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Hello and welcome to the fourteenth edition of The Ferocity Letter, a softly fierce Sunday note for visionary women—and everyone who supports them.

My mission is to empower you to trust your intuition and communicate with presence, clarity, and resonance.

Every other week, I share field notes, practices, and words from women.

This week’s letter is about sarcasm. Is it ever the empowered choice for visionary communication? What sits beneath it? What are we really trying to protect? What’s more fierce - your wit or your vulnerability?

FIELD NOTES

sarcasm
/ˈsärˌkazəm/
The use of irony to mock, ridicule, or convey contempt. It typically involves saying the exact opposite of what you actually mean, often delivered with a specific, mocking tone of voice, exaggerated emphasis, or non-verbal cues like an eye roll.

“Small meanness,” are the words I remember.

It was 2013 and I was sitting cross-legged on my mat for the first weekend of a year-long yoga teacher training. Our cohort was introducing ourselves to each other by sharing a six-word memoir. Soft words like “kind,” and “tender,” and “curious,” and “seeker,” were floating out of our mouths.

But one woman used “small meanness” to describe herself.

She tossed those words down without shame, surprising us and daring us to see her as not only imperfect but (gasp) mean. It was a moment of truth telling and it made me think.

We all have this. It’s the voice of judgement that lives in our heads, and it can be cruel.

• Sometimes, the voice judges others. We keep ourselves elevated (and thereby safe) by making a distinction between what they’re doing (wrong/bad) and what we’re doing (obviously right/good).

• Sometimes, the voice judges us. We keep ourselves small (and thereby safe) by believing whatever fear is telling us about who we have the ability to become.

• Sometimes, the voice is sarcastic. It sneers. It says the opposite of what we actually mean, rolling its invisible eyes. It mocks and ridicules.

I wanted to write a letter about sarcasm because I’ve noticed it pop up in professional conversations with intelligent women recently. And I’ve noticed how it can operate like a silent killer, dooming the chances of higher-level connection, generative thinking, sharing of new ideas, effective communication, and personal and professional growth.

And I do not want this to keep happening.

We have important work to do. We have a world to change!

My questions:

1. Is sarcasm ever the empowered choice for visionary communication?

2. Assuming we’re not making our living as comedians or satirists, is it possible to wield sarcasm to positive effect?

3. If we were to boil sarcasm down to its essence, what would it say?

4. What’s more fierce – your wit or your vulnerability?

Reasonable people could debate whether sarcasm can be a strong rhetorical tool. Clever wit is a sign of intelligence, certainly.

But when I find myself thinking or speaking with sarcasm, it usually has anger, grief or fear beneath it. I want a bad situation to be different but I can't change it. Sarcasm lets me feel momentarily protected. It creates distance between me and the thing that hurts. It gives me a brief feeling of relief when my conversation partner agrees and we laugh together, before I go back to feeling like I have no real agency. Or at least I’m not employing my true power in that moment.

When I hear others use sarcasm, I do often laugh — a truth revealed can be very funny, and comedy is powerful and healing. Mockery is quite life-giving when the subject of our ridicule is an oppressor, and political satirists play an important role in our society. But if the larger conversation over time doesn’t move in the direction of solving something, growing, connecting, creating, celebrating or contributing, we start to get the ick and we want to leave it.

If we employ sarcasm as a tool to connect with people, we must be prepared to surround it with messages that do something with the recognition our mocking has stirred.

Do you remember Michelle Obama’s speech from the 2020 Democratic National Convention? She delivered one line — and one line only — with sarcasm: It is what it is.

“He is clearly in over his head. He cannot meet this moment. He simply cannot be who we need him to be for us. It is what it is.”1

She was mocking a very public statement made by President Donald Trump two weeks prior, when he was asked what was being done to control the COVID-19 pandemic as 1,000 Americans were dying each day, and he said:

“They are dying, that’s true. And you have — it is what it is. But that doesn’t mean we aren’t doing everything we can. It’s under control as much as you can control it.”2

The reason her line was so memorable is that the rest her speech—the entirety of it—was delivered with zero sarcasm. She had the credibility to use one sarcastic line to great effect because every other sentence invited people toward a larger future.

But the small meanness behind the overuse of sarcasm? I think it’s fear.

And the antidote to fear is love. The communicators I admire (and trust) avoid mockery and build their influence on love.

Just five days ago, Samara Bay’s TEDx Talk posted as an editor’s pick. It already has more than 14,000 views and climbing: “The One Thing Every Great Speaker Does (And No One Teaches).” In it, she reminds us:

“We’re in a well-documented global trust crisis, literally affecting life as we know it. No matter how much power any of us has, when we let the fear story run the show, we are part of the problem, not the way out.”3

And, she shares a secret to communicating with influence:

“Less fear, more love. And not love in the abstract. A mental model that orients us toward what we love about what we’re talking about, or what we love that is absent. In practice, this means when you focus on what you care about and who you are, instead of on how you’ll seem or if you’ll mess up, you show up totally different. We hear the care in your voice.”

Watch Samara’s talk. It is full of powerful insight for sounding, well, human.

Every communication choice we make either expands trust or contracts it. Whether we employ sarcasm or not, showing up with more love and care makes us fierce.

PRACTICES

The next time you notice an impulse toward the small meanness of sarcasm, get curious.

1. Pause. Ask yourself:

   -What am I actually feeling?

   -What am I hoping this sarcastic remark will accomplish?

   -Is there another way to communicate the truth?

2. Translate the sarcasm. Write down your sarcastic thought, then translate it into the truth that lies beneath it. Notice how much more vulnerable (and useful) the translation is.

   -For example: “Well, that was brilliant,” becomes “I’m frustrated because I think this could have been handled more thoughtfully,” or even “I feel powerless watching this happen.”

3. Find your agency. Complete these sentences:

   -I tend to get sarcastic when…

   -Underneath that sarcasm is…

   -One thing I actually have the power to influence is…

WORDS FROM WOMEN

Sarcasm reveals what's happening in our minds, but these three writers remind us to pay attention to what's happening in our hearts.

1. ELIZABETH LESSER, Co-founder of Omega Institute and author of “Cassandra Speaks: When Women are the Storytellers, the Human Story Changes”

“All my life I’ve toggled between being an activist—someone interested in healing and changing the world around me—and an innervist, a word I made up to describe the part of me that seeks inner change, inner healing. I’ve never regarded activism and innervism as mutually exclusive. In fact, one keeps the other in check. If we focus only on fighting what we perceive to be wrong out there, we miss out on the very real work waiting to be done within our own hearts and minds and lives. If we don’t look at our blind spots, our projections, our hypocrisies, we can end up doing what Friedrich Nietzsche warned against: “Whoever fights monsters,” Nietzche said, “should see to it that in the process he does not become a monster.”4

2. ANNE LAMOTT, American novelist and non-fiction writer, progressive political activist, public speaker and writing teacher.

“How did we become so filled with hate? This is not who we are. Hate is the worst emotion of all, second only to acute jealousy.

Certain people of late have caused a majority of us to experience derangement. Some of us have developed hunchbacks, or tics in our eyelids. Even my Buddhist friends have been feeling despair, and when they go bad, you know the end is nigh. Booker T. Washington said, “I shall allow no man to belittle my soul by making me hate him,” and this is the most awful thing about it. Yet part of me sort of likes it, too, for the flush of righteousness, the bond to half of the electorate. Who would we be without hate? In politics, breakups, custody disputes, hate turns us into them, with a hangover to boot, the brown-bottle flu of the spirit.”5

3. GLENNON DOYLE, activist, author, podcaster, producer, philanthropist

“I am a human being, meant to be in perpetual becoming. If I am living bravely, my entire life will become a million deaths and rebirths. My goal is not to remain the same but to live in such a way that each day, year, moment, relationship, conversation, and crisis is the material I use to become a truer, more beautiful version of myself. The goal is to surrender, constantly, who I just was in order to become who this next moment calls me to be. I will not hold on to a single existing idea, opinion, identity, story, or relationship that keeps me from emerging new. I cannot hold too tightly to any riverbank. I must let go of the shore in order to travel deeper and see farther. Again and again and then again. Until the final death and rebirth. Right up until then.”6

Thank you for reading The Ferocity Letter.

I write these words to encourage and empower you—and because I need them, too.

I’d be curious to hear your thoughts on sarcasm. Is it ever the empowered choice for visionary communication?

Until next time, trust your ferocity.

— Laura

Laura Lowery is an advisor to visionary women. A communications strategist, writer, and founder of Light Advisors—she partners with purpose-driven leaders to give voice to your vision, elevate your presence, and empower you to communicate with clarity and resonance. Learn more: lightadvisors.co

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Hello and welcome to the thirteenth edition of The Ferocity Letter, a softly fierce Sunday note for visionary women—and everyone who supports them.

My mission is to empower you to trust your intuition and communicate with presence, clarity, and resonance.

Every other week, I share field notes, practices, and words from women.

This week’s letter is about practice.

FIELD NOTES

Do you ever think about your future self?

What is she like?

How does she move through her world?

What does her voice sound like?

What does she do differently than you do today?

I recently discovered Molly Gebrian, a musician, neuroscience scholar, and author of Learn Faster, Perform Better: A Musician’s Guide to the Neuroscience of Practicing1.

She writes about how our brains learn how to do things differently.

Her book explores how we can use neuroscience to learn to play music better, but I think what she offers can also apply to how we learn to communicate better. It has a lot to do with creating new neural pathways as we practice.

So, what would it look like to practice communicating the way your future self does?

First we have to imagine her.

When I imagine the version of me who is 20 years older, I notice her energy first. She holds herself in a way that feels more relaxed and confident. She makes people feel welcome, but she owns her space. She makes more eye contact. She asks thoughtful questions. Her voice has wisdom.

I also notice that she doesn’t doom-scroll, she inspo-scrawls. She writes by hand in her journal just to see what creativity might like to say through her that day. She photographs light. Her hands have colorful paint on them half the time, because she got lost in another big canvas.

She doesn’t actually seem all that fierce. Until I remember she is. Her ferocity lives in the way she pays attention. In the way she speaks truth with love. It looks an awful lot like peace.

This summer, I am going to rehearse what it’s like to be her. Practice being both relaxed and confident. Make more eye contact. Ask more thoughtful questions. Own my space. Absorb and share more wisdom. Use my fingers to write more, capture more, create more. Swipe the screen less.

We often imagine transformation arriving all at once as a breakthrough.

But neuroscience suggests something much less dramatic.

We transform over time. We imagine how our life will be, and then we act. And if we act differently, if we choose to practice a different way of being, over and over, then we create a new neural pathway. Forming and strengthening new neural pathways is how we change. But we must practice them.

We don’t become pianists by reading a book about the piano, we become by placing our fingers on the keys and moving through the scales and arpeggios until they become familiar.

Communication is no different.

We don’t suddenly become a great communicator. We become because we've rehearsed listening deeply to people, we’ve rehearsed looking people in the eye, we’ve rehearsed asking more thoughtful questions, we’ve rehearsed writing what’s true, we’ve rehearsed speaking what’s in our heart.

We practice.

PRACTICES

Imagine the person you want to become. 10 years from now. 20 years from now.

• What does she think about?

• How does she speak and write?

• How does she connect with people?

• What does it feel like to be her?

This summer, choose one way future-you communicates that you admire but have not yet fully embodied.

Write it down.

Then, look for opportunities to practice it.

Also, get plenty of rest. According to Gebrian, much of what we learn through practice is consolidated while we sleep, and the neuroscience proves it2. Sleep is an integral part of the practice.

WORDS FROM WOMEN

1. TOKO-PA TURNER, Dreamworker and award-winning author of “Belonging: Remembering Ourselves Home” and “The Dreaming Way”

“Reversing the culture’s materialist approach to life would be like turning a mighty ship around in a powerful current, but at the individual level it’s a much more manageable shift. Every one of us can learn to take our cues from the imagination. And if enough people pivot to follow the way of their dreams, we become like a murmuration that can reorient on a dime.”3

2. ELLEN J. LANGER, Social psychologist, writer, and professor of psychology at Harvard University

“Mindfulness, as we study, isn’t a practice. It’s a way of being, and it comes about through the simple but difficult understanding of uncertainty. Everything is always changing. Everything looks different from different perspectives, so we can’t know. People are afraid of not knowing because they think they should know. Once you realize that nobody knows — some people pretend they do, but nobody knows — it becomes very easy to pay attention to what’s going on and to learn new things.”4

3. MOLLY GEBRIAN, Professional violinist and scholar of neuroscience

“Mental practice is hearing and feeling everything you need to be aware of when you play your instrument, but inside your head without actually doing it. Invariably, the things that are the hardest for us to imagine are also the hardest for us to play as well. If you make it clear in your head, it will be much clearer when you try it on your instrument.”5

Thank you for reading The Ferocity Letter.

