So, there you have it! Menopausal women rarely get mentioned. Yet, pesky pubescent girls are accepted as normal - a fact of life.
Why the difference? It’s an age thing! The older the woman the less she’s valued. And whilst we may roll our eyes at the menopausal male, the menopausal woman has been condemned to off-limits status.
Here’s the narrative; you’re training for your dream career and there’s a placement you desperately want - but they can’t pay you. Would you do it anyway?
Not many people would, I reckon. But if you’ve a raging fire in your belly and you’re driven by passion and purpose, wouldn’t you do anything to get your foot in the door?
Risks! Love them or fear them, rarely, it seems, are we indifferent.
The prevailing belief that risk taking is a masculine trait and women are risk averse has been slammed by scientific evidence. But the myth lingers.
Well, here’s a woman who’s more than comfortable taking risks.
Here’s the scenario; you’re an internationally successful consultant and business owner travelling the world doing demanding work and raking in the dosh. And suddenly, you’re diagnosed with a disabling degenerative illness that changes your life forever. What would you do?
Back in the day, when it came to choosing a career, school girls were often steered away from ‘boys’ subjects’ such as math and physics, towards ‘girls’ subjects’ such as nursing and teaching. But what if these girls didn’t naturally follow the norm? What then?
When you’re co-running a business and you discover that you and your business partner are mismatched, it’s make or break, right? Such was the narrative of my Page 1 Woman. However, she walked away from this challenging experience, scared but with her head held high. And with some coaching from me, in the first few months, she drew on her inner resources and set up another business in Goa in 2016.
Here’s the picture – you’re on honeymoon in a jaw-dropping romantic setting, and you’re given a choice by hubby, between remaining his wife in a regular job or being a successful big-dreaming entrepreneur. Which would you choose? For many of us, this might be a no-brainer – go for the marriage, right? But for some, giving up your dream would be so devastating that walking away from your marriage would be the only option.
Girls who leave school knowing they want a ‘different’ occupation are probably a rare breed. And increasingly these days, they’re opting for careers in male dominated fields. Different, indeed! Gone are the days when careers were strictly divided along gender lines that we were expected to follow, even if we didn’t want to.
When you’re out and about and see screaming young kids, do you assume they’re ‘monsters’ and their parents lack control? Perhaps you’re less judgemental and wonder about the circumstances behind the screams?
We’d all like to be in that last category, wouldn’t we? But that’s not the experience of my Page 1 Woman.
According to scientists, smiling enhances your mood and brings you joy. But when smiling comes naturally, why would you need a strategy?
My Page 1 Woman styles herself as a ‘smile strategist.’ She’s all about creating effective relationships with yourself and others through the benefits that come with smiling.
Artists are interesting people, right? They’re often stereotyped as quirky, spaced out Bohemians living on the breadline, desperate to sell the next piece of work. But my Page 1 Woman is an artist who in no way reflects this stereotype. Quirky? Maybe. Talented? For sure. Bohemian? Well, she did experience a nomadic spell, before settling in London.
Here’s the scenario, mother of four children, BMX champion and successful woman solopreneur. And yes, one woman has all three roles.
If you’re anything like me, you’ll probably think, ‘How does she do it?’ But that’s exactly what my Page 1 Woman has achieved. You’d think she was one of those ‘Have it all’ women. But she isn’t.
This Page 1 Woman runs a social media and web design business with clients worldwide, and a networking group side hustle. She’s active, focused, determined and incredibly productive.
Have you ever been a member of a religious cult? Although, it’s difficult to generalise, cults are often identified as communities that place rigorous restrictions on their members, demand separation from mainstream society and hold dogmatic and unconventional beliefs.
If you value freedom and autonomy, beware cults. But, here’s someone who was a cult member for several years. And she’s my Page 1 Woman.
According to research, most people fear public speaking more than death. So the last thing you’d want when you’re about to speak in public is to trip on stage.
This is the stuff of nightmares for many public speakers and possibly a calamity from which some might never recover. But my Page 1 Woman has turned stage tripping into an art-form, and her audiences love it. It takes a special kind of woman to pull this off, right?
Did you know that there’s an insidious epidemic in the UK? It’s called job burn-out. Apparently over half a million people suffer with work-related stress. Thankfully they don’t all collapse at work or breakdown psychologically and take years to recover. Such was the experience of my Page 1 Woman.
When you’re a teenager from an unstable, oppressive background, in which mental health features, what do you do?
And what if this background causes you to drift into an abusive relationship with an older man? And the days become years and you find yourself imprisoned with two children in a cycle of violence, emotional abuse and coercive control, desperate to escape but hunted down each time you do.
If you came from a dysfunctional family that emotionally and sexually abused your child, what would you do?
My Page 1 Woman has led an unusual life of setbacks – child sexual abuse and abduction, stalking/harassment, eating disorders, murder – I could go on. And she’s experienced victories too- for example inventing an award winning multi-combination safety ladder.
Imagine HR professionals; what images spring to mind? Traditionally HR professionals are seen as the organisation’s scary police or its agony aunts– neither of which are favourable.
My Page 1 Woman, Su Patel, is an HR consultant on a mission to transform the face of HR.
Did you know that suicide is the biggest killer of young people in the UK?
When 10% of school children have a diagnosable mental illness, you’d be forgiven for believing that appropriate intervention would be obtainable at a sufficiently early age. However, 70% of children and young people experiencing mental health problems don’t get this. Shocking? Of course.
If your friends were denouncing a charity appeal as a scam, would you make a donation? My Page 1 Woman, moved by the plight of a group of Ugandan children, silenced the cynics’ voices, did her homework and made a generous donation to the ‘Divine Care Missions’. Since then, she’s raised funds for it, written three books about it and is negotiating to turn the story into film.
