What Can You Give Up To Do What You Want To Do?

I don’t send holiday cards anymore. So, for those of you who thought you fell off my list, it’s actually the list that’s fallen off the list. 

I know for many these cards bring a lot of joy—and I do love seeing the cards I receive. But serious stress would set in when I had to find the perfect photo and assemble the list of woefully out of date addresses. My resentment only grew as the return to sender cards would arrive and I inevitably became the default fixer of the mess.

Three years ago, on a particularly busy year, I turned to my husband and said, “I don’t know why we’re doing this every year and I’m done with it.” He expressed mild disappointment, but knew he didn’t want to sign up for the task—so we stopped, without saying more than a few words about it. 

As the flurry of perfect baby and puppy photos began wallpapering our home in early December, I felt a few moments of shame and regret. And then I thought about all of the other amazing things I had done that fall instead of assembling the pieces of this project:

1. Ran a marathon

2. Made a baby shower for a terminally ill friend

3. Started a career transition

It was clear I gave up something that was meaningless and time consuming to me for things that were yes—time consuming—but also core to who I am and what fuels me. Of course, giving up on holiday cards was a small tweak to my life, but it was an experiment that gave way to larger changes on how I CHOOSE to spend my precious time and energy. 

When you say “no” to something that feels like a drain on your life—no matter how small—you’re opening space to say “yes” to things that are meaningful to you. I must warn you, that once you get started, these moments of rebellion are delightfully satisfying. Get ready. 

Take these steps to start saying “no” to things so you can shift your priorities:

1. Make a list of all the tasks (or in some cases, people!) that are both time-consuming and energy sucking. Call it “Drains.”

2. Create a 2nd list of things you’re dying to do, but feel you don’t have the time. Call this one, “Dreams.”

3. Go back through your Drains list and put a star next to the items for which absolutely nothing would happen if you stopped doing them. (Why you continue to do them could be the subject of several other posts.)

4. Write down how it would feel to give up these drains.

5. Choose 1 Drain to give up and 1 Dream to add.

6. Figure out a way to celebrate making this change. You’re practicing living a life made up of your choices. It may seem small at first, but it’s a symbol of what’s possible.

While you’re celebrating, a special shout-out goes out to the toughest drains on your list—people. You need not aim to change the people on your list, but rather change your behavior toward them. 

There may be people on your list who don’t support you when you’re doing things that are important to you. It’s ok that they don’t support you. Not everyone must support you in everything you do. But it’s not helpful for you to continue to talk about it with them or to try to convince them. You can set a boundary that you understand their point of view, you respect it, but it’s no longer helpful for you to discuss whatever that topic is that brings you pain—and by the way—is going nowhere. How much time could you have back in your life if you weren’t trying to convince others of your worth or the “rightness” of your decisions? 

For some of you, you might just be able to check off that triathlon from your bucket list and for others, you could at least fit in more time with the best friends you never get to see. 

Whatever dreams you create in your life, it’s thrilling to know that you have the power to make these shifts whenever you’re ready to do so. 

The choice is yours. 
 

What's Your Minimum Viable Self-Care Routine?

Among crumpled tissues and throat drop wrappers sits my laptop and my PSA to you. Fighting the urge to put my head back down on the pillow, a foggy head that begs to be horizontal, I tell myself—just one more thing and you can rest. It's a cold. Nothing more, nothing less—so why does it feel like I should throw in the towel on this day, on this week, on this whole thing called self-employment?

The worst part of it is—I did this to myself. Ouch, it hurts writing that. I've given up on my supplements regimen for months. I stayed up until the wee hours all week. I ate too much sugar. I consumed too much news (hello, cortisol!). These things strung together when I was 23 would have been called, "life"—but two decades later, my body is sticking me with a "time out". Hopefully I will learn my lesson this time around. 

In order to continue to do what I love—helping my clients and being there for my family—I must be able to take care of this body, which has made its needs very clear. 

Yes, there will be times when my energy is high, when I'm in a good groove with running and exercising, eating leafy greens like it's my job—and then there are the times when life happens and I'm lucky if I sneak in a 2 mile run between sessions. For those times, I'm taking a page from my tech colleagues. 

Let's define our Minimum Viable Self-Care Routine! 

Without it, we are non-functional. 

With it, we're not our ideal vision of success—but we're operating, we're in action—and for the love—it's a starting point! 

If you know what's worked for you in the past, but have fallen off the wagon, think through ways that you can re-ignite your commitment. Feeling like I do right now (she says, red nose aglow!) is definitely a motivator to do something different, but knowing myself, I'm also clear I must sweeten the deal. 

