Girl Talk

After a Friday full of rodeoing, we made our way north to Topeka where I was blessed with the opportunity to speak at the Back to School Girls Leadership Summit at the Boys and Girls Club of Topeka.

Let me rewind back to April just for a second when I received an email from Carrie, which asked me if I would be interested in being the keynote speaker for the event. I was shocked and amazed – the keynote speaker…that’s a huge thing! I agreed to it immediately after I read that they are hoping to promote positive leadership in young girls.

Fast forward back to the end of September, I walked into the BGCT building to find a group of girls playing a game of telephone at the table. It instantly took me back to my junior high days and at that point I became a little nervous and I hoped that they would like my presentation!

This is my ideal age group of girls I like to speak with as this was who I had in mind when I thought up my platform for Ms. Wheelchair Kansas. This is the age where judgment often gets skewed and we lose who we are to who someone else thinks we need to be, or we do things that are not true to ourselves.

The girls were great and listened intently to what I had to say and to the presentation. They had some awesome questions and when I got to the part in my presentation where I talk about unique qualities often being insecurities – I had a feeling that these girls knew who they were and they had it figured out…they didn’t seem to be afraid to step out from the crowd, they weren’t trying to be in that cookie cutter mold. This truly made me smile.

I had an amazing time speaking with the girls and I must thank them for giving me such an opportunity. I hope they were able to learn as much as I did!