How Women Changed America

This week we're going to delve into the untapped power of women, women economic power, and how women change the world, specifically change the United States of America, which then in turn changes the world because the United States of America is the largest economy in the world and the soul superpower in the world. And I wrote a piece this week in Time magazine that really speaks to some of

the double standards that are out there. The piece is entitled how women like Kamala Harris, Vice President saved and shaped America. And it's not about her per se, but it's inspired or triggered by undue criticism of her being a so called dee and I presidential candidates offensive. She's got a jd Degree, which is essentially a doctorate degree. She has been a US Senator, She's a sitting vice president in the biggest economy in the biggest country in

the world. She hasn't embarrassed us. She's made US proud. She's been a US Senator, as I said, held offices throughout state of California, several offices, legal positions within government. It's just offensive. She's probably more qualified than most people who are sitting in the role of vice president. But and I cover the details in the piece of why I think that women are both underpreciated and have been such an incredible contributor to the US cultural scene in

the economy. But there's a couple of things I wanted to drill down on in the piece. I encourage you to go to Time magazine and read the whole piece and share it with your posse, share it with your friends, share it with those you love. Let's level the playing field on ignorance and build houses of hope in their place. This is just ignorance, and it's also I think a sign of desperation by some who feel good Fiel, They've got to put somebody else down in order to elevate themselves.

I'm rather focused on the facts I like, and it just happens. The folks I'm going to quote here are women. Melody Hopson says, I like math because it doesn't have an opinion. I'm going to quote my friend Stephanie Ruhl of MSNBC and CNBC and NBC who says that all we're trying to do is expand the table and add a chair, which of course builds more opportunity for everybody and doesn't diminish opportunity for anybody when you grow the

economy and you expand participation in the economy. But in the article in the piece and Time magazine, which again I encourage you to download, read and share, I also cite in there that twenty five percent of American GDP today gross domestic product are women. That's right. The moral issues and ethical issues aside the thing that people call de NI diversity, equity and inclusion. They want to discount it and now call the sitting Vice president of DEE

and I candidate, which is again highly offensive. Whatever that is you're referring to, whatever those women, the means and means and means of women out there who are working every day with people underneath them in leadership teams, I mean, how they're supposed to feel with the Vice President of United States is being discounted on merit. But that aside, this is twenty five percent of twenty five trillion dollars of economic activity in this country, and without women, this

country would be an also ran country. We'd be the country that used to lead the world. We would be a third tier economy. In fact, six tray dollars versus twenty five percent of twenty five trade and give or take, it's larger than most countries GDP. It's larger than most countries economy. That's just the women portion. But I'm going to get in this podcast. I'm going to get into the details. I want anybody who wants to be inspired

by women, for women to become a woman. If you're a young girl, you want a girl, I want you to know why and how you contribute and why you should be extraordinarily proud of what you've done with your parents have done, and to know the barriers that also sit in front of you. And that's seven from your at least your mother not so long ago. Did you know that in nineteen seventy two, not eighteen seventy two, nineteen seventy two, that a woman could not get a

credit card, that's right. A woman could not get a bank account nineteen seventy two, not eighteen seventy two, That a woman could not get alone unless her husband co signed it. That's right, nineteen seventy two. And before I get into the sax and facts of how women are now charging into progress and prosperity, the economy, the culture, our education, big business, small business, and the incredible impacts that they had they've made and continue to make, and

how we can't live without women. And by the way, without women, it'd be much less men as fewer men. But you will figure that out. Help that figure that tongue in cheese statement out. You figure that out later. But besides that, are not getting to that, because that is really the rainbow after the storm. I want to talk to you about how they got here and how interconnected we are, because it's both the troubling story and

inspiring one. So oftentimes whites are pitted against blacks, or rich against poor, or different social strata printed against each other. And this is one of these unique stories where a blonde haired, blue white woman from a very well to do family is connected directly to the plight of African

American men and women. Well, maybe for well to do, entigh educated backgrounds, but in all likelihoods, because of our history in this country, probably from a more modest background in the American South or wherever that these two cultures collided, two groups collided in the most beautiful way possible. So let me explain. In the early nineteen sixties, you had doctor King, Ambassador Andrew Young, my mentor Dorothy doctor Dorothy

