Why High‑Achieving Women Must Reclaim Softness to Resolve Conflicts Successfully
- Brainz Magazine
- Jul 31
- 8 min read
Julia Dencker is a multi-passionate entrepreneur and expert in inner peace and peaceful leadership. She founded The Peaceful Path, hosts a German-speaking podcast, and provides recourses, mentorship, workshops, and retreats to promote sustainable conflict resolution for a possible peaceful world.
In today’s fast-paced, high-pressure world, high-achieving women often find themselves torn between being fiercely competent and managing overwhelming stress. This article delves into the transformative power of reclaiming softness, not as weakness, but as a potent tool for sustainable strength, conflict resolution, and personal growth. By embracing this softer side, women can enhance their leadership and relationships, all while maintaining their inner peace.
“I’ve been here before. The meeting where the tension rises, voices sharpen, and every cell in my body wants to interrupt. I could feel my chest tightening, and yet I chose to breath. I stayed soft. Present. Not passive, but powerful. And the entire room shifted. That wasn’t weakness. That was internal conflict mastery.” – Susanne, 34, Department Manager
Yes, it’s possible: you can live a life of peace instead of constant struggle, conflict, and overwhelm. Let’s be honest, though, the one energy you’re already drowning in is your own stressed, hyper-vigilant, overly reactive mind.
Women like you want to feel powerful without always performing. You want to feel respected without having to prove yourself in every room. You want to speak your truth, without either exploding or shutting down.
But most days, it’s one or the other: you’re either the diligent bee, sweet like honey, endlessly accommodating, and full of hidden resentment, or the wildfire, fierce, fast, and emotionally triggering. Your words are sharp as glass, and your shame for your internal fire lingers for days after you’ve burned the bridges again.
This is for you, fiery woman, the one who’s tired of only being feared, but terrified of losing her edge.
What is softness, and why does it scare you?
Softness is not weakness. It’s not submission, and it’s not silence.
Softness is the ability to stay open, even in heated conflict. It’s your nervous system knowing it doesn’t have to brace for war every time someone says something stupid. It’s a regulated presence, not because you’ve silenced yourself, but because you’ve learned to trust yourself.
This isn’t just a poetic idea; it’s your innate biological reality. Your nervous system doesn’t lie. And the way you relate to conflict, emotion, and intensity is written into your body’s stress code. It seems we live in times where inner work becomes more and more important.
According to peace scholar Paul Redekop (2014), inner peace is the ability to remain centered in the midst of turmoil. That, my dear, is the power of softness. And that’s the power I want you to experience because it is about to change your understanding of life entirely.
And why does it scare you?
Softness melts your hard shell, the one you had to grow because of all the attacks you’ve endured. Yes, I see them, and I see you in the midst of it. I know it well, life only makes you harden when there’s an outside force pressuring you into defensiveness.
But what was once a brave shell of defense became your weapon, one that’s difficult even for you to control. And so, you never got to meet your true power: your raw, beautiful femininity. A force that could burn bridges to defend her people, but rarely needs to, because her intuition is so sharp and clear that she knows exactly when to snap and when to leave.
So why does it feel terrifying to allow your soft side to shine through? Because softness has been marketed to strong women as the opposite of their identity.
But here’s the truth: your softness doesn’t make you less strong, it makes your strength sustainable. And here’s why.
The science behind the soft shift
When you’re constantly in fight-or-flight mode, your body doesn’t just burn out; it becomes addicted to conflict. Your nervous system begins, early on, to confuse intensity with safety. High cortisol levels become your baseline. You start to crave the high of righteousness. And you brace against every new situation, just in case.
But choosing softness doesn’t mean you stop setting boundaries. It means your boundaries become cleaner, quieter, and more powerful.
Neurologically, softness is a parasympathetic state, where digestion, connection, clarity, and empathy return home. It’s like calling all your power back to yourself when you learn to soften into your own being.
This is what a dozen recent studies have shown: softness, understood as empathy, openness, and non-confrontational communication, significantly influences women’s conflict resolution skills (Turner, 2019). Thus, women who allow their softness to shine through in leadership report more constructive, inclusive, and sustainable outcomes (HKS, 2023).
And I am not talking about the naturally quiet, nice, perfection-driven female leader who already uses her softness naturally. These women often lack the strength to draw boundaries and have problems being truly heard by their colleagues. No, I am talking about studies that looked at boss ladies like you.
Our softness is actually why we are better leaders and managers. We make fewer emotion-led and risky decisions than men, and we focus more on the greater good than on personal gain (HKS, 2023).
But female changemakers who are, often unknowingly, overly masculine tend to lack inclusive dialogue, collaboration, acceptance, and empathy (Norbury, 2025). Instead, they focus on competition, being the best, and achieving perfection (Psychology Today, 2025). When they fail to compete or succeed, they lose it, point fingers, and feel emotionally overwhelmed by internal stress they can’t manage healthily.
That’s why we are the ones running into burnout with our eyes wide open. We’ve been so conditioned to play the male game in a man’s world that we misread every signal our body, mind, and heart send us.
Only once you’re hanging upside down do you realize your loss of inner peace, discover you never really knew what resilience meant, and begin to grieve the damaged relationships you’ve burned (Forbes, 2025).
