Female Disruptors: Emilie Perz of ‘Sequential Body’ On The Three Things You Need To Shake Up Your…

Female Disruptors: Emilie Perz of ‘Sequential Body’ On The Three Things You Need To Shake Up Your Industry

Have discipline — You won’t make much roadway in life if you immediately give up on something when you don’t like the end result. Commitment is everything. When you dedicate your energy purposefully into one place
you will see results. But it takes that much discipline.

As a part of our series about women who are shaking things up in their industry, I had the pleasure of interviewing Emilie Perz.

Emilie Perz is widely known for her strong, creative and educational vinyasa flow classes. Voted one of California’s best yoga instructors, Emilie’s detail-oriented teachings reveal how yoga asana mirrors the practical movements we make in life and how learning to align the body precisely can create energy and equanimity in the body and mind. Perz recently launched Sequential Body a new online fitness platform.

Thank you so much for doing this with us! Before we dig in, our readers would like to get to know you a bit more. Can you tell us a bit about your “backstory”? What led you to this particular career path?

My father passed away while I was transitioning from high school to college. Shortly after I began suffering from stress induced panic attacks that left me in the hospital. Months of heavy antidepressants only made matters worse, so at the advice of a friend I tried my first yoga class. The breath techniques (pranyama) practiced at the end immediately sedated my anxiousness and gave me a feeling of power over my mind and body connection. I made a promise to carry on with yoga everyday and ten years later it led to a full-time career.

Why did you found your company?

Sequential Body came to light out of necessity during the Covid 19 pandemic. I wanted to offer a top-notch experience to my existing yoga students during the initial phase of quarantine and being home to effectively combat fatigue, anxiety, depression, and worry and to supply them with the tools to move, breathe and connect to their bodies and spirit.

Can you tell our readers what it is about the work you’re doing that’s disruptive?

I’m a brutally honest person and can convey that through my public speaking. Through
Sequential Body, I’m able to speak openly and patiently about the trials
and tribulations we are facing as a society. I don’t simply offer up
quick fixes to life’s challenges, but rather, I provide and hold the
space necessary for people to investigate and uncover their shortcomings
and to initiate self-improvement projects that will make them a better,
kinder, more successful human being.

We all need a little help along the journey. Who have been some of your mentors? Can you share a story about how they made an impact?

Presently it’s been the Sequential Body team. I have hired three women who were private clients of mine to help run the company as a start-up. I have learned more from them in the
past 3 months then I have from an employer, manager, boss, co-worker,
student. They have educated me in numerous ways about start-ups and the
ins and outs of marketing, PR, advertising. Honestly, it’s because of
their dedication that I am equally vested in Sequential Body’s continued
success.

We are sure you aren’t done. How are you going to shake things up next?

We are pivoting directions in early 2021 to start speaking out about the integral need to employ yoga teachers in medical settings such as clinics and hospitals. Whether we are talking about addiction or injury, yoga teachers are aligned with an arsenal of therapeutic practices to help manage pain, depression, anxiety, etc. I couldn’t think of a better time than now for yoga teachers to be working alongside doctors to treat the human spirit; especially when we are living in an onslaught of fear, worry, and doubt. Our future society is going to be affected by PTSD from the Covid- 19 pandemic. It’s important to understand the role of the yoga teacher which is to help heal and hold space for people going through a crisis. Mind, body, connection is real, and employing yoga teachers in medicine is necessary for a kinder, more connected society.

Can you share 3 of the best words of advice you’ve gotten along your
journey? Please give a story or example for each.

Go for it — when the pandemic hit I wasn’t sure if it was the appropriate time to start an online business. I worried that things would open quickly and I wouldn’t have the time/energy to commit to it. I worried that my lack of business and enterprise skills would affect my ability to run it. I worried that I wouldn’t generate enough money through sales to sustain it. But all of those fears were dismantled when I finally just did it. Do the launch. Start the thing. Whatever it is, I promise you the road will pave itself, but you must be brave enough to take the risk and willing enough to stay on the journey.

Be Brave — nothing good comes from acting out of fear and hesitation.

Have discipline — You won’t make much roadway in life if you immediately
give up on something when you don’t like the end result. Commitment is
everything. When you dedicate your energy purposefully into one place
you will see results. But it takes that much discipline.

We are very blessed that some of the biggest names in Business, VC funding, Sports, and Entertainment read this column. Is there a person in the world, or in the US whom you would love to have a private breakfast or lunch with, and why? He or she might just see this if we tag them.’

I’d love to meet Michelle Obama.

What is the best way our readers can follow you online?

On Instagram @EmiliePerzYoga or online at https://www.sequentialbody.com/.


Female Disruptors: Emilie Perz of ‘Sequential Body’ On The Three Things You Need To Shake Up Your… was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Female Disruptors: Vidhya Subramanian of ‘Zymmo’ On The Three Things You Need To Shake Up Your…

Female Disruptors: Vidhya Subramanian of ‘Zymmo’ On The Three Things You Need To Shake Up Your Industry

Many others have advised me to be prepared for anything. In a start-up environment, not all days are going to be the same. When I was in my corporate world, there was more predictability. I had my role, and my team. My yearly strategy was set, and I knew the projects I was working on. There are always uncertainties in life, but relatively speaking, that was a stable environment. Working for large companies, there was a lot of predictability in my life. That has completely disappeared for me!

As a part of our series about women who are shaking things up in their industry, I had the pleasure of interviewing Vidhya Subramanian.

Born in India, Vidhya Subramanian is a strategist, technology leader, founder and CEO of Zymmo — an innovative new app designed to bring local freelance chefs into foodies’ homes. A self-made entrepreneur, Vidhya previously held prestigious executive management positions at Goldman Sachs, Target and JPMorgan Chase & Co., delivering technological advancements to run successful global businesses. After years of providing solutions for corporations, Vidhya sought to develop a dining solution for local communities. Her creation, Zymmo couples chefs with food lovers for unique culinary experiences.

Thank you so much for doing this with us! Before we dig in, our readers would like to get to know you a bit more. Can you tell us a bit about your “backstory”? What led you to this particular career path?

I joined the startup ecosystem in 2019, after two decades as a technology executive in the financial and retail industries.

I held leadership positions in technology at Goldman Sachs, JP Morgan, and Target. These roles weren’t in food tech, but they gave me a strategic perspective on how technology can empower people, organizations, and cultures.

Managing large global teams and budgets of several million dollars was quite different than running a start-up, but that experience was invaluable in showing me how technology can enable profitability, efficiency and great customer experiences.

Can you tell our readers what it is about the work you’re doing that’s disruptive?

Historically there has not been a meaningful way to connect foodies and the chefs directly. When we think of chefs we think of restaurants, or private chefs, who one assumes are only for the wealthy or a different class of people.

Zymmo breaks these barriers by connecting foodies and chefs directly without a middleman or a delivery network. It’s about democratizing good food, whether you’re simply ordering ready-to-eat, or booking a chef for your own private event. Now anybody can do this using Zymmo, so it’s going to be a huge disruptor for anyone who eats.

Can you share a story about the funniest mistake you made when you were first starting? Can you tell us what lesson you learned from that?

I have absolutely made mistakes that are probably funny to other people! Before Zymmo had even written a single line of code to build the app, we hired an influencer. Looking back, that was just so premature — a typical newbie mistake. I was anxious to get the brand out there, but there was nothing to back it up!

Despite my seasoned career experience, I’m a first-time founder, so there are things I’m continuing to learn. Our influencer created our social media accounts, and started posting about food, but that was it! Week after week, we were saying, “What do we post? What do we talk about?”

We’d barely finished with the product design and there were only 4 or 5 of us at Zymmo. When I look back at this, I see it was clearly a mistake. What was I trying to influence people to do?

We all need a little help along the journey. Who have been some of your mentors? Can you share a story about how they made an impact?

I have been fortunate enough to work with great people like Al Mellina, who’s not just an investor but someone who gives me valuable feedback and input.

I also have Silvia Baldini, who has been a priceless addition to the team. She is a former ad executive and my first board member. She’s a key advisor and has really opened up my world. I don’t have a background in food or food tech but Silvia’s skills compliment mine. One of the reasons I invited her to join Zymmo was that her background was so different from mine, which is more at large companies doing tech and product. Silvia also brings a unique marketing perspective and counsels me on how to think about PR.

Another person who has supported me through this journey, and who has invested in Zymmo while mentoring me, is Rabih Ramadi. He works at another young company; a really great place called Unqork. They are a more mature startup than Zymmo, having finished their Series C. Rabih has a senior role in Unqork, and he was one of the people to join there early. He continues to inspire and motivate me and he’s always been there for me from day one.

Frankly I’ve been overwhelmed by the support of co-workers and school friends from my prior life who still encourage me to keep moving forward. I’m thankful they offer such support and continue to motivate me.

In today’s parlance, being disruptive is usually a positive adjective. But is disrupting always good? When do we say the converse, that a system or structure has ‘withstood the test of time’? Can you articulate to our readers when disrupting an industry is positive, and when disrupting an industry is ‘not so positive’? Can you share some examples of what you mean?

If you think about Apple, when Steve Jobs came out with this touchscreen smartphone, that is a disruption that’s definitely benefited humanity. There are also models like Airbnb, which has challenged the hospitality industry in a really unique way.

The one thing about life we all know is that change is the only constant. I believe change in general is a good thing. I fully endorse any disruption that benefits the planet and the community and makes things more equitable. But not if it’s taking us in the opposite direction; benefiting a select few, or excluding a certain group, or impacting our environment negatively.

One negative example I can think of is plastic. Decades ago plastic started replacing almost every other material. But now we’re dealing with that disruption in a very negative way. What I’m saying is anything disruptive also needs to have a long-term view about what the planet is going to look like down the road.

Can you share 3 of the best words of advice you’ve gotten along your journey? Please give a story or example for each.

As an early-stage start up, you need to make every dollar go a long way. It’s kind of intuitive, but many have helped me to keep this in mind every day. Being thoughtful about where we spend the money and what we are getting for it — I think is the most important responsibility for a CEO.

Another good bit of advice is to be nimble and have the ability to pivot quickly. When I worked at large corporations, it could be kind of like turning a ship. As a small company, you need to be like a speed boat, not an oil tanker. You should be able to turn quickly, and should be able to react instantly to what’s happening.

Many others have advised me to be prepared for anything. In a start-up environment, not all days are going to be the same. When I was in my corporate world, there was more predictability. I had my role, and my team. My yearly strategy was set, and I knew the projects I was working on. There are always uncertainties in life, but relatively speaking, that was a stable environment. Working for large companies, there was a lot of predictability in my life. That has completely disappeared for me!

Now every day is different. It’s not just talking about funding. It’s the excitement of a magazine picking up an article on us, or the app coming together. It’s getting our first order, or having our first customer service issue. Every day looks different. That’s something I was told by other start-up founders. It’s a very different life and a very different mindset. You need to be prepared for it and not make the same mistakes twice. Be courageous and learn. That’s what I tell myself every day!

We are sure you aren’t done. How are you going to shake things up next?

I’m still shaking this one! I haven’t really thought about what’s next. I’m looking forward to growing and scaling Zymmo as a big brand. There are a lot of good ideas in our road map, like onboarding venues, farmers, suppliers, anyone that has a significant role in the food ecosystem. We want to become the Amazon of the foodie industry. That’s our goal. Until we get there, that’s going to be my sole focus. Of course I hope a lot of ideas and dreams will come down the road for me, like traveling all over the world, but that’s a conversation for another day.

In your opinion, what are the biggest challenges faced by ‘women disruptors’ that aren’t typically faced by their male counterparts?

I know there’s a lot of chatter and media coverage of the issue, but this, unfortunately, is something I’ve lived with throughout my career. I think there are hurdles, especially for a woman of color. There’s even a Ted Talk about the kind of questions that female founders get from investors versus a male founder. The fundraising has been a challenge for me, though Zymmo’s raised 350K in pre-seed, and right now we’re actively raising 750K to help scale the company to the next level.

It’s been a challenge even with companies that claim to support female founders. Sometimes we have great conversations with investors, but we’re not able to close the deal. I’m not saying this is all because of being a woman of color, but with the kind of endorsement we’re getting from my customers, the response to our social media campaigns, and the buzz we’re getting from our circle of friends, I wouldn’t have imagined it would take us so long to raise funds.

Do you have a book/podcast/talk that’s had a deep impact on your thinking? Can you share a story with us?

This is going to expose my spiritual side. I read a lot; I am a voracious reader. Lately I’ve not had a lot of time so I’ve switched to audiobooks. Sometimes I listen when I am cooking or doing laundry. I’m re-visiting The Untethered Soul by Michael Singer. This book was life-changing for me when I first read it.

Being a founder, you have days when you feel like, Oh my god what am I doing? Whether it’s imposter syndrome, or just the stress, or the fear that comes from uncertainty. This book just grounded me instantly. I loved it so much that I’m listening to it again. It’s a six-hour listen, and well worth the time.

Since I’ve founded my company, I find myself leaning more towards business, start-up, entrepreneurial-type books and documentaries. I’m also finding myself seeking content about being courageous and centered. I am reading more books like that , and I’m doing less and less fiction.

I also enjoy reaching out to others who have gone through a similar journey, and being part of Elpha, a community of females in tech. That’s where I met Ellice Ogle, (my Head of Customer Acquisition and Marketing). More than a year ago I was talking about Zymmo and she was one of the early people who said, “I’m in, I think it’s a fantastic idea, let’s do it.”

You are a person of great influence. If you could inspire a movement that would bring the most amount of good to the most amount of people, what would that be? You never know what your idea can trigger. 🙂

For me the absolute top first thing would be cleaning the oceans. It’s something that I’ve been meaning to influence or impact in a big way, and I unfortunately haven’t figured out what that platform is yet.

At my home, we recycle ruthlessly. On recycling day we’ll be the only house with ten bags out. I’m sure everyone is aware of the Pacific garbage patch — again, we haven’t really found a solution to all the plastic we’ve ended up putting in the ocean. I wish we could spend at least some of the space exploration budget on keeping our current planet clean and livable. I think that may be what’s next for me; something that impacts our sustainability in a very positive way.

Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share how that was relevant to you in your life?

When it comes to work, I tell myself to take my working career seriously, but not personally. That’s a big one for me. I am very invested emotionally in Zymmo, and I need to make decisions as a leader but without getting too emotionally involved. It’s difficult, because my career is a big part of who I am.

I also remind myself every day to keep things simple. We tend to complicate everything, whether it’s a pitch deck, a social media post, or thinking about a product workflow. I think we as humans we tend to overthink, weighing all possible scenarios.

One reason the book I mentioned (The Untethered Soul by Michael Singer) resonated with me is that it validated these lessons. The book connected me back to one of the big things growing up for me, which was a quote from an Indian saint who asked “Who am I?”

I grew up 30 minutes from where he set up his ashram and we actually know their family. Reading this super-popular book, and hearing Michael Singer, a fellow tech CEO, talk about that concept of being something much bigger than just a body or a mind, really hit me.

As a professional, when I started working here in a western culture, it was easy to get caught in the rat race. But this book brought me back to a quote from Bhagavad Gita, which I’ll paraphrase as, Don’t always measure what you’re getting out of something just do your duty and let things happen. This is something we were reminded of every day in school, and by our parents.

The whole quote is: “Your right is only to perform your duty. You do not have the right to expect any consequences thereof. You should neither be motivated by the fruits of your action, nor should they encourage you to be inactive.”

Start ups are often viewed as a quick way to become wealthy. It may or may not be. That depends on a lot of factors. When I founded Zymmo I wanted to have a mission. I wanted to make sure to impact communities in a very positive way.

Some people ask me, So what’s your plan for Zymmo? Are you going to sell it? I tell them I’m not thinking that far ahead. Yes I’m a strategist, and if you ask me I can tell you the five different paths Zymmo could take. But I’m not thinking about it every day. I’m thinking about how to put out a good product. I’m thinking about how to make the tech work. How to get my customers superior service. I’m thinking about how to keep my team motivated, so to me it’s like every day will bring progress, and I’m not thinking about what I am getting out of it.

How can our readers follow you online

Readers should follow me on LInkedIn. My posts there give an insight into how I see the world! People should follow Zymmo on Instagram (@zymmoeats) and Facebook (Zymmo).


Female Disruptors: Vidhya Subramanian of ‘Zymmo’ On The Three Things You Need To Shake Up Your… was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Women In Wellness: Holly Dolke of ‘Pink Dragon’ on the Five Lifestyle Tweaks That Will Help Support

Women In Wellness: Holly Dolke of ‘Pink Dragon’ on the Five Lifestyle Tweaks That Will Help Support People’s Journey Towards Better Wellbeing

People don’t care as much as you think they do. Sounds negative but honestly it is meant in a positive way! We get so caught up in caring about what people will think about what we post, upload or say, that we do not always feel confident enough to share our opinions or work. You have to remember, people are busy in their own lives to worry about us so much, so be confident and share!

