Most of us are not walking around with our own sense of self. We are walking around with a secondhand one,  a secondhand interesting, a secondhand valuable, a secondhand worthy,  all of it made by somebody else, handed to us, and carried so long we forgot it was never ours to begin with.

Toni Morrison called it "secondhand loneliness" in Sula. This episode extends that to the whole self.

This episode is The Invitation, a relaunch, a podcast about art, film, writing, culture, and the women building first-person lives. In this episode, we get into what decentering men actually is underneath the TikTok caption, why it is not primarily about men at all, and what it actually looks like when a woman stops locating her value in someone else's confirmation and moves the source inside.

This week's tool is the Permission Slip. 

new episodes every week. Find the full show notes, essays, and community at charliestoolbox.com or substack at charliestoolbox.substack.com

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Tools and stories to help you choose yourself in a world that socializes you not to.

Your sovereignty is your foundation. My role is to help you use it as a launchpad.

Follow for Daily Inspiration:

Take Action Now: Hit subscribe if you're ready to stop waiting for permission and start choosing yourself. New episodes drop weekly with tools for building a life that's authentically felt and beautifully lived.

Most of us are not walking around with our own sense of self. We are walking around with a secondhand one,  a secondhand interesting, a secondhand valuable, a secondhand worthy,  all of it made by somebody else, handed to us, and carried so long we forgot it was never ours to begin with.

Toni Morrison called it "secondhand loneliness" in Sula. This episode extends that to the whole self.

This episode is The Invitation, a relaunch, a podcast about art, film, writing, culture, and the women building first-person lives. In this episode, we get into what decentering men actually is underneath the TikTok caption, why it is not primarily about men at all, and what it actually looks like when a woman stops locating her value in someone else's confirmation and moves the source inside.

This week's tool is the Permission Slip. 

new episodes every week. Find the full show notes, essays, and community at charliestoolbox.com or substack at charliestoolbox.substack.com

----more----

Tools and stories to help you choose yourself in a world that socializes you not to.

Your sovereignty is your foundation. My role is to help you use it as a launchpad.

Follow for Daily Inspiration:

Take Action Now: Hit subscribe if you're ready to stop waiting for permission and start choosing yourself. New episodes drop weekly with tools for building a life that's authentically felt and beautifully lived.

300,000 Black women have been pushed out of the workforce. The system labels them "aggressive" when they speak, "not a team player" when they set boundaries, "difficult" when they advocate for themselves. These aren't random incidents; they're the deliberate mechanisms that systematically remove Black women from positions of power and influence.

Minda Harts has documented this structural violence across thousands of women's experiences and built a framework to navigate it with clarity. As a bestselling author, workplace consultant, and NYU professor, she created The Seven Trust Languages®, a system that gives women the precise vocabulary to identify where and how they're being strategically undermined at work in real time.

She's the author of The Memo: What Women of Color Need to Know to Secure a Seat at the Table, Right Within: How to Heal from Racial Trauma in the Workplace, You Are More Than Magic, and Talk to Me Nice: The Seven Trust Languages for a Better Workplace. Recognized by LinkedIn as the #1 Top Voice for Equity in the Workplace and by Business Insider as one of the 100 People Transforming Business, Minda is the founder of The Memo LLC and Queen of Harts Productions. She works with Fortune 500 companies to rebuild trust and teaches the next generation of leaders at NYU's Wagner School of Public Service. In this conversation, Minda shows you how to see the patterns, name what's happening, and make strategic choices that protect your power.

You can find Minda Hart's work here:

Website: https://www.mindaharts.com/

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/mindaharts/?hl=en

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@OfficialMindaHarts

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mindaharts/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/MindaHarts/

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Tools and stories to help you choose yourself in a world that socializes you not to.

The Shop: Discover exclusive tools, curated workshops, and guides for the radical woman ready to step fully into her power. https://www.charliestoolbox.com/shop

Substack Newsletter: Read deep dives and stories about women choosing themselves, money, self-trust, and building power outside of old systems. https://charliestoolbox.substack.com/

Website: Find more resources, learn about our methodology, and explore all our offerings in one place. https://www.charliestoolbox.com/

The Podcast: Listen to real conversations with women who've built lives beyond approval, expectation, and limits. https://charliestoolbox.podbean.com/

Your sovereignty is your foundation. My role is to help you use it as a launchpad.

**Follow for Daily Inspiration:**

- TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@charliestoolbox

- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/charliestoolbox/

- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/charliestoolbox

Take Action Now: Hit subscribe if you're ready to stop waiting for permission and start choosing yourself. New episodes drop weekly with tools for building a life that's authentically felt and beautifully lived.

