There was a season when I was very good at being almost ready.

In 2002, I was a single mom working in child welfare. I wanted to move up. I wanted to earn more.

But to do that, I needed a master’s degree and the only program was over an hour away.

I had every reason not to apply.

I was a single mom to a three-year-old.

I didn’t have money for tuition.

I would need to rely on my son’s father to step up.

I would need to drive back and forth every day.

Everything in front of me said, “Don’t bother. You can’t do this.”

But I applied anyway.

I got a full scholarship and a tutorial assistant position.

My son’s father stepped up.

My girlfriend let me stay over a couple nights a week.

My workplace gave me part-time work.

Everything lined up, but I wouldn’t have known that if I hadn’t tried.

That decision changed my life.

Not because the degree itself was magic, but because doing the thing opened doors.

And the biggest lesson I walked away with was this:

Time is going to pass whether you do it or not.

So how do you want to spend it?

The second lesson?

I can do anything I put my mind to.

And that level of confidence is something nothing can beat.

Too often we let the almost stop us.

We let the logistics, the fear, the inner critic with her very good vocabulary talk us out of what our heart is telling us to do.

But what if you can? What if you try?

If you’re in your “almost” season right now, I see you.

The version of you on the other side of the yes is waiting.

What’s the one thing you keep almost doing?

#AlmostReady #InnerCritic #SingleMom #GradSchool #SocialWork #MSW #PersonalGrowth #WomenInLeadership #SelfTrust #FearVsDiscomfort #YoureNotTheBossOfMe #TherapistOnLinkedIn #TimeWillPass #Confidence

The Ego Doesn’t Want You to See It Clearly

Nobody talks about the ego enough. Not in the way it actually matters.

Not the ego as arrogance, but the ego as the part of you that will do almost anything to avoid feeling wrong, inadequate, or exposed.

The ego is why we double down on a decision we know isn’t working. Why we get defensive when feedback is exactly right. Why we sometimes choose familiar suffering over unfamiliar growth.

Here’s what most people miss: your brain processes feeling wrong the same way it processes physical pain. Same neurological signals. So when someone gets defensive — when you get defensive — that’s not a character flaw.

It’s a brain doing its oldest job: keeping you safe.

And that person you’re sure has an over-inflated ego? Sometimes the biggest ego in the room belongs to the most vulnerable person in it, someone working overtime to protect a fragile sense of self.

This is why everything starts with judgment-free awareness.

Not “what’s wrong with them?” or “what’s wrong with me?” but “what is this brain trying to protect me from?”

Because when you can pause and ask that question, a lot of what feels like conflict turns out to be something else entirely: a segue into actually understanding each other.

What’s one pattern you’ve been calling “just who I am” that might actually be your ego keeping you safe?

#TherapistOnLinkedIn #EmotionalIntelligence #PersonalGrowth #Leadership #SelfLeadership #Relationships #Ego #InnerCritic #Defensiveness #ConflictResolution #GrowthMindset #TheJAMEffect #SelfAwareness #Communication

Turns out, according to my husband’s old neighbor, you have to cut away the old growth before the new can come through. I did it. Within weeks, it bloomed.

I haven’t stopped thinking about it since.

We do the same thing, don’t we?

We keep carrying the old, the hurt, the grudges, the version of ourselves that made sense in a different season, and wonder why we’re not blooming.

Sometimes growth isn’t about adding more. It’s about letting go of what’s already dead weight.

What’s the “old growth” you know you need to cut away? 👇

#WhyCantIMoveOn #HowToLetGo #EmotionalIntelligenceCoach #SelfLeadershipExpert #TherapistTips #MentalWellnessJourney #WomenInTransition #HealingIsNotLinear #ProcessingTrauma #ChooseYourselfFirst

This weekend I managed to injure one tiny toe while walking on a deck at my goddaughter’s wedding venue.

Nothing dramatic, no laces, no sprinting, just a missed step and suddenly every movement hurts more than it should.

That little toe has had me hobbling around and reflecting on how often we take the quiet supports in our lives for granted: our bodies, our relationships, our faith, our colleagues, even our own nervous systems keeping us going in the background.

Today’s invitation? PAUSE and notice one small thing that’s quietly holding you up.

If it disappeared tomorrow, you’d feel its absence immediately.

What’s one “small” thing in your life or work you’re grateful for today?

#SelfAwareness #InnerCritic #EmotionalIntelligence #PsychologicalSafety #Leadership #Gratitude #MentalHealthAtWork

We have a real fear of abandonment.