As a part of my series about the women in wellness, I had the pleasure of interviewing Holly Dolke.

With over 1.2 million subscribers on YouTube and many videos with 5+ million views, fitness expert, founder of Pink Dragon, and new mom, Holly Dolke, has not only used exercise and wellness to gain her infamous “Holly Dolke abs,” but she has transformed the lives of her millions of followers around the world physically, mentally and emotionally. Awakening everyone’s inner dragon through her fitness program PINK DRAGON, Holly implements three key principles around the right nutrition, daily movement, and having a strong mindset. She teaches members how to evolve their view of exercise from dreading it to loving it. In a social media world catered to toxic diet culture, Holly helps her community respect food as fuel rather than a chore. Her mission is to reignite people’s confidence in themselves, love the body they live in and build each other up to achieve their dreams.

Holly’s three key principles create the basis of every program and product she offers such as a 3-Day Detox, 30-Day Meal Plan, and her e-book Sweet Treats. She believes that the most important part for people during their health and fitness journey is to recognize their starting point. She created a short quiz that leads visitors to specific recommendations based on their circumstances and goals they want to achieve.

Growing up in Kent County, England, Holly found her passion for fitness while attending college. As a fashion marketing major, she spent her days sitting at a desk — studying, completing assignments, having little to no exercise and her eating habits were far from healthy. After not getting the results she desired from a standard gym setting, she took her health and fitness into her own hands and own home (as many of us have this year, too) she started a YouTube channel — which was on trend in the UK, (especially in food and fitness) and began her home workout videos. Being an introvert, working out from the comfort of her home was the best space and she never expected to gain the following she was building. In mid-2019, her channel took off in a way she never expected with spikes in views and subscribers recognizing her for her flat stomach abs and indoor walking in place videos.

Thank you so much for doing this with us! Our readers would love to “get to know you” a bit better. Can you share with us the story about how you first got involved in fitness and wellness?

You are so welcome, thank you for having me. I got into fitness because of low self-confidence in myself. I was at University and felt like I had zero time to exercise.

I was glued to my desk, eating junk food all the time to cope with the stress of exams. I couldn’t fit into my clothes like I used to. So, when the year ended and I went back home, I decided to do something about it. I started walking, then built it up to a run, then I started going to the gym. I felt lucky at the time because when I signed up, I got free Personal Training sessions. I thought with his help I’d melt the fat off my thighs in no time — boy was I wrong! Literally every exercise he made me do involved weights, which made my legs even bigger than when I started. I quickly decided to quit the gym and tried to find the answers by myself. I went through fitness forums, joined Facebook groups, read all the nutrition books I could get my hands on. Finally, I found what works for me and that’s when I fell in love with fitness. Fitness was my escape to focus on myself and gain confidence in my body and my own abilities.

Can you share the most interesting story that happened to you since you started your career?

Getting pregnant! I’ve had to balance living in a foreign country with no family, while going through a pandemic, and growing my YouTube channel and business to its biggest numbers over a short amount of time.

Can you share a story with us about the most humorous mistake you made when you were first starting? What lesson or take-away did you learn from that?

My first ever YouTube video was filmed on a webcam because I couldn’t afford a camera. Quality was so terrible, and I had no mic so you couldn’t hear me. I learned the value of good video quality as I progressed.

I learned that nothing can be perfect. Especially not when you are starting something. There is no such thing as perfection. There’s just a lot of trials and errors. It’s important that you learn from your mistakes and keep moving. That is how you grow.

Can you share with our readers a bit about why you are an authority in the fitness and wellness field? In your opinion, what is your unique contribution to the world of wellness?

I have tried a lot of different fitness routines and programs. I tried running, cross training, weights, yoga, Pilates — I tried everything. The trouble was that nothing really worked for me 100%. There wasn’t a fitness program out there that understood the importance of activating the smaller muscles. So, the only thing left for me to do was to create my own fitness routines.

My unique contribution is combining my technique of small muscle activation exercises with HIIT focused moves to lose weight and get you that lean, toned physique. It’s something that works for me and for my 1.2 million YouTube subscribers.

Using my own body weight only for exercise, and actually doing that myself makes me an authority in the fitness world. People still believe to this day that I go to the gym, but I don’t!

None of us are able to achieve success without some help along the way. Is there a particular person who you are grateful towards who helped get you to where you are? Can you share a story about that?

Yes, my partner, Aaron. He is the business behind Pink Dragon and my biggest supporter. He is the person who told me to create a YouTube channel and pushed me to continue when I felt like no-one wanted to watch my videos. He encouraged me every step of the way and helped me grow not only my channel, but Pink Dragon to what it is today. We are partners in life, business and now a family with our newborn baby girl.

Ok thank you for all that. Now let’s move to the main focus of our interview. We all know that it’s important to eat more vegetables, eat less sugar, exercise more, and get better sleep etc. But while we know it intellectually, it’s often difficult to put it into practice and make it a part of our daily habits. In your opinion what are the 3 main blockages that prevent us from taking the information that we all know, and integrating it into our lives?

Oh yes, I totally agree, it is hard to put that all into practice, especially all at once!

I would say that the 3 main blockages are:

– Peer Pressure: social peer pressure from partners, families and friends. Just to have another drink, or enjoy more of the naughty treats, because YOLO. This can really make it difficult to stick to a healthier lifestyle, because we will want to be agreeable and not miss out on events, and even tell ourselves we will start again on Monday.

– Time: everyone is always rushing, so we grab snacks and food on the go to save ourselves time and end up eating less nutritious foods.

– Self-Sabotage: we are our own worst enemy! We self-sabotage our own success, by not exercising with the excuse of we are too tired, or cannot afford a gym (hello YouTube), or we put ourselves down emotionally

Can you please share your “5 Non-Intuitive Lifestyle Tweaks That Will Dramatically Improve One’s Wellbeing”? (Please share a story or an example for each, and feel free to share ideas for mental, emotional and physical health.)

1. People don’t care as much as you think they do. Sounds negative but honestly it is meant in a positive way! We get so caught up in caring about what people will think about what we post, upload or say, that we do not always feel confident enough to share our opinions or work. You have to remember, people are busy in their own lives to worry about us so much, so be confident and share!

2. When you feel down, smile! We are in control of our emotions. So, when you feel down, get up, move and smile and it’ll make you feel good!

3. Move every day, even if it’s just a walk.

4. Drink at least 3L of water a day! Hydration is key and there are tons of benefits, so we won’t list them all.

5. Journaling! We all live busy lives, consuming insane amounts of information on a daily basis. There’s social media, work stuff, private life, it never ends. Putting your thoughts onto paper or a note app in your phone before going to bed every night will make your life easier. We constantly keep everything in our heads, and by a simple act of writing whatever comes to your mind and offloading your brain, you will instantly feel lighter.

As an expert, this might be obvious to you, but I think it would be instructive to articulate this for the public. Aside from weight loss, what are 3 benefits of daily exercise? Can you explain?

Since COVID, I think exercise has really been highlighted as a benefit for so many people recently.

1. Boosts Mental Well Being: Exercise boosts endorphins and makes us feel good about ourselves. I find exercise a great escape from reality and self-care time for my mind, as well as a stress-reliever.

2. Increases Energy: You get a rush of hormones from a good exercise session which gives you a significant energy booster to help fight through fatigue and stay more focused.

3. Body Confidence: Exercises make us feel good, physically and mentally, and this all will increase your confidence.

For someone who is looking to add exercise to their daily routine, which 3 exercises would you recommend that are absolutely critical?

  1. Walking: Anyone can do this!
  2. Burpees: A tough one, but it works so many muscles in the body and helps burn fat.
  3. Crunches: I love abs, and found that there are so many varieties of crunch exercises that you can do to help tone those stomach muscles.

Is there a particular book that made a significant impact on you? Can you share a story?

Money Blueprint — it is not fitness related but it was an inspirational read that assisted me in growing my finances within my business.

I highly recommend anyone reading this book, because it makes you more aware of how you regard and spend money.

You are a person of enormous influence. If you could start a movement that would bring the most amount of good to the most amount of people, what would that be? You never know what your idea can trigger. 🙂

I was raised in a single-family household with my mum and my nan. My nan was a huge influence and part of my upbringing. She was sadly diagnosed with Alzheimer’s in her 70’s and I watched her deteriorate over the course of a decade. At the time, I was not into health and fitness, and watched the doctors feed her high sugar, calorie dense diet to make her gain weight, due to fast weight loss, which I now know is the worst thing to do, as it feeds the illness.

I have always held a soft spot for the elderly, and I would love to be able to help more elderly in our community and prevent a disease like Alzheimer’s through health and nutrition. That’s why I am so passionate about helping young females to exercise and get fit, to learn these habits at an early age to prevent diseases.

I’d love to create a movement where I encourage the senior generation to move and eat better and also get the younger generation to keep these habits.

Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Do you have a story about how that was relevant in your life?

I’ve said it before, but this truly is my life lesson quote! “People don’t care as much as you think they do.” Aaron told me this quote when I first started out on YouTube. I was terrified of people’s opinions, reactions and scared of negative comments appearing. Having Aaron tell me that quote, shifted my perspective so much and made me realise that, yes, this is SO true! People really do not care as much as I think they do, because they are busy! Any negative comments I do get, are lost within the positive comments. I always remember this quote and share it with others too, who start a YouTube channel, and really feel it has helped.

We are very blessed that some of the biggest names in Business, VC funding, Sports, and Entertainment read this column. Is there a person in the world, or in the US whom you would love to have a private breakfast or lunch with, and why? He or she might just see this if we tag them 🙂

Kris Jenner! She needs to write a new book for entrepreneurs! She is such a businesswoman and a powerhouse, and I would love to meet her for breakfast or lunch to pick her brain on how she created such an empire! I’d love to hear more of her stories, ideas and tips for success and share my business plans with her, and what she would do to make it more successful to help others.

What is the best way our readers can follow you online?

https://www.youtube.com/c/HollyDolke/
https://www.instagram.com/hollydolke/

Thank you for these fantastic insights. We wish you only continued success in your great work!

You are welcome! Thank you so much for having me!


Women In Wellness: Holly Dolke of ‘Pink Dragon’ on the Five Lifestyle Tweaks That Will Help Support was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Women In Wellness: Dr Marilyn Pink of ‘TurningPoint Breast Cancer Rehabilitation’ on the Five Lifes

Women In Wellness: Dr. Marilyn Pink of ‘TurningPoint Breast Cancer Rehabilitation’ on the Five Lifestyle Tweaks That Will Help Support People’s Journey Towards Better Wellbeing

Pick a career to be something you LOVE! If you don’t love it, the chances of being successful narrow significantly. One of my sisters told me that as a little girl she always loved animals and had wanted to be a veterinarian. Halfway through her career in marketing, she gave it up and became a veterinarian’s assistant. She is much happier now.

As a part of my series about the women in wellness, I had the pleasure of interviewing Marilyn Pink.

Marilyn Pink, PhD, MBA, and PT is the executive director of the Atlanta-based nonprofit TurningPoint Breast Cancer Rehabilitation and assumed that role in 2019. TurningPoint’s mission is to improve the quality of life for patients with breast cancer by providing, promoting and advocating specialized and evidence-based rehabilitation. Most recently Pink served as CEO of Educata.com, where she strategically led, developed and launched a global online education company for clinicians in more than 100 countries. She also led two other companies in the healthcare space, including FIT-HITS and HealthCare Research and Management.

Thank you so much for doing this with us! Our readers would love to “get to know you” better. Can you share the most interesting story that happened to you since you started your career? What were the main lessons or takeaways from that story?

In 1992, a group of 12 men from another country came to visit my research laboratory with their interpreter. It was easy to figure out the head “honcho” of this group. Towards the end of the visit — through the interpreter — he asked a question, and I heard several of the men in attendance gasp. The interpreter turned to me and said in English “I don’t know how to ask this, but he is asking ‘Where are the men?’ as he only sees women here, and clearly the women are not doing the important work, so where are the men?” I smiled and replied, “In our country it does not matter if it is a man or a woman. We simply find the best people for the jobs required.”

Lesson to be learned: People come from different backgrounds, cultures and beliefs. When responding to something that we might consider to be an outrageous question, just stay calm and educate the other person.

Can you share a story about the biggest mistake you made when you were first starting? Can you tell us what lesson you learned from that?

Rather than talk about a big mistake, I would like to talk about the biggest moment that helped my career take off. At the time, this moment was small and just part of an everyday conversation. In 1981, I was in the audiovisual (AV) department of the hospital where I worked as a physical therapist talking to my friend Tom and flipping through some of his AV magazines. I saw an ad for a high-speed video that was used to capture the nature of a fire spreading through an airplane. “Wow! That is cool, Tom, but how many planes need to be blown up? They need to find much wider applications.” Throughout our chat we thought about various applications in physical therapy. We concluded by stating, “Wouldn’t it be great to use to watch an amputee walk with a new prosthesis? Or watch a runner run and analyze the deficits than may be contributing to a recurrent ankle problem?” So, Tom and I decided to visit this high-speed video company and talk about this potential application. I did not know it then, but that is when my career first changed direction. From using the video with patients, it went to the Elite Athlete Project in preparation for the 1984 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles, then to the actual games to manage a physical therapy clinic. Next, I was asked to run a biomechanics research laboratory. With all this research data and knowledge, I received a couple of patents to develop algorithms that resulted in personalized excise programs. Then, with all these new contacts, I met Jill Binkley, the founder and longtime executive director of the unique nonprofit TurningPoint Breast Cancer Rehabilitation. Long story short: I am now the Executive Director of TurningPoint and we are doing some new, very exciting projects to help women and men in a myriad of ways in their respective breast cancer journeys.

The lesson I learned was to leverage your career. Your career may not be linear. The twists and turns make for a very interesting life.

None of us are able to achieve success without some help along the way. Is there a particular person who you are grateful towards who helped get you to where you are? Can you share a story about that?

Dr. Frank Jobe was a very well-known orthopaedic surgeon in sports medicine and creator of a revolutionary procedure to reconstruct ulnar collateral ligament of the elbow. Despite his many commitments, he always had time to acknowledge, speak and listen to another person. When he would ask me “why” it was with gentle curiosity. He wanted to know how I came up that thought. And it helped me to consciously develop my thought process. Subsequently whenever I am now asked “why?”– even when said with an antagonist manner — I think of him, and I present the thought process in an even tone and a smile. The double lesson learned with this story is that I try to listen to another person and ask them to explain what is behind their thought process in a curious way.

Ok perfect. Now let’s jump to our main focus. When it comes to health and wellness, how is the work you are doing helping to make a bigger impact in the world?

The work that I am doing at TurningPoint is virtually (pun intended) impacting the world. Every woman with breast cancer deserves evidence-based rehabilitative/recovery care. In the world of 2019, it was difficult to treat patients that did not come to your clinic. Now — with the help of technology and the insistence of Covid-19 — we can help care for women around the world. Just this morning Jill Binkley and I had a call with a therapist in Kurdistan. The needs are the same for the women in Kurdistan and the US. In the midst of the global pandemic we now find ourselves, we have learned how to offer the same level of care for breast cancer patients regardless of where they live.

Can you share your top five “lifestyle tweaks” that you believe will help support people’s journey towards better wellbeing? Please give an example or story for each.

  1. Do a monthly self-breast exam and get your mammogram! One in eight women are diagnosed with breast cancer at some point in their lifetime. How many women do you know? Divide that number by eight and you know how many women you know will be diagnosed with breast cancer. There is a one-in-eight chance that woman could be you.
  2. Consider taking exercise snacks throughout the day. Been sitting too long? Mind on the fritz? Take five minutes to dome some stretches, arm circles or squats. Your mind will be clearer, and your body will be happier!
  3. Get your sleep! According to the National Sleep Foundation, adults between the ages of 18 and 65 should sleep between seven and nine hours a night. How much sleep do you get?
  4. Let it go. Very good advice from Elsa in “Frozen.” Are you hurt by what someone said to you? Let it go. Are you angry at your best friend? Let it go. People cannot make you feel bad — you choose to feel that way.
  5. And the corollary to #4 is to wake up and decide to be happy. Think happy thoughts. Laugh at yourself. Feels good, doesn’t it?

If you could start a movement that would bring the most amount of wellness to the most amount of people, what would that be?

