Giving

This Saturday is International Women’s Day.

When I read the theme of #IWD my first thought was #WTF!

“Give to Gain”. Scrambled my head. My first thought was how women give constantly day in, day out! Ironically often for very little personal gain!

Give to Gain. It sounds lovely on a poster. But for a lot of women, the word "give" lands in our bodies like a heavy sigh.

Because we already give. A lot. We give at work, we give at home, we give to our friends, our kids, our communities. We give when we're tired. We give when nobody asks. We give so automatically that we don't even clock it anymore.

The shitty truth is that unconscious giving erodes us.
We wake up empty.
We start the day depleted.
We constantly disappoint ourselves to honour others.

I believe that our energy is designed to be given away but you cannot give what you haven't got. Except we do. We give and we give until we no longer recognise ourselves. In an effort not to lose others, we lose ourselves.

The women I admire most aren't the ones who give the most. They're the ones who've figured out how to fill themselves up first, and then give from that fullness. That's the real gain. That's the version of "give to gain" I want to be part of.

My energy framework: Get it, Guard it, Give it, starts with getting for a reason. You don't start with the giving. You start with YOU. You go and find what fills you up. You protect it like it matters. And then, from that full place, you give. And here's the beautiful part, when you give from fullness, it comes back. Energy is transferable. What you put into the world, you attract back.

Women have been told for generations that the generous thing is to put yourself last. We have been trained to be in service from a very early age. In service to notice what needs doing, to do what others don’t. We are even taught that being selfless is honourable! Putting yourself last doesn't make you honourable. It makes you depleted.

I think that the most generous thing you can do for the people around you is take responsibility for your own energy. To be an example. Fill your own cup. Turn up full. That's the real gain.

This International Women's Day, the invitation isn't to give more. It's to get better at GAIN! Focus on receiving, rest, support, joy, help and space. When you get good at that, the giving takes care of itself.

Your energy introduces you before you do. Turning up wrecked and exhausted is not cool in 2026.

That's my theme!