What happens if you don’t soften
You became a leader because you wanted to make the world better for those who come after you, so that your children or nieces don’t have to endure what you did.
So, you worked your ass off. You became more successful than those before you. But somewhere in the back of your mind, there’s a whisper: this isn’t what your life is truly about.
Deep down, you know that playing the high-achiever doesn’t change the world; it keeps the old system alive. And you’re a part of it.
So, I ask you this: what do you fear more, continuing to live in this broken system, or facing your inner world and becoming vulnerable enough to find your softness?
Most people fear the latter more.
Why? Because we were never shown how to face our own internal feelings. The society we live in only taught women how to override their boundaries. While men are trained to march through fear, women must pause, soften, and sink in.
I’m not saying don’t face your fear. I’m saying: sit with it. Let yourself feel the discomfort of being with yourself. That’s the real unknown that your system fears and is so successful at running away from.
No blockbuster or soap opera can show you what that looks like; they’re all based on toxic coping mechanisms and dysfunctional relational patterns.
So, change only happens when you’ve had enough. But if you keep pushing, bracing, and defending, your relationships will wear thin. Your body will collapse before your ambition is fulfilled. And you’ll keep mistaking control for love and righteousness for safety.
No amount of exercise, vacation, or spa treatments can fix your deep exhaustion or inner disconnection. You’ll still believe that your true, authentic self is a woman who overreacts, is chronically stressed, and is entitled to voice her opinion at any cost, because you sacrifice so much for your family, your company, or your friendships. Even studies show that women who stay stuck in masculine overdrive often experience a deep erosion of self-worth and heightened imposter syndrome (xxx).
And the worst part? You’ll never get to feel the intimacy, reverence, and rest you were fighting for all along.
How can a woman like that resolve conflict or hold space for others when she’s never learned to hold space for herself?
And that, at its core, is what softness really is: holding space. For yourself and for others. Especially when it’s hard.
What becomes possible when you reclaim softness
Now imagine this instead: You walk into the room and speak with grounded power, not defensiveness. You say no, without needing to explain why. You feel the rise of anger, and it becomes clarity, not chaos. You let your shoulders drop. You breathe. You trust the version of you who no longer has to prove herself.
This is what softness allows. It gives you your sovereignty. It helps you make concise, controlled decisions from a place of calm.
And let me tell you, it takes incredible strength to act from grounded clarity instead of impulsive reactivity. But by embracing softness, you save energy, energy you can now use for your side hustle, your partner, your hobbies, or visiting your grandma more regularly. Free energy to listen more deeply to your clients, hold space for a colleague’s pain, and make wise decisions for your business.
When you soften, you de-escalate workplace tension with ease. You inspire cooperation. You create space for healing, innovation, and sustainable leadership.
Softness distances you from impulsive reactions. It roots you in present-moment awareness. It leads to wiser choices and fewer destructive conflict cycles.
Softness gives you the ability to focus on what matters most and let go of what doesn’t. That’s why soft, high-achieving women are better equipped to maintain strong relationships, both personal and professional, even in moments of tension.
And as you’re still reading, I know you’re ready to step into your soft leadership era, what I call Peaceful Leadership. To start embracing your soft core, I’ve brought you a few guiding prompts to reflect on:
Where in your life are you still choosing intensity over intimacy?
What emotion feels unsafe to soften into, and what do you fear would happen if you let yourself feel it fully?
Who told you that softness makes you weak, and were they wrong?
Choose your fights wisely
As a strong woman, you may be feared by many, but you often waste energy on unnecessary wars. You argue for truth in rooms that will never value it. You defend yourself in conversations that never deserved access to your power.
But soft power flows where it’s needed. It knows peace is not surrender. It knows you don’t need to be loud to be heard. You just need to be clear from the inside out.
This is how softness becomes your superpower, not because it hides your fire, but because it aims it.
This is the beginning of softness and strength. The beginning of a different kind of leadership, the kind that lives in your body and breath, not just your calendar.
If something inside you exhaled while reading this, follow that. Not to buy anything, but to become an authentic one.
She’s already in you. Soft. Fierce. And free.
Read more from Julia Dencker
Julia Dencker, Inner Peace & Conflict Transformation Mentor
Julia Dencker is an expert in peaceful leadership and inner peace, focusing on fostering holistic well-being in personal and professional environments. With a background in leadership from a young age, she combines her experience with her MA in Peace and Conflict Studies to help others find peace holistically. As the founder of The Peaceful Path and host of its German-language podcast, she explores the transformative power of inner peace. Julia is currently writing two books: a memoir on her journey to inner peace and a guide to the '8 Dimensions of Inner Peace,' a model she developed after four years of research. She provides mentorship and conflict-resolution strategies to individuals and organizations worldwide.
References:
Forbes 2025: Bruneau, Megan. Why High-Achieving Women Are Trading Gratitude Journals for Group Saunas.
Norbury 2025: Norbury, Helen. The Hidden Cost of Playing Small: How High-Achieving Women Lose Themselves in the Hustle.
Psychology Today 2025: Brancu, Mira. Breaking the Vicious Cycle of Compensatory Hyper-Achievement: Grappling with the Backlash to Women’s Success.
Turner 2019: Turner, Catherine. Soft Ways of Doing Hard Things: Women Mediators and the Question of Gender in Mediation.
