It's Messy Middle Monday
and Women's History Month!
I’ve been thinking a lot about what it really takes for women to lead businesses sustainably — not just successfully.
Last week I came across a post from Elenor Beaton that stopped me mid-scroll. One line in particular stuck with me:
“At one point I started interpreting every business constraint as a personal development problem.”
She went on to describe how easy it is for women entrepreneurs to assume the solution is always more confidence, more visibility, more mindset work.
Revenue plateau? Confidence problem.
Distribution challenge? Visibility problem.
Capital gap? Abundance mindset.
Her point was sharp and uncomfortable: women are often sold advice while the structural support that actually changes outcomes is much harder to access.
And if I’m honest, that observation hit close to home.
Because the longer I work with women running businesses, the more I see a pattern that almost nobody talks about.
Success has a funny way of making you feel like you’re failing.
From the outside, things look great. The clients are there. The reputation is growing. Opportunities are showing up.
But internally?
It can feel like you’re constantly running just to keep the ball rolling. Every day becomes reactive — answering messages, managing deliverables, solving problems for clients or team members — with almost no space to step back and think strategically.
And then something else starts creeping in.
You begin to see real opportunities to grow your business… but you’re quietly wondering if the infrastructure you have is strong enough to hold it.
What worked to get you here suddenly feels a little fragile for where you’re trying to go next.
And the idea of pausing to actually get organized can feel scary in its own way — like taking your foot off the gas might cost you clients or momentum.
Which leads to the small thing I’ve been experimenting with lately — for myself and in conversations with founders I work with.
It’s a simple exercise I call a CEO Energy Map.
Nothing fancy. Just a quick way to look at where your leadership attention is actually going right now.
Instead of tracking time, the idea is to notice which of these four areas is consuming most of your energy:
Does your energy match the CEO you want to be?
That’s it. No guilt-trip or self empowerment message. Just something to notice. Because sometimes the messy middle isn’t about doing more.
Sometimes it’s about realizing that the business you’ve built now needs a different version of you to lead it forward.
