Writing About Writing

One of the biggest realizations I had at NASCAR was that I loved to write. This really isn't anything new, so it's more of a rekindled notion rather than a realization. Anyways, I compiled a mental list of how I came to the conclusion that writing is probably one of my few true passions in life. Here's some of the highlights from the list:- To start with an obvious one, I started a blog as a hobby. - I really wanted to study English in college but didn't think it was pragmatic enough. - When I'm at work, I sometimes daydream about writing for myself rather than our clients. - I casually google search topics such as "creative writing seminars" like that's what normal people do. - When I ran into my first grade teacher she said she thought I'd have become a writer.

So clearly, if first grade me liked writing and so does current me, it's something I should be doing more of. However, the only type of writing I love is self-reflexive humor pieces, opinion editorials about inane current events, and extensive research papers.

Journalism doesn't quite work for me, as the most hard hitting news story I've written is about leggings not being real pants. Even when I wrote a front page article about the African drummers that came to our school, I somehow rambled at length about me dancing to it. How no one edited out my editorialized narration about myself is beyond me.

I've also dappled in fiction, and see this as the most probable fashion of actually pursuing writing, except for the issue that unless I am retelling exact stories, my imagined ones make no sense. My first piece of fiction that I remember writing was from third grade, where I wrote a story about taking a walk behind my house with a frog and then running from a bear, only for him to come tuck me into bed. When you're a kid you're supposed to have a good imagination, except for me apparently.

If I had it my way, I would take Joel Stein's job. The guy just writes about himself all the time and is hilarious. Getting paid to disseminate my opinions to the masses is essentially what my end goal would be. Unfortunately, that job doesn't really exist to apply for. Trust me, I've been trying.

Absurd Ways I've (Attempted to) Make Money

For reasons that escape me, I always seem to pursue the most ridiculous methods of making money. Even the "normal" jobs I get seemingly turn into strange experiences.  In some sort of a particular order, here is a list of  jobs I have had and how it turned out for me: The "normal" jobs that could have been more normal:

My first job was at a bagel store, which would have been normal if upper management ever got itself together. By the end of my first year I was the second most senior person in the establishment at a ripe age of 17. Once when I came into work, there was some corporate people there that made me pose with sandwiches for a website. Within the week, some other corporate lady came in and had me cleaning out the inside of the trashcan in the back with a scrubber, and then proceeded to yell at me for not keeping an eye on the cash register and the customer standing at it (which was in a different room, where she happened to be, without her head in a trashcan).

I was a camp counselor for two summers. I would give this job the award for most normal, except for the time a six year tried climbing up onto my lap and then proceeded to try to motorboat me while yelling "BOOBIES!"

The jobs I took that I didn't expect to be normal, and weren't:

I then spent two summers interning at a theme park. I knew this was going to be an experience, but never did I think it would be THIS CRAZY! First off, people on vacations are insane and forget that those people working at a theme park are actual humans.  Beyond that, I lived at the housing unit for international students, so the crazy never subsided. The perks of living there was that the internationals thought I was a helpless undomesticated American that would eat frozen pizza and oatmeal everyday if left to their own devices (painfully true actually), so they'd make me a rice dinner at least 1-2 time a week. On the downside, it was expected that I drink Popov with them every night and would consider marrying at least one of them so they could have a green card.

I spent a summer of my life making political phone calls. As I am not politically active, and I can't honestly say which side I was supporting, but I was told to burn in hell by someone on my first night. It didn't really improve after that night, yet it was a $9.50 a hour job, which was more than I'd ever made anywhere else, so so what if I got death threats? I endured the entire summer.

The jobs that were just plain sketchy, in hindsight:

I sold windows too for a summer. Just on weekends, so it complimented my camp job well. I would go to fairs and such with this short, creepy man and stand next to this window and pretend to know anything about it.  Old men would come over to me, I would get them to sign up for a consultation, and then make a whole lot of money. I made a base of $10 an hour, plus $15 every time I got someone to sign up for a consultation. I would smile a lot and always wondered why I was so good at this job without knowing anything about construction. It was only recently when I talk about this job did I realize I was basically a window prostitute to all these old men who thought I would be the one coming to their house for the presentation.

I also thought donating plasma would be a good money maker. I ate a big meal, laid down to get my plasma sucked out, and vomited everywhere once the process started. The saline taste from whatever chemicals they were putting into my body with the blood they were returning to me clearly didn't suit me. I did get paid though, so my mother encouraged me, "Just try again. I bet they'll pay you even if you puke again." I did contemplate it because I puke for free most nights, but decided against it.

The jobs that are just funny:

My current endeavor of selling makeup. Enough said, especially if you already read From Tomboy to Tweezers.

My real full-time job of social media, which yes, is a real job, and yes, I do get paid for it.

