Age: 30
Relationship Status: Married
Occupation: Executive Manager - @ a nonprofit | Events + Design - @ my own company
Income: Salary from nonprofit - $95K + annual bonus | Salary from my business depends on how many events we have per month and what role I take on in said events; this can vary significantly!
Astrological Sign: Pisces Sun, Aquarius Moon, Sagittarius Rising
What is the first thing you do when you wake up?
Scrape my tongue, brush my teeth, drink water + check my phone.
Have you ever felt genuine fulfillment? When?
Absolutely! I feel very fulfilled in my relationship with my husband, my friends, and my family. By nature, I’m a homebody, so I’m most fulfilled when I have a house full of people that I love, eating good food, and in a clean environment. I love gifting this feeling to other people through my work - providing people with an aesthetically pleasing environment + food that they love so that they can enjoy it at home with their loved ones. Sometimes, it feels like more of a gift to me than it does to our clients. As I’ve gotten older, I’ve been able to tell that I am most fulfilled when I am living my life completely on my terms and not looking to “prove” anything to anyone - something I seriously struggled with in my youth.
What is your most repetitive, negative thought?
That something bad is going to happen to my husband. I don’t have a fear of not being able to survive without him, but I don’t want to live without him. I really love our life together. I don’t believe I would find this connection with another person, nor do I wish to. I feel completely understood by him, and we have so much fun together! I have re-occurring intrusive thoughts that something bad could happen to him.
What is your most repetitive, positive thought?
That I deserve to be happy and that I am capable enough to handle what comes next.
What is one thing that surprised you about adulthood?
How much work friendship really takes! My mom has an extremely tight-knit group of women who I grew up with, and they always showed up for each other and for everything. They made it look so effortless and jumped in whenever, wherever they could. Now that I’m older and have this big group of friends - some from high school, some from college, some from being an adult in the city - I realize how much time it actually takes to stay connected, be present, and have authentic, meaningful relationships with each of them. It’s an important investment for me because each of them fills a different bucket in my life, but I had no concept of how much my mom had built these relationships up far before I was even born.
What are three things you want to put every woman onto?
4. Adding a fourth that’s not a material item because learning this changed my life - No one is thinking about you as much as you are thinking about you. Do what you want. No one else’s opinions, thoughts, feedback, matter. You are the subject matter expert on your life. Not your family, not your parents, not your friends, you. And life is not supposed to be that serious!
Rank the following from most to least important:
money, food, sex, love, and laughter (feel free to explain or don’t).
love, laughter, sex, food, money
Love and laughter go hand in hand for me. I could never love someone who I don’t laugh with. Growing up with divorced parents taught me to look for love in unexpected people and places and I’m glad that I don’t just prioritize the love in my marriage and child but the other sources of love that I have - my friends, my alone time, time spent in the ocean, a good bath, etc. Sex is important to me because I think it’s like a reset to get back into sync with your partner if things are ever off but I’ve always also been able to accomplish this with laughter. I love food and I think it’s a connector for people from all different walks of life, but it doesn’t hold the weight for me that the first three words do. Money is a necessity for me, but not one I like to think about, focus on, or associate my goals with. I’ve had times in my life where I’ve had a lot of money and times where I’ve had close to none - my happiness has not correlated with either extreme.
How has your relationship with your parents/ guardians changed in adulthood?
My relationship with my parents has been a work in progress since I was 11 years old. I have one parent who never actively parented me and wasn’t really around for my childhood. My other parent and I then developed a co-dependent relationship that I didn’t realize wasn’t healthy for either of us until I was much older. Therapy helps a lot - I’ve learned how to set boundaries and then constantly reinforce them. It’s unnatural and uncomfortable for me but the more I do it, the better I get at it, and the easier our relationship gets. Becoming a mother has allowed me to do a lot of work and come to an understanding of what life was actually like for my parents. When I look at their childhoods, I really do think they did the best they could with what they had at the time. I wish a lot of things were different for a lot of reasons, but my job is to make sure I do that for my son. Before deciding to have a child and then while I was pregnant, I worked with my therapist to try and resolve my relationship with my dad the best I could. We had a lot of very difficult, honest, and vulnerable conversations – they surprised me and have been extremely healing. I’ve always wanted him to take accountability but had never asked him to. Doing this transformed our relationship. The one thing a child needs is constant, unconditional love, and unfortunately, I didn’t get that from my parents as a child. It’s both painful and healing to realize what my reality was and work to change it. I really do not like to blame them for things and feel that I am accountable for what my life turns into - but I want to give my son a different foundation for his future. This is why I married the man that I did!
