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Hey everyone, this is Molly and Matt and we re the hosts of Grown Up Stuff How to Adult, a podcast from Ruby Studio and iHeart Podcasts.
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It s a show dedicated to helping you figure out the trickiest parts of adulting.
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Like how to start planning for retirement, creating a healthy skincare routine, understanding when and how much to tip someone and so much more.
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Let s learn about all of it and then some.
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Listen to Grown Up Stuff How to Adult on America s number one podcast network, iHeart.
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Open your free iHeart app and search Grown Up Stuff.
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This is the story of how a group of people brought music back to Afghanistan by creating their own version of American Idol.
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The joy they brought to the nation.
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You re free completely.
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No one is there to destroy you.
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The danger they endured.
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They said my head should be cut off.
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I m John Legend.
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Listen to Afghan Star on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
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Guess what, Will?
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What s that, Mango?
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I ve been trying to write a promo for our podcast, Part-Time Genius, but even though we ve done over 250 episodes, we don t really talk about murders or cults.
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I mean, we did just cover the Illuminati of cheese, so I feel like that makes us pretty edgy.
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We also solve mysteries like how Chinese is your Chinese food and how do dollar stores make money?
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And then, of course, can you game a dog show?
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So what you re saying is everyone should be listening.
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Listen to Part-Time Genius on the iHeartRadio app or wherever you get your podcasts.
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And everyone talked about a morning routine and meditation.
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And I m like, if all of these really successful people that I admire do this, there s got to be something to it.
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I need to wake up and work out.
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I need to wake up and do this.
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But those things didn t work for me.
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So it was trying something for a week.
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Do I feel better?
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And I got it to a routine of the things that feel best for me.
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Those five things might not work for you.
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Hey everyone, welcome back to On Purpose, the number one health podcast in the world.
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Thanks to each and every one of you that come back every week to become happier, healthier, and more healed.
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And I m so excited to be talking to you today.
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I can t believe it.
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My new book, Eight Rules of Love,
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is out, and I cannot wait to share it with you.
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I am so, so excited for you to read this book, for you to listen to this book.
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I read the audiobook.
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If you haven t got it already, make sure you go to 8rulesoflove.com.
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It s dedicated to anyone who s trying to find, keep, or let go of love.
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So if you ve got friends that are dating, broken up, or struggling with love, make sure you grab this book.
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And I d love to invite you to come and see me for my global tour.
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love rules.
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Go to jscheddytour.com to learn more information about tickets, VIP experiences, and more.
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I can t wait to see you this year.
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And you know that I m always on the lookout for guests who have different experiences, different walks of life, people who ve built and created incredible cultural phenomenons, and also at the same time, learned lessons along the way that they can share with us.
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Now I know that you re going to be really excited for this one because I know a ton of you already follow our next guest and I m excited for you to learn about the behind-the-scenes story and the journey that she s taken to get there.
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I m speaking about the one and only Mariana Hewitt who s the leading voice in social media and the co-founder of Summer Fridays, the skincare brand whose iconic jet lag mask became an instant bestseller.
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Mariana is also the host of her own podcast, Life with Mariana, the number one fashion and beauty podcast.
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I got to be a guest, I think right at the beginning, near when the show launched.
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It s been on an incredible trajectory, amazing guests.
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Make sure you check it out.
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Mariana is a dear friend, so I m loving this opportunity.
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I just said to her offline,
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that when a friend comes on the show, I think I know them a little bit and then we interview them and then I realize I know them a whole lot better.
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So I hope you feel inspired to interview your friends as well.
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Mariana, welcome to On Purpose.
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Thank you for having me.
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No, it s so great to have you.
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I ve been looking forward to this and I loved the interview we did for your podcast two years ago now.
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Yeah, it was one of my favorite episodes and people loved it so much.
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And so I m so happy you re coming back again.
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Yes, yes.
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I m excited to come back again.
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And, you know, you ve just been on this incredible journey with your brands, your work, the community you spend time with.
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You re such a respected voice, such a well-known face in the industry, which I think is really hard to do when you ve done it from building a brand, when you ve done it from building social media.
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It s hard to maintain that.
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But I want to go backwards today, because as we were researching, we also found that you don t always share too much about yourself.
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And that s obviously what On Purpose is built upon.
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And I wanted to ask you, like, and I ask this often, what s your earliest strong memory as a child?
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Like, can you remember, if you could go back, what s one of your strongest earliest memories?
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And why is it so important to you?
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And I ll tell you mine as I let you think on yours.
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If I think about my earliest, earliest memory, I can probably remember holding my sister when she was born.
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So I was around four and a half going on five and I remember her being in my arms and like it was amazing to have that opportunity to actually hold this baby and I remember my parents had been like
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preparing me for this moment where they were like, you got to pray for a new, new little friend to be in your life.
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And so like for weeks on end and months, I was praying.
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So I was prepped.
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And then when my mom was going to hospital and everything, I remember my dad, like staying at home with me and doing puzzles and like keeping me occupied and like getting me ready.
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And then finally, when I held my sister, it was like such a moment.
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And the reason why, and I think about how that moment impacted me and I feel my parents did a great job at me being excited.
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and at the same time I feel that s been a big part of why I feel so close to my sister and I often call my sister kid because I see her as my little child and so there was a parental aspect I feel like I became quite fatherly early on so anyway that s my earliest memory of four and a half years old I want to know yours
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We have a mutual friend, Audrey, and she was asking me the other day, like, how far back do you remember?
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And I m like, I remember my first day of kindergarten.
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She s like, you do?
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And I was like, yeah, I can remember waiting in line.
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I can remember my backpack.
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I remember going into school.
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And it really was memories from six on where I remember a lot.
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At the time my parents got divorced, I was six.
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So this is very early 90s, before a lot of families were getting divorced.
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and i had grown up in germany that s where i was born and after my parents divorced my mom went back to germany and this is very modern on my parents at the time but i ended up living with my dad full-time so my dad was a full-time single parent they were cross-continental co-parenting which
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is like it just seems very crazy like thinking back then but i think it s a lot to my independence now because i started flying by myself to germany to see my mom when i was six so my dad used to take me to the airport this is before tsa pre-check this is this is how long ago it was where your people could like walk you to the gate so my dad would walk me there and then someone would take me on the plane i would fly to germany i would meet my mom there on the other end and i m an only child and a youngest child so i have two older half sisters but i was my parents only kids so
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from a really young age i had this independence of okay i could fly to germany by myself like i can do everything by myself and i think my parents always treated me as an adult at a really young age and they instilled independence in me and they always treated me like i was an adult so my parents are much older now my dad is 85 my mom is 72 and so i think they were at a phase in their life where
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They were a little bit more grown up.
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They had figured things out themselves.
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And they said, this is the way I want to parent.
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I m not going to smother you.
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I m going to let you be your own person and figure things out.
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And I think that independence has really gotten me to where I am today.
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And so when people are like, how do you travel all the time for work?
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I m like, I ve been traveling since I was a baby.
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So it s something I m so used to.