Health equity. The movement would find ways such that all of us can receive quality health care. Without good health, there is less a person can do to pick themselves up and be productive members of society. So, let’s give all of us better health.

What are your “5 Things I Wish Someone Told Me Before I Started” and why?

The 5 things are things that I WAS told.

  1. Have a strong work ethic. That will make you shine before education, experience and all else.
  2. Pick a career to be something you LOVE! If you don’t love it, the chances of being successful narrow significantly. One of my sisters told me that as a little girl she always loved animals and had wanted to be a veterinarian. Halfway through her career in marketing, she gave it up and became a veterinarian’s assistant. She is much happier now.
  3. You CAN DO whatever you want. Or at least a modified version of it. Know what you want and start taking steps in that direction.
  4. You can support yourself. Make the pledge to yourself right now. You can support yourself. You will be much more powerful if you know you are in charge of yourself, not your parents, not your husband. You can support yourself.
  5. You don’t get what you deserve, you deserve what you get. So, make it happen rather than just think you should get it.

Sustainability, veganism, mental health and environmental changes are big topics at the moment. Which one of these causes is dearest to you, and why?

Mental Health. At TurningPoint, we are treating women in their 20s through 80s, all of whom are facing drastic changes in multiple aspects of their lives. They have undergone surgery, radiation and chemotherapy. They have every reason to be depressed. However, despite this, I am continually amazed at how many consistently manage their mental health. I watch these women come to us with drooped shoulders and head down, and typically leave smiling and standing straight. They start to realize they are not alone and that there is a path as well as guidance for their full recovery. Also, much of their improved mental health seems to be due to compassionate care from friends, family and healthcare workers. My hope is that you will be one of those special people offering compassion for those in need.


Women In Wellness: Dr Marilyn Pink of ‘TurningPoint Breast Cancer Rehabilitation’ on the Five Lifes was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Women In Wellness: Dr Deepika Chopra, ‘The Optimism Doctor’ on the Five Lifestyle Tweaks That Will

Women In Wellness: Dr. Deepika Chopra, ‘The Optimism Doctor’ on the Five Lifestyle Tweaks That Will Help Support People’s Journey Towards Better Wellbeing

Replace the B-word “balance” with a new B word: “boundaries!” I find that we strive for some type of balance that we are so often told to achieve, it can be a frustrating and pressurizing chase… balance sometimes can feel impossible and being able to cultivate boundaries is much more practical and measurable.

As a part of my series about the women in wellness, I had the pleasure of interviewing Dr. Deepika Chopra of The Optimism Doctor.

Dr. Chopra specializes in bridging together holistic practices and evidence-based science to cultivate self-mastery tools that help clients, couples, and corporations (Fortune 500 to small businesses) produce their sense of lasting happiness, resiliency, optimism, and success. The Optimism Doctor® practices from a unique perspective as she talks to today’s robust health and wellness trends and provides real evidence-based science and experience.

Dr. Chopra holds a doctorate in clinical health psychology, with a special interest in the mind-body connection, sensory-based visual imagery, color therapy, innovative cognitive-behavioral strategies and strategies and methods to increase optimism and resilience. Dr. Chopra completed her formal dissertation on optimism, positive sensory visualization, and the connection to optimal well-being. With special training in elevating empathy, reducing anxiety, and creating a balance within the technologically and social-media-focused world today, Dr. Chopra’s work is timely & beneficial to anyone curious about living more fully, a self-mastery point of view, increasing happiness, and optimizing functionality and success.

Dr. Chopra completed a double postdoctoral fellowship at both the University of California at Los Angeles and Cedars Sinai Medical Center and has been an integral part of the wellness community for over a decade. Since becoming a new mom, Dr. Chopra has a special interest in increasing optimism and empathy in children while empowering women and parents. She devotes part of her practice to motherhood coaching and mindful parenting.

Thank you so much for doing this with us! Our readers would love to “get to know you” better. Can you share your “backstory” with us?

I am an Optimism Doctor®, the founder of the Things Are Looking Up Optimism Deck of Cards, and the Host of the LOOKING UP with Dr. Deepika Chopra podcast. I have a doctorate in clinical health psychology, and I have been studying the science behind optimism, resiliency, and joy for the past decade. I specialize in blending holistic and evidence-based practices to help people cultivate tools that increase optimism, resiliency, and happiness in their lives. I maintain a global practice working with clients and companies — from boutique to Fortune 500 — by speaking, leading workshops, and consulting. I work as a media expert and a mental health advocate.

I am also a wife and a mother to the most amazing three-year-old boy and weeks away from welcoming our second baby boy into this world! I did not come into this line of work linearly. I worked at a punk music label, was an investment banking analyst, and worked in business development at a health tech company before deciding to go back to school to pursue a career in Psychology.

While working with patients in graduate school, we used many prominent theoretical perspectives. These outlooks taught to us to find important ways to discuss where certain behaviors stemmed from with patients. However, I found it even more interesting to answer the question, “Now, what?” and I became obsessed with being the “then what” for people… helping them come up with ways to adopt new thoughts and practices rather than spend most of the time on their past and what wasn’t working. Science and the brain have always deeply moved me. Much of what I learned was that the brain is an anticipatory organ, rooted in the future. So, I was curious why so many of the psychological interventions available to us as clinicians were so past-oriented. I became intrigued about the idea of future thinking, anticipatory anxiety, optimism, and pessimism. I ended up writing my dissertation on Utilizing Sensory Based Visualization techniques to Increase Optimistic Thinking.

I fell in love with it all and never looked back! At the time, what I was doing was a bit too “woo woo” for the academic community, and a bit too science-esque for the more “self-help” community. What’s amazing is now so much of that is blended and enmeshed –right time is the opportune time to be talking about both. I have always been a spiritual person and, at the same time, drawn to science, and I get to blend the two every day, which brings me so much joy. One of my clients started calling me the Doctor of Optimism, and so pretty soon after that, OPTIMISM DOCTOR just stuck. It is not something that existed, but it perfectly described what I was doing, so I trademarked it!

Can you share the most interesting story that happened to you since you started your career? What were the main lessons or takeaways from that story?

One of the most profound moments in the start of my career was when I was a graduate student. It was my first clinical experience, we’re talking Day 1, and I was working with patients diagnosed with severe OCD at UCLA. One of my patients and I were on a walk in Westwood, I was doing an exposure and response prevention practice with her, and as we were leaving the coffee shop — part of her treatment was to work on being exposed to a public environment while working through the practice of allowing the anxiety and obsessive thoughts to pass through without engaging in any of the rituals or compulsions she had been carrying out — and all of a sudden, there was a man with a gun nearby. A ton of cops started yelling for everyone around to get down on the floor. We were in the middle of a possible shootout (yes, this is Day 1 of my clinical experience, People! :/). Once we were in the clear and walking back, she looked very anxious (obviously, I was as well), and I asked her if she was okay. She shared that a piece of her hair blew in the wind and touched the side of the coffee shop door while we were leaving. Then it blew in her mouth; she reverberated the scenario in her mind assessing if she had swallowed something obscene.

At that exact moment, I really truly understood how debilitating and pervasive a mental health issue could be. She missed the entire shootout situation and was suffering the entire time, ruminating over her contamination fear. I felt a ton of empathy for her, and so many times in mainstream media, things like OCD had been glamorized or romanticized, and I hadn’t quite appreciated the struggle of it all until I was in that moment. I also took away something so powerful from the early work I was doing and my supervisors at that time. Sometimes what you know in your gut is the right intervention when you are working with a client. However, other times what research says, or adequate supervision helps direct you towards something opposite, what you imagined would be effective.

I wanted to help calm her anxiety, and my gut told me to take her out of the situation, distract, rationalize. Though I learned quickly, there was a plethora of evidence that showed she needed exposure therapy (which is, in many ways, the opposite). I think that was a very humbling experience and helped shape the kind of work I would subsequently do.

Can you share a story about the biggest mistake you made when you were first starting? Can you tell us what lesson you learned from that?

I’ve made many mistakes. Interestingly the brain learns information better from mistakes vs. no errors being at all. I am still very hard on myself during and after mistakes, but I have made progress in bouncing back and finding the gift in them a lot quicker.

I get to teach people about the phenomena of making mistakes: specifically, how memory, learning work, resiliency is formed, and how that all amplify optimism and self-competence. Early on, I allowed for much self-inflicted confusion on what I wanted to pursue. I hadn’t quite teased out if I was seeking certain things because I was personally called to them or thought I should follow specific things for other motivations. I learned quickly that mistake or not, I have a pretty robust drive and barometer about what feels right and what I need to achieve. So although I made “mistakes,” I don’t quite see them as such, the trials, tribulations and non-linear path are how I developed my gauge and how I got to where I am now, doing what I’m good at and what I’m authentically passionate about today.

None of us are able to achieve success without some help along the way. Is there a particular person who you are grateful towards who helped get you to where you are? Can you share a story about that?

I would say I am beyond fortunate to have had the most loving, supportive, encouraging, and generous parents who have always been my core source of guidance. I still run everything by them. My husband has been incredibly helpful and supportive over the past couple of years as my career grew. Positive and effective mentorship is essential. I’ve also been fortunate to have had the most supportive supervisors during my graduate career, who allowed me to grow my innovative approach within the field. I wouldn’t be where I am today without them.

Okay perfect. Now let’s jump to our main focus. When it comes to health and wellness, how is the work you are doing helping to make a bigger impact in the world?

I am passionate about accessibility, inclusivity, and helping people develop practical, useful, and self-mastery tools while using the resources we all already possess.

Currently, I’m partnering with Colgate to launch the Colgate Optimism Project — an equity-driven campaign focusing on championing the Gen Z generation who are putting optimism in action and igniting positive change in the world. I’m working with Colgate to help them understand the power of optimism and put optimism into action in a practical way that empowers today’s young people to make positive changes in the world. Gen Z makes up nearly half of the U.S. population — they are the future — and through this partnership, I will lend my expertise to teach them how to strengthen their optimism muscle and build resiliency.

I believe in working with the natural human resources we already possess, like perspective, breath, movement, visualization, and other tools that only require one’s mind and body! It is much more important and empowering to help people help themselves and help people understand that they may be the solution they have been searching for all along.

As an Optimism Doctor and someone who specializes in increasing hope and positive future thinking, people are surprised by how much education around dispelling perfection and breaking down the notion of toxic positivity. Yes, as an Optimism Doctor, I am saying that positivity can sometimes be toxic when insincere and serve to vilify the normal range of human emotion. I define what Optimism is (hint: it has a lot more to do with resiliency and duality of the emotion than slapping a positive spin on all situations) and why it is essential, how it can change the trajectory of your life, for the better, and why working through struggle is the most potent way to increase optimism.

Can you share your top five “lifestyle tweaks” that you believe will help support people’s journey towards better wellbeing? Please give an example or story for each.

  1. Spend more time outdoors. Research shows that spending on average, just 2 hours a week outside, decreases stress and anxiety, and boosts positive mood.
  2. Develop a positive morning ritual. Research shows your mood at the start of your day impacts your mood for the rest of the day. Ideally, this will be something that takes a short amount of time, is meaningful, and can be done anywhere. I do something called “wake up and dance” I turn on music, and the first thing I do when getting out of bed is dance! Sometimes I only have 15 seconds or just a few songs. I also always pick a Things Are Looking Up Optimism Card from my deck (thingsarelookingup.co)!
  3. Spend more time being in a state of awe. Research shows that being in a state of awe can have a powerful impact on reducing anxiety. Being in a state of awe is about being transcended by something bigger than you and being inspired; for me, I find awe in nature, pictures I find on the internet, listening to a beautiful piece of music, and more.
  4. Pay attention to what you consume. Our energy is our most valuable currency. What we consume is not just about what we eat; it’s what products we buy and who and what we spend our time on, in person and virtually. Use the unfollow and mute buttons on social media platforms mindfully and as often as needed!
  5. Replace the B-word “balance” with a new B word: “boundaries!” I find that we strive for some type of balance that we are so often told to achieve, it can be a frustrating and pressurizing chase… balance sometimes can feel impossible and being able to cultivate boundaries is much more practical and measurable.

If you could start a movement that would bring the most amount of wellness to the most amount of people, what would that be?

A Self Compassion Movement for sure! Much of the compounded struggles we go through are by shame, guilt, and self-destruction. The first practical and potent step to take is working our way through our emotions (the positive, negative, and the neutral), lean into head-on with self-compassion, and a level of curiosity. We’re able to ask ourselves, “I wonder what will I learn from this?” or “I wonder how I will grow from this?” while at the same time holding space for the fear, disappointment, anger, joy, excitement, or grief.

What are your “5 Things I Wish Someone Told Me Before I Started” and why?

  1. Change is hard for everyone. Although a new beginning is on the horizon, some form of loss also occurs. Normal and a natural part of the process.
  2. Ask for help! Something that I am working on, too.
  3. No amount of time is too little for practicing a form of self-preservation or self-care; if you have 15 seconds, that is good enough.
  4. Nothing is permanent; whatever is happening right now will not last forever. So, if you are going through a tough time, know that something better will come. On the flip side, if you are in a period where things are wonderful, truly mindfully savor in the moment.
  5. Saying NO is not selfish: it’s emotionally proactive and highly productive.

Sustainability, veganism, mental health and environmental changes are big topics at the moment. Which one of these causes is dearest to you, and why?

To a degree, all of them but most dear to me is destigmatizing mental health and promoting proactive mental health care and well-being. Today’s society struggles with mental health: doctors can help these issues, and there are valuable tools and significant support. However, the number one reason people don’t seek out help is the stigma associated with and around mental health, which needs to change.

What is the best way our readers can follow you on social media?

@drdeepikachopra and my Optimism Deck of Cards: @allthingsarelookingup and the LOOKING UP with Dr. Deepika Chopra podcast available everywhere (Spotify, Apple, and more) where you can subscribe to podcasts.


Women In Wellness: Dr Deepika Chopra, ‘The Optimism Doctor’ on the Five Lifestyle Tweaks That Will was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Women Of The C-Suite: Pamela Puryear of ‘Zimmer Biomet’ On The Five Things You Need To Succeed As A

Women Of The C-Suite: Pamela Puryear of ‘Zimmer Biomet’ On The Five Things You Need To Succeed As A Senior Executive

Life is a marathon, not a sprint. It’s important to pace yourself because the road can be long and stamina is absolutely necessary when working toward important goals. I have only done one marathon, but the parallels to life are often stated and absolutely accurate from my experience.

As a part of our series about strong women leaders, I had the pleasure of interviewing Pam Puryear.

Pam Puryear, PhD is a Senior Vice President and Chief Human Resources Officer at Zimmer Biomet. Dr. Puryear has extensive global leadership experience in human resources, including three years with Pfizer, where she served as Senior Vice President and Chief Talent Officer. While at Pfizer, Dr. Puryear was responsible for leadership development, talent management, learning and development, employee engagement, organizational culture, diversity and inclusion and workforce analytics. She joined Pfizer from Hospira Inc., where she spent six years as Vice President, Organization Development and Chief Talent Officer. Before joining Hospira, Dr. Puryear was an independent external organizational development consultant for 12 years. Dr. Puryear spent the first 10 years of her career in financial services in the real estate investment advisor industry. Dr. Puryear holds a Ph.D. in organizational psychology, an MBA from Harvard Business School, and a bachelor’s degree in psychology with a concentration in organizational behavior from Yale University.

Thank you so much for doing this with us! Before we dig in, our readers would like to get to know you a bit more. Can you tell us a bit about your “backstory”? What led you to this particular career path?

When I graduated from Yale University in the ’80s with a BA in psychology and organizational behavior, most of my classmates were going on to graduate school in the humanities, medical school, law school or business school. I chose business school because it felt like the choice that would give me the most flexibility for future employment. After completing my MBA at Harvard Business School, I pursued what was considered a “sexy” career path at the time — real estate.

During my 10 years as a real estate investment advisor, I experienced organizations and leaders who knew very little about leading people, building effective teams or managing diversity. I knew there must be a better way, so I quit my job in real estate, started an independent consulting practice working with a global roster of clients ranging from non-profits to Fortune 100 companies, and went back to school for my PhD in organizational psychology.

With a background in business and organizational development, I was well equipped to help organizations create and sustain excellence considering both financial and human factors, and to manage both using sound organizational management thinking and focused business metrics. Unlike many who cut their teeth in large organizations and then transition to start their own consulting practices, I followed a reverse path and left consulting to become a C-level executive at Hospira, Pfizer and now Zimmer Biomet (ZB), where I serve as Senior Vice President and Chief Human Resources Officer.

Can you share the most interesting story that happened to you since you began leading human resources at your company?

