The Middle Finger Project
Shocking right?
I was indeed shocked by the title of this book. It was there, on the shelf of my local bookstore and it took me a few minutes staring at the title before I got it in my hands. And when I read the back cover, oh boy! I was paying the bill after 2 minutes and could not get home fast enough to start reading. Why? Yes, why…you must all be wondering!
It is very simple! Ash Ambridge is not just one of Huffington Post’s 50 must-follow women and founder of the multi-million-dollar, multi-award-winning website and blog ‘The Middle Finger Project’. She is a woman and she is one of us! That’s right! She is one of us who started from the very bottom, with humble origins and literally fought her way up. She heard so many ‘no’s’ in her life and had so much doubt about her ideas that she could easily build an army with all those ‘no’s’.
She is the woman who like us has heard the whisper at the advertising company she used to work for ‘who does she think she is’ for every success, every client and bunch of money she brought in instead of ‘congratulations, you are doing a great job, you deserve a promotion!’. Sounds familiar? Yes, I know, same here! Worst of all is that all the doubt and jealousy and the Dream Zappers as she calls them in her book, she had it from women. Sad, yes, I know but this is our reality! Women supporting women meanwhile many of them fear any woman who walks in and has a shining star on her head.
Ash is like us because she dares to tell her story in a very raw and honest way! She is the woman who went on a business meeting only to find out that the client wanted to throw her in his bed and in response she cleverly managed to get that contract signed and gave him the middle finger. (I will not reveal how! Order the book to find out!)
This same woman allowed herself to fall in love and then be battered physically and mentally by her abusive partner only to end up sleeping in her car at the parking lot of a Target store! This is the woman who found herself burying her mom who suffered from mental illness in her early twenties.
This is the woman though who had an epiphany in that same car, the night that she cried in that parking lot for hours and hours and managed to recreate herself from her ashes (Ash is her name after all) by simply believing in her own strength and talent which is in writing!
So, she dared! What did she dare? She dared to put herself out in the world with one simple question! ‘How can I help you?’
‘When the rest of the world is busy keeping their professional faces on, you have an opportunity. You have an opportunity to connect, to listen, to delight – to persuade by showing up as eager and honest and helpful and YOU. If you can make someone feel hope, you ‘ll never starve a day in your life.’
She created a business by writing content to businesses, giving courses online and becoming a consultant. She worked hard and she is now thriving!
‘Do not play small because someone else is uncomfortable. Play bigger, because there are people who need you to be brave enough to do so. There are people who need exactly what you want to create, and who will be so, so grateful that you did. DO. NOT. SHRINK.’
I read every single page and I underlined the parts that interest me the most so I can go back and read again and again, as this woman talks to every single one of us about so many common things and situations we face but we are reluctant to ever discuss. But most of all, Ash Ambridge is teaching us to know our self-worth and our value as women, professionals, partners, mothers or friends.
We have value and we are worth the best! Even when people do not believe in us or try to minimize us because they feel threatened by our light and our energy. We are so much worth of thriving and succeeding in all levels!
As Ash says we only need to remember that ‘Being great requires you to tell the world who you are.’
