I have received Becoming by Michelle Obama for Christmas 2018. When you enter my office room: in front you is my vision board (I developed with my coach Celine Chatti last year) where Michelle picture is occupying one third the space!! ?

I was thrilled when we decided to start at WomenLiftUp the book club with Michelle Obama. I was not only excited to read it for a second time, but as well so happy to share with my bookmates our views and our feelings.

Her story is resonating with me. I know I am not the only one to relate to her for various reasons

I could summarize my personal takeaways around few key words.

1.       Not fitting in and how to find your own voice. Sometimes in the beginning of her life, she felt being in between 2 worlds. Sometimes you are coming from a world where speaking and acting a certain way looks like you are denying your culture… and at the same time you evolve in a world where you don’t know all the codes.

2.       Being enough: the question of “am I enough?” , the noise as she is describing it, will never go away . You could be scared of failing but as she is saying “failure is a feeling long before it becomes an actual result”. But she had faith in her own history. Confidence should come from within ourselves. “AM I GOOD ENOUGH?. YES I AM”

3.       Balance your personal life as a mother and a work you love, and the feeling of struggling doing everything part time. How do you balance the competing worlds of family life and work in your life? In the world we live today the question is in my opinion even more relevant.

4.       Giving back: being able to get out of your world is one thing, changing this world for others is something else. This is how she started in her first job at the law firm, how she was involved in the hiring process to challenge the way they hire, how could you really attract more diverse candidates?

5.       Finding your purpose, asking yourself how you would like to contribute to the world.

She realized that she didn’t really take the time to ask herself this question. When she worked in an ONG helping students she realized for the first time in her life that she felt she did something meaningful, impacting life of others.

Being at Washington she created several programs, one being education for girls.

She believes from her own experience that when you invest in the education of someone, when you get interested the same way her parents invested in her, it makes a difference.

Like her I believe in education, how it can elevate anyone: EDUCATION HAS BEEN THE PRIMARY INSTRUMENT OF CHANGE IN MY OWN LIFE”

Michelle continues more than ever to be a role model. I consider her as being part of my group of guides in my “Hero journey”. My own conclusion: listen more to my little voice, owning more than ever my history, contribute at my scale to this world, in particular by investing in education of others. This is where I am proud and so thankful we have started with 2 friends our non-profit last year, “Momentum foundation”

Sheherazade Lesueur