It’s hard to narrow it down to just one interesting story. The life of an HR professional is filled with as many interesting stories as there are interesting people! Arguably one of the most interesting professional experiences I’ve had while leading HR at Zimmer Biomet has been navigating the global COVID pandemic. While this was a challenging time to be an HR leader, it was heartwarming to witness the tremendous response that our team members exhibited to assist fellow colleagues in need. While thankfully we didn’t have to institute wide ranging or long-term furloughs or layoffs, many ZB families were impacted because their partners or spouses lost income during this period. To do our part and provide support, we set up a Team Member Relief Fund. Thanks to team member donations and company matches, we were able to provide nearly $1 million in grants to about 1,000 team members globally. I was so proud to see everyone come together to support each other during a time of such uncertainty.

None of us are able to achieve success without some help along the way. Is there a particular person who you are grateful towards who helped get you to where you are? Can you share a story about that?

I know the powerful and positive impact that mentors can have. Throughout my career, I have formally and informally mentored and championed others and I have a couple of strong beliefs about mentoring and how it can be most effective.

First, formal mentor programs where people are paired with a mentor often don’t work because so much of the relationship is driven by chemistry, which cannot be anticipated or understood through an algorithm that pairs mentor and mentee. Second, no single mentor can provide everything that a mentee will need to navigate his or her career. That’s why I’m an advocate for organic pairings rather than structured mentor pairing programs. I also advise people to create a network of mentors, advisors and coaches in the form of a personal board of directors. The best personal boards mirror corporate boards — they are filled with people who bring different experiences, backgrounds and skill to the table.

So, when you ask who has helped me get where I am today, I have to say many people, not just one person. My personal board of directors includes my parents, siblings, friends and former and current co-workers. This board brings together people from within and outside my industry and function; people more senior, peers and direct reports; people younger and older; male and female; and from every ethnic background.

In my work, I often talk about how to release and relieve stress. As a busy leader, what do you do to prepare your mind and body before a stressful or high stakes meeting, talk, or decision? Can you share a story or some examples?

I’m a firm believer in the need to manage stress, particularly as I advance in my career and the pressures are amplified, as the decisions that I make and influence, affect thousands of employees. It truly goes beyond preparing mind and body, which is why I believe in holistic energy management –a comprehensive focus on managing physical, spiritual, emotional and mental energy. I do my best to get exercise and good sleep to support strong physical energy. I was fortunate enough to purchase a Peloton treadmill just before the pandemic, and strive for 7–8 hours of sleep each night! Spiritually and emotionally, I maintain a meditation practice, and recently led a 15-member group in a 21-day meditation focused on gratitude and abundance. Finally, I try to stay focused on what matters, which allows me to manage my mental energy. I don’t wait until the high stakes meeting, talk or decision. I try to maintain good energy management practices each day so I am prepared whenever the challenges strike!

As you know, the United States is currently facing a very important self-reckoning about race, diversity, equality and inclusion. This may be obvious to you, but it will be helpful to spell this out. Can you articulate to our readers a few reasons why it is so important for a business or organization to have a diverse executive team?

I would reframe the question to ask why it is so important for a business or organization to have diversity, equity and inclusion …not just diverse teams. Building diverse teams without equity and inclusion is meaningless. The evolution from focusing on diversity — defined as representation of people with varying characteristics, experiences, skills, cultures and traditions — to inclusion, where all diverse people feel a sense of belonging and that diversity is leveraged across the organization, to equity, which ensures that fair and impartial systems exist for all members of an organization, is important. So, we don’t want to go back to just speaking about the importance of diversity. In fact, much of what we are experiencing with regard to racial injustice in society is about equity — the extent to which our system of policing, for example, is not fair and impartial. In response to the George Floyd tragedy, Zimmer Biomet, like many companies, articulated a series of commitments to drive and accelerate change both within our own organization and around the globe.

Additionally, as a black female corporate executive who has risen through the ranks to become a Chief Human Resources Officer at a Fortune 500 company, I know firsthand the value of gender and racial diversity on the executive team. One of my top priorities at Zimmer Biomet is to integrate diversity, equality and inclusion into the fabric of the corporate culture, and I am committed to bringing a sea of change in how we apply these principles to every aspect of our work at Zimmer Biomet.

As a business leader, can you please share a few steps we must take to truly create an inclusive, representative, and equitable society? Kindly share a story or example for each.

I don’t know if I am the right person to speak broadly about society, but let me draw upon my experience as a business leader to address how we can do it in companies. First, we must build these concepts of diversity or representation, equity and inclusion into our corporate cultures. They must be embedded and woven in, not stand-alone and disconnected concepts. At Zimmer Biomet for example, we have Culture Promises, or commitments we make to each other, which include specific behaviors and habits we expect as we bring the Culture Promises to life. One example is “Empower Every Voice” which speaks directly to the need for inclusion of all points of view. Second, we need leadership to role model, reward, develop and, sometimes, reprimand behavior that is not aligned with the culture that we aspire to realize. Finally, we need systemic practices for hiring, pay, opportunity for development and promotion that are equitable.

If we do these three things while connecting diversity, equity and inclusion to the success of the business, we will see the sea of change that I previously referenced. At Zimmer Biomet, we have launched some exciting work tying DEI to innovation, a critical business priority for us, and I am sure many other companies.

Ok, thank you for that. Let’s now jump to the primary focus of our interview. What are the “myths” that you would like to dispel about being a CEO or executive. Can you explain what you mean?

As an introvert, I was thrilled when the book ‘Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World that Can’t Stop Talking’ by Susan Cain was published in 2013, because it gave voice to what I’ve known and thought my entire career — it takes all styles and personalities to run a company. Diversity of every dimension is necessary and neither an executive boardroom full of introverts, nor a board room of extroverts will be successful in today’s world. The myth that CEOs and executives must have “big” personalities is one that I would like to dispel. In my experience, great leadership comes in different packages. The key is to be authentic, transparent and a good communicator that connects well with people.

In your opinion, what are the biggest challenges faced by women executives that aren’t typically faced by their male counterparts?

When I hear this question, I am reminded to be careful applying stereotypes by gender. While challenges faced by executives are not always related to gender, there are some gender dominant value orientations that can apply. For instance, there are some values or patterns of behavior women may ascribe to more so than men, and vice versa, which may influence how they’re viewed in the workplace.

There are three “C”s that come to mind — communication, confidence and consensus. Women can struggle with effective communication, such as overuse of upspeak, uptalk or upward inflection at the end of a statement, as if the statement were a question. This speech pattern is rarely observed in men and can suggest a lack of conviction. Lacking confidence or suffering from imposter syndrome is another that women may suffer from disproportionately in comparison to men. For example, it has been proven that when applying for a new role, women focus on what small percentage of skills they don’t have, while men focus on the skills they do have. Finally, women can over-rotate to gaining consensus to the detriment of moving forward or taking action. Again, men may face these challenges, but likely to a lesser extent.

Certainly, not everyone is cut out to be an executive. In your opinion, which specific traits increase the likelihood that a person will be a successful executive and what type of person should avoid aspiring to be an executive? Can you explain what you mean?

I have long ascribed to a theory of leadership that says that successful leaders are three dimensional, — They possess head, heart and guts, as outlined by Dotlich, Cairo and Rhinesmith, 2006. What do I mean by that?

Head leadership means demonstrating a strategic approach to understanding and managing the complexities of your executive role using analytics, often rethinking and reframing as new data emerges. Heart leadership suggests balancing the needs of people and the business, while creating trust, exhibiting compassion and driving commitment and engagement. Lastly, guts leadership implies taking risks, exhibiting courage and making tough decisions. While everyone likely leans toward one or more of these leadership attributes, all can be learned or softened. Therefore, in my opinion, anyone who is willing to learn, grow and take this multi-dimensional approach to leadership, can aspire to be an executive.

How have you used your success to make the world a better place?

We all hope that we leave the world a better place than we found it. While I hope that I’m doing that in small ways every day, one area of passion and commitment has been my desire to affect positive change for women and girls. This dates back 30+ years to my time as an MBA graduate to today in the C-suite of a Fortune 500 company, and throughout my volunteer service.

And on a personal level, I feel like I’ve been mentoring young girls for most of my life. I would argue that it started when I was a teenager as the eldest of three girls, with sisters eight and 12 years my junior. And now as Auntie to two teenage nieces, I continue to try to be a role model and make this world a better place for them, and other girls and young women.

What are your “5 Things I Wish Someone Told Me Before I Started” and why? (Please share a story or example for each.)

Life is a marathon, not a sprint. It’s important to pace yourself because the road can be long and stamina is absolutely necessary when working toward important goals. I have only done one marathon, but the parallels to life are often stated and absolutely accurate from my experience.

Enjoy the moment. I am one who can too often be so focused on what’s next that I am at risk of missing the here and now. I am increasingly trying to relax into the moment without too much concern as to what’s coming next.

Asking for help is a sign of strength, not weakness. No one achieves anything alone, so the sooner we learn to partner with and rely on others, the better. Many of us are trained not to show our frailties or reveal our gaps, but true strength is doing just that, so that we can learn, grow and benefit from others who help fill those gaps.

Trust, but verify. I have found that there are generally two approaches to trust. Some trust unconditionally until they are proven wrong by a betrayal. Others don’t trust until trust is earned. I have learned over time that something in the middle might be best. Trust, but verify.

Follow your internal compass. We all have that internal compass, voice in our head or intuition that shows us the way. Too often we don’t follow it, we don’t listen or we get distracted by outside influences. I wish I had learned that sooner, but it’s never too late!

Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share how that was relevant to you in your life?

There is a parable that teaches “this too shall pass.” While the full parable is too long to share here, a quote from it reads, “As night changes to day, so do moments of joy and despair replace each other. Accept them as the nature of things, as part of life.”

This parable is a reminder to me that nothing is permanent or lasts forever, so it’s imperative to truly experience things in the moment and to relinquish control as change is constant. I consistently try to incorporate these learnings in how I manage my life through good times and bad.

We are very blessed that some very prominent names in Business, VC funding, Sports, and Entertainment read this column. Is there a person in the world, or in the US with whom you would love to have a private breakfast or lunch with, and why? He or she might just see this if we tag them

I’ve been fortunate to know and meet many prominent people across business, sports, entertainment and government so no one person comes to mind. In fact, the opportunity to have breakfast or lunch with any one of the millions of Americans, particularly people of color, who have been negatively impacted by COVID or Black Lives Matter, would mean more to me than time with a celebrity. People are suffering, and any words of wisdom, comfort or gratitude that I could deliver would be a blessing.


Women Of The C-Suite: Pamela Puryear of ‘Zimmer Biomet’ On The Five Things You Need To Succeed As A was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Female Disruptors: Olivia Davis of ‘Art of Choice’ On The Three Things You Need To Shake Up Your…

Female Disruptors: Olivia Davis of ‘Art of Choice’ On The Three Things You Need To Shake Up Your Industry

Buy what you love — of course it’s always great to see something you buy increase in value over time or even overnight, but one should always love what they buy because this is something you are living with and if you have other expectations you are more likely to get disappointed.

As a part of our series about women who are shaking things up in their industry, I had the pleasure of interviewing Olivia Davis.

Launched in 2018, Art of Choice is an editorial-focused initiative that seeks to democratize the way that art is examined. From classics to contemporary art, it spotlights exciting artists and their works, introducing audiences through images, interviews and insights that make art understandable and accessible to everyone.

Olivia Davis is the 27-year-old founder of Art of Choice. The L.A.-based entrepreneur grew up in Manhattan and earned her BA in Communications and Art History from Boston University and her Master’s from Sotheby’s Institute of Art. Olivia has experience working with the most globally recognized galleries, institutions, artists, and collectors across the contemporary art market. She works with both new and seasoned collectors on acquisitions and strategy with an eye towards building valuable collections. Her past experiences have allowed her to foster relationships with emerging and already established blue-chip artists, giving her access to both primary and secondary market works.

Thank you so much for doing this with us! Before we dig in, our readers would like to get to know you a bit more. Can you tell us a bit about your “backstory”? What led you to this particular career path?

I grew up in Manhattan, surrounded by the best museums, galleries, and artistic culture in the world, and because of this was able to immerse myself in the art world quite easily. When I began my undergraduate degree at Boston University, I was confident that I would major in business; however, I majored in communications, declaring Art History as my minor during my junior year. My minor in Art History spurred my love for the art world and is what ultimately led me to pursuing art business as a career. After completing my undergraduate degree, I applied and was accepted to the Art Business MBA program at the Sotheby’s Institute of Art. While there, I continued to grow the Art of Choice Instagram account (something I had started in college as way to keep track of pictures I liked) and forged new relationships in the art world. After graduation, I worked for two galleries and an art advisor in Los Angeles before going off on my own in 2018.

Can you tell our readers what it is about the work you’re doing that’s disruptive?

Art of Choice is the first of its kind. It’s the only contemporary art advisory that delivers both a sales service around buying and selling art, as well as content to its viewers. Through the Art of Choice social channels, we provide readers with a “no bullshit approach to art” content — stemming from interviews with artists, exhibition reviews, artist spotlights, and more.

Can you share a story about the funniest mistake you made when you were first starting? Can you tell us what lesson you learned from that?

A few years ago, I was emailing with a contact at a notable Miami-based gallery for quite a bit of time and we were planning to meet in-person during Art Basel Miami. The contact’s name was a feminine name, or so I thought when I went to the booth during our long-awaited meet up. Very confidently, I approached the booth and asked for “her” when “he” was actually the one greeting me. I soon realized that the contact’s name was a masculine French name — from then on, I have made sure to Google people prior to meeting them so I can avoid making similar cringe-worthy mistakes in the future.

We all need a little help along the journey. Who have been some of your mentors? Can you share a story about how they made an impact?

I don’t necessarily have any mentors in mind, but I most definitely look up to certain figures who have made an impression on me. One in particular is Leo Castelli — a well-known, NYC-based art dealer who had a heavy hand in shaping the world of contemporary art.

In today’s parlance, being disruptive is usually a positive adjective. But is disrupting always good? When do we say the converse, that a system or structure has ‘withstood the test of time’? Can you articulate to our readers when disrupting an industry is positive, and when disrupting an industry is ‘not so positive’? Can you share some examples of what you mean?

I think disrupting an industry can be either good or bad — it depends what you do and how that change impacts a culture, and this is always a gamble. From my perspective, disrupting an industry can lead to positive change. For example, Art of Choice’s “no bullshit approach to art” can help younger individuals understand and interpret art more effectively, helping them narrow down their style, preferences, and favorite artists. However, older generations may not take to this approach as much, finding it difficult to relate to the language used or the content published.

Can you share 3 of the best words of advice you’ve gotten along your journey? Please give a story or example for each.

Currency is connections — in this industry you make money based off your connections

Reputation is everything — it really is especially in this industry; if you have a bad reputation, a gallery won’t sell to you

Buy what you love — of course it’s always great to see something you buy increase in value over time or even overnight, but one should always love what they buy because this is something you are living with and if you have other expectations you are more likely to get disappointed

We are sure you aren’t done. How are you going to shake things up next?

I recently launched a limited-edition merch line — so far we’ve had two launches: baseball hats and hoodies. I’m excited to share some new designs we’ve been working on and I’d be lying if I said I didn’t think about planning exclusive art dinners for young collectors in different cities across the world.

In your opinion, what are the biggest challenges faced by ‘women disruptors’ that aren’t typically faced by their male counterparts?

One of the biggest challenges faced solely by women in business is that one is more likely to come across men in leadership roles vs. women. You will still encounter those who are stuck in their ways, who think women should stick with the stereotypical, dated role of being a housewife. While being a stay-at-home mom is one of the hardest jobs on the planet, why shouldn’t women be seen in roles of leadership just as much? Women in business are still somewhat of a taboo to many, which is why the more women disruptors who go against dated gender norms and pursue what the profession they want in life is, is so crucial.

Do you have a book/podcast/talk that’s had a deep impact on your thinking? Can you share a story with us?

Don Thompson’s “The $12 Million Stuffed Shark” was one of the first books I read during my MBA program at Sotheby’s Institute of Art. It truly gave me a first-hand look into how the art world operates and forced me to think differently about how one should conduct themselves in the business of art.

You are a person of great influence. If you could inspire a movement that would bring the most amount of good to the most amount of people, what would that be? You never know what your idea can trigger. 🙂

While growing up in New York City, you take note of all the different neighborhoods — how they look, sound, smell, etc. NYC is an enormous, wonderful city, but there are so many neighborhoods who are neglected so much more than others. Providing less-developed, impoverished communities with a creative outlet is something I hope to be able to deliver during my career. Art is not only something to learn about — art is rooted in self-expression. Providing a community with an outlet to not only learn, but also express themselves is how I hope to contribute and, hopefully, make a difference.

Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share how that was relevant to you in your life?

“You can’t go back and change the beginning, but you can start where you are and change the ending.” — CS Lewis.

This quote is one that I constantly turn to in my own life, professionally and personally. Thinking through the way I’ve done things and acknowledging how I could have done those things differently can be helpful and constructive, but it can also lead to spending so much time and energy harping on a decision, answer, question, etc. that cannot be taken back. We can’t travel in time, so why wonder “what if…”? Instead, this quote reminds me to focus on what I can do in the present and how those decisions will help me in the future.

How can our readers follow you online?

Website: artofchoice.co

Instagram: @artofchoiceadvisory

This was very inspiring. Thank you so much for joining us!


Female Disruptors: Olivia Davis of ‘Art of Choice’ On The Three Things You Need To Shake Up Your… was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Female Disruptors: Deeannah Seymour of ‘pH-D Feminine Health’ On The Three Things You Need To…

Female Disruptors: Deeannah Seymour of ‘pH-D Feminine Health’ On The Three Things You Need To Shake Up Your Industry

Learn to quiet your inner-critic. Self-doubt and negative thoughts will not get you far and can become self-fulfilling prophecies, especially when you fail. Know that failure is inevitable. I have learned more from failure than I have success. Let failure guide you and not stop you from achieving your goals. Believe in yourself, allow and accept that you will make mistakes, learn from them and move on.

As a part of our series about women who are shaking things up in their industry, I had the pleasure of interviewing Deeannah Seymour, the Founder of pH-D® Feminine Health, a woman-owned business reinventing holistic feminine hygiene and wellness solutions that help millions of women feel confident and comfortable. Unsatisfied with the lack of holistic feminine hygiene and wellness products on the market, Deeannah Seymour developed pH-D® Feminine Health in 2014 with the introduction of the brand’s best-selling boric acid suppositories. Having spent two decades in the pharmaceutical industry, she wanted a better alternative for women– and it had to be backed by research. She examined hundreds of clinical studies on the use of boric acid vaginal suppositories to help with vaginal odor and vaginal balance and decided to make them available to the millions of women like herself who needed them. You can learn more at www.phdfemininehealth.com.

Thank you so much for doing this with us! Before we dig in, our readers would like to get to know you a bit more. Can you tell us a bit about your “backstory”? What led you to this particular career path?

Unsatisfied with the lack of holistic feminine hygiene and wellness solutions to common vaginal issues, I developed pH-D® Feminine Health in 2014 with the introduction of our best-selling boric acid suppositories, which are what the brand instantly became best- known for (one bottle sells every 30 seconds!). Having spent two decades in the pharmaceutical industry, I wanted a holistic solution for vaginal odor, which could be used safely and effectively — and it needed to be backed by research. I examined hundreds of clinical studies on the use of boric acid vaginal suppositories to help with feminine odor and vaginal balance. I tried it with great success, but this ingredient was not commercially available.

I knew I wanted to make this solution available to millions of women just like myself who had suffered for years with vaginal odor so I partnered with a holistic healthcare company, Vireo Systems, and began producing boric acid suppositories in our own registered facility. pH-D Feminine Health was born! Today, pH-D has successfully helped millions of women while becoming one of the top-selling feminine hygiene brands with the #1 best-seller on Amazon for more than 5 years. At the moment, we’re in the midst of increasing brick and mortar distribution to more than 25,000 locations nationwide by the end of the year and can be found at retailers including Target, Walmart, Walgreens, CVS, Meijer, Kroger, Publix and more.

Can you tell our readers what it is about the work you’re doing that’s disruptive?

Despite the fact that nearly 50% of women will experience vaginal odor at some point in their lives making it the most common vaginal condition, the topic of vaginal health still has a stigma associated with it. This issue affects millions of women but continues to go largely unaddressed in conversation. Too many women feel shameful about this topic, don’t speak about it, and aren’t aware that there is an accessible solution that is available on retail shelves nationwide. As a female founder and as a brand, we’re working hard to de-stigmatize this critically important issue, particularly amid a moment of change and growth for female equality and empowerment.

Bringing vaginal health topics out of the shadows and creating a simple yet incredibly effective product, which was the first of its kind when we launched it in 2014, has helped us disrupt the sector of feminine health and the feminine hygiene category at retail.

We all need a little help along the journey — who have been some of your mentors? Can you share a story about how they made an impact?

One of the most important people in my journey, who’s been critical to my growth as an entrepreneur, has been my business partner Mark Faulkner, the CEO of Vireo Systems. Our strong alignment has been a huge component to our success and growth. He has been an entrepreneur for many years and brings great experience in business management, product development, manufacturing and leadership, I have benefited from this exponentially.

Can you share 3 of the best words of advice you’ve gotten along your journey? Please give a story or example for each.

Conquer your fears. Being fearful will always hold you back from success, in fact, it can be crippling. In many cases our fears are derived from our unknowns and weaknesses. We can use them as a reminder to seek answers and educate ourselves so that we can progress forward while growing and conquering our fear. My personal motto is faith over fear. If you are living your purpose, you should have faith that you are being guided on the right path and you should not let fear control you.

Learn to quiet your inner-critic. Self-doubt and negative thoughts will not get you far and can become self-fulfilling prophecies, especially when you fail. Know that failure is inevitable. I have learned more from failure than I have success. Let failure guide you and not stop you from achieving your goals. Believe in yourself, allow and accept that you will make mistakes, learn from them and move on.

Self-care is essential. Creating and running a business is exhausting — there’s no two ways about that. Finding time to nurture your body, mind and spirit is essential to being able to bring the best version of yourself to your family, friends and employees.

How are you going to shake things up next?

We want to continue breaking down the barriers so that we can openly discuss feminine and vaginal health! We are focused on helping women drop the shame they feel when they experience natural, common and normal feminine health problems, and on bringing accessible solutions to women everywhere.

Do you have a book/podcast/talk that’s had a deep impact on your thinking? Can you share a story with us?

Michael Singer’s The Untethered Soul has had a huge impact on my personal and professional growth. It helped me learn how to control my “inner roommate” that was responsible for the negative thoughts I was experiencing that were also self-limiting. As women and as mothers, we frequently fall victim to this. As a result of reading this book and deep introspection, I have been freed from my own limitations and really realize now that anything is possible!

You are a person of great influence. If you could inspire a movement that would bring the most amount of good to the most amount of people, what would that be? You never know what your idea can trigger. 🙂

Imagine a world where women aren’t uncomfortable or embarrassed about discussing feminine health topics! That’s the movement I aim to lead.

Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share how that was relevant to you in your life?

“The most effective way to do it, is to do it,” Amelia Earhart.

Sometimes in life you have to be the creator of the change you seek — pH-D Feminine Health is a business based around this concept.

How can our readers follow you online?

Facebook (https://www.facebook.com/pHDFeminineHealth/)

Twitter https://twitter.com/phdwomenshealth

Instagram https://www.instagram.com/phdfemininehealth/

LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/company/ph-d-feminine-health/

This was very inspiring. Thank you so much for joining us!


Female Disruptors: Deeannah Seymour of ‘pH-D Feminine Health’ On The Three Things You Need To… was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Author Yehudit Silverman: “5 Things Anyone Can Do To Optimize Their Mental Wellness”

…Everyone is creative. There is an innate calling to respond to the world through some sort of creative medium. Sadly, this creative impulse is often stifled, or worse, actively discouraged in childhood. Creative Arts Therapies is a field that recognizes the inherent value of the arts as necessary for health and wellbeing. As a registered dance and drama therapist, and as an artist working with documentary film, mask making, dance, and music, I have seen the power of the arts to transform individuals and communities. As we go through life, we each have a unique way of experiencing the world. Each one of us is unique with a specific set of patterns, preferences, and innate skills that determine the way we create. Some of us will see the world from a large sweeping view, or the big picture, while others will focus intensely on what is right in front of us very close up and detailed.

As a part of my series about the “5 Things Anyone Can Do To Optimize Their Mental Wellness” I had the pleasure of interviewing Yehudit Silverman.

Yehudit Silverman, M.A. R-DMT, RDT, is a Creative Arts Therapist, and former Chair of the Department of Creative Arts Therapies, Concordia University, Montreal. She is also the author of The Story Within which includes a step–by-step guide through a creative arts therapies approach, with reflections from those who have gone through the process as well as the author’s own personal journey. An award — winning documentary filmmaker, she produced and directed “The Story Within — myth and fairy tale in therapy” video which is a helpful companion for the book. She created The Story Within method out of her clinical practice and has been teaching it to graduate students for over 20 years.

Thank you so much for doing this with us! Our readers would love to “get to know you” a bit better. Can you share with us the backstory about what brought you to your specific career path?

I grew up hanging upside down from apple trees, sometimes reading a book. The old gnarly apple trees were my refuge, and hanging upside down gave me new perspectives about how the world could look. The street leading to my house was dirt, the houses spread apart, and the yellow school bus that arrived every day was not my happy place. School was a challenge and being one of only a few Jewish students, I learned early about being the “other”. Sometimes alone on the playground, I would wish that I was different, perhaps straight hair with bangs, or that I had magical powers. In my imagination I did, and when I was singings, dancing, writing poetry and stories, I felt alive and free. So, early on I associated my imagination and creativity with healing. Being able to express my feelings onto something outside myself gave me a sense of meaning and hope.

One of my brothers was born with a heart condition and this was before open heart surgery, so we were always looking out to see if his lips were blue, if he was tired, or to make sure we were the ones to run instead of him. I learned early that bad things happen to good people, and that there was nothing I could do to save him. However, I also learned that what matters is how we respond to what we are given, and my brother was the first to learn to dance the twist, to laugh at a joke, or to drive with the top down. He lived fully until he died of a heart attack at age 46.

Myths and fairy tales were also a big part of my childhood. My grandmother read me fairy tales from an old musty book. And as the afternoon light faded, we were lost in a world with witches and magic. Certain stories stayed with me…The Handless Maiden…The Boy and the Three Goats…. and then at night in the darkness I listened as a male voice slowly read aloud the Greek myths from a a vinyl record with a purple center, my dreams filled with gods and goddesses…

In college I studied dance and liberal arts. For the graduation I was asked to choreograph a dance and I created an outdoor piece based on the descent of Persephone into Hades, using movement and music. Once I graduated I became a professional dancer and to support myself I taught dance. One of my students, an energetic woman in her thirties, couldn’t speak above a raw whisper. This happened a few years previously and she was diagnosed as having “selective mutism” which meant there was no physical cause for her condition, but she was still unable to speak. She asked if I could “work” with her. Having no therapeutic training I didn’t know what she meant. But she was insistent so I told her I wouldn’t charge her, but we could explore together. Because of my childhood love of stories and the arts I brought all of this into our sessions and asked her if there was story that she was drawn to. Immediately she said, “Snow White” and she chose the moment when she ingests the poisoned apple and falls into a deep sleep. Allowing herself to be immersed in the character and moment she physically placed herself in a large container that happened to be in the room, to represent the glass casket from the story. Once inside she started banging on the wood then at one point yelled in a perfectly normal voice “let me out!”. I was shocked. She didn’t realize that she had actually used her voice in a normal way until I reordered her in role. After that she gradually regained the normal use of her voice. She felt that somehow I “cured” her, but I knew the truth. It wasn’t me; it was the story and her creativity that led her where she needed to go. After this I decided to study Dance Therapy and later on Drama Therapy, as well as several somatic therapies, this began my career in Creative Arts Therapies. I think my childhood experiences of being the “other”, finding meaning through the arts and stories, and having a brother with physical challenges, were the steppingstones that led me to develop The Story Within- myth and fairy tale in therapy process.

I began developing this approach as a creative arts therapist working in hospital settings and in private practice with children, adolescents, and adults, dealing with diverse psychological and physical issues. For over twenty years as a professor and former Chair of the Creative Arts Therapies Department at Concordia University, in Montreal, I taught The Story Within to graduate students. Most recently I have expanded to working internationally with communities around the issue of suicide, mental illness, interfaith and cross-cultural dialogue, and trauma. Last April my book, The Story Within — myth and fairy tale in therapy, was published and offers readers a step by step approach to working with the arts and a character from a myth or fairy tale to work with personal challenges. I also created a documentary film that works as a companion to the book.

As part of my University research I received provincial and federal grants to work on issues around the shame and stigma that surround suicide. My research culminated with a documentary film The Hidden Face of Suicide that enters the world of survivors, those who lost loved ones to suicide, and tells their remarkable stories. The film has travelled the world, playing in cinemas, and festivals. At one of these screenings after the film finished an elegant woman stepped up to microphone and said very softly “I’m 65 years old. My other took her own life when I was 25. For sixty years I never spoke about it I was too ashamed. Hearing the survivors tell their stories gave me the courage to speak”. Sadly, this proved to be a common response to the film. Many audience members shared their stories of losing a mother, father, sister, brother, best friend, husband, wife, to suicide. And only now after seeing the film, did they feel they could break the silence. This was my motivation for making the film, to help in some small way break the silence and stigma that still surrounds this issue of suicide. If we don’t speak about suicide, if the subject is still cloaked in shame, then those who are suffering will not seek help.

For me, one of the biggest lessons in all my experience is that those who are suffering need a voice, an avenue to express their pain, but also to discover and express their strength and resilience. Right now, because of the Coronavirus many of us are feeling fear and anxiety about our health, our livelihoods, and uncertainty about the future. And perhaps a sense of deep loss in terms of social connections and intimacy. Maybe even anger at all we are missing out on. What do we do with these feelings? When we express these feelings through a creative medium, whether it be an art piece, dramatic role, music, poetry, or dance, they take on a form outside of us and become less overwhelming. Working creatively allows us to have a high degree of safety when working through difficult feelings, and the ability to discover new perspectives about our situation. The power of the arts is that they have the capacity to contain paradox, complexity, and opposing points of view in one form. For example, we could create a collage that expresses both grief and loss as well as hope. Engaging with our own creativity is life giving and active and builds resilience and hope.

The other lesson I learned from my background, is the inherent power of myths, fairy tales, and ancient stories. All of them from around the world speak of a quest: a journey fraught with obstacles, demons, and monsters. From Persephone to the Ugly Duckling, the themes and challenges within these stories still speak to us today. As we go through our lives we face our own profound challenges and obstacles and seek an effective way to work with them. How do we access what remains unconscious and hidden? How can we find a safe way to approach the parts of ourselves that keep us caught in destructive patterns? How do we help those we work with discover their inherent creativity and life force? The power of myth and fairy tales is that they give form to archetypal and personal fears and longings. Often these are too frightening to confront directly but we can identify with the protagonist in the story as they face demons and obstacles on their journey. Right now, with what we are going through we might feel helpless and it is important to find a sense of agency and meaning. I found that combining the power of creativity with the potent and ancient content of myth and fairy tale is an effective way to work with our inner feelings and challenges and also discover our inherent creativity and resilience.

Can you share the most interesting story that happened to you since you started your career?

As a creative arts therapist I worked in several Montreal hospitals and had the privilege of bringing my creative arts therapies approach with stories and the arts to many patients suffering from physical and psychological challenges. This story is from when I just was beginning my career as a therapist. I entered the room and saw a skeletally thin girl sitting up in bed hooked up to a heart monitor. I introduced myself and sat at the edge of her bed. She was admitted to the hospital because she had severe anorexia and her heart was affected. She was 16 but looked around 11. I felt something squishy under the covers and found, to my dismay, old uneaten food hidden there. She started to deny that it was hers, but without saying a word I wrapped the food in Kleenex and threw it out. And then I surprised her by asking if she liked fairy tales. Immediately her face changed into a big smile and she said she loved “The Wizard of Oz.” For several months we worked together with this story. She refused all other forms of therapy and continued to be non-compliant about re-feeding but agreed to see me because I never spoke about eating or her weight. Instead, within the limitations of her hospital bed, she made masks, costumes, artwork, and embodied characters from the Wizard of Oz. She identified as Dorothy and told me that the tornado was “good” because it took her to the sacred place of Oz, where she felt special and in control, whereas Good Witch Glenda was “evil” and tried to get her to betray the tornado and send her back to Kansas. To feel a sense of “order” in her life she had to abstain from eating (the tornado) so she could enter the magical world of Oz where she experienced the euphoria of starvation. In contrast, any attempt by the hospital staff to get her to eat was perceived as a direct threat and pushed her directly into “chaos.” As time went on, she became thinner and thinner and we were all concerned that her heart would give out and she would die. I understood that until she had a direct experience of the danger of her eating disorder she would not respond to treatment. Instead of challenging her perceptions, I worked with them within the story. I had her embody the tornado and speak as the tornado to her character Dorothy. One day, as she was embodying the tornado, she laughed a maniacal laugh and then came out of role, crying and shivering. For the first time, she experienced the tornado (her anorexia) as malicious and chaotic. This was the start of her recovery. It was a difficult journey, but by working with this story she was able to face her eating disorder and leave the hospital and continue in high school. During a six-month follow-up visit she told me, “I felt so magical in Oz, it provided me a rigid sense of order. I didn’t want to return to Kansas and the ‘chaos’ of eating and feeling myself in my body…it was hard to find out who I was without anorexia. I felt like no one, nothing, so boring in flat Kansas. But now I know the truth about Oz and that the tornado/starvation was not my friend but leading me to death.”

