Jones Alexis - I am that girl : how to speak your truth, discover your purpose, and #bethatgirl

How to speak your truth,
discover your purpose,
and #bethatgirl

Copyright 2014 by Alexis Jones

All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without written permission from the publisher.

The content of this book has been prepared for informational purposes only. Although anyone may find the ideas, concepts, practices, suggestions, recommendations, disciplines, and understandings presented in this book to be useful, the contents of this book are provided with the understanding that neither the author nor the publisher is engaged in providing any specific business advice to the reader. Nor is anything in this book intended to be a strategy or recommendation for any specific kind of business problem or business opportunity. Each person and business has unique needs, qualities, resources, abilities, and other attributes and this book cannot take these individual differences into account. Each person and business should engage a qualified professional to address his, her, or its unique situation.

Ten percent of the authors proceeds will go towards supporting I Am That Girl 501(c)(3).

I AM THAT GIRL: How to speak your truth, discover your purpose, and #bethatgirl

Published by Evolve Publishing, Inc.

www.evolvepublishing.com

Interior design by Ramsdell Design

Cover design by AVEC.US

978-0-9893222-8-7 paperback

978-0-9882245-7-5 ePUB

978-0-9893222-7-0 ePDF

Printed in the United States of America

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

For my mom, my dad, and Jane.

I am who I am because of you.

Thank you for giving me wings to fly.

I love you.

And to you my dear, reading this book,

and to all the girls I have met along this awesome journey.

I do what I do because of you.

What do you want? What makes you happy? Write your own constitution and start living by your own rules.

Are you compassionate with yourself? Practice making you a priority in your own life.

Hows your work ethic? Stop making excuses for not taking steps toward your dreams and start making them come true.

Do you dance to the beat of your own drum? Stop worrying so much about the naysayers and start surrounding yourself with people who support your dreams.

Dream big. Then even (especially!) when everyone else thinks it cant be done, put on your big girl boots and do it anyway.

Do you give up after the first sign of failure or rejection? Practice your rebounding skills and learn how to get up when youre knocked down.

Learn all you can from the awesome chicks (and dudes) who have come before you. Track down a mentor and soak up their knowledge.

Love yourself, live your purpose, and share your gifts.

My dear friend, my soul sister, girl-who-can-finish-my-sentences-before-I-do Alexis Jones called me to ask me a question. Would I write the foreword to her book? I ... uh ... Would I what? What would I say? Where would I start? What was she possibly thinking? The swell of fear and self-doubt began almost instantly. I found myself saying Id be so honored into the receiver while trying not to throw up all at the same time. She paid me some incredibly powerful compliments, telling me what a light I am in her life and in the lives of the girls I talk to every day. How much my passion and perspective mean to her and to my audience. What a fearless warrior for girls I am. I heard the words, but none of them could get past the force field of panic that had quickly enveloped me. Remember that movie Bubble Boy? I felt like that kid, trapped inside a plastic bubble. But my bubble was comprised of all of my innermost fears and deepest, secret insecurities. They were screaming things like, Im much better in the moment! How will I sit and write something without being inspired in the moment by a global issue, a twitter storm, or an injustice being done somewhere? I am terrible with a blank piece of paper. I need parameters. I need ... And in that moment I started laughing. It was slow, and then it got weird. Because I was laughing hysterically, all alone in my house, with my dogs looking up at me like I was going crazy.

Want to know why I laughed? Because I realized I was smack in the middle of my own global issue. Girl-on-girl hate is a pandemic. And in this case, it was my inner critic hating on me. The screaming doubts. The shame spiral of inadequacy. Those things were all coming from inside myself. And I remembered something my friend Jo likes to say whenever any of her friends are criticizing themselves. Hey. Thats my best friend youre talking about like that. Its amazing to see girls react to that statement. Yeah, youre saying some truly negative things about my best friend. That friend just happens to be you. Why dont we love ourselves the way we love our friends, ladies? Because I know Id die for my best friends. Id run into a burning building, stand up to the most frightening opponent, and push myself harder and farther than I thought I could possibly go for any of you. So why not for me?

There are plenty of theories out there about why this happens. How we are taught to self-shame by society. How we are pitted against each other in some imaginary competition that becomes more and more real as we play it. How we are simultaneously hyper-sexualized and demonized for our sexuality. How we are criticized for being too fat, too thin, too girly, too butch. We get put down an awful lot. And we not only take it, we dish it out. Well, guess what? That is done. Done. One more time ... shout it out with me ... D-O-N-E. Lets go ahead, throw in the towel, and go have a meal together instead, shall we?

Now, to get to my point, I actually need to take you all back a bit. Way back. To college. A little over a decade agoa decade which, by the way, has gone by in a flash yet also feels like its taken 100 years to passI was a student at the University of Southern California. Id arrived at USC from an incredible, and incredibly tough, all girls prep school called Westridge. I arrived at college outspoken, highly educated, sheltered, utterly confused, and completely open-minded. But not without judgment. Sorority girls? Stupid. Party animals. Never going to be my friends. Until I found out one of my favorite girls from my hometown happened to be in one, and she was still a philanthropic wunderkind and academic superstar. She encouraged me to look beyond the stereotypes. Were there party girls in some sororities who were only in college to get what some girls call an MRS degree? Sure. But why did that affect me? There were also many brilliant, motivated, cultured, and culturally varied girls, pursuing academia as well as full social calendars. What was so wrong with that?

I was swayed by ideas of large-scale study groups and resources including senior students being able to help you out with work. I was also swayed by the way that the houses felt similar to the school Id come from. Big groups of cool girls, hanging out on the front lawns of their Greek houses the way Id hung out on the Westridge quad. And, low and behold, I was a Greek system girl. It was at USC that I first became the philanthropy chair of my sorority housea title I held for two yearsand learned to give my hyper-motivated-all to causes. It was there that I learned how to balance being an honors student on an academic scholarship with weekends spent cheering on our sports teams, going to formals, and learning who I was away from the safety net of home. I made mistakes. I had immense successes. I had my heart brokenutterly shatteredbut I also broke a few hearts as well. It was glorious, silly, inspiring, messy, motivating, childish, and oh-so-grown-up. It was real life because it was gray and fluid and ever-changing. I learned to let go of my judgments. I learned to accept myselfALL of myself. The good, the bad, and the in-between. And, somewhere in the blur of love and joy and growing up at college, I met Alexis Jones. You might not think of Lex as a sorority girl either. Well, were sorority sisters all right. And best friends. In a place that seems like it could be a cauldron of girl-on-girl bullying and backstabbing, I made a friend for life. I knew she was special then. She was magnetic. Motivated. Excited about everything. A truly shining light. And she still is all of those things.