I write these words to encourage and empower you—and because I need them, too.

Tell me, what are you practicing?

Until next time, trust your ferocity.

— Laura

Laura Lowery is an advisor to visionary women. A communications strategist, writer, and founder of Light Advisors—she partners with purpose-driven leaders to give voice to your vision, elevate your presence, and empower you to communicate with clarity and resonance. Learn more: lightadvisors.co

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Hello and welcome to the twelfth edition of The Ferocity Letter, a softly fierce Sunday note for visionary women—and everyone who supports them.

My mission is to empower you to trust your intuition and communicate with presence, clarity, and resonance.

Every other week, I share field notes, practices, and words from women.

This week’s letter is about how to approach building brand & communications style guides that will enable anyone who creates for you—or your brand—to better understand the voice, tone, message and meaning you need to deliver.

FIELD NOTES

In the last two weeks, I’ve had conversations with three women who are each creating (or co-creating) brand positioning for new businesses.

One is opening a hotel, restaurant, and retreat center here in the San Juan Islands. One is leading corporate communications, brand, and marketing for a startup. One is an experienced copywriter and website creator reinventing her business to focus on design.

Brand and communications style guides came up in all three conversations!

It made me realize there is a hunger for having one, if you lead a business or oversee communications for one.

In fact, the copywriter went so far as to tell me,

“I’ve gotten to the point where I won’t write for a business until they have a clear brand or style guide that helps me understand their voice. The trial and error to figure out how to write for them by revising blog posts and web pages over and over is exhausting and wastes time. I wind up trying my best to create a voice for them as we go, when that part should already be clear and I should simply be focused on writing or designing in it.”

There are 25 bajillion free articles on the web about “How to create a brand guide” and “How to create a style guide,” and as I perused some before writing this week’s letter, I was struck by how formulaic they can be. Now, I love a good framework. As a foundation, it helps me be more creative with my thinking when I have a grounded structure from which to push off from. Ideas can take flight while staying at least somewhat grounded in the purpose they were intended to serve.

But I also know this: Of the myriad of brand and communications style guides I’ve used and helped build in my career, no two are identical in structure or form!

This is the fun part.

There are no prescribed rules you must follow.

You are creating the rules.

And each brand, like every human being, is a completely unique expression.

My advice? You already know it involves journaling. Get out a pen (or hire someone who loves to listen and write while you talk).

Perhaps most importantly of all, answer this first:

How do you want your customer, client, reader, or listener to *feel when they encounter your brand?

A brand is a promise, and your reputation is how you fulfill and live up to that promise. Consistency of communication and design is part of building that trust. The way you write does more than describe your brand—it also serves to shape it because it shapes how people will feel when they encounter your brand.

Next, dive into these eight questions:

1. Brand Identity: Who are you? Tell us everything. Where you were born. What is your name. Who do you love? Who loves you? What are you here to do?

2. Brand Guiding Light: What is your purpose? Your North Star? The most important thing you always come back to? Your business or brand’s very reason for being here on this earth?

3. Brand Essence: How does your purpose boil down as a concept? How might you distill it into just a few single-word descriptors? (e.g. Love. Service. Nature. Ferocity. Education. Magic. Equity. Lift. Nurture. Vision. Women. Visibility. Warmth. Empowerment. Angelic. Speed. Mindful. Intelligent.)

   1. Play with dozens of words. Write a bunch of them on a white board. Get the thesaurus down from the shelf. Explore what the most interesting words mean to you, your organization, your team. Choose three or four, no more. These might even become your communications and brand positioning essence words. You might even give them their own page in your brand book or style guide.

4. Brand House: If your brand was person and they lived in a house, what would that house be like? Imagine and describe it in your guide. “House of [Your Brand Name Goes Here].” Get as detailed as possible:

   1. What does it look like? Colors. Artwork. Landscaping. Room set up. Furniture. Flow. Cleanliness. Windows. Doors. Flooring. Amenities. Location.

   2. What is the experience people have when they visit your brand’s home? How do they feel? What do they do? What is their favorite part of your house? How often do they visit? What happens to them during and after? How are they changed? What are the emotions they might experience?

5. Brand Persona: If your brand was a person, how would they interact with other human beings?

   1. How do they behave? Are they more introverted or extraverted? Are they polite? Cautious? Reserved? Conscientious? Deeply listening? Asking thoughtful questions? Are they outgoing? Gregarious? Like a stage actor with talent, flair, wit and charm?

   2. What is it about their character that causes people to not only like them, but come to trust them?

   3. What do they say? What are some phrases, colloquialisms, words and sentences they would say often? What are some things they would never be caught dead saying?

6. Brand Vision: What is the world you—and your brand persona—envision and wish to invite and manifest? I am asking what is the grand, pie-in-the-sky vision that maybe feels like a far-off dream today, and will be utterly amazing when it does come true? Describe that world to us. Make us feel the possibility with you. Make it electric, give it energy, allow us to feel it and want it too.

7. Brand Mission: What do you—and your brand—wake up and do, every day, to make this vision come true? What are the actionable goals you have set to get closer and closer to the vision?

8. Brand Values: Values are verbs (thank you Simon Sinek1). What are the principles your brand lives by, and how do they translate into actions?

There are dozens of different details to consider including in your guide. Like I said earlier, you can find all of them by Googling: “How to create a brand guide” or “How to create a communications guide.” A few examples:

1. Will your brand write in AP Style? Chicago Manual of Style? American Medical Association? IEEE? The Bluebook? Some combination of theses?

2. Will you have special rules for special things, like: Does every blog post include a call to action? Or a prayer? Or a link? Or a question?

3. Will your brand be brief, sharp and to-the-point? Or will your style lean to longer sentences that that flow like poetry, dropping unexpected gifts for the reader?

Mostly, I want to give you permission to create the guide that serves you, your brand, your business, and the people who will help you write, design, and build it. You can follow a formula, but remember that the rules are being written by you!

A brand and communications style guide is a living, breathing book. Like a magician’s book of spells, it will be constantly changing. Allow for this. Plan for this. Do not get caught up in perfection for posterity. There is no such thing.

“Am I doing this right?”

The answer is yes.

There is no perfect brand or style guide waiting somewhere on the internet for you to discover it.

There is only the one you create.

Trust your instincts.

Trust your voice.

Trust the spark that made you start this thing in the first place.

Permission granted.

Now, go make the rules.

WORDS FROM WOMEN

1. INGRID BERGMAN, Academy Award-winning actor and international film icon

“You must train your intuition - you must trust the small voice inside you which tells you exactly what to say, what to decide.”2

2. PENNEY PEIRCE, author of “The Intuitive Way”

“People often ask me if they can trust their imagination. They assume that there is some kind of evil twin lurking beneath the surface, bent on sabotaging the good twin on the outside. It’s as though imagination is an insidious force, which, given the slightest foothold, will trick your logical mind into losing control or acting foolishly. I remind them that the logical mind would have nothing to do but repeat itself ad infinitum if it weren’t for the creativity and genius of imagination. Life would have no juice, no zest.”3

3. SHARON BLACKIE, Award-winning writer and internationally recognized teacher of the mythic imagination and mythic feminine

“Women are spinners and weavers; we are the ones who spin the threads and weave them into meaning and pattern. Like silkworms, we create those threads out of our own substance, pulling the strong, fine fibres out of our own hearts and wombs. It’s time to make some new threads; time to strengthen the frayed wild edges of our own being and then weave ourselves back into the fabric of our culture. Once we knew the patterns for weaving the world; we can piece them together again. Women can heal the Wasteland. We can remake the world. This is what women do. This is our work.”4

Thank you for reading The Ferocity Letter.

I write these words to encourage and empower you—and because I need them, too.

If you are creating the stylebook for your brand, and would value a thought partner in the process, I'd love to hear from you.

Until next time, trust your ferocity.

— Laura

Laura Lowery is an advisor to visionary women. A communications strategist, writer, and founder of Light Advisors—she partners with purpose-driven leaders to give voice to your vision, elevate your presence, and empower you to communicate with clarity and resonance. Learn more: lightadvisors.co

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Hello and welcome to the eleventh edition of The Ferocity Letter, a softly fierce Sunday note for visionary women—and everyone who supports them.

My mission is to empower you to trust your intuition and communicate with presence, clarity, and resonance.

Every other week, I share field notes, practices, and words from women.

This week’s letter is an open commencement message to all new Master of Business Administration (MBA) graduates in the Class of 2026. If you know a graduate, will you share it with them?

FIELD NOTES

Commencement speeches are drawing boos this season for talking about AI being the future. I almost decided not to share this week’s letter. Nobody likes to be booed.

• Former Google CEO Eric Schmidt gave the University of Arizona’s commencement address Friday, and was roundly jeered when he discussed AI and automation saying, "The question is not whether AI will shape the world. It will. The question is whether you will have shaped artificial intelligence.”12

• Meanwhile, at the University of Central Florida’s May 8 commencement ceremony, private equity executive Gloria Caulfield prompted loud boos from the crowd when she described AI as “the next industrial revolution.”34

But my message is not to say AI will shape the world. Nor that it is the next industrial revolution. I believe the future is far more human than it is AI.

I was inspired (dared?) by a friend to record a short graduation speech about human connection in the age of AI. She asked, “What would you tell newly minted MBAs?”

So here’s my advice. Full transcript is below the video.

(Oh my gosh I don’t love watching myself on video. It gets easier, right?)

TRANSCRIPT

Hi! I’m Laura Lowery, your creative communication strategist.

I’m here with a short commencement message for newly minted MBA grads.

Congratulations on this big step into the world of business leadership. Your success will depend on how you connect and build trust with people.

And in this age of AI, it’s getting trickier to do that well.

I have a piece of advice.

Be ferocious about holding onto your humanity, and lead with it in all of your communications.

When you connect with people, they feel something. It’s like a frequency. And if you are thoughtful about how you communicate, then you can really resonate with the people who you need to help you get where you want to go.

Two things I want you to do:

The First Thing: Share your sense of purpose. We want to know why you’re here, what drives you, and how it connects to what you’re building, where you’re going, and why you’d like us to join you.

Here’s mine: I believe I’m here to learn, ever more deeply, how to give voice to what’s felt, what’s in the heart—and in doing so, help others do the same. I have lot of heart tee shirts. How we do this is what drew me to a career in communications.

When you share your purpose, people feel it.

The Second Thing: Avoid using AI to write your speeches or any communication you hope will influence other human beings.

Why do I say that?

Because we carry an unspoken contract in which we care about what you say because you took time to craft it yourself. It comes from your heart. When you honor the contract, you build trust and people pay attention. But if we sense you’ve broken the contract and outsourced your voice and we’re listening to an LLM, then trust begins to break down.

So - Class of 2026 - knowing this, how will you approach your leadership communications? How will you share your purpose and your vision with us?

I’d love to hear your thoughts, and I can’t wait to see what you do next.

Stay connected to your heart. Stay human.

WORDS FROM WOMEN

1. JASMINE BINA, Cultural futurist. CEO of strategy agency Concept Bureau, and cofounder of Exposure Therapy

“The reason someone’s incensed that your entire blog post is written in AI-first person is because there was a contract - they give you their attention, you give them the interiority of your mind. Even if AI helps you do that better for your audience, it’s not what the reader agreed to.”5

2. MADONNA, best-selling female music artist of all time

“If you’re a boy, there are no rules. If you’re a girl, you have to play the game. What is that game? You are allowed to be pretty and cute and sexy, but don’t act too smart. Don’t have an opinion, at least, don’t have an opinion that is out of line with the status quo. Be what men want you to be. And finally, do not age, because to age is a sin. You will be criticized, you will be vilified, and you will definitely not be played on the radio. What I would like to say to all the women here today is this: as women, we have to start appreciating our own worth and each other’s worth. Seek out strong women to befriend, to align yourself with, to learn from, to be inspired by, but to the doubters, the naysayers, to everyone who gave me hell and said I could not, that I would not, that I must not. Your resistance made me stronger, made me push harder, made me the fighter that I am today.” (edited excerpts from her iconic Billboard Woman of the Year speech, 2016)6

3. MELINDA FRENCH GATES, Philanthropist, businesswoman, author, and advocate for women & girls

“I am relieved that mifepristone will remain—at least for now—available for women and their care providers to rely on. But a provider’s ability to prescribe safe, effective medication and a woman’s right to make decisions over her body and future should not be up for debate, now or ever.”7

Thank you for reading The Ferocity Letter.

I write these words to encourage and empower you—and because I need them, too.

Until next time, trust your ferocity.

— Laura

Laura Lowery is an advisor to visionary women. A communications strategist, writer, and founder of Light Advisors—she partners with purpose-driven leaders to give voice to your vision, elevate your presence, and empower you to communicate with clarity and resonance. Learn more: lightadvisors.co

5

Jasmine Bina, Concept Bureau, “Not the AI Era. The Contract Era.”