Hyge got wrestler soul correct, Scott King got wrestler. So who were in the civil rights movement I called the Second Reconstruction, and they made this incredible progress right and as a result of their efforts and others, John Kennedy President, then President Kennedy started something called a firmative action, and then President Johnson built on that, and really President Johnson

became the civil rights It's president with Kennedy's assassination. But the man who actually giving credit what credits do, who codified affirmative action, really really baked it in, was a president named Nixon, very unassuming, assuming, very unlikely I think most people with the unlikely character to lock in rights for blacks, given that his candidacy for presidency was in

some ways the antithesis of that. In some ways, he was running in a way that scared people of the progress of the sixties, and suggested that people should be afraid of the progress of blacks and other groups, and that somehow this was bad for business in America. And maybe he did a firmative action thing to show he's not a bad guy. I don't know. He did it actually a lot of things for women in the environment and or at least intention with intentionality African Americans. I'll

give him credit. He codified affirmative actions in many ways created affirmative action, so it was created. It was inspired by both parties. But really, I'm gonna give credit again, Nixon really codified this. And so almost as soon as

he did this, the courts sound familiar. The courts began to block it and said that the racial all the racial innuendos, and not even in the windows, the racial preferences, racial outlines, racial cticides were unconstitutional, lot not allowable, and so they start the court starts striking this down in the furtive action area. So it's oddly enough, blacks were the only ones enslaves in American soil. Blacks were clearly held back from various levels of progress tied to clear discrimination.

It was obvious to everybody whould see it. That's why blacks were trying to get basic rights in the nineteen sixties that there were denied them for one hundred years since the eighteen sixties, and so this law was makes sense law to redress that. But then somebody tried to go to to a man, a white man tried to go to college in California, and it was one hundred

slots available for this college program. Sixteen slots were set aside for essentially black people, and so there was eighty five percent of these slots available for the mainstream America. And he decided he wanted one of the sixteen slots. He wanted the other slots, he wanted the ones that was sent aside for the black people who had been previously deco denied. So he took the school to court and he won. He and this and other rulings, by the way, reminds you so much of what's going on

with the Fearless Fund today. Again, black women in Atlanta trying to provide funding a very thinly funded area of venture capital for black women founders. I venture capital's like one percent venture capital goes to black founders, some crazy number like that. And the Fearless Phone was set up to modestly fund viable black businesses and somebody suit them

to shut them down. Sounds familiar anyway, Back to the story that this happened in the nineteen seventies, so there's a delusi of affirmative action, and the court said, well, gender is a thing that we can allow. And I'm not sure this was intentional or not, but the folks closest to the door of economic opportunity from a gender perspective were not Black women or Latino women, or Asian

women or Indian women. It was white women. Because white women were more socially acceptable, they were more socially plugged in, they were closer to the decision making and decision makers and the societal norms, and so white women were allowed to go through the door. Now, I think this is a good thing. I'll take progress by any means necessary. So I'm not saying this is bad at all. I'm saying all progress is good progress. But I'm saying that

rainbows follow storms. Can I have a rainbow out of storm? First? That blacks had this storm, and it's unfortunate, once again pushed back against the very meager advances that they were allowed to make in the markets and in the economy. But the door that opened opened for women, and white

women went through first. So this is now nineteen seventy two, when a white woman or any woman could not get a bank account or credit card, or get a loan unless her husband co signed it in By nineteen seventy four from revaction laws plus other laws that were codified in seventy four kicked the door open for women, and

they start immediately making progress. Now. The drop of mic statement I'm gonna make here is that if that had not happened, and if we had not ended up with this additional GDP six trillion dollars plus, today we'd be an also ran nation. We'd be a third tier country, we'd be the country that used to leave the world. Because you've never had a superpower that wasn't the economic power at the same time in the history of the world. And today you need diversity in order to do that.

You need inclusion in order to do that, which is why it's so silly to me that people are pushing back on diversity, equity and inclusion. That made a political piniata. So the phrase is almost dead because people have made it almost toxic to talk about it, but underneath the phrase are real people, real situations and demographics of this country. Please read the Business Plan for America, which I wrote, and just download it and get it to search my

name and find it. So read the Time magazine piece that I just wrote on women's contribution to society, and read the Business Plan for America. And yes, read my book Business Financial Literacy for alls. I believe that financial literacy is a civil rights issue of this generation. And you know better, you do better. But these stats, in these facts today absolutely make it clear that you cannot succeed, continue to succeed as the nation without all of us contributing.

