When the Inner Voice Gets Loud: Reclaiming Feminine Wisdom in Leadership

"The more she is trapped in a competitive mode, the more likely the inner voice will manifest at the physical level – it will be heard." Judith Duerk , Circle of Stones

I have a question for my mamas in leadership roles.

Are you finding yourself succeeding in your career, and yet, something feels deeply off? You’re ticking all the boxes, reaching the milestones, sitting at the leadership table… but somewhere, something is quietly (or not so quietly) aching. The best way I can describe it is this ‘off’ feeling. I know it’s not specific but I also know you know.

Maybe it's the fatigue that won't lift. The Sunday dread. The strange and hard-to-describe sense that you're “not quite yourself” anymore. Or the growing distance between the leader you’ve become and the woman you truly are.

That’s the inner voice Judith Duerk speaks of. And for many women in leadership, that voice becomes impossible to ignore after becoming a mother.

Because matrescence, the transition into motherhood, isn’t just a personal shift. It’s a profound, identity-altering rite of passage (yes I know it sounds a little much but keep on reading!). One that often blows open the gap between how we’ve been taught to lead and how we now want to lead (and quite honestly, the way we’ve been taught to live too).

The Masculine Mask So Many of Us Wear

For decades, the path to leadership for women has been paved with masculine ideals: linear progression, constant productivity, competition, results, performance, and control. Traits like intuition, empathy, vulnerability, cyclical thinking – although more recently being brough onto the leadership scene (Dr. Brown is the famous pioneer in this work), are still very often associated with the feminine, have historically been dismissed or even penalised in the corporate world.

I have worked with many male leaders who couldn’t get promoted BECAUSE they were displaying the more feminine leadership traits and strengths.

I have also met many women in leadership who were trapped in the masculine ‘mask’ of toughness. Women who adapted to the system.

We pushed harder. We worked longer. We sharpened our elbows and dulled our softness. We led with our heads, sometimes at the cost of our hearts. We wore the mask because, for a while, it worked. We gained credibility, respect, and promotions.

But the cost was steep. Emotionally and physically.

And eventually, the inner voice begins to protest.

For some, it’s burnout. For others, it’s a slow erosion of joy. For many, it’s the sense that they’ve abandoned parts of themselves in the climb, and don’t know how to retrieve them. The ‘off’ feeling. Hard to pin down. But it’s there.

And then comes motherhood. And it cuts through all of this.

Matrescence: The Great Disruptor

Becoming a mother can be the moment where the mask begins to slip, because the rules that worked in the boardroom no longer serve in the nursery. You can’t control a newborn. You can’t push through on 3 hours of sleep forever. You can’t strategise your way out of vulnerability, exhaustion, or love that shatters your sense of self. That gives you that identity split.

Suddenly, you’re dropped into a realm where time is fluid, needs are immediate, and success is redefined.

The doing gives way to being.

The outcome gives way to presence.

The rush gives way to surrender.

And for many women, this cracks something open. A realisation that the way we’ve been working, and leading, and living - doesn’t fit anymore.

The Reclamation of Feminine Mother Energy

Masculine energy is not the enemy. It is vital. It’s structure, clarity, action, courage and direction. But without the balancing force of feminine energy, receptivity, intuition, compassion, creativity and rest, it becomes brittle. Unsustainable. Disconnected.

Matrescence invites women to reclaim what has long been devalued: softness, slowness, wisdom, emotion. And when we integrate this into our leadership, we don’t lose power, we gain it. We become more whole.

The problem isn’t ambition. It’s the system that rewards only one version of it.

A New Leadership Paradigm

What if leadership didn't require self-sacrifice? What if success included seasons of rest? What if intuition was as valued as strategy?

What if workplaces were designed with the rhythms of real life in mind, including caregiving, hormonal cycles, emotional wellbeing, and community? How different would your life be? This is something so beautiful in Judith’s book – the way she asks the question – how might your life be if….

We are in a moment where many women are waking up to this possibility. They are no longer willing to contort themselves to fit a model of leadership that denies their humanity.

They are seeking workplaces that honour both masculine and feminine energy. Cultures that understand cyclical productivity. Structures that support, not suppress, life outside of work.

They are not opting out of ambition. They are redefining it. It’s only a matter of time.

Listening to the Inner Voice

If you’ve felt that inner voice lately, tugging at you, whispering that something’s off, it’s not a weakness. It’s wisdom. Your body, your spirit, your instincts, your bigger self, are asking for more. Or maybe less. They are asking you to pause and listen.

Matrescence is not a derailment. It is an initiation.

It’s here to wake us up, not just to the needs of our children, but to our own. It’s here to show us a different way to live, work, lead, and thrive.

One where the inner voice doesn’t have to scream to be heard. One where feminine wisdom is not a liability, but a leadership asset. One where the mask comes off, and you lead from your whole self.