Concept Bureau

Not the AI Era. The Contract Era.

Welcome! If you found this article, or my recent posts Second Order Thinking For Brand Strategists or What I shared at Parsons about my work and futurism, I invite you to become a free subscriber to get more of my articles on the intersection of strategy and culture…

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4 months ago · 100 likes · 14 comments · Jasmine Bina

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Hello and welcome to the tenth edition of The Ferocity Letter, a softly fierce Sunday note for visionary women—and everyone who supports them.

My mission is to empower you to trust your intuition and communicate with presence, clarity, and resonance.

Every other week, I share field notes, practices, and words from women.

This week’s letter is an urgent appeal to return to and trust your voice.

Also, thank you for your patience as I did not write a letter for several weeks. I have been weighing the world, consuming far too much news, working closely with clients, and gardening (aka fierce weed-pulling therapy). I hope to return to the regular rhythm of writing this letter.

FIELD NOTES

Everyone is saying the future is AI.

But is it?

I mean really, let’s think about what AI actually is, and what it is not.

• IT IS data, analyzed and regurgitated. It is a new technology. We need to pay attention to it and understand it so that we can use it for the betterment of life on Earth, just like we have endeavored to do with all new technologies, ever.

• IT IS NOT a cosmic download from consciousness. It cannot receive a download from consciousness all by itself. Humans can, though. We can feed our own downloads (our ideas) into AI, but what happens when we stop doing that? Won’t the LLM just keep cycling through whatever data it already has, growing stale like a swamp with no river running to it?

What if the future is *not* AI?

What if the future is telepathic communication, human connection, emotional frequency and resonance, and an expanded understanding of what consciousness is and how we are all part of it?

What if humanoid robots will be a short fad that fails to catch on broadly, like, oh, I don’t know – Segway, Tamagotchi, or WebTV?

What if the concept that AI will replace humans is mostly a mirage and there’s not a great deal of there there?

On Writing

I reached a point last week where the volume of AI-generated language positioned as personal writing that came across my desk made me genuinely concerned for the creative, visionary, heart-connected minds that make us human.

Those who work in communications are probably more sensitive to this than everyone else, but oh my god what’s happening feels so bleak. I am seeing intelligent, professional women and men hand their voices completely over to Claude or ChatGPT, and what comes out sounds like pap. My heart breaks a little bit each time it happens.

I am not talking about using AI to get unstuck, find a word, ask a better question, or make a super long paragraph shorter. What I’m reacting to are entire pieces written by a robot—no colorful stories, no sense of being an actual human—and it makes me sad. Have you noticed it too?

It’s like the glorious geese who have always laid golden eggs—eggs that shine in the sunlight, sparkling with uniqueness and imperfections—have changed. Suddenly they are laying eggs made of plastic, eggs that look and feel and sound like every other plastic egg on the shelf at Walmart one day after Easter.

I have used AI to write, too. It’s a little humbling to look back at pieces where I really leaned into it to help me compose something when I wanted to sound smart, but wound up sounding plastic.

The white-haired seer inside me is eternally forgiving, but she is also flashing sage advice with a futuristic neon warning sign: “Do not continue to follow this path.”

Instead follow poetry.

Messy handwriting.

Awkwardly human messages that wind up being endearing.

Write what’s real.

Your experience!

Like right now, my window is open. It is May Day here on Orcas Island, and thirteen different birds are singing. Each song is unique.

Like right now, I am looking at my office desk and notice the wood grains. The way they make waves, concentric light and dark layers that radiate out from each imperfection—tiny knots shape the waves into something interesting, dynamic, complex, and alive.

A fake wood desk wouldn’t have that richness. A flock of robot birds would sound weird. So does the AI writing.

Do not give your precious voice away so soon. The vulnerable place, sounding human because we are being human, bringing our voices outside of the machine, is where our power lives. Trust me on this.

And if you don’t believe me, believe the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. On Friday they announced significant rule changes1, including that screenplays must be human-authored to be eligible for an Oscar. The Academy reserves the right to investigate the use of generative AI in any submission.

I’m apparently not the only one getting tired of AI writing!

On Resonance

Have you listened to The Telepathy Tapes? I’ve been tuning in through my earbuds as I garden. My hands and heart get grounded and healed by the dirt while my mind expands into realms where communication takes place without words.

I’d dare anyone to listen to the first 25 episodes and not come away believing that we humans all have within us the ability to communicate telepathically. This, this is part of what I mean when I say the future is feeling.

For now, we have words. I love words. Words can help us get closer to other human beings, or they can drive us further from each other. How we use words matters.

To be human is to feel. When we feel others, and they feel us, we come into resonance. And resonance is where the amplification of a message takes place.

But how on earth can we resonate with you—how can we feel you—when your message is generated by the plastic egg maker that is AI?

On Perfectionism

Why do we tend to fall for the lure of letting AI generate writing for us?

I think it is because the perfectionist who lives inside of us longs to create and connect, but is afraid of writing something that will cause us to feel shame. And sometimes it’s also because we are on a deadline to produce words, fast, and we want them to be good (i.e. not cause us to feel shame).

Brené Brown defines perfectionism as a “self-destructive and addictive belief system” that fuels the thought: “If I look perfect, live perfect, and do everything perfectly, I can avoid or minimize the painful feelings of shame, judgment, and blame.”2

The irony is, when we look perfect, live perfect, and do everything (including writing) perfectly we lose our humanity and become uninteresting to the very people whose love and acceptance and admiration and business we seek. When we let AI write for us, we think we sound good, but we often sound flat.

Let’s pinky promise each other that we’ll stop letting AI write Substack and blog posts, professional feedback, and personal emails.

Let’s pinky promise each other that we’ll write something real this week. From the heart, no matter how messy it is or how ashamed we might feel.

Let’s pinky promise each other that we’ll share those real, human, unedited words with at least one other soul who will appreciate them and encourage us to keep going.

I love us. We are so human! Let’s please stay human. Stay soft, stay curious, stay kind and… get back to laying those precious golden eggs.

Your voice is your signature. Make it golden.

[End of appeal]

PRACTICES | How to Stop Using AI to Write

1. Get a notebook.
   Write some words down about what you’re thinking, feeling, experiencing. Get what is on your mind onto the paper. Let it be messy. Let it flow like a river or chop like an ocean. Write stuff down when you think of it. Be a secret poet.

2. Open a voice notes app.
   If writing by hand is really not for you at all, then use voice notes. Or do both. Transcribe your voice notes later in Otter.ai, or another transcription app. Voila - your own voice.

3. Write from your heart.
   Let go of the need for your writing to convince, control, or impress anyone. Write your experience. Write what your inner critic says is silly. Write garbage. Write gold. Write feeling. Write human. Write from someplace in your body that is below your chin. Trust that the authenticity of your intention will resonate more than the perfection of your prose.

4. Trust yourself.

   You are a better communicator than AI. You really are. Even if you are illiterate (and if you’re reading this you’re literate) you are a better communicator than AI. Trust me. Trust yourself.

5. Share your work with at least one other soul.
   Share what you wrote, raw, with at least one person you can trust to appreciate what you are communicating and encourage you to keep going.

WORDS FROM WOMEN | (and a man)

1. BRENÉ BROWN, research professor, author, podcast host

“I call perfectionism the 20-ton shield. We think we carry it around to keep us from being hurt. But what it actually does is it keeps us from being seen. And it is so addictive.”3

2. FEDERICO FAGGIN, physicist, inventor of the microprocessor

“Telepathy is really a property that we all have at some level, to some extent, even when we don’t think that it is telepathy. For example, when people have love for each other and they communicate with love, they can understand each other at a much deeper level than when they communicate just with symbols because love is what actually allows the state of the fields to go into resonance with each other. It’s like a force. Resonance means the same meaning is in both entities. That’s why they understand each other much more deeply.”4

3. REESE WITHERSPOON, Academy-Award winning actress, producer, entrepreneur

“I don’t believe computers should replace humanity. I’m planning on learning as much as possible (about AI) so that I’m educated about this technological revolution. If you want to learn with me, great, let’s do this! If you don’t, that’s okay too.”5

It takes courage to be seen. There is power in connection. We have a responsibility to stay curious and open as the world evolves. We need your voice, powerfully unedited by AI.

Thank you for reading The Ferocity Letter.

I write these words to encourage and empower you—and because I need them, too.

I have space this season for a new client! If you or a visionary woman you know is seeking a high-touch creative communications strategist and advisor, I’d love to connect.

Until next time, trust your ferocity.

— Laura

Laura Lowery is an advisor to visionary women. A communications strategist, writer, and founder of Light Advisors—she partners with purpose-driven leaders at threshold moments to give voice to your vision, elevate your presence, and empower you to communicate with clarity and resonance. Learn more: lightadvisors.co

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Hello and welcome to the ninth edition of The Ferocity Letter, a softly fierce Sunday note for visionary women—and everyone who supports them.

My mission is to empower you to trust your intuition and communicate with presence, clarity, and resonance.

Every other week, I share field notes, practices, and words from women.

This week’s letter is about sovereignty, voice, and the quiet power of love.

FIELD NOTES

My parents were married beneath oak trees in Salem, Oregon, in the warmth of early August 1973. A music box with a boy and girl on a carousel going around and around was playing the tune, “Love Makes the World Go ‘Round.”

I have always thought these lyrics speak to a higher truth about the nature of our universe: “High in some silent sky, love sings a silver song, making the Earth whirl softly, love makes the world go ‘round.”

Silver

I no longer think of ‘silver’ as a casual word in that song. Silver is associated with soft power—the kind we wield when we are in concert with the world. Silver is a sign of collective wisdom. It reflects light. It is the color our hair turns when we age.

I had mine colored this week, a ritual that means more at age 50 than it did at 40.

Women are beautiful whether we color our hair or not, of course. It’s a personal choice, like the clothing we choose to wear or the attitude we choose to inhabit. We all ought to be able to express ourselves in whatever way makes us feel strong, beautiful, confident, creative, capable, joyful, or however else we want to feel.

I was born brunette and as I age, more silver is appearing mixed with the brown, especially around my temples. I choose not to cover my grays entirely, but I do get a twice-yearly blend with a blonder shade. It creates the illusion that my hair is lighter where the sun hits it, and you can’t easily tell the difference between which strands are silver and which are light brown or blonde. They all look a little lighter.

Who knows what I’ll be doing with my hair at 60. My friend who owns the coffee house here on Orcas Island has the most stunning long silver hair I’ve ever seen. I absolutely love it.

At the salon, a woman in her early 30s was in the chair next to me getting her brown hair trimmed while my stylist was finishing me up. As I went to pay, I overheard the woman tell her stylist, “I’ve been finding a few gray hairs! My first ones!”

Her stylist congratulated her and warned, “Don’t you pluck them out!”

The young woman gasped, “Oh, I would never.”

It’s a tiny salon, and we were the only four people in the room so I couldn’t help but softly blurt out the first thing that came into my mind.

“Those are strands of sovereignty.”

I surprised myself with this description, but it felt right. And it led to a conversation in which I shared that my strength coach, Amanda, who trains women in their 40s, 50s, 60s, 70s and beyond, calls this our Queen Era. Queen because we are not ready to be crones yet, but we’ve outgrown the maiden and mother personas.

We are sovereign.

We all agreed what our country needs now is to be led by a circle of sovereign grandmothers. “Matriarchy is going to be better for men, too,” said the stylist. “They’ll live longer and be happier.”

I said goodbye as we all cheered for women remaking the world, and the little bells on the door jingled as I closed it behind me.

Sovereignty

Our sovereignty is made clear by how we express authority over our own lives. It is how we do our hair, how we move through the world, where we choose to place our attention and time and money, and perhaps most importantly, how we use our voice.

In the last few weeks I have had some wonderful conversations with women who are communicating with great love and great power—and teaching us all how to do it better.

As I sit here to write, it is Valentine’s Day and I am in awe. I am looking around my life and wondering, how on earth did I manifest this growing network of powerful women who lead with love? Keep it coming, universe! Thank you, thank you, thank you.

I want to share four of these women with you right now because they are each teaching us how to better sing our silver songs with love and power. Their work is worth your time.

• Samara Bay is the author of Permission to Speak: How to Change What Power Sounds Like1 and I am delighted to call her a new friend. She helps Hollywood movie stars integrate good acting with good accents, and she coaches rising leaders speak in a voice they recognize as their own to truly make waves. I had the honor of listening to an early practice version of a powerful talk Samara will soon give at TEDx Culver City on February 26. The details are not mine to share, but friends, I was in tears. Go read her book and watch for her TED talk.