This experience taught me to trust the inherent strength and healing potential in everyone. And most importantly, it taught me what my real job was; help the client discover a story and character that resonates in a deep, perhaps even uncomfortable way, and encourage their own inherent creativity. And to trust that the story and the arts themselves will lead the client exactly where they need to go in a safe and gradual way. Everyone has a story. We all live by narratives that define who we are and how we approach the world. Our reactions to what we encounter come out of these narratives. And yet, our emotional reactions often surprise and challenge us because they seem to come out of nowhere. In my work as a therapist I discovered that there are underlying and often hidden stories that remain inaccessible. It is these hidden stories that truly control how we approach and interact with the world. Within these hidden stories are the traumas, emotional wounds, and difficult memories and experiences that we have blocked off from our consciousness. We cannot see or feel them, yet they hold us firmly in their grip, leading us to react as if we are fighting for our very survival. While talk therapy and addressing personal issues in a direct manner may be helpful, working only cognitively can keep us from making a true visceral connection to that which lies buried and out of reach. How do we access what remains unconscious and hidden? How can we find a safe way to approach our deepest fears? For much of our human history our fears have been expressed in our myths, fairy tales, and traditional stories The fairy tales reimagined by Disney left out the most important darker aspects from the original versions, which can allow us to truly explore the chaotic and challenging aspects of our current situation. The darker elements of the stories allow us to explore the darker elements within ourselves. And, most importantly, by externalizing these darker feelings onto a story and character, we find creative ways of discovering our own courage and strengths.

Can you share a story with us about the most humorous mistake you made when you were first starting? What lesson or take-away did you learn from that?

I’ve made many mistakes along the way and will invariably continue to do so. Here is one that happened when I first moved from Boston to Montreal. I was hired to work as a creative arts therapist on a psychiatric unit of a major hospital. During my initial interview I was asked if I spoke French and I said, “No.” However, when I arrived to lead my first group of inpatients diagnosed with schizophrenia, I was shocked to discover that they only spoke French. Desperate, I decided maybe if I spoke English very loudly and slowly, they would understand. Of course, this was not successful, and for the rest of the session I used a lot of mime and hand gestures. Somehow, we managed to communicate based on the kindness and patience of the group. Over the course of the next few sessions I brought my French dictionary with me and tried to string words together to form cohesive sentences. However, I believe I mostly said things like “chair, move, here, now.” The group was very attentive (because they never knew what would come out of my mouth) and really tried to help, offering suggestions. One day when I felt I had mastered enough French to feel more comfortable, I was leading them in a relaxation exercise and I said, “Relaxez les jambons.” They were lying on the floor and several lifted their heads and asked “les jambons?” and I proudly stated, “Oui, les jambons.” Noticing that everyone looked very confused and some were trying hard not to laugh, I looked in my dictionary and realized I had asked them to “relax their hams.” The word for legs in French is “les jambes” and the word for ham is “les jambons.” I started to laugh and then all of us were rolling on the floor laughing and saying “Relaxez les jambons” over and over. The fact that I could laugh at my own ignorance and foolishness allowed all of us to share a precious moment of vulnerability and closeness. For the group, this was a turning point when a real alliance was built. From then on when a patient was stuck, or we reached a tough moment, someone would inevitably say “Relaxes les jambons” and we would laugh and remember that moment and something would ease. For me, this was a huge lesson as to what “healing” and “therapy” means. I realized that the best I could offer was my full presence with all my foolishness and imperfections and that this allowed them to relax and not feel that they had to be perfect. And perhaps most importantly, I realized that therapy is always about learning a new language. We cannot possibly know what specific words or metaphors mean for our clients and we must be open to admitting we do not know and enjoy the process.

None of us are able to achieve success without some help along the way. Is there a particular person who you are grateful towards who helped get you to where you are? Can you share a story about that?

My parents sent me to a private high school in the hopes of having better teachers, less prejudice and stimulating classes. Unfortunately, I was a stubborn sullen teen and wanted nothing to do with classes or homework. Until I met Deborah. Her ancestors came over on the Mayflower, and mine were Rabbis in a Polish Shtetl, yet she was the first person I could really talk to. We stayed up for hours, phone cords wrapped around our legs, speaking about the meaning of life. She was a devout Atheist and for me spirituality was as present as breathing. One night when she slept over, we had a huge argument about whether there was a divine presence in the universe. I was so upset I woke my parents up at 2 am. They were not amused and told me to go back to sleep. Even though we disagreed about many things our friendship flourished. She was smart, aced all her tests and taught me how to study. She also introduced me to Leonard Cohen and Joni Mitchell, and we would spend hours trying to interpret their lyrics. She was the first person who believed in me as an artist. As adults she encouraged my dancing, choreography and writing. Before I became a therapist, I shared with her my ideas of bringing together stories and the arts into some sort of healing practice. She listened and said she had a premonition that I would publish a book someday. I laughed out loud. At that time, I had just started graduate school to become a therapist, was mourning my life as a dancer, and didn’t know where I would end up. We became mothers around the same time and met every summer in Maine, watching our children play in the sand. During her last pregnancy she was diagnosed with stage 4 breast cancer. She called me up to ask what she should do — abort her baby and receive immediate Chemotherapy or bring the baby to term. I told her whatever she decided I would support 100 percent. She chose to keep the pregnancy. And while her kids were small, for six years she fought a courageous battle with her cancer, suffering through chemotherapy, a bone marrow transplant, until eventually the cancer won. I was with her throughout her illness and in her dying. We had such special moments, both of us in our houses many miles apart on the phone watching Peter Pan on television with our children beside us, or driving through a snow storm to have a delicious candlelight dinner in a fancy restaurant, and near the end a painstakingly slow walk with her limping and leaning on me, along the marginal way in Ogunquit. She died at age 39. She was my best friend. She taught me to believe in my ideas, my visions, and that I could forge my own path. Her illness and dying taught me that life is precious, and that in the end nothing matters but love. Also, I learned that I could be with suffering and not be consumed, that it was a privilege, and even, perhaps, holy to be vulnerable, and that in our woundedness we touch our deepest strength. Without Deborah I would not have dared to be a therapist, create my own creative arts therapies approach, make films, or author a book. I am eternally grateful. And I miss her every day.

What advice would you suggest to your colleagues in your industry to thrive and avoid burnout?

  • Be creative

Those of us in the helping professions can become consumed with all the suffering we witness. Often we see clients who are faced with way too many life challenges from poverty, abuse, trauma, physical illness, racism, war, and the list goes on. How can we be present for all this suffering and yet still stay healthy? For me the key is to always have a creative practice, an avenue for expression, whether it be through art, music, dance, writing, drama. It doesn’t matter what medium as long there is some way to process and give form to what we have witnessed and held inside. Once our feelings take on a creative form, they become less overwhelming. It is also a way to work through any counter transference, or difficult feelings we have about clients. And as well our creativity can lead us to examine our blind spots and bias, so we ensure we are not imposing our own limitations on our clients. When I worked in hospitals I would try and leave time between seeing clients so that I could take a moment to draw, write, move, what came up for me in my previous session. This really helped to process my feelings so that they didn’t stay lodged and stuck inside.

  • Be silly

Often as therapists, we feel we need to be serious. Of course, we need to take our professional role and clients seriously, but this doesn’t mean we can’t allow ourselves to be downright silly at times. Some of my most precious and therapeutic moments with clients were when we both found something hilariously funny even in midst of great suffering and lost ourselves in uncontrollable laughter. For example, I was sitting in my hospital office with an adolescent whose mom was very ill, and her boyfriend had just left her. She was quite despondent and sat slumped in a chair looking down at her feet. When she looked up she saw that I had 3 pairs of glasses on my head and I was looking around asking where my glasses were. This was not on purpose. As I continued to look for my glasses she started to giggle and pointed to my head and once I felt the three pairs just sitting there (quite happily) I also started laughing and then we couldn’t stop. This proved to be a healing moment for both of us.

  • Be out in nature

There is something about being with trees or water or listening to the wind that makes us feel better. It doesn’t have to be fancy, or involve expense or travel, just a simple park where there is some green, perhaps some animal life (ducks are always interesting) and mainly making the time to go there. Find time every day even if just for a moment to slow down. I’ve made the word S.L.O.W. an acronym for myself. S — stop, breathe, L — look, listen, O — open to what is here right now, W- wake up to the beauty before me. This helps me when I get carried away by thoughts and worries. And when I do this in nature it is easier to slow down and pay attention. Right now, with our limited travel capacity you can also watch a nature show, really, it helps to see beautiful vistas of green with unusual creatures making their way through the forest, or colorful fish weaving through coral reefs. We may feel we don’t have the time, but just by entering this world vicariously can slow our breathing and give a larger view on the world and our worries. Hey, at least we don’t have to scale a 100-foot tree to search for the hidden sap… perspective matters…

  • Be imperfect

In the Jewish mystical tradition one of the creation stories is about the divine light going into vessels on earth and that the light was too strong for these vessels to hold so they shattered spreading shards of light throughout the universe. And the interpretation is that we are these broken vessels, and as Leonard Cohen says, “there is crack in everything that is how the light gets in”. Can we celebrate our brokenness, our imperfections, and honour them as our greatest teachers? I know first-hand how hard it is to accept imperfections and to embrace discomfort and yet this is the way we grow, when we can laugh with our imperfections (as with my three pairs of glasses on my head) or even at something truly embarrassing such as unconsciously using language that is offensive to someone else. I have been on receiving end of many people inadvertently saying antisemitic quotes or sayings, most of the time with absolutely no idea that they are offensive to me. And conversely, I have been the perpetrator, making assumptions based on race, religion, gender, and when confronted, wanted nothing more than to hide or become defensive. However, after taking a deep breath, and embracing my discomfort as a sign of growth, I asked to learn more. In this challenging time with the health crises, and with increasing awareness of endemic racism, it is important that we allow ourselves to be imperfect, to recognize we are all on a learning curve and to take responsibility for our actions but always with compassion for ourselves and others. Not easy…

  • Be nourished

Often when we have very full days of looking after family, seeing clients, doing laundry, dealing with broken pipes and leaking roofs, the last thing on our list (or not even on the list) is taking care of ourselves. When I was working full time in hospitals with young children at home and later during my University days lunch was not at option. I believed that work was important than me taking time to actually eat a meal. Of course, there was a toll, my health suffered, and I became irritable and easily fatigued. It took me a long time to realize that my nourishment was key to be present for both my family and my work. And that nourishment takes many forms; a good meal, a walk in nature, a moment of silence and deep breathing, meeting a friend for coffee… What matters is to take the time to discover what nourishment means for us and to alter our mindset to put this on top of the list instead of at the bottom or not even on it.

What advice would you give to other leaders about how to create a fantastic work culture?

In my three years as Chair of the Department of Creative Arts Therapies at Concordia University, I learned the value of having an open and inclusive culture. Even with a fabulous team of colleagues, inevitably there were tough decisions to make and many passionate and deep-felt discussions on how to move forward. As Chair I wanted us all to agree. However, agreement is not always possible. Based on each of past experiences, training, world view, our solutions to the department issues were different. For me as Chair this proved a challenge, but my approach was to try and listen to all sides, to encourage faculty and staff to come to my office, to try and understand the essence of each faculty’s argument. Also, at times I brought creativity into the meetings whether we sang, made art, or wrote out our hopes and dreams. Yearly retreats were helpful to bring us together and find new avenues for communication. I think the most important advice for all of us who take on the role of leader is to remember we are in service of something larger than ourselves whether it is a department, a business, a hospital unit, a long term care facility, a healing centre, or a prison. This means that when considering a decision, it is not about us as individuals but rather the entity and integrity of the group. If one member of the group feels harassed, unsafe, or excluded, then the group is not healthy, not functioning well. We need to find courage to sometimes go against the prevailing group or larger organisational culture to ensure that all members feel safe. For me safety is always central whether in therapy or in a work culture. What I find helpful is to determine what safety and respectful interaction means for all members, and to have this discussion and create a written or verbal contract. This contract can then be a touchstone for all communication and can be referred to when things get tough. Once of the courses I taught for many years was Group Dynamics and I found that Irving Yalom’s stages of group process and group rules were relevant in the workplace. Every group has its own culture its own communication style and its own challenges. And yet there are some basic tenets of group process that can be helpful to learn about to ensure the best work culture. I suggest reading about Group Dynamics and to hire a group specialist (if financially feasible) to lead a retreat for your group. Interview the person first and make sure it is a good fit. Lastly, I think shared humour goes a long way to bring a group together and having some fun activities away from work can allow the members to share different sides of themselves.

Ok thank you for all that. Now let’s move to the main focus of our interview. Mental health is often looked at in binary terms; those who are healthy and those who have mental illness. The truth, however, is that mental wellness is a huge spectrum. Even those who are “mentally healthy” can still improve their mental wellness. From your experience or research, what are five steps that each of us can take to improve or optimize our mental wellness. Can you please share a story or example for each.

  1. Inspiration and Meaning

Without a sense of meaning in our lives we feel lost and without purpose. What gives us meaning changes depending where we are in our lives and what is important. However, what doesn’t change is the need for meaning. An important task for all of us is to constantly re-examine and reassess what inspires us. It could be the feeling of a grandchild’s hand in our own, the beauty of morning dew on the grass, the feeling of clay as we mold it, singing with others, or thinking about a problem. Whatever it is we need to take time to discover the activities that inspire us and help give a sense of meaning to our experiences. My first job as a creative arts therapist was in a long-term care facility. One group I worked with consisted of men and women in the middle stages of Alzheimer’s and Dementia. Before I met them, I was worried about how I could help, how could we establish a sense of meaning when they had little or no short-term memory? What could be inspiring for those who lost their homes and much of their past? I thought memory was necessary for inspiration and meaning. Boy was I wrong! In our first meeting one of the members who had been a professional jazz singer started singing and then we all joined in improvising, some adding their own words or even gibberish. After a few sessions I asked if I could record their music and then before each new session would play the recording. They would recognize their own voice and be thrilled even if they couldn’t remember the previous sessions. When I would see one of them in the hallway, even if they were immobilized in front of the television, they would see me and start humming, and I would respond through song. Somehow this simple interaction through music was inspiring for them and in that moment gave them a sense of meaning and connection. Another resident in same long-term care facility was only in his fifties but suffered from the ravages of MS. He was full of despair and saw no reason to keep on living. When we met, I noticed he was an avid reader and had books piled up beside his bed. Based on this I suggested he might want to write a book about his life and experiences for his grandchildren who came to visit. At first, he was reluctant, feeling as if he had nothing to say. I asked him about a medal he had hanging on the wall and he began telling me the story of his experiences serving in Vietnam, and once he started talking, he didn’t stop. I recorded his voice since his arms were too weak to write and one of his older grandchildren, a girl of 14, offered to transcribe them into text. As the weeks went on, he became inspired and eager to tell a new story and his grandchildren (and wife and children) came more often because he was animated and shared parts of his life they never knew about. Even though his body was growing weaker, he became stronger in terms of gaining a sense of purpose and meaning. The last time I saw him his daughter presented him with a bound book of all his stories which he received with tears in eyes. Meaning and inspiration can come in many forms, and whether we are facing severe life challenges, or just the everyday variety, finding out what truly inspires us and gives meaning can be the very thing that makes us want to go on living.