And if folks trying to push folks back from progress. We were afraid of the future in the nineteen seventies nineteen sixties were successful in killing the d E and I of that day affirmative action. Where will we be again? We'd be a third world country, not third world country. We be a third rate country. Less six trillion dollars, and I mean six three dollars by itself is bigger than most economies in the world. That's bigger than eighty percent of all the economies of the world. Just that

part just the women's part. So let's now get into and break down this six trillion dollars of GDP and talk about where it comes from. And then I'm gonna get in something really I think inspiring and exciting, which is talk about what women are actually doing in the economy and some of it's gonna blow your mind. Something I think is going to really shock you. So where does a GDP come from? Again? Twenty five trillion dollars for the whole country, six trillion dollars six point three

trading for women. That's about labor force participation. First, women make them about forty seven percent of the workforce today, that's seventy four million women employee. Hello, can I get me a man? The median earnings for a women is about forty five thousand dollars annually, and there's still the gender pay gap, so women are being paid what men are being paid, but it's still an impressive progress from

where we've come from. The aggregate earnings of women contribute to substantially contribute substantially the household incomes and economic stability, which I'm going to get to into a minute because it'll talk about another big impact about it have had beyond the six trillion dollars, beyond a twenty five percent, It's talk about entrepreneurship and small business and business ownership for a minute. Women own businesses accounts for forty two

percent of all businesses in the US. You'ar that forty two percent. They generate one point nine trillion dollars in revenue, employ nearly nine million people. The growth of women owned businesses contribute to innovation, job creation, and economic diversification. Spending power. This is where it kicks in to something that's I talk about all the time, which is what drives the American economy. Women control the significant portion of household spending,

estimated at about seventy to eighty percent. They make the decisions in the house This translates to a substantial influence on consumer markets, impacting industries from retail to healthcare. Women spending decisions drive demand for goods and services, affecting overall economic growth. And so what does this mean That they're making seventy to eighty percent of the decisions in the household. That means that if this economy is seventy percent of

consumer spending, the biggest economy in the world. Right, So, my rich friends need my poor friends do better, if only to stay rich, because it's people making paying cardoals and paying rent and going to restaurants and going to get their hair done and nails done, renting cars, going on vacations, whatever, just normal stuff, going to CDs, going to Walmart. Whatever it is. By the way, they found

the chairman of the CEO of Walmart. CEO of Walmart, duncc millan brought with the ford for my new book for sort of we're all so thanking for that. But if whatever it is you're doing, that's driving the US economy, and so women are twenty five percent of the whole economy, but they're also contributing to that seventy percent. Seventy percent of the seventy percent influencing decisions are being made around consumers spending and the deep women in participation in the

workforce and business ownership contribute to economic resiliency. Diverse workforces leadership has improved organizational performance and innovation. Reducing gender disparities and pay and employment can lead to more equable growth and increase GDP. Translation, more diverse companies are more profitable. They're almost forty percent more profitable by the way, it's not even close. And you candgin to read more about that than my business plan for America. So now let's

get into you know how and where women contribute. This is so cool. Put out your pen, get out your iPad, get out your iPhone, get out your Samsung, get out your Androy whatever it is, and write this stuff down. Want to be inspired. And this is for folks who say that women don't do enough, or can't do can't contribute, or they're not serious, or they don't know they're talking about. This is like, this is just ridiculously obvious. Check this out.

Women have consistently hired enrollment rates in undergraduate and graduate programs compared to men. Now people say, okay, John, that's a generality. Okay, try this on for precise This is twenty nineteen numbers. So it's gotten better. Is that fifty seven percent of masters of sorry, fifty seven percent of bachelor's degrees women, sixty percent of master's degrees women, fifty three percent of doctorate degrees women. What do you think the vice president has as a JD. That's assistantly a

doctorate degree. So this is a doctorate of law. So the majority of all these degrees are women. Labor force participation seventy seven percent of healthcare and social assistance workers women seventy seven percent. Seventy four percent of workers in educational services women. Women dominate certain sectors and industries such as healthcare, education, and social services. Let me get into that. Health care and social assistance seventy seven percent of workers

in this space are women. Educational services seventy four percent are women. Now, these numbers are less impressive about to tell you, in government, but because it's elected and there's biases and sexism and hello, we just talked about the what people saying about the vice for the United States, for God's sakes, so think below that it's probably even harder to get a fair shot. But here these numbers

are still impressive. Members of Congress twenty seven percent of seats in the House of Representatives, twenty four percent of the US Senate. I think that's pretty impressive for women. Thirty one percent of those in the state legislature are women. Twelve governors in the US as of twenty twenty three, pretty dangon impressive. Corporate leadership, eight point eight percent of