My Minimum Viable Self-Care Routine will include simple things I know work for me:

1) Mostly clean, always gluten-free eating
2) Running 2-3 times a week
3) Daily supplements
4) 8-9 hours of sleep

Plus, things that can make me excited again about re-committing:

1) Trying out a new fun exercise class like kickboxing (who's in?) 
2) A new evening wind-down routine that acknowledges all I've accomplished that day and is a reminder that I can let go (The sleep struggle is real no matter how articulate Arianna Huffington is on the topic!) 

Because this is my MVSCR (who doesn't need another easy to remember acronym?), I am NOT going from head cold to 6 days a week at the gym or Whole 30. While I know I'm drawn to quick fix, dramatic life overhauls—I also know they don't work for me. I find that sometimes getting back to basics and committing to the no-brainer stuff clears the way for the possibility of bigger changes down the line. So I will take these baby steps to get back on track, but first—it's all about that nap! 

Getting Started With A Creative Writing Practice

Last year I worked with a coach who told me I MUST start a blog and a newsletter in order to grow my coaching practice. This was not good news. I didn't have the time. I didn't have the ideas. And most importantly, I feared it would be shit. 

Throughout my corporate career, I loved writing, but the only time I ever gave myself permission to write beyond email and PowerPoint was the 6 months I blogged about my ridiculous dating life while my then boyfriend (now husband) and I were on a break. As the late and great Nora Ephron put it, "Everything is copy." I knew, even if the date sucked, if the guy was arrogant or socially inept—or if I was, it was still a good story, making it worth getting out there. 

I became a fierce, bold, awkward twenty-something with zero game to take on dating life in my beloved—but harsh—NYC. While the blog grew a teeny fanatical following—due mostly to my friends and family who were worried about me (thanks loved ones!)—when I reconnected with my boyfriend, I feared my life became too boring and mundane, and after one final post, I gave it up. 

Thirteen years later, when I learned the necessity of blogging as a "content marketing" practice, I spent a week resisting, brain dumping pages worth of excuses and reasons this was a bad idea. And then I channeled the peace, comfort and joy that my dating adventures brought me during a truly rough time in my life. How it pushed me to do things outside of what was comfortable so I could both get out there and live AND have a creative outlet to reflect and observe the absurdities of human behavior—starting with my own. 

I decided to commit, but in order to do so, I set up some guidelines for myself that have been pivotal in sticking with it for nearly a year. I've outlined them here to inspire you as you jump into your own creative practice (which I highly recommend you do!): 

1. Do instead of asking for permission
For many years during my digital marketing career, I was called to write, but I thought I had to get my MFA to pursue it. When I thought about taking evening classes as a working mom of two, I became overwhelmed and dropped the idea altogether. Then two years ago, I read Elizabeth Gilbert's, Big Magic, in which she says, "The guardians of high culture will try to convince you that the arts belong only to a chosen few, but they are wrong and they are also annoying." What if I don't need a degree or a credential? What if my first blog posts aren't even very good? I will never even know if they are if I never get started! So, without a workshop, a course or even a plan, I began. 

2. Experiment and play
I didn't know how to move forward or where to begin, so I promised myself I would take risks with topics, my voice and my style. I would have fun. I would take this time to be quiet, reflective and to go deep into my observations of people and myself. I started to include topics that came up often within my coaching practice, as well as topics I was personally struggling with. Combining the personal with the professional allows me to see what topics resonate best with my audience and learn more about the people I'm serving. 

3. Be honest and be you
I spent my first couple of weeks judging my conversational, self-deprecating and yet optimistic tone. Then I let go, because 1.) I was following my first two rules, 2.) It flowed right out of me and, 3.) People liked me…they really liked me. The moment I allowed myself to curse in a post was liberation to my core. I wrote it, held true to it through the copyedit—but when it came time to hit publish on LinkedIn—I hesitated. What was I thinking? This is my professional network! What will they think? And then I realized a sprinkling of choice words for emphasis has always been part of my style, so, "Fuck it." I published. 

4. Make it a top priority and show up
I knew the only way for me to commit fully was to make my writing time my top order of business. I blocked out two three-hour windows a week into my calendar for each week in the coming months. I scheduled everything around those times. When a client asked for a session during those times, I held firm and practiced saying that I was booked. When I showed up to write on those mornings and I felt uninspired, I kept going. I wrote anything. I stayed with it, and it was/is nothing short of brutal. Some days I ended up with 3 paragraphs in three hours and sometimes a piece seemed to write itself in an hour. And then there are the days, like today, where I'm making it work against all Starbucks odds (like the woman who loves to have conference calls in public, the baby who's wailing for food, and the carpets that must be vacuumed during peak business hours). 