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love that I was I did not know that and I think it s really interesting I don t live in my past that much and I you don t strike me as someone who lives in your past a lot but I do love going backwards to kind of connect the dots with those experiences and what you just said is a perfect example of how you took that have you found sometimes that you speak to people but we all react to things differently like for someone else
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that going back and forth would have made travel really scary and they would have been like, God, my parents got divorced.
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Like it was the worst.
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And I had to go back and forth.
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Whereas your story is I m independent and I travel.
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Do you think you had to reflect or did you do any work to get there?
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Or was that just natural for you where it was like, I just felt like it was a good thing because I m always intrigued as to life happening to us versus us choosing what life does to us.
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Yeah, I think there s two scenarios here.
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So I have a friend who has really bad flight anxiety, like she cannot get on a plane without taking something first.
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And we talked about it recently.
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And she s like, I think because my parents were divorced and I thought every time I got on a plane, it was that I was leaving one parent and going to another one.
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And so she has a really bad time flying now, 30 years later because of those experiences.
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Again, my parents being modern at the time, which is more common now, my parents actually got me a therapist when they were going through divorce.
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And this is 30 years ago.
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So you have to think I was six years old and my parents said, OK, we re going to separate.
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We re going to give you someone to talk to.
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And so at the time, I could actually process my emotions, not really remembering like what was happening, but they were
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so cautious about how to handle the situation that I think it made me feel like, oh, it s not a bad thing that they re separated.
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They re doing these things because they love me and they want to be happy people independently.
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And so the way they handled it then reflected on who I am as an adult today.
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So I think as I think about one day becoming a parent, all those things from someone being six really does reflect on who they are as an adult.
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That s incredible.
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Yeah, so your parents are super mature.
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This is like parent goals over here.
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Yeah, but you have to think then, people weren t getting divorced.
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People were not going to therapy.
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Parents weren t co-parenting.
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There s not even really cell phones at this time.
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So they were trying to co-parent in different continents without Wi-Fi, without cell phones.
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And the fact that they were able to do it, it s like if you live in the same city with someone else, it s definitely possible if they could do it between countries.
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Wow and do you feel that because of the way they handled it you ve continued to have a good relationship with both of them?
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Yeah.
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Because of how they, how did they, what were some of the others because I think there are so many people today who have parents who got divorced or a lot of people who actually have parents who never got divorced but they feel that could have benefited them and then of course their parents who stayed together and people are grateful for that but from your experience
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What else, I m just so intrigued by how incredible your parents are, what else do you think they got right that despite being in separate countries, you felt like you had a healthy relationship with both of them?
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They always made sure, no matter what, this was the schedule.
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I spent my summers with my mom in Europe.
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I would go see her during holidays.
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She would come back to see me.
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My mom was always planning work trips about coming back to where I was.
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She would make sure she was present at school, even though she didn t live in the same state as me.
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She would come to different things.
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And so that time is really important.
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And I remember more the days that she was there than she wasn t there.
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And so now I m so close to both of them.
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And they re really like friends to me now at this point.
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It s not really like a parental relationship of anything.
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I probably parent them a little bit too much, but they re just so incredible.
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And I think
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hindsight is that they re older and I have the gift of age from them.
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And I think because they were fully mature adults by the time they got married and had kids, they realized how to be a parent more.
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I think a lot of times when you re still trying to figure yourself out in your 20s and 30s, it might be a little bit too early, but I think
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My mom waited till she was 36 to have me.
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My dad was 49.
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And I think they were in a place where they were fully ready to become parents.
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And I think that really reflected on the way they raised me versus feeling like I have to do this because of my age, which I think a lot of women feel that way now.
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Like, oh, I m 30.
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I have to do this thing now.
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But they don t feel ready because society keeps telling us we have to have kids by a certain age.
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But I think they waited.
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And that waiting made them better parents to me.
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Yeah, wow.
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So not only were your parents open to therapy, getting divorced, moving country, your dad being the primary caretaker, and then your parents were actually having kids late, which was so not normal then.
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Yes.
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So it sounds like they were breaking all the rules.
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They were doing all the things that I want to do now in life, but a long time ago before it was like normalized.
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Yeah.
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Tell me one of the ways that you feel you parent your parents now that they re older.
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And of course, you know, what s been one of the most beautiful ways that you ve got to return that?
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I do every I do so much for them now, but it s like such a blessing to be able to do that for them.
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And so my parents are so grateful for anything if I buy them a flight or book something for them.
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But now it s like travel.
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I want to make sure that they re like very comfortable.
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So it s just making sure that they have everything that they need.
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So I have a half sister who s older.
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She lives in Connecticut.
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So my dad wanted to see them for Thanksgiving.
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So it s just he s like, oh, thank you so much for this flight.
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Like he has so much gratitude for a flight that I could book for him.
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And it s like if I can work hard to make sure that you can go see your great grandkids, it makes me so happy or
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my mom to be able to go on a trip and do the things that she wants to do.
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So now they re probably annoyed with me because I m like, don t do this.
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Don t do this.
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Don t go here.
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Remember this.
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Like wear your face mask.
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Like I m telling them all of these things.
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But I try to do it a little bit less.
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But they re like my dad even text me later.
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OK, thanks, mom.
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So they re cute.
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I love that.
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That s so adorable.
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It s so beautiful.
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I think for all of us who can support our parents in any way, it is such a blessing.
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One of the things that you brought up there that really stuck with me was this idea that you want to live your life in the way your parents were living their life back then.
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Do you feel like you didn t grow up with a lot of limitations in your mindset or boundaries?
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Because I think what you were saying is that a lot of, for example, you gave the example that a lot of women feel like, oh, by the time I m 30, I should have had kids by now or by the time I m this.
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And I think time and society place a lot of these boundaries and barriers.
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Did you feel more free from them because of how you were parented?
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Or did at any point in your life, did these become a part of your
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Yeah.
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Education as well.
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There s a couple of things.
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So one, my dad grew up really poor.
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He was born at the end of the Great Depression and grew up.
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My grandpa was a preacher.
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They had no money, like very, very poor.
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My dad only could go to college because he joined the Air Force and was able to go on a GI Bill.
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My mom immigrated to the U.S.
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during the Vietnam War and came to America with literally nothing.
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So between the two of their stories, I thought if they come from nothing, they come from war, they come from the Great Depression and they could make this life for themselves.
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I can do anything possible because they ve given me this great life that I could have that anything is possible here.
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So if I don t live my life to the fullest, it s almost a disservice to the sacrifices that they made for me to be here.
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My mom is also Vietnamese, so I grew up with a very much a tiger mom who was like, you have to do these things.
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Go to school.
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You need to graduate.
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You need to get a job.
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But she also taught to me independence.
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And what she told me was never rely on anyone else for anything.
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You need to be able to fully support yourself.
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So if you re in a relationship or a situation, you can walk away and not feel like you have to rely on another person for something or be in a scenario you don t want to be in because you need this person for this thing.
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And maybe I took it a little far, overly independent in my life.
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And so growing up, I told my parents, I want to be a television host.
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And then my mom was like, OK, you need a realistic job.
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Like, being on TV is not realistic.
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So I said, OK, my backup job is going to be PR.
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So I went to school for journalism.
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My backup was PR.
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I interned in PR in college.
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It was my first job out of college.
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I was taking celebrities to interviews.
