#InTheEyesOfMC: Hello? It's Me (Midlife Musings and Leadership Reflections)

It has been nearly an entire human gestation period (9 months) since I last wrote a piece for my #InTheEyesOfMC series. The hiatus has been largely due to overthinking, procrastination and an element of imposter syndrome, but with today being the first day of my 30s, I found myself reflecting on life thus far and saw it fit to write a letter to myself as an ode to the first half of my life (based on my parent's life expectancy, I am officially in my mid-life crises era).

In addition, as I wrapped up writing this piece I saw that some of the thematic areas gravitate towards this year's International Women's Day theme, "Inspire Inclusion" which took place yesterday.

PS 1: These are my reflections and do not reflect the views of any organization I am affiliated with or were formerly affiliated with.

PS 2: This piece can be read in two ways. You can either read the titles alone and deduce for yourself how it applies to you. Or you can read the entire piece with my reflections as examples

You will never be enough / Perfectionism is a fallacy

Yes, I said what I said. However, there is a reason I have chosen this lesson to start us off.

For starters, your very existence was a mistake (as is a good number of pregnancies in the world) and if you followed the laws of gestation then this piece would be coming out around May, but you had other plans, including being she/her (yes, your mother openly shared with you how she wanted a son, a partially fulfilled wish as she ended up with a tomboy of a daughter)

As you go through the first 30 years of life, you spend a good proportion of it running several rat races, I wish I could say these races focused on you but as you learn after reading an old journal about what you want to achieve by 30 vitu kwa ground ni different (the situation on the ground is different).

Now let me expand on this lesson with a few more lessons

What makes your anchor?

Growing up, you get to see the importance of hard work, integrity and standing for what you believe in from not only your mum but her extended family. You also see what not to become from the few appearances of your father and Thank God your mum dodged that bullet.

With this foundation, you become somewhat of an old soul as you can relate various life happenings with stories you were told. This anchor also has a large bearing on your leadership journey and life in general as you find yourself pondering on where you are in life at the moment. The best way to summarize your anchor is this quote

Selfish is Easy. It's sharing that takes courage- Simon Sinek

Everything you do beyond your job description can be viewed as an asset or a liability (more often the latter)

One way to look at this is the pregnancy penalty and male bonus syndrome as well defined by Women in Global Health report on the State of Women and Leadership in Global Health.

At a personal level, as a medical student, your dean was supportive of your engagements in student body activities, but certain department faculty saw it as misplaced priorities and you have the academic and health penalty to show for it.

As a medical doctor, your "great" strides in the youth health leadership space don't mean much, what matters is delivering on deliverables and even if you do your best to deliver those deliverables, your ghosts of Christmas past, present and future can still come back to haunt you, whether leadership oriented or otherwise (a couple of weeks back I was being questioned about an engagement with a mentor). Damned if you, damned if you don't. Like I said at the start, "You will never be enough / Perfectionism is a fallacy."

Michael Jackson lied. It DOES matter if you're black or white

Okay, that title has no relation to health leadership but, here is the alternative version, "Yes, the world, especially the global health space still favours the fairer, masculine and deep-pocketed."

Two weeks ago I was having a catch-up conversation with my good friend Daniel David OTOBO (MD). and we were trying to deduce why the career trajectory of young global health Leaders from Africa is slower than our colleagues from other regions. The truth of the matter is our systems are yet to adapt to global levels (a reference to my previous article on the age mismatch of youth cut-off here).

Even at a senior level, there is a lag despite the rise of DEI hires etc (I will use Dr. Tedros as my reference point). I remember whilst, at the 152 World Health Organization Executive Board meeting, a Kenyan friend jokingly asked me if my photo would be hung on the corridor of previous DGs alongside Dr. Tedros and I bluntly answered, that was once my and my mother's dream (in medical school), but the reality is that it might take another 75 years for that to happen and I will be far in the pecking order.

Very pessimistic yes? Well, it was based on these rationales: in my first engagement in global health elections (medical school), I was dubbed the proverbial "Angry Black Woman" hereafter referred to as ABW (for lack of a better reference). Some politely rephrased to call me MC-Most Controversial. Guess who I lost the elections to, white men. Secondly, as I look at where most of my peers from the global student body are within the ecosystem of global organizations in global health, it is unsurprising that those who had the financial and time bandwidth to engage more in the organization and its opportunities made a faster transition to being global health experts and few were from Africa and this is still largely the case in many associations and organizations.

(Strategic) Silence is Golden

This lesson is a bit ironic considering the piece and your leadership journey. However, it is the most important and shortest lesson yet.

As alluded to in my previous lesson, it is key to realize that the leadership scale for women of colour starts at a negative because of the proverbial, ABW bias and this is even more negative if you're from Africa. You see this very well with your mother growing up as a kid (but it hits you years later), you also learn this the hard way as a medical student as indicated earlier.

Even as a medical doctor, this pops up in various ways, you will be asked how you can speak so well on a topic during a side event in New York and you will be tempted to ask why this question is being asked, but you find a nice way to dodge answering. Most recently, you might try an authoritative approach in an engagement after being assertive doesn't work and it ends up being misconstrued as ABW. Again, like I said at the start, "You will never be enough / Perfectionism is a fallacy."

Additional lesson: Rejection is Redirection / Failure is human

You may be feeling discombobulated by these tough lessons, but as you enter the second half of life, it is important to remember that you need to show yourself some grace. I hope these lessons and the numerous others that you have learned (and may not be reflected here) can guide you and shape the next phase of your life positively. As you start this next phase remember:

No Human is Limited- Eliud Kipchoge

The rumblings continue in a couple of weeks. Meanwhile, you can leave comments below or DM if you want to give anonymized feedback or email [email protected]