Frankfurt: Helping others to gain self-confidence
Zoë Cross coaches people with and without disabilities so that they no longer hide. Her self-confidence inspires despite her own convictions.
Zoë Cross speaks quite openly about her own experience of discrimination without castigating it as such. The 50-year-old has congenital facial paralysis (Möbius syndrome) and found out from a preferred employer that – despite perfect professional qualifications – she was not allowed to have customer contact. In the end, a colleague was chosen who wasn’t as qualified but didn’t have a disability. Situations like this are common for people with disabilities. Cross, who lives in Frankfurt, would like to help others as a business coach.
With her coaching, she primarily addresses women with or without a disability. She addresses bullying and wants to show how you can be successful at work. “We are so much more than just our disability,” says the native of Munich, who spent a large part of her childhood in Great Britain. At the age of nine she returned to Germany with her family, to the Rhine-Main area.
She attended high school in Wiesbaden, visited England, worked for Japanese companies and started coaching part-time in 2016. With her own experiences, but also with her emotional self-confidence, she tries to help others to gain more self-confidence. She strengthens the mindset, the way people think, as she says herself. And it’s not just women with disabilities who find it difficult to stand in front of a camera, give a presentation, or even say something in a meeting.
“I know what it means to be rejected,” says Cross. Maybe she is inspired by others. The 50-year-old says she experienced situations as a teenager where she was spat on, insulted and thrown to the ground. But she also experienced positive things. One event in particular stuck in her memory. As a school child, she had practiced a dance with other children. “During the performance I hid behind the stage. I thought the others looked perfect and ‘normal’ and I didn’t.” After the performance, she noted the astonishment of many in the audience that she wasn’t there. “People were sad that I wasn’t on stage.”
Help and contact points
The Frankfurt Life Aid offers places in children’s facilities, housing options and outpatient services. Contact via the Gut Hausen office, Friedrich-Wilhelm-von-Steuben-Strasse 2, Tel. 069/174 892 500, email:
[email protected] and online at www.lebenshilfe-ffm.de
The EUTB (Supplementary independent participation advice) advises people with disabilities or relatives free of charge and on all questions of participation and rehabilitation. Contact via the Frankfurt Association, Mainzer Landstraße 233, Tel.: 069/73 94 367 28,
Email: [email protected] and online at www.eutb-frankfurt.de
The International Confederation (IB) has a support and advice center in Frankfurt. The educators there: help with dealing with authorities, in crisis situations and with all questions relating to participation. Contact the center in Hanauer Landstr. 146 by phone: 069/90 43 98 40 or email: [email protected]
The Union Disabled people and their friends (Cebeef) offers assistance, care, integration aids, a transport service and more. Contact the head office in Frankfurt, Königsbergerstr. 2, by phone 069/97 05 22 0, email: [email protected] and at www.cebeef.de on the internet. microphone
That triggered something in her. Later in Germany she spent her youth on the stage, was courageous and self-confident. Those qualities that she would also like to teach her customers so that they can live their lives in freedom and dignity. “It’s never too late to see what you really want to do with your life,” she says. And you shouldn’t let outsiders tell you what you can and can’t do.
The Frankfurt native draws strength from the feedback from the participants in her coaching. “It motivates me to keep going.” People tell her that they cut their hair shorter so they could no longer hide behind it, or that their personal story of their first kiss at 41 encouraged a woman to have one to look for partners.
Cross wants to help make people with disabilities more visible. “It is normal for a person with a disability to read the news, become a model or be on stage.” Politicians can certainly do more to make life easier for these people. But people with disabilities also have to do something about it themselves. Cross will help with this. Because they are more than just their disability.