I had the honor of speaking at an event for moms last week. My talk was “How to Play Bigger in Life without Asking Permission.” After my talk, there was time for Q&A and the question folks kept circling back to was, “How do I start to speak up so I can play a bigger game?”  

A number of attendees noted they were so in the habit of not speaking up that they didn’t know where or how to start using their voices.  

Because women have been socialized to stay small and quiet, we often have to really make a concerted effort to actually use our voices.  

I gave these women three steps to start practicing speaking up:


Practice stating your preferences out loud 

Practice stating your needs out loud

Practice sharing opposing opinions in neutral ways 


These steps are intended to be practiced over time, in this order. Start out with low risk/low exposure steps. The stakes are typically pretty low when you’re stating a preference: “I prefer pepperoni pizza to sausage & mushroom.” Or, “I would prefer to watch Movie ABC vs Movie XYZ this evening.”

Once you’ve practiced this a few times, try to share a need with a loved one: “I need some time to myself, so I’m going to take myself to lunch and a movie this weekend.” Practice this a few times.  

Once you’ve practiced #1 and #2 over time, you can move to higher exposure speaking up - where the risks and stakes are higher. This is where you can start to practice sharing an opposing opinion in a neutral way, “Thank you for sharing your opinion/experience. That hasn’t been my experience.” Or, “Thank you for sharing your opinion/experience. I see it differently.” Make sure to listen in to the episode to learn how to do #3 safely, this part is important!

Listen in to learn more about how to practice speaking up - in order to get what you want and, ultimately, in order to impact the world. 

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