Check out the Mother’s Day Special Episode of Speak to Inspire with Princess on Spotify.
Today is Mother’s day. The one day in a year that the world pauses even if briefly to remember the special people in our lives. Those who felt our presence in their bodies before we knew we existed. Before we knew not who we were, they loved, us nurtured us and sacrificed for our sake. Mothers – the women who hold their children’s, hands for a while but their hearts forever.
If you are reading this and you’re a mother like me, I know you can relate with the fact that motherhood is the exquisite inconvenience of being another person’s everything. It sounds scary but it’s a profound truth. You and I show up again and again for school plays, swimming galas, sports days, prize giving days and graduation days. We spend our weekends shuttling from one activity to the other – music lessons, chess games, soccer training, gymnastics etc. What about the late nights you stayed awake nursing a fever or soothing a colic infant? On many occasions you are exhausted, unsure and imperfect but you show up anyway. Because being a mother is learning about strengths you didn’t know you had.
“Sometimes the strength of a motherhood is greater than natural laws.” - Barbara Kingsolver
Mothers are the original strategists, the master negotiators, and the architects of human potential. To celebrate a mother is to celebrate the very heartbeat of our society—a relentless, vibrant force that moves us from “what is” to “what is possible.” Today, we don’t just “thank” mothers; we honor the women who possess the grit to lead with love and the grace to command a room without a single slide deck.
This year as Mother’s day approached, I remembered my mother as I do every year around this time. However, this time it felt different, I thought about her in the context of the work that I do. As a public speaking and communication coach, I spend my days helping people find their voice — to stand up, speak up, and be heard. And the longer I do this work, the more I realize: the most profound communication lessons I’ve ever encountered were learned in a workshop called a kitchen. They were modeled, quietly and consistently, by a woman who never once called herself a teacher or coach.
A mother’s resilience
Today, I choose to celebrate mothers for their role in inculcating the first communication lessons to their children just like my mother did. Before I tell you about the communications lessons from the kitchen table, I can’t help but think about the word ‘resilience’ a value that she instilled in me and my siblings. Coincidentally ‘resilience’ is one of my words for this year. My mother was not one to shy away from confrontation or give up easily. As I write this, I am under the weather. The discomfort in my body has threatened to derail me severally. I almost threw in the towel, but I remembered that I am a mother who was taught resilience by her mother. Keep writing…
Communication lessons from my mother
Audience Awareness
Long before I had ever heard the phrase “audience awareness,” my mother was practicing it. She knew, without a word spoken, when I was sad or scared or lying. She could read my body language, my silence, the particular way I walked when she sent me for something and I didn’t want to go.
That is elite-level emotional intelligence - one of the hardest skills I teach professionals to develop.
The Power of Strategic Silence
She was a master of the “strategic pause.” She would use silence to communicate displeasure or to force us to reflect on our actions. Sometimes the silence landed heavier than a raised voice. Over time we learnt that the raised voice from her was better than silence because often the silence would be followed by a thorough beating. From her, I learned that the most powerful person in the room is the one who can hold a pause. That silence is not weakness, its strategy.
The Gaze of Command:
She communicated volumes through her eyes and facial expressions. The look across the room that said everything – shut up, sit upright or stop your nonsense! She taught me that eye-contact intelligence is the heart of human connection. If your eyes don’t match your message, you lose your audience. She never lost hers.
I still borrow from her playbook as a mother, although sometimes my efforts do not achieve the desired results.
Executive Presence:
When my mother walked into a room, her authority was felt instantly—both within our home and without. She didn’t need to announce herself; her posture and stride did the talking. That’s what I call executive presence – commanding the room without saying a word.
A Personal Tribute: Gladys Munje Eguchi
On this Mother’s day 2026, many of you will celebrate your mothers with flowers, gifts, lunches, dinners or simply quality time spent together. For me, this article is my way of celebrating my communication coach (without a title) - my mother Gladys Munje Eguchi.
She left this world 27 years ago - not at the end of a long life, but at the height of it. At the peak of her motherhood, when her children still needed her daily, when her story still had so many chapters left to write.
She did not get to see all that her love and lessons built. She did not get the graduation ceremonies, the milestones, the gifts she deserved. And yet - she is here, woven into the way her family speaks, listens, loves, and shows up for each other.
Because that is the extraordinary truth about a mother’s voice: it does not disappear. It lives in the courage of the people she raised. It echoes in the lessons she didn’t know she was teaching. It shows up, quietly and powerfully, in every room her children walk into.
Dear mother, thank you. Your voice still matters. It always will. 🕊️
To Every Mother Reading This
Your voice has mattered more than you know. Being a mother is a calling that requires a unique brand of executive presence—the kind that builds empires out of dreams and leaders out of children. Whether you are in a boardroom or at a kitchen table—know that you are coaching the next generation of voices. That is not a small thing. It is everything.
And to those who are motherless this Mother’s Day, those who carry their mothers only in memory, your grief is also a tribute. It is proof of a love that was real, and a voice that still echoes.
Maya Angelou said it best:
“To describe my mother would be to write about a hurricane in its perfect power. Or the climbing, falling colors of a rainbow.”
Some voices are simply too vast for any words to fully hold. But we try. And in the trying, we honor them.
Happy Mother’s Day. 🌸