2. Creativity

I’ve already spoken previously about how essential I believe creativity is to our mental health. Everyone is creative. There is an innate calling to respond to the world through some sort of creative medium. Sadly, this creative impulse is often stifled, or worse, actively discouraged in childhood. Creative Arts Therapies is a field that recognizes the inherent value of the arts as necessary for health and wellbeing. As a registered dance and drama therapist, and as an artist working with documentary film, mask making, dance, and music, I have seen the power of the arts to transform individuals and communities. As we go through life, we each have a unique way of experiencing the world. Each one of us is unique with a specific set of patterns, preferences, and innate skills that determine the way we create. Some of us will see the world from a large sweeping view, or the big picture, while others will focus intensely on what is right in front of us very close up and detailed. Some of us are visual and we take in our environment through our eyes, while other listen intently to the surrounding sounds, and someone else may need to touch a fabric or a tree to appreciate it. These preferences are ingrained and most of the time we are unaware of them. However, it can be helpful to learn what our primary preference is so we can learn which perceptions are overused and which perceptions are recuperative. For example, I am very visual and take in the details of my environment, noticing the way the storefront reflects the light, or a person’s expression as they walk by. This is a gift, but also is exhausting so to recuperate I use my auditory skills and close my eyes to listen to music. This can be helpful for mental health to learn which perceptions we use most and which perceptions can give us rest and recuperation. And expressing our feelings creatively, particularly when we feel overwhelmed can give us perspective. For example, I worked with a woman who recently went through a difficult divorce and was now a single mother of a young child with special needs. She felt overwhelmed and helpless to cope with all her responsibilities. In our work together she chose the story of Rumpelstiltskin — which is a about a miller’s daughter who has to spin straw into gold, or she will be put to death by the king. This moment when the girl is faced with the impossible task of spinning straw into gold really spoke to this women’s situation. In the story a little man, Rumpelstiltskin, agrees to help if the miller’s daughter can guess his name. And this character of Rumpelstiltskin intrigued my client, who made drawings and funny little sculptures representing him. And as she did so she became inspired and showed some of her creations to her son and to friends. To her surprise they were delighted. Her creativity helped her remember her playfulness and she discovered a whole side of herself she had lost. When we last met she told me she had started a creative support group for mothers of children with special needs and that they were inspired by her to make their own creative helpers.

3. Connection

Right now, many of us feel more isolated than ever. Therefore, it is essential for our mental health to find new ways of connection. It could be that you plan weekly online meeting with family and loved ones or you could join an online group where there is personal interaction. Many places of worship, community centers, art centres, universities, and online support groups, are offering free online groups and these can offer support and an opportunity for connection. When we are clinically depressed or even just feeling lonely, the hardest step is to reach out to others. And yet this is exactly what is needed. During this time of Covid I have been separated from my family. Sadly, we live in different countries and cannot be together. However, via Zoom we discovered a new intimacy and closeness due to sharing our creativity. My family ranges in age from 18–95 and we were all eager to find a way to stay connected. My brother came up with the idea of having a task for our meetings. For example, all responding to the same piece of art, or responding to a theme such as courage or cowardice. Our responses included poetry, photos, music, artwork, and mixed media. And as well we told stories from our life based on a question such as “what was a transformative travel experience” or answered a question such as if you were on a deserted island what 3 things would you take with you? By sharing our stories, reflective answers, and creative responses we learned more about each other and became closer than ever. And because the meetings were only an hour we knew they were precious, and we were focused and attentive in a way that doesn’t happen when we have more extended time together. For my elderly parents isolated in a big American city, this was a way of feeling connected to loved ones and also something to look forward to every week. I believe that staying connected to family (whether our biological or created), and friends, is an essential aspect of our mental health.

4. Compassion and Getting Messy

“Take chances, make mistakes, get messy” Ms. Frizzle from The Magic School Bus.

Life is messy! Even with our best intentions we find ourselves face down in the mud while wearing our best white clothes and surrounded by those we are trying to impress. For me, literally having had many mud encounters, I’ve learned that this falling and getting dirty is ultimately very healing. If I try to avoid getting messy then I avoid life’s juiciest moments. For example, when I went for my first job interview, I didn’t realize I had leaves hanging form hair and my shirt was on inside out. As I was answering questions, I noticed the interviewers looking at me intently and I wondered if I was being very witty or failing miserably. Then at one point I saw the leaves and the tag on the sleeve of my shirt and realized that I looked foolish. I felt ashamed and wanted to hide under the chair. However, there I was the focus of attention and everyone could see that I now knew what they were all looking at. I had a choice, either try to avoid getting messy and pretend I didn’t have leaves hanging or an inside out shirt, or, let myself take a chance and laugh with my situation. To do this I had to have compassion for myself in that moment and compassion for my interviewers that perhaps they could identify with my situation. I brushed the leaves off and held one up and said “they really are beautiful this Fall time of year, and I guess my curly hair is a good place to hang out” After a beat we all laughed and I spoke about mistakes and being vulnerable and the possibility for repair. I told them about my internal dialogue and my choice to take a chance and get messy. Since this was for a clinical position I also spoke about how inevitably as therapists, parents, friends, we make mistakes but that the opportunity for repair is always there, right in that moment of falling in the mud. I believe that for our mental health we must get messy, take chances, and know that this is the human condition. If we are willing to have compassion for ourselves when we make mistakes, others will forgive us as well. And that if we have compassion for the person in front of us yelling and out of control, we can help them find their way to repair and healing. And this compassion for getting messy may even lead to a sharing of messy stories. This is what happened in my interview. To my surprise after I acknowledged my hanging leaves and inside out shirt the interviewers laughed and told their own stories of saying the wrong word or being on television with shaving cream on their face, and remarkably I got the job!

5. Gratitude

Much has been written about the importance of gratitude for mental health. While as a concept we all agree, in practice this can be harder especially when we have just lost our job, or received a diagnosis of a serious illness, or feel isolated and alone. I have a practice that I do every day that I find helpful. No matter where I am, I try to find three things of hidden beauty. This can be the colorful fungi that emerge after a rain, the pattern of light on the floor of hospital corridor, the rain drops in the spider web on my back porch. There is something about taking the time to search for and find things of hidden beauty that takes us out of our habitual attitude. The idea of it being hidden is important since it cannot be something too obvious, but rather something we didn’t notice before but now that we are paying attention, we recognize its beauty. For me this practice is central to my mental health and a daily reminder that beauty is always there, and that gratitude is always available if I pay attention. I shared this practice with friend who was suffering from acute anxiety and was having trouble leaving her house. I suggested she could do this in her house even in one room. Once she started this daily practice, she sent me photos of the hidden beauty just from one room and I marvelled at the beauty in dust balls with a halo of sunlight, an orange cat toy against a dark pillow, and an African violet flower against the windowsill. So simple, and yet for her, so transformative.

Much of my expertise focuses on helping people to plan for after retirement. Retirement is a dramatic ‘life course transition’ that can impact one’s health. In addition to the ideas you mentioned earlier, are there things that one should do to optimize mental wellness after retirement? Please share a story or an example for each.

I can speak about this personally since I recently retired from my University position. Right after leaving I felt elated, that now I would have time to do all the things I had always wanted to. However, as the weeks progressed, I felt unsteady, uncertain, as if I no longer knew who I was. Without the structure of classes, meetings, research, and the push to achieve who was I? What was important to me now? Where was I headed and what was the next step? When I met with my University colleagues I was embarrassed to speak about my uncertainty because I felt I was supposed to be happy and loving my freedom. Once I acknowledged to myself that I was in a huge transition and that transitions take time I was able to sort through my feelings. For many of us when we retire, we lose our sense of identity, of purpose, and of self-worth. I found it was essential that I allow myself to mourn the ending of my University life, to feel the sense of loss so that I could move on to something new. Over the first year I allowed myself to try different activities, different projects, to try and discover what was inspirational now. Interestingly, my book, The Story Within- myth and fairy tale in therapy, was published nine months after I retired. It felt like a birth and I went through labour pains and then like any new mother fretted whether my new “baby” would survive, be ok, make it in the world. And finally, I learned to let go, to trust that the book would have its own life and I could focus on my own path. Without the pressure to “prove” myself, or work toward tenure, or succeed within an outside mandate, I was free to chart my own adventure. For me this involves being of service, finding a way to use my skills to be helpful, but also the way of being of service must nourish me as well. How to balance both? I began to offer free online seminars and videos related to my book and organized a conference around the use of stories in healing hosted by Concordia University with a fantastic group of panelists. All of these were demanding but also fun and along the way I was privileged to make connections with some truly wonderful people from many different countries. And yet still every day I am rediscovering who I am and letting go of old identities. It is a process of trial and error, willing to take chances, get messy, laugh, brush myself off, and keep going. A man I worked with who retired from years of construction work told me that the day after he retired, he came down with mysterious physical symptoms, muscle aches, fatigue, brain fog, and vertigo. He spent most of his time lying on the couch watching Netflix and sports. In our work together we explored the idea of loss and mourning, and he came up with the idea of writing a letter to his old self. He wrote a beautiful letter filled with compassion for all the hard-physical work he done for over thirty years. When he read the letter out loud, he realized that his body was tired, and he needed days of rest and was able to allow himself this period of recuperation. Seeing his symptoms as a well-deserved rest changed his attitude and instead of feeling debilitated, he started treat his body with tenderness and slowly over time started to feel better. It’s not that we can cure all illness by changing our attitude, but particularly in retirement we need to take the time to honour the fact that we are going through a huge transition. A group of retired women who are going through The Story Within process together sent me images of their creations. I was struck by how several of them chose characters who were also in transition. For example, two women chose the story of Beauty and the Beast, however one woman chose the moment when the witch cast a spell turning the prince into beast, and the other chose the moment when the beast turns back into a man. Interestingly, both women found the stories helped them with their own transitions into retirement. They both made masks expressing this transition and both masks contained anguish and joy. One of the woman wrote me “Finally I can let my inner beast come through in my art, my tennis, and my wicked sense of humour.” Finding stories that speak to us, expressing ourselves through the arts, can be of immense help during retirement and allow us to uncover and express our feelings and lead us to new adventures.

How about teens and pre teens. Are there any specific new ideas you would suggest for teens and pre teens to optimize their mental wellness?

As we know adolescence can be a really challenging time with so many changes in terms of hormones, social life, body image, and identity. Many of the those I’ve worked with were teens or preteens. Here is one example from my practice that I believe illustrates the power of using story and the arts as a way for adolescents to work through their complex feelings.

She walked into the room like a shadow, completely silent and not taking up any space. Making no eye contact, she quickly sat down slumped in a chair. The medical staff knew her as the beautiful ten-year- old with the long red hair who never spoke; this was clinically referred to as “selectively mute.” She had not spoken a word for six months and no one knew why. Her family was baffled, and according to the medical experts nothing was physically wrong. In our work together she chose the story of “The Little Mermaid” who gives her voice to the witch in exchange for the love of the prince. When she found this story, it was validating to find a character who, like herself, had chosen to give up her voice. She made a mask using a pair of black tights filled with newspaper with glued-on images of female models and superstars. The images were cut up and ripped apart. The mouth was covered with masking tape. When she placed the mask in the room, she put it under a chair with plastic wrap around it so you could see

it, but it was covered and protected. She became very emotional when she stood back and looked at her mask. We communicated through writing and she wrote that the mermaid looked incredibly sad and alone. When she put on the mask and embodied the Little Mermaid she glided through the room and settled in a corner, making herself as small as possible. Then she started crying, making gasping sounds. I picked a few percussion instruments and sat with her in her corner and asked if she could play the mermaid’s sadness with an instrument. She grabbed a small drum and started banging on it, getting louder and louder, until at one point she also began very quietly using her voice to make guttural sounds. Eventually her voice became stronger. Over the next few sessions we worked with percussion and sounds until she gradually started to whisper to me and told me the story of how she was being bullied in school and over the internet. Once she allowed me to disclose this to her parents, they were able to tell the school and decided to move her to a new school. In her new school she started speaking again, at first very softly, but she slowly regained her confidence. In our last session she told me, “Seeing the mask of the Little Mermaid so sad and alone released my own feelings, and then becoming the character myself, I realized how I had given up and basically didn’t want to exist anymore. Even though I chose this character because I identified with her not speaking, she gave me my voice back.”

For teens and preteens, creativity is essential. Finding the words to express what they’re going through can be daunting, yet the arts allow for a more nuanced and complex articulation. Especially if they are given permission to create through whatever medium they choose and without any limitations of what is aesthetically pleasing. And as well identifying with a character from a myth or fairy tale can help teens feel less alone and find a safe way to explore issues of sexuality, bullying, identity, social pressure etc. In the process of creatively and emotionally engaging with their character’s problem and challenges, they see things from the character’s point of view. As their character deals with monsters, obstacles, in the fictional world, the adolescent can begin to gain perspective about their own life’s struggles, and safely uncover and express the suffering, while at the same time discovering their innate strength and resilience.

Is there a particular book that made a significant impact on you? Can you share a story?

I read the book, “I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings”, by Maya Angelou, as 14-year-old who felt lost, different, and in many ways helpless about my own life. The book is an autobiography describing her early years that illustrates how strength of character and a love of literature can help overcome racism and trauma. While I certainly did not experience the racism or the horrific trauma that she did, I was moved by her courage and transformation from a girl with low self-esteem who felt caged in by society’s racism to a writer, mother, and self-possessed adult. Reading about her transformation and all the obstacles she faced and how she could express all this with poetic words, was inspiring and ultimately uplifting. This was also 1969, during social upheaval and the women’s movement. My mother, a professor, who went back to school when we were young, was an anomaly in her circle of friends. Even her mother thought she shouldn’t pursue her career, that it was unseemly for a woman. This is hard to believe now that women were told not to go to University, not to pursue their dreams, and that getting married was the only destination. For me this reality was the backdrop, but it was being dismantled. Sitting in the vortex of this changing world was unsettling and reading Maya Angelou gave me a role model, someone who could write about what is what like not only to face intense racism but also to be a woman in a male dominated society. In my own life I wanted to find a woman doctor and could not find a referral anywhere. I was told “there are no women doctors in this state” Undaunted, my mother and I searched and finally found a nun who was also a doctor in a practice three hours away. We drove there and it was my first time meeting a nun. She was in full habit and I was intimidated and quite shy. However, she was warm and funny, and I ended up telling her about the book. She laughed and said it was one of her favorite books as well. Immediately we were bonded. Who knew that a book written by an African American women could be the very thing that formed a bond between a Jewish adolescent girl and a nun! Yet I believe Maya Angelou spoke to many of us, and her love of books and literature really spoke to me as I spent my days happily lost in stories. My favorite activity, as mentioned before, was hanging upside down from an apple tree reading a book. Not sure how I managed to do this, but there was something about entering a fictional world from upside down that allowed for all possibilities. And this powerful memoir by Maya Angelou was pivotal in my development.

You are a person of great influence. If you could start a movement that would bring the most amount of good to the most amount of people, what would that be? You never know what your idea can trigger. 🙂

Right now, there is such a need for healing in terms of political divisions, social unrest, endemic racism, climate crises, the pandemic, poverty, inequality, and the list goes on. The enormity of what is needed can be overwhelming and perhaps even paralyzing. How can our individual actions have any impact? Is it even worth it to try? For me these questions are ongoing and essential and difficult to answer. As a therapist I’ve always been curious about how change occurs. Some clients come in with what appears to be insurmountable challenges and yet they find the will, the impetus to adjust and thrive? And yet others with far fewer outward obstacles remain locked in destructive habitual patterns. Despite all the research of predicting factors, still in practice it remains a mystery. It seems to me that any change must begin with an internal movement, a subtle, yet profound, awakening. This awakening is what allows us to change our belief systems and our behaviour. Sometimes awakenings are immediate. For example, I was invited to present my work in Istanbul during the Muslim holiday of Eid al — Fitr. This meant Muslims from all over had come to Istanbul to celebrate and many were from countries where women wore full body coverings and the Niqab or veil so that only their eyes were showing. Being brought up Jewish, and in the US and living in Canada this manner of dress was foreign to me. One day while I was there, I was trapped in a tunnel with a crowd of people that was so thick we were not moving. It seemed everyone was headed to a nearby Mosque. I’m a bit claustrophobic so this was terrifying, and I panicked. Looking around me I felt so obviously different with my blond curly hair, jeans, and all the other women I saw were completely covered with only their eyes showing. I felt so alone and as the panic rose, I was unable to catch my breath. There was a woman close beside me, wearing a Niqab, who must have sensed my discomfort because she very gently placed her hand on my shoulder and looked at me with the kindest eyes, and audibly breathed slowly. We were stuck in the tunnel for 30 minutes and the whole time she kept her hand on my shoulder and we continued to stare into each other’s and breathe. Without her I don’t know how I could have made it through. When we finally left the tunnel, she gave my shoulder a squeeze and we bowed our heads to each other. That encounter was an awakening. All my preconceptions about devout Muslim women wearing a Niqab dissolved and I realized that it doesn’t matter what we wear but who we are inside. And this women was so kind, so patient, so healing in the very moment I needed her, despite our differences.