What if owning yourself had nothing to do with hating yourself into submission? In this episode, I challenge the toxic belief that you need to criticize, shame, or beat yourself up to become better. The truth is, real self-ownership comes from acceptance, not attack.

I'll share practical tools for owning who you are right now, flaws, mistakes, and all, without falling into the self-hatred trap. You'll learn how to take responsibility for your life without the constant negative self-talk, how to accept yourself while still growing, and how to find genuine joy in being exactly who you are.

Whether you've been stuck in a cycle of self-criticism or you're tired of thinking you need to hate yourself to improve, this episode offers a different path. Listen in to discover how true self-ownership is built on compassion, not cruelty.

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Tools and stories to help you choose yourself in a world that socializes you not to.

Your sovereignty is your foundation. My role is to help you use it as a launchpad.

Follow for Daily Inspiration:

Take Action Now: Hit subscribe if you're ready to stop waiting for permission and start choosing yourself. New episodes drop weekly with tools for building a life that's authentically felt and beautifully lived.

We're the most educated generation of women in history. We're choosing ourselves in ways our mothers couldn't. And we're being punished for it.

If you're feeling anxious, confused, or like you're being pushed back into a box you fought to get out of, you're not imagining it. There's a pattern. A system. And once you can see it, you can navigate it differently.

Anna Malaika Tubbs (PhD, 2x NYT bestselling author of The Three Mothers and Erased) breaks down what we're actually up against and, more importantly, how to survive it while choosing yourself anyway. This is about recognition, strategy, and hope despite knowing the cost.

You can find more of Dr. Tubbs' work here:

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Tools and stories to help you choose yourself in a world that socializes you not to.

Your sovereignty is your foundation. My role is to help you use it as a launchpad.

Follow for Daily Inspiration:

Take Action Now: Hit subscribe if you're ready to stop waiting for permission and start choosing yourself. New episodes drop weekly with tools for building a life that's authentically felt and beautifully lived.

There's a genre of journalism that's exploded over the last decade. On the surface, it seems reasonable, even necessary. Articles about boys falling behind in school. Men struggling with loneliness. The crisis of modern masculinity.

But here's the question nobody's asking: Who benefits when we frame it this way?

Today, we're pulling apart the machine. Looking at what these articles do, not just what they say. And once you see it, you can't unsee it.

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Tools and stories to help you choose yourself in a world that socializes you not to.

Your sovereignty is your foundation. My role is to help you use it as a launchpad.

Follow for Daily Inspiration:

Take Action Now: Hit subscribe if you're ready to stop waiting for permission and start choosing yourself. New episodes drop weekly with tools for building a life that's authentically felt and beautifully lived.

What does it take to choose passion every single time, even when it's uncomfortable?

In this episode, we sit down with Kara, a woman who has spent her life following one unwavering voice: the one that tells her when something isn't alive enough, passionate enough, worth it enough. She's left Google. She's left the presidency of Starface.

She's moved her family to Italy. Not because things were falling apart, but because they weren't lit up enough. This is a conversation about living for the feeling. About refusing to settle for work, environments, or choices that don't serve you. About the discomfort of pivoting away from what looks good on paper toward what actually makes you feel alive. And about what it costs to live this way, and why it's worth it.

Kara doesn't just talk about passion as a nice idea. She builds her life around it. She protects it. She keeps choosing it, over and over again, even when everything else is pulling her toward safety and stability. For anyone who's learning to trust that voice, the one that says "this isn't it, but that is," this conversation will remind you why it matters to keep listening.

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Where to Find Kara Brothers

-Instagram: @karabrothers

-YouTube Podcast: https://www.youtube.com/@sayit.outloud

-Say It Out Loud; available audio only on all platforms as well

-Community: For The Play Collective or 1:1 Coaching Opportunities

- Shoot her a note at [email protected] -Newsletter sign-up: https://substack.com/@sayitoutloudnow

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Ready to stop living life on autopilot and start designing it intentionally?

- **The Shop:** Discover exclusive tools, curated workshops, and guides for the radical woman ready to step fully into her power.

- https://www.charliestoolbox.com/shop

- **Substack Newsletter:** Read deep dives and stories about women choosing themselves, money, self-trust, and building power outside of old systems. - https://charliestoolbox.substack.com/

- **Website:** Find more resources, learn about our methodology, and explore all our offerings in one place.

https://www.charliestoolbox.com/

- **The Podcast:** Listen to real conversations with women who've built lives beyond approval, expectation, and limits.

