Some guidelines to help this space be a positive experience for everyone:

☮ As always with the Avocado, don’t feel compelled to share beyond your comfort level.

☮ Anyone who identifies as female, or who was socialized female/AFAB/otherwise has firsthand experience with the issues being discussed, is welcome to post. If you identify as cis-male, we ask that you please set your participation to “lurk” mode, unless otherwise explicitly invited to participate further (i.e. if we did an AMA kind of thread). I’m sure there’s plenty to be gleaned just by reading!

☮ Please do your best to be mindful of others’ experiences when commenting or posing questions for the group. The female identity is Legion and contains multitudes, and not everyone who has experience with being treated as female by society identifies as female. Furthermore, racial and ethnic identities, sexual orientation, and many other factors can color how one experiences their gender identity on a day-to-day basis. 

Bring us your news, discussions, frustrations and inspirations, Avocado Ladies+!

This week’s suggested topic: Putting yourself out there

As this goes up I’m up to my armpits in demonstrations for work at a conference in Vegas. I got here by putting myself out there at work in a way I never have before by actively volunteering to both travel and arrange things. The me of 5 years ago would be aghast to see me now. So I’m thinking about getting out there, what it takes and how we process it.

Wherever your ‘out’ is, how do you put yourself there? How does it make you feel to be there? What sort of challenges do you face getting there? What parts of it come easily? What sort of things do you wish you could put yourself out there for?