The most prestigious talk I’ve ever given was at Lincoln Center in front of an audience of 2,000 people. I was on stage, under a spotlight – good hair, good dress, too much blush (my thing) – and the theme of the day was embracing ambition. I loved the moment, and was so proud, but if I’m being honest, I wished the whole time that I could wear a sweatshirt that clarified: “this is only one kind.”

Too often, as I meet new moms and coach them, they’ll describe feeling guilty or uncomfortable with the ways they’ve had to slow down or change course at work (often just temporarily). They’ll say, “I guess I’m just less ambitious now?” No, I assure them. You’re not. You’re more. You’re ambitious in an expanded sense of the word, one that acknowledges both paid and unpaid work; one that asks you, uncomfortably, to examine your values and to choose every day what’s worth your precious energy.

We’re so conditioned – me, too! – to measure achievement in career terms: rank, money, and power at work. So, instead, I ask these moms: When you put your head on the pillow at night, what made you tired today and was worth it? And what are you excited for tomorrow? Those are your ambitions. Allow them to count. No one gets to define your ambition but you.

Here are nine new ways I’m defining it for me. Steal them, use them, write your own. And be so, so proud.

Ambition is: Having a shoe repair guy.

Mine is cranky, randomly closed, and charges inconsistently. But a couple of times a year, when I visit his shop, I get to feel like a virtuous, responsible, hard-working-and-walking person who knows her style and comfort and invests in them for the long haul. Ambitious for sure.

Ambition is: Understanding when good enough is actually excellent.

It’s good enough to go to the kids’ sick-visits and let someone else take them for their flu shots. It’s good enough to use a pre-existing template for that deck. It’s good enough to do all of your movie watching six months late on a plane. Every one of these “good enoughs” is in service of a greater goal. Identify that and you’ll realize how ambitious you’re actually being in that moment.

Ambition is: Extremely strategic and rare over-delivery.

I know you’re thinking, duh, of course it’s ambitious to over deliver. But most of the time, truly, try not to – it can connote indecisiveness or unnecessary subordination, and lock you into unrealistically high standards perpetually. It can also make more work for your boss! Every now and then though, you’ll want to shoot the moon with a specific goal in mind – and then your exceptional work will mean even more. Yesterday, I turned in a big reported piece with twice as many interviewees as required – financially, not a great use of my time, but the topic was child care solutions, and offering a wider diversity of perspectives felt like a values-imperative for me.

Ambition is: Doing just the basics.

Did you show up for the minimum number of in-office days this month? Do you get to the dentist basically almost twice a year? Do you eat three meals a day? Gold stars all around, seriously. None of these things on their own is ambitious, but collectively, in the stage of life when you’re caring for other humans and also growing a career, and doing it while perpetually under-resourced? That’s a freaking miracle, and you are ambitious.

Ambition is: Something you perform just for yourself.

So often, we think of ambition as requiring an audience. But I think it can be almost a purer form of effort when nobody’s watching. A year before I gave that speech at Lincoln Center, when I was first promoting my book, I was invited to give an evening talk at an affluent town’s library about 90 minutes away. My husband was working late, so I booked a sitter, got a train ticket, wore something fancy (and un-ideal for train travel), arrived right on time, and walked in to an impressive stage and a neat, orderly lineup of 200 chairs…that were all empty. Not one person had shown up. Zero. I felt like someone crumpled up my chest into a ball and tossed it in the trash. Actually, there was one person there, the AV guy. He was on site to mic me up because the library was recording my talk for its podcast. “What do you wanna do?” he asked. I took off my heels and sat on the edge of the stage and gave my whole 45-minute lecture. Of course I didn’t have to, and I definitely didn’t want to. But I knew that I had a choice between two different ways of waking up the next morning, defeated, or proud. I went with proud.

Ambition is: Always asking to be paid more.

Even if they say no, they’ll see you as someone who valued herself enough to ask. Ambitious.

Ambition is: Setting boundaries – or unsetting them.

My dear friend, the psychiatrist Dr. Pooja Lakshmin, has taught me that boundaries are a form of self-care, and that sometimes a boundary can even look more like a pause–taking time to think, consider, and reset the power dynamic when you’re asking to do something that isn’t an easy “yes.” I love that and use her advice all the time (highly recommend her book!). Boundaries are absolutely ambitious.

But I’m also learning that deciding to break a boundary – deliberately, openly, with purpose – can be ambitious, too. Earlier today, my sons’ school had a lockdown (not a drill, a real one). They are fine, thank goodness, but because of a boundary I’d set, to not look at my phone during a client call, I didn’t see my older son’s texts. That boundary was a reasonable boundary, maybe even an ambitious one, but I don’t like how it made me feel, so I’m changing my own rules and will keep my phone face up on my desk – and if I’m in a situation where it looks rude, I’ll just explain. That openness is ambitious, too.

Ambition is: Red-lining the contract.

You are not being a pain to ask for mutual indemnity or a lighter NDA. You are asserting your rights and tailoring a purposefully generic and partisan first draft to suit your specific value (and values). One example: I always request Net 30 payments (as opposed to waiting the standard 45 or 60 days, which I find borderline discriminatory against freelancers).

And ambition is: Giving your brain grace to do its best work.

Does your home have a bag of mis-matched socks? Ours does. Actually, right now it doesn’t because I had to think through what I wanted to say in this column and did so while pairing and balling all of the soccer socks, and dress socks, and little anklet socks, and many, many Costco specials. I used to think of myself as a lazy procrastinator in these moments, avoiding a more challenging task. More recently, I’ve given myself permission for a pretty amazing reframe, and I encourage you to, too. Thinking (while folding, or walking, or doing something easier on my list) is actually the most ambitious, visionary part of my process. And if my kids get a drawer full of socks out of it, too, even better.

Lauren Smith Brody is the CEO of The Fifth Trimester, a workplace gender equality consultancy, and a co-founder of the Chamber of Mothers, a public policy nonprofit