CEOs are women. Board memberships in the Fortune five hundred, twenty eight percent of all board seats in the S and P five hundred as of twenty twenty three year women. That's an impressive number to me. Twenty eight percent entrepreneurship women own forty two percent of all businesses in this country. These are not small numbers. These any one of these numbers is the story in it of itself. Right again, I just want to just break all these stereotypes and

this misinformation. I want you to download that article from Time magazine, share it with all of your friends, making a conversation tied into the Business Plan for America, which I also want you to downlo pull out. Get your copy of Financial Literacy for all so no one can deny you so that you're working your money money's not working to you, and share this information along with this podcast.

Anybody who is telling you anything inaccurate about supposedly women's contribution and tying it to anything and saying anything that's even remotely derogatory or discounting, are something ridiculous, Like the vice president the United States is a Dee and I candidate for the presidency. That's just nothing but fear talking and desperation. In my opinion, and this is from somebody who has been an advisor Republican and a Republican Republican

and Democratic presidents. I've been, I've been, I've advised Republican Democrats. I'm not partisan. I've been honored by five US president recognized by five US presidents, and I've known n I've got a security clearance. I mean, I've been in the House, as they say, the White House, in and out, and I'm telling you, you cannot do these jobs and not

be super competent. And she's more qualified. So we're going to come back to small business because I think it's a really important point to make healthcare industry or women or account for thirty six percent of all position posts in the country, nurses women in CONSTUS over ninety percent of the nursing positions, and that amazing, over ninety cent. So ladies, young girls, ladies, people going to college, you go to high school, young girls coming up, people in

the workforce. People are trying to reset your career. If you're trying to figure out what you can do where you want some job security and you want some you want to know that you know there's a good chance that you'll be able to be in a growing industry, even with artificial intelligence and all this stuff coming up, and you'll be treated with dignity of respect well. Nursing is definitely and it pays well too. Nursing is definitely a place that you should be thinking about leaning in

healthcare executives. Women hold a significant percentage of leadership positions in the healthcare and healthcare organizations in the healthcare indust the legal professional we talked about the Vice President's Jade degree. Women represent over fifty percent of all law school students fifty percent judicial positions. Women hold approximately thirty five percent of all federal judge ships judicial seats. These are judges judge positions, federal position thirty five percent. Isn't that cool?

Nonprofit sector, this is a sector where you know, this is part of what I do at Operation Hope, is I run a nonprofit. But it's really the exception, not the rle to see a guy in a personal color like me running a huge nonprofit like I do in

Operation Hope. And I've got my for profit businesses as well, but my passion really is my nonprofit Operation Hope, which is the largest financial literacy organization in the country, and really the inspiration for my book Financial Literacy for All, which is our best seller and I want you to get a copy of it, and the inspiration for this podcast all came out came out of the Silver Rights movement.

Third reconstruction from civil rights to civil rights. Financial literacy is the civil rights issue, the generation, the expansion across the country with our work, where the bigga's in the country and what we do. But I'm really the exception, not the rule. The vast majority people running nonprofits, to the tune of seventy two percent of nonprofit executives are women. I love it. I think seventy percent of the employees

and Operation Hope, by the way, are women. As my own factoy and just as a complete aside, my mother when he to Smith got rest her so she transitioned the last year she's been promoted, gone all a better place. Jinnia Smith worked an hourly job thirty two years. McDonald Douglas Aircraft Bowing Aircraft. Was a seamstress, fabric a fabricator. She made the seats in the airplanes. You can pull

up her story. She had not done videos together when he dismith is her name, pull up my name and her name, go to her memorial fund, Winnie Smith a memorial fund and read about her. She ended up building a net worth of about a million dollars. She had a wheel, She had affairs in order. Her credit score was eight fifty plus. Back in the at time where they had credit scores above a fifty. She had a maximum credit score it was a fifty four. She wasn't black,

she was green. And she bought and sold seven homes, working in an hourly job, and ended with a net worth of a million dollars. So she just sprints to those that she loved and I was the executive. Ver stay proud of it. But it's that amazing what one woman can do, you know. And I don't know if a man could have done what my woman did, what my mother did. The fact that my dad was an amazing guy, but he didn't do what my mother did.