- https://charliestoolbox.podbean.com/

- **Take the Free Assessment:** Learn where you are on your decentering men journey.

- https://www.tryinteract.com/share/quiz/68b71e8eeb218c0015ec5c4f

Your sovereignty is your foundation. My role is to help you use it as a launchpad.

---------------------------------------------------------------

**Follow for Daily Inspiration:**

- TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@charliestoolbox

- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/charliestoolbox/

- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/charliestoolbox

**Take Action Now:

** Hit **subscribe** if you're ready to stop waiting for permission and start choosing yourself. New episodes drop weekly with tools for building a life that's authentically felt and beautifully lived. Ready to stop living life on autopilot and start designing it intentionally?

- **The Shop:** Discover exclusive tools, curated workshops, and guides for the radical woman ready to step fully into her power.

- https://www.charliestoolbox.com/shop -

**Substack Newsletter:** Read deep dives and stories about women choosing themselves, money, self-trust, and building power outside of old systems. - https://charliestoolbox.substack.com/

- **Website:** Find more resources, learn about our methodology, and explore all our offerings in one place. - https://www.charliestoolbox.com/

- **The Podcast:** Listen to real conversations with women who've built lives beyond approval, expectation, and limits. - https://charliestoolbox.podbean.com/

- **Take the Free Assessment:** Learn where you are on your decentering men journey.

- https://www.tryinteract.com/share/quiz/68b71e8eeb218c0015ec5c4f

Your sovereignty is your foundation. My role is to help you use it as a launchpad.

---------------------------------------------------------------

**Follow for Daily Inspiration:**

- TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@charliestoolbox

- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/charliestoolbox/

- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/charliestoolbox

**Take Action Now:** Hit **subscribe** if you're ready to stop waiting for permission and start choosing yourself. New episodes drop weekly with tools for building a life that's authentically felt and beautifully lived.

Have you ever felt like your family's voice is so loud, you can't hear your own? In this episode, we're diving into one of the most challenging but necessary journeys of adulthood: learning to prioritize your own voice over family expectations.

This isn't about abandoning the people who raised you; it's about creating the space you need to discover who you actually are beneath the layers of inherited beliefs, expectations, and advice that may not align with the life you truly want to live.

Whether your family is warm and supportive or domineering and rigid, this episode offers practical tools for anyone who's ever struggled to separate their own desires from what they were taught to want.

You'll discover:

This episode is for the woman who's ready to stop living by someone else's blueprint and start honoring her own truth—without guilt, without apology, and with full permission to be beautifully selfish.

If you've ever needed validation that it's okay to choose yourself, this is it.

----more----

Ready to stop living life on autopilot and start designing it intentionally?

- **The Shop:** Discover exclusive tools, curated workshops, and guides for the radical woman ready to step fully into her power.

Your sovereignty is your foundation. My role is to help you use it as a launchpad.

---

**Follow for Daily Inspiration:**

- TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@charliestoolbox

**Take Action Now:** Hit **subscribe** if you're ready to stop waiting for permission and start choosing yourself. New episodes drop weekly with tools for building a life that's authentically felt and beautifully lived.

What if the very beliefs meant to guide you are actually keeping you stuck? In this episode, we explore a hidden pattern that traps millions in cycles of repeated mistakes, unclear direction, and unresolved problems. You'll discover why certain phrases you've relied on your entire life might be stopping you from thinking, and what to do about it. By the end, you'll have a framework to recognize when you're giving away your power and practical steps to reclaim it. Warning: This conversation will challenge what you've always been told.

----more----

Ready to stop living life on autopilot and start designing it intentionally?

Your sovereignty is your foundation. My role is to help you use it as a launchpad.

Follow for Daily Inspiration:

Take Action Now: Hit subscribe if you're ready to stop waiting for permission and start choosing yourself. New episodes drop weekly with tools for building a life that's authentically felt and beautifully lived.

What if the voice in your head didn't have to be your worst enemy? In this episode, we explore the exhausting cycle of perfectionism, why we replay our failures on loop, and what it takes to finally make peace with the messy, complicated parts of ourselves. Through the lens of one beloved TV character's journey from self-destruction to self-acceptance, we uncover what it really means to be worthy of love, flaws and all. If you've ever felt like you need to fix yourself before you deserve compassion, this conversation is for you.

----more----

Ready to stop living life on autopilot and start designing it intentionally?

Your sovereignty is your foundation. My role is to help you use it as a launchpad.

Follow for Daily Inspiration:

Take Action Now: Hit subscribe if you're ready to stop waiting for permission and start choosing yourself. New episodes drop weekly with tools for building a life that's authentically felt and beautifully lived.