Category: Featured

Lessons from a Thriving Power Couple, With Devan and Morgan Kline Of Burn Boot Camp

An Interview With Candice Georgiadis

Saving the best for last on purpose! We do everything 50/50 and it’s important to us to divide and conquer, especially with the kids. We go 50/50 in all of our business decisions we make, so why would parenting be any different? This isn’t 50/50 in responsibility, but in willingness. Do I actually change as many diapers as Morgan in a diaper-to-diaper scale? No, but I’m willing to.

As a part of our series about lessons from Thriving Power Couples, I had the pleasure of interviewing Devan and Morgan Kline.

Devan and Morgan Kline are the co-founders of Burn Boot Camp, one of the nation’s fastest growing group fitness brands with over 300 open gyms in 39 states and an aggressive pipeline of 55 gyms to open by the end of 2022. Founded in 2012 by husband-wife duo Devan and Morgan, who now have three children of their own, Burn Boot Camp was created as a tool to inspire mental, emotional, and physical transformation via a passionate, supportive fitness community with the overall aim of building confidence.

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Thank you so much for doing this with us! Can you tell us a story about what brought you two to your respective career paths?

Morgan: When we first started Burn Boot Camp, I was working full time at the Kellogg Company while working with Devan in the morning and at night with Burn Boot Camp. I was finding fulfillment in seeing people smile, making people feel happier when they walked out than when they walked in and realized I wanted to start impacting people more — full time, all the time, because it was impacting me more, too. At this point I went through my own transformation by quitting my job and committing myself to fitness full time.

Devan: My first major success was becoming a professional baseball player, although this was also my first monumental failure. After working years to get to where I was, I was released from the team. I felt defeated. I had a moment of weakness and convinced myself I had failed. As I was sitting there with my head in my hands, feeling defeated, my girlfriend, now wife and business partner, Morgan, called me and told me to keep moving. Ever since that day, her words have stuck with me and have become the tagline for more life, and the drive to take my passion for building community and fitness to found Burn Boot Camp.

Can you share the most interesting story that happened to you since you two got married?

Morgan and Devan: We were having our 3rd baby, closing all of our gyms, live streaming in our house with employees who were living with us for lockdown. When we shut down our gyms — we weren’t going to leave members hanging and believed they needed us then more than ever. Morgan, 8 months pregnant, was working out with me in 80-degree livestream studio that we set up at my house. Our entire family turned into trainers, even our daughter Cameron, was streaming kids’ camps for our children of Burn Nation.

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

Morgan and Devan: Devan created a referral rewards program that incentivized our current members to bring friends into the gym to try us out. If their friend joined, they got 50% off their next month’s membership. Devan would write them a handwritten check and pass them out in camp. One time he was promoting the program and posted a stack of checks on social media, not realizing that he was giving away our bank information (routing/checking/etc.) to the world! He quickly had Morgan and several members calling him to tell him to take it down!! Lesson learned for him to not show all of our private information online.

What do you think makes your company stand out? Can you share a story?

Morgan and Devan: Burn Boot Camp is all about community. When you step into one of our gyms, you become a part of #BurnNation. With our supportive, inspiring, and motivating community, you’ll have all you need to achieve greatness, and we’re proud that this sense of community has been authentically translated across our franchise partner network.

In the parking lot days, we had 150 women at an outdoor Saturday camp in the 95-degree heat. We had a very hard leg workout — and we approached the finisher with 150 sweaty and tired people. We lined up and began sprints and we were working so hard that a few members’ legs were so tired that they gave out and they fell down. Scraping elbows and knees — one by one, over 10 fell down. What happened next solidified who we are as a brand. Members who finished the sprints were sprinting back to help those who fell. They were literally carrying them across the finish line. It was that moment in time where Morgan and I knew we had something special.

Are you working on any exciting new projects now? How do you think that will help people?

Devan: We’re thrilled by Burn Boot Camp’s rapid growth — we currently have over 300 gyms open in 39 states and should have as many as over 50 additional gyms open by the end of the year. We also recently had our 500th franchise signing, a super exciting milestone for our team. Looking ahead, we plan to further foster connection and offer more benefits to our community with new digital offerings, continuing to offer our members support throughout every element of their lives.

Morgan: Echoing Devan, we’re looking forward to continuing to empower our community and our members by bringing back some of our annual challenges and initiatives such as the Be Their Muscle campaign in July, which has raised over a million dollars for the Muscular Dystrophy Association (MDA).

What advice would you give to other CEOs or founders to help their employees to thrive?

Morgan: There will always be problems and setbacks; in life and in business and in fitness. My younger self may have thought that these problems would go away, but in reality, problems will always be there and there will always be challenges. The problems just get better and better and sometimes harder, but they never go away. Tackle your day, knowing there will be problems, and shift your mindset to find solutions to create for yourself and people around you.

Devan: Having a positive and progressive attitude, communicating a vision effectively, recognizing small victories, and being empathetic are essential to being a strong leader and ensuring your employees feel empowered to do their best work possible. We’ve made it our priority to replicate and instill these traits from the top-down as we work with our Franchise Partners nationwide to ensure they are adopting the same approach with their on-the-ground teams and trainers.

How do you define “Leadership”?

Morgan: Leadership to me is being the best version of yourself so you can be the strongest leader for your company/team. Life is all about balance, and I know I need to put my family first in order to feel confident showing up for my career every day. Leadership is also about teamwork and delegating to people that love our mission and what they’re doing. As a leader, I naturally want to hold onto every little thing, but the biggest mistake is that people want to do things by themselves, for themselves, alone.

Devan: Leadership to me means maximizing your time to the best of your abilities, using every free minute to better yourself, to better your team and organization. In addition, I am all about connection, and aim to fully connect whenever I have the opportunity to visit our franchise partners and on a day-to-day basis at our home office.

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?

Morgan: Our business, Burn Boot Camp, wouldn’t never have been possible without my husband, Devan Kline. In addition, I’ve always been inspired by my mom and sister. I lost my dad when I was 5 years old, and my mom became a single mom overnight. I watched my mom’s work ethic as she worked so hard for our family and always showed up with a smile on her face. She became my motivation, and the strength and courage she had inspires me.

Devan: Anytime I am asked the question, “who inspired you along the way?”, Morgan is the only person I can give that title to. Mostly, because my weaknesses are her strengths. Partly, because she calls me on my bullshit when no one else will. I think the definition of marriage is to conspire together to compete and make each other stronger. She always believed in my dream to go to the MLB and play under the bright lights. But my dreams were absolutely crushed when I finally got released in 2011 from the San Francisco Giants Baseball Organization. Something I worked for my entire life was gone in one moment and the worst part was I didn’t even see it coming. But Morgan was there and gave me some of the best advice I’ve ever received. She said, “Look where you’ve come from, look at what you have accomplished, and use this to propel yourself. You just have to keep moving babe.”

How have you used your success to bring goodness to the world?

Morgan: I found my life’s calling in founding Burn Boot Camp with Devan as it allows me to fulfill my passion for positively impacting other people’s lives. As a mom with a full-time career, I learned first-hand the pressures that many women have to ‘do it all’ and how overwhelming that pressure can be. My goal at Burn Boot Camp is to support our members and debunk the weight-loss narrative that permeates the fitness industry, encouraging women that they are beautiful just the way they are. You can still have goals to lose weight or goals to be healthier in other areas of your life, but we want to instill confidence first.

Devan: Our community is unmatched, and it has been so rewarding to see how we’ve been able to scale our hometown community out of parking lots when we first started, to a nationwide network of franchise partners. It has been also great to lean into community driven initiatives across our network with programs like the Be Their Muscle campaign that benefits the Muscular Dystrophy Association (MDA), which brings our community together even more to support an incredible initiative.

What are the “5 Things You Need To Thrive As A Couple”? Please share a story or example for each.

Morgan and Devan:

Number 1: We believe power couples are great communicators. Communication with each other is super crucial!

Number 2: Don’t disagree with each other in front of other people. Maintain cohesiveness! People need leaders through tough times, and you can’t be the turbulent ones, especially if you are owning a business.

Number 3: Don’t have expectations of one another that are going to hinder your happiness. That way, your expectation isn’t carrying your happiness. You should have expectations for yourself, to be accountable for things, but don’t tie it to your happiness. It’s key as we’re talking about a power couple. We are individuals first, that come together to create the power couple.

Number 4: You have to be intentional about carving out time to be husband and wife. Make sure you make your relationship a priority. Date nights, or the time we get to travel with each other and have one on one time outside of our normal setting, that’s where some of our great ideas come from. That’s where we can dream and make wishes about ourselves and our families.

Number 5: Saving the best for last on purpose! We do everything 50/50 and it’s important to us to divide and conquer, especially with the kids. We go 50/50 in all of our business decisions we make, so why would parenting be any different? This isn’t 50/50 in responsibility, but in willingness. Do I actually change as many diapers as Morgan in a diaper-to-diaper scale? No, but I’m willing to!

You are people 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?

Morgan and Devan: I would love to see a shift in how the fitness industry defines success as it looks so different for everyone — it could be defined by weight loss, finding time for themselves as they balance work and family life, having more confidence, or so many other things! People don’t need to look a certain way to be healthy and fit, and we encourage this mentality by having no mirrors in any of our gyms. There is so much pressure on people, particularly mothers, who are trying to do it all, and our aim is to have Burn Boot Camp be a safe place where people put themselves first and leave feeling better than when they walk in the door.

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

Morgan and Devan:

“Success is never owned, it is rented, and the rent is due every day.” — Rory Vaden. This quote reminds me that no matter what, I need to put in the work every day. It inspires me not to have a “I made it” mentality. Success is not something that is handed out or given to anyone, it must be earned. The great thing is when you know you’ve put in all the hard work, it makes the success much sweeter!

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 with whom you would love to have a private breakfast or lunch with, and why?

Morgan: Sarah Blakely (Spanx Founder) is someone I look up to in business. She gives back and she’s doing the right thing, which I find super inspiring.

Devan: If I could sit down with anyone and pick their brain about anything it would either be Mark Cuban or Elon Musk. I would love to own the San Francisco Giants one day and Mark would be a great person to talk to. I think the mission to be a multiplanetary species is exciting as well and I’d want to ask tons of questions around that to Elon.

Thank you so much for joining us. This was very inspirational.

Lessons from a Thriving Power Couple, With Devan and Morgan Kline Of Burn Boot Camp was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Female Disruptors: Elizabeth Ashford Of Beyond The Beez On The Three Things You Need To Shake Up…

Female Disruptors: Elizabeth Ashford Of Beyond The Beez On The Three Things You Need To Shake Up Your Industry

An Interview With Candice Georgiadis

I know these seem overly simple, but there is a reason we hear these pieces of advice so often. For the first piece of advice, don’t compare, it’s clear how easy that is to do but stay focused on your goal, take steps towards them every day, and trust the timing of your life.

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

Elizabeth is the founder of BTBz, a stigma-free resource guide, e-commerce platform, and social community supporting young people’s sexual wellness journeys. She hopes that by working to champion affirming and inclusive sex education, she can help form a world where questions, consent, and curiosity are not the unexpected — but the norm.

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 sexual education journey started in college. I graduated from Harvard College in 2019 with a degree in psychology. While an undergraduate, I was involved in SHEATH (Sexual Health and Education Throughout Harvard College). We put on what we coined sex week and sex weekend which were a series of events hosted by sex-educators to teach a variety of topics that most education systems don’t provide. Post-graduation, I wanted to put my love for psychology, research, accessible education and sexual wellness into one space…… and BTBz was born!

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

When it comes to BTBz, there is nothing more rewarding. For me, the happiness lies in the small moments when someone opens up about an internal sexual struggle. As a quick overview, sex and shame are deeply intertwined due to cultural norms, parental shaming, toxic masculinity, slut shaming and so much more. Furthermore, that same shame often gets its power from being unspeakable.

