What Qualifies You To Do That?
I've been in a few situations lately where an older man asks what I do. I explain it, and then comes the follow-up question: 'what qualifies you to do that?'
It's rarely curious. It's something else. Sometimes it's meant to invalidate. Sometimes it's less about me and more about them needing to validate something in themselves.
An earlier version of me would have wanted to prove myself. My heart would start racing. My words would get harder to find as I tried to build a case. I'd feel my face flush, because some part of me feared that they were right, saying out loud a belief I secretly held about myself.
I no longer do that. I explain how the work actually functions and let the results speak, and let that either land or not. I don't let a veiled remark send my heart racing or make me question my own legitimacy. That used to happen. It doesn't anymore.
I shared this recently, and a woman replied that she gets the same question with the same energy behind it. Her response: 'because I'm invited to.'
That’s not a defense, just a plain fact: the work keeps getting asked for again and again, and she says ‘yes’.
That's the real shift, for both of us. It's not that we got better at proving ourselves. It's that we stopped needing to. The invitation itself is the qualification. The results are the qualification.
Questions for you to consider:
Where are you still trying to prove something that's already been demonstrated?
Whose approval are you seeking that you technically already have?
What would it feel like to answer a challenge to your legitimacy with a fact instead of a defense?