• Katherine (Katie) Dudtschak has written a forthcoming book, Sincerely, Katherine. Life, Gender, Inclusivity, and Leadership for the Future.2 Meeting her felt like kinship. Katie is one of Canada’s most recognized corporate executives. She achieved success at the highest levels, yet something essential was missing. At 50, she made the courageous decision to affirm her true self, coming out in front of 80,000 colleagues, as an act of leadership. I had the good luck and honor of reading her book in advance. It releases March 31—part memoir, part call to action for humanity—and it resounds. She gives us the keys to unlock human potential by understanding and honoring the entire spectrum of human uniqueness, and by leading with love. Go pre-order Sincerely, Katherine., and prepare to be transformed.

• Tara Mohr is the author of Playing Big: Practical Wisdom for Women Who Want to Speak Up, Create and Lead.3 I’m participating in her six-month Playing Big course and receiving so much. This week’s lesson was about communicating with power and one takeaway was the recognition that when we can hold both our warmth (love, care, understanding) and our competence (professionalism, strength, authority) at the same time, we are communicating with true power. I recommend her book, and her course, to anyone interested.

• Ashley Mac Isaac-Butler is a grounded guide for women moving through inner change, transition and becoming. We were introduced last summer, and I finally had a chance this week to participate in one of her unique quarterly virtual offerings, The Threshold. It is a live, guided, hour-long pause to listen inward to what is arising in life at this moment. She holds space beautifully and her subtle energetic approach is warm and healing. If you are looking for this kind of quiet, spirit-level support, go visit her.

Ferocity in Motion

Beyond the salons, stages, books, and spirit work, this same silver sovereignty and power is visible in graver arenas.

The news here in the U.S. this week included multiple Epstein survivors being in the audience together at a House Judiciary Committee hearing where Attorney General Pam Bondi was called to testify on Capitol Hill4.

The courage and tenacity of their presence are as powerful an example of ferocity as I’ve seen, and it stirred something in my heart. You can feel courage by watching others be courageous. Banding together, they are speaking truth to power with a deep, directed, transformative energy that is neither reckless nor hostile, but rooted in purpose, clarity and care. It is the power to disrupt what harms, protect what matters, and shape what comes next. It is fierce love.

They want what we all want. A world where children—all children—are safe from the kind of harm that was done to them.

On another front, I have been moved to tears by people in Minneapolis who are singing out ICE, and singing in care for their immigrant neighbors, chanting, “They belong to us, we belong to them. Every one, oh every one, oh every one of these people are ours and we are theirs.”5

When we communicate from love like this, people pay attention.

Samara writes in her book that speaking up requires the courage to “reject the old conceit of a chasm between speaker and audience at all,” and instead engage in a dialogue of what matters to us, what we share, and what we want in common. “It’s saying, ‘Let’s care about things together’.”

Love is strong. It brings light and reveals truth. It is what makes the world go around, in every sense of the phrase.

And something shifts when we speak from our wise hearts.

PRACTICES | How to ‘Sing a Silver Song’

1. Notice Your Silver.
   What wisdom is showing up at your temples—metaphorically or literally?

2. Choose Power.
   In your next meeting, conversation, or post, ask yourself: What would it sound like to hold warmth (love, care, understanding) and competence (professionalism, strength, authority) at the same time?

3. Care Out Loud.
   Say one thing this week that makes it clear you care about what they care about.

4. Honor the Becoming.
   The next time you notice a new strand of sovereignty in yourself—aging, grief, anger, intuition, experience, wisdom, love—honor it. This is your authority making itself known.

Thank you for reading The Ferocity Letter.

I write these words to encourage and empower you—and because I need them, too.

May we remember that love makes the world go ‘round—and fierce love changes it.

Until next time, trust your ferocity.

— Laura

P.S. Nominations for the 2026 Fortune Most Powerful Women list are due February 25.

P.P.S. My friend Megan at Catalyst sent me this stone, and it arrived today with a beautiful note, and I teared up again! I’m calling it “The Ferocity Stone” and keeping it on my desk where I’ll see it every day. Thank you, Megan.

Laura Lowery is an advisor to visionary women. A communications strategist, writer, and founder of Light Advisors—she partners with purpose-driven leaders at threshold moments to give voice to your vision, elevate your presence, and empower you to communicate with clarity and resonance. Learn more: lightadvisors.co

Subscribe now

Hello and welcome to the eighth edition of The Ferocity Letter, a softly fierce Sunday note for visionary women—and everyone who supports them.

My mission is to empower you to trust your intuition and communicate with presence, clarity, and resonance.

Every other week, I share field notes, practices, and words from women.

This week’s letter is on speaking with courage in charged moments, when staying silent feels safer.

If you are weighing how to respond to the fatal shootings of U.S. citizens by federal agents in Minnesota — or any situation that is politically or emotionally charged — consider this permission to connect with your heart before you choose what to say.

This is part of what it means to be fierce.

FIELD NOTES

I have been watching for the women leaders speaking out following the deaths of Alex Pretti and Renée Nicole Good—eerily few outside of politics are saying anything yet.

• Melinda French Gates, Founder of Pivotal Ventures, shared a strong statement earlier this week.1

• Three Fortune 500 female CEOs—Beth Ford, CEO of Land O’Lakes; Corie Barry, CEO of Best Buy; Dana Erickson, CEO of Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Minnesota; and Gunjan Kedia, CEO of U.S. Bancorp—are among the 60 signatories on a letter released by the Minnesota Chamber of Commerce2 that calls for an immediate deescalation of tensions.

• Celebrities Jamie Lee Curtis, Glenn Close, Natalie Portman, Kerry Washington, Cynthia Nixon, Martha Stewart, The Chicks, Mandy Moore, Billie Eilish, Hannah Einbender, Olivia Rodrigo and others are also speaking out.3

I know that speaking truth — especially speaking truth to power — requires courage because those who do not want the truth revealed will inevitably criticize those who tell it, or worse.

One of the gifts my dad gave me while he was still alive is this bit of hard wisdom, wrapped in a call to stay brave:

“Keep telling the truth. You’ll be punished for it, of course. Tell it anyway.”

Courage Is the Turning Point

Attitude changes how the very muscles in our bodies respond to a situation. We become stronger or weaker based on our emotional state.

David R. Hawkins, M.D., Ph.D, captured this in his work and book Power vs. Force: The Hidden Determinants of Human Behavior4. Based on 25 years of clinical kinesiological muscle testing and the correlation of muscular responses to different attitudes, thoughts and feelings, he created a Map of Consciousness.

This matters because while leadership communication is partly cognitive, it is also physiological. People are going to register what you say in their bodies.

Hawkins’ Map of Consciousness defines a range of attitudes and values along a scale of 1 to 1,000. At the bottom of the scale are shame, fear, hate, anger, blame, despair, retribution and humiliation—these attitudes cause muscles in the human body to weaken. On the top of the scale are hope, meaning, forgiveness, optimism, trust, love, reverence, joy and enlightenment—these attitudes cause muscles in the human body to respond with strength.

The map is divided in two: upper values reflect power while lower values reflect force. Power is self-sustaining, effortless and constructive. Force is coercive, temporary, and requires constant energy to maintain.

And this is the cool part: There is a single attitude that sits in the middle of this map, where we shift from a state that requires force to a state that inhabits power — where we move from weakness to strength. It is the attitude of courage.

The root of the word courage is the Latin word cor, which means heart.

Pragmatism, Plus Love

Especially if you are a business leader, discernment matters.

The public statements you make have to be well considered and pragmatic. The risk of publicly saying whatever is on your mind in the heat of a moment can be outsized. I believe this is part of why so many business leaders have been silent—at least publicly. Fear looms large. A lot is at stake. If this is you, partnering with experienced crisis communications experts can be invaluable.

Global Gateway Advisors just published a helpful newsletter with practical advice for executives and corporate teams who are considering whether and how to speak out. You can read their insights in “Is corporate activism back?”, including these five questions to help guide clear communications decisions:

1. Do we have relevant authority?

2. Is there an impact on our employees or operations?

3. Does this align to our organization’s mission or values?

4. Would our customers expect us to respond?

5. Are we willing to commit to an action?5

To be effective, communication in this moment requires clarity and courage. Without courage, even a clear message falls flat and feels weak. And while expert advisors bring helpful structure, insight, and discipline to moments like this, strong leadership requires one more ingredient—and it is something no framework can provide for you.

That ingredient is love.

Human, squishy, vulnerable, and yet stronger than any force we know.

You lead people, and people are human. We feel. We tend to make important decisions and act with our hearts first. Our brains follow along later.

As you craft your statements, talking points, remarks and social media posts, remember this. Show us you are human. Show us you see what is happening. Show us you have principles and will speak up when they are violated—and share your vision too. Inspire us. Encourage us. Strengthen us.

Holding love and pragmatism is a bit like putting on and taking off a pair of rose-colored glasses, again and again.

You take them off so that you can see the risks. So that you can see what you are up against. So you can see the terrain. So you can see what is unethical, immoral, and wrong—and what is righteous, good, and true.

Then, you put the glasses go back on so that you can see your people—and all of humanity—through the eyes of love. This is the only lens through which one can truly lead.

PRACTICES

1. WRITE.

   Handwrite a love letter to the people you impact. Do it today! This is not a letter that needs to be read by anyone but you, so be candid. Avoid keyboards and dictation if you can. A very real thing happens when we get out of our heads and into our bodies to communicate. Writing a letter by hand slows down our thinking and we become more present to the heart of the matter. So write by hand. Be messy. Sloppy, even. Be human. Dear fellow citizens, …

2. NAME.

   In your letter, name:

   -What you see happening—what is right and what is wrong?

   -Your values—what principles guide you?

   -Your vision for the future.

   -What you feel about about the actions being carried out by ICE.

   -What you feel about Americans and immigrants who have lost their lives.

   -How this affects the people you lead and serve.

   -What you know to be true.

   -What you believe we must do.

3. INTEGRATE.

   -Take a breather. Put the letter away and go outside. Move your body. Shift your focus. Let what you wrote settle.

   -Come back to your words. Make sure anything your communications team writes for you—or works with you to edit—reflects and embraces the values, principles and calls to action that align with your heart before it is made public.

   -Trust your ferocity. Remember, we are defining ferocity as a deep, directed, transformative energy that is neither reckless nor hostile, but rooted in clarity and care. It is the power to disrupt what harms, protect what matters, and shape what comes next.

WORDS FROM WOMEN

This week, I was inspired by a mix of voices—some responding directly to what has happened in Minnesota, and others commenting more generally on the power of leading with love. Take note as you consider what your message might be. I look forward to hearing your voice among the chorus.

1. MELINDA GATES, Founder of Pivotal Ventures

“The deaths of Renée Nicole Good and Alex Pretti are unconscionable and weighing heavily on so many of our hearts.

Over recent weeks, in Minneapolis and other communities across the country, we have seen neighbors standing up for each other with courage, compassion, and solidarity.

No one in the United States should ever have to fear losing their life for taking peaceful, principled action in support of their beliefs.

Our country is not our government—our country is us, we the people. For 250 years, we have been bound together by bedrock values, the rule of law, and inalienable rights.

There is nothing more American than exercising our rights and holding our government accountable. Our democracy depends on it.”6

2. KAYLA SCHULTZ, Resident of Minneapolis and eye witness to the shooting of Alex Pretti

“They want us to be afraid of them. They want us to be scared, intimidated into silence. I can lose my safety. I can lose security. They can take everything away from me, but they can’t take my voice.

They want us to be intimidated. They escalate in every single way. If they are not able to use that fear in order to intimidate us into backing down, they escalate, and that’s exactly what happened to Alex.

He did not let them intimidate him. In fact, he stood up for two women that they were absolutely brutalizing, and that made them mad that they were not able to intimidate him into tucking his tail and leaving.

One moment, there are people being pushed around. There are people being maced right in front of me. The next thing I know, it’s gunshots. It’s so many gunshots, I couldn’t believe it. I really have barely a recollection of the moments immediately after, other than just the feeling of absolute horror and also rage that it escalated like this. They backed up, and I was sure he was dead.

I think it’s so important. Now is not the time to stay silent in this, for anyone at all.”7

3. AYANNA PRESLEY, U.S. Member of Congress

“Minnesota is writing the blueprint for radical love and community response. Everyday people showing up for each other, rejecting hate, and demonstrating what's possible when we stand up for our neighbors.”8

4. JASMINE BINA, Brand Strategist and Cultural Futurist, CEO of Concept Bureau

“When I work with human rights orgs, they all want “awareness, awareness, awareness”!! But look around. Nobody is starved for information. We are starved for empathy. Awareness assumes people act from their brains, when we all know they act from their hearts.”9

5. CHRISTINE LAGARDE, President of the European Central Bank

“One thing that I have done in the course of my life, which I have never regretted, was to take risk. I see too many people who are risk averse, who are going to calculate, who are going to participate, who are going to plan, who are going to strategize, who are going to weigh the cost and the benefits and the pluses and the minus. And there are times in your life when you just have to look at the face of it, how you feel about it, who are the people who you're going to do it with? And then, you just take your risk. Don't over calculate, don't over strategize.