My dad owned his own business and should have been originally the one that was building that was wealthy in the family. But he could make it, couldn't spend it he was making could he could make it, but could only spend it. He could he made the money, made a dollar and spent a dollar for emptied So the more money we made the broke over got and he wouldn't. He didn't understand that in order to not spend a yet to give it to my mother to invest in.

And she was good at growing wealth. But they didn't work as partnerships because he didn't take her seriously. And so my dad broke, died broke, and my mother died wealthy. So there you go. My dad had a business, my mother working an out the job. It's about it really is about decisions you make in mindset that you have. And as you'll hear as I get into this, women have some natural advantages in starting certain businesses and approaching

certain things like investing. Getting that in just a second, Okay, journalists forty one point seven percent of all newsroom employees journalists women, women hold leadership roles and major media organizations and outlets. Also sports, this is a real drop the mic forty four percent of all n Cuba athletic scholarships women. And you've been seeing women killing it in a number of sports, right, and things that you wouldn't necessarily assume to be in like well tendance of course, yes, golf

now and even motorsports by sport, all the sports. You've seeing women in all of sports and just dominating wherever they set foot. And now Women's NBA is just absolutely killing it and making great strides. So let's now talk

about women and succeeding in business after the pandemic. The number one group of businesses that succeeded or that grew be very specific here the biggest business growth since two thousand and four the surge of small businesses were black owned businesses, and of all groups within groups, it was black women. So black women really excelled amongst all groups and started businesses after the pandemic. And then after that came Latino women, a lot of LA businesses, and that's

group now is creating this record number of businesses. And they tend to have focuses and the ability to focus on some of the subtleties that allow them to I think have an advantage over men as they pursue certain businesses and industries. So I talked about my mother being a good investor. There are studies now that have proven that women are actually under certain conditions, and I've explained

that a second better investors. Well, actually the studies just say that better investors, but that's if you carve out sort of there's day trading thing, like if there there they trade that ten women. Women tend to trade less frequently, better at avoiding over confidence, which I think I think is really funny. So they are not egomaniacs like men are. They focus on goals and research and better performance in

down markets. Specifically, what that means is women tend to remain calmer during market downturns, avoiding the panic selling that

can harm long term returns. Their patience and discipline offer a result in better performance during volatile periods, and they tend to have a long more of a long term focus on investing well that that's going to give you better returns, and so that's debatable, but I'm just telling you that is the data is in that that uh that under many conditions where as a long term investor, women have been found to be better investors. And that's was my mother's strength that my father could have been

it from benefited from. My dad was making the money the short term, and my mother would have been investing in the long term. So you want to you want to optimize everybody's strength and a relationship, and my dad just didn't do that. So are their businesses or their industries or their sectors where women are Just if you're listening to this, you're watching this and you want, you want to find a leg to stand on. You're now inspired, You're encouraged by what you've heard. You're a young girl

coming up, You're a person going to college. You're a young woman start setting out in life, your young family, you're or you're maybe you're older in your life and you want to reset your life and you're looking for ways to give you a leg up on somebody else coming into the marketplace. What are businesses and occupant where you might have a strategic advantage as a woman. Well, here you go. Here are a few choices for you. The number one is not should not be a surprise

to you. Nursing and healthcare Women tend to excel in nursing and healthcare due to their strong communication skills, their empathy, and natural nurturing instincts. These qualities are critical for patients and building trust with patients. Now, what did I say to you before tying us back to facts that over ninety percent of all nurses are women, and that you know there's also doctors and other categories. But over not evencent of nurses and women. And that is like being

an engineer. It's like just a job for life if you do it right right, and I mean a well paying job, a good job of a higher upper middle class occupation. Here's another one for you, human resources. The HR field often benefit from women's strong interpersonal skills ability to manage conflict. I think some people would have a lot of they have a field date with this one

