Like many 5 year old girls, I wanted to be a ballerina.

I pranced and twirled around the house. My mother’s friend called me Princess (and still did even when I was grown.) At some point, someone said good Latin girls don’t draw attention to their bodies like that.

Good girls are obedient. Good girls gotta good girl.

The result was I stopped wanting to be a ballerina. 

If I wanted to validation and approval, I learned I had to perform in a different way. Get all A’s at school, be quiet and unassuming. I was the best good girl in the history of good girls.

I was also full of rage that I turned outwardly by overachieving, doing and doing to the point of burnout. And depression. And some more depression.

Before [insert: the impact of patriarchy, socialization, generational trauma, etc], I was something and so were you. You may not remember, but your body definitely does.

I know you’ve worked hard, but I am not going to describe you as…

• high achieving

• high performing

• disruptor

• a go - getter

• a doer

• highly successful

• high effective leader

• a boss

• a founder

• a rockstar mom

• a rockstar (of any kind)

• a bad bitch (no, I like this one. Let’s keep it)

• driven

• hustler

Do you see a pattern here?

To embody these terms, you have to perform in a certain way in order to exist. You can’t just be any of these things. You have to achieve a certain result just to be able to call yourselves any of them.

They are extractive and rooted in capitalism. 

Capitalism needs you to do, do, and do some more in order to produce so someone (or something) can get paid. Capitalism depends on your burnout.

It needs you to wake up in the morning and say ‘I am a high performing, high achieving boss bitch and I am going to kill it today.’

It needs you to feed into these terms so they are part of your identity, so you can obtain validation and approval capitalism promises you.

Capitalism needs you more than you need it.

If everyone sat home for a week without the internet and credit cards, this house of cards would come crashing down. Let’s not forget the whole ass pandemic we survived. 

I know what you are thinking. And don’t roll your eyes at me. “But Lidia, I like working. I love being creative. I love my business.”

All these things are valid and great by themselves. How does what you do and what role you play in the world define YOU? 

If you are not a mom, who are you?

If you are not a soccer dad, who are you?   

If you are a founder, executive, and leader, who are you?  

If you are not a spouse, who are you? 

If you are not a daughter, coach, sister, a pastor, an athlete, an advocate, who are you? 

Before you defined yourself by your IG bio, who were you? 

Really, who are you? 

DO YOU KNOW?  

DO YOU EVEN REMEMBER?  

I’ll give you the answer.

You are human.  

You are a human who leads. 

You are a human who mothers. 

You are a human who builds.

You are a human who advocates.

But fuck, you are human first.

Modern life is incredibly dehumanizing. It’s okay if you forgot how to human.

How different would your life be if you returned home to yourself? 

It starts with discovering your own body liberation.