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And I was like, I still want to be the one interviewing them.
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Like, this is, I don t want to be behind the camera.
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I want to be in front of the camera.
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And so I started working as a TV host and then Instagram and YouTube came around in 2012.
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And I had a Reel and to send my Reel places, I needed to upload it somewhere.
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So I uploaded it to YouTube and I had to send the link to places to go on interviews.
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And so I would send them this link.
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That was my first YouTube video.
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And then I had a channel.
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So I was like, I may as well start uploading makeup tutorials because I have this place.
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This is very early YouTube days, 10 years ago.
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And after two years, I was able to do it full time.
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And I told my parents, I m going to quit to do the Internet.
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And they were like, quit to do the Internet?
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Like, what is this?
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And so even though they support me now, I don t think they gave me they let me know that all things were possible because of their own stories.
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But I didn t know at the time that I could make it a career for myself.
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And they were definitely a little bit skeptical.
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Now they re like the most supportive people.
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But at the beginning, you know, it s like Internet full time.
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Like, what is this?
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Parents always want us to be safe.
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Parents always want their kids to be safe.
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But it s almost like the safest thing parents can do is let kids take their own risks.
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I feel the same with my parents.
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My mom moved to England when she was 16 and they built their life.
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Her brothers were like 18 and 19.
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and they built a life.
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Whereas when I was moving to New York at 28, it was like, no, no, no, like, are you okay, my baby?
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I m like, mom, I m 28 years old, like, you were 16.
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But they forget that they forget the pain and the sacrifice and the risk they took on.
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And they want to shelter you away from it.
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When you made that decision, were you so convinced that
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this is right for me I know it s the thing or was it hard because I feel like when you did that step it wasn t a thing to be a youtuber yet it wasn t a career path that someone could say I want to be a creative mom and dad look at what XYZ are doing there weren t any role models at that time
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And so when you did that, it was even a bigger risk than it is today.
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But I find so many people who listen to this show today struggle to break out of what their parents think of them.
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So when your parents, it sounds like you have such a close relationship with your parents, they love you, you love them.
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Was there a part of you that felt you were letting them down by doing this?
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Yeah.
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Yeah, never letting them down.
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I was never worried about letting them down.
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I think I just had to prove them.
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So like my my dad is very much like, OK, go do whatever you want.
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Like, this is great.
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Like he grew up in a time there s not even phone.
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So like to have a job on the Internet seems so insane to him.
1
SPEAKER_01
But my mom is very much like, show me what you can do and then I ll support you.
1
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And so I had to show her these opportunities.
1
SPEAKER_01
And I think when I went on my first brand trip and I could bring her on the trip, she was like, oh, you could travel for work.
1
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You could go places.
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I went to Thailand and I took her with me.
1
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And she couldn t believe that you could have this job on the Internet and create this for yourself.
1
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And so I was never worried about disappointing them because I always believed in myself.
1
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Like if I want to do something, I know that it s possible.
1
SPEAKER_01
And now we re in a really great place where you can see people s careers that you want to emulate or you look up to.
1
SPEAKER_01
But at that time, there was no one to
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We were figuring it all out at the same time.
1
SPEAKER_01
And luckily, it was very early days of influencers having managers and teams.
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And I happened to get an agency, and I think that helped legitimize it to my family.
1
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And then they saw over time, like, OK, you can actually
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like make money doing this and here we are a decade later.
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SPEAKER_00
I love that.
2
SPEAKER_00
That s amazing.
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SPEAKER_00
Congrats.
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SPEAKER_00
Congrats on having the strength at a time.
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SPEAKER_00
I think that s underplayed like how hard it is when something is brand new to kind of bet on it because you you didn t have the you didn t have the benefit of hindsight of how successful this thing was going to be or how big it was going to be.
2
SPEAKER_01
No idea.
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At the beginning, people were PayPal-ing me $50 to post something.
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So I was like, that s how early it was.
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SPEAKER_01
And I was like, you would pay me $50 to post something?
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SPEAKER_01
Let s go.
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SPEAKER_01
I was so excited.
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SPEAKER_00
Yeah, that s incredible.
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SPEAKER_00
And when you started doing makeup tutorials and everything, was that somehow, and what I love about that story is you set out to be a TV anchor, right?
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SPEAKER_00
That s what you wanted to be.
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SPEAKER_00
Then you go into PR, realize that being behind camera doesn t work.
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SPEAKER_00
Then you do makeup tutorials.
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SPEAKER_00
Was doing makeup tutorials fulfilling somewhat of a passion of being in front of camera?
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SPEAKER_00
That obviously wasn t being a news anchor, but there was something about it that was feeling right.
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SPEAKER_01
Yeah, I always had a passion for sharing things that I loved with an audience.
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And so at the time, I thought being a TV host was the only way to do this because I had to be on a show to talk about things that I love to share it with people.
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When YouTube came around and I m like, you can upload videos and talk about whatever you want and people can watch it.
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It was always the things I felt I wanted to do in my heart when I grew up.
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But when I grew up, there was no platform to do that.
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And then at the time when I was auditioning, I was going to a lot of shows to be a host.
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And every time I would get towards the end and they would be like, we re going to give this job to this celebrity, like this celebrity host is going to do this job.
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I m like, well, how am I ever supposed to be known if I don t get the opportunity?
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With the internet, we re in such an amazing place where we can take our careers into our own hands.
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There s no one to tell us, no, you can create the content.
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And if the audience is there and people want it, they will show up, they will watch, they will download, they will follow, they will listen.
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SPEAKER_01
And so it was everything I wanted in this new platform.
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And it finally gave me a place where I wasn t getting told no in an audition that someone
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didn t have to say yes to me, and I could prove and show that I had this audience online.
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And so I love it so much, and it was everything I wanted to do when I grew up.
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I just didn t know that s what it was.
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And I always had a love for beauty, and my dad used to take me to beauty counters.
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So growing up with my dad, he didn t know how to do my hair and my makeup, so he would take me to department stores.
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SPEAKER_01
And he would take me to an Estee Lauder counter and say, OK, here s my daughter.
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SPEAKER_01
Can you show her how to use hair and makeup?
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Can you show her what products to buy?
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Because he had no idea.
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What a great dad.
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I know, he was the best.
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And so that really was my love of beauty from a really young age.
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And so I started learning about beauty from the experts, these people at counters who were telling me about products.
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And that was in middle school and high school.
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And then I took that love into creating tutorials for myself and then starting our own brand.
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SPEAKER_00
That s such a great story and I m so glad we re doing this like background journey because I feel like I think about this all the time.
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SPEAKER_00
I went to public speaking school from 11 to 17, public speaking drama school age 11 to age 18 for seven years.
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SPEAKER_00
And I think about it all the time that before I d even launched my online career I probably had around like 20 years of public speaking experience before I ever did this professionally or got paid to do it.
