Coloring Outside the Lines at all Ages & Stages

sWhat you Missed… 

FEW Japan members gathered around the (virtual) fireside for an open, heartfelt conversation with two extraordinary women, Angela Ortiz Pettas and Ginger Griggs on December 12, 2024 for our Members’ Meeting titled “Coloring Outside the Lines at all Ages & Stages”

The intimate conversation held online brought together our members to rethink the possibilities of an abundant and interesting life full of opportunities at every age and stage.

Event Highlights

The evening began with a warm welcome from Laura Staub and Maud Niemi, Directors of Member Engagement, who introduced our guest speakers for a warm and open conversation.

Key components of the event included:

1. Holiday season: Co-President Stephanie Napier acknowledged the holiday season's mix of joy and challenges, especially for expats far from home, the pressure in creating holiday magic for others. The evening’s program aims to provide support and connection through inspiring stories from two extraordinary women.
2. Inspiring journeys: Our guest speakers  Angela Ortiz Pettas and Ginger Griggs shared their experiences at different life stages. They talked about learning your way to new careers, making bold moves, going through traumatic experiences and how to overcome them
3. Questions from our members:
   Our members had time to ask questions to Angela & Ginger and reflect on their own journey in a safe space for womxn.

Key Takeaways

• Finding your way by learning new skills:

1. 1. Using and applying your existing knowledge to help you pivot and thrive in new environments (people skills, project management, capitalizing upon knowledge from NPO to morph to another industry, such as CSR…)
   2. Learning a new language, a new career, a new culture, a new fitness regimen.
   3. Being inquisitive, asking questions to understand what people need and how to support them, rather than assuming we already know. 
   4. Inviting others in to support us in finding answers and allowing them to guide us in finding out what we need to know to move forward to help them best.
   5. Learning how to outsource to people who are better at certain fields of expertise.
   6. Learning persistence of a gentle nudge, rather than overpowering somebody. Helping them find a way to trust you and come back to you to open up. 
2. Making bold moves and being courageous:
   1. Starting a disaster relief nonprofit without prior experience in that field of work.
   2. Returning to school later in life to get an MBA after 20 years of being a teacher. 
   3. Moving to a new country with no language skills, barely any money and no market knowledge.
   4. Willing to keep believing in and then reinventing yourself. ‘You can’t do that’ is just a label people put on you. Be the best that you can be without putting yourself in a box.
   5. Sticking with the belief in your own vision, rather than letting any situation or negative person around you scare you from your path.
3. Going through traumatic events and how to overcome them: Our trusted relationships and community of support will help us get through loss & grief, divorce, unemployment, overdue bills, the Tohoku Great East Japan Earthquake, and more. Build your relationships and invest in communities of people who see you, cherish you, and celebrate you! 

Questions from our members

Career evolution:

• Aspire to be good enough, not perfect.  

• Practice the language in a less pressured environment such as with friends or through volunteering in spaces where they are just glad you want to help.
• Forget about being perfect and try to be good enough.

How to build confidence?

• Find a particular area that you're good at and make that part of the story of who you are and why you enjoy that thing you are great at.  
• Build resilience to have the skills to deal with negativity and negative people
• Study coaching can help because it is a practice that you have to do over and over again to remain objective.
• Remain curious and keep asking questions of yourself to test the stories you tell yourself (is it true?) and also that you can ask others to draw out and get to see the best of other people.