Making Up For Glossed Time

Please, Retta, don’t hurt ‘em

Rosie went for a 30 second swim today.😂

Let’s have a heart to heart, kiddo.

It’s September 11, and every year on this day I always take some time to reflect.

I grew up just on the other side of the river from Manhattan. And I have so many memories of standing across the river and looking at New York City and those two majestic towers, standing tall at the southern end of the island. From time to time, I will come across an old picture of me with the skyline behind me and the towers still visible, and my heart will ache just a little bit.

After the towers came down, I remember going home and the first time I saw the skyline, I lost my breath. I could FEEL the loss of them. It was like seeing a family portrait with one person missing. Something didn’t feel right. And it never did after that.

I remember walking the streets in my hometown and all the shop windows were papered with photographs of the lost, the missing. Loved ones that would never be found. There was a heaviness in the air. It lingered for a long time.

People were angry, tensions were high, it was a painful, painful time. And a lot of people wanted someone to blame—so they turned to people who looked like the people they saw on the news. Whose names sounded similar, who came from the same place. Seeing the backlash toward that community was heartbreaking.

But what I also remember…was the love.

This feeling of community— where people slowed down, took their time, and were kinder and gentler with each other. I was proud to be an American then. That’s what I thought America was supposed to feel like.

I don’t know what happened, and I can’t pinpoint when it did, but that has changed. We are suspicious of each other, trying to read someone’s intentions and motives and beliefs, just by looking at them. We’ve lost sight of each other, and of ourselves.

We lost the love.

I hope, deep in my heart, that it’s not too late to get it back. I gotta believe that it isn’t. Because the alternative is just too hard to bear.

I love you, kiddo. ♥️

No one asked you, sir.

Yesterday, I was telling the story about my decision to stop seeing Tony the Butcher. And this stugots rolled up into my comment section to offer up his ‘never asked for’ male perspective. (I have since blocked him because it’s one thing to disagree with me, but it’s another thing to insult My Kiddos in the comment section and I won’t stand for it.)

This kind of s**t fires me up because it’s messaging that us girls have been given our entire life— that we are not allowed to set boundaries, that we should always give someone the benefit of the doubt, a second chance, a sixth chance.

That our love should be unconditional.

F**k that.

I don’t believe in unconditional love. I believe that you should absolutely put conditions on access to your love. I’m not saying build walls… I’m saying build guard rails. Make it clear for everyone how they need to behave in order to be given the gift of your love.

After 55 years of living, I know what all of that old messaging has done to me: it kept me in relationships where I was only getting crumbs when I deserved the whole cake. It made me think that because I was the more emotionally intelligent one, that because I had done the work, I had the empathy to see why they might be acting this way or treating me unkindly.

That it was up to me to love them through their stuff.

And couple that with the guilt that women are often given when we do decide to set boundaries… well, that’s a s**t sandwich I’m no longer eating.

Tony is a good man. I know this. But he’s not a ready man.
Both things can be true.

However, I am no longer giving All Access Passes to my heart to men who haven’t accumulated the emotional currency to get one.

Set the boundary, girls. Guilt free.😘

A story to be continued…

Hey kiddos. I know a lot of of you started following me when I told you about Tony the butcher asking me out on a date. And it’s been sweet how invested all of you have been in the potential of our budding relationship.

I ran into him over the weekend, and unfortunately, I think the potential is not quite what I thought it was.

Tony admitted to me that he still has some walls up after his divorce, some stuff he still has to work through. And from what I can tell, he isn’t doing much to work through that stuff except waiting for it to sort of work itself out on its own.

And these days, that’s not enough for me.

You see, kiddo, I’ve been that gal for most of my life— I’d see the potential in someone, latch onto that, and ignore what they were telling me every day to my face. I would take someone telling me the truth about the limits of what they could be for me, and I would see it as an opportunity instead of an admission. And then my empathetic side would kick in and think that I could love them through their stuff.

Here’s the thing, kiddo— people aren’t broken birds. We’re not supposed to pick them up, put them in a soft little box, and wait for them to heal on their own. People have the resources to help their own healing before they bring their broken wings to someone else. And I am no longer in the habit of tending to broken birds, no matter how beautiful they may be.

I’m not saying that this is the end necessarily, but it’s definitely on pause. Because seeing him, even casually, is going to put me in that energy of trying to “help“ him. I know me well enough to know that. And I also know that men really like that about me— I’m a good listener, I give good advice, and I’m quick to offer my heart to someone who hasn’t quite earned it yet.

This is my reciprocity era, kiddos. I can’t do one-sided anymore. And I don’t think you should either. We deserve someone who is going to work on themselves as much as they work on their relationship with us. And who don’t expect us to just sit around and wait for them to figure things out.

So, I get to keep Tony as a friend. And I get to still go t

You probably don’t want to hear this.

I have had MANY conversations with clients and friends trying to build a brand online, and here’s what I have heard:

“I don’t want to be on camera.”
“I don’t want to be known for the bad thing that happened to me.”
“I don’t want to talk about ‘my stuff’ online.”

And I get it. And I know what they want me to say—they want me to tell them that they don’t have to be on camera, that they can just share the stuff they WANT to share—all of the positive/informational/wisdom/“wow” content, and that will build their brand.

