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When I began my PhD program, I got feedback that I was a good writer, but that I was too colloquial. What an odd thing to say! I had to Google colloquial. It means informal, which begs the question of why not just say, “Carrie, be formal!” In general, academia is full of intellectuals who I am reasonably sure are reincarnated medieval torture coordinators. They poke, redline, disassemble, tweak, toss, disparage, disagree (with you and each other), and they force multiple rewrites. There is a particular way to structure, argue, read, analyze, critique, and write.

When I was putting together my book submission, my literary coach told me not to write like an academic—in other words, don’t be formal—facepalm! She also said, use your own voice, Carrie. And, so, I will, and thus, I do! I am a blend of informal and formal—I love language and stringing together words to form a meaningful sentence, but sometimes I just need to cuss out the phrase. It is with my voice that I introduce you to many characters and stories. Names and companies are changed to honor the confidentiality of the women who participated in this research but make no mistake; their experiences are real.

I have held onto these stories as long as I can, and now they are laid down in print. You may see glimpses of your own experience here and breathe a sigh of relief to know that you are not alone. You may read this and scratch your head, thinking—I did not realize. Soon you will.

I am far from a passive observer of the silenced female leader. I did not witness women in leadership from some safe distance and wonder why they were not using a more effective voice. I did not ponder this from an ivory tower or a successful, high-paying corner office. I do not bring you this book about female silencing from a place of pedigree. Nor do I have lunches with CEOs from Facebook, Google, Yahoo, or the World Bank to discuss the crisis of few women in executive leadership roles and ways to mitigate those issues moving forward. At least, not yet.

As one might expect, I bring it because I lived it.

Not only did I live it—I suffered through it in crazy and indescribable ways. I then slowly climbed out of it. I realized I was beyond it. I got super curious and decided to study it.

I am about as average as a white American woman can be. I grew up with two parents, two siblings, and a mangy mutt of a dog that we bought for $30 at a pet store. He was a smelly, Terrier-Chihuahua mix that never quite got potty trained. We named him A.J. because my mom, sister, and I had a collective crush on Jameson Parker from the TV series Simon & Simon that ran from 1981–1989.

I went to high school in Colorado Springs and attended a small college in Denver. I was not looking for substance, fame, or prestige. My parents were on the verge of divorce, and I needed to find a new home and get a job. College was the best direct route to ensure that was possible. I had solid grades in high school but my ACT and SAT scores were barely above average. Attending anything elite was out of the question, and since I had no idea what I wanted to do or be, I chose a bachelor’s in psychology. It made sense to study something that might help me better understand myself and get a four-year degree at the same time.

My undergraduate program fostered hunger in me that was unrealized until I was a few months away from graduating. It was 1993, and I was sitting in one of my last social science classes and was told to take the remainder of the hour and write a paragraph about my life in 2013. In my imagination ten years into the future, I wrote that I was married with one son; I had a PhD in neuropsychology and was published. In 1993, I didn’t even know what neuropsychology was, but it sounded pretty cool.

Today, I am married (second husband) with one biological child (daughter) and two stepsons sixteen months apart. I often joke with others that I may not have given birth to the boys but make no mistake—there was plenty of labor. Oh, and I tried to get into a neuropsychology master’s program in my mid-twenties. My legacy of poor test-taking did not improve with the GRE and no surprise, I was not granted acceptance.

The path of education for me has never entirely been straight or smooth—but it was undoubtedly a relentless internal desire to achieve. When I was twenty-five years old, I decided to make a yellow afghan. I wanted it to be large enough to cover me in a king-size bed. It took me fourteen years to finish. I called it the yellow yard. When I was thirty years old, I did go on to get a master’s degree in organizational management; later, I got accepted into the leadership coach training program at Georgetown University. Eventually, like the yellow yard, and fourteen years after the master’s, I got a PhD in human development. I have learned that most goals are accomplished if you give them enough time.

Parallel to that journey to get a doctorate, I had a career in healthcare. I held professional and leadership positions within HR and organization development. I am known to say that I am a recovering human resources director.

I have the same story as many of my readers. I have an ex-husband, an excellent second husband, stepchildren, a biological child, coworkers, extended family, neighbors, church, community groups, old friends, new friends, clients, pets, and life. I have a regular middle-class existence. I have a heap of failures and a mound of things that make me proud. Despite my very average reality, I am intensely aware of my privilege. I am a white, heterosexual, Christian female in good health.

I am blessed with everything I just named—my life is full of people and opportunities that leverage my voice. Those same blessings can quickly turn on me, and if I am not careful, they can silence me. The groups we belong to, the relationships we cultivate, the careers we work hard to achieve, the bosses we aim to please, the employees we hope will love us, and the customers that are always at the back of our brains can swiftly and effortlessly take our good intentions and suppress us. It is hardly a conscious move and something we rarely see coming. But it happens.