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SPEAKER_00
and i think that when i hear your story of like as a little girl like going to a beauty counter learning about not just how to put on makeup but which brands were doing well and why and then skin tone and color and then maybe looking for gaps in the market like you get such a real grassroots experience that no one else can get just by looking at what we have today i feel like i feel like grassroots learning there s nothing better than that do you feel like there were things then that you were like
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one day like yeah i think at the time i remember learning how to contour in high school before it became trendy like years later and i remember i was at a mac counter and they were like this is what like drag queens use on stage this is what they use in stage makeup this is called contouring you use this brush you use this powder you put it right here so when you re on stage your face really stands out and i can remember this person telling me at a mac store how to do this step and it s something i still do in my makeup every day today and here we are like
2
SPEAKER_01
15 years later from when they taught me this and so I loved learning from them and so it was so great but you don t know it at the time and I think in life every job and every experience whether you end up doing that job long term or not you really do learn something from each of those things that pile on to the next job like in high school I used to work at restaurants I used to be a hostess at restaurants and
2
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Being a hostess, maybe you don t think it s connected to the job I have now, but I had to stand in front of a restaurant.
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I had to talk to strangers.
2
SPEAKER_01
I stood on my feet for a long time.
2
SPEAKER_01
I had to have conversations with people who were angry waiting for their tables or wanted something really quickly or making conversation with them, walking them to their tables.
2
SPEAKER_01
And now I have no problem networking or meeting new people or going up to people when I see them at events or places because I had these skills that I learned at a really young age of how to talk to anyone in these scenarios.
2
SPEAKER_00
if you feel like you re not living your passion right now or you re not living your purpose or, you know, we talk about these words a lot, I really want you to go back and look at every job you ve ever done and reflect on what you learned there because I promise you that skill is going to be so useful for your passion and your purpose when it comes along.
2
SPEAKER_00
I was saying to someone, my first ever job was I delivered newspapers, but then my second job was I worked at Morrison s, which is our version of like Walmart or like a grocery store, but a big one.
2
SPEAKER_00
And I remember just stacking shelves and everyone s like, well, what did you learn then?
2
SPEAKER_00
I m like, I learned how to memorize what was in every aisle.
2
SPEAKER_00
If anyone asked me where anything was, I knew exactly which aisle it was in.
2
SPEAKER_00
I learned how to turn up to work on time and leave on time.
2
SPEAKER_00
And I learned that over time you got paid more, like you d learn so many basic things.
2
SPEAKER_00
And what you just said, you learn how to work with different people.
2
SPEAKER_00
I was 15 years old and I learned how to have a boss and how to have a good relationship with my boss.
2
SPEAKER_00
all of these techniques and skills that you would never learn in a textbook, you d never learn at school.
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SPEAKER_00
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SPEAKER_00
When you were going through this journey, you take this decision to make YouTube videos, to make content.
2
SPEAKER_00
Did you ever get wrapped up in views?
2
SPEAKER_00
How beautiful am I?
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Because I feel like that can get so toxic for people.
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SPEAKER_00
And I think now what we re seeing so much of is creator burnout.
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So there s one side that I want to talk to you about, which is like likes, views, comments, engagement.
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SPEAKER_00
Like how do you deal with the pressure of that?
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SPEAKER_00
Like you upload something and it doesn t get views.
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SPEAKER_00
And the other side is when you actually get good at it and now you re like knocking out videos, you re getting views, everything s going well.
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SPEAKER_00
But we meet so many creators today who just say, I m tired of putting stuff out.
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SPEAKER_00
Like I m burnt out of having to upload every day to three different platforms.
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SPEAKER_01
I never worried too much about views.
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And I know that that s a really hard thing to say in a world where our job is valued on followers, views, likes, clicks.
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And that really is how we re valued.
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But at the time on YouTube, I started my very first videos with products I use today in my skincare routine.
2
SPEAKER_01
And that s 10 years ago because I genuinely love these products.
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SPEAKER_01
I was shopping at Sephora.
2
SPEAKER_01
I love Prestige Beauty.
2
SPEAKER_01
I was a little bit older in the YouTube
2
SPEAKER_01
age a lot of the people were in either high school or they were very young and what they were sharing was not genuinely the products that I loved and so I could have fell into this trap of I care about virality I care about what s trending and I m going to use these products but it wasn t genuine to who I was so I had a slower growth and I said I love these brands and these products I m going to create videos around this content and I m not going to be the
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fastest growing and that s okay because it s true to who I am.
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SPEAKER_00
And so if I thought about the longevity of my career, it was more important to me to create content that I genuinely liked and products that I genuinely loved versus chasing views because virality, maybe people will click on it and watch it because they care about this trending product or this theme, but they re not getting to know you.
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SPEAKER_00
And it was more important for me to people to like me for what I genuinely wanted to talk about because
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I can t really create content if I don t love it and I just won t do it.
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It s just not something that I like.
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And I think that was a problem I had when TikTok first started was I didn t want to create content just for like the sake of virality.
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SPEAKER_00
And so on YouTube, I grew a little bit slower, but I started working with luxury beauty brands.
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SPEAKER_00
And at the very beginning, they weren t really spending money with people, but they saw like there s only a handful of girls on YouTube who are creating content around Armani Beauty and Laura Mercier and these kind of brands.
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SPEAKER_00
And then I ended up getting to work with them because there wasn t a lot of people sharing it.
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SPEAKER_00
And so I started working with Sephora at that time and creating videos for their brand pages because they wanted an organic type of video that wasn t a sponsored brand video.
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SPEAKER_00
And so it was a slower growth for me, but I think it s helped me be where I am today because what you don t want to do is create content that s just for the sake of being viral.
3
SPEAKER_00
And then, well, what happens then?
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I have a friend who she used to be an editor and she left and she s creating content full time now.
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SPEAKER_00
And there s this trend of people
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kind of taking like editorial beauty news content and regurgitating it into TikToks.
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SPEAKER_00
But then you re just retelling a news story and there s nothing personal about it with you.
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And sure, people are going to watch it.
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It might get millions of views, but you re not really building your personal audience.
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SPEAKER_00
And so now that we ve created more things for ourselves, I m so happy that I always kind of stay true to the kind of content I wanted to create, because if not, then you re always going to be in this hamster wheel of creating things for the views and you re never going to really feel satisfied by that.
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SPEAKER_00
it is frustrating when something doesn t perform well and you want it to do well and like it is our job and like you know brands work with us because they want a certain reach or number and so that stuff is important and that will come if you create the content that your followers really want to see from you and then I think you know there s been phases of burnout for me because being a creator there s no job security
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There s no hours.
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There s no health benefits.
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We have no teams a lot of times.
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SPEAKER_00
And so it is this scarcity mentality of every time a job comes in, you want to say yes to it because you don t know when the next thing is coming.
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SPEAKER_00
And so you want to do all the things that you can.
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SPEAKER_00
But I think in time, I learned I have to take a step back and not say yes to everything because it s better for myself long term and the things will come.
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And it s but I know it s difficult, especially if you re just starting out, because you are really based and judged on a number.