That is why it is so rewarding to create a space, even if I am identified as that ‘space’, where people can come to share the feelings/experiences/thoughts that they have been harboring in for months, years, or decades.

When people share their struggles, it gives BTBz a chance to let them know they are, in fact, normal. I can often visibly see a weight lifted off someone’s shoulders when they hear this. The power in this release can be truly life-changing.

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 think what’s interesting about being a founder is wearing so many hats. Mistakes can often be made because you are teaching yourself new skill sets every single day. These mistakes can range from a grammar typo to sending an email to the wrong partner (never a fun one!) But you’re learning more than ever before.

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?

When I think of a mentor, I think of someone who pushes you and questions you — but is always in your corner. My parents come to mind as my biggest mentors. They are always here to support me on my hardest days but keep pushing me to my best. If you are someone who doesn’t have your family’s support, I recommend connecting to like minded communities!

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?

Being disruptive doesn’t always feel good and it is important to both accept that truth and depersonalize it. That way, the days when you feel like people are putting you down or judging you, you can remind yourself that this is the journey of being disruptive. In that same vein, I remind myself that you will never change the world by thinking just like it. The social norms we have formed around ourselves are just ideas built by other people. It is ok to push against those ideas.

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

Here are my top three words of advice that I’ve gotten along the way.

Don’t Compare
If you’re the smartest person in the room, you’re in the wrong room
Treat others the way you would want to be treated

I know these seem overly simple, but there is a reason we hear these pieces of advice so often. For the first piece of advice, don’t compare, it’s clear how easy that is to do but stay focused on your goal, take steps towards them every day, and trust the timing of your life.

When it comes to #2, if you’re the smartest person in the room, you’re in the wrong room, this allows you to welcome corrections, suggestions, and feedback.

I’ve noticed that when I enter a room with this mindset, it often gives my collaborators permission to give feedback without worrying that their thoughts will be matched with a distasteful response. Bring the experts in, listen to them, and work together.

For #3, treating others the way you would want to be treated, can have a huge impact on the work environment. I worked at a company that had a very bad work culture. As my days there continued, I saw that most complaints whether it was from the intern level, or higher up amongst the directory board, were the same. Bad treatment trickles down through the company and becomes the norm. You want to uplift people and make them happy to be around you and your work. That way no one is cutting corners and there is positive and collaborative energy in its place.

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

BTBz is currently undergoing a re-launching. The most exciting part of our relaunch is our content studio. We want our community to be the face (of faceless) aspect of this brand. Our series is called Bodies in Motion, where the content is featuring our community, with no face, just bodies. You can see examples of this all over our Instagram.

Here is what I love about this: too often we let this spotlight shine on the influencers and models … but let’s ask ourselves — why can’t we be the star of our own show? Why can’t we be the center of a campaign — especially one that focuses on human relations and body empowerment. At BTBz, we are ready to put that element back in the hands of our audience and redefine what inclusivity looks like.

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

There are many challenges for female disruptors. I am reminded of this in the workplace, in my personal life, with relationships, and more. The double standard is everywhere.

What’s important about the male vs female dynamics is that it isn’t just men upholding ideas that make us feel small. Sometimes our female counterparts or even ourselves are just as guilty of this.

My biggest tip to fight gender oppression is to “flip the scenario”. Let me explain: When you are questioning if gender is a part of the issue you are facing, — flip the narrative — if a man was the one in the context, would it be the same? If its clear misogyn is involved — stand your ground. Make sure you are holding yourself to the same standard you want others to hold you to and not allowing people to belittle or undermine you based on gender.

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

One book that changed my life is called The Compound Effect by Darren Hardy. The book starts off with a thought-provoking question: “If you were given a choice between getting $3 million in cash today or a single penny that doubles in value every day for 31 days, which one would you choose?” Many of us would go to grab the big chunk of change, but the answer is the penny.

Hardy makes you realize that the slow, consistent pace has such value, and it helps me remember that even the slow days are still a step in the right direction. Take the time to build the foundation for your brand or your goals and exercise little habits that will set you up for success.

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. 🙂

My focus at this current moment would be to galvanize enough support to change the current direction our reproductive rights are headed in. I won’t go too far into this discussion, but I will say that our human rights are on the line. If you are on the side of pro-life, I ask that you at least make sure that you are 100% educated on the matter, because that is often where many go wrong.

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

My favorite quote, specifically for disruptors, is by Florence Given in her book Women Don’t Owe You Pretty:

“You cannot win, and the world will judge you either way. Being your authentic self-forces people to reveal whether they deserve a place in your life or not”

I love this quote because this mindset can really help any disruptor keep their head up high despite critique of judgment. Not everyone will understand your path, but continue on with what feels true to you. (P.s if you want more amazing quotes, I can’t recommend her book enough)

How can our readers follow you online?

You can find Beyond The Beez by going to our Website (our relaunch is coming at the end of august) and our Instagram!

Thank you so much for joining us. This was very inspirational.

Female Disruptors: Elizabeth Ashford Of Beyond The Beez On The Three Things You Need To Shake Up… was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Female Disruptors: Cheryl Dowling Of The IVF Warrior On The Three Things You Need To Shake Up Your…

Female Disruptors: Cheryl Dowling Of The IVF Warrior On The Three Things You Need To Shake Up Your Industry

An Interview With Candice Georgiadis

Don’t compare your journey to others. — There’s a saying “comparison is the thief of joy”, I believe this holds true for so many different situations in life. Whether it’s comparing relationships, careers, finances, real estate, travel, or more. Comparing usually leaves you feeling really crappy and full of negative self-talk. It’s important to remember that everyone’s path is different and what you see from the outside, isn’t often the full story. Be kind to yourself and focus on you, it’s more productive.

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

Cheryl Dowling is a Certified Counselor, women’s health advocate, and founder of The IVF Warrior, a leading fertility health and wellness platform connecting people from all over the world who are struggling with fertility issues and navigating different paths to parenthood. On The IVF Warrior she provides support, resources, and empowerment across multiple social platforms to those struggling with infertility.

Absolutely! My background is in both mental health and business. Many years ago, I landed a position as a women’s mental health counselor. Focusing my career on women’s health and wellness wasn’t what I originally envisioned, but I can’t imagine having any other focus. It’s truly shaped who I am today. I’ve supported women struggling with mental health issues in many settings, and have had countless clients navigating infertility and loss too. This showed me how complex these issues are, and how misunderstood and isolating they can be.

Around this time, I started my own fertility journey. What came afterwards was an infertility diagnosis, multiple rounds of IVF, and recurrent pregnancy loss to build my family. I felt first-hand how emotional and isolating infertility, IVF, and loss were. This is when my current platform, The IVF Warrior was founded. I recognized while navigating my path to parenthood that support and resources for those experiencing fertility issues was very limited. I started sharing my story, as well as providing information for those trying to conceive or dealing with different health struggles while trying to grow their family. I’ve been able to combine my professional background in both counseling and business with my personal struggles. It’s not something many do, but I was able to take pain and struggles to create something meaningful and helpful to so many. It’s something I’m very passionate about.

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

1 in 4 experience loss. 1 in 6 experience infertility. Statistics you never think you’ll be part of, but once you become part of them, you realize how common it is, yet no one talks about it. I knew that something had to be done to change this. No one should ever have to face the toughest battle of their life in silence.

The work I do is disruptive for many reasons including the fact that I talk about the things that are typically battled silently. I encourage others to share their story if their comfortable. I remind people that they don’t have to suffer in silence to make other people comfortable, and that no matter what you’re facing, you’re not alone. Infertility, mental health, and pregnancy loss are still so stigmatized and taboo. Many still believe that someone’s personal struggles should remain “personal”, and that talking about them is attention seeking or inappropriate. It’s been my mission to break down these walls so those struggling have a safe-space to access resources and much-needed support.

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?

Not double-checking work! Posting social content with spelling errors is a hard lesson. I learned quickly to even triple check before posting content online, especially content that can’t be edited! People love to correct errors and call people out on mistakes — you see it daily on social media posts for various platforms. To this day, memes stating “I do my best editing after I press send”, still get me. It happens to the best of us, but I definitely had a few situations of having to take down graphics and/or other content to fix it. So, lesson learned, always check your work!

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?

There have been so many amazing people I’ve met throughout the years who’ve supported, guided, or coached me. People who have inspired me, believed in me, and encouraged me along the way. Two that come to mind are:

Erin Bulcao. She’s a close friend who I actually met on social media, and hit it off with instantly! She’s such a major source of support to me, always cheering me on, and inspiring me. She’s been there through the ups and downs, and always offers wisdom.

Dr. Roohi Jeelani. She’s an incredible fertility doctor and inspiration who has shown me that women can do anything they put their mind to. That following your dreams and passions despite what society or others deem acceptable, is important. She’s constantly taking on projects to do good in the world.

It can definitely go both ways, and I think the intentions around “disrupting” is what make the difference.

Relating to what I do, disrupting an industry can be positive if a call for change is overdue and needed. Talking about issues openly, raising awareness, and changing the conversation about things like infertility, mental health, and pregnancy loss, can encourage companies to expand insurance health policies in workplaces to offer more family-building options. It can push companies to have more flexible book-off policies to accommodate someone going through infertility treatments. Talking about these important issues can not only help people feel less alone, but encourage companies to introduce things like mental health days, pregnancy loss leave, and flexible hours. These are good disruptions. They’re leading to more inclusivity and positive changes in the workplace and beyond.

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

Don’t compare your journey to others.

There’s a saying “comparison is the thief of joy”, I believe this holds true for so many different situations in life. Whether it’s comparing relationships, careers, finances, real estate, travel, or more. Comparing usually leaves you feeling really crappy and full of negative self-talk. It’s important to remember that everyone’s path is different and what you see from the outside, isn’t often the full story. Be kind to yourself and focus on you, it’s more productive.

You can never get back time.

This can mean a lot of things from don’t let other people waste your time twice, to learn to prioritize what’s important. For me, it’s also a good reminder that we live in a time where we often feel rushed to get to the next thing. The next job, the next goal, the next dream. It can really take away from what life is offering right now. Life is a series of events — both good and bad, but nothing lasts forever. Hold on during the bad, and embrace the good as it comes. There’s a lot of things in life you can gain back, but time is never one of them. Don’t take today for granted.

Nothing worth doing is easy.

This is an important one when you’re starting something new or already feeling like every obstacle is getting in your way, and you’ve become discouraged. What’s often seen online or from the outside, is the final result — success. Not the countless obstacles, failures, and journey it took someone to get there. It’s important to set out realistic expectations before getting started, so that you aren’t too hard on yourself, or setting yourself up for disappointment and failure.

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

So much! The IVF Warrior is just getting started. There are around 48 million couples and 186 million individuals worldwide living with infertility. The hard conversations must continue. More support, tools, and awareness need to be shared. The IVF Warrior will continue to expand resources and support to reach more and do more for those struggling.

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

I feel like women disruptors get labelled a lot of things compared to men. Whether it’s emotional, dramatic, attention-seeking, extreme, wrong, or opinionated. People tend to have more opinions on women’s behaviors vs. men. It’s a sad reality that I see all the time. I also feel like a lot of the issues that women disruptors try to change are deemed insignificant, so women have to push harder to be seen and heard. Hopefully this changes.

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

I love The Papaya Podcast by Sarah from The Birds Papaya. It’s extremely raw, real, and relatable. I’m really drawn to platforms that normalize things. Sarah does such an amazing job talking about the hard stuff in life and bringing awareness to issues and topics that matter, but in a fun way. It’s so important to know you’re not alone, that perfectionism isn’t healthy or realistic, and to have these honest conversations with others and yourself.

