Hello beautiful soul
There was a moment early in my career when I realised something quietly unsettling.
I couldn’t find the kind of leader I wanted to be anywhere around me.
In fact, worse than that, the leadership I saw, in particular from a lot of senior women, gave me the ick.
I had started immersing myself fully into corporate culture, learning the rules, observing the dynamics, watching who spoke, who held back, who cared enough to be inclusive.
And honestly?
Something didn’t sit right.
I saw brilliance, yes.
But I also saw people annihilating each other to survive.
I saw performance over presence.
Power without depth.
Leadership that felt disconnected from humanity.
As I looked around me, I struggled to find examples of women leading that felt like home.
Not because powerful women leaders didn’t exist.
But because many of the models I saw were shaped by systems that required contortion rather than authenticity.
So I did something instinctive.
I started looking elsewhere.
In my early 30's I spent time in different communities, outside the workplace, searching — although I didn’t know at the time that that’s what I was doing.
One of those communities was the street art world in London. I became a mega street art nerd (me in that era above). I loved it.
I watched artists innovate in public spaces, rebelling against the system in their own sweet ways.
Leading by also simply choosing a life and career that felt truly aligned, which fely quietly radical.
They created beauty in sometimes the bleakest of Central London spaces.
Demonstrated values through expression rather than hierarchy.
There was something deeply alive about it.
Leadership without titles.
Influence without permission.
Another community that deeply shaped me — and still does to this day — is the Rastafarian community (and the Black community in general actually).
And this is where I first witnessed something that changed me.
Embodied leadership.
For Rastafarians, living itself is an act of worship.
There is a sovereignty in how they move.
A reverence for life.
A deep understanding that the body is a vessel carrying purpose.
I watched people lead not through domination or performance, but through presence.
Through connection, to self, to each other, to the divine.
Through community, by often sharing food even when the events primary focus was music.
Through love being at the heart of everything.
And something inside me recognised itself.
Because I had always carried this ache — this sense that leadership should feel different.
More human.
More embodied.
More connected to something larger than ego.
Slowly, without realising it, I began constructing my leadership identity not from what I saw inside corporate environments, but from what I gathered across many worlds.
I became a kind of filtration device.
Oh, I like that.
That resonates.
That doesn’t feel true.
That’s not who I want to become.
And honestly, I think this is what leadership should be.
Not imitation. Integration.
Since then, many of my leadership mentors and inspirations have existed outside traditional corporate leadership spaces.
Artists.
Spiritual teachers.
Community builders.
People who embody their values rather than speak about them.
Because the truth is this:
If the models available to you don’t feel aligned, you are allowed to look beyond them.
You are allowed to create your own blueprint.
And maybe right now, more than ever, we need to.
Because what we currently see isn’t working.
The systems we’ve inherited are exhausted.
The leadership models we’ve normalised are showing their limits.
And the next evolution of leadership will not come from repeating what already exists.
It will come from women — and humans — willing to learn differently.
To gather wisdom from unexpected places.
To build identities rooted in embodiment rather than performance.
So I’m curious.
Who stands out to you as someone who truly role models leadership — especially outside the traditional workplace?
Who embodies something real?
Who moves differently?
Hit reply and let me know.
I’m going to curate everyone’s answers, because I have a feeling together we’re going to create something powerful.
And maybe that list becomes a new map for what leadership can look like.
And speaking of leadership…
I’m currently deep in preparation for my upcoming TEDx talk in Jasper, Florida on March 14th, and I am genuinely SO excited about it.
I’ll be speaking about relationships, relational dynamics, power, and the deeper context behind why women show up the way we do in the workplace today.
Because when you really look closely, so much of how we operate makes perfect sense based on what we’ve experienced — individually and collectively.
And when we understand that, everything shifts.
How we lead.
How we relate.
How we reclaim our voice and agency.
It feels like a full-circle moment for me, and I can’t wait to share more with you as it unfolds.
One final thing on that... people have asked me about if I am planning to do a TEDx for YEARS. But it wasn't the right season yet. The right season for it is right now, at almost 46 years old.
So I say all that to say: you are not behind my darling. You are right on time for exactly who and where you are meant to be.
Right here, walking alongside me.
Rooting for you always
Ruth x
Ps. I’m also hosting my first ever in-person yoga workshop in New York on Saturday March 28th — and if you’re NYC-based I would absolutely love to see you there. Here’s the link: https://luma.com/q3pmtenh
Please share with your friends also!
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