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SPEAKER_01
Yeah I think that s so refreshing to hear that from you like I hope that there s so many people listening to this right now that are going Mariana thank you so much for saying that because I think everyone feels that pressure but you just explained something really beautifully that you can have a lot of views
3
SPEAKER_01
but people are not necessarily watching it for you or understanding who you are and therefore every video you post can get lots of views but it s not like people are really interested in your viewpoint or your perspective or your thoughts and I think we get those two things mixed up we think that virality and followers means influence
3
SPEAKER_01
and actually it doesn t make mean influence at all because if people only see you as entertainment they re not going to suddenly listen to your perspective on something you should buy or something you should use or your expert opinion and so that s what I m hearing from you and I hope that gives people a lot of confidence because I think it s very easy to chase the views I know
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SPEAKER_01
there s someone I m thinking about right now who makes amazing content and it doesn t get a lot of views but it s built him a really good business and he s trying to get more views and virality I m like no like this is building real value because your content is so awesome you re actually attracting real companies who want to work with you privately because of the value that they see and that s what your journey says too.
3
SPEAKER_01
When it gets to burnout and everything you just mentioned about
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no benefits, no work hours, like that s so real.
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I think burnout comes from doing too much of what you don t feel is true to your core.
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SPEAKER_01
It doesn t come from doing too much of what is very aligned with you.
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SPEAKER_01
Would you agree with that?
3
SPEAKER_00
Yes and no, because I think there is a balance of having time off.
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SPEAKER_00
And so, yes, we want to do all of these things and we want to work really hard and create this life for ourselves.
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SPEAKER_00
But I cannot do those things I need to do if I don t also take time to rest.
3
SPEAKER_00
And one weekend I used to always like work through the weekends.
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SPEAKER_00
I m like, oh, it doesn t really bother me if I answer emails on the weekend.
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SPEAKER_00
It s not a big deal.
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SPEAKER_00
But then one weekend, I actually took that weekend off and didn t answer my emails.
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SPEAKER_00
And Monday, I felt so much better and more refreshed.
3
SPEAKER_00
And so now it s really important for me to take those breaks.
3
SPEAKER_00
So I did go through periods of burnout, of over creating and going to too many things.
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SPEAKER_00
And in college, I had a stomach ulcer because I took on too much and I physically was burnt out in my body because I was doing too much.
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SPEAKER_00
And so I know that I need those periods of rest.
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SPEAKER_00
But I know it s hard when you re freelance.
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SPEAKER_00
I know it s hard when you re a creator.
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SPEAKER_00
And there s so many jobs who are freelance who don t have, you know, certain hours set for themselves.
3
SPEAKER_00
So it is important for them to, you know, want to make an income, especially if you re solely supporting yourself or a family.
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SPEAKER_00
And so I know those things are difficult.
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SPEAKER_01
You ve talked about energy drainers and energy givers before.
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SPEAKER_01
Walk us through that, because I think everyone feels that whether it s people, places, projects, we all feel that certain people drain us, certain projects give us energy.
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SPEAKER_01
Walk us through your version of that.
3
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, my energy drainers are saying yes to too many things.
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SPEAKER_00
So saying no to me is what gives me energy.
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SPEAKER_00
And I know that saying no might seem difficult at first, especially when you have opportunities that come to you and you want to say yes to everything.
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SPEAKER_00
But saying yes to things I absolutely want to do has been so helpful.
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SPEAKER_00
i m in a place now where i can say no because i feel like i worked hard in my 20s to get to where i am today that i have the ability to say no to things but those no s also are important because it s gotten me to the jobs i want to do the brands i want to work with i think if you say yes to too many things you might dilute yourself doing too many things so saying yes to the things that are in alignment with the content you want to create the brands you want to work with the long-term goals you have for yourself personally and professionally
3
SPEAKER_00
Other energy drainers that I have are not doing my morning routine and my evening routine, so really setting myself up for the day sets me up for success.
3
SPEAKER_00
I get up in the morning, I usually meditate, I gratitude journal, I do like a little stretch, I drink my water, and even like just a few things in the morning set me up because if I wake up and I just instantly start doing things, there s no time for me just like in myself to turn off
3
SPEAKER_00
And then I m kind of just thinking all day long other energy drainers Sometimes it s work and people and I know that that one s a really difficult one to have boundaries around because you maybe cannot Control who you have to be around with work or people that you have to spend your time with so it s creating boundaries around those people and things and
3
SPEAKER_00
to make you feel your best so maybe it s at work you don t sit next to that person or you you know focus on working on yourself when you re at work so you don t have to be near them too much because i know we can t always like eliminate energy drainers in our life and if it s someone in our life personally it s difficult but as i ve gotten older i realize okay this person and this friend is draining my energy when i m around them i don t feel great i don t feel better after i left them i almost feel more drained just being around them and so i can love you from a distance
3
SPEAKER_00
I still love you, I still like you, but I don t have to spend a lot of time with you and that s okay.
3
SPEAKER_00
I can support you from afar, but I know that if I m around you, I don t feel my best and I want more of those energy givers in my life.
3
SPEAKER_00
Like, who do I hang out with and I feel better after I leave them?
3
SPEAKER_00
Like, who makes me feel happier and whole, motivated, energized?
3
SPEAKER_00
And I always love being around you because whenever I see you, you make us feel so great.
3
SPEAKER_00
You re such a great friend.
3
SPEAKER_00
Our friend Audrey is another one of them.
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SPEAKER_00
I was going to say Audrey.
3
SPEAKER_01
The first one that came to my mind was Audrey.
3
SPEAKER_01
I was like, Audrey, she s amazing.
3
SPEAKER_01
We love you, Audrey.
3
SPEAKER_00
We love you, Audrey.
3
SPEAKER_00
And she really is one of those people where you want to be around people who are good like that.
3
SPEAKER_00
You want people who make you feel your best.
3
SPEAKER_00
And so as I ve gotten older, it s less about quantity of friends.
3
SPEAKER_00
It s quality of friends.
3
SPEAKER_00
And I choose to spend time with the people in my life who give me energy and make me feel my best.
3
SPEAKER_00
Because if you notice that after you leave a friend and maybe you re a little bit tired or drained, or you re just like, whoa, and you left them, it s OK to start phasing out people and love them from afar.
3
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, I couldn t agree more with that.
3
SPEAKER_01
I saw this tweet that said, my circle is shrunk in size but increased in value.
3
SPEAKER_01
And I think that that s the mindset that you re sharing.
3
SPEAKER_01
And I think that s something people struggle with.
3
SPEAKER_01
I think we feel guilty because we feel like we re leaving friends behind or we feel bad because we feel people are going to think we re better than them.
3
SPEAKER_01
Like when you move on from a group, you re often worried about the perception that those group of people are going to think,
3
SPEAKER_01
or Jay or Mariana think that they re better and it s like, well you re not leaving because you think you re better, you re leaving because you want to be better and you want to grow.
3
SPEAKER_01
How have you kind of outgrown groups or do you feel you ve generally had a group that s grown with you or have you had to let go of friendships, relationships and things like that?
3
SPEAKER_00
I have a core like five people who have been with me for like over a decade.
3
SPEAKER_00
So these are like, these are constants in my life.
3
SPEAKER_00
Like Audrey, we met in 2006.
3
SPEAKER_00
So that s like 16 years ago.
3
SPEAKER_00
So we ve been friends for a very long time.
3
SPEAKER_00
So it s like, I had this core group of people who are very core to who I am.
3
SPEAKER_00
They know me in my personal life.
3
SPEAKER_00
This is who I want to spend my time with.
3
SPEAKER_00
Like, it s not about content or online or anything.
