The Midwife in All of Us

Over the past two weeks, we’ve been on a journey together.

First, we explored the liberating truth that [nobody has it all figured out], and that’s actually the doorway to a more curious, connected life. Then, we sat with the idea that [regret isn’t the enemy]; it’s a teacher pointing us back to what we truly value.

Today, I want to talk about what happens after you’ve done that inner work. Because something shifts when you stop performing certainty and start engaging honestly with your own story. Something that has nothing to do with you and everything to do with the people around you.

You become a midwife.

Not the Kind You’re Thinking

I’m not talking about delivering babies (though if that’s your calling, bless you). I’m talking about a different kind of delivery: helping someone bring forth something that’s already alive inside them but hasn’t yet made it into the world.

An idea. A dream. A decision. A version of themselves they can feel stirring but can’t quite name.

A midwife doesn’t create the life. She doesn’t own the process. She doesn’t get to decide what emerges. Her job is to be present, to create safety, to offer guidance rooted in experience, and to trust that the person in front of her has everything they need to bring this new thing into being.

That’s the kind of leadership I believe in. And it’s the kind of presence I think the world is starving for.

Why This Metaphor Matters

We live in a culture that celebrates the expert, the guru, the person at the front of the room with all the answers. And there’s a place for expertise; I’m not dismissing that. But there’s another kind of influence that’s quieter, more powerful, and far more sustainable.

It’s the influence of someone who’s done their own work and now has the capacity to hold space for someone else’s.

Think about the best mentor you’ve ever had. The teacher who changed your trajectory. The friend who helped you see yourself more clearly than you could on your own. Chances are, they weren’t the person with the most impressive résumé or the loudest voice. They were the person who listened. Who asked the question you didn’t know you needed to hear. Who believed in what was growing inside you before you believed in it yourself.

That’s midwifery.

My Own Midwife Moment

I think about Mr. Hartman, my teacher who told us the story of grasping the nettle, of leaning into the thing that frightens you rather than tiptoeing around it. He didn’t hand me a formula for success. He handed me a story, and that story became a seed that’s been growing in me for decades.

He wasn’t performing with expertise. He was sharing lived wisdom in a way that invited me to find my own.

And I think about the people who showed up for me during my hardest seasons, the ones where I was peeling away masks and reckoning with the gap between who I was performing and who I actually wanted to be. They didn’t fix me. They didn’t advise me into compliance. They held steady. They said, “I see you in there.” They waited while I found my way.

That’s the gift. Not solving, but witnessing. Not directing, but holding space.

What Makes a Good Midwife

If this metaphor is resonating, you might be wondering what it looks like in practice. From my years of coaching leaders and working with educators, I’ve noticed that the best “midwives” share a few qualities.

They’ve done their own work. You can’t hold space for someone else’s uncertainty if you haven’t made peace with your own. You can’t help someone reckon with regret if you’re still running from yours. The inner journey isn’t separate from the ability to serve others; it’s the foundation of it.

They trust the process more than the outcome. A midwife doesn’t dictate what emerges. She trusts that the person in front of her is capable, that the timing will be what it is, and that her job is to support rather than to control. This requires a kind of faith that our results-obsessed culture rarely rewards but desperately needs.

They ask better questions than they give answers. The most transformative moments in my coaching work almost never come from something I said. They come from a question that helped someone see their own situation from a new angle. Questions create space. Answers, even good ones, tend to close it.

They celebrate the whole person. Not just the polished, public version. The quirky, messy, still-figuring-it-out version. My Great Dane, Aryanna, taught me this beautifully: she has never once apologized for being exactly who she is, and in her fierce independence, she gives everyone around her permission to be exactly who they are, too.

Your Invitation

Here’s what I want you to consider: you’ve already been someone’s midwife, even if you’ve never used that word. You’ve had a conversation that shifted something in someone else. You’ve held space during a hard season. You’ve asked the question that cracked something open.

You don’t need a title or a certification to do this work (though those are wonderful). You need the willingness to show up with what you’ve learned from your own journey, including the uncertainty and the regret, and offer it not as a prescription but as a presence.

The world doesn’t need more experts standing at the front of the room performing certainty. It needs more midwives sitting alongside people in the sacred, messy, beautiful process of becoming.

And if you’ve walked through what we’ve explored in this series, if you’ve loosened your grip on certainty, if you’ve let regret teach you instead of haunt you, then you already have what it takes.

Now go hold space for someone. The thing they’re trying to bring into the world might just be the most important thing you’ll ever help deliver.