Normalizing mental health including conversations around mental health, the different conditions people face, and treatments including therapy or medication. It should never be “attention seeking” or “shameful” to talk about mental health or any health condition. Mental health is as important as physical health, it’s time it was treated this way. It’s time we end the stigmas and labels. So many people suffer every single day in silence. This needs to change.

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

Never stop chasing rainbows. It’s a quote I fell in love with on my journey, and has stuck with me. It reminds me that no storm lasts forever, and that even if there’s a storm you’re currently living and navigating, beauty can come from it. This helped me throughout my infertility journey and while building a business too.

How can our readers follow you online?

You can find me on:

Instagram: @the.ivf.warrior

Facebook: @theivfwarriorcanada

LinkedIn: The IVF Warrior

I’d love to connect with more of you there!

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

Female Disruptors: Cheryl Dowling Of The IVF Warrior 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.

Dr Pamela Pyle: 5 Things Anyone Can Do To Optimize Their Mental Wellness

An Interview With Candice Georgiadis

A healthy body is the result of genetics, healthy habits, and health checkups. The same can be said for our mental health. A healthy mind is the result of genetics, healthy habits, and mental health check ins.

As a part of my series about the “5 Things Anyone Can Do To Optimize Their Mental Wellness”, I had the pleasure of interviewing Dr. Pamela Prince Pyle.

Dr. Pamela Prince Pyle is a Board-Certified Internal Medicine Physician, Chair of the Board of Africa New Life Ministries in Rwanda, Museum of the Bible Women of Legacy Ambassador, author, and international speaker. She speaks and writes on the topics of global health equity, women’s discipleship, and ingredients which make for a good death. Her website www.drpamela.com is meant to be a resource for navigating the healthcare world once you have been labeled “patient” and discovering that A Good Death is Not an Event, but a Lifestyle.

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 had an interest in medicine when I was younger but did not believe I could afford the extended education. However, a financial aid counselor helped me with scholarships and loans and I graduated second in my medical school class. I chose internal medicine because of the complexity of diseases that affect people in different ways, and I wanted to help solve that complexity for the patient. I especially like working in hospitals and have for most of my career since 1989.

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

I have had many interesting patients for different reasons but one story that I published in the Annals of Emergency Medicine was related to a snake charmer. Yes, a snake charmer. This man had a van full of snakes and would set up in parking lots to do an illegal side show of his prowess with snakes.

Unfortunately, a King Cobra wasn’t in the mood and took a strike at him. Their venom causes muscle paralysis and people die from respiratory failure. In his case we immediately put him on a ventilator, and I had to search for anti-venom (most zoos will carry) but the closest one to us in South Carolina was the Bronx Zoo and they had to life-flight it down. It is about $3000 per bottle, and you give 30 or more bottles depending on weight.

Within an hour of receiving the anti-venom the snake charmer woke up, pulled out all his tubes and left Against Medical Advice (AMA) because he didn’t want to be responsible for the bill and not be arrested for his side show. This case was the first successfully treated King Cobra bite in the US at the time.

Can you share a story with us about the most humorous mistake you made when you were first starting?

I don’t have a humorous story, but a terrifying story was the first day of starting residency. One day you are called Pamela and the next you are called Doctor. I did not get smarter in that one day, but now I was expected to be smarter. I was given a long white coat and pocket protector to go with this new title and make decisions regarding patient’s health, life, and death.

What lesson or take-away did you learn from that? Rarely, does life drop you into this dichotomy of roles which are changed in a twenty-four-hour period. Fortunately, it wasn’t as dramatic as we thought.

While I was a newbie Doctor as well as my graduating classmates, we weren’t stranded. Nurses, who had significantly more experience with patient care and with fearful interns gently guided us to become the person our name tags declared that we were.

My lesson became, “If I don’t know the answer, look it up or ask someone else.” Medicine is one area that you don’t want to fake it until you make it.

None of us can 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 am always grateful for my husband who is a great encourager, but I am grateful for the financial aid counselor I mentioned above as the one who made it possible for me to afford school.

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

The work environment for clinicians had become more difficult. Greater regulatory requirements and less income producing streams are available. Doctors are then forced to see more patients just to keep the doors open. This diminishes one of the joys of medicine, time with patients. The pandemic has affected the mental health of clinicians with higher rates of suicide, depression, anxiety, and PTSD. Self-care must be scheduled into each week. Therapy should be considered for those suffering with mental health symptoms.

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

Relational time together moves a group of people who work together to be a true team.

Ok thank you for all that. Now let’s move to the 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?

A healthy body is the result of genetics, healthy habits, and health checkups. The same can be said for our mental health. A healthy mind is the result of genetics, healthy habits, and mental health check ins.

1. We can’t change our genetics; however, we can become aware of them. Studies between monozygotic (identical) vs. dizygotic (fraternal) twins have revealed a higher incidence of some mental disorders in the identical versus the fraternal twins. Bipolar disorders and schizophrenia are two examples of mental health issues that are more common in the identical twin versus the fraternal twins. However, the identical twins did not have one hundred percent equal expressions of either issue. This indicates environmental factors also affect the outcome for any individual. Understanding our family mental health tree is not meant to define our future, however, it is an opportunity to observe and manage our own environments that favor mental wellness.

2. Healthy Habit #1 — Diet

Nutritional Psychiatry is an advancing discipline in the care of mental health. Studies reveal that processed foods and refined sugars impair brain function including production of serotonin (our emotional feel-good hormone). Traditional diets such as the Mediterranean Diet versus a typical “Western” diet results in a 25% to 35% reduction in risk of depression.

The SMILES trial was one of the earliest interventional studies looking at the impact of a healthy diet in adults with major depressive disorder. The patients that were in the dietary intervention arm had meals which emphasized fruits, vegetable, whole grains, oily fish, extra virgin olive oil, legumes, and raw nuts. There was a significant improvement in depression symptoms with the intervention group after twelve weeks with all other variables confounded.

The greatest first step in our dietary journey to mental wellness is to eradicate processed foods.

3. Healthy Habit #2 — Exercise

We intuitively know that exercise is beneficial to our physical health. However, the benefits to our mental health are just as significant. Research has revealed that exercise is nearly as effective as anti-depressants in the treatment for Major Depressive Disorder.

The spectrum of symptoms associated with anxiety, Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), and Schizophrenia have improved with introduction of exercise into the healthcare regiment.

Exercise benefits extend to prevention of mental health disorders and contribute to mental wellness. One study reviewed different types of exercise and noted the greatest effects were seen in team sports followed closely by cycling and aerobic exercise. In this study they found that exercising forty-five minutes for three to five times per week made the biggest difference. However, even walking had a positive effect on mental health.

In my thirties I began to have a real passion for running marathons. A friend who had a desire to join me but had not been a runner or even exerciser at the time. We began by walking one mailbox to the next followed by running one mailbox interval. It was a great experience for us both and we ran the Marine Corps Marathon together. Starting a fitness program can begin with that simple step of the mailbox interval, whether literal or figurative.

4. Healthy Habit #4 — Sleep

Sleep is a powerful reset for our mind. It should be a time for healing but, often, we can become mental health insomniacs. All the emotions that we don’t process during the day become monsters at night. Anxiety, negative self-talk, depressive symptoms,etc. settle in as night falls. Each stage of sleep, especially REM sleep, is necessary for emotional processing of daytime emotions.

There is a bi-directional component to sleep and mental health. Most mental health disorders contribute to insomnia and insomnia worsens mental health disorders.

“What is the answer?”

Developing a sleep hygiene plan is crucial to the process. I recommend these resources as a starting point, however, many other options exist including The Insomnia Workbook.

5. Healthy Habit #5 — Mindfulness

I want to share a personal story previously printed about the benefits of mindfulness in my life.

It was an ordinary office. The couches and chairs well worn by the patients who came before me. The therapist said, “Take a seat, anywhere you would like.”

My physician mindset thought, “I imagine my choice of chair or couch are already giving insight to this well-respected counselor.” When I mention this, he laughs. “Well, sitting position, body language, greeting, they all give me a sense of the comfort of the patient in the room. I want them to be comfortable.”

This was not my first visit to a therapist for the coat of depression I had worn. Most of the time it was light, however, on this day, it was quite heavy. This was a new therapist; however, I expected a similar approach to working through my issue at hand. I was wrong.

During that first visit, he began by showing me Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging (fMRI) of control subjects without reported depression in comparison to subjects who had depression. I sat up straight in the recliner (yes, I chose the comfy chair close to him). I could not believe the images displayed and the distinct differences of a healthy brain versus one that was trapped in depression. I was intrigued.

He then began to explain that the great majority of those who suffer from depression can be successfully treated through retraining or “re-wiring” how the brain processes negative emotions. He said, “It is not the negative emotion itself which causes depression. It is the struggle against it which can spiral an individual into negative self-talk ultimately resulting in a sense of chronic depression.”

I sat back and processed what he said. It was true, I could be having a great day and a fleeting sense of melancholy would occur. I have experienced significant depression in the past which felt as if I had been consumed in a “black hole”. I would then spend time focusing on avoidance of that “black hole”. If you have ever had depression or anxiety, I am sure that you can relate.

He then switched screens on his computer and said, “This is the good news. These are images after development of a mindfulness practice.”

I sat up again and was amazed at the differences which occurred on these fMRIs. I thought, “But, will this work for me?”

He must have read my mind because he stood up and walked over to the bookshelf. Turning back to me, he said, “I would like for you to read this book. It is called The Mindful Way Through Depression. Also, there is a companion workbook to the book and part of an eight-week program which I believe will significantly help you. We can meet as you want while you complete it.”

I believe if he had not started with the images, I might not have been so willing to try this process of becoming mindful. I am thankful he did. I went from skeptic to advocate during this time. It was a summer of change for me and a new way of thinking that benefits me to this day. I continue to share my story with those who suffer with fear, grief, anxiety, and depression. If I share my bruised authentic life, then perhaps, I may be able to help in another’s bruised authentic life.

I can share that I have had to take an active role in my mental health. A history of suicide, bipolar disorder, and depression have been a part of my family tree. Implementing these healthy habits in my life has significantly benefited my mental wellness. The work is worth the outcome.

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?

I believe the most important role a parent has is to keep their child safe. One of the easiest ways to do so for teens and pre-teens is to say no to social media. Multiple studies have revealed the negative impact of social media on the mental health of our youth. Guiding our children to make this decision for themselves is even better than dictating their adherence to rules.

I believe we forget how smart children are and presenting the facts around social media and mental health is the first step in making the case for a social media exodus or at least holiday.

All the habits I described above are equally applicable to children and adolescents. Parents of adolescents can role model the benefits of healthy habits in the home. It is also crucial for parents to do a “check in” on a regular basis. Parents can become a trusted confidant with relational mindfulness and time. Returning to the concept of family dinners is a simple step towards maintaining open conversations.

We cannot ignore the ongoing impact of our children living through a pandemic. They live in a world that does not feel safe and promotes social isolation. Identifying ways to overcome that will be necessary for a long time.

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

The most impactful book in my life and the best-selling book of all time is the Bible. I did not grow up with religion or spirituality but began seeking answers for the existence of God in my early thirties. I eventually came to the end of me and found faith in the process. My faith has been the greatest gift and gives me hope when the world can feel hopeless.

I am currently reading Atomic Habits and oh how I wish I had come across this book earlier in life. I highly recommend it if you desire a life of effective purpose.

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. 🙂

I believe that I have been called to do just that with the phrase, “A Good Death is Not an Event, but a Lifestyle. A patient who was actively dying told me, “It’s okay, I am going to have a good death”.

The phrase stayed with me, and I began writing about the question, “Is it possible to have a good death?”

