The Promotions Were Real. The Power Wasn’t.

Why so many brilliant women rise, but not really…

Let’s talk about the top of the ladder.

You’ve made it.
The office, the title, the meeting seat that once felt off-limits.
You’re managing budgets, leading teams, shaping strategy across regions.

From the outside?
You are power.

But inside?
Something’s off.

The friction is getting harder to ignore.
You’re exhausted in a way that vacations don’t fix.
You question your value even as others lean harder on you.
You carry the work — all of it — but it doesn’t seem to land.

You’re not crazy.

You’re not broken.

You’re not alone.

You’re just waking up to a truth most people never dare name:

The promotions were real.
The power wasn’t.

Corporate Cinderella

I call it the Corporate Cinderella Effect.

You do the work.
You keep the wheels turning.
You know where the bodies are buried and how the projects are built.

And yet… you’re still stuck below the stairs.

Invisible.
Under-resourced.
Smiling while someone else presents your ideas.

You’re the wizard behind the throne —
The quiet force powering execs who shine on panels, close deals, and get credit for magic you made.

And the real kicker?

You’ve been trained to tolerate it.

Not because you’re weak.
But because you were raised to be good.

Good Girl Programming

My clients are some of the sharpest women alive.

MIT grads. Barristers. Policy wonks. C-suite operators.

The girls “going places.”
Bright. Polished. Rule-abiding.

Exceptional — as long as they didn’t get too loud, too weird, or too much…

So they followed the script.

They met expectations.
Crushed deliverables.
Ticked every damn box.

And along the way, they learned something dangerous:

“What I want doesn’t matter.”
“My job is to be excellent, not visible.”
“My worth is in what I do, not who I am.”

Sound familiar?

When the Soul Says No

Here’s the thing:
What looks like burnout?
Is often your soul saying, “No more.”

No more pretending.
No more pouring energy into roles that feel like bit parts in bad wigs (shiny, stiff, entirely fake.)

Because at some point, your soul rebels.
It whispers…

“This isn’t it.”
”This is not who I came here to be.”
”This is not my beautiful life.”

That quiet revolt?

It’s not collapse.
It’s initiation.

You’re not breaking down.
You’re waking up.

The Illusion of Power

Let’s go there:

Most of what passes for power in corporate culture?

It’s mimicry.

Posture without presence.
Strategy without soul.
Leadership cosplay.

You’ve seen it:

The polished operator who sucks the oxygen out of a room.
The “people-first” exec who burns through staff like matchsticks.
The “corporate values” no one actually lives by.

And there you are.

Holding real power — intuitive, relational, wise.
But unacknowledged, because it doesn’t fit the mold.

That’s not your failure.

It’s the system doing exactly what it was built to do:
Reward the mask, punish the truth.

Why You’re Still in the Shadows

Let’s get honest.

If you’ve spent years behind the throne…
If you’ve dimmed your voice while shaping million-dollar outcomes…

There’s a reason.

At some level (conscious or not), it’s safer to be unseen.

Why?

Because visibility is risky.

And for many women, that risk is ancient.

You may carry the residue of soul contracts and lifetimes where:

• Your gifts got you punished.

• Your voice got you exiled.

• Your light attracted harm.

Somewhere deep down, you decided:

“Better to serve quietly than to lead visibly.”

But here’s what’s true now:

Playing small doesn’t keep you safe.
It just keeps you stuck.

And you're not here to stay stuck.

The Seat You Actually Want

Many clients arrive wanting a better seat at the table.

More recognition.
More resources.
More respect.

And yes, those things matter.

But what they really want?

To stop begging to belong.

To stop bending their brilliance to fit systems that were never designed for soul.

What they want — and what you want, I suspect —
Isn’t a title.

It’s sovereignty.

Not performance.
But presence.

And that? Doesn’t come from the org chart.
It comes from within.

Your Throne Is Waiting

The journey from “wizard behind the throne” to “wizard on your own throne”
isn’t just more personal development.

It’s a soul retrieval.

It’s ancestral.
Energetic.
Existential.

You have to face the fear of your own light.

Clear the vows and past life patterns that keep you hidden.

Reclaim the power you’ve dimmed for lifetimes — and install it into your leadership now.

That’s not coaching.

That’s consecration.

And when you do?

You don’t just get seen.
You get felt.

You don’t just succeed.
You transmit.

You become the woman your soul always knew you were:

Visible.
Vital.
Sovereign.

Not because someone gave you a seat…

But because you remembered the throne was always yours.

Because you weren’t born to run someone else’s kingdom.
You were born to rise in your own light.