Leadership Journeys [39] - Nermeen Ghoniem - "I cannot dictate how people feel about me, but I can dictate how I react to it."

This is the Leadership Journey series on the Choosing Leadership Podcast.I believe we all have a lot to learn from each other's stories - of where we started, where we are now, and our successes and struggles on the way. With this series of interviews, my attempt is to give leaders an opportunity to share their stories and for all of us to learn from their generous sharing. If you know a leader whom you would like to see celebrated on the show, please send me a message on LinkedIn with their name.In the interview, she talks about being a women in a male-dominated tech world, and how her mother inspired her to be her own self. We discussed how knowing who you are and trusting yourself first is the key to move forward in a world where you do not feel like you fit in or understand what you are permitted to do. She gave a powerful message of not giving anybody else the permission to make you upset, stressed, or impact your mental health. I loved interviewing her, and I am sure you - the listener - will take a lot away too from this interview.You can find Nermeen at the below linkshttps://www.linkedin.com/in/nermenghoniem/https://helloada.ai/In the interview, Nermeen sharesI've continued to live my life from a very young age being a hybrid between I like to be involved in storytelling and impacting people's life.At the same time, I'm also very much a scientist at heart and to sit down and really nerd out the technologies. So I think  I have always been balancing these two The technology world is very male dominated and I'm also currently based now in Silicon valley and it's also very male dominated.I realized that there is a really big gap in how we communicate these fields to women.I want more women in technology and especially more women in AI engineeringMore women are working and more women are taking into leadership positions. And a lot of men are welcoming to it and some are less welcoming to it. But that's part of the journey.Unapologetically, be yourself because I think confidence comes up from within. And you can strongly believe that you are being your best self and at the same time also allow room for constructive criticism.I cannot dictate what other people will say to me. I cannot dictate how people feel about me, but I can dictate how I react to it.I don't think it's worth getting personalYou can control how things affect you. You can control what you want to hear, and if it doesn't serve your purpose, if it doesn't serve your growth, it's not worth putting your energy in. We become too sensitive as the generation sometimes. And if we consider everything to be a negative message, then we will not grow.And if you trust a little bit more, I think you were able to do whatever you put your heart to. You are also much more powerful than you think you are. I think a lot of women sometimes put themselves down and don't think they're good enough for the job or good enough to get into the engineering field or good enough to start their dream.I can do whatever I want.I think people don't realize that I am a work in progress to get to this place. And there are moments where I feel insecure and where I'm like, I don't know what I'm doing, where I'm going and it's okay.