I discovered in that journey that yes, it is possible and I have a book coming out with all the ingredients. However, you can also go to my website, www.drpamela.com, and begin the journey. Because we do not know our death date, living as if it were tomorrow will create The Good Death Lifestyle. Asking ourselves these questions is the beginning to a changed life:

Am I truly living my moments?
Am I fully breathing my purpose?
Am I confident of my destination?

Yes, I believe we can begin a movement and I thank you for this question and platform to share my dream.

Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”?

“I’ve learned that people will forget what you said, they will forget what you did, but they will never forget how you made them feel.”

Maya Angelou.

Do you have a story about how that was relevant in your life?

It is a quote that I carry in my heart as a reminder to treat people with kindness and that simple act will be the aroma I leave when I am gone.

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

Thegooddeathdoctor or Dr Pamela on IG, Pamela Prince Pyle on FB and you can contact me through my website, www.drpamela.com.

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

Thank you so much and to you!

Dr Pamela Pyle: 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 Founders: Carlye Morgan Of Chalonne On The Five Things You Need To Thrive and Succeed as a…

Female Founders: Carlye Morgan Of Chalonne On The Five Things You Need To Thrive and Succeed as a Woman Founder

An Interview With Candice Georgiadis

Be very clear in your mission and vision. I knew the company and culture that I wanted to create but I didn’t actually put it to paper until a couple of years into the process. Having a clear vision and mission statement can act as a touchstone for everything you do. When in doubt, ask yourself if it meets one of those objectives, and if it’s not consistent with those values, don’t do it.

As a part of our series about “Why We Need More Women Founders”, I had the pleasure of interviewing Carlye Morgan.

Chalonne, founder and designer Carlye Morgan is a seasoned marketing and advertising executive with two decades of experience working on ubiquitous brands like L’Oreal, Frito Lay and Sony. As a mom and Los Angeles native, Carlye’s unique blend of elegant style and practical function are evident in each band she designs. Carlye founded Chalonne with the ethos of empowering women and giving back built into its DNA.

For my entire life, I’ve always had an artistic mind and a passion for design. I loved expressing myself through drawing and painting and studied art history at the University of Pennsylvania. While I loved the arts, I ultimately decided to pursue advertising — where I could marry my creative side to the reliability of a business career. Although this granted me a breadth of invaluable marketing and strategic business experiences, I always had an inkling I would return to my artistic roots. The moment presented itself when I was taking a respite from corporate life and identified a business opportunity and white space to design luxury Apple Watch bands.

Each design is a metaphor of my personal experiences through travel. Evoking pristine beaches, the scent of dried grass, Venetian architecture or the relentless desert sun, all our designs are imbued with a sense of time and place. Designs are dreamed up in Los Angeles, CA and manufactured by artisan craftsman in a small town in Pelousey, France. Specific moments in my travels, throughout my life, have such a visceral quality to them that my designs simply become an expression of those experiences.

Today, I’m very proud that Chalonne is delivering the finest Apple Watch bands on the market. Our bands offer a luxurious way to express individuality and style every day. Every single band is meticulously crafted with the finest, ethically sourced materials available including diamonds, freshwater pearls, lustrous 14k gold and rich leathers.

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

I often travel from Los Angeles to New York for business meetings, etc. and I usually like to use the time to work. But on one occasion, I sat next to someone who struck up a conversation with me before I could get out my laptop. I learned that they were an artist so I immediately perked up given my life-long interest in art. They shared their sketchbook with me and I was awestruck. We discovered that we had many of the same interests and we spoke the rest of the flight about art, fashion, LA, food, Italy and so much more. I had wanted to partner with an artist on a design so I just threw it out there and they were receptive. We continued the conversation when we returned to LA and that evolved into a larger business relationship and Ricky Amadour has become a trusted member of my team acting as Creative Director. It was a chance encounter that became an incredibly meaningful business relationship.

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’m not sure that I have a funny mistake, but the funniest story happened when I was visiting my manufacturer, Jean Rousseau, in France. My husband came along on the trip so we could tack on a much-needed vacation, so we took a road trip across the France, from Paris to Pelousey. My husband dropped me off at the manufacturing facility where I spent the day meeting the amazing artisans, learning about the tannery, seeing their new materials and discussing my business plan with the CEO. At the end of the day, at the appointed pick-up time, I went outside to meet him. The CEO offered to wait with me in the freezing cold…but no husband. I didn’t want to waste his time and asked him to please go back inside, because I was sure my husband would be there any moment. After a very long delay, my husband finally appeared. Apparently, he crashed the rental car in a parking lot just an hour before he was supposed to pick me up. Given his perfect driving record, I was shocked, but luckily no one was hurt and we had a good laugh at how it happened…until we received the bill a few months later! Lesson leaned…take an Uber next time!

The biggest challenge to starting my own business was having the courage to take the leap and leave the corporate world. My husband was integral in supporting the decision to pursue my passion and start my own business. He encouraged me to step down from corporate life, focus on being a mom while setting aside time for myself to reset and find the balance that was badly lacking from my life. And it turned out to be exactly what I needed. I was able to hit the reset button, and without the daily pressure, I had the space to be creative. It was during that time that I developed the initial concept that evolved into Chalonne.

Ok, thank you for that. Let’s now jump to the primary focus of our interview. According to this EY report, only about 20 percent of funded companies have women founders. This reflects great historical progress, but it also shows that more work still has to be done to empower women to create companies. In your opinion and experience what is currently holding back women from founding companies?

Women need other female roles models they can look up to and respect and I believe that starts at home. Parents can be the most powerful role model a young person is exposed to. I think that’s the reason why so many of my friends decided to pursue the exact same profession as their parents. The more, strong, women entrepreneurs and leaders we have as roles models, the more young women can imagine themselves in that role or job and may be more likely to consider it as a career path. There also seems to be a disparity when it comes to funding. New businesses are incredibly expensive and with a financial sector is still dominated by men, they are more likely to fund founder who look like themselves. In addition, men may not intuitively understand the potential of a fantastic new product that is designed for female consumers, which may be why female founded businesses are much less likely to secure angel or VC funding than their male counterparts.

Can you help articulate a few things that can be done as individuals, as a society, or by the government, to help overcome those obstacles?

The media has a definite role to play. External role models can be just as powerful as homegrown ones but they need to be seen and heard. Look at the entrepreneurs that are talked about every day? It’s mostly men making headlines. The media could absolutely make more of a conscious effort to balance the share of voice by seeking out stories about successful women entrepreneurs who are making a meaningful difference.

This might be intuitive to you as a woman founder but I think it will be helpful to spell this out. Can you share a few reasons why more women should become founders?

If you have a great idea, something that is unique or that disrupts, go for it. Creating something from nothing is one of the most rewarding things one can do in business. It’s a constant challenge, forcing you out of your comfort zone on a daily basis. Women can be very creative thinkers and so good at multi-tasking which is essential for founders. And as I mentioned earlier, we need more female role models to inspire the next generation.

What are the “myths” that you would like to dispel about being a founder? Can you explain what you mean?

I’m honestly not sure what the “myths” are, but founding a business seemed like a very daunting task at first. You need to be scrappy, creative and very organized. You need to believe in your idea and give it enough runway to allow it to grow. It can be slow-going at first but it’s all about perseverance. You need to lean into what is working and pivot when something is obviously not — Be ok with ‘taking a hit’. You’ll make many mistakes but those mistakes have value and will help you do it right the next time. You also need to have a healthy relationship with rejection, which just comes with the territory, so you can’t let it knock you down. I heard the word “no” more times than I can count, but you need to just keep on persisting until you get a “yes”. Because they will come. You just need to keep working and be patient.

Is everyone cut out to be a founder? In your opinion, which specific traits increase the likelihood that a person will be a successful founder and what type of person should perhaps seek a “regular job” as an employee? Can you explain what you mean?

Founders require grit. If you have an idea that you believe it, you need to have the resiliency to stick with it. You have to be in it for the long haul and have a 5–10 year outlook, so I try to avoid situations with arbitrary deadlines. Founders understand that ‘Rome wasn’t built in a day’ and you need to make a huge investment of time and money in order to create something from nothing. ‘If you build it they will come’ only works in the movies. You have to invest in marketing to achieve brand awareness which takes time and consistency.

Ok super. Here is the main question of our interview. What are your “5 Things I Wish Someone Told Me Before I Started” and why? (Please share a story or example for each.)

Be very clear in your mission and vision. I knew the company and culture that I wanted to create but I didn’t actually put it to paper until a couple of years into the process. Having a clear vision and mission statement can act as a touchstone for everything you do. When in doubt, ask yourself if it meets one of those objectives, and if it’s not consistent with those values, don’t do it.
Know Thyself. Take an inventory of your strengths and weaknesses so you can use both to your advantage. Not everyone is good at everything, but as a Founder you have to do everything. So it’s a good idea to come up with an alternative plan for the tasks that are outside your comfort zone and lean into the tasks that are in your wheelhouse. You need to learn how to let go, so why not start by letting go of the tasks that someone else can do better.
Work/Life balance will still be a challenge. I somehow thought that when I had my own company that having a work/life balance would be “easier” to achieve and I’d have more time to spend with my daughter. It’s true that I have more flexibility with my time, but there’s even more pressure to perform and succeed especially when it’s your company. You’ll still have to figure out how to do it all.
Be decisive. Don’t dwell on decisions, it will save you a ton of time. Certainly, you must be thoughtful, but trust your gut — your first thought is usually the right one. In the event that it doesn’t go your way, have the flexibility to acknowledge a mistake and pivot. Again, don’t dwell, just switch gears and move on.
Trust your Intuition. ‘Women’s intuition’ is a thing for a reason — because there’s truth to it. There have been so many times when I had a ‘gut’ feeling and didn’t trust it. In hindsight I have found that my intuition tends to be correct. It taught me to trust my instincts and lean into them.

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

Having worked in the corporate world for many years, I spent a lot of time thinking about Chalonne’s culture and I decided to make female empowerment an integral part of Chalonne’s DNA. My ideal is for Chalonne to help empower women and support them in ways that truly make a difference in their lives. From personal experiences, I knew that I wanted to start with Breast Cancer research. A friend of mine connected me with the Breast Cancer Research Foundation, who agreed to a partnership very early on, even before I had product, so I was thrilled that they said ‘yes’. Chalonne donates 4% of all retail sales on Chalonne.com to BCRF. Every donation is one step closer to finding the cure to the disease that affects hundreds of thousands of women in the United States each year and we are proud to help that cause. The ultimate goal is for Chalonne to be successful enough to extend our mission of empowering women, by supporting other organizations who champion physical health, economic and educational opportunities and inner strength of women everywhere.

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

I would love to create a mentoring program for young women where they not only get the guidance they need to become young entrepreneurs, but where they can teach others the skills that they have learned from the process. I think the hardest thing when trying to create a movement is sustaining the momentum and inspiring people to “pay it forward”. We need to create sticky bonds that encourage mentees to be generous with their new-found knowledge and later become mentors themselves. Only after being a mentor does it become clear how valuable that experience is for both parties involved. I truly believe that we have so much to learn from others, regardless of age, experience, or any other perceived differences. I firmly believe that women need to support each other and lift each other up. If we expect to inspire the next generations, we need to start doing it now.

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 would love to meet Oprah Winfrey. I have so much respect for her as a woman. She pursued her passions, capitalized on her talent, listened to her intuition to become a highly respected and successful entrepreneur. And as a bonus, she wears her Apple Watch all the time and I just know that she would love my product if she tried it.

Thank you for these fantastic insights. We greatly appreciate the time you spent on this.