5. Know they can't all be winners! 
Part of experimenting is knowing sometimes you'll crash and burn—and not only accepting that, but expecting it. I've found that sometimes I have the hardest time getting back to writing not after a post that experienced radio silence—but after a piece that was well loved. Even on a small scale—I feel the pressure of expectation, hoping the next time I write, it will be just as good. It's usually not. Yet, I move on and know that next week I have another shot, another chance to share my thoughts and to reveal new observations I have about what makes people tick. 

6. Express gratitude
Your support is the fuel. I am simply in awe of all of you and beyond grateful for your invaluable feedback. Thank you for reading, for forwarding to your friends and colleagues and sharing with your people on social. When I hear from you, "I needed this today." or "You did what???" it makes my day. I felt truly blessed for the outpouring of love when I've shared my more personal posts and took some risks to speak outside of my industry or my expertise. 

In my mind the blog is no longer simply a marketing tactic. Of course, it brings me new clients and when they come to me they feel like they know me. That said, I treat it as my creative playground and practice. I've come to need it and to believe it's a critical part of my life. I often wonder why it took me so long to feed this creative hunger and why I deprived myself the joys of making something that has the power to move people. And then I struggle over a paragraph like I'm doing with this one and I get it. This is hard. I'm new to it. I'm learning. It takes practice and commitment—and those are two things I know how to do. So, here's to being inspired by my awkward former single self, a creative experiment that showed me how to have fun while living the examined life, and to sticking with it in a way that doesn't allow life to get boring. 
 

Your Personal Brand: It's More Of Who You Already Are

I love Brooklyn. 

I tell (what I think are) funny stories about my daughters. 

I'm grateful to have transitioned my career from digital marketing to support the advancement of women and girls. 

I love talking about topics where I can blend my marketing and coaching expertise (cue the foreshadowing). 

I sometimes over-share. People appear to be charmed by it (or at least they tell me they are). 

I've gone through some hard shit and I see that as a strength—not a weakness.

I like simple clothing and a clean, clear kitchen counter. 

I'm always in the process of connecting two or four or one hundred great people. Friends call it "The Rachel Garrett Explosion." 

I believe people can choose to be the best version of themselves (which is usually 10x who they thought they could be) and I will do whatever I can to lovingly push them in that direction. 

I dance the line between snark and hope. 

This, my friends, is what I would call…my personal brand. Which means, it's not fake or phony. It's me—after doing the work to think about who I am. 

Here are some of the most commonly asked questions I get about personal brands to help you get yours up and running:

Why (do I have to do this crap) is a personal brand important? 

People are going to form an opinion about who you are no matter what you do. Wouldn't you want to do your best to project the message about you that is based on the core of who you are? When you're clear on your personal brand, you can be more of yourself in conversations—and that authenticity will put you and others at ease, fueling deeper, more meaningful relationships. 

How can it help my career?

Your personal brand makes you more memorable—and it helps you stand out from others with similar titles and roles. It also drives people to connect you with opportunities, projects, people and information that are a match with your strengths and priorities. For example, awhile back a New York Times article came out covering various coaching firms who were supporting parents returning to their organizations after Parental Leave. Ten different people texted, emailed and FB messengered this article to me. Supporting working parents is so core to my mission and my message that all of these friends, colleagues and acquaintances felt compelled to share it with me!

What's the first step in creating my personal brand?

Self-acceptance for the win! All of those imperfections you've been trying to hide are personal branding gold. Your imperfections make you more relatable, believable, trustworthy and human. I'm grateful to blend my two careers to tell you, being you is just good marketing, friends.

What are the components of my personal brand?

Get clear on your values, strengths, passions, imperfections and your style or aesthetic. Also—what are the topics that when you talk about them—you are impassioned and alive? This is what I call "Your Truth." You can see my article on What Happens When You Speak Your Truth to better understand how that plays into your brand. 

How do I get the word out about my brand? 

In everything you do. At a surface level, it's about how you dress, what you post on social channels, how you design your home—all of these things say something about who you are. And then when you go a bit deeper, it's who you're being in the world. Are you living your values in your relationships and in your job? Are you connecting with people and companies who live those values and share in your mission? The people with whom you hang out are as much a reflection of your brand as your latest Instagram post. 

How do I know when my brand is working?

When you feel like you're being yourself for a large percentage of the day AND you're getting momentum in your career and relationships—it's working! Isn't it wonderful to get traction when you're simply "being" instead of "trying" all the time? Also, when you begin attracting the kinds of opportunities and people who are in synch with your message and your values, you know you're cracking the code. 

Now that I have two decades of professional experience spanning two distinct careers paths, I believe more than ever that my personal brand was a critical component fueling my career success. Building a personal brand is a long-term career approach that assumes you won't always be in this role, at this company or even delivering remotely similar services—but you will always be you. And you—with all your strengths and imperfections—are the person in charge of your success, no matter what you're doing.