3
SPEAKER_00
It s just like, who do I want
4
SPEAKER_00
sit on my couch with like scroll on my phone or watch tv or just hang out with and those people are really important to me i have a lot of acquaintances and people that we know just from work and being around people and i just know like i don t have to be overly close with a lot of people and that s okay
4
SPEAKER_00
And I think a lesson that I learned now in my 30s was that a smaller circle is fine.
4
SPEAKER_00
In my 20s, I think you move to Los Angeles, you want to make all these friends, you want to be around all these people.
4
SPEAKER_00
And then I m like, wait, I don t feel great when I m around them.
4
SPEAKER_00
I don t feel like myself.
4
SPEAKER_00
I feel like I m trying to have to be someone I m not or prove to them that I m something.
4
SPEAKER_00
And I don t want to do those things.
4
SPEAKER_00
Like I want to be truly who I am authentically.
4
SPEAKER_00
And as I got into my 30s, I realized it s okay that my circle is smaller.
4
SPEAKER_00
Like, it s okay to have these people who I know love me and are there for me no matter what.
4
SPEAKER_00
And then everyone else is a bonus.
4
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, absolutely.
4
SPEAKER_01
And I love that you did that.
4
SPEAKER_01
Like, I think if we started seeing our relationships as degrees of connection, as opposed to like friends and not friends, it becomes a lot easier to know how much time and how much energy to give someone.
4
SPEAKER_05
When the Taliban banned music in Afghanistan, millions were plunged into silence.
4
SPEAKER_05
Radios were smashed, cassettes burned.
4
SPEAKER_05
You could be beaten or jailed or killed for breaking the rules.
4
SPEAKER_05
And yet, Afghans did it anyway.
4
SPEAKER_05
This is the story of how a group of people brought music back to Afghanistan by creating their own version of American Idol.
4
SPEAKER_05
The danger they endured.
4
SPEAKER_03
They said my head should be cut off.
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the joy they brought to the nation.
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SPEAKER_02
You re free completely.
4
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No one is there to destroy you.
4
SPEAKER_05
I m John Legend.
4
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Listen to Afghan Star on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
4
SPEAKER_04
Guess what, Mango?
4
SPEAKER_04
What s that, Will?
4
SPEAKER_04
So iHeart is giving us a whole minute to promote our podcast, Part-Time Genius.
4
SPEAKER_03
I know, that s why I spent my whole week composing a haiku for the occasion.
4
SPEAKER_03
It s about my emotional journey in podcasting over the last seven years, and it s called Earthquake House.
4
SPEAKER_04
Mango, I m going to cut you off right there.
4
SPEAKER_04
Why don t we just tell people about our show instead?
4
SPEAKER_03
Yeah, that s a better idea.
4
SPEAKER_03
So every week on Part-Time Genius, we feed our curiosity by answering the world s most important questions.
4
SPEAKER_03
Things like, when did America start dialing 911?
4
SPEAKER_03
is William Shatner s best acting work in Esperanto.
4
SPEAKER_03
Also, what happened to Esperanto?
4
SPEAKER_04
Plus, we cover questions like how Chinese is your Chinese food?
4
SPEAKER_04
How do dollar stores stay in business?
4
SPEAKER_04
And of course, is there an Illuminati of cheese?
4
SPEAKER_04
There absolutely is.
4
SPEAKER_03
And we are risking our lives by talking about it.
4
SPEAKER_03
But if you love mind blowing facts, incredible history and really bad jokes, make your brains happy and tune in to Part Time Genius.
4
SPEAKER_04
Listen to Part Time Genius on the iHeartRadio app or wherever you get your podcasts.
4
SPEAKER_02
A new season of Bridgerton is here.
4
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And with it, a new season of Bridgerton, the official podcast.
4
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I m your host, Gabrielle Collins.
4
SPEAKER_02
And this season, we are bringing fans even deeper into the ton.
4
SPEAKER_02
Colin Bridgerton has returned from his travels abroad.
4
SPEAKER_02
Is Betrothal written in the stars for the eligible bachelor?
4
SPEAKER_02
Meanwhile, the ton is reverberating with speculation of who holds Lady Whistledown s pen.
4
SPEAKER_02
We re discussing it all.
4
SPEAKER_02
I sit down with Nicola Coughlin, Luke Newton, Shonda Rhimes, and more to offer an exclusive peek behind the scenes of each episode of the new season.
4
SPEAKER_02
Watch season three of the Shondaland series on Netflix.
4
SPEAKER_02
Then, fall in love all over again by listening to Bridgerton, the official podcast on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
4
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Subscribe to catch a new episode every Thursday.
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SPEAKER_01
When you decide to make that transition from creating content for amazing brands, prestige brands, and you re making the switch to being like, I m going to be a founder, I m going to create Summer Fridays.
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When you re making that transition, walk us through some of the things you thought about.
4
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Because today I find that everyone feels the pressure now, just as we felt the pressure when we were growing up to work at a big company or a well-known organization.
4
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Today the pressure is everyone should be an entrepreneur and found their own company.
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I feel like that s kind of like the energy and everyone thinks like they have to launch something or whatever.
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When you re going from selling other people s things to saying, I m actually becoming a founder, what are the questions you think people should be asking?
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What are the insights they should be considering?
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Because I think it s very easy for everyone today to think, oh, I ve got a few followers, I should launch something or because I m connected, I should do this.
4
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And I don t think that that always works out.
4
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Obviously it s worked out for you.
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So I m wondering what were the things you had to think about?
4
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I think if I had to go back and tell myself when we started the brand, what do I wish that I knew?
4
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And I wish that somebody would have asked me, which it s all the things that I love now, but like, do you really want to run a company?
4
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Like the days that we launch a product,
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let s say we launch fry products a year, that s five of 365.
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So the other 360 days, you really want to work on a business.
4
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Do you really want to work on a company?
4
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Do you want to be a manager of people?
4
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Do you want to run the finances and operations?
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Like it s all of those not fun things that you do every day.
4
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And so I would just ask yourself before starting a business, like, do I really want a business because I love running a company or do I just want to say I have my own company?
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And that s fine if you don t love some of the other stuff.
4
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And so Lauren, who s my co-founder of Summer Fridays, we have no ego in saying there s things we either don t want to do or we don t know how to do.
4
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And once we grew a little bit after our first couple of years, we were able to hire for the things that we didn t know how to do because we really wanted to bring the best people in to run the business who we felt like could get us to the next level.
4
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Um, I think it s difficult when you re starting a business because running a company is actually just so difficult the day in day out of like production of the company of the items, like selling the things, getting them online.
4
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Those things are not the sexy, fun parts of the job.
4
SPEAKER_00
And you have to really want to do that because at the very beginning you have very small teams.
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It s basically yourself, maybe a couple other people.
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And you re not making a lot of money for the first few years.
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I think there may be a misconception of like, oh, you start a brand and then all of a sudden you re rich and you have all this money.
4
SPEAKER_00
And that s definitely not the case.
4
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It takes a long time because whatever you invested into the business and you sell stuff, you re just recouping your money for what you ve already invested.
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SPEAKER_00
And then as you grow, you make a little bit of money, you put it back into the business, you hire a person and then you hire someone else.