My experience with voice and silence is tangled within that twenty-year career of navigating a leadership role within the complexity of systems, relationships, and a desire to understand self. In 2011, I began my own consulting and coaching business. It was here that I paused and looked back at myself and the systems that raised me. I also reflected on the clients that I have coached and their systems. I thought about the women in my life who spoke with passion, clarity, and purpose. I also thought about the women who had it in them, but the words never surfaced. I wondered about the language women use that inspire both genders to lean in and follow. I pondered the words we hear that make us disengage and reconsider our willingness to support. I was swimming in a lot of mystery and inquiry of voice and silence—but I was mostly thwarted by what I perceived was prevalent female silencing—my own and those around me.

However, this is not my story. I had to examine myself first before I could study the silenced female leader. I had to consider my own voice box, eye color, belly button, feet, thoughts, and style of leadership. I believe this journey to understand self never entirely ends, but at times it deserves greater energy and attention. It is said that when studying phenomena in social sciences, you have to do the “mesearch” before you engage in the research. We are always the main characters in the story of our lives, and sometimes we have lengthy monologues, other times we quietly stand as others tell their story, and then there are those long pregnant pauses between lines as we move across the stage in a dance of pain and uncertainty.

I have interviewed dozens of women. They are black, brown, and white. On average, they are over the age of forty, and they represent over twenty different industries. They are directors, physicians, educators, vice presidents, and CEOs. Most are graduate prepared, and many hold doctorate degrees. From law firms to classrooms to boardrooms, these women are leading and trailblazing in ways that I admire and respect. I have not walked the same path, but as women, we are woven together in similar stories. They are survivors of silencing and have fought (and at times still fight) a vicious psychological virus. They pioneer, innovate, aspire, and propel forward despite all the obstacles they encounter. They create a mural of voice and silence and shed light on the insidiousness of silencing that the following chapters will soon highlight.

I am also keenly aware that I stand on the shoulders of remarkable women who have researched and studied women’s issues. People like Susan Cain and her work on introversion describing the ones who prefer listening to speaking or Sheryl Sandberg, who artfully examined women’s progress in achieving leadership roles. Amy Cuddy encourages us to bring our boldest self to our most significant challenges. Brené Brown’s work on vulnerability is profound. There are other scholars who I have read and come to know like Cheryl Glenn who writes about the rhetoric of silence, Carol Mitchell whose book is about breaking through “bitch,” and Deborah Tannen who was dynamic with her work on how the language of everyday conversation affects relationships. These are just a sample of women who have provided footpaths or highways into the complicated aspects of women in leadership. I stand humbly amid these giants as I bring you my nuanced findings of female leader silencing.

Silence is rarely the absence of words, and silencing can be a psychological form of violence to a person who desires to speak. We are individually and creatively woven together as human beings, and the ability to exercise choice in our actions and communication is the highest form of intelligence. When we hold leadership roles—a public position regardless of level, company, or industry—we are wired to speak with a megaphone. It is almost as if leaders are wired with their own internal Bluetooth system that automatically connects to microphones in every conference room or conversation to carry their sound or their lack. Given this, a leader’s silences, words, gestures, and language are amplified whether they want them to be or not. They need to be conscious of the difference between silence and silencing, voice and valuable voice, and whether they are just being heard or effectively heard. These are all distinctions this book unpacks in ways that will challenge your thinking about your own communication.

In addition, we can be physically, emotionally, cognitively, and spiritually compromised when we are silenced. This compromise comes in the form of a virus that if not treated, can spread and contribute to female leadership opt-outs, glass ceilings, sticky floors, glass cliffs, and any other metaphor that may describe why women are not successfully promoting into and sustaining in their leadership careers. It is dreadfully hard to be successful as a leader if you are continually feeling unwell.

The cure for this virus is not a simple vaccine or medication—it requires a level of self-regard and community that I believe (and the research will show) that few executive women are successfully creating. Recovering from feeling silenced does not happen by accident. It occurs when female leaders earnestly shift their behaviors with the help of both men and women. So, for the men who have picked up this book by accident or by choice—please keep reading. You are not the villain in this story. You are part of the healing, and your partnership with your female colleagues will help create the needed change. It’s an act of courage to be a leader, and it is a higher act to be a generous one.

For women in leadership, this book is for you whether you have experienced a form of silencing or not. If you have not, I am relieved on your behalf, but realize you may be in the minority. The majority of women are wrestling with some form of silencing and the struggle does not necessarily show. For emerging leaders who want to mitigate what is sure to be a future of many encounters that could potentially silence you, Bravo! By reading this book, you are creating a form of self-care that will help you notice and recover when that silencing begins.

As a society, we have become too quick with naming fast solutions, strategies, techniques, and tips. We love simple lists, but there are no shortcuts highlighted here. This book is about the silenced and the path to recover and lead with a valuable voice. Sometimes we have to understand the darkness before we can fully appreciate the light. This book explores them both along with the journey in between.