And the last thing that I'll say, and I fundamentally believe in this, is: Rely on love. Give love. Receive love. It will build your confidence, and it will give confidence to others. I know it sounds a bit bizarre for President of Central Bank to talk about love, but if I had not had love in the way I have received it and given it, I wouldn't be where I am, I can assure you.”10

And when we choose to lead with love—clear and courageous—our words carry power that does not need force.

Thank you for reading The Ferocity Letter.

I write these words to encourage and empower you—and because I need them, too.

May this letter land as an invitation to connect with your heart before you choose what to say.

And if you are trying to figure out how to ground your message in empathy and human connection, I’d be glad to support you.

Until next time, trust your ferocity.

— Laura

Laura Lowery is an advisor to visionary women. A communications strategist, writer, and founder of Light Advisors—she partners with purpose-driven leaders at threshold moments to give voice to your vision, elevate your presence, and empower you to communicate with clarity and resonance. Learn more: lightadvisors.co

Subscribe now

Hello and welcome to the seventh edition of The Ferocity Letter, a softly fierce Sunday note for visionary women—and everyone who supports them.

My mission is to empower you to trust your intuition and communicate with presence, clarity, and resonance.

Every other week, I share field notes, practices, and words from women.

This week’s letter acknowledges the darkness present in our world right now, and invites a question: How are you protecting your peace?

FIELD NOTES | Softly fierce

The news out of Minnesota this week brought back a feeling I had several years ago. I was being forced to defend my Seattle floating home—my only significant asset, my entire life savings—in a years-long series of court battles against people who behaved with what my best friend simply described as “a darkness.”

Darkness was truly the most accurate descriptor.

You can sense darkness like that in the pit of your stomach. It has a cold, creepy quality to it. It feels inhuman somehow. Unsafe. Void of care. Sick. Transactional. Insatiable. Disconnected from heart.

And fighting it consumed me. I was angry at their shameless lies and grab for the home I had poured my heart and money into. I was scared because if I lost, I would be bankrupt. I was embarrassed to be in such a vulnerable situation at all—I am a responsible person with sound judgment and excellent credit. I was exhausted.

I had to appear in court three times; each time I would prevail, they would appeal.

As a sensitive introvert, I knew I might get overwhelmed without strong energetic preparation. I knew my presence in front of the judges mattered. I could not let anger, fear, or exhaustion sabotage the truth I was there to tell. I could not let my opponents’ greed win by crushing my spirit or making me sound crazy.

So every time we went to court, I intentionally carried a vision and three powerful mantras in my mind to protect my peace:

The vision was a cloud of tiny mirrors that surrounded me like a mirage so that my opponents would only see their own reflection when they looked at me. No gaze seeking to harm me could get through that cloud of mirrors. The truth, my heart, my peace and my body were safe.

The first mantra was the Heart Sutra: gaté gaté paragaté parasamgaté bohdi svaha. It is a central text in Buddhism that explains the concept of “emptiness” and reveals that everything is interconnected. It helps us find freedom from fear by realizing that what we fear is an illusion.

The second mantra was more of a simple request and honest blessing: May the truth be seen and may justice prevail.

The third mantra was a paradox, as reality always is. It helped me remember how I wanted to show up energetically: May I be softly fierce and fiercely soft.

***

Her last name was Good.

I do not believe that is mere coincidence.

When we look for the truth, it is there for us—recorded on multiple videos—plain as day.

Renee Nicole Good was softly fierce. The truth of what happened to her is being seen now, and it is time for justice to prevail.

This violence—the cold-blooded murder by a federal agent of an American citizen exercising her rights—is infuriating. All of the violence happening to human beings under this administration is infuriating. I am angry.

How do we shine light on this darkness?

It is important to remember that love is more powerful than fear.

“Truth may be vital, but without love it is unbearable.” -The Two Popes1

First, we need to be able to access our inner clarity.

This week, I asked women I met with, “How are you protecting your peace?”

It is so important that we do, so that we can get to clarity and communicate well. When we can speak truth with clarity and love—especially through anger—we lift the spirit and energy of everyone who encounters our words.

• One woman told me she is holding her center by not consuming bad news other than headlines and a few select articles like Heather Cox Richardson’s daily Letters from an American.

• Another woman told me she is protecting her peace by using a Brick device to lock her out of social media apps at night—freeing her mind from the addictive scroll.

• One woman told me she has been guarding her clarity by saying “no” to the energy suckers in her life and being more discerning with her energy than with her time. “It’s where my energy and attention go that matters. Time takes care of itself.”

• Another woman told me she has been tending to her inner strength and peace by “caring more about how my life feels to me, and less about whatever it might look like to anyone else.”

***

My legal battle ended in a settlement. I was able to avoid bankruptcy, and make a down payment on the home I have today. I am beyond grateful for my attorney and the loved ones who held and lifted me throughout that ordeal.

From that fight, I learned how to protect my peace.

My hope and wish for all of us in 2026 is that we can each protect our peace, so that we can speak truth clearly, with fierce love, and begin (again) to remake the world.

PRACTICES | How to be a fierce light in the darkness

1. Name what is disrupting your peace.

   Write it out by hand, if you can. Then ask yourself: How am I actually feeling? What feels tender? What feels charged? When have I felt this before? What did I learn? What truth do I want to communicate to the people in my sphere?

2. Name where you want your attention go.

   Focus your energy—and 90% your communication—on what reveals truth, elevates, uplifts, supports, enlightens, strengthens.

3. Choose the state of mind you want to communicate from.

   Music can help set the tone. I wrote most of this letter while listening to The Heart Sutra2 by Wah, and the Heart Chakra3 by Beautiful Chorus. You might choose something entirely different. What matters is the state of mind you create before you communicate.

4. Consider a vision and a mantra

   It is hard to overstate the mental health value of a vision and a mantra for moments when we must face darkness head-on. No one else needs to know what it is, or even that you have one. But it gives your mind something to do that is the opposite of spinning into fear.

WORDS FROM WOMEN

The quotes I want to share this week come from three women who hold defiance, steadiness, and tenderness in equal measure. Each, in her own way, reminds us that protecting our peace is how we stay rooted in love and purpose when the world is turbulent.

1. NIKITA GILL, Irish-Indian poet, writer, illustrator

The rage you’re feeling
comes from the same place
inside your heart as the love.4

Gill reminds us that our strongest emotions are not opposites but kin. Rage and love are drawn from the same source of deep care for one another and for our world.

2. BROOKE D. ANDERSON, President, Pivotal

“I’ve never been a big fan of New Year’s resolutions, but there are a few that Pivotal has no trouble committing to. In 2026, we will maintain our focus on expanding women’s economic and political power. We will prioritize the health and well-being of women and young people across the globe. We will continue to lift up bipartisan approaches, build alliances, and use every tool in our toolbox, from venture capital to charitable grantmaking to advocacy, to help remove the barriers that hold people back. No matter the headlines or headwinds that come our way, we will stand firm in our commitment to our partners and the steady pursuit of progress. If there is anything we resolve to do this year, let it be to never give up.”5

Anderson names a form of leadership that does not react to headlines but instead anchors itself in long-term commitment—protecting purpose so it can endure.

3. SULEIKA JAOUAD, American writer, advocate, motivational speaker

“The day before I was admitted to the bone marrow transplant unit for my second transplant, John was like, ‘Let’s get married. Let’s get married today. This is what you do in the face of these things. You double down on love.’

In the course of 24 hours, we threw together a tiny, little living room wedding. We ordered fried chicken sandwiches and had champagne and five people there. John rented a piano just for the night.

I walked into that bone marrow transplant the next day on cloud nine. I was the happiest I’ve ever been.

It really did feel to me like that forever lesson that I’m always learning of holding the brutal facts of life and the beautiful ones in the same open palm.”6

Jaouad shows us how choosing love is not naïve. Especially in moments of darkness, fear, illness, or uncertainty, it is quietly radical.

Together, these voices point to a shared truth: protecting our peace allows us to stay in relationship with reality without hardening, collapsing or turning away. It is how we remain capable of the kind of leadership this moment asks of us.

And it is fierce to protect our peace.

Thank you for reading The Ferocity Letter.

I write these words to encourage and empower you—and because I need them, too.

May this letter remind you that protecting your peace is not the same as withdrawing from the fight. It is preparation for powerful truth-telling and the work that you are here to do.

Until next time, trust your ferocity.

— Laura

Laura Lowery is an advisor to visionary women. A communications strategist, writer, and founder of Light Advisors—she partners with purpose-driven leaders at threshold moments to give voice to your vision, elevate your presence, and empower you to communicate with clarity and resonance. Learn more: lightadvisors.co

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Hello and welcome to the sixth edition of The Ferocity Letter, a softly fierce Sunday note for visionary women—and everyone who supports them.

My mission is simple: to empower you to trust your intuition and communicate with presence, clarity and resonance.

Each week, I share field notes, practices, and words from fierce women.

This week’s letter is about the language of emotion—and how our communication expands when we can acknowledge what people are actually feeling, with attuned precision.

FIELD NOTES | Language Under Pressure

During the pandemic, I worked closely with a c-suite executive at a global health organization.

A scientist and physician by training, she’s brilliant, rigorous, deeply committed to people, patients, ethics and the integrity of the scientific method. She was leading at a moment when fear, uncertainty, grief, and urgency were everywhere.

Her communication needed to be as genuine and human as she is, and it needed to be grounded in science—accurate and clear. It had to acknowledge what people were living through without amplifying panic. It had to offer steadiness and agency without denying reality.

On our regular calls, I would pose simple questions and listen carefully to how she answered:

• What are you most concerned about right now?

• What or who are you inspired by right now?

• What do you most want people to know and remember?

• What feels important to say but easy to overlook?

• How are you feeling and how are you coping, personally?

• What are you hearing from your team, partners, colleagues, patients?

Her responses gave a clear view into her humanity, vision and innate sense of responsibility as a leader. She never wanted her communication to dwell in fear or grief. She wanted to inspire people to their best. But she also never wanted to bypass the gravity and complexity of what we were dealing with, or dismiss the very human challenges that people were experiencing.

The language she chose had to do something very specific. It had to name what people were feeling just enough to be felt and then help move that energy somewhere life-giving. It had to empathize with the real feelings and elevate the message toward collective responsibility and collaboration. Toward trust in science. Toward our shared humanity. Toward the belief that we could get through something hard, together.

Those months spent listening deeply and helping frame her messages, speeches, and bylines illuminated something for me about executive communication: The most admired and trusted leaders pay attention to the emotional state of the people they lead.

In communications they face it head on with empathy and clear language—not indulging in emotion but rather channeling the energy of it toward the higher calling. They elevate the moment, inspire the human spirit and invite their audience to join them in working toward a shared vision.

This requires emotional fluency. It’s also a form of ferocity—the deep, directed, transformative energy that is neither reckless nor harmful but rooted in clarity and care.

Emotional fluency is one of the most underdeveloped—and most essential—skills in modern leadership communications.

A Vocabulary for What We Carry

At senior levels, communication is rarely about saying more. Instead the work is to choose words that can hold complexity, emotional resonance and direction at once.

The autumn after Covid-19 vaccines became available and the world had started to return to some semblance of normal, Brené Brown published my personal favorite of all her books, Atlas of the Heart: Mapping Meaningful Connection and the Language of Human Experience1.

In this book, she does something powerful. She names and verbally illustrates feelings not as a handful of blunt categories like anger, sadness, fear, but as a nuanced and well-researched landscape of 87 different human emotions and experiences.

• Disappointment is not the same as grief.

• Anxiety is not the same as fear.

• Resentment is not the same as anger.

• Happiness is not the same as joy.

Each carries a different energy, a different story, a different invitation for response.

This distinction matters more than we’ve been taught to notice.

When we collapse complex emotional experiences into vague or overly general language, people feel unseen and disconnected, even when the intention is kind.

Imagine an executive saying “I know many of you are sad about the election, let’s take the rest of this week to work from home,” when what you’re really feeling isn’t sadness, it’s a sickening sense of catastrophic collective loss, shock, and anger. Would you feel seen?

But when we can name what’s actually present with accuracy and care, something shifts. People feel recognized.

The same executive could say, “I know many people are experiencing intense emotions today. They are absolutely valid. I feel them too. Please take care of yourself. Work from home if you need to, no questions asked.” This would make more people feel seen, supported, steadier and less alone.

Empathy is Listening

Brené writes that empathy is not “walking in someone else’s shoes.” It is listening to the story someone tells about what it’s like to be in their shoes and believing them, even when it doesn’t match our own experience.

That distinction is important.

