Knowing your worth

– SheCreates Networking

Before we talk about business… before titles, roles, income brackets, social media numbers, or what we do.

I want us to remember who we are.

Every woman in this room arrived today carrying something invisible.

A story.

A doubt.

A quiet question that sounds like:

Am I enough?

Am I doing enough?

Do I belong here?

2026

And today, I want to gently but firmly say this:

Your worth is not up for negotiation.

Not in business.

Not in relationships.

Not in rooms where you feel the urge to shrink so others feel more comfortable.

Your worth existed before your first client.

Before your first failure.

Before your first success.

And it will exist long after.

As women, especially women in business, we are taught to earn our value.

To prove ourselves.

To over-explain.

To over-deliver.

To apologise for taking up space.

We are taught that confidence should be quiet, ambition should be soft, and success should be justified.

But here’s the truth we don’t say often enough:

You do not need permission to be valuable.

Your prices don’t need defending.

Your boundaries don’t need explaining.

Your growth does not need to make sense to anyone but you.

And when someone misunderstands you…

Undervalues you…

Or projects their limitations onto you…

That is not a reflection of your worth.

It is a reflection of their lens.

At a previous SheCreates Networking meeting, the group chose to do something deeply vulnerable together.

Each woman stood up, one by one.

When she stood, she said:

👉 “What I think the women at this table think about me is…”

Not what they actually thought - but what she feared they thought.

The judgments.

The stories the inner critic whispers.

And then the women around her responded with what they actually saw.

Because so often, the harshest judge in the room…

is the one living inside our own heads.

After that exercise, something powerful became clear.

So many of us walk around bracing for rejection that isn’t even there.

Preparing for judgment that exists only in our minds.

We assume we are being seen through the lens of our flaws —

when in reality, others are seeing our strength, our warmth, our courage.

We are not being devalued by others nearly as much as we are devaluing ourselves.

At that same meeting, the SheCreates group explored value in another way.

An inanimate object was placed in front of the table - a simple, ordinary item.

The group was asked to insult the object.

They were creative. They were ruthless.

And then the question was asked:

Did the object change?

Was it less valuable?

Less useful?

Less itself?

The answer was no.

Then the group was asked to do the opposite —

to compliment it, admire it, speak kindly about it.

And again, the question was asked:

Did it change?

No.

Because the lesson became clear:

The object’s value never moved.

It did not increase with praise.

It did not decrease with criticism.

And neither does ours.

Other people’s opinions are weather, not truth.

They pass.

They change.

They say more about the person holding them than the person receiving them.

You are not more worthy because someone applauds you.

You are not less worthy because someone doubts you.

Your worth is intrinsic.

Unshakeable.

Non-transferable.

And when you truly know that —

You stop begging to be chosen.

You stop shrinking to be accepted.

You stop allowing access to people who cannot honour you.

Taking Up Space - In Business, In Rooms, In Life

Now I want to speak directly to the woman in the boardroom.

The one who has an idea but waits for validation before speaking.

The one who watches a man repeat her idea and receives the credit.

The one who softens her voice, adds disclaimers, or ends sentences with “just” or “sorry”.

If you are in the room -

You deserve to be there.

You were not invited by accident.

You were not hired out of kindness.

You were not promoted because someone felt sorry for you.

You are there because you bring value.

And if you sit silently, shrinking yourself, doubting your voice,

then you are robbing the room of what only you can offer.

Taking up space is not arrogance.

It is responsibility.

The same applies to every area of your life.

You are more than: a wife, a girlfriend, a mother, a household manager, an employer, a co-worker, a caretaker, a peacekeeper

Those are roles you play, not the measure of your worth.

Your value does not disappear when those roles change.

It does not vanish when you rest.

It does not lessen when you say no.

And confidence — real confidence — is not about knowing everything.

Confidence is trusting yourself enough to speak anyway.

To say:

This is my perspective.

This is my experience.

This is my voice.

Because when you truly know your worth, you stop asking:

Do I deserve to be here?

And you start asking:

How can I contribute fully while I am here?

So today, I want you to make a quiet but radical promise to yourself.

That you will no longer wait to be validated before you speak.

That you will no longer apologise for your ambition.

That you will no longer make yourself smaller to fit into spaces you were meant to expand.

Because the world does not need quieter women.

It needs women who know their worth and stand in it.

Women who walk into rooms and say, without words:

I belong here.

My voice matters.

My presence is valuable.

And when one woman does that —

she doesn’t just change her own life.

She shifts the energy of every room she enters.

She raises the standard for what is possible.

She gives other women permission to rise with her.

So take up space.

In your business.

In your relationships.

In your life.

Not because you are loud.

Not because you are perfect.

But because you are worthy.

We started SheCreates Female-Led Business Networking—or SheCreates Networking, as we like to call it—because we were tired. Tired of surface-level spaces. Tired of sitting in rooms where women felt like they had to shrink, over-perform, or wear a polished mask just to be taken seriously. We wanted something real. A space where women could bring their whole selves: ambition, exhaustion, passion, confusion, confidence, burnout, spreadsheets, dreams… all of it.

Our Goal

We wanted to build a space where a woman could walk in whether she was selling handmade scrunchies at a local market or running a company with 200 employees—and feel like she belonged. Where the woman juggling three kids and a side hustle could be seen and heard just as much as the woman with business cards and a boardroom. Because we believe every woman has something to teach and something to learn. And we wanted to create a support system for all of it.

Click here for our application form:

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