A real fear that setting a boundary means someone we love decides to leave.

And sometimes, that fear is right, sometimes they do leave.

But people come into our lives for a reason, a season, or a lifetime.

Some outgrow us. We outgrow some.

That’s not failure, that’s just what happens when people grow at different speeds.

I stayed in a job for 19 years, knowing by year 5 that I needed to go.

The golden handcuffs kept me there, you know the benefits, a mortgage, small children, all the “responsible” reasons to stay. When I finally left, everything opened up: entrepreneurship, books, relationships, all of it.

Sometimes I still wonder what might have opened up sooner.

This is the heart of I Before We: learning that a boundary isn’t a wall, it’s a sentence — this is what I will and won’t accept — and that setting one isn’t about losing people.

It’s about making room for what’s actually for you.

Six weeks. Wednesdays, 5:30–7:00 PM ET.

Starting July 15. Fully virtual, women only.

A few seats left.

📍 thematwagroup.com/programs

#IBeforeWe #FearOfAbandonment #BoundariesMatter #GoldenHandcuffs #RelationshipPatterns #HealthyBoundaries #SelfWorth #EmotionalIntelligence #WomenSupportingWomen #InnerWork #TendToTheWound #EverythingHappensForAReason #VirtualWorkshop

I know that sounds dramatic, but it’s true. The amygdala doesn’t distinguish between real physical danger and emotional danger — it just knows unknown means unsafe, and known means safety, even when what’s “known” is actually harmful.

That’s why we repeat what we watched growing up. Not because we’re choosing to, but because our very first caregivers wired our nervous system’s definition of normal. If conflict in your house looked like silence, or yelling, or someone always giving in first — your brain filed that under safety, simply because it was familiar. And it will keep reaching for familiar unless you’re intentional about interrupting it.

This is how intergenerational patterns survive. Not through some conscious decision to repeat harm, but through a brain doing exactly what it’s designed to do: seek the known over the unknown.

The good news is intentionality works. You can’t rewire it by accident, but you can rewire it on purpose. That’s a lot of what we do in I Before We — naming the pattern, understanding where it came from, and building something different in its place.

Six weeks. Wednesdays, 5:30–7:00 PM ET. Starting July 15. Fully virtual, women only. A few seats left.

📍 thematwagroup.com/programs

#IBeforeWe #AttachmentStyles #IntergenerationalPatterns #Neuroscience #EmotionalIntelligence #BreakThePattern #TraumaInformed #RegisteredSocialWorker #InnerWork #TendToTheWound

You are patterned.

And sometimes changing a pattern is smaller than you think.

Your turn: pick a time, set the alarm, and tell me one word for what came up when it went off.

#EmotionalIntelligence #JAMEffect #InnerCritic #SelfLeadership #WomensLeadership #PatternsNotBroken #EmotionalWellness #MentalHealthMatters #GratitudePractice #YoureNotTheBossOfMe

You probably know it. The shoulders drop slightly. The stomach tightens. You start forming the sentence that’s smaller than what you actually think.

Your body knew before you did.

Most of us have been taught to manage our feelings by managing our thoughts. And that works until the feeling hits faster than the thought can form.

That’s where the PAUSE comes in. Not to fix the feeling. Not to talk yourself out of it. But to create enough space to ask:

“Is this moment actually dangerous or does it just feel like one I’ve survived before?”

Your nervous system doesn’t know the difference between a board presentation and a third-grade moment when you said the wrong answer and everyone laughed.

It responds to the feeling of risk, not the actual risk.

This is why some high-functioning people sometimes make their worst decisions in their highest-pressure moments not because they’re not smart enough, but because they’re working from a nervous system that hasn’t gotten the memo that things are different now.

You don’t have to run on instinct. You can PAUSE, check in, and choose.

Where in your life do you most need to practice the pause?

#NervousSystem #PAUSEMethod #InnerCritic #EmotionalIntelligence #PsychologicalSafety #WomenWhoLead #MirrorMoment #SelfLeadership #TherapistOnLinkedIn #YoureNotTheBossOfMe

WELCOME NOTE | BEHIND THE HIGHLIGHT REEL

This month I have been thinking about loneliness.

Not the kind that comes from being alone on a Friday night. The other kind. The kind that shows up in a room full of people who are counting on you. The kind that sits quietly in the driver’s seat while you are performing confidence, making decisions, and holding everyone else together.