It means strong communication is more about listening deeply and with curiosity to understand what’s moving beneath the surface for people… and then choosing language that meets the moment with honesty.

We build trust by demonstrating that we are listening—carefully, humbly, without an agenda. Emotional fluency begins here.

And in fields like medicine, where trust is foundational and the words we choose impact human health and well-being, emotional fluency becomes an ethical responsibility.

It also impacts business. In moments of uncertainty, your emotionally fluent communication materially influences your organization’s credibility and reputation—shaping outcomes long before they show up on the balance sheet.

PRACTICES | Refining Your Fluency

1. Read Atlas of the Heart and keep it close. Use it as a thesaurus for human experience.

2. Pause and consider: What are the human hearts in my audience feeling right now? What do they wish they could feel?

3. Ask some of them. Listen to what they share. Stay curious.

4. In your next communication, practice naming a real human emotion your audience is feeling.

WORDS FROM WOMEN

With the holiday pause this week, I’ve had some quiet time at home and found myself back at my bookshelf. I ran my fingers across familiar spines of books I love. I returned to wisdom of three women, each illuminating the same truth from different angles:

1. bell hooks, African American feminist, author, educator, social critic

“To indoctrinate boys into the rules of patriarchy, we force them to feel pain and to deny their feelings.”
— The Will to Change: Men, Masculinity, and Love2

Hooks saw that emotional illiteracy is not accidental, it is taught. When children are denied language for their inner experience, they grow into adults who struggle to recognize, regulate, or communicate what they feel. What she calls for is not sentimentality, but emotional awareness as a foundation for integrity, relational skill, and ethical leadership.

2. LISA FELDMAN BARRETT, neuroscientist and author

“A skilled interior designer can look at five shades of blue and distinguish azure, cobalt, ultramarine, royal blue, and cyan… My students and I discovered a similar phenomenon for emotions.”
— How Emotions Are Made3

Barrett’s work shows us that precision matters. Emotional granularity—the ability to distinguish between closely related feelings—gives us the ability to be more attuned and informed. When our communication collapses everything into catch-all words like “stress,” we lose resonance. When we name what’s actually present, we gain connection and power.

3. BRENÉ BROWN, research professor and author

“Choosing to be curious is choosing to be vulnerable because it requires us to surrender to uncertainty. We have to ask questions, admit to not knowing, risk being told that we shouldn’t be asking, and, sometimes, make discoveries that lead to discomfort.”
— Atlas of the Heart4

Brown reminds us that emotional fluency begins with curiosity. To listen without an agenda, to admit we don’t yet understand, to stay present to discomfort—this is not passive. It is an act of leadership that builds trust and opens the door to real connection.

Together, they point to the same essential truth: that emotional fluency is a learned, disciplined, courageous capacity that shapes power.

And it is fierce to choose words and stories that will resonate, so that we can direct that emotional energy toward something good.

Thank you for reading The Ferocity Letter.

I write these words to encourage and empower you—and because I need them, too.

If this letter stirred recognition, if you sense that emotional fluency is part of your communications edge, I’d welcome a thoughtful conversation.

Until next time, trust your ferocity.

— Laura

Laura Lowery is an advisor to visionary women. A communications strategist, writer, and founder of Light Advisors—she partners with purpose-driven leaders at threshold moments to give voice to your vision, elevate your presence, and empower you to communicate with clarity and resonance. Learn more: lightadvisors.co

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Hello and welcome to the fifth edition of The Ferocity Letter, a softly fierce Sunday note for visionary women—and everyone who supports them.

My mission is simple: to empower you to trust your intuition and communicate with presence, clarity and resonance.

Every other week, I share field notes, practices, and words from fierce women.

This week’s letter is about the story beneath your stories.

And I want to begin with a moment that rearranged me.

FIELD NOTES | The Day My Own Story Found Me

In the midst of pandemic lockdown, on an overcast spring morning in Seattle, I wandered down to the dock on Lake Washington with coffee in hand. The air was still, that particular kind of quiet that makes you feel as though the world is holding its breath.

I had recently begun a new practice that felt strange and revealing. I was leaving voice notes for myself as a way of hearing my own voice more clearly.

I remember lifting my phone and beginning to speak, asking open-ended questions about what work I want to do next, and why? Somewhere in the middle of a sentence, a realization surfaced. I heard my eight-year-old self, ashamed, repeat words an adult had once spoken to her:

“Stop feeling sorry for yourself.”

Except this little girl had not been ‘feeling sorry for herself’. She felt sad and frustrated at an unfairness, but she didn’t have language for how to express her feelings—and the adult didn’t have the skills to receive them.

Brave little eight-year-old me had learned that day that difficult inner feelings were not something to speak about or expect help with. I learned to feel ashamed of them.

Feelings were sometimes discussed on Sesame Street, Mr. Rogers, and in Judy Blume books, but not in school, not in the broader culture we grew up in, and rarely at home. Generation X was taught achievement, perfection, composure and self-reliance. We learned how to do things, solve things and push through. But we weren’t collectively shown how to name what was happening inside of us, or how to sit with someone else’s feelings without trying to tidy them away.

Standing on that dock as a grown woman, listening to my adult voice as I articulated something long unspoken, I felt a shift. It was a quiet but profound recognition that so much of my life — my work, my writing, the spaces I create for women — had been seeking to resolve that little girl’s sense of shame:

I wanted to learn how to give voice to what lives inside me, and in doing so help other people do the same.

Without realizing it, I had been building a professional life around the very thing I didn’t grow up with enough of. I had been working to create language that respected feeling in corporate communications. To make space for intuition in business. To make it safer for the kind of human truth-telling that makes us whole.

Lucia, the magazine I founded in 2015 with a mission to give voice to the heart, was that. The essays I published were that. The communications work I still do — advising visionary women as they articulate the heart of their leadership — is that.

On that dock, I understood clearly for the first time that my work has always been about creating the kind of attuned, emotionally intelligent communication I once didn’t have words for.

The moment was a remembering.

It also helped clarify my vision of a world where every woman can move from inner wisdom, trust her ferocity, speak truth without shame and bring her boldest visions to life.

And this is why I believe so deeply in the power of a Vision Narrative.

What Is a Vision Narrative?

(and why it matters more than ever)

This week, The Wall Street Journal published an article1 noting that the number of job postings using the word “storyteller” has doubled in the past year. Companies across sectors are suddenly searching for people who can help them “tell their story.”

But are organizations really looking for more “storytelling” in the Hollywood, Joseph Campbell sense of a timeless tale about a journey with a hero, a conflict and a resolution?

Or are they really looking for meaning makers?

As AI becomes increasingly capable of producing polished content at scale, what’s growing scarce—and therefore valuable—is meaning.

Humans who make meaning surface emotional truths that resonate with one another. We know how to make felt sense out of complexity because we can feel.

In a crowded, noisy landscape, people give their trust and attention to what sounds and feels real. Imperfect but full of meaning and soul? You win.

Humans want to hear from humans. You move us by touching our hearts—by giving us a piece of ourselves reflected in your true story. And a true story about what’s behind your vision gives us a reason to believe and a future to believe in.

This is where a Vision Narrative comes in.

What is it?

Your Vision Narrative is a powerful expression of your purpose, written and spoken in a way that moves people. It ties together your personal and professional journey, your vision and strategy for the future, and the stories that shape it. It becomes the foundation for all of your communications.

It holds:

• your lived experience

• your values and point of view

• the emotional truth behind your leadership

• and the vision that others are being asked to step into with you

It’s what allows people to believe you.

And in this moment, when trust is fragile — and women who lead are still asked to prove their credibility again and again — a clear Vision Narrative becomes an incredibly powerful, and dare I say fierce, tool. Remember, we are redefining ferocity as:

ferocity (fe·’rä·se·tē) noun

1. A deep, directed, transformative energy that is neither reckless nor hostile, but rooted in clarity and care.

2. The power to disrupt what harms, protect what matters, and shape what comes next.

3. The fierce love, conviction, and creative force women channel when they trust their intuitive wisdom.

A Vision Narrative serves as a living instrument that weaves all of this into one through line, a touchstone and a guidebook that you (and your team) can carry.

Think of it as the foundational work beneath the speeches, the platforms, the books, the moments when the stakes are high and the world is listening.

PRACTICES

If you are contemplating your own leadership story as a Vision Narrative in the new year, here are four creative questions to explore:

1. What do I believe is my purpose in life? Why?

2. What is my vision of a future that does not yet exist, but that I will commit my work to help build?

3. What is the change I believe we can make in the world?

4. If I could write a heartfelt love letter to the world, what might I say?

WORDS FROM WOMEN

Three fierce voices that caught my attention this week each name a truth about power, emotion, and responsibility. They show us what becomes possible when women refuse to ignore what they know to be true.

1. ALANIS MORISETTE, Musician

“I think anger gets a bad rap, because it’s often perceived to be this destructive acting out. But anger itself moves worlds. At the foundation of every form of activism and advocacy is rage. So it’s almost as though, as I get older, rage becomes my friend and my ally to help me show up when I’m scared or I’m terrified of a risk.”2

In a recent interview, Morisette reframes anger not as a loss of control, but as a vital signal that something matters. When named and directed, it becomes a source of courage rather than destruction, a force that helps us move toward what we care about instead of away from risk.

2. MACKENZIE SCOTT, Novelist and Philanthropist

“The potential of peaceful, non-transactional contribution has long been underestimated, often on the basis that it is not financially self-sustaining, or that some of its benefits are hard to track. But what if these imagined liabilities are actually assets? What if these so-called weaknesses foster the strengths upon which the thriving (or even survival) of our civilization depends?”3

In her 2025 Yield Giving letter, “We Are the Ones We’ve Been Waiting For,” Scott challenges the dominant logic that says metrics and transactional proof are necessary for giving to have social value. Her letter also reminds us that some of the most powerful contributions — respect, understanding, empathy, forgiveness, inspiration — are difficult to quantify, and yet essential to the survival and health of humanity.

3. NAOMI SHULMAN, Writer and Editor

“Nice people made the best Nazis. Or so I have been told. My mother was born in Munich in 1934, and spent her childhood in Nazi Germany surrounded by nice people who refused to make waves. When things got ugly, the people my mother lived alongside chose not to focus on “politics,” instead busying themselves with happier things. They were lovely, kind people who turned their heads as their neighbors were dragged away.”4

Shulman draws a stark line between being “nice” and being ethical. Her words remind us that comfort and politeness are not neutral. Her words, written in 2016, are even more resonant today.

And when you can tell the story behind your vision, your presence inspires and gives us something real.

If you are supporting a principal’s voice—or your own—and curious about creating a Vision Narrative, I’d be honored to explore it with you.

Thank you for reading The Ferocity Letter.

I write these words to encourage and empower you—and because I need them, too.

If this letter speaks to you, forward it to another woman who leads, advises, or helps shape the stories that remake the world.

That’s how quiet revolution grows.

Until next time, trust your ferocity.

— Laura

Laura Lowery is an advisor to visionary women. A communications strategist, writer, and founder of Light Advisors—she partners with purpose-driven leaders at threshold moments to give voice to your vision, elevate your presence, and empower you to communicate with clarity and resonance. Learn more: lightadvisors.co

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Hello and welcome to the fourth edition of The Ferocity Letter, a softly fierce Sunday note for visionary women—and everyone who supports them.

My mission is simple: to empower you to trust your intuition and communicate with presence, clarity and resonance.

Each week, I share field notes, practices, and words from fierce women.

This week’s letter is about truth-telling — the kind that illuminates and opens what needs to be opened without inflicting harm.

And one woman just modeled this at the highest possible level.

FIELD NOTES | A Masterclass in Revealing What Matters

Melinda French Gates’ newest book, The Next Day: Transitions, Change and Moving Forward1, is a rare and powerful example of how to reveal big truths with grace, discernment and holy restraint.

In its pages she shares tender memories, hard-earned lessons, and seismic personal truths — all without taking a single swipe. No retribution. No pettiness. No spectacle. She never burns the room down.

Instead, she writes with vulnerability and keeps her eye on the bigger arc: What can these stories help others see about their own next day?

I read it over three nights, staying up later than I intended. Each time I closed the book, the dried streamlines of tears on my face reminded me that this is what happens when someone tells the truths that matter.

Melinda gives us access, but she also gives us elevation.

She helps us rise into our own transitions, griefs, reinventions, and quiet resurrections without needing to center herself as the heroine. She centers the human. She centers the reader. And she does it with an emotional intelligence so calibrated that every senior communications leader I know will feel it in their chest.

This is what it looks like when revelation is done with purpose.

Myth Helps Us Understand Why This Works

More than a decade ago, during my yoga teacher training era, I learned a story that has followed me ever since. It’s the story of Siva and Sakti, the masculine and feminine halves of consciousness in Shaivism.

