Workshops & Institutes
Who Are You (BECOMING)?
This 6-week transformational series centers on self-realization: the journey of seeing yourself, defining yourself, and stepping into your fullest expression.
THE POWER OF BECOMING
The question of becoming is timeless—and always worth exploring. For women, and especially women of color, this journey carries unique urgency, shaped by the intersecting dynamics of race, class, gender, and sexuality.
In 2018, Forever First Lady Michelle Obama brought this theme to the forefront with her bestselling memoir Becoming. The book sparked worldwide enthusiasm, resonated powerfully with Black women, and cast a bold spotlight on the importance of this very question.
In her own words, Mrs. Obama defines what it means to become:
“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. I became a mother, but I still have a lot to learn from and give to my children. I became a wife, but I continue to adapt to and be humbled by what it means to truly love and make a life with another person. I have become, by certain measures, a person of power, and yet there are moments still when I feel insecure and unheard. It’s all a process, steps along a path. Becoming requires equal parts patience and rigor. Becoming is never giving up on the idea that there’s more growing to be done.”
The Question Behind the Question
This series is designed for women who are ready to pause, reflect, and move beyond surface-level definitions of who they are. If you’ve ever struggled to answer the simple question “Who are you?” then you already know It’s not such a simple question to answer.
Do you immediately pause because you’re unsure of how to answer?
Do you automatically identify with your profession?
Do you recite aspects of your resume that showcase your accomplishments?
Do you lead off with the roles you play—mother, wife, daughter, teacher . . . ?
Have you ever felt that you’ve satisfactorily answered that question?
Have you ever pondered the question yourself, “Who are you—becoming?"
Becoming More, YOU
Envisioning New Possibilities
Behold A Woman’s Pledge
Crafted by past participant: Melissa Dodd
I am a woman.
I am free to be myself whatever that may look like for me because
I am forever growing and developing.
I am strong, determined, and disciplined.
I have a beautiful heart, smile, and mind with a positive attitude and the best intentions.
I live my truth and I don’t conform to the status quo.
I inspire people by my actions and have a talent for bringing people together.
I am a fixer and a problem solver.
I am very passionate about traveling and learning new things.
I am okay with not having it all figured out and being a work in progress.
I am love.
I give love and I deserve love and I will get it when the time is right.
So for now I will continue to live my life to the fullest and
enjoy the good things I have going for myself.
I am very blessed and I appreciate all that I have and all that I am.
I’m excited for all to come!
You need not settle for any defining category. . .Of course you’re general, but you’re also specific. A citizen and a person. And the person you are is like nobody else on the planet. Nobody has the exact memory that you have. What is now known is not all what you are capable of knowing. You are your own stories—and therefore free to imagine and experience what it means to be human without wealth, what it feels like to be human without domination over others, without reckless arrogance, without fear of others unlike you, without rotating, rehearsing, and reinventing the hatreds that you learned in the sandbox. And although you don’t have complete control over the narrative—no author does, I can tell you—you can nevertheless create it.
– National Treasure, Nobel Laureate Dr. Toni Morrison (Excerpt from 2004 Commencement Speech at Wellesley College)




