about carrying yourself as the amazing, amazing, Wonder Woman that you are, that truth that's got weight. You know it when you walk in a room and we've all walked into a I don't know meeting, say where you don't know anyone. You don't know anyone in that meeting, and yet you know, you know who has the power in that room. You know who trust themselves without them saying a fucking word, you know, from the way that they carry themselves. That's back to the energy rehab again, but that's resulted from their identity as that person, right? And while we're going through the edit code, let's do a little bit of thought detox as well, and call out some of the thoughts that do keep you hidden, thoughts like, oh, I don't want to come across as arrogant. Oh, up myself. Told him a show off. Because, you know us, women, we're told we're show offs like men aren't, but women are don't want to show off. Or other people need need this more than me. They need it more than I do. I'll, I'll speak up when I'm I'm more established when I when I know a bit more I show what I just want to do good work. I don't need the spotlight. Here's the detox. Being known for your utter brilliance is not arrogance. Actually, I'd argue it's your responsibility. It's responsibility if you have insight, wisdom, skill, experience, perspective, opinions, hiding. It doesn't make you humble. It makes you unavailable. It hides you and the women who really need you, who want to feel the impact of you, they can't find you if you're still playing too damn small to stay comfortable. And this is where most women think that they have to become someone they're not. You don't you really don't letting yourself be known doesn't mean oversharing. It doesn't mean shouting. It doesn't mean pretending to be confident. It doesn't mean being on switched on all the fucking time when we're talking about doing the damn thing, once we've got the energy and identity and thoughts nailed acting on it. It means speaking from ownership, not permission, sharing your thinking, not just your output, allowing people to see the you behind the competence. It might look like saying the things that you normally all soften a little bit because you don't want people to think you're harsh. Do we? It might look like claiming your perspective without some kind of disclaimer to follow it. It might look like just letting your name be attached to your work, taking the credit small actions equal big, huge identity shifts.

Sarah Elizabeth  20:01

And you can see it in the women who crossed this threshold. It's subtle. It's so subtle, but you can see it. They stop asking, oh, is this okay? Is this all right? And start saying, This is mine. This is me. They don't need to convince they don't need to chase validation. They don't wait for applause, they don't ask for permission. They just let themselves be seen and trust that the right people will recognise them, and that that's when opportunities start to shift, when respect starts to grow, when this elusive confidence stabilises, life starts to fit again, and none of this, none of this is because they worked harder. It's because they stopped hiding. So if this episode has stirred something in you, if you've felt that internal nod the whole way through like, Oh my God, I feel if you know you're done being the best kept secret in your own goddamn life, then let this land. Please. Let this land. You do not need to become someone else to be known. You just need to stop abandoning who you already are. This next era is not about proving it's about presence, not louder, not shinier, not more impressive, just more you and that it changes everything. So if this episode spoke to you, just sit with it. You don't need to rush to do anything. Just notice where you're still editing yourself down. Notice where you're ready to step forward. Notice the version of you that's been waiting patiently to be recognised by you first. And if you do want to explore any of this work more deeply, you know where to find me, queen, so until next time when I will be back in your beaut badass earbuds. Don't just be good. Be known. Go Queen bye.