4
SPEAKER_00
And so the first few years of Summer Fridays, we didn t pay ourselves because we thought it was more important to invest back into the company.
4
SPEAKER_00
If you re thinking about starting a business, ask yourself, do I actually want to run a company?
4
SPEAKER_00
And if you do, great.
4
SPEAKER_00
If you don t, then maybe say like, what am I good at?
4
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Like, what am I passionate about?
4
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What do I love so much?
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Why do I maybe want to start a company?
4
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Is it because you love the creative?
4
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There s so many creative jobs.
4
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You could be a creative director.
4
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You could work at an ad agency.
4
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You could consult for brands.
4
SPEAKER_00
If you love creating product, maybe you help someone with product development.
4
SPEAKER_00
There s so many skills that we learn as creators.
4
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Find what you love best and then offer that as a service to other brands.
4
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So something I love is like branding and marketing.
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And I think in life, this is just one of the first things that I will do of many.
4
SPEAKER_00
And I hope in the future I can consult for brands and work for them on branding and marketing, because that s something I m passionate about.
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SPEAKER_00
So I would love to continue to do that over a portfolio of them.
4
SPEAKER_00
And I know like the actual starting of the business is difficult.
4
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So I don t know how many more times I could do that part of it.
4
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Now that we re here, I m so grateful.
4
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But
4
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I just wish I would have known going into it how hard the actual starting of the business and running of the business day-to-day is.
4
SPEAKER_01
Think about the way your team works right now.
4
SPEAKER_01
If all the work is spread out across different documents, spreadsheets, and a stack of workflow tools, it s tougher to focus on getting things done, let alone getting them done together.
4
SPEAKER_01
This is why you need Coda.
4
SPEAKER_01
Coda is the doc that brings it all together.
4
SPEAKER_01
by putting data in one centralized location regardless of format, eliminating roadblocks that can stop your team in their tracks.
4
SPEAKER_01
With Coda, you ll never ask, where are the latest project updates?
4
SPEAKER_01
Anyone know where the performance stats are?
4
SPEAKER_01
Is there a report about licenses I can see?
4
SPEAKER_01
This is what slows down productivity and collaboration.
4
SPEAKER_01
With Coda, your team can operate on the same information and collaborate in one place to get projects across the finish line faster.
4
SPEAKER_01
Coda.io is an all-in-one platform that can do document creation, project management, data analysis, and more.
4
SPEAKER_01
What I really like about it is the fact that it s super flexible and customizable, so it can easily fit into any workflow.
4
SPEAKER_01
And if you re working on a team project, it s got great collaboration features too.
4
SPEAKER_01
Whether you re running a small business or a large corporation, I think Coda.io is definitely worth checking out if you want to streamline your workflow and increase productivity.
4
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If you re ready to join the efficiency revolution with Coda, you can get started today for free.
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Head over to coda.io forward slash purpose.
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That s C-O-D-A dot I-O and get started for free.
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io forward slash purpose.
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This show is sponsored by BetterHelp.
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When you re at your best, you can do great things, but sometimes life gets you bogged down and you may feel overwhelmed or like you re not showing up the way that you want to.
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Therapy can be a great way to empower yourself to start setting healthy boundaries to heal the past that may still be holding you back consciously or subconsciously or to even just learn better mindsets to cope with life s everyday stresses.
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To see my top 3 reasons why you should try online therapy, visit betterhelp.com forward slash jays top 3.
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It s just a great way to look at it because often you end up starting something, you put a lot into it and then you realize it s not what you wanted.
5
SPEAKER_01
Like you didn t want your 90% of your life to be operations, strategy, management, HR.
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SPEAKER_01
And people don t realize that often when we see entrepreneurs living their greatest life, we look at it and we go, oh, they just do what they love all day.
5
SPEAKER_01
And it s not true, right?
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Me included.
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There are so many things I have to do and there are so many things I want to do.
5
SPEAKER_01
And I ve accepted that that s how my life is split up.
5
SPEAKER_01
And there s also knowing what to start.
5
SPEAKER_01
Like when I look at my career, there are things like this podcast that we started, my genius community that we started.
5
SPEAKER_01
But then there were amazing partnerships like me being chief purpose officer at Calm, which was just a brilliant synergy because I was friends with the founders for four years.
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They were already solving a problem that I deeply believed in.
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And I would rather join forces than go and build something to compete with my friends.
5
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Well, it s already an existing incredible platform.
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SPEAKER_00
So it s like if I can plug into what you already have created and I can make it even better by coming on board, we can make this really great instead of me having something that I m trying to build and takes time.
5
SPEAKER_00
And so I think you can think about like, what are you uniquely good at?
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What skills can I offer someone else?
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SPEAKER_00
and go work with a company, go consult for people and then see from there.
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Maybe I do want to start my own thing or I can do this with other people.
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SPEAKER_00
And so if there s a brand you love, maybe reach out to them.
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SPEAKER_00
Like, let me creative direct a shoot for you.
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SPEAKER_00
Like, let me help you with social.
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SPEAKER_00
And you never know what person will say yes, because as creators, I think we wear so many hats and we can be good at so many things.
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SPEAKER_00
And you can take what you love as a creator and then do that on a larger scale with more budget working for brands and people that you love.
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Exactly.
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Did you ever raise or did you choose not to?
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We raised money.
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So we ended up raising.
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Walk us through the choice of that and then that process.
5
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So Summer Fridays was self-funded and then we ended up raising money in 2019.
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So we had a really great first year, but we were running everything ourselves.
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We had the two of us, an employee, a couple consultants.
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SPEAKER_00
And we were on the sales calls, we were running our retail accounts, but we really didn t know best how to do these things.
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SPEAKER_00
And it was almost a disservice to ourselves by trying to figure it out ourselves.
5
SPEAKER_00
Like we got us to a really great point, but we saw we have a bestseller.
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It s working really well.
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What can we do to take our brand to the next level and not lose the momentum that we had?
5
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So when we first launched the brand, people started reaching out to us and raising money is a bit like dating.
5
SPEAKER_00
So you want to date and meet everyone.
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SPEAKER_00
And we met any and everyone.
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SPEAKER_00
And then you kind of see like, who do you like?
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SPEAKER_00
Who do you enjoy spending time with?
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Like, do I really want to talk to these people every day?
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And
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a business is like a marriage and there s a contract like sometimes in marriages there are and so you re getting into a marriage with now another person into your business so you have to ask yourselves like are these people trustworthy do we have the same end goal do i really trust that they want what s best for my brand and that if i really want something they re gonna listen to like what i want and not because they re an investor and they re gonna take control of something and so
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We ended up going with a group, and they have a minority investment, which is very small.
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SPEAKER_00
So it means we still own the majority of the business.
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So we have the majority of the say in things.
5
SPEAKER_00
But it was two females who founded it.
5
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And they re incredible.
5
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And they almost served like an intermediate president for us and helped us with hiring, our org chart, what things to do next.
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SPEAKER_00
And it really was the right fit for us.
5
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And they weren t the biggest place that we went out to.
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They didn t have the largest portfolio or the biggest investment they were making into the brand.
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But it was two people we trusted.