Siva, the masculine, holds space: awareness, stillness, presence.

Sakti, the feminine, creates: energy, expression, form.

I return to this story often because mythology shows us what we sometimes forget in communication: the power of well-crafted revelation.

**

One day, in the beautiful quiet darkness of space, Sakti turns to her lover Siva:

“Let’s make a universe.”

“Why?” Siva asks.

“For the sheer joy of creating.”

So, she creates a universe and they marvel.

Then Sakti says, “Let’s make Earth—and humans who resemble us.”

“Why?”

“For the sheer joy of experiencing what it’s like to taste, touch, feel, and be alive.”

So, she creates Earth and human beings, and again they marvel.

And then Sakti says something wild:

“Let’s make the humans temporarily forget that they’re divine.”

“Why would we do that?” Siva asks.

“For the sheer joy of remembering.”

**

This story captures something true about being human: we forget and remember, over and over. The truth is concealed and revealed, again and again. We lose the thread and find it, sometimes in the same hour.

Revelation—the right truth, at the right moment, in the right form—is what wakes people up.

Melinda’s book is revelation. She uses personal narrative to awaken something powerful inside all of us—an ability to navigate change, find our bearings and move forward when the ground beneath us is shifting.

What Visionaries (and Their Comms Partners) Can Learn from Her

Revealing big truths without harm requires us to:

1. Do the deep work privately. No one writes a book like The Next Day without saying the unsayable somewhere—to a therapist, a trusted friend, a coach, a writing partner. You get it all out (privately) first. Then you do the work to discern where is the light, where is the gold.

2. Have partners who can hold the depths. This includes communications directors, ghostwriters, editors, strategists, and advisors who are comfortable in emotionally complex terrain and can distinguish confession from contribution.

3. Know your purpose, vision, and values by heart. Like etchings in light, these become the compass for every story, every speech, every post, every off-hand remark. Know them like the back of your hand. Live them, breathe them, speak them.

4. Choose revelation over reaction. There is a difference between sharing what awakens and sharing drama for attention. Melinda chose awakening.

5. Tell the emotional truth without weaponizing it. This is a discipline and an art. It requires maturity, regulation and a steady center.

It is a sacred responsibility.

The way you tell your truth will shape not only your reputation, it shapes the world we live in.

Narrative Is Power

Our narratives shape culture, policy, belonging, imagination, and what becomes possible for women.

Melinda French Gates knows this. Her team knows this. Her investment firm and philanthropic foundation, Pivotal, is acting on this.

In fact, Pivotal is supporting this challenge right now with a $60 million grant competition—the Workplace Innovation Now (WIN) Challenge2, led by Aspen Digital, a program of the Aspen Institute. The Narrative Challenge is asking, among other things: What game-changing approaches will shape new narratives that help women thrive and everyone win as workplaces transform?

I wonder, how might we all experience more of the sheer joy of remembering the truth of who we are?

A deep bow to Melinda French Gates and her trusted advisors and editors, whom she names with praise and gratitude in her book’s acknowledgements. Thank you for giving us these stories and this inspiration. This is ferocity at its best.

PRACTICES

This month, take advantage of the contemplative darkness December brings to ask yourself three questions:

1. What is the truth that matters in my story? Not the truth of your emotions in the moment—the truth that serves people, the truth that serves your vision.

2. Have I said everything somewhere (privately) so that I don’t need to say everything everywhere?

3. Is this the moment to reveal… or the moment to hold, shape and prepare?

WORDS FROM WOMEN

This week I came across three other voices of revelation—each naming truth without burning down the room, each modeling how ferocity can be clear, grounded, and deeply human.

1. BILLIE EILISH, Musician

“We’re in a time right now where the world is really, really bad and really dark and people need empathy and help more than ever… And if you’re a billionaire, *why* are you a billionaire? No hate, but yeah, give your money away shorties.”3

Eilish didn’t shame—but in a room that included high-profile billionaires, she accepted the WSJ Magazine Innovator Award by asking a question that disarms and awakens. It’s fierce in its simplicity and impossible to ignore, an invitation to look at power with clear eyes.

2. ERIN GALLAGHER, author of Hype Women

“Let’s amplify everyone he’s attempting to destroy… And in every situation don’t mention his name once, because those he’s attacking represent what’s good in our world.”4

Gallagher reframes the “Quiet, Piggy” moment with clarity: when a public figure attacks, we can respond with elevation. This is a form of narrative aikido—redirecting harm and turning someone else’s contempt into collective amplification of what is truly good.

3. CHIMAMANDA NGOZI ADICHIE, Nigerian-American author

“Be kind, because kindness is a measure of our humanity. But do not be nice… Nice means silencing inconvenient truths… Nice will not remake the world. And there is so much about our world that needs remaking. And while you bravely remake the world. Please be skeptical of perfection, because perfection is, among other things, utterly boring.”5

Ngozi Adichie draws a vital line between courage and appeasement. She names the difference between comfort and truth, and reminds us that leadership requires a form of bold imperfection.

And when we reveal what truly matters, the world rearranges around it.

Much of my work supports visionary women and the teams around them as they discern what the moment calls for, and what the world is ready to hear. Surfacing the light, the gold. If you feel a next chapter forming in you, a story that wants to be told with clarity, courage, and grace, I’d be honored to help you shape it.

Thank you for reading The Ferocity Letter.

I write these words each week to encourage and empower you—and because I need them, too.

If this letter speaks to you, forward it to another woman who leads.

That’s how quiet revolution grows.

Until next time, trust your ferocity.

— Laura

Laura Lowery is an advisor to visionary women. A communications strategist, writer, and founder of Light Advisors—she partners with purpose-driven leaders at threshold moments to give voice to your vision, elevate your presence, and empower you to communicate with clarity and resonance. Learn more: lightadvisors.co

Subscribe now

Hello and welcome to the third edition of The Ferocity Letter, a softly fierce Sunday note for women who lead—and everyone who supports them.

My mission is simple: to empower you to trust your intuition and communicate with presence, clarity and resonance.

Each week, I share field notes, practices, and words from fierce women.

This week is about the state of our nervous systems—because yes, this absolutely shapes how your vision and message land.

What does it take to be fully awake? When was the last time you touched earth?

FIELD NOTES | Restorative Surplus or Deficit?

I could hear the edge in her voice.

She was describing a stressful week and decisions she had resolved — brilliantly — but her body hadn’t caught up. I heard it in her clipped cadence, her shallow breath, the rush behind her words. Her nervous system was convinced the threat was still happening, even though her higher mind knew it had passed.

She couldn’t yet fully register the truth that she had just taken a major leap toward the dream she has been building for years.

We paused. Took a few longer exhales. I could feel her system soften a little.

I sense many leaders are moving through the world this way right now — tired but wired, brilliant but fried, conscious but not able to be really awake. Too much in our heads.

In a recent study by Deloitte, 73% of the C-suite reported that they aren’t able to take time off and disconnect1.

As your communications partner — and I say this with nothing but love — I need you to be as fierce about what truly restores you as you are about your purpose.

Why?

Because this is how your vision comes through without distortion. A regulated nervous system is what enables presence. And presence is what enables clarity and communication that resonates.

Awake vs. Woke vs. Wide Asleep

Like many of you, I read the opinions recorded and published by The New York Times last week under the headline, “Are Women Ruining the Workplace?2”

The whole conversation seemed predicated on a single, flawed assumption:

“Our institutions have gone woke.” (and they mean it’s a bad thing)

Three conservative writers spend almost an hour treating “wokeness” as a free-floating pathology of institutions without ever discussing the actual historical injustices it’s supposedly reacting to—racism, slavery, segregation, and ongoing structural inequities by gender, sex, race, and more. That absence is loud.

But what does “woke” even mean?

Literally: to wake up, to be awake.

Metaphorically: to become aware of systemic injustices

To be awake is to be present. Informed. Attuned. Connected. Clear. Truth-seeking.

Why would any leader wish to be the opposite of that?

My sense reading the piece was that these individuals, accomplished as they may be, are wide asleep. The whole conversation is framed in a way that ignores the truth about power and history in this country.

And here’s where the nervous system comes in.

Since this interview was published, I’ve seen dozens of amygdala-driven reactions across my social feeds. It made people angry. Understandably.

But beyond reactivity, what we need is ferocity.

Ferocity—the way we’re redefining it:

“A deep, directed, transformative energy that is neither reckless nor hostile but rooted in clarity and care. The power to disrupt what harms, protect what matters, and shape what comes next. The fierce love, conviction, and creative force we channel when we trust our intuitive wisdom.”

We do need to acknowledge foolish takes like the Times piece for what they are—misguided, misogynistic, even weaponized. But then—and this is far more important—we need to speak truth and speak our vision for the world.

But we can’t do that if our nervous systems are fried.

Your Body is an Amplifier

Whatever you’re holding internally comes through your voice, your timing, your message and your presence (or your absence).

You cannot hide it.

When operating on pure adrenaline becomes the daily norm, the temporary highs can trick you into believing you’re performing well. But long-term, adrenaline narrows your field of vision. It makes you reactive. It steals your access to your own intuition.

To be awake — as in clear-eyed, grounded, visionary awake — your system has to settle.

Presence is a Physiological State

I was talking about this with my good friend Amanda this week. She shared something Martha Beck3 calls the zone of genius: that spacious, powerful, creative place we access only when our nervous system is regulated enough to receive insight instead of chasing threat.

It’s presence.

Presence is staying with ourselves while staying open to the people and the moment around us, without losing our center. It allows us to be clear. To respond, not react. It’s what tells people they can trust us.

True presence is impossible without a regulated nervous system.

You cannot speak your vision from your amygdala. You cannot genuinely inspire anyone from an adrenaline addiction. You cannot lead from a state of contraction.

But:

When your nervous system is calm, you become awake.
When you’re awake, you can be present.
When you’re present, you can listen and speak truth.
When you listen and speak truth, you become powerful.

That is ferocity.

PRACTICES

This week, ask yourself three questions:

1. How is my nervous system right now? Be honest. Humans are notoriously good at convincing ourselves we’re okay even when we’re not.

2. What do I need to come back into presence? Movement? Stillness? A walk? A run? A cry? A conversation? A nap? A boundary? A meal? Bare feet touching earth?

3. What would my communication sound like if I spoke from a fully rested mind and body? You’ll feel the answer before you hear it.

WORDS FROM WOMEN

Three voices caught my attention this week—each addressing the power of prioritizing rest in her own way.

1. TORI DUNLAP, CEO of Her First $100K

   Dunlap shuts down her $8M financial education company for one week every quarter—on top of providing unlimited paid time off. She does this as a proactive investment in the well being of herself and her seven employees.

“The irony of overwork is that the more you push, the less inspired you get. In my own life, I’ve noticed that my best ideas (new product concepts, creative marketing angles, partnership pitches) come when I’m not in front of my laptop. For my team, it’s the same. When you’re constantly reacting to notifications, your brain doesn’t have time to wander, and that’s where innovation lives.”4

2. EVY POUMPOURAS, former U.S. Secret Service agent

   Poumpouras noticed one U.S. President she served kept thirty identical suits in his closet—a simple way to spare his mind one more daily decision. Even the most powerful nervous systems have limits.

“Your brain—your cognitive load—is like a bathtub. It can only hold so much water. If you keep pouring more and more in, it overflows… When your cognitive load is overflowing, you’re inefficient, you’re sloppy, you’re stressed out, you’re frazzled—you’re maxed.”5

3. FAITH POPCORN, futurist and cultural strategist

   Popcorn names what’s humming beneath the surface: women are redesigning the future by honoring what is humane, connected and sustainable. This kind of leadership requires inner spaciousness, not depletion.

“Women are unplugging from models that never served them and building values-led, regenerative, networked systems in their place. When women move… markets, culture, and the future move with them.”6

Together, they paint a picture of what the future looks like: leaders who prioritize restorative practices and healthy nervous systems so we can remain awake in a world that keeps trying to sedate us.

Thank you for reading The Ferocity Letter.

I look forward to writing these words each week to encourage and empower you—and because I need them, too.

I’d love to hear how the practices go for you.

If this letter speaks to you, forward it to another woman who leads. That’s how quiet revolution grows.

We are all in this together.

Until next Sunday, trust your ferocity.

And rest like you mean it.

— Laura

Laura Lowery is a strategist, writer, and founder of Light Advisors. She partners with purpose-driven leaders at threshold moments to give voice to your vision, elevate your presence, and empower you to communicate with clarity and resonance. Learn more: lightadvisors.co

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Hello and welcome to the second edition of The Ferocity Letter, a softly fierce Sunday note for women who lead.

My mission is simple: to empower you to trust your intuition and communicate with presence, clarity and resonance.

Each week, I share field notes, practices, and words from fierce women.

