Reflection #6: On Finally Accepting Yourself, With Sadie Shepard

Last time, I had the fun of speaking with my friend, business coach Sadie Shepard. After ten years in real estate and tech, she decided to go into consulting and started her own business advising female founders. What is amazing about Sadie is her ability to show up and speak confidently and empathetically about all the unique experiences that make her her.

If you didn’t see the interview last time, you can check it out here, where she discusses suddenly becoming a caregiver for her dad in her twenties, learning to embrace her ADHD diagnosis, recovering from job loss when she was killing it in her career, and losing a friend to gun violence. She is honest, open, and unapologetically herself.

Here are my four takeaways.

#1: The people who love you will still care about you, even if you stop trying to please everyone.

Many of us fear that if we say exactly what we want to say, and show up exactly how we want to show up, we will drive away everyone that we know and care about. But what Sadie said struck me: during a particularly intense, dark period of [her] life,” she stopped worrying about trying to please everyone with her words — because she didn’t have the energy anymore to do so. And what she found is that the people who loved her still supported her, fully — “It has translated to the fact that now I know I can show up as full Sadie.”

After I reread her interview, I tested her advice in a few small ways, saying what I actually wanted to say a few times that week.

And it did feel freeing. We don’t even realize a lot of the mental and psychological burden of trying to contort our opinions to everyone else’s real (or perceived) expectations. It was a huge weight off my shoulders to simply say what I wanted to say, even in a very small way.

I can’t even imagine what the world would be like if everyone felt comfortable in expressing themselves fully (and hopefully, respectfully!).

#2: Really get to know the unique way you are wired.

I’m glad I could learn from Sadie about ADHD, because it’s so commonly discussed and stereotyped, but rarely understood. We also rarely bring up the positives that neurodiversity can also bring us — Sadie mentioned it’s given her an ability to connect dots extremely quickly. In fact, Sadie was the first guest I’ve had on the newsletter who helped me edit the interview itself, when I was trying to figure out how to arrange the story. I couldn’t believe how quickly she could weave a beautiful story together based on the disparate things we talked about.

Hearing Sadie’s way of decompressing was also a great learning moment for me. She mentioned she relaxes by simply zoning out, not by “doing” anything like yoga, meditation, etc. To me, that was revolutionary. While I don't have ADHD, I also find it extraordinarily hard to context switch, like Sadie. I’ve always felt weird that my form of “relaxing” is not like most peoples’, which is watching TV or playing video games, for example. Hearing her story mentally gave me permission to relax in my own way, too. For me, that is closing my eyes, reducing all sensory input.

I tried it one day after work and it actually, completely, refreshed me, in a way that no other activity ever does.

Who knew such a simple concept — that I could decompress in my own way — could have such a big impact. It makes me think — what else could we unlock, if we simply accepted our unique traits a little more?

#3: We might not even realize some of the barriers holding us back.

When Sadie and I discussed the themes she’s seen in coaching female business owners, I had a guess what might come up — probably some form of lack of confidence, which is an issue I’ve heard about over and over again, whether in research papers or in stories I swap with my friends. But it’s one thing to know about these trends on a societal level, and another to grasp how much they are affecting us in our day to day lives.

During the interview, Sadie and I discussed how women are often quick to dismiss their accomplishments because they say they’ve gotten “help.” I didn’t even realize, until I reread the transcript a few times, that there were multiple examples of me doing that —even just this week.

On one hand, I find that sad, that I’m doing this confidence-busting behavior without even realizing it, and that so many other women are doing it too. But it made me grateful that people like Sadie are helping recognize and change this common pattern.

Doesn’t it make you wonder what other sneaky things we might be doing that are holding us back — without us even being aware?

#4: Watching other people’s setback stories can be a huge part of our own.

For this newsletter, I have typically interviewed those who have gone through difficult experiences directly. But talking to Sadie, I was reminded how much our loved ones’ setbacks can also be catalysts for us, too. Sadie discussed how her dad’s sudden, life-changing spinal cord injury in 2018 completely rewired the way she thought about adversity herself. Watching him advocate for himself in the medical system, focusing on what he could control, learning to walk again — all these things gave her fuel as she faced other setbacks in her life.

Thinking about this gives me hope. Because when we go through a difficult time, we almost always forget how our journeys might be helping others too, as they see us face and grow from adversity. When I think about my own experiences I’ve dealt with, and how much they might have helped my friends or family to see me grow from them, it gives me hope that our struggles are truly not for nothing.

Thank you so much for reading! I’d love to understand: what did you take away from Sadie’s conversation? What unique traits have you initially seen as weaknesses that might actually be strengths?

Comment below!