My roommate also put up a pet care profile for me online yesterday. Here's the picture from my profile:

If that doesn't instill in you a sense of security that I can handle your pets, I'm not sure what will.

Maybe one day I will get a job that isn't in some fashion funny, but I doubt it. I have accepted that normal isn't for everyone.

What NASCAR taught me about blogging

As a northerner, attending NASCAR seemed like a right of passage to permanently living in the south. So I rounded up my friends for a 10 hour marathon tailgate and NASCAR race. After hours of consumption, games, music, and sun, it was finally time for the race. Once we got in, it was super loud and there was no way to communicate with anyone except for exchanging questionable gestures back and forth. That left me hours of watching cars driving in a circle essentially alone. After the long tailgate, it was nothing like I expected. Rather than being some hick sport, NASCAR was an emotional experience for me. Granted, this revelation occurred after ten plus hours of beer and sun, but there was something fantastic happening at NASCAR that night.

NASCAR is what life should feel like. It's intense. It roars. There is so much noise and chaos, but in the end there is an end goal so clear and attainable that it cuts through everything in the periphery. But more than anything, you feel NASCAR. It rumbles your soul and shakes your eardrums until you lose a sense of equilibrium.

And for me, this created the perfect environment to think. I usually don't feel too strongly, so the literal shaking atmosphere of NASCAR got my creative juices flowing. All I could think about were topics worth blogging about. By the time I got home, I had a whole list of topics that inspired me to write, to tweet, and to create.

The juxtaposition between a redneck, beer loving, gas guzzling sport and deep intellectual thought may not seem to make sense on the surface, but on deeper introspection, it actually does.  By living your life and experiencing new things, you are opening yourself up to new topics, new thoughts, and new memories. When you go outside of your comfort zone, you end up learning more about yourself.

Maybe NASCAR won't inspire you to write like it did for me, but doing something new most likely will. You never know when you'll get a dose of perspective, so you mine as well take every opportunity to try and see what encourages your passions. You might just be surprised at what comes out if it.

On Being Sorry

I apologize if this opinion piece offends you. Wait, no I don't. I have a right to have opinions, and people have a right to disagree with them, so why do I always apologize for expressing myself? Often at work I know something relevant and do not share with my boss for fear she will disagree, or when I correct her, I apologize. Why? Why should I apologize for having expertise and wanting to help the situation? Do I really need to apologize for being right or having a different but equally important opinion?

I apologize in arguments all the time to make them end, especially in relationships I care about most. Even when I know I am right or giving in, I'll just apologize to make the conflict go away.

I never considered the implications of my over-apologizes until I talked with my slightly older project manager. When you are apologizing, you are admitting a level of guilt. Why do I- and some other women in work- admit guilt in situations just to spare people's emotions? My coworker and I had an insightful dialogue about it, and in the end I realized I need to stop apologizing.

I have opinions and thoughts and do not need to be sorry about it. Just because I am young does not mean my authority in my field is not adequate. Even when I am wrong, I shouldn't have to feel bad about it because people are wrong all the time. As long as I can balance between enforcing my authority and considering people's feelings, I should be able to make a contribution without apologies.

So go out there and have creative differences and work to the best possible outcome in a respectfully unapologetic fashion.

When the Life Plan Doesn't Happen

When I was growing up, I had my life entirely planned out. Now that I am at the threshold of my life that I was planning for, I have realized it is in no way what little me thought it would be.  While what I pictured for myself was pretty fantastic- depending on which version of now we are talking about- the "plan" I have for my life now is even better. When I was in elementary school, I had a plan that I was going to be married and be a meteorologist by now. I also envisioned living in a house similar to my Barbie's mansion, which was pretty cool. Needless to say, that version of my life didn't quite pan out.  While the Barbie mansion would be an upgrade, I must confess being unwed and not wrongly predicting weather is better than if this dream had come true.

In middle school, I thought by now I would be at NASA launching rockets into space. I'm not even kidding, I thought it was someone's sole responsibility to press the button to make the rocket go into space.  When I found out that those people are called "Rocket Scientists" and do excessively more than pressing a button, that dream died.

During my high school years, I did not have as much of a "plan" as before, but I did focus all of my energy on finding a way out of my town. I applied to no college within the state, except for my "safety" school. Then I proceeded to pick a college to go to based on how far away it was and how affordable it was.

When I was a freshman in college, I remember picking my major and knowing that by the time I graduated, I would have a job working for a huge public relations firm and in a serious relationship. I am 0-2 in that category.

However, working for a tiny social media company and selling makeup on the side (while not planned) actually perfectly fits me.  I have more leeway on creativity than if I was writing structured press releases all the time. I get to dapple in a bit more of everything because it is such as small company too, which keeps me from getting bored.  I am making less than I would elsewhere, but I get a whole lot more say in what we do, as well as more flexibility in what I am doing.