If I were to start a movement it would be about this very type of awakening, an internal movement that allows us to change ourselves in a profound way so that we can determine what actions to take. If enough of us awaken, then we can change the planet! My awakening led to my latest film project bringing young adults from Jewish, Christian and Muslim communities together to work through the arts. So far, I have a 10-minute clip called Who is the Other? that shows how the different communities explored their similarities and differences though music, drama, movement and art. It was a profound gathering and most of the participants had never engaged with members of the other faiths. It was my awakening experience in Istanbul that led to this action.

Here is an evolving list of tools that can help us start an Awakening Movement:

The Story Within

The process I describe in my book is meant to be a tool to use myths, fairy tales, and creativity, to uncover and work with hidden and inaccessible aspects of ourselves. It is a practical resource, a step by- step guide to the process that we can follow at our own pace, also presenting a framework to understand the theory and practical application. This arts-based approach– creating masks, artwork, costumes, dramatic scenes, music and movement, can be a helpful way to rediscover our inspiration and sense of meaning and lead to a personal awakening.

S.L.O.W.

S — stop, breathe, L- look, listen, O- open to what is here right now, W- wake up! I think this acronym can be a simple helpful tool that we can use at any moment to make us more aware, more present, and therefore more able to react in a helpful and healing way to what happens.

Arts for Health

Start a creative practice. It doesn’t matter what medium, or if you have any training, this is for you and for your health. Find a way to express your experiences. Explore different mediums, sign up for classes if that feels right. Most important is that creativity becomes as necessary as eating or sleeping. And it can be very simple and spontaneous without the need for expense, extensive materials, or time. It can be a quick free form movement, an exploration of sounds in the shower, a drawing doodle during long meetings, anything that keeps your creative muscles active and alive. Form Arts for Health groups where you share your creations. And these creations can lead to social action — murals dealing with racism, plays giving voice to those have been silenced, songs honouring Ruth Bader Ginsberg, the possibilities are endless.

Embrace Discomfort

I know this is not easy and the last thing we want to do. However, to truly awaken we need to embrace our discomfort and learn to see it as a friend. Without discomfort we wouldn’t grow. To begin a new relationship with our discomfort, find one book, one person, one activity, that makes you a bit uncomfortable and stay with it. Notice your discomfort and how you respond to these feelings. Do you run away, avoid, get angry, sad? The more awareness you have about your reactions to discomfort the more you can stay with it and let it lead you to new awakenings.

Curiosity and Joy

What draws so many of us to young babies is their immediate sense of curiosity about everything they encounter and also their pure joy at the simple movement of light or a stranger’s smile. We all have that capacity and the more we foster curiosity and joy the more open we are to change and to awakening.

Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Do you have a story about how that was relevant in your life?

“Dance above the surface of the world. Let your thoughts lift you into creativity that is not hampered by opinion.”
Red Haircrow, an award-winning writer, educator, psychologist and filmmaker

I find that I constantly rediscover the meaning of this quote . I love the imagery, the movement, and the sentiment of going beyond our opinions. I think this notion of allowing our creativity to soar above the restraints of our limitations is truly inspiring. For me this idea became central while working on my documentary film about the shame and stigma that still surrounds the issue of suicide. I received two major grants for my research and many in the research community strongly suggested I seek out “experts” to get their opinions on why there was this continued shame and stigma. I was told my film would have more “weight” and influence if the audience could hear their expert opinions. However, the idea in this quote of “…creativity not hampered by opinion.” led me to take a different path. Instead of turning to professors and researchers, I found a self-help support group for suicide survivors. All participants lost family to suicide and used the term “survivors” to describe themselves My own loss of an uncle to suicide allowed me entrance and acceptance into the group. To understand and capture their experience through visual data, I asked if some of them would participate in a documentary film. Responding to their theme of feeling as if they had to wear a mask, mask making, and masks became central to the research. The survivors participated in mask-making workshops, and the masks, once made and put on, became a poignant, extremely emotional metaphor for the trauma of the suicide itself and the need to hide that trauma from the outside world. The film then went on to win some awards and travel the world. And it was the survivor’s courage and stories that gave the film its weight. Using the quote as a guiding light led me to enter this painful subject in a creative and authentic way.

I believe that the quote helped me write and complete my book. In trying to write the book I had extensive moments of writer’s block and a dear friend said to me “You need to go through process as you write”. This meant that I would have go through each step that I outline in the book and share my own personal process. I tried hard to resist this, but it was the only way I could write so… as I outlined the concepts and each step, I would go down into my basement and do the work. This meant, making masks, writing, embodying a character, building an environment and engaging others to work with me. And then going upstairs and writing, sharing some of my personal process. It was totally immersive, the words flowed, and I finished the book. However, when I sent it to the publisher I was hoping they would tell me to leave my own process out. They did not. Here was the quote in action again, I had to “dance above the surface of the world…. Not hampered by opinion…” trust the process.

I think another aspect of how this quote affected me is in the development of the story within approach. The process involves an in-depth relationship with a self-selected myth or fairy tale, that evokes a personal sense of relevance, although not understood. The identification of the story, the character in it, and the dramatic moment that is felt to be the most significant, all involve a personal quest. Without being required to understand or make the character/life connection, we enjoy creating masks, art — work, costumes, dramatic scenes, music, and movement, as we identify with our character. This “not knowing” and trust in the journey itself allows the depth work to be done and allows the internal story, the one that is hidden, buried, and hardest to access, to be gradually revealed, often for the first time. Red Haircrow’s quote gave me courage to persist in my approach to therapy and to life as an inquiry, a journey into the unknown. If creativity is to soar and go beyond our opinions we have to let go of certainty. I believe when we are certain, we don’t feel the need to pay attention. In contrast, when we are uncertain, we become more sensitive to context and engage in the present and can come up with more creative solutions.

I am thankful to this quote for helping me to awaken to my own limitations and opinions, so that I can “…dance above the surface of the world…”. May we all get on our dancing shoes and take that first step….

What is the best way our readers can follow you on social media?

My website

Thank you for these fantastic insights. We wish you only continued success in your great work!


Author Yehudit Silverman: “5 Things Anyone Can Do To Optimize Their Mental Wellness” was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Female Disruptors: Carrie Martz of Clean Light Laboratories On The Three Things You Need To Shake…

Female Disruptors: Carrie Martz of ‘Clean Light Laboratories’ On The Three Things You Need To Shake Up Your Industry

Perseverance– I have had to be relentless to overcome all the hurdles to launch this business from social media to manufacturing, to when our product got stuck in China during the outbreak of COVID-19. We are constantly hitting new roadblocks and how we overcome them or develop work around is the way we will grow.

As a part of our series about women who are shaking things up in their industry, I had the pleasure of interviewing Carrie Martz, CEO and Founder of Clean Light Laboratories.

Carrie Martz is a nationally recognized and award winning senior level executive and entrepreneur. She has over 35 years’ experience within the startup, consultancy, product marketing, PR, and manufacturing industries. During this time she has founded several companies and nonprofits while demonstrating a knack for product development, marketing communications, brand development, developing diverse distribution and marketing channels, business growth, preparing businesses for sale, advertising, and social media marketing.

Currently, Carrie is CEO and Founder of Clean Light Laboratories. She founded the company to develop unique sanitizing solutions for the growing hygiene conscious population. The company began by designing and manufacturing the world’s first sanitizing, charging and storage system for intimate products but after receiving their patent expanded the line in to all household products including baby and beauty.

Carrie also consults on marketing and branding issues through another company she founded called Carrie On Consulting.

Carrie began her career by building the Martz Agency from scratch and over three decades grew it into an award winning, highly profitable company. She went from a single client to a Top 10 advertising agency and one of the top women-owned businesses in the southwest. What made Martz Agency unique was its dedication to community causes in tandem with national product launches for its main clients. The primary focus was on real estate developments, home building, golf resorts, and master planned communities.

Carrie sold the agency to Bob Parsons, founder of Go Daddy in 2013. She remained on board of the newly re-named Martz Parsons Company, acting as CEO and President for an additional 18 months and helped to double the size of the staff during its transformation into a nationally recognized agency. During this time she retained 100% of the agency’s clients and was recognized as the Bronze Winner of Woman Marketer of the Year nationally by Stevie Awards.

Outside of work, Carrie has garnered a reputation for working on non-profit boards, advisory boards and helping with charities. She is currently on the Western Board of Cancer Treatment Centers of America and a non-profit focused on the safety of children called Maxie’s House. Previously, she has sat on the boards of numerous companies and nonprofits including being the founder and Chair of Celebrity Sock Hop and Bachelor Bid for Cystic Fibrosis, Marketing Co-Chair for Super Bowl XXX, and a Foundation Board Member of the Phoenix Children’s Hospital as well as Childhelp USA.

Carrie Martz graduated Arizona State University with a Bachelor of Science in Marketing and was honored with the Most Distinguished Alumni ASU Marketing Award in 1997. Throughout her career, Carrie has been honored and recognized for her business acumen and position as one of the leading women in business today. She is the recipient of the Athena Award for Business Woman of the Year (1998) and Phoenix Chamber’s Athena in (1996), Golden Heart of Business Award (1997), and the Women of Distinction Award (1998).

Carrie is a mother of two adult children and grandmother to two beautiful granddaughters.

Thank you so much for doing this with us! Before we dig in, our readers would like to get to know you a bit more. Can you tell us a bit about your “backstory”? What led you to this particular career path?

I started an advertising agency in my 20’s, funded by selling my mustang. I sold the agency thirty+ years later to Bob Parsons, Founder of Go Daddy. During my agency days, I helped bring several products to market that became nationally recognized brands. I was also very involved in non-profits especially focused on women’s causes. After selling my business, and not being ready to retire, I looked at a variety of industries focused on women’s health. Women were inventing all types of products to feel younger, healthier and more vibrant. I saw a need to provide a system that would safely sanitize intimate care products thus keeping women healthier. Knowing UV-C light had been used in hospitals for decades I understood that it killed germs, but had not seen any product available for home use. I invented, and brought to market, the worlds’ first locked sanitizing system that was scientifically tested and proven to kill 99.9% of bacteria and germs that may lead to disease. A year later we received our patent for Sanitization of Complex products, and quickly pivoted our efforts to develop more applications for all types of products that are difficult to sanitize yet harbor serious germs and bacteria. This all happened before the pandemic.

Can you tell our readers what it is about the work you’re doing that’s disruptive?

We took hospital grade technology and figured out how to make it affordable for everyday home use. We were also the first company to market a sanitizer in the intimate health category. Even though we were only selling the sanitizer, not the products, we were banned from advertising on Facebook and other social media platforms. And if truth be told, even manufacturers of intimate products were hoping we would go away. But we didn’t. We found alternative ways to tell our story and we sold thousands of our first products. To my surprise, we are facing the same problem now on various social media platforms, based on scientifically proven claims we’re making that relate to killing SARS-CoV-2, with our new product “Puritize”. Shortly after the pandemic outbreak, dozens of cheap untested UVC sanitizers came on the market. We had been manufacturing since 2017 and had scientifically proven results. To continue to highlight our differential and focus on consumer safety, we have proven that our system kills more than 99.9% of SARS-CoV2, the virus that causes COVID-19, through an independent lab study. Puritize kills COVID-19 on things you touch and we can’t promote this because social media channels are afraid it supports fear with consumers and may be political in nature. Again, we are working through these hurdles to get our message out so we can provide safe, proven solutions to the public. Additionally, we have created several adapters, using our patented advanced refraction technology, to penetrate and sanitize other daily use items that harbor bacteria.

Can you share a story about the funniest mistake you made when you were first starting? Can you tell us what lesson you learned from that?

Early on we were having trouble in China with our manufacturer. Of course, I thought I will go over there and straighten these people out. And while I was smart enough to hire a translator, even she didn’t understand what they were talking about. Two weeks in China, lesson learned. Hire someone with experience in manufacturing in China and stay in the US where I understand the language and know what I am good at.

We all need a little help along the journey. Who have been some of your mentors? Can you share a story about how they made an impact?

One of my first mentors was Cristina Carlino, the founder of philosophy. She built a company around an amazing brand and created a huge following that even 15 years after she sold the company, her fans are still trying to reach out to her and beg her to bring their favorite product “Grace” back. Cristina taught me about being authentic and true to your brand and to listen to and appreciate every customer. Recently, I have had the great fortune of working with another powerful, smart, and accomplished woman, Deb Henretta, a former president at P&G, one of only two female presidents in their history. Deb has not only helped me navigate the many challenges of a start-up but has reminded me to celebrate the little wins along the way.

In today’s parlance, being disruptive is usually a positive adjective. But is disrupting always good? When do we say the converse, that a system or structure has ‘withstood the test of time’? Can you articulate to our readers when disrupting an industry is positive, and when disrupting an industry is ‘not so positive’? Can you share some examples of what you mean?

I believe that disruption, just by its meaning, is uncomfortable. However, it is necessary to advance our economy. Disruption creates hard conversations about status quo. Telemedicine is a disrupter that benefits so many and ultimately should save Americans thousands of dollars but has changed the way people think about healthcare professionals. And without the one on one relationship with a doctor, how does trust develop? Crowdfunding is a great disrupter for bringing new ideas to market and forwarding entrepreneurship, yet it has a risk for purchasers. I would look at being disruptive as a good thing if it adds value to the industry and ultimately the consumer.

Can you share 3 of the best words of advice you’ve gotten along your journey? Please give a story or example for each.

Patience — something I lack. I expected that we could get a product designed, manufactured and on the shelves within a year or so. I have learned that my timeline is not anyone else’s.

Perseverance– I have had to be relentless to overcome all the hurdles to launch this business from social media to manufacturing, to when our product got stuck in China during the outbreak of COVID-19. We are constantly hitting new roadblocks and how we overcome them or develop work arounds is the way we will grow.

Shift — Be prepared to make important adjustments to your business strategy as conditions change. Prior to COVID-19 breaking out we were preparing to announce and bring to market the world’s first Menstrual Cup and Sanitizing Kit using our UV-C patented technology. When the pandemic hit, we quickly repositioned all our resources to produce PURITIZE Home to help families stay safe by offering a system that kills the coronavirus on things they touch everyday.

We are sure you aren’t done. How are you going to shake things up next?

I believe that if you do for others, good things will happen. I am committed to making a difference in the health and well being of women’s lives, in particular. I intend to create more ways to give back through unique cause related programs. I learned early on that people will give if they believe in the cause and are given the opportunity.

In your opinion, what are the biggest challenges faced by ‘women disruptors’ that aren’t typically faced by their male counterparts?

It is absolutely our lack of confidence. When a man goes to pitch an idea or company, he is confident. His ego drives the presentation and ultimately the confidence of investors that drives the market. Women pitch differently. As much as we believe in our product or solution, we do not sell hard enough. We have been taught to not show emotion and now to the point that we aren’t demonstrating to our potential supporters that we believe and we have what it takes to get the job done. We have to own the power of the words we choose while being true to ourselves.

Do you have a book/podcast/talk that’s had a deep impact on your thinking? Can you share a story with us?

There is no one who has made a bigger impact on my life than Gerda Weissman Klein, humanitarian and Holocaust survivor. Her book, All But My Life -One Survivors Story, in it’s 86 edition worldwide, changed my thinking. Out of all the motivational and inspirational podcasts and books I have read or listened to, Gerda’s messages gets to my core. When I am afraid I won’t be good enough or successful enough and I feel a bit sorry for myself, I ask “How bad can it be?” We have our freedom. I have my health and I own my outcome.

You are a person of great influence. If you could inspire a movement that would bring the most amount of good to the most amount of people, what would that be? You never know what your idea can trigger. 🙂

Firstly, more mentorship for young women, and more support by women for women’s advancement with more female representatives on national boards. Secondly, more support for manufacturing incentives in the US to reduce our reliance on China but still being able to bring affordable consumer solutions to market.

Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share how that was relevant to you in your life?

You are tougher than you think! Over the years I have faced significant ups and downs in business and in my personal life. Right before the great recession, in 2007, I had 60 employees, two offices, owned a 15000 sq ft. building, and 90% of my client base was in real estate. Literally over a 30-day period my client base dropped to less than 10%. The next year was extremely difficult to manage through the building, layoffs and a divorce. My attorneys told me to declare bankruptcy, of which I did not take their advice. I powered through and rebuilt, started over financially, as well. Three years later I sold my agency for a nice multiple which gave me the opportunity to start another business, Clean Light Laboratories.

How can our readers follow you online?

Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/carrie-martz-198951/

Puritize’s Instagram and Facebook: https://www.instagram.com/puritize/, https://www.facebook.com/Puritize/

For more information about Puritize please visit Puritize.com.

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Female Disruptors: Carrie Martz of Clean Light Laboratories On The Three Things You Need To Shake… was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.