It’s funny.
As children, we’re asked what we want to be when we grow up. Most of us offer a lofty answer: doctor, lawyer, president, or CEO. The adults asking the question are usually proud of such self-aggrandizement. But later in our lives, when those goals are actually reached, particularly by girls-to-women, that ambition is viewed differently.
Bianca B. King realized this and didn’t like what she felt.
“For the longest, ambition seemed like it was relegated to a specific type of person, mostly men,” King told ESSENCE. She’s a serial entrepreneur who runs a marketing firm as well as a matchmaking agency that connects women with career coaches best-suited for their professional needs. “When I heard the word {ambition} it never evoked joy or happiness—so I created my own definition.”
Her company, coaching company, Pretty Damn Ambitious was founded on the premise of this new denotation, which is:
Ambition
/amˈbiSH(ə)n/
noun
A core values-based pursuit of success on your terms.
2: The joyful, diligent pursuit of success informed by one’s ideals.
King isn’t off-base with her inclination to redefine the concept of being an ambitious woman. According to a 2022 workplace report from the organization Every Level Leadership, 88% of the Black women surveyed said they often, or always experienced burnout. Additionally, 78% of Black Women shared that they sometimes, rarely, or never have the ability to go home at the end of the workday with any energy in reserve.
“I included joy in the equation because I feel like when I was working in corporate before starting my companies, given all of the systemic issues that are there, there was some joy,” King explained, sharing she enjoyed working with her coworkers, but overall, her ambitious pursuit of success wasn’t very joyful.
“That’s why, now, as I’m doing all the things I’m doing, that joy has to be a part of that equation.”
So, now that this new concept of ambition has been established, how does work in practice?
King said it starts with dismissing the patriarchy’s behavior of ambition and give yourself permission to want something different.
“Actually figure out what you want,” she told ESSENCE. “I think a lot of us are afraid to do that deep work and be like, I want X. Right? And then after you figure out what you want, actually put a plan in place and go for it. And I know it sounds so trite and so easy, but it’s not for most people. Most people are not living the lives that they really want to live. They’re living the lives that they feel that they should live. But if you can actually tap into your inner self, tap into that inner voice, that woman who’s been locked away, and maybe she’s like, ‘remember me? I really wanted to do X. I really want to be a speaker, or I really want to be an actress.’ Listen to her and then figure out a way to actually take the steps in order to make that happen.”
She shared that the next, and most important step is finding a community to help move those ambitions forward.
“Ambition was once (and sometimes still is) presented as synonymous with chasing materialism, and I reject that,” she said. “Our new definition says ambition is simply the means by which we pursue success. And yes, there’s room in this definition for commas in bank accounts and luxury cars in the driveway, but there’s also room for the person whose ambition is to plant a thousand trees daily.”