building to manage conflent. Okay, whenever you generalize, you discriminate. Okay, but assuming that the dramas out of the situation and people are not making emotional decisions, and nobody's upsetting somebody just the I'm making neutral comments here about a person's natural strengths and weaknesses. A person a profiles natural strengths and weaknesses. So don't get into a fight with me about this, Okay. I make a lot of generalities that

you might might disagree with. Like a man learns a love of woman he's attracted to, and the woman becomes more attractive than the man that she loves. I think that that's generally true. That she's my own philosophy. Shure, somebody would disagree with that. But you know, God did know that men were meander thoughs. That's white made women beautiful.

We were attracted for visually first and then then we learned to love them and we love him for life, and they're the mother our children and all that kind of stuff. But I think women are deeper. I think women are are more intuitive. I think that women are natural feelers. I think women are we're all terminous to a higher power. Women are more mopent time connected with

their emotions and there they're they're real feelings. And have you ever been in a room and a woman will say he ain't right or she ain't she ain't right, And you're like, well, Joe Anne, girl, why are you Susie? Why why are you talking about that person? You don't know that person. Then you find out later that the person did some horrible thing, right, like I just I don't know, it's just a feeling. Well, we're not human beings having a spiritual experience, but we're spiritual beings having

a human experience. Energy matters, and women are better intuitively and reading energy. Because women create life. Without women, that be a lot less men. Women create life men don't. It just gives them a strategic advantage. So when I'm talking here like my in our household, my wife is amazing and she she can think with her left side of her brain. She runs service around people. She's extremely smart. But in our relationship, I created the house she turns

into a home. She lets me be the thinker. She's a feeler and she's she's much better at the love piece, and I am the feeling piece. I learned from her, and I like to think that she learns from me in my in my area, I build wealth, she builds health. I'm the ego, she's the butterfly. Both are necessary. But everybody has a strength of a weakness and and and

don't optimize your weakness, optimize your strength. Right, So, women, if you, if you will bear with me that women, I think because of this, their creators of life have natural instincts. Then I'm going to now give you some natural advantages. I'm gonna give you some occupations to speak to those. And yes, there are exceptions to every rule, and maybe this doesn't apply to you, so let's not get hung up on that, all right. So I mentioned

human resources talking about the ability to manage conflict. That was funny to me. Understanding the uh. I think women are emotional geniuses, so that's the whole other thing, and understanding of emotional and social dynamics within an organization. Relations and communications. Women often excel in PR and communication roles do their proficiency in verbal and writ communication, as well as their ability to understand and connect with diverse audiences.

Education and teaching. Now I covered that statistically earlier in the podcast, So just tie all this back to the statistics that gave you what many women thrive in educational roles, demonstrating patients, empathy, and strong organizational skills which are essential for managing classrooms and facilitating learning. I mean, isn't a classroom just an organized professional environment of raising a kid in your house. I mean your natural nurturer and a

learner and a teacher used doing in a classroom. Let's see what else here. Event planning and management, Women's attention to detail organizational skills again, and ability to MULTITASKLA because I know some people who just can't multitask at all. But you know, okay, I'm going to give you credit anyway, ladies. But event planning and management around around even execution, tends to be an area where women excel more than men

marketing and branding. Women often excel and marketing and branding due to their creativity, intuition, and ability to understand consumer behavior, which is crucial to developing effective campaigns. Nonprofit and social work have already covered this. This sector is dominated by women. There's a strong sense of empathy, dedication to social causes, and ability to engage with communities and their stakeholders and

to build trust. Again, it's a natural asset interior design and fashion, And it sounds a little sexist, but I think it's actually true. My wife at a fashion house that was extraordinarily successful and it's a passion. She also very good interior design. The house houses. Again, I tend to create the house she turns into a home, and the house is banging, not because of me, because of

her her interior design skills. Women frequently excel and creative industries like interior design and fashion due to their keen esthetic sense and the ability to understand and to protect trends. Doesn't mean that men can't, right, but this is just again and that's just sort of a natural advantage for women.