This week is about the power of naming. In a fairy tale, the queen saved what was most precious to her by speaking the devil’s name. How might we do the same?

FIELD NOTES | Read the Room

Let’s read the room for a minute.

Everywhere you look, people are struggling.

Layoffs. Rising costs. Uncertain economies. Skyrocketing healthcare premiums. Nightly videos of masked ICE agents hurting people. Fear seeping in through headlines, timelines, communities, dinner tables.

Even the people on your payroll — the ones still “doing fine” — are connected to someone who isn’t. We’re a country of interdependence and unease. When people you love are scared, it touches you too.

This is the room you’re leading in. This is the environment you’re speaking in.

Before people can feel inspired by your vision, they need to feel safe in your presence.

Before they’ll follow you anywhere, they need to know you see what’s real.

That’s what it means to name the devil.

The Power of Naming

When there’s an elephant in the room but no one talks about it, unease becomes the dominant frequency. Energy drains into the unsaid and distrust fills the silence. The elephant holds the power.

But when a leader names what everyone else is afraid to say — even briefly — the air shifts. Shoulders drop. The room exhales.

This is an ancient kind of power.

In an old fairytale, the young queen is haunted by a dark bargain: her firstborn child, promised to a strange little man who spins straw into gold. He tells her she can keep her child only if she guesses his name. For days, she tries and fails — until one night, her messenger overhears him singing his secret in the woods:

“The queen will never guess my game, that Rumpelstiltskin is my name!”

The next morning, she speaks it aloud. “Your name is Rumpelstiltskin.”

And in that moment of truth-telling, his power disappears.

Naming the devil takes away its hold.

That’s why dictators hate comedians. It’s why silence feeds fear.

And it’s why the best executive communication begins with the courage to say what’s real.

In my work helping leaders shape their vision with resonant communication, I’ve seen again and again that trust begins with truth. When you speak to what’s unspoken, your audience leans in, not away.

Evolved Executive Presence

You don’t have to dwell on the darkness, or turn a meeting into a lament, or make your speech into a recounting of all the injustices in the world. In fact, don’t do this.

But you do need to understand and name the thing that’s stealing your audience’s focus.

Say, “This is a hard moment because…”
Say, “What’s happening is wrong and…”
Say, “People are suffering because...”
Say, “We can hold what’s hard and still move toward what’s next.”

Then, once the devil has been named — and only then — shift the room toward vision.

Remind people of what’s still good, what’s still possible, what you’re still building together.

Naming the devil is a fierce, transformative act.

And remember, we are redefining ferocity1 as a deep, directed, transformative energy that is neither reckless nor hostile, but rooted in clarity and care.

This is how we transmute fear into resilience.

Empathy first. Then clarity. Then creation.

Research backs this shift. In her 2024 Harvard Business Review article, “The New Rules of Executive Presence,”2 economist and leadership expert Sylvia Ann Hewlett notes that while confidence and decisiveness remain foundational, qualities like authenticity, inclusiveness, emotional intelligence, and the ability to listen to learn are now considered just as critical.

Or, as Brené Brown puts it, what we need now is what a football team calls their quarterback’s pocket presence3—not posture but attunement. It’s the shared ability (leader and team) to sense what’s happening, name what’s real, and move the ball downfield together. Presence as system, not solo.

PRACTICES

This week, stay curious.

1. Ask at least one person (who you trust to be honest with you) if they’ll share what is worrying them deeply right now. Listen to what they say, and listen for what they don’t want to say. Use your intuition to listen more deeply, like the queen’s messenger listened for the name of Rumpelstiltskin. Trust it.

2. Start a list. Call it your ‘devil list’ or your ‘elephant list.’ Write down the fears and challenges you notice your employees, customers, investors, and other audiences are quietly grappling with.

3. Use your words. Come up with ten different ways you could name these devils in a conversation, a meeting, or an upcoming executive communication. Practice speaking them out loud.

WORDS FROM WOMEN

Three voices caught my attention this week—each naming the devil in her own way.

1. KAMALA HARRIS, Former Vice President of the United States

“This is a moment in time where we all need to be in rooms like this to remind ourselves of the fact that we have a sisterhood that is strong. That we are not alone, that no one can take our identity or existence from us because we won’t let them. And that we will also find a way and a time to be sisters in the sisterhood, to pamper ourselves, to relax. I told Deb, if I hadn’t had something else to do today, I would not have come here with my hair blow dried (laughter). And we all deserve to have those moments.”4

At a time when women’s rights and belonging feel under siege, Harris begins by naming what’s real—this moment in time, the exhaustion, the threat—and transforms it into solidarity. She spoke these words at the Leading Women Defined Summit in April 2025.

2. ROBIN WALL KIMMERER, botanist, author, citizen of the Potawatomi Nation

“‘Drill, Baby, Drill,’ that mantra of destruction and extraction, is an intentional slap in the face to people who value land, life, health, and justice over corporate profits. Well, let’s raise a garden-gloved middle finger in return… Together, we can spark a grassroots movement to heal land, build community, and transform love of land into social change. I invite you, my friends, my neighbors, my readers, my fellow citizens into a new movement called Plant, Baby, Plant.”5

Kimmerer names the force of destruction first, then reclaims its language with creative defiance and vision. “Plant, Baby, Plant” is both invitation and incantation.

3. LISA MARCHIANO, Jungian analyst

“There’s the devil, at every stage of development… You have to confront this somehow, and you have to understand that you have your own devil, and your devil is going to make demands on you. You have to have a stance and a willingness to—in essence—claim your devil. Otherwise, you will be immobilized.”6

Marchiano reminds us that the devil isn’t only external—it lives in our psyche, too. Naming it is how we move from fear into agency.

Together, they model three kinds of courage: collective truth-telling, creative defiance, and inner reckoning.

Each begins by naming the dark—and then turning it toward light.

Thank you for reading The Ferocity Letter.

I look forward to writing these words each week to encourage and empower you—and because I need them, too.

I’d love to hear how the practices go for you.

If this letter speaks to you, forward it to another woman who leads. That’s how quiet revolution grows.

Whether you’re writing or speaking to your team, your board, or the wider world—how you name what’s real shapes what comes next. If you ever want to explore how to bring more presence, resonance, and trust into your leadership voice, that’s the work I love most.

We are all in this together.

Until next Sunday, trust your ferocity.

— Laura

P.S. A quick note for founders: Inc. is accepting applications for its 2026 Female Founders 500 list through November 7. If you’re building something with heart, purpose, and ferocity—or you know a woman who is—this is a beautiful opportunity for national recognition. → Apply here

Laura Lowery is a strategist, writer, and founder of Light Advisors. She partners with purpose-driven leaders at threshold moments to give voice to your vision, elevate your presence, and empower you to communicate with clarity and resonance. Learn more: lightadvisors.co

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Hello and welcome to the first edition of The Ferocity Letter, a softly fierce Sunday note for women who lead.

My mission is simple: to empower you to trust your intuition and communicate with presence, clarity and resonance.

Each week, I share field notes, practices, and words from fierce women.

This first edition asks three simple but radical questions: What do you feel fierce about? What is that ferocity protecting? What vision lives on the other side of it?

FIELD NOTES | The Moment the World Shifted

Until June 24, 2022, I never thought of myself as a promoter of ferocity. I’m an introvert—a listener, a harmonizer, a seeker of beauty. Conflict drains me.

That day, somewhere over the Midwest on a flight home to Seattle from New York, I learned the Supreme Court had overturned Roe v. Wade. Suspended in that plane, I hovered between two Americas—one I had grown up believing in, and one we had just entered. Something ancient stirred in me. A knowing. A quiet but urgent awareness that we were entering a new era, and women—courageous, conscious, wise, visionary, fierce women—would need to lead it.

Three years later, that feeling hasn’t faded. Ferocity is stirring—in me, in you, in women everywhere who are paying attention.

We tend to associate the word with aggression or rage, but ferocity can be something deeper and more purposeful: an energy in service of creation and life itself.

I often think of Kali, the Hindu goddess of time, destruction, creation, and power—a fierce, dark, transformative aspect of the divine feminine. In her spirit, I’ve redefined ferocity for our times. (Merriam Webster, if you’re listening …)

ferocity (fe·’rä·se·tē) noun

1. A deep, directed, transformative energy that is neither reckless nor hostile, but rooted in clarity and care.

2. The power to disrupt what harms, protect what matters, and shape what comes next.

3. The fierce love, conviction, and creative force women channel when they trust their intuitive wisdom.

How might we reclaim this energy together?

Purpose at the Top

Scrolling through the McKinsey app a few nights ago, I found an article titled The Inner Game of Women CEOs.

It confirmed what I see in my work every day: the new generation of women leaders is redefining power itself.

“In our conversations with women CEOs, we found that a strong sense of personal and organizational purpose is the main driver of their boldness—much more than ego. They define their organization’s vision clearly and understand how it meshes with their own values.”1

That’s ferocity. Purpose instead of ego. Clarity instead of posturing.

I work with women founders and executives, and I see how alignment between inner purpose and outer communication transforms everything—from team culture to public trust.

That alignment is also what we capture in a Vision Narrative. Inspired by the framework created by Justina Chen2 of Chen & Cragen, which she has generously shared and allowed me to adapt, here’s how I define it:

A Vision Narrative is the most powerful expression of your purpose, written and spoken in a way that moves people. It ties together your personal and professional journey, your beliefs, your strategy, and your vision for the future.

The Vision Narrative becomes the foundation for inspired communications and, ultimately, for organizational growth.

If you don’t have one yet, let’s fix that together.

Born for These Times

None of us asked for such polarized, exhausting times—but here we are. And if you believe, as I do, in the quiet order beneath the chaos, you also know we were born for these times.

So much of what is life-giving—democracy, art, science, education, human rights—is under assault. I’d love to write only about joy, but the truth is: these are the conditions that call forth both our ferocity and our light.

Used wisely—rooted in clarity and love—the ferocity of your voice becomes not destructive, but generative.

Can we please reclaim what it means to be fierce?

Let’s own it. Let’s wear tiger T-shirts3 under tailored blazers. Let’s make courage cool again.

Most of all, let’s get really practiced at giving voice to what matters most.

PRACTICES

This week, ask yourself:

1. What do you feel fierce or angry about?

2. What is that ferocity protecting?

3. What vision lives on the other side of it?

Grab a pen and a notebook. Set a timer for 10 minutes. Write it all down.

If you don’t have time to write, go for a walk and speak your anger and your vision into a voice note.

When you get back, listen to it.

Those words you wrote or spoke? That’s your power. Trust it.

WORDS FROM WOMEN

Three voices caught my attention this week—each fierce in her own way.

1. EMMA HINCHLIFFE, Fortune’s Most Powerful Women Editor

Emma’s calm, precise presence on CNN International reminded me what courageous nuance sounds like. Discussing Japan’s first female prime minister Sanae Takaichi, she said:

“It raises interesting questions about what it means for women if the women who are rising to power are not necessarily supporting policies that those who support women’s rights believe would advance all women. … But the only way to reach parity is for women to rise to power in every political party.”4

2. BRENÉ BROWN, research professor and author

At the Fortune Most Powerful Women conference, Brené spoke to the strain leaders feel right now—and the particular steadiness women bring:

“If you’re leading people, you probably know people are not okay. I mean, folks are still going into Costco with, you know, an automatic weapon, because they’re out of Cheese Whiz. People are emotionally dysregulated, distrustful and disconnected. So you’re leading a workforce that is increasingly struggling. You’ve got really massive instability, geopolitically, changing markets and AI and tech. … We need productive urgency. What we’re seeing is reactive, action over impact. The ability to take a deep breath and settle the ball? The women in my life have taught me how to do that.”5

3. NAOMI BEINART, high-school student and author of “The Chill Girl” (op-ed, The Guardian)

Naomi’s piece stopped me cold. It describes teenage girls choosing silence over confrontation in the wake of rising misogyny:

“A group of kids is talking … one of the boys makes an off-handed joke. Maybe it’s racist or sexist or homophobic. … The girls face a choice: speak up and be labeled annoying, or let it pass and be regarded as chill. … Since November 2024, the latter reaction has become far more common.”6

Her clarity is chilling—and catalytic.

These three remind us that ferocity shows up everywhere: in nuance, steadiness, and truth-telling at any age.

It matters that we use our voices, now.

Thank you for reading The Ferocity Letter.

I look forward to writing these words each week to encourage and empower you—and because I need them, too.

How did the first practice go? I’d love to hear.

If this letter speaks to you, forward it to another woman who leads. That’s how quiet revolution grows.

We are all in this together.

Until next Sunday, trust your ferocity.

— Laura

Laura Lowery is a strategist, writer, and founder of Light Advisors. She partners with purpose-driven leaders at threshold moments to give voice to your vision, elevate your presence, and empower you to communicate with clarity and resonance. Learn more: lightadvisors.co