But after 6 years of building a brand literally from scratch, and all of the trials and tribulations that have come along with it—all of the research, all of the courses I took about social media content, all of the advice I’ve followed—I can tell you that the one thing that built my brand wasn’t my editing, my hooks, my messaging, or my knowledge.

IT WAS MY VULNERABILITY.

Yes, I have wisdom. Yes, I have experience. Yes, I have good content and things that help people build their confidence. I’m good at what I do.

But I know WHY they wanted to listen to me—it was because I was vulnerable. I was willing to share the ugly stuff, the ridiculous things, the times when imposter syndrome creeped in, the times when I felt frustrated and unmotivated. When I showed up on the Internet without a stitch of makeup on. When I shared about getting dumped at my kitchen island by my husband 3 weeks after I walked away from my big corporate job to bet on myself. I have cried many times on the internet—something I once thought was cringy, was something that connected people to me.

People BELIEVED that I would be a good coach for them because I had been through it myself.

I became a GUIDE instead of a coach.

And in a world of AI, that’s the one thing that will make your brand stand out. Put the PERSONAL in personal brand.

And if you need help building your confidence in your brand, comment CONFIDENCE below.

This blew my mind.

In my coaching membership for women over 40, The Confidence Clubhouse, I bring in guest coaches to share their wisdom with the community.

A couple weeks ago, Samantha Brand, did an incredible session about journaling. And something that she said in that session cracked my head open.

Listen, I always wanted to be “journal girl.“ To have volumes of handwritten accounts of my thoughts, my dreams, my escapades, etc. I like to think that I’m cool enough to fill books full of my thoughts.

But I’ve never been consistent. I would get on a journaling kick for a few weeks, forget to journal for a couple days, then go down some shame spiral about being a few days behind and then stop.

As I was telling Sam that I’ve never been consistent in my journaling, I was quick to correct myself— I’ve actually been very consistent for the last six years—here, with all of you.

As she was quick to point out, journaling doesn’t have to be writing things down. It can be video, it can be voice notes or emails or text messages to yourself. The way you outward process is irrelevant. It’s the process that matters.

And then she said the thing that hasn’t left me:

when you are in a consistent journaling practice, your voice becomes the loudest in your head.

And when she said that I made the connection: here I am at 55, feeling the most confident I have ever felt. I have built a business around confidence. And all of that was built while I was outwardly journaling my life, thoughts and feelings to all of you. Doing that drowned out all of the other voices— friends, family, coworkers, trolls on the Internet— and has built this unshakable and unf**kwitable sense of self in me. I am proof positive that what Sam shows people in her journaling workshops is true.

So, Sammie inspired a month-long journaling discovery that we will be doing in The Clubhouse. To join us, comment CONFIDENCE.

And to be sure to check out Sammy’s workshops: Samantha Brand

When you get to the top of the mountain, reach down and help others up, too.

This week, I’m doing a series all about Dolly Parton and lessons we can take from her life about how to love and live.

Today, it’s a story about what she did after she made it big and her song “I Will Always Love You” topped the charts.

They say character is what you do when no one is looking. And Dolly did a lot of things behind the scenes that people didn’t know about. Things to make people’s lives better, to protect their health, to put books in the hands of kids.

We could all take a page out of her life‘s handbook.

So, for Dolly… Let’s throw on some sparkles, push our t**s up, and spread a little love in the world.

Love you, kiddo.
Aunt LBD 💋

Breaking up is hard to do.

With the passing of Dolly Parton, I’ve been looking at what an inspirational life she has lived. This week, I thought I would share some stories about her that you might not know —and some lessons that we can all take from the way she lived.

Today, it’s about walking away from someone who you love and who has been good to you… and knowing that is still not enough to make you happy. That sometimes we have to make tough decisions in order to chase down our dreams.

Not everyone is meant to walk with us through every season of our life. And when we are in a season of change and personal growth, sometimes the folks we thought would be there for the journey decide to opt out. Or, we outgrow them. When we go through a metamorphosis, we shed layers. And often, those layers are going to be people. And when the cost to stay the same is greater than the price we’d pay to shed those layers so we can grow… that’s when we know we have big decisions to make.

Come back tomorrow for part three of the series!

Love you kiddo.

Dolly Parton was a bad ass.

A lot of you kiddos may not know a whole lot about her, but for people in my generation and older, Dolly Parton meant a lot to us.

I thought over the next few days I would share a few stories about her and the life lessons that she taught us just by living the beautiful life that she lived for 80 years.

I’m going to call the series “What Would Dolly Do?”

And today I’m going to tell you the story about her most famous song and how a lot of people don’t even realize she’s the one who wrote it.

I’m sure most of you kiddos know the song by Whitney Houston, “I Will Always Love You“— but many of you may not know that Dolly Parton actually wrote that song 18 years earlier and it was a little country song first. Not the power ballad that it became once Whitney got her hands on it.

The story behind that song is a testament to Dolly‘s business savvy, her refusal to be anything but herself, and her steadfast determination to never let anyone underestimate her.

Come back over the next few days and I’ll tell you a few more stories about her.

And in the meantime, t**s up kiddos. Let’s do it for Dolly.💖