Source: BlackEnterprise.com
Ask motivational speaker and empowerment specialist Lisa Nichols what her favorite affirmation is and she'll quote Mahatma Ghandi, "Be the change you want to see."

It's this dedication to transformation that has her ready to attend another Black Enterprise Women of Power Summit.

It's this need for change and empowerment that has her taking charge of her own life and finding ways to drop off the grid to empower herself. The best-selling author and CEO of the empowerment training company, Motivating the Masses, takes a moment to talk to BlackEnterprise.com about her own moments of needing and gaining power.

                                                                                 

BlackEnterprise.com: Whenever you empower someone, what does it do for you?

Lisa Nichols: There's a deep swelling in my heart of possibilities. I believe in transformation, 'cause I'm a product of it. So something happens to me, it empowers me. It transforms my soul. It allows me to keep  understanding how possible it is and lets me know that I'm not an anomaly and the human spirit is unbreakable, unshakeable and unstoppable. It is my fuel. My students come to me for 5, 6 years because they are inspired by a community that stays in action. Action brings forth more transformation.

How do you stay empowered when you're not empowering others?

I keep people around me. I always have people in my space praying ten times better than me. I remain a student. I spend as much time as I can with my 85 years old grandmother. She keeps it in perspective. I will never have her 85 years of wisdom. I keep my grandma around me to remind how it's it all relative. I've begun to live like I can have everything, but I don't need to get it all now. I stopped living in urgency as if I were running out of time. Like I usually work all weekend – like entrepreneurs. So I sent my entire teams a message saying, 'It's Friday at noon. Here's my task list and if you need anything else, after 1p tomorrow, I'm off the grid.' That's me saying, 'I don't want to live a life preparing for what's next and missing what's now.' I'm not gonna miss my now trying to get to my next. So that's how I also stay grounded. I ask people to hold me accountable to staying to those declarations. I find people who are not afraid of me.

Why is it important for you to appear at the Women of Power Summit?

It's important for me to appear at the Women of Power Summit as an African American woman in leadership. I understand the need to have a safe, caring and inspiring space to take off our super hero capes, and invest in ourselves.  The Women of Power Summit is likened with going to the well and depositing the things we no longer need and picking up new possibility, new energy, and new friends.  I gain as much as I give each time I'm there. Black Enterprise has had an amazing history of showing possibility for us as a culture. They have been number one for me in displaying African American financial growth and the intention of being in great service while doing great business.  With the Women of Power work, Black Enterprise has successfully created space where woman of color can come and stretch ourselves and one another.  Most importantly a place where we can come to take a deep breath and settle into who we have been and who we are becoming with grace and ease and with one another.