When do you feel most like yourself?
In the warmth, with a tan, floating in the ocean. In the winter, I’ll take a bathtub as a substitute.
What is the best compliment someone has ever given you?
My old boss gave me a reference and said if he had to use one word to describe me it would be magnetic, it has always stuck with me! My best friend always tells me I’m a good storyteller, and whenever she smells a good candle, she says it reminds her of feeling safe in my home. Being a safe place for my friends is the highest compliment in my book.
How do you feel about falling in love?
I love falling in love; I think it’s so much fun. Staying in love is even better. When I look at my friendships and my marriage, I think the most impressive thing to me is the devotion we have to each other through time, distance, life circumstances. Making a commitment to stay in love with someone is a really powerful thing.
What is one thing you’re sick of hearing?
I’m sick of people stereotyping or making assumptions about someone based on one decision, character trait, or Instagram post. I think the black-and-white severity in which we jump to judging each other is so ridiculous. Rarely do we have the full picture of what someone’s life is really like and who they really are.
How often do you feel alone?
All the time! I think this stems from being the youngest child in my family by 8 years. I spent a lot of time by myself as a child. I really, really, really like my alone time. I can count on one hand how many times I’ve felt lonely in the past two years, and most of it has to do with relocating from all of my friends and family while becoming a new mom. Sometimes I want my tribe closer to me. More often than not, I’m happy with my decision to be where I am though. Just a reminder to me that two things can be true at the same time.
What is one thing you hope everyone experiences in their lifetime?
I have a bunch:
Unconditional love,
A night out with friends followed by a sleepover and the coffee and recap the next morning,
An outdoor shower after a long day at the beach and then laying on your bed in your towel,
Laughing until you cry with someone you love,
Seeing an old friend again after a long time apart,
Forgiveness,
Feeling pride for someone other than yourself.
What is one thing you hope no one has to experience in their lifetime?
Watching someone you deeply love mentally and physically decline at a young age.
What is the best decision you’ve ever made?
To be happy!
When do you feel most at ease?
When I have a clean, well-organized home, I’m freshly showered in my robe with a candle lit.
What does having a successful life mean to you?
Having a roof over my head, food in my fridge, having the ability to move my body freely, having financial freedom to do the work that I love, and maintaining relationships with the people closest to me. Health, happiness, and some spare change in the bank!
How often do you think about your body?
I used to think about my body a lot because I’m big-boned, curvy, and always seemed to be “bigger” than the girls in my grade. I used to focus on what my body looked like to other people. Now that I’m 30, I think about how my body feels to me, what it does for me, how it functions for me. I have stretch marks, back acne scars, jiggly thighs, my dad’s feet, broad shoulders, and hairy armpits that never seem to have a 5 o’clock shadow. It's funny how I used to want to change all these things, and yet it would change literally nothing about who I am internally. I have changed the way I think about my body because I refuse to not be absolutely in love with a body that has carried me successfully all the years of my life.
When do you ask for help?
Almost never before I met my husband. I’m an “I can do it all myself and will have a major attitude if you treat me otherwise” type of girl. Now, I know I need help. I’m not ashamed of it, and I don’t think I’m any less of a person for requiring it. The bigger problem is that I don’t think anyone does anything as well as I would. That’s part of the reason I own my own business :)
What is something you feel strongly about?
Being patient with life. I think a lot of us are in a rush to have it all but don’t really know what having it “all” entails and then take it on before we are ready to do so. I really feel at peace with letting the universe unfold as it should before me. I think this is largely because I have such older sisters, I’ve seen all the winds in the road for them, and I never want to put the cart before the horse when it comes to doing all the grown-up stuff. It’s good to be young.
BONUS: Tell me something good.
There is always time - you just have to make it. <3
Comments