We Are the Leaders, Issue #8- Luvvie Ajayi Jones

by BREAKTHRU Team

December 12th, 2025

Dear Leaders,

Before we begin, a small but important correction: I previewed Luvvie Ajayi Jones last week as a Visionary. But it sat uneasily with me because it wasn’t true. In the BREAKTHRU framework, and in her leadership, Luvvie is not a Visionary. She is The Catalyst. And naming someone’s leadership clearly matters especially to me.

Catalysts spark change. They ignite truth. They move us, sometimes with a jolt, sometimes with a laugh, always with intention. And Luvvie is one of the clearest examples of that kind of leadership I know.

In 2021, during a year thick with uncertainty and reinvention, I read Professional Troublemaker. Around the same time, I was reading Untamed, and it felt as though the universe had coordinated an intervention. Both books pushed me toward a question I had long been circling:

What is the truest version of myself that I’ve been hesitating to become?

Glennon invited me toward that truth gently, by sharing her own journey.
Luvvie shoved me toward it, with humor, honesty, and a well-placed side-eye.

There is something electrifying about the way Luvvie writes. She carries humor like a sharpened tool, honesty like a torch, and courage like a muscle she’s been training for decades. What makes her leadership so compelling is not performance — it’s how she works so diligently in her practice.

This Week’s Reflection: Luvvie Ajayi Jones and the Power of the Catalyst

Catalysts don’t simply create change, they awaken it. They surface truths that have been sitting quietly in the room, and by naming what others avoid, they make movement possible.

Luvvie Ajayi Jones is that kind of leader. Growing up between Nigeria and the United States sharpened her eye for contradiction and her appetite for clarity. She began as a blogger, but her voice, bold, hilarious, incisive, quickly became a force. Over time, she evolved into a bestselling author, podcaster, TED speaker, and cultural critic whose honesty moves people toward courage rather than comfort.

Her TED Talk, “Get Comfortable with Being Uncomfortable,” ranks in the top 1% of all TED Talks, with more than 13 million views and translations into 23 languages. Her NYT best-selling book Professional Troublemaker carries this same call: courage isn’t the absence of fear, it is movement through fear..

And this message lands even more sharply today. In a political climate where exhaustion is high, markets feel unsteady, families are stretched, and entire communities whisper, “Let’s take care of ourselves,” shrinking can feel like survival. It can feel sensible and responsible.

But I believe we will regret this moment if we let shrinking become our story. We will look back and wonder why we muted ourselves when clarity was needed, softened our edges when truth required sharpness, or chose comfort over courage when the world needed leaders who would speak, stand, and show up fully.

Luvvie’s work reminds us that silence is not safety, it could be erasure.

The Roots That Made Her Brave

Running through Professional Troublemaker is the steady presence of Luvvie’s grandmother, Funmilayo Faloyin, a woman who believed courage was a responsibility. Her guidance became the backbone of Luvvie’s leadership:

“If you’re going to stand in the truth, stand in it fully.”
“Do not dishonor yourself or where you come from.”

These teachings shaped Luvvie long before audiences knew her name. They are why she refuses to shrink, because shrinking dishonors the lineage that made her.

Luvvie pairs that wisdom and humor with the Yoruba practice of Oríkì, a personal praise poem — a distilled naming of who you are, where you come from, and the courage you’re called to embody. Oríkì is identity as grounding. Identity as steadiness. Identity as truth-telling.

While explaining the power of the Oríkì, she says: “It lets people know who your WERE, who you ARE, and who you WILL BE. It reminds you of those who came before you and blesses those who will come after. It might even include some shade.”

I wrote my own Oríkì using Luvvie’s creative examples (sited in her book) as an inspiration:

Lindsay of the Big Purpose Energy.
Feminist by Birthright, Lesbian by Fierce and Glorious Truth.
Heir to Angela Tilton Heywood, Queen of Free Love and Radical Voice.
Sworn Enemy of Shrinking.
Mother of Frameworks and Finder of Possibility.
She Who Turns Leadership Into Liberation.

I agree with Luvvie. When we name ourselves, we become harder to silence. We are stronger when we remember our lineage, find our grounding, and define our calling. I will forever be indebted to Luvvie and her powerful courageous words.

From Reflection to Action

As you move into this week, consider:

Where am I being called to “be a professional troublemaker” — to say the thing that needs to be said, even if it makes the room uncomfortable?

Where have I been shrinking to make others more comfortable — and what would stepping into my full self look like this week?

What would my own Oríkì — sound like, if I named who I am without apology?

Until Next Week

Next week, we’ll explore The Champion’s Way, featuring Patsy Mink — the first Asian American woman in Congress and coauthor of Title IX, whose moral clarity reshaped access to education and sports for millions. Her legacy reminds us that courage is not only personal, it can lead to generational change.

Lindsay Gaskins

Co-Founder and CEO of BREAKTHRU