Female Founders: Carlye Morgan Of Chalonne On The Five Things You Need To Thrive and 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 Founders: Melissa Hanley Of Blitz On The Five Things You Need To Thrive and Succeed as a…

Female Founders: Melissa Hanley Of Blitz On The Five Things You Need To Thrive and Succeed as a Woman Founder

An Interview With Candice Georgiadis

Say yes to the weird and the wonderful! I think about how some of the best experiences have been because I was dragged to an event or meeting and it ended up opening the door to some of the best, most fun, most exciting work we’ve ever done. I often think about the events I didn’t go to and opportunities I didn’t take, and I wonder what saying “yes” could have brought.

As a part of our series about “Why We Need More Women Founders,” I had the pleasure of interviewing Melissa Hanley,

Co-Founder, Principal, and CEO of full-service architecture and interior design firm Blitz. Since Melissa co-founded Blitz in 2019 at the age of 26, the firm has expanded rapidly with locations in San Francisco, Los Angeles, Denver, and St. Louis and an impressive roster of clients such as Dropbox, Spotify, Microsoft, Google, Reddit, Lucid Motors, and Verizon, to name just a few.

I grew up in a rural part of Northern California on a Christmas Tree farm. My father is a contractor and fine woodworker, and my earliest memories are of us drawing and painting together. My parents recognized this interest in art and enrolled me in after school art lessons from the age of six. Growing up in such a creative environment gave me the sense of exploration and freedom to test ideas without restraint — often to the detriment of the walls and furniture. Somehow, over the next decade, I became convinced that I should sideline creative pursuits as hobbies only and should pursue law as my profession. I’m so envious of the people who say they knew they wanted to be an architect from the time they were four years old. For me, it wasn’t until my 20th birthday. My design epiphany came during my second year of college. I was working at a law firm to pay for my tuition and preparing for law school when I made a visit to the San Francisco MoMA on my birthday — something I do nearly every year. In a moment of reflection and contemplation while sitting in front of a Rothko, I realized how inauthentic my life was. In that instant, I was called back to design. I knew that fine art wasn’t going to stimulate the part of my brain that loved the problem solving and research aspects of law. I took an architectural history class on a whim, and it opened my mind to a whole new world which I had never considered.

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

I think one of the most interesting stories is wrapped up in Blitz’s founding. In mid-2009 at the height of the economic downturn, my co-founder (and now husband) and I were both laid off from the same firm at the same time (different conference rooms) along with ¾ of the staff. The next day, while nursing a serious tequila hangover, Blitz was born. At the time, there was a 40% unemployment rate in the A/E industry in San Francisco. We knew that if we wanted to stay in the profession, we were going to have to make our own way. Within four months, through one of Seth’s connections back in the UK, we landed Skype’s North American headquarters in Palo Alto. The size of the project quickly grew from a 10,000-square-foot space to a 90,000-square-foot building. Up until then we had been primarily designing schools and hospitals and didn’t know the first thing about creative workplace design. However, we learned quickly. We delivered the project from our dining room. I remember, in preparation for our 100 schematic design presentation, the Skype team asked us to travel to London to formally present to the executive group. They wanted the deck sent in advance so it could be printed locally. We were working around the clock to deliver a project that really should have been serviced by a team of four to five people and worked through the night before our flight. We managed to press send on the deck right as the taxi arrived to take us to the airport. After getting some much-needed sleep on the plane, we went straight into the meeting only to discover that — of course — printing parameters are different in the UK. Key sections of the presentation got cut off and it was scaled incorrectly. Whoops. Luckily, we relied on the digital version of the presentation, and it all went swimmingly. It was an exhilarating and terrifying experience figuring out how to work together, build a business, and deliver what was one of the largest projects going in the Bay Area at the time. That project was the springboard for the firm in many ways. While we didn’t set out to create a workplace interiors firm, we found that the speed and sense of creative experimentation of the project typology aligned with the way we liked to work.

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?

There are so many people who made it possible for me to do what I do. From a supportive foundation at home to incredible teachers at university to the grumpy, old men architects who took me under their collective wing and taught me how to be a professional through the school of hard knocks and hard work. I would not have the confidence, nor the tenacity required to tackle what it takes to run a growing business without these influences.

The person to whom I am most grateful is my partner. I know this is a little fundamental, but maybe that’s why it’s the first thing to come to mind. Having a life partner that shares your ambition and completely supports your goals in executing those ambitions is priceless. The fact that he is also my business partner and, if we’re being honest, the person who carried the heaviest load in forming me into an architect, makes it all the sweeter. It’s important to remember I was only 26 when we founded the company. Looking back, it seems ridiculous that any of this worked given how young and inexperienced I was. The learning curve was steep, but it was shortened by a great teacher. People usually respond to us with incredulity when we mention that we’re in business together, and quickly remark that they “could never work with their spouse.”

There are far more positive aspects of working together than negatives. We value that our work spills over into our personal lives. The fact is that Blitz is our brainchild, and we have dedicated our lives to the studio and its success. If we had to overcome challenges on the home front with an unsupportive — or just ambivalent — spouse, we would never have been able to sprint as far and as hard as we have. The shared vision, language, and shorthand is everything. I heard once that one’s choice of partner (in life) is one of the most important business decisions a founder will make. A little hyperbolic yes, but fundamentally true. I get all the support I need at home and at work that I could ever want to keep chasing the dream. As a female architect, I find this incredibly powerful. I’m also very proud of the number of women at Blitz. We are a predominantly female organization and are committed to gender pay equity and regularly reassess pay scales across the disciplines and individuals.

Obviously, I’m not an expert in sociology but I believe that this begins very early in life. Girls are taught to not take up space and, therefore, don’t take their seat at the founder’s table. On an HBR podcast I heard about a study of teenagers gathered at a friend’s house. When the friend’s parent came into the TV room with an offer of afternoon snacks, the boys in the room immediately jumped on the offer while the girls looked around anxiously at one another and demurred. The conclusion was that girls are societally trained to not be a bother, to not be pushy, to not inconvenience anyone. There are several things you must be comfortable with as a founder, namely that you have to be pushy, you have to elbow your way in, and you are going to inconvenience someone (if only your competitors). If we started the messaging at an early age that girls should own their space, I really think this would fundamentally change the framework within which women operate.

Can you help articulate a few things that can be done as individuals, as a society, or by the government, to help overcome those obstacles?

The first task must be awareness. This concept of not owning space is so culturally ingrained we need to name it and make parents aware of it. I’m pretty sure most parents don’t want to raise their daughters to be shrinking violets, but they are, likely, completely unaware that their behavior reinforces these societal norms. I don’t know how you begin to tackle such a systemic issue.

This might be intuitive to you as a woman founder but I think it will be helpful to spell this out. Can you share a few reasons why more women should become founders?

It would be easy to lean on ‘empathy’ as an expected response here and I think that’s just way too simplistic. I think it’s more nuanced than an emotional response to business. It is about perspective. And it is more than just women, it’s all minorities and under-represented groups. A variety of perspectives at the table means that no one is redundant, and through the diversity of viewpoints we will get to a better, more holistic solution faster. If everyone in an organization has the same background and the same life experience, then there is redundancy in decision making. Women should become founders because the business world needs to evolve to a more diverse landscape. It’s good for women but it’s also good for the world.

What are the “myths” that you would like to dispel about being a founder? Can you explain what you mean?

Myth: You get to make your own schedule. Reality: You work when, where, and how you need to make the business work and that rarely falls into a 9–5 schedule.

No. Beyond the time commitment required to start a company (think 60+ hours / week) there must be a comfort level with the constant unknown landscape. You don’t know if this venture is going to work. You don’t know if the patent will get approved. You don’t know if your staff will meet your expectations. You don’t know if the next round of funding will come through. Every aspect of your work life will be in dynamic flux for years. Things didn’t stabilize for us for at least three years. Most people aren’t great with so many variables being up in the air. Being an innately curious person is also a major key to success. As a founder I have had to learn about accounting, payroll, IT infrastructure, employment contracts, lease negotiations, janitorial agreements, etc. etc. etc. If I had “stayed in my lane” as an architect, the business never would have survived. When you’re starting out you need to be and “do all things” until you can hire the expertise. Even if you get to that point, you need a working knowledge of “all the things” to be able to interface and communicate with the experts.

In this same vein, I also don’t think every founder is cut out to be the CEO of the company they’ve built. Several of my clients have stepped into advisory or inventor roles within their companies and allowed someone else to step in as CEO. As a technician myself, I see the appeal. I was not trained in management or business strategy. What I know now I have learned from trial and error. If our company were on track for explosive growth, as is the case with many of our clients, we might seriously consider bringing in that expertise to avoid the pitfalls associated with trial and error.

Ok super. Here is the main question of our interview. What are your “5 Things I Wish Someone Told Me Before I Started” and why? (Please share a story or example for each.)

Take an accounting class. Learn how to read a balance sheet, a P+L and understand the weirdness that is accrual accounting. You cannot run a business of any scale on the principle of “more money coming in than going out.”
Prioritize sleep. I learned this one early on (not that I always practice what I preach). Our first big purchase when Skype paid their first bill was new bedding. Investing in sleep pays dividends in creativity, patience, and empathy. The worst decisions I’ve made and the times I’ve been less than civil are all tied to times when I was exhausted, rung out and stressed because I was trading sleep for work.
Take more pictures (or better yet, keep a journal). One of our clients in the early days gave us this nugget of advice and I’m so glad that they did. We’ve taken pictures of everything we’ve seen and done, but I really wish we’d gone a step farther and kept a journal. There are so many details about the experience of starting a company and the adventures we’ve embarked upon because of far-flung projects, and it’s all become a blur.
You will never not be worried about your business. The things you worry about will change over time, but you will never be free of worries. For example, I no longer worry about the survival of the company. I worry about the happiness of our staff or the press coverage of a key project. If you are looking for a job you can close your mind to when you clock out at the end of the day, being a founder is not for you.
Say yes to the weird and the wonderful! I think about how some of the best experiences have been because I was dragged to an event or meeting and it ended up opening the door to some of the best, most fun, most exciting work we’ve ever done. I often think about the events I didn’t go to and opportunities I didn’t take, and I wonder what saying “yes” could have brought.

Stop wasteful design. If something can be reused, reinvested, repurposed — do it. It is so typical in interior design to rip out everything existing and start anew with alarming regularity (every 24–36 months) which is outrageously wasteful.

A glass of wine with Michelle Obama all. day. long! She is fierce, accessible and authentic.

Thank you for these fantastic insights. We greatly appreciate the time you spent on this.

Female Founders: Melissa Hanley Of Blitz On The Five Things You Need To Thrive and Succeed as a… was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Joe Kryszak of Stirling CBD: 5 Things I Wish Someone Told Me Before I Started Leading a Cannabis or…

Joe Kryszak of Stirling CBD: 5 Things I Wish Someone Told Me Before I Started Leading a Cannabis or CBD Business

An Interview With Candice Georgiadis

The health benefits I have seen have been amazing. I personally had cancer last year, and cannabis products were one of the only things that made me feel better.

As part of my series about “5 Things I Wish Someone Told Me Before I Started Leading a Cannabis Business” I had the pleasure of interviewing Joe Kryszak.

Joe Kryszak is the founder and owner of Stirlingcdboil.com & Stirlingprofessional.com. Joe completed his undergraduate at San Diego State University and received his MBA in 2002 from Pepperdine University. Joe has run billion-dollar businesses at HP, Lenovo, and Amazon. In 2014, Joe launched Stirling with the goal of providing a healthy, natural alternative to over-the-counter and prescription medication.

Thank you so much for doing this with us! Can you share with us the story about what brought you to this specific career path?

Growing up in California, I have always had a passion for Cannabis — it was a part of my social upbringing. During the 1990’s while I was attending SDSU, the cannabis industry was not a consideration — of course it was not legal anywhere. Luckily I had some amazing opportunities to develop myself and in traditional corporate America. After some amazing successful years of corporate experience at Fortune 500 companies like Black & Decker, HP, and Amazon, I determined it was time to follow my passion and help lead the wave of holistic health solutions for people. The CBD / Cannabis industry was the logical place to put my energy and passion.