Despite having failed at every career and milestone goal I had planned out for my life thus far, I am glad none of my previous plans came into fruition. Sometimes you can't plan the life that you should have. It just happens and makes you happier than any other plan could have in ways that you couldn't have even imagined for yourself.

Positive Space

One of the best lessons I've ever learned from my Mary Kay director was about space. It's totally unrelated to makeup, but absolutely perfect. Think of every person in your personal space. Then strip them of how you know them, how you're related, the history between you, etc, and think only about their presence in your space. Is it positive, negative, or neutral? Then make changed based off of your assessment. Get rid of the negative people (or limit time if you're related or work with them and can't just block them out). Then consider the neutral people. Why bring them around if they don't add anything? At that point, you can just be by yourself.

Why waste time with anyone less than a positive influence on your space?

For the first time in awhile, I actually took someone's advice and listened. Naturally, since I am in social media, my first inclination was to apply this to my Facebook and Twitter. I went HAM on the unfollow and unfriend button. If you are on my newsfeed sub tweeting your ex, calling out your "haters" or whining about politics, you became dead to me.

While some may think it's harsh, the effects of getting rid of people that bring negativity into my space has been amazing. Rather than getting sucked into drama, I am now filling my space and thoughts with positive and meaningful messages. Viewing my social networks became actually a release from stress and a way to refresh myself and keep tabs on people and messages worth looking at.

It's your social network. Fill it with people worth being surrounded by.

How to Love Social Media

I hated social media for a bit, mainly because of FOMO (click here for a flashback to my issues with anxiety online). As a public relations student, one of the main jobs you get straight out of college in these days is doing social media. I vowed to myself I wasn't going into social media. I already got stressed with my own pages, so why would I want to do it all the time as a job? Then I got an internship in social media, which was the most healing experience between me and social media. It reframed my mind and made me feel a lot less anxiety about being on social media. Here's all the ways working in social media has helped me feel better about my life on social media:

1. You are posting for people other than yourself. This makes spending all day on Facebook healthier because you're on someone else's newsfeed and not stalking out your friends profiles and wondering why their lives seem so much more fulfilling.

2. It tuckers you out. I used to spend all my free time on social media, but since I do it for a living now, I don't really want to waste more time on it after work. I basically check it on my phone and then put it down and refocus on something else that I haven't been doing all day.

3. It helped me mature. I used to follow some whiners. It was a huge sobfest on my timelines, which did nothing but make me want to complain and gave me a negative worldview. Once I made it into the industry professionally, I started connecting with relevant people and my timeline went from a high school locker room to a forum for articulate discussion.

4. Probably the most important part about working in social media for me has been understanding it as a way to no longer feel social anxiety. I get it all now. I understand the practical and pragmatic networking abilities and it stops becoming such a powerful emotional experience. Transitioning from this heavily emotional forum to a logical outlet for communication has helped me respect social media more and feel less possessed by it.

I'm not saying that everyone should work in social media to feel better about it (because then I would be out of a job), but once you stop letting social media dictate how you feel, life becomes a lot less stressful.

Overcoming FOMO

In college one of my favorite articles I read was about FOMO, the fear of missing out. It's basically a feeling you get when you go on social media and see that all your friends are having so much fun and you weren't there. There's all these studies out now that back FOMO up, saying that social media and the Internet is causing kids to feel higher levels of anxiety (click here for an article that backs me up. and another just to up my credibility). Why I liked this article so much- and literally printed it out so I could always have it- was because I could deeply relate to it. I always felt like I was missing out. If I was invited to 2 different events at the same time, I would pick one and then sit on Facebook or Twitter the day after, waiting to see pictures and and status updates about the party I missed out on. I consistently felt like the other option was better no matter how much fun I'd have the night before, I'd always feel like I should have done the other thing.

Making decisions would be stressful, and then I'd have anxiety about it after, knowing that I'd be able to see if the other people had fun. One night I wanted to unwind after a rough week and relax, so I made no plans and decided to stay in. However, it was nowhere near relaxing. I kept checking in on social media and seeing how much fun people were having and I wondered why I ever decided not to go out. So much for relaxing...

Over time I built it up in my head that social media was this huge problem and that I'd never want to work in it because it is an evil empire. After getting a job where my title is literally "Social Media Specialist", I realize how wrong I was about social media.

Social media was never the problem. The problem was all in my head. This is how I needed to think about it: when people go out and take pictures, they hardly ever take sad ones and post them on Facebook. Even more, some of the best nights I've ever had were ones where we didn't take any pictures because we were literally having too much fun to do so.

Consider that people that tweet excessively are probably not doing anything else that would distract them from tweeting, while you're out there having a blast.

