Cristina Higgins, an expatriate who has spent the last 10 years living in Istanbul, Italy and Singapore, returned to the United States and the Lehigh Valley with a vision.

With a background in corporate training, she realized that managing people is a difficult skill which requires a mind shift. A similar mind shift occurs when women become mothers.

"We are not prepared for motherhood," Higgins says. "We prepare a lot for birth but not for the actual experience of being a mother, and we only have a clue of what it means to hold the job of 'mother.'

"We focus on the technical skills of being a mother but not the identity shift we undergo when we have children, which is huge," she says. "Where I get my ideas is through my management training: how to delegate; how to create a vision; how to identify what the job is you're trying to accomplish," Higgins says.

So Higgins took the materials and training she'd used in the corporate world and created a company, Strategic Mama, through which she runs workshops for mothers and women considering motherhood.

"I use classic management topics like 'managing change' and 'effective delegation,' for example, to empower women to manage motherhood with less angst and more joy," she explains.

Recently, Higgins has been a guest speaker on motherhood in a Psychology of Women class at Moravian College and conducted workshops in Bethlehem and Philadelphia. She has teamed up with the Haas School of Business at UC Berkeley to create a work/ life balance webinar.

Her most recent webinar focused on "Becoming a Mother: What Management Can Tell You about What to Expect."

Higgins started her mission in Turkey, when she felt overwhelmed by motherhood.

"Three children in four years, and I hit a wall," she says. "There was nothing else in my life and no way around that, and I couldn't take a break without feeling awful. There wasn't depression, but I got lost in the job of motherhood.

"A lot of challenges people have when they come to my workshops is that basically it's finding a way to take care of yourself and integrating motherhood with other aspects like going out with your husband or partner and taking care of that relationship. That's part of being a good mother. It can't be an either-or deal. You have to recognize that you need to escape and reframe."

Her material comes not only from the corporate world but her experiences living abroad, especially in Italy.

"Italian women learn how to be moms from the people who know them the best - family, friends, doctors - and who provide advice more real and supportive. It never occurs to Italian moms to go online for information about their kids," she says.

"American women have to deal with so much judgment and so many people telling them so many ways to do something, which is very disempowering," she says. In her workshops, Higgins encourages participants to trust their own judgments even though they'll make mistakes. "It's okay," Higgins says. "You learn, and you go with it."

Higgins employs a business formula in her workshops: the "Change Curve" which was developed in the 1960s. The X axis represents time, the Y axis represents happiness (at the top) and depression (at the bottom). She asks participants to chart where they sit on the curve.

Higgins pairs this Change Curve with the Expectations versus Reality formula, and asks her participants to consider: What do they think is happening or not happening (the Reality) that they think should be happening or not happening (the Expectations). From there, she suggests they take a step back and ask themselves what they should or can do next.

"It's a way of instantaneously taking away stress and angst," she explains, "and the thing about motherhood is that [they'll deal] with these expectations and realities all the time because [their kids] will be changing all the time."

Higgins' "Big Picture"?

"I want women to be prepared for motherhood. Women come into my workshops feeling it's just them. It's hard for them to open up about their problems.

"I'm doing consciousness-raising groups. What are we trying to live up to? These are impossible standards [set by experts and media] and if they're impossible, what's the point? Let's reframe them.

"I'm giving participants the message that 'you're not alone. Take that to heart, because if you don't eat, and you don't sleep, you will eventually pass out. Take care of yourself, and give yourself fun and whatever makes you feel alive."

"Women need to hear that," she says.

For more information on "simple strategies to reinvent modern motherhood and thrive," visit her website, www.strategicmama.com .