Can you share the most interesting story that happened to you since you began leading your company? Can you tell us what lesson you learned from that?

Unfortunately, the Cbd/Cannabis industry is full of what Californians call “posers.” In my 8 years in this industry, I have met more unprofessional & unscrupulous people than I have met in my 30 years in the corporate world. The good news is that my experience working with all types of people with different backgrounds and skillsets makes me an excellent evaluator of talent. The biggest lesson I can tell people who want to enter this business is? Trust but verify, and then verify again. A bad partnership in this industry means you are doomed.

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 potential partner indicated that they had extracted one of the “Holy Grails” of Cannibionodis. However, he was unwilling to prove this by getting his product tested — he was adamant that all 3rd party testing was a scam and the testing companies could not verify his solution. We passed on the partnership, and he quickly got bought out. Just 3 months later, that partnership blew up, and the potential partner returned to us with a radically reduced fee. We passed on him again…Trust but verify — and then verify again!

Are you working on any exciting projects now? How do you think that will help people?

We are working with leaders in the retail, extraction, B2C, and telehealth communities to develop a complete solution for people who are interested but nervous about CBD. This will open up a whole new avenue to this amazing solution.

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

I continually lean on people who are smarter than me in specific areas. As we are in over 200 Chiropractic offices, I have contact with people who love, own, and practice healthy solutions. I appreciate all the partnerships I have made and will continue to lean on them for product advice.

This industry is young dynamic and creative. Do you use any clever and innovative marketing strategies that you think large legacy companies should consider adopting?

The biggest way to fail in this industry — spend too much $$ with marketing companies. Marketing companies continually overpromise and underdeliver. Learn the basics of marketing and do a deep interview of any marketing company before you sign up with them.

Can you share 3 things that most excite you about the Cannabis industry? Can you share 3 things that most concern you?

Excite:

The health benefits I have seen have been amazing. I personally had cancer last year, and cannabis products were one of the only things that made me feel better.
The continued adoption of cannabis by all demographics, races, and ages. It is great to see so many diverse communities adopt cannabinoid products.
The discovery and development of new cannabinoids. For instance, we just launched a Water-Soluble CBGA/CBDA powder that is getting a lot of attention in the press.

Concerns:

CBD companies continue to make health claims that their product can cure/prevent diseases. This is a sure-fire way to attract the attention of the FDA and have them come down on all CBD companies.
There will be a continuous shake out of the industry. 1000s of CBD companies will start this year, and 1000s will close

Can you share your “5 Things I Wish Someone Told Me Before I Started Leading a Cannabis Business”? Please share a story or example for each.

This is not a get-rich-quick scheme — and you will have bigger competitors who can outspend you. Find your niche and attack it.
You will spend far more time making your company successful than you expect
Trust is earned in this industry.
Marketing companies are better at marketing themselves than you
This business is like a good golf shot — “Keep your head down and follow through.”

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

https://www.facebook.com/InfoStirlingOils/

https://www.instagram.com/stirlingcbdoil/

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

Joe Kryszak of Stirling CBD: 5 Things I Wish Someone Told Me Before I Started Leading a Cannabis or… was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Total Health: Dr Sandra Indacochea Sobel On How We Can Optimize Our Mental, Physical, Emotional, &…

Total Health: Dr Sandra Indacochea Sobel On How We Can Optimize Our Mental, Physical, Emotional, & Spiritual Wellbeing

An Interview With Candice Georgiadis

Laughter — with so much turmoil and uncertainty, it may seem selfish or hopeless to seek out joyous outlets. But there is nothing selfish about this and allowing for opportunities to experience a good belly laugh, which leads to endorphin and other neurotransmitter release optimizes emotional wellness!

Often when we refer to wellness, we assume that we are talking about physical wellbeing. But one can be physically very healthy but still be unwell, emotionally or mentally. What are the steps we can take to cultivate optimal wellness in all areas of our life; to develop Mental, Physical, Emotional, & Spiritual Wellbeing?

As a part of our series about “How We Can Cultivate Our Mental, Physical, Emotional, & Spiritual Wellbeing”, I had the pleasure of interviewing Dr. Sandra Sobel.

Dr. Sandra Indacochea Sobel is a board-certified Endocrinologist who also holds additional board certifications in Lifestyle Medicine and Obesity Medicine and practices in Pittsburgh, PA. In 2021, after functioning as the Clinical Chief of Endocrinology in an academic center for seven years, she founded Summon Health, the first direct care endocrine clinic in Pittsburgh where the mission is to deliver evidence-based, personalized, and comprehensive medical attention by addressing nutrition, exercise, and stress, in addition to continuing to use medicine therapies to help each person summon their best metabolic health. At Summon Health she supplements the medical visits by applying culinary medicine through use of her teaching kitchen and meditation instruction via her meditation room.

Thank you so much for joining us in this interview series! Before we dive into the main focus of our interview, our readers would love to “get to know you” a bit better. Can you tell us a bit about your childhood backstory?

Thank you so much for the interview!

Absolutely! I am a first-generation U.S. born Latina and the eldest of 3 children. My parents immigrated here in the 1970s from Peru, so that my father could obtain his doctoral degree in metallurgical engineering. They ultimately planted roots in the suburbs of Chicago where my brothers and I grew up. My parents raised us bilingual and keeping our heritage present was important. They would host these marvelous get-togethers, where friends and family would bring their favorite foods and instruments and we would clear out the furniture of the living room so that there was ample room for the make-shift band and people to dance. A get-together wasn’t complete without the night ending in the adults telling stories of their childhood, or sharing jokes that had everyone’s eyes streaming with tears from laughter.

When I was 13 years-old, my father took a sabbatical year in Germany, purposely moving the family to a country where we didn’t know the language, so that we could have the chance to learn a third language. I went to a German school, and on weekends, my parents made it a point to around Europe. I kept up with my German studies even upon my return to the United States and it was even one of my majors in college and by the time of my college graduation, I was arguably more fluent in German than in Spanish!

What or who inspired you to pursue your career? We’d love to hear the story.

There were no physicians or other medical professionals for that matter, in my family. But there were hustlers and story-tellers and these two truths inspired me to pursue medicine.

My father was one of nine children and he was the first in his family to go to college. At the age of 18yo, he had earned a scholarship to study in the United States and left Peru for the first time at that age to move to a country where he did not speak the language. He told me he would spend endless nights with an English dictionary on the desk with him while he did his homework, trying to understand his assignments. Not only did he complete his undergraduate degree, but he went on to get a doctorate degree in engineering. As a young college professor, I remember him preparing his lesson plans and talks for national conferences. He would practice these talks with the slide projector and use my brothers and me as his audience. We had no clue what he was saying, but I was inspired to one day be able to get to gain enough confidence and share my knowledge with colleagues.

Having grown up in a family of story-tellers also inspired me to pursue my career. Whenever we got together with extended family, the adults would gather around the table and start telling stories and some of the children would sit with them at the table, to eagerly listen. I was one of those children at the table, completely entranced by these stories. I always wanted to hear more — the stories of struggle, joy, defeat, and triumph. I cherished each detail of the stories shared and I approach my privilege of being a physician in the same way. Ultimately, my patients are sharing their stories with me, and I listen intently to the details they entrust to me. I genuinely am fascinated by the health stories or experiences individuals share with me and I try to provide clarity to these symptoms or conditions.

None of us can achieve success without some help along the way. Was there a particular person who you feel gave you the most help or encouragement to be who you are today? Can you share a story about that?

I go back to my parents being my inspiration to blaze my own path. They immigrated to the United States only having each other. Through perseverance, sacrifice, and self-belief, they were able to achieve their version of the American Dream. We had no physicians in our family and when I told them from a young age that I wanted to be a doctor, they supported me and encouraged me through my many years of schooling and gave me the confidence to blaze my own path.

Can you share the funniest or most interesting mistake that occurred to you in the course of your career? What lesson or take away did you learn from that?

I moved to Pittsburgh, PA after my internal medicine residency and prior to starting my fellowship in Endocrinology, I worked at a hybrid urgent-care/primary-care office. Pittsburgh has its own dialect and I was learning the dialect mostly from interactions with patients.

One afternoon at this urgent-care, I was seeing an older gentleman who had come in for shortness of breath and a cough. I walked in the room and spoke with him, examined him, and noticed that his blood pressure was quite elevated. I saw he was on blood pressure medicine and he confirmed to me that he was taking his medicine as prescribed. I then asked him who his primary care physician was (again, the place served as an urgent care as well). I understood his reply to be, “Yinzer”. So, I responded, “Ok sir, I will reach out to Dr. Yinzer to let him know that your blood pressure is elevated and that you should have it rechecked soon to see if you need a dose adjustment to your blood pressure medication”.

He looked at me and then, more slowly, and a little more loudly said, “Yinz are”.

I had a confused look and as I thought over his slower response, I realized that “yinz” is the Pittsburgh way of saying “You guys, or, ya’ll”. It then dawned on me that he was telling me that WE (the physicians at this hybrid office) were his primary care physicians. We both laughed about my lack of Pittsburgh-slang knowledge and I informed him that I would then be increasing the dose of his blood pressure medicine.

But this also served as an important reminder to me that prior to walking into each room with a patient, it is important to take just a couple of minutes to review the patient’s chart. Familiarize myself with who their primary physician is, what medications they are on, and what their main concern is that they would like to address at the time of the visit.

I can also say that now, after having lived 12 years in Pittsburgh, my Pittsburgh slang is on point.

Is there a particular book that made a significant impact on you? Can you share a story or explain why it resonated with you so much?

Anne Frank, The Diary of a Young Girl.

I read this book at the age of 13 years-old, while I was living in Germany.

Anne Frank was 13 years-old when she started writing that diary, while she was in hiding in fear of Nazi persecution during WWII, in the next country over to where I was living at the time, the Netherlands.

Her writings took hold of me, as the young teen experiences she was narrating were ones that I could so easily identify with. Yet at the same time, the fear of being found out and the clandestine life she wrote about, were so incomprehensible to me.

Can you share your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Why does that resonate with you so much?

“The journey of a thousand miles begins with one step.” -Lao Tzu

This quote is a humble reminder to myself that while the work to achieve lofty goals and intentions may feel overwhelming when taking it all into account, to not let this stall forward motion. In order to get from where I am on the journey to where I intend to go, I have to begin the journey with one step. At a time.

What are some of the most interesting or exciting projects you are working on now? How do you think that might help people?

My direct care metabolic practice! My reason for pursuing medicine as a career was my genuine interest in people’s stories, hearing their health journeys, and wanting to help investigate causes of medical conditions, but also educate and provide personalized recommendations to improve health. All of this requires mutual trust between the patient and the physician, and in order to build that trust, it also requires time to build that relationship.

I felt that this time was being taken away in traditional medical models and being outsourced, so I needed a way to protect the time I had with patients and to address all the important factors that impact a person’s metabolic health, namely: nutrition, exercise, stress, sleep, in addition to hormonal health. That is why I established a direct care metabolic health practice, where I devised a model of care where time is a priority (initial visits are 90 minutes long!) and health recommendations touch upon the previously mentioned metabolic health variables. In addition, my practice has a teaching kitchen where I apply culinary medicine principles to health, as well as a meditation room.

I think this innovative approach to metabolic health highlights to each person that metabolic health is complex: it’s not just an abnormal lab value and, “here, take this medicine and check back with me in three months”. No! Let’s have that conversation about your nutrition patterns, your exercise patterns. Let me discuss with you what the studies have shown to be the minimum amount of time that is needed per week for exercise to reap cardiometabolic benefits. Let’s talk about non-pharmacologic ways to deal with stress and while we are at it, we can have a seat in the meditation room. When a person understands how multiple areas of our life impacts health, I have seen this increase engagement and I have seen the dramatic improvements people achieve in their health. This comprehensive approach to care has transformed many of my patients’ lives!