And lastly, who the hell cares? Remember that. If I had a great time, why should I be concerned if someone else had more fun? Why can't we all just have fun and not attempt to quantify it and compare it?

Social media is a great way to connect friends and families, consumers and companies, and strangers with similar interests. Just because someone tweets more than you, is tagged in more pictures than you, has a higher Klout score, or is Vine famous does not intrinsically mean that they are living vastly more exciting lived than you. It's just means they waste a lot more time trying to document their lives, while you're out there living it.

How to Afford the Real World

Disclaimer: I am not a finance person. I once took a personal finance class and sometimes did some of the homework for it. I grew up upper-middle class and went to college with an extremely generous backing from my parents. Essentially all I had to afford was shampoo and conditioner. So now that college is over, I am expected to be a self-sufficient person. Here's what I've learned so far in regards to transitioning off your parents budget onto your own:

Another Disclaimer: When I say "my own budget", that excludes my cell phone bill and car insurance, as well as a send-home traffic violation ticket, which my parents are still paying for.

Realize whose budget you're now on. When I was on my parents budget, I was used to going out to dinner and ordering whatever I wanted. Now I realize that that steak dinners are only for people that make real money.

Get in the right mindset. I constantly tell myself I am poor. If you remind yourself everyday that you don't have money, you'll end up saving A LOT of money. Even now, when my funds are not terrifyingly low, I still remind myself that I don't have a seemingly endless supply of money anymore.

Prioritize. This is the section that I take most seriously. Know what is worth spending your money on (think back to my earlier blog about being thoughtful with who to share your money with too). While I can tell you that giving priorities to your pennies is essential, I am giving out no advice on what those priorities should be, as mine are questionable. My priorities lie in consumption, fun, and being young. I spend no money on clothes or shoes because my priority is having money to go out rather than to have going out clothes without money to go out with.

Just don't buy things. This may seem obvious, but it's how I spent so little money when I moved out. I just didn't buy things. My headboard is from my parents. My mattress was a gift from my parents when they thought my free mattress was inhumane to make me sleep on. My bookshelf and cd rack is from the side of the road. And I haven't invested a penny past that for things that normal people may see as essential for a room, such as a dresser or night tables. One day, when the plastic containers and crates holding my clothes gets too tacky for me, then I might invest in real people furniture.

Coupons and happy hours (aka get a plan). I got myself a Kroger's card and now base all my purchasing decisions off of what Kroger puts on sale that week. My friends and I plan to go places where drinks are cheap at certain times on certain days. That way I can indulge, yet still remind myself that I am a young struggling professional now.

Enjoy it. Struggling isn't actually bad. We're all there, or have been. My roommates are in the same boat, and we paddle along with each other. We help each other when one is having a better week than the other and laugh about it when we're eating frozen pizza together. It's a bonding experience that reminds us we are independent young people making it work. It's fun to know I fund my own life and its exciting watching money going in and out of my account.

Life is exhilarating out here in the real world, even when it means your budget is the smallest it has ever been before.

A Reason to Stay

So my friend and I were trying to move a tv and accidentally dropped it on my foot. I ran to my nurse roommate who dumped hydrogen peroxide into the wound and we called it a night. When I woke up the next morning, I freaked at how bruised and nasty it was, so me and nurse roommate took a field trip to a mediquick. The point of this blog post is not to talk about my doctors visit, but let's just say it could have gone way better with a lot less judgement.

Fast forward a few hours.

I'm sending a picture of my war wound to everyone, even my Mary Kay director (she asked for it).

Then she shows her doctor husband, who offers to help. It's 1045 at night and I have never met him before. Obviously I want to put my toe in the best possible environment to recover, so I go. He cleans it up, gives me a few tips, butterflies it up, and sends me on my way.

I sell (well try to) Mary Kay under the direction of his wife for less than two months and he is putting my foot back together on his off time. If that kindness and generosity does not perfectly explain how everyone wants to be treated, I don't know what will. To know that there are people out there like that gives me a lot of hope for the world. It's also why I'm falling for Mary Kay.

I definitely didn't join Mary Kay for the medical benefits (there typically arnt any) but it's one of the reasons I am re energized to stay. Not the fact that it connects me with doctors, but that the network it creates takes care of one another. Not successfully selling makeup in a makeup industry is pretty demotivating, but to know that the people I'm surrounding myself with are actually fantastic humans keeps me going.

Selling makeup might seem trite, but being immersed in a culture of giving and genuinely helpful people is not. Having people that care about you beyond just numbers is what sets Mary Kay apart from other multilevel marketing companies. Despite being an independent contractor and basically only having minimal responsibility for me, my director went out of her way to help me and demonstrated an unparalleled level of compassion outside of the job related requirements. That's why I'm proudly staying with Mary Kay.