coming full circle

My Mom died when I was 29 and she was 63. During her too short time on this earth she always made me feel good about myself and consistently believed in me. I designed the half full Women's Forward in honor of her and in recognition of my personal story. The Women’s Forward aims to shed light on barriers that often, unknowingly, stagnate our progress and prevent us from getting the most out of life. It's a weekend of goal setting, action planning, and one-on-one coaching to help women achieve their personal or professional goals.

telling my story my way

I typically tell me story at the beginning of a Forward to earn the trust from the group. When the first Women's Forward launched seven years ago I knew that I had to instead share my story upfront or else women wouldn't feel comfortable signing up. This helped to establish a mutual trust. I decided if I was going to be honest about my story, and all the insecurity that came along with it, then I might as well share it in a big way. I partnered with Vintage Girl Studios which specializes in traditional pin-up photography. I had a session with the studio and then used the resulting photos in ads for the Women's Forward. I went into the photo shoot feeling very vulnerable since I was not able to control the environment or the narrative. I ended up having an incredible experience and Vintage Girl Studios provided a supportive and fun space to literally kick up my heels!

picture perfect

Vintage Girl Studios encouraged me to do a photo where my left hand is covering my right hand. This was scary for me since I usually hide my left hand in photos. But I ended up loving the photo and all that it stood for – me empowered and no longer hiding. It's the photo I chose to promote the Women's Forward with the very appropriate line "i am unique beautiful confident." I admit it was not easy to put my authentic self out there, but it was important to me to remind women that we all have something special to offer to the world, whether we feel it yet or not.

moving forward

I had spent so much of my life wrapped up in my own insecurities that it made it incredibly difficult to grow personally and even professionally. But when I finally accepted my own uniqueness, and worked with it rather than against it, I built my confidence and had the tenacity to move forward in my life. My story is still continuing. I'm still moving forward, growing, and learning as my next chapter unfolds. Thank you for listening and taking a left with me.

The Taking a Left with Rebecca e-newsletter series tells the story of half full founder Rebecca Twitchell’s trials and triumphs of living with only two fully developed fingers on her left hand.

Contact Rebecca at rtwitchell@half-full.com