Michelle Obama Drops Major Gems on #FriendshipGoals, Overcoming Haters, & Self-Confidence

At the United State of Women Summit on Tuesday, our FLOTUS and Oprah Winfrey sat down and had candid girl talk on a few areas like confidence, mentorship, surviving the haters, giving back, men, and why shopping at Target is first on Michelle’s list after Barack’s presidential term is over (I mean who doesn’t love Target’s infamous dollar deal section?)

In less than 45 minutes, Michelle and Oprah dropped major gems that every young girl and women of should hear.

While the entire convo is a must watch (see below for the clip), here are the top 8 takeaways.

1.“Our first job in life as women I think, is to get to know ourselves.”

I love to read and I am proudly creating my own home library in my apartment. My boyfriend is also an avid reader and recently I noticed the extreme difference in the type of books we separately purchase and read. The majority of my books are self-help books on “getting to know yourself, girl power, and being a woman” while his are the exact opposite. While I don’t think there is anything wrong with reading self-help books, I will say that I think reading too many can cause us as women to drown out our own inner thoughts and definitions of who we are.

As Michelle said, “We spend our time pleasing, satisfying, looking out into the world to define who we are. Listening to the messages, the images, the limited definitions that people have of who we are. There is a limited box that we are put in and if we live by that limited definition, we miss out on a lot of who we are.” This is proof that we should be more intentional with spending quality time with ourselves and listening to our heart and mind. We need to figure out who we are and what we want out of life before we letting the world figure it out for us.

2.“Surround yourself with goodness.”

Even when you are content with yourself, you will go through a period when the world will test you. During this period, it will either make or break you. When you experience this tough journey, it is critical to have positive vibes around you. It’s important to surround yourself with friends and people that will lift you higher, keep you motivated, and keep it real with you without knocking you down.

On the same note, surround yourself with people that will inspire you to work harder and that have the same “hustle hard” mindset. As the saying goes, birds of a feather flock together. If you surround yourself with people that have zero goals or aspirations, it will soon rub off on you. But if you surround yourself with people that are adamant about reaching their goals and making a difference, you will be empowered to do the same. #squadgoals

3.“When it comes to social media there are just times I turn off the world.”

Oprah wanted to know how Michelle dealt with her haters and Michelle kept it simple by saying she purposefully tunes out the world. “You can’t be reading all that stuff,” she said regarding social media. “I mean, that’s like letting somebody just walk up and slap you, you know? You would never do that. You would never just sit there and go, slap me in the face and I’m good with it.”

I think this is important as we are becoming more involved in social media. On our social media pages we open ourselves up to the world about our personal lives and relationships, thus opening ourselves up to the opinions from others. In order avoid your own thoughts, feelings, and values influenced by others, it’s critical that you watch what you post and learn how to tune out the world when needed.

4.“The best revenge is success and good work.”

Even though I’m not a huge Lebron fan, I have to respect his game. Even when I open my mouth to criticize what I perceive as his negative attitude and lack of humility, I can’t help but to acknowledge that he is a damn good player. #DamnLebron

I think the same holds truth for you and your life. In her talk with Oprah, Michelle admitted that hard work trumps all and when you do good work it speaks for you. “You don’t have to say anything to the haters. You don’t have to acknowledge them at all. You just wake up every morning and be the best you, you can be and that tends to shut them up,” says Michelle.

5.“You need to have people in your lives that you’re connecting with, that you’re helping.”

In the workplace, it is easy to get lost in the chaos of “meeting this goal”, “finishing this project”, or “closing this deal.” If you’re not careful, the work that you do can just become “work” and nothing more. No matter what occupation you have and what pay rate you have, you have to remember that you were put on this earth to serve. When you focus on serving and impacting others, the money and the success will come.

As Oprah said, “The best success comes when you can actually shift your paradigm to service.  I figured this out early on in the show. I had read this quote from Dr. King. One of my favorite quotes from him that says, “Not everybody can be famous, but everybody can be great because greatness is determined by service.” I literally shifted, I used that quote to help me shift the way I saw the platform of television.”

And we all know how well that worked out for Oprah.

6.”There are so many phases to life that [is] still just a portion of a very bigger journey that I have yet to know the outcome.”

I recently turned 26 and hour after my birthday I had my first quarter of a century breakdown. I sadly thought to myself how I wasn’t even close to where I want to be professionally and financially in life. Then I realized that I was still young and that I had plenty of time in life for all of that and I got over it.

Nonetheless, as we get older, we are constantly ever-evolving. We are going through phases in our lives and we have to remember that nothing is permanent. In each phase that we go through, we should take time to learn more about ourselves, inspire others, and make the most out of it. Even if you are in a phase in your life where life isn’t going the way you desire, you can’t give up. Just push through that phase and remember that another one is on its way and you have another opportunity to meet your goals. As Michelle said, “There’s another phase that’s coming up where you might be able to have more of what you thought you wanted, you get to know yourself a little bit more.”

7.“I don’t want young women out there to have the expectation that if they’re not having it all, then somehow they’re failing.”

Growing up, most women dream of having it all. You know a gorgeous family, overly successful career, successful friends, money overflowing in the bank, nice car, and even nicer house. Oh yeah and a few beach homes too. While having those things are not impossible to have, sometimes they don’t come all at once, or at least when you want them to come. As Michelle said, “You’re beating yourself up and feeling less than because you aren’t having it all. It’s a ridiculous aspiration. I’ve told many young people is that you can have it all but oftentimes it’s hard to get it all at the same time.”

Even if we are at a point in our lives where we feel we don’t “have it all” we need to be gracious anyway. When we are bothered with what we don’t have or with what we think we should have, we fail to make the most out of those opportunities and those life experiences.

8.“Be better. Be better at everything. Be a solid example of what it means to be a good man in the world.”

Before ending the chat, Michelle had some advice for the men too. As someone that grew up around positive male figures, Michelle understands and respects the value of positive male figures in a young woman’s life.

As Michelle stressed, “Men, be better husbands. Be a part of your family’s life. Do the dishes. Don’t baby-sit your children. You don’t baby-sit your own children. Be engaged. Don’t just think going to work, coming home makes you a man. Being a father, being engaged, all that stuff is important.”

With the amount of single parent households increasing, it’s important for men to work hard to be the best father figure they can be. Even if you are not a father, men it’s important for you to set a good example of what a man should be for your female peers.

As promised, the discussion with Michelle and Oprah is below. I recommend you bookmark this video because it is definitely inspiring.