Badass Women

 This past weekend I visited Nerd HQ, an awesome event outside of Comic Con held by Zachary Levi’s company, The Nerd Machine.  They hold a bunch of fantastic panels with casts from different shows and movies and raise a crazy amount of money for Operation Smile.  One of the panels I got to see was Badass Women featuring Yvonne Strahovski (Chuck/Dexter), Retta (Parks and Rec), Missy Peregrym (Rookie Blue), Jennifer Morrison (Once Upon A Time), Ming-Na Wen (Agents of Shield/Mulan) and Sophie Turner (Game of Thrones).

Look, I don’t know these people personally, but in listening to them talk I’m going to say that it’s a group of really strong women on and off the screen.  And what struck me as they answered questions was how familiar their answers were.  The things they talked about—knowing who you are and what you believe in, having conviction in that, the courage to be vulnerable or to go outside of your comfort zone—are things that we talk about so much in the USA program as we try to learn and grow and become better athletes and people.  It honestly felt like a session from one of our mindset meetings.

That isn’t all that surprising because I’m really lucky that I get to be surrounded by a lot of strong women every day.  But it was cool to see how important it is to find that clarity and acceptance of oneself no matter who you are—woman or man, athlete or actor.  Because that is the foundation of strength.   And, in my opinion, the key to being a successful person.  Success here, by the way, having nothing to do with money, fame or winning, but rather being the best human being you can be.  The people I admire and respect the most never seem to have to impose themselves on others to feel strong; it just flows from them as they live their truth.  Because doing that—living honestly and openly, with conviction and love—that’s the strongest thing there is.  That’s the strength I want to strive for every day and clearly these women are doing the same.

Also, they’re hilarious.  Really, go watch it right now.