Becoming by Michele Obama — Leadership lessons.
“For me, becoming isn’t about arriving somewhere or achieving a certain aim. I see it instead as forward motion, a means of evolving, a way to reach continuously toward a better self. The journey doesn’t end.” — Michele Obama
A previous couple of months have been a busy schedule, and I could not find time to read. Moreover, my travel time to work was almost 1 hr or more daily. With work pressure and stress, traffic adds to the frustrations that I could not spend enough time reading. I decided to download audiobooks, though I was not sure if this would be effective. By the end of the two months, I completed two books. “Becoming” was one of them.
Becoming had mixed reviews from my friends and in my network. There were a lot of reasons I picked this book for listening mostly importantly for me, Michele Obama’s speeches were always inspiring. One of the most powerful lines I remember is, “I wasn’t bossy, I was confident and strong.”
Many times, I go into the shell that the eco-system creates for you as a woman with many conscious and unconscious bias. During these times, Michele Obama’s speech as one of the best pep talks for being the best of myself.
Sincerely I liked “Becoming” Audiobook. Mostly it was Michele Obama’s voice. Driving to work and back home, it felt like she was narrating her story. It felt like she was with you. I utilized the time during the driving as well, and the frustration turned into excitement to listen to the book.
Michele Obama, as a lawyer, businesswoman, educator, powerful speaker, wife, and mother, the former first lady talks about her life in an intimate portrait of women playing all the roles.Michelle Obama talks about her journey from a child growing up in a humble home in the south side of Chicago to her position as First Lady of the United States.
Women need to learn to lift their energy when we go through the discrimination of gender, race, and color every day. Obama portrays her excellent leadership characteristics in every phase. The audiobook taught me many lessons of leadership lessons and helped me to “Lean In,” especially on the days when I was not able to do more or demotivated.
Becoming Me — Believe in yourself, being compassionate and courageous.
“Your story is what you have, what you will always have. It is something to own.”
Leadership begins at home. Michele Robinson to Michele Obama was the journey that starts from the education. She believed education was the key to success. Michele Obama paid a lot of importance to this even today. Right from helping herself to go to Princeton and being First Lady was to visit schools populated by historically marginalized groups and empowering girls to push themselves.
Her strong character helped her fight for social issues and inspire others means standing up for what you believe. Regardless of opposing views, controversial situations, or fear of the “status quo,” she lived by her values.
“One of the lessons that I grew up with was to always stay true to yourself and never let what somebody else says distract you from your goals.”
Here is what I learned, the choices of life are many, but it’s essential to believe in yourselves and the values. Never get distracted from your goals and values. Whenever there is a question, “Am I good enough?” even if you struggle to say “Yes” but say “Yes.” Don’t let your mistake pull you down, learn from them, and raise the standard of meeting your values every day. It’s vital to experience the risks, criticism in extreme forms, but we should always earn respect through integrity.
Becoming Us — Intimacy, vulnerability and graceful under pressure
“For me, marriage was more like a full-on merger, a reconfiguring of two lives into one, with the well-being of a family taking precedence over anyone’s agenda or goal.”
I like the introduction of Barack Obama in the book. A beautiful way of Michele Obama’s life transition, Barack Obama as her mentee and who becomes part of her life. She beautiful depicted her engagement and how she embraced every stage of life. Her love for Barack Obama is heartwarming even though they were opposites. “The problem is we don’t know each other, we don’t let each other in,” she writes in her book. She credits her husband to teach her to change the path to discover her destiny and finding a way to care for others. There is greater strength in difference and learning from them.
Unifying any group of people is one of the most significant and most challenging tasks of a leader. It requires to be compassionate and never views the challenges as a disadvantage.
The emotional part of the journey was when she had a miscarriage and later conceived Sasha and Malia through in vitro fertilization. The journey of the women during the conceiving, especially during the help of medical help is always lonely. How much your spouse stands next to you or does not hold. It demoralizes you to the cellular. The first part is accepting that you cannot conceive, the second part is going through the lonely road with medical help, and the third part is the social silence and no acceptance. It takes a lot of courage to talk about it and express the feelings which you go through daily and yet smile when people around you go silent as they learned you could not conceive.
She takes us through her joy later when Shash and Malia enter the Obamas’ life and how they lived their childhood and every bit of happiness and innocence of the children. Life is always happening; we need to embrace the challenge and live it!
She has become one of the most influential and inspirational speakers, irrespective of the criticism she faced. Every speech she practices, she asked and took help, and every time she was more powerful. She didn’t limit her dreaming based on the limitations of her circumstances nor for her family. She leads by example.
Becoming More — Time Management, finding and serving the community
“If you don’t get out there and define yourself, you’ll be quickly and inaccurately defined by others.”
The journey of the marriage beautiful, and it takes two individuals to learn about each other, compromise without guilt, and understand each other’s priorities and valuing the same. The new dimension gets added to children. She talks about among all the priorities to serve their nation how Obamas played a critical role being for both their daughter. Beginning when they were born, the first days of school, freshmen days, or their birthdays. She reveals her feelings while she lived in the White House. Michelle established a detailed schedule that did not depend on Barack’s ever-shifting agenda. It helped her married life, and the plan allowed her to regain “calmness and strength” in the political chaos. The importance of time management and health becomes a strong value in your leadership. She talks about the importance of the family, which we ignore and health. I learned a lot of significance of investment in time , health and family. We all know it, but we ignore it and always focused on the rat race!
Michele Obama has always been a community organizer and serving the community. She has always role modeled women, worked to create poverty awareness, education, nutrition, and eating healthy. Be it growing organic vegetables in white house or importance of Girls education, her interest and expertise let her move to the public sector. Breaking down the barrier was an essential characteristic of her personality. In my opinion, that’s when you lead communities, your honesty and authenticity shapes the community.
For me, her campaign to reduce childhood obesity and encourage a healthy lifestyle in children was motivating. Let’s Move and Let Girls Learn are very inspirational, which shows that she cares about society. You become a great leader only by helping other, and her initiatives talk about the excellent thought leadership lessons.
Obama also brings in more memories, filled with interactions with the Queen of England and special moments with many prominent leaders. I had so much of learning from her various initiatives as the first lady and leading the life of the First lady like the organic garden, serving the military family, and empowering the girls to educate. Finally, Obama walks us through the emotions of saying goodbye and starting a new.
She sets an example, as we earn the privilege of life and learned many things, we need to learn to Give back to the community. Give back to the people who need support and empowerment to grow, and this only makes us stronger together.
