“I'm through accepting limits / 'Cause someone says they're so / Some things I cannot change / But 'til I try, I'll never know” -- Wicked, “Defying Gravity”

“I'm through accepting limits / 'Cause someone says they're so / Some things I cannot change / But 'til I try, I'll never know”
-- Wicked, “Defying Gravity”

Yes, I’m quoting Wicked again 😉
Stay with me.

I've been thinking about this lyric lately.

There's something about these words that land differently at this stage of my life and work.

The song keeps popping into my mind whenever I’m on a call with a female founder (or several) and we’re talking about how we decided to “take the leap” to run our own businesses.

And then I think about all the female founders I know.
About my own decision to start my business.
About choosing again and again to stay out on my own.

The women I know who've taken this leap?
They're some of the most badass humans I've met.

They've navigated challenges they never imagined when they started:
→ Parting with a cofounder
→ Building a second business alongside the first
→ Burying a beloved dog in the midst of a brutal year
→ Building a sales pipeline while caring for aging family members

We all took on this founder journey for the same reason: 𝘄𝗲 𝘄𝗲𝗿𝗲 𝗱𝗼𝗻𝗲 𝗮𝗰𝗰𝗲𝗽𝘁𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗹𝗶𝗺𝗶𝘁𝘀 𝗷𝘂𝘀𝘁 𝗯𝗲𝗰𝗮𝘂𝘀𝗲 𝘀𝗼𝗺𝗲𝗼𝗻𝗲 𝘀𝗮𝗶𝗱 𝘁𝗵𝗲𝘆 𝗲𝘅𝗶𝘀𝘁𝗲𝗱.

And the whole “until I’ll try, I’ll never know” feels like a founder's rallying cry.
We're out here experimenting, trying things, falling on our faces, learning, and trying again.

If you're reading this, maybe you're a founder, maybe not (or maybe not yet 😉) - but I bet there's somewhere in your work or life where you've been playing it safe, accepting limits that aren't really yours.

𝗪𝗵𝗮𝘁 𝗽𝗮𝗿𝘁 𝗼𝗳 𝘆𝗼𝘂𝗿 𝗹𝗶𝗳𝗲 𝗼𝗿 𝘄𝗼𝗿𝗸 𝗮𝗿𝗲 𝘆𝗼𝘂 𝗱𝗼𝗻𝗲 𝗮𝗰𝗰𝗲𝗽𝘁𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗹𝗶𝗺𝗶𝘁𝘀?

Image: my daughter and I, holding her Playbill for Wicked on Broadway, from a few years ago