OK, thank you for all of that. Let’s now shift to the core focus of our interview. In this interview series we’d like to discuss cultivating wellness habits in four areas of our lives: Mental wellness, Physical wellness, Emotional wellness, & Spiritual wellness. Let’s dive deeper into these together. Based on your research or experience, can you share with our readers three good habits that can lead to optimum mental wellness? Please share a story or example for each.

Meditation — Everyone who is reading this has more than likely been profoundly impacted by the shift in our realities over the past 2+ years. The world shifted and this ripple effect has touched each human being. And throughout this time, we have had to find ways to pivot — multiple times. And this is incredibly stressful. If we do not have outlets to relieve stress, the internalization of these constant stressors can lead to heightened anxiety and panic. I know, because this is precisely happened to me. I was working at my computer in Fall 2020, when all of a sudden, I felt an intense pressure in my chest and a sudden feeling of doom. I read what was on my computer screen and could not see how what I was working on could elicit such a response. But the symptoms were classic of a panic attack. I realized that I had been internalizing my stress over, and over, and over again, without having established and healthy coping skills for it. That is when I decided to explore meditation. I was floored by the impact it had on me — allowing for a moment to let me mind settle and to accept that each attempt at meditation would not result in extended moments of calm. But even so, the cumulative response to consistent meditation practice resulted in significant alleviation of anxieties.
Proper Sleep — studies have demonstrated that individuals who do not get enough sleep have a higher prevalence of depression. Sleep impacts hormonal signaling as well, and without sufficient sleep, melatonin and cortisol cycles become disrupted as well.
Social Connections — one of the pillars of lifestyle medicine is relationships. Being able to foster and maintain healthy relationships with each other is essential for our mental wellness. As humans, we are not meant to experience life in isolation, and having social connections and building relationships with trusted others helps us navigate new or difficult situations and can help protect us from distress and even depression and anxiety.

Do you have a specific type of meditation practice or Yoga practice that you have found helpful? We’d love to hear about it.

Transcendental Meditation has really offered me a way to ground myself and allow capacity for the life pivots that occur without forewarning. I found guided meditation to at times increase distress, especially if the teacher was guiding the meditation through a visualization. During meditation, external thoughts creep in, this is expected and natural. However, despite this being natural, I then found I would become upset that I had missed a portion of the guided meditation — was that an important part I missed? What if that was the most important part I missed?

With transcendental meditation, I have been able to use my mantra and allow for the settling of my mind without having the same distressing reaction when thoughts creep in. And as with anything, consistency with the practice is important to reap the most benefits.

Thank you for that. Can you share three good habits that can lead to optimum physical wellness? Please share a story or example for each.

Hydration — staying well hydrated is so essential for physical wellness. It is important for skin turgor, mental clarity, circulation, and sleep! If one is dehydrated, this can lead to peripheral vessel constriction at night. When this occurs, it shunts blood to the core and doesn’t allow for an optimal cooling of the core during sleep, which is important for restful sleep. With proper hydration, this does not happen and individuals will experience a more restful sleep.
Minimize unprocessed foods — Overprocessing of food can have a litany of adverse health consequences. It frequently strips foods of important fiber and nutrients while adding sugar salt. The result of frequent consumption of these hyperpalatable low nutrient but frequently high-calorie content foods? Increase risk of high blood pressure, insulin resistance, diabetes, and obesity. Focusing on mostly consuming minimally processed to unprocessed foods and enjoying the natural flavors packed in these wholesome, nutrient dense foods will help promote physical wellness.
Pick up weights — and I say this as a former cardiovascular workout junkie. It wasn’t until I started incorporating resistance training did I see real transformation in my strength, toning, energy, and stamina. Alternating between cardiovascular and strength training during an exercise — an added bonus as this ‘inefficiency’ in exercise concept maximizes energy expenditure which translates to more calories burned! High five!

Do you have any particular thoughts about healthy eating? We all know that it’s important to eat more vegetables, eat less sugar, 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 main blockages that prevent us from taking the information that we all know, and integrating it into our lives?

I love Michael Pollan’s statement, “Eat food, mostly plants, not too much”. My interpretation of this is to focus on real foods (so avoiding the ultra-processed foods), high fiber (fiber is found in plant-foods!), and moderate portion sizes.

The main blockages I know from personal life, but also in discussion with patients when we talk about nutrition is time. Everyone is incredibly busy. Having the time to meal plan, or to cook food, is a luxury. And the choices for convenience foods and fast foods abound! But the ‘convenience’ of fast foods, consumed over and over again, can eventually add up to future inconvenience of chronic disease.

Can you share three good habits that can lead to optimum emotional wellness? Please share a story or example for each.

Socialize with others — please see my explanation above on social connections!
Travel — experiencing different cultures adds to our understanding of humanity: through food, music, beliefs, and language, we can learn to appreciate the nuances that create unique interpretations of the human experience. These experiences may help transform our perceptions or our realities. And through this transformation, we also have the opportunity to reflect on shared experiences as humans. This realization of shared experiences has a profound impact on optimizing emotional wellness.
Laughter — with so much turmoil and uncertainty, it may seem selfish or hopeless to seek out joyous outlets. But there is nothing selfish about this and allowing for opportunities to experience a good belly laugh, which leads to endorphin and other neurotransmitter release optimizes emotional wellness!

Do you have any particular thoughts about the power of smiling to improve emotional wellness? We’d love to hear it.

Much like the effect that laughter has on emotional wellness, so does smiling! Just stop and think about what goes through your mind when you see someone smile? For me, it elicits curiosity, joy, happiness, and elation. Talk about wonderful boosts to emotional wellness!

Finally, can you share three good habits that can lead to optimum spiritual wellness? Please share a story or example for each.

Do you have any particular thoughts about how being “in nature” can help us to cultivate spiritual wellness?

When we spend intentional time outside — for example, sitting in nature, whether in meditation, doing yoga, or just absorbing its grandeur, connects us to our planet and helps provide a sense of purpose.

Ok, we are nearly done. You are a person of great influence. If you could inspire a movement that would bring the most amount of good for the greatest number of people, what would that be? You never know what your idea can trigger.

Every morning, take 5 seconds to look at yourself in the mirror, with intention, then smile.

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, especially if we both tag them 🙂

It would have to be Chef José Andrés. I would love to speak with him about his motivations and inspirations that go behind his genius in creating cuisines that not only enlighten and invigorate the palate, but also elicit emotional responses with the flavors he produces. I use culinary medicine in my medical practice and I have seen how it provides another opportunity to strengthen connection between humans when we discuss recipes or prepare and share in the enjoyment of eating foods together. In addition, I would love to sit down and speak with him at length about his non-profit, World Central Kitchen, where they provide meals to disaster-stricken areas of the world. He has leveraged his culinary expertise to be able to ensure that those in these disaster-stricken areas have access to one of the most basic of human needs — food.

How can our readers further follow your work online?

Follow me on social! @drsandraisobel on instagram and tiktok or Sandra Indacochea Sobel, MD on facebook!

Thank you for these really excellent insights, and we greatly appreciate the time you spent with this. We wish you continued success.

Thank you so much!

Total Health: Dr Sandra Indacochea Sobel On How We Can Optimize Our Mental, Physical, Emotional, &… was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Female Disruptors: Miranda Jiggins On The Three Things You Need To Shake Up Your Industry

An Interview With Candice Georgiadis

“Trust the process”. Both my bodybuilding coach, Neal, and success coach, Stacy have said that. This resonates with me because, so many times you feel as if you are doing the work day in and day out, and you feel as if nothing is getting accomplished. However, things ARE getting accomplished. If you trust the process and keep going, it will pay off eventually.

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

From bullied to boss — Miranda was a total social outcast in high school; after going through a lengthy inner work journey, she has overcome a ton of mental hurdles, and owns a fitness business transitioning into the events space. Miranda is a high energy leader with a purpose to be an example to others that have been bullied or have felt alone; their goals are possible, they do matter, and someone has felt the way they are feeling.

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Thank you for having me! When I was in high school, I was a total social outcast; I didn’t go to prom, didn’t eat lunch in the cafeteria (I ate it in the library), and always struggled to fit into social groups. This carried into my adult life, until I did a year of inner work, and came out a totally different person on the other side.

When I turned 16, I was given the task of driving my younger brother to boxing practice. One day, his coach said “why don’t you workout with us”? So, I tried a workout and was hooked — fitness became a huge mental release for me — without it, I don’t know where I would be. Working out helped me mentally through the struggles of high school.

During the challenges of school, I always knew I was going to do “something” with my life. I had no idea what or how, but I just knew. In addition to fitness, that thought kept me going on the harder days. I would read any book I could about leaders and their journeys. I desperately wanted someone I could fully relate to, but couldn’t find anyone that was 100% relatable. Then, when I was 16, I made the decision to be that person as an adult for someone who is going through a dark time, and needs someone that may know how they are feeling to look up to.

Shortly after college I connected with my first mentor, Betsy McNally. She helped me get started with my business, and I have been fully self employed since 2019.

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

The work that I am doing is disruptive, because I am an example of someone who has been to mental rock bottom and back multiple times. I also did not take a day off from work for 4.5 years before my inner work journey (hello burying your issues unhealthily in work). Now, I am a huge advocate of taking care of YOU, which I preach to my clients. We can only fully show up at our highest power for others when we take care of ourselves first.

I am so grateful for my experiences, because I tend to attract high performers who are at their rock bottom, and they do a total 180 degree transformation — it is so amazing to experience and be a part of their journeys. My program mixes the inner work with fitness — we work on boundaries, AM/PM routines, fears; it’s the inner work with fitness mixed in. In turn, my clients come out shining from the inside out and confidence is at an all time high!

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?

LOL! My very first in person fitness class I ever taught, literally day #1 — I was giving a demonstration on the stability ball, and FELL OFF! It slid right out from under me! The entire class laughed, including myself.

This taught me to not take things so seriously, and if I mess up, it is okay — my clients won’t leave if I make a mistake. Everyone makes mistakes! Very grateful that I learned that lesson early.

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 would not be where I am without my mentors — so grateful for them. Betsy McNally found me when I was selling cars, and helped me get started with my business.

Neal Cash is my bodybuilding coach — I have been with him since 2018, and has had a huge impact on my business and my competing goals.

Stacy Raske — I found her during my rock bottom moment in January 2020. She helped me through my inner work journey, and is helping scale my business.

I am very grateful to be a member of Apex, a business owner mastermind led by Ryan Stewman. He has taught me to take risks; I had a huge scarcity mentality around money, and he has helped me overcome that plus much more.

It’s interesting looking at the timeline, each one of my mentors have added layers to my journey. They all have come into my life at the right time, and I would not be where I am without any of them. It’s funny how the universe works!

I believe being disruptive is a positive, when what you are doing is inspiring and helping others to elevate and better themselves. Whenever I make a post on social media, I usually receive a comment or message stating how the person is having a bad day and needed to hear that, or, how they find me relatable — that is my goal and why I do what I do. It all ties into my original mission of being an example to someone who has no one else to look up to.

I believe when someone is being a negative example, such as partying too much, or not showing a realistic viewpoint of their life, that is not a positive disruption to an industry. The world needs positive examples of leaders that “keep it real” — both for adults and our youth. I do my best to share my challenges and struggles online along with my wins, so people can see this is not always rainbows and butterflies. You can come out of a challenge stronger than ever on the other side!

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

“Trust the process”. Both my bodybuilding coach, Neal, and success coach, Stacy have said that.

