I first worked with Kelly a few years ago, back when I was still at Google and Neverdrift was something I was building on the side.

She wasn’t new to self-development then. She was already someone who showed up fully – curious about herself, committed to growing, quietly but consistently doing the work. She came to Neverdrift with the same mindset she carries into everything: wanting to keep becoming a better version of herself.

Fast-forward to January this year. Kelly showed up to the Neverdrift community social – her first outing after giving birth at the end of December, with the assurance that her baby would be taken care of by her husband at home.

That tells you something about Kelly. She knew she needed community, her growth, her sense of self beyond the new role she had just stepped into. So she made plans and showed up. That’s self-leadership – the one that looks like choosing yourself even despite all that might be going on in your life.

Becoming a mother changes something at the identity level. What makes it hard to name is that it happens while everyone around you expects you to just naturally step up to the role.

Kelly, in her own words

“I did not grow up aspiring to become a mother – I was and still am actually quite awkward around other people’s kids. But ever since I felt my husband and I had love to share for a new family member, and from the day we found out our little one in my belly may be coming into the world in April 2025, something in me changed – opening up a capacity for love, fear, and pain I never knew existed.

I recall that when I was in my first trimester, I kept tracking which pregnancy week and day I was and re-watching my ultrasound videos time and time again, to process this new life in me, thinking – would I ever get to see my baby’s face? Because I knew the first trimester is the most risky.

Fast-forward, my pregnancy was healthy and smooth – my labour was amazingly fast actually, where my baby came out the way I wanted, natural birth, in 5-7 minutes. People often told me I looked ‘energetic’ and ‘as if I did not just give birth’ soon after. While meant kindly, it felt like an invisible expectation – that looking tired and less than my pre-pregnancy self would somehow be a failure.

Often behind the makeup and dresses in gatherings was two to four hours of sleep and a struggle just to find time for a shower. First-time new parents without a helper, doing 100% breastfeeding with an ever-hungry baby – you may understand.

But I’ve had to learn to hold back the ‘challenger’ in me, responding with a ‘thank you’ while acknowledging my own hidden reality.

Watching my baby boy smile, sleep, and hearing his first babbles is a level of joy I can’t describe. But that love brought a fierce need to protect him – from cigarette smoke to mosquitos – especially in those early, vulnerable weeks.

It still hurts when my concerns were met with eye-rolls or scolding instead of understanding, and when all the unsolicited advice comes right upon seeing people for the first time since giving birth. In those moments, I’ve had to lean on my self-awareness cultivated from Neverdrift and personal growth to remember: my needs are valid, I am important, behind every emotion there is a need.

I am learning to trust myself to love my husband, my baby, and my own evolving self in this wondrous, challenging season of motherhood – and am a stronger person because of this.”

Where Identity Drift starts

What Kelly describes – the unsolicited advice, the commentary on who she was supposed to be now, the invisible expectation that she perform a certain version of new motherhood – is one of the clearest examples I see of where Identity Drift begins.

The noise from outside starts to drown out your own signal. It is something to take note off as when you’re depleted – running on little sleep, navigating a completely restructured life, your body changed, your identity in transition – you’re more vulnerable to it than you’ve ever been.

The gap between who you are and who the room expects you to be widens quietly, often before you notice it’s happening.

This is the moment where the inner work either holds or it doesn’t.

What Kelly did in those moments is exactly what years of doing that work made possible. She held back, said thank you and she came back to herself privately – my needs are valid, I am important, behind every emotion there is a need.

She didn’t give her voice to whoever was loudest in the room.

She found her own ground and stood on it.

That’s self-leadership. Not the version that looks effortless from the outside but the version that happens quietly, in the middle of exhaustion, even when nobody is watching.

A closing thought
Watching Kelly move through this season – with honesty, with humour, and at our January social just weeks after giving birth – genuinely inspires me. It’s a reminder of why this work matters – it makes you someone who can hold more of life with grace and presence.

If you’re in a season that’s reshuffling something at the identity level – motherhood, or something else entirely – the disorientation you’re feeling is a signal. A question about who you are beyond the roles you perform – what you actually want, what version of yourself you’re building toward etc.

The earlier you look at that signal, the more choice you have in how you respond to it. That’s where the work begins. 🍃

Note: Not sure if or where in your life you might be drifting? The Drift Finder is a good place to start. It is a free self-assessment for high functioning individuals who sense something is off, but haven’t quite named it yet.