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And a lot of our friends are like, you re the only people we know that like you re investors.
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And we really do.
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And they re incredible.
5
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So they have a great portfolio of brands, including like Westman Atelier, Sol de Janeiro.
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In food, they have Fly by Jing and Banza Pasta.
5
SPEAKER_00
So they focus in like good for you brands in food and beauty.
5
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And so we are so grateful to have them.
5
SPEAKER_00
So then after that, after we raised a little bit of money, we were able to hire more people.
5
SPEAKER_00
And our first big hire was a CEO.
5
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And I know a lot of people, when they start a business, they have a dream of becoming a CEO and running a brand.
5
SPEAKER_00
And that was never what Lauren and I wanted for ourselves.
5
SPEAKER_00
And we have no ego in saying, I don t want to be the CEO.
5
SPEAKER_00
I don t want to run the entire business because, one, I ve never done this before.
5
SPEAKER_00
And that s fine if you haven t and you want to figure it out along the way.
5
SPEAKER_00
But we knew what we re good at as product development, marketing, branding, anything that s consumer facing, and bringing on someone who could really run the business day to day so that I can create content, I can be on podcasts, I can do the other things with my time was important to us.
5
SPEAKER_00
And someone whose values really aligned with the things that we wanted.
5
SPEAKER_00
So our company culture is really important to us.
5
SPEAKER_00
And as we interviewed for the CEO role, it was someone who led with kindness, who people were excited to work for.
5
SPEAKER_00
And so we ended up bringing on a CEO in 2020, right before the pandemic.
5
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so grateful for our CEO.
5
SPEAKER_00
And so between them, it s been really incredible to get the brand where it is today.
5
SPEAKER_00
And I don t think it s possible without them.
5
SPEAKER_00
And so I think if you are if you have a business and you re thinking about either partners or raising money, you really want to make sure that you want these people to be in your marriage with you and that your baby, which is your business, you guys all have the same goals aligned for where you want it to go, because then all the decisions are easier because you re all on the same page versus a group wanting one thing and in another group wanting something else.
5
SPEAKER_01
It just sounds like you really know what s important to you and you re willing to do what s important to you and what you re good at and what you value.
5
SPEAKER_01
And then there s all this other stuff that you realize, well we have to find someone for that, we have to figure this out, this needs to be shifted.
5
SPEAKER_01
How do you decipher between what s important to you
5
SPEAKER_01
and what you think is important because I think a lot of people again when they start something they put the pressure of I have to be CEO because it s my baby and if I m not CEO then someone else will think I m just this or I m just that.
5
SPEAKER_01
You don t strike me as someone who worries about what other people think of you or what you do.
5
SPEAKER_01
Where does that come from and how do you define or decide what s important to you?
5
SPEAKER_00
I live my life day to day, me, myself.
5
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I m not living my life for other people.
5
SPEAKER_00
So if I m so concerned with being called CEO, I m going to take on a role because I care that other people think that this is my title.
5
SPEAKER_00
But I have to do something every day that I don t enjoy that makes no sense.
5
SPEAKER_00
So why would I live my life for this title for other people s opinions when
5
SPEAKER_00
this is what i want to do within the business and this is what s important to me and so i like to take inventory of my life pretty frequently so i usually do like my new year s goals and intentions i like to call them intentions not goals because it s what i intend on doing for the year and then i m always checking with myself with like my journal every day so it s like what s important to me how do i want to feel today um what things do i love and so i ll go through and i ll make like a note on my phone of like what are my energy drainers right now like what do i not like doing what of these things can i eliminate and if that s
5
SPEAKER_00
running the finances of the business, like I don t want to do that.
5
SPEAKER_00
So who can we hire eventually to do this thing?
5
SPEAKER_00
And so it s eventually just like taking less of those drainers off of my plate.
5
SPEAKER_00
And so I can really focus my time on the things that I m good at and I enjoy doing.
5
SPEAKER_00
I think it s difficult for people, especially women, if you have been calling yourself a CEO in the company.
5
SPEAKER_00
then you have to make this announcement like, oh, I stepped down as CEO because we hired somebody.
5
SPEAKER_00
We never intended to be the CEOs of the business.
5
SPEAKER_00
So we didn t call ourselves that in the first place.
5
SPEAKER_00
So if and when the time came, we weren t like it wasn t that we were stepping down as CEOs.
5
SPEAKER_00
It was that we just never had CEOs.
5
SPEAKER_00
We started the company.
5
SPEAKER_00
And a CEO is somebody who can help run the business when it gets to that like phase.
5
SPEAKER_00
And so I think it s about taking your ego out of it.
5
SPEAKER_00
And like, what do you really want to spend your time doing every day and just focus on that and not what other people think about what most people probably don t even know what people s titles are anyway.
5
SPEAKER_00
So it s like whether you re the founder or the CEO or the whatever it is you are, most people don t know, they just think of it as your business and so don t so much worry about that or you re going to spend your time every day doing something you don t actually want to do and you re not going to be happy and then the business might suffer because of that.
5
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, you ve talked so much about habits and routines like you have a morning routine, an evening routine, you just talked about your journaling habit, your intentions for the
5
SPEAKER_01
were these things that became a part of your life over time and if you could walk us through one of them or a couple of them in depth of your actual practice.
5
SPEAKER_01
So I d love to hear about what is your personal meditation practice and then any other one that you pick.
5
SPEAKER_01
Just walk us through it because I think we see this in successful CEOs, successful founders, entrepreneurs and just
6
SPEAKER_02
happier, healthier people, that routine and a commitment to practices are really beneficial in their life.
6
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What are some of yours that you can walk us through with a bit more depth?
6
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Yeah, so on the podcast, I kept interviewing people and everyone talked about a morning routine and meditation.
6
SPEAKER_01
And I m like, if all of these really successful people that I admire do this, there s got to be something to it.
6
SPEAKER_01
So pre-pandemic, I was just waking up, working, going to sleep, working on the weekends.
6
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I had no routine and schedule.
6
SPEAKER_01
That was not great for me.
6
SPEAKER_01
But during the pandemic, I actually had time for myself to pick up a meditation habit, to figure out how to journal, to make a morning routine for myself.
6
SPEAKER_01
So I started doing a morning routine because I thought other people were doing it.
6
SPEAKER_01
And I think that s where I failed at first, because I m like, oh, these people do these things in their morning routine.
6
SPEAKER_01
I need to wake up and work out.
6
SPEAKER_01
I need to wake up and do this.
6
SPEAKER_01
But those things didn t work for me.
6
SPEAKER_01
So it was trying something for a week.
6
SPEAKER_01
Do I feel better?
6
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Yes or no.
6
SPEAKER_01
What things should I eliminate and what things should I keep?
6
SPEAKER_01
And I got it to a routine of the things that feel best for me.
6
SPEAKER_01
Those five things might not work for you, but it s the things that work best for me.
6
SPEAKER_01
And so it s trial and error of figuring out how can I set myself up best for the day.
6
SPEAKER_01
Basically, once I start working in the day, my mind is going at all times.
6
SPEAKER_01
And I am always someone who s thinking of 50 different things.
6
SPEAKER_01
And so meditation is the only time in my day where I m actually just sitting and being and thinking of either