Leadership loneliness is real. And almost nobody talks about it -- which, honestly, surprises me because I talk about it constantly. But I think the silence in most professional spaces comes from something deeper than just not having the conversation. It comes from shame. From the fear that admitting you sometimes feel unseen or misunderstood will make you look weak, ungrateful, or like you do not deserve the seat you worked so hard to earn.

This issue is for the person who is doing all the right things and still feels like nobody quite gets it. You are not alone. And the weight you are carrying is heavier than it needs to be.

Let’s get into it.

With warmth,

Jennifer

FEATURE ARTICLE - The Loneliness Nobody Talks About at the Top

There is a particular kind of loneliness that does not get a name.

It is not the loneliness of isolation. It is not the loneliness of having no one around. It is the loneliness of being surrounded by people and still feeling like nobody fully understands what you are carrying.

It lives in leadership. And almost nobody admits to it.

What It Actually Looks Like

In my clinical work and my own leadership experience, loneliness at the top rarely looks like sadness. It looks like drive that the people closest to you cannot quite match or understand. It looks like missing your child’s event and not feeling guilty about it -- and then feeling guilty about not feeling guilty. It looks like wanting to go out with friends but choosing the work, again, and wondering somewhere underneath whether that makes you a bad person or just a focused one.

For women in leadership, there is an added layer. The loneliness of having to fight to be heard. Of bringing an idea to a room and watching it get acknowledged only after someone else says the same thing twenty minutes later. Of carrying the emotional labour of a team while also being expected to perform strength at all times.

And then there is the martyr complex that leadership can quietly cultivate. The belief -- often unconscious -- that everything will collapse without you. That you have to be present for every decision, every crisis, every moment. The ego sometimes needs to believe that. But the truth is it is exhausting. And it is lonely. Because when you believe you are the only one who can hold it all together, you stop letting anyone else in.

The Cost of the Performance

Here is what nobody tells you about performing confidence: it feeds the exact inner critic narrative it is trying to silence.

Every time you put on the show -- the certainty, the composure, the I have got this energy -- while feeling something very different underneath, you are quietly reinforcing the story that the real you is not enough. That if people saw what was actually going on, they would question everything. That you are one honest moment away from being found out.

That is exhausting. Deeply, bone-level exhausting.

And here is the thing I want you to hear: the performance is unnecessary. Belief plus courage plus resilience equals confidence. The mere fact that you are in a leadership position means you believed in yourself enough to go for it. To be a leader means you have made mistakes and kept going. The show is costing you more than it is protecting you.

My Own Version of This

I will be honest with you because that is the only way this works.

I have been blessed with business partners I can be truly open with. That has been one of the greatest gifts of my professional life. But there are times when my drive and my vision feel lonely in a different way -- when the people I love most do not quite understand where I am going or why it matters so much to me.

Now here is where I have to catch myself. Because sometimes that loneliness is real. And sometimes it is a story I am telling myself. I have had deeply aligned conversations with certain friends and family members who show up for my vision completely. But in the moments when I feel misunderstood, my brain conveniently forgets all of that evidence. It curates the loneliness and calls it the truth.

That is the inner critic at work. And it is worth naming.

Alone Versus Lonely: There Is a Difference

Being alone in leadership and being lonely in leadership are not the same thing.

In leadership, you are never truly alone. No one becomes a leader in isolation. There are always people around, always support available, always someone who has walked a version of this path before you.

The question is whether you are using the support you have.

Feeling lonely is often -- not always, but often -- a result of the story you are telling yourself. That no one understands. That you cannot speak freely. That trust is too risky. Those feelings are worth examining. Not to dismiss them, but to ask honestly: is this true? Or is this my inner critic keeping me small and separate because connection feels vulnerable?

What I Want You to Know

If you recognized yourself in any of this, here is what I want to say directly to you.

You are not alone. Stop performing like you are.

There is a weight that lifts when you choose honesty over performance. Not reckless oversharing -- but real, grounded authenticity with people who have earned it. You do not have to have it all figured out to be worthy of your leadership. You do not have to be unaffected to be effective.

The loneliness you are carrying is real. And it is also, at least partly, optional.

INNER CRITIC CORNER

What she says:

“You are not ready. Go back to school first. Get another credential. Launch the product when the time is right -- and right now is definitely not the time.”

Why she is lying:

The inner critic is not a career advisor. She is a fear manager. And her favourite tool is delay. There will never be a perfect time, a sufficient credential, or a readiness that satisfies her. She will always move the goalpost.

What to tell her instead:

“I have everything I need to take the next step. Not every step. Just the next one.”