I think this one's big. Therapy and counseling women often succeed in therapy and counseling roles, beveraging their empathy, their strong listening skills, and ability to build trust with clients to provide effective support. My mother in love, my mother in law, Penny Dalton, we call her Penny mom Amy Dalton, it's her real name. It's just a wonderful listener. It's so empathetic. She she listens to all the people in her life, mostly your daughter. She loves her daughter in Shadra,

my wife. They're good friends. But she's just so anthetic. She's such a good listener. She'd be a great counselor or therapists. It's you know, what is a friend? I mean, was a therapist a paid friend? You know, for lack of a friend, we paid a live pound of couch. So that's a great career for people who have an interest in healing people and using their empathetic skills in

a professional way. Corporate leadership and management, increasingly, women are recognized for their effectiveness in leadership roles often bring collaborative, collaborative, and inclusive management styles, strong decision making abilities, and a focus on ethical leadership And don't we need that today? I'm going to to end this podcast today with hopefully a bit of a little bit of inspiration for you

as you go out on this journey. You know, you mean again, if somebody's messing with the vice Parsi of the United States, you can pretty much bet they've got messed with you too. But I take no revitamins. I don't know about you not. When as of my self esteem depends on your acceptance of me over to rounded through it, I decide I'm going to get to it. Success is going from failure to failure without loss of enthusiasm.

I take no revitamins, you know. I just decide I'm going to succeed, and the haters are just going to make me better, that's all they're going to do. So I get up early, stay of later, work harder, and deliver more because I'm being discounted all the time, and that's fine. I love being underestimated. And I want you to know that your weakness, your so called weakness, is a strength and the facts bear that out. But the

facts not going to set you free. Your personal philosophy is going to your mindset and when you're when you're going about your life, I want you to remember this poem. Now, this, this poem going to read to you, was actually part of an inaugural address from a man I met, and I really admire Nelson Mandela, President Nelson Mandela, South Africa. I wear his prison number on my risk all the time. If you see me. The bracelets on one of them is a Mandela's prison number where all the time, every day.

And I really loved this man. It's a fantastic leader. And he read a poem. It wasn't trying to take credit for it, but he was given credit with this poem that he read in one of his president's sort dresses. But it's actually written by a woman, Marion Williamson. And the poem is our deepest fear. And I want you to listen to this, right, ladies, young ladies, girls, ladies in the making, ladies resetting your life, those who need to know that you're enough, Here you go. Our deepest

fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness, that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented and fabulous Ashley, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. You're playing small does not serve the world. There's nothing enlightened by it about shrinking so that other people won't feel insecure around you. We are all meant to shine, as children do. We were born to make

manifest the glory of God. The glory of God that is within us is not just in some of us, it's in everyone. And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others. Go change the world, Ladies, in many ways, you already have let your light shine, And remember that rainbows only follow storms. Cannot have a rainbow without a

storm first. And anybody, step on your fears, step on your dreams, and make your fears manifest. Courage nothing more than your faith reaching through your fear. Displaying yourself as action in your life is from my books Love Leadership, one of my first books I've ever written. And you

can't grow without legitimate suffering. So hopefully this has been a point of inspiration for you to know that you are enough and to step into your greatness and to make well, to be the change that I just articulated in this podcast for almost an hour. With you, be the change you want to see in the world. I'll see you at the finish line. And when you see me in the airport or you see me someplace, stop me and say I am somebody be and you will be the manifest destiny. Watch how you live your life

and may be the only Bible anybody else reads. Don't let anybody get you down, and don't let anybody step on your dreams. As doctor King said in Memphis talking to the sanitation workers, you going to be a sanitation worker, be the best one that anybody's ever seen. And don't bend down or bend over. Nobody can ride your back. Stand up straight. Nobody can ride you back unless your bit over. Stand up straight and walk with pride. This

is John O'Brien. This is the Money and Wealth podcast series on the Black Effect Network on Iheight Radio, and this is highlighting the untapped power of women, the economic power of women who've already changed the world and will

do so again in the future. I'm out. Get the podcasts, Tell your friends, get the book Financial Lucy for all go to Operation Hope, download the Business Plan for America, and I'll see you around the country on the American Aspiration Tour, which is coming to a city near you. Check the dates online. Money and Wealth with John O'Brien

is a production of the Black Effect Podcast Network. For more podcasts from the Black Effect Podcast Network, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.