Building Without a Blueprint
Most people know the Brooklyn Bridge.
Fewer know the woman who held it all together.
After her husband fell ill during construction, Emily Warren Roebling stepped into the role of chief engineer - without the title, the recognition, or even the encouragement. She learned civil engineering while on the job and oversaw a project that would shape New York forever.
Not because she was asked to.
Because she saw what was possible.
And refused to let it fall apart.
I’ve been thinking about what it takes to build something when no one hands you a blueprint:
🎙 Launching the Forbes Quadel podcast.
🎤 Speaking on panels with people I once admired from afar.
🧱 Sharing my own story of housing instability on a TEDx stage.
The skeptics and obstacles will always be there.
But so will the calling to keep building.
Sometimes the most important bridges are the ones we build when no one believes we can. Not even ourselves sometimes.