This resonates with me because, so many times you feel as if you are doing the work day in and day out, and you feel as if nothing is getting accomplished. However, things ARE getting accomplished. If you trust the process and keep going, it will pay off eventually.

“Show up as the authentic you”.

I am someone who shines really bright, both with my personality and work ethic, and have been misunderstood by many. This used to really bring me down, because I was just being myself around others. So, I stopped showing up as the full, authentic me. After I met Stacy and did a year of inner work, I FULLY showed up as my unapologetic self, and fully believed in myself. Coincidentally, I have had zero negative comments since I have started believing in myself first and embracing the real me. Funny how that works!

“Trust your intuition”

The little voice in the back of your head is there for a reason! I used to not listen to it as much, but, through my inner work journey, I fully listen to the voice in the back of my head. Even if my decision may seem “crazy”, I still implement and execute, and it has never failed me — the situation always turns out better than I thought it would, even if it totally takes me on a different path than planned.

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

I certainly am not done — I have barely scratched the surface! My business is transitioning into the events space — I am so excited! These events are going to be an intimate space for high performers who have been or are going through the inner work journey. We currently have dates for late 2022 and 2023 in Cincinnati, Tampa and the Dominican Republic. I am so excited for this next level of impact!

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

Our voices. I was the “blonde girl” that was “too nice”, not many took seriously, and felt unheard. It was so frustrating. After my rock bottom moment in January 2021, I said enough was enough, I was going to be taken seriously, and it was time for a change. Never allow our fellow male counterparts to overpower your voice!

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

“Can’t Hurt Me” By David Goggins. Right after my rock bottom moment in January 2021 and before I met my coach, I decided enough was enough, people were going to take me seriously — I wanted to be seen as “mentally tough”.

So, I found the “hardest” person on the planet, David Goggins. I really resonated with his story, and wanted to be taken seriously like people took him seriously — no one took him seriously from the beginning, and now they do. I read his book multiple times and listened to all of his YouTube videos. His content 100% got me through a very hard time, and has been a huge impact on my life.

Love this question! I would inspire an “Shine your inner light bright” movement. From someone who was so misunderstood and afraid to shine her light, to now shining my light so bright, it has been life changing for me to allow myself to fully show up as the true me. Imagine if everyone in the world showed up as their authentic selves, shining their lights so bright? It would be amazing and so powerful — I have goosebumps thinking about it!

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

Life lesson quote — “I am not for everyone, and that is okay”.

Most people want to fit in and be liked — especially the younger generation — I know I did. I desperately wanted that so badly when I was in high school, and I could never understand why I fully didn’t “fit in”. It can be really mentally damaging for people who are seeking external validation, craving it, and do not receive it. Once I learned that I am okay with not being for everyone, it was a game changer! I was able to shine brighter than ever, and elevate people with me!

How can our readers follow you online?

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/miranda.jiggins

Website: mirandajiggins.com

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/miranda-jiggins-68143986/

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

Female Disruptors: Miranda Jiggins On The Three Things You Need To Shake Up Your Industry was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Female Founders: Camille Styles on the Five Things You Need to Thrive and Succeed as a Woman…

Female Founders: Camille Styles on the Five Things You Need to Thrive and Succeed as a Woman Founder

An Interview With Candice Georgiadis

Eliminate what’s unnecessary in order to illuminate what’s essential. This practice of stripping away what’s not essential, whether it’s with my commitments, a story I’m writing or editing, purging my closet, or even writing a recipe, has become my most important habit as my career has grown. I think about how I can pull out the most “flavor” with the fewest number of ingredients.

As a part of our series about “Why We Need More Women Founders”, I had the pleasure of interviewing Camille Styles.

Camille is the Founder and Editor-in-Chief of leading lifestyle digital publication Camille Styles. An influential go-to resource for elevating everyday experiences, Camille Styles is the definitive guide to simplifying life without compromising style. The online publication covers food, design, gatherings, wellness and beauty, connecting with its audience that reaches 50 million impressions each month across the website and social media channels.

In 2009, I was running my two-person event planning company out of the basement of my house. Though I’d majored in journalism and dreamed of being a magazine editor, I’d spent the first couple years of post-college life working in catering, where I fell head over heels for event planning. I thought I’d found my dream job. It married my love of cooking and my passion for design, all with the goal of bringing people together. I couldn’t believe I was getting paid to do what I loved.

But it wasn’t long before I craved a creative outlet all my own. So I started a blog, just for fun, where I could share my inspiration and entertaining tips. In this pre-influencer, pre-social media world, I couldn’t have dreamed that it would become the focus of my career for the next 12 years. I just knew that I found so much joy creating in this space, and over many years, building a community to share it with.

Today, it’s still sometimes hard to believe that I actually did become that editor-in-chief that I dreamed about, though instead of doing it in heels in my corner office, it’s usually sweats in my kitchen, racing to see how much I can get done between school drop-off and pickup. When I started the site more than a decade ago, it was driven by a passion for beauty and uncovering it in others’ lives. Bringing that vision to life through food, design, and gathering friends around a table is my true happy place. Today, I lead our incredible team of editors as we share daily content to inspire the pursuit of the life you dream about.

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 learned the hard way that I don’t have to be good at everything. A few years back, I was working with Target as a spokesperson and one year, they asked me to fly out to LA to be in the brand’s annual holiday commercial. Wow! Me, on a national TV commercial that would run on all the major networks through the whole season? This was huge.

So, I flew out to LA and reported to set. It was a huge production — there were hundreds of people working on this set with craft services and stylists, the works. When it came time, I got up on the stage that had been transformed into a holiday set and said the couple of lines that I’d memorized on my flight over. I felt a little off my game, but everyone said I did great, so I flew back home with my fingers crossed I did okay. Well, the holiday commercial dropped, and I wasn’t in it. I was so disappointed and felt like I’d wasted all that time for nothing. But after watching the commercial online a few times, I had my “aha” moment: I’m not an actor. I don’t want to be an actor, I have no desire for acting to be any part of my career. In fact, I’ve built my career on just being me. And in fact, trying to excel at things that aren’t part of my priorities and values can be a major distraction and a source of energy drain.

My husband has been my biggest cheerleader and support, encouraging me to start my company so many years ago when I thought I lacked the experience. As an entrepreneur himself, he knew that the secret sauce of starting a business is made of vision and grit, and I’m thankful he saw that in me before I could see it for myself.

I see so many women who are afraid to dream too big — whether it’s a fear of failure or of disappointing themselves or others, this limiting belief often prevents talented, capable women for reaching as high as their potential could take them. Sometimes it takes a success or two under your belt to build that confidence to “go big,” so even though that initial leap is scary, my encouragement would be to just get started.

Can you help articulate a few things that can be done as individuals, as a society, or by the government, to help overcome those obstacles?

We can all be more mindful of our power as conscious consumers — our dollars, our voices, and our time are all valuable tools for enacting change. Supporting women-owned businesses and other female founders is key to showing the next generation that being an entrepreneur and being a woman are not only not mutually exclusive, they are actually supportive of each other. While being a female founder is not easy, it’s an empowering way to build the life-work balance that is so often missing from high-powered corporate careers.

This might be intuitive to you as a woman founder but I think it will be helpful to spell this out. Can you share a few reasons why more women should become founders?

Leading your own company — whether you’re a solopreneur or running a team of hundreds — puts you squarely in the driver’s seat. It’s you making the decisions for you and your team without outside forces dictating your day-to-day. I’ve found that that freedom and influence can be used for the greater good — creating more life-work balance for myself and my team. Even though we all work hard to achieve our shared goals, we have the freedom and the flexibility to work when, where, and how makes the most sense for us and our lives.

I think it’s also important for women to recognize their ability to be role models for the next generation. I appreciate that my children are watching me build this business, which encourages them to dream big, as well.

What are the “myths” that you would like to dispel about being a founder? Can you explain what you mean?

I think the pervasive myth that you need to put the rest of your life on hold to be a founder is not only incorrect, it’s dangerous. Yes, it’s true people who start companies need to be driven, dedicated, and diligent, and the lean years after launch demand a lot of your time and attention. But you should always put your own health and wellbeing first and give yourself ample time for nurturing personal connections and pursuits. The business will be better because of your attention to your physical and mental health and the support system you build around yourself.

While I believe everyone has the capability to lead, not everyone may want to, and that is okay. We need to recognize and celebrate that every individual’s life goals are personal and not every woman wants or needs to be the boss.

To be successful as a founder means different things to different people, but I believe that conscious leadership — the ability to lead with compassion and self-awareness to build a culture of kindness where everyone feels valued and supported — is the key to long-term success.

Ok super. Here is the main question of our interview. What are your “5 Things I Wish Someone Told Me Before I Started” and why? (Please share a story or example for each.)

Eliminate what’s unnecessary in order to illuminate what’s essential. This practice of stripping away what’s not essential, whether it’s with my commitments, a story I’m writing or editing, purging my closet, or even writing a recipe, has become my most important habit as my career has grown. I think about how I can pull out the most “flavor” with the fewest number of ingredients.

Dream about the future, but we don’t hold on too tightly to exactly what those dreams will look like. My career story is an example of following what lights you up without really knowing exactly how it would all play out. That’s something I’ve followed through the rest of my career: being very intentional about pursuing the things I love and that I know I want to spend my time doing, but also keeping an open hand to the full expression of how that might look different than what I had initially imagined. And that it might be better than what I thought it would be.

The way we spend our time is a direct reflection of our priorities.

Whether we are conscious of it or not, we’re always expressing what our true priorities are. I had to get very real with myself about the fact that the way I spend my time is a direct expression of what is most important to me — when my kids were little, I was trying to be the kind of mother I wanted to be, without giving up any of my work responsibilities. I’ve now become more conscious of how I regularly spend my time to make sure it’s aligned. Examples of this: I never check emails in the morning. I spend that planning how I’ll time-block my day to make sure I leave room for what’s important. When my kids are up, I’m focused on them until it’s time to head to school. And then I have focused work time where I tackle my top priorities first.

Your unique genius is already within you. Spend time cultivating your inner life so that you can uncover the unique beauty that only you can bring to the world. For me, that happens each morning during my journaling practice.

Be patient. In the early days, be scrappy so you can invest in people — the most important part of any company. In the first few years of my company, I saw my peers renting these beautiful studio spaces, but I chose to invest that money right back into the business and hire great people while we worked together in the guest room of my house. It was unglamorous, but I could be patient because I was in it for the long haul. When the timing was right, we were in a position to buy a beautiful studio of our own in downtown Austin, and since I didn’t do it too early, we were able to make a great investment that led to future growth instead of draining resources.

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

Within my inner circle of my family, friends, team members, professional partners, and industry peers, I hope I have modeled what leading with kindness can create. I value each of my personal and professional relationships greatly and appreciate the collaboration and support they provide.

To our readers and the outside world, I hope we provide a warm, welcoming space for them to explore how to live the life of their dreams by uncovering their own quest for beauty that lives within each of us. I strongly believe in the power of beauty and creativity in all its forms and the positive effect they can have on our lives and society at large.

I would want to empower every person — regardless of skill level, budget considerations, or time constraints — to recognize that they have the power to create the life they want.

I’d love to sit down with Oprah to soak up her wisdom and hear her lifetime of incredible stories. Out of all her accomplishments, what I admire most about her is her desire to forge her own path and recreate her career many times over. She truly does things on her own terms, and has never let naysayers keep her from going after big dreams. I also respect Gwyneth Paltrow’s ability to make a major career pivot, walking away from a successful acting career to create a media empire that celebrates other voices and perspectives. She’s never afraid to be controversial and push the envelope in an effort to question assumptions and make people think.

Thank you for these fantastic insights. We greatly appreciate the time you spent on this.

Female Founders: Camille Styles on the Five Things You Need to Thrive and Succeed as a Woman… was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.