THE REFRAME | ONE TOOL YOU CAN USE THIS WEEK

When the loneliness or the self-doubt gets loud, try the T.A.G. Method before you do anything else.

T Tell Yourself the Truth.

What is actually happening right now? Strip away the story and state just the fact.

A Affirm Your Capacity.

You have navigated hard things before. Name one. Remind your nervous system that you have evidence of your own resilience.

G Give Yourself Proof.

What evidence actually exists that contradicts the lonely narrative? Who in your life does get it, even a little? What support is available that you have not reached for yet?

The goal is not to make the feeling disappear. The goal is to stop letting the feeling make decisions on your behalf.

For the deeper work on rewriting the patterns underneath, the full T.A.G. and P.A.I.D. frameworks live in You’re Not the Boss of Me: Slaying the Inner Critic.

AWL PARTNERS SPOTLIGHT

All Women L.E.A.D. is the gender equity branch of AWL Partners, a leadership and organizational development company dedicated to building workplaces and communities where everyone can thrive. You will find a brief AWL spotlight in every issue because the work we do there and the work we do here are rooted in the same belief: that when people know themselves better, they lead better.

We are wrapping up a strong speaker season and the energy heading into September is extraordinary. The new season, Be The Change, launches in September and it is shaping up to be one of the most powerful lineups we have built. If you want to be in the room, get on the list early.

Full details and registration at awlpartners.com/upcoming-events.html

REFLECTION QUESTION

Are you happy or satisfied with your life right now?

If yes, that is worth celebrating and worth examining. What created that? How do you protect it?

If not, sit with the harder question: why not? Not the surface answer. The real one. And then ask yourself the one question that actually matters -- what are you going to do about it?

MONTHLY AFFIRMATION

You are allowed to feel what you feel.

The feelings are not the problem.

Your method of coping and managing them is where the real work lives.

You are not too sensitive. You are not too much.

You are human, doing a hard thing,

in a world that rarely makes space for that truth.

Feel it. Then choose what you do next.

A NOTE FROM JENNIFER

Thank you for being here for the very first issue of The Human Side of Success. This newsletter exists because the conversations that matter most are the ones we are not having out loud. I hope this becomes a space where you feel safe enough to have them.

Hit reply and tell me: did any of this land? What do you want me to explore next month?

With warmth and honesty,

Jennifer

Registered Social Worker | Speaker | Author

jen@awlpartners.com calendly.com/jen-awlpartners/30min

AWL Partners | All Women L.E.A.D. | The Matwa Group

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Let me be honest with you from the start: I almost didn’t do this.

Not because I didn’t have anything to say, I have been sitting with these ideas for years. But because putting your real thoughts in writing, for real people to read, requires a kind of courage that even a therapist has to work up to.

So here we are.

The Human Side of Success exists because high achievers are some of the loneliest people in the room and nobody is saying that out loud. We talk about the promotions, the goals, the frameworks for peak performance. We do not talk about the anxiety underneath the confidence, the exhaustion behind the highlight reel, or what it actually feels like to be the person everyone else leans on.

This newsletter is about that. The gap between how people appear and how they actually feel. The messy, complicated, deeply human experience of trying to grow, professionally, personally, and emotionally, without losing yourself in the process.

Here is what you can expect, every issue:

• Behind the Highlight Reel — A short, honest note from me. Something I noticed that week. Unpolished on purpose.

• What Nobody’s Talking About — The main feature. Real thought leadership on the things we collectively avoid saying.

• Inner Critic Corner — Three lines. What it’s saying. Why it’s lying. What to tell it instead.

• The Reframe — One practical tool or shift in thinking you can actually use. Not a listicle. One thing, done well.

• AWL Partners Spotlight — A quick look at what’s happening in the community I’m proud to be part of.

• The Closing Question — One question I genuinely want you to think about. This is where conversation starts.

• The Affirmation — Something that feels like a hand on your shoulder before you go.

Seven sections. Under eight minutes to read. Because respecting your time is part of the brand.

Issues drop monthly, starting in July 2026.

I am Jennifer Matwawana — Registered Social Worker, speaker, and author of You’re Not the Boss of Me: Slaying the Inner Critic. I have spent years in clinical practice watching brilliant, capable people quietly fall apart behind very impressive exteriors.

This newsletter is for them. For you.

No highlight reel. Just real.

Subscribe now

If someone forwarded this to you and it landed, trust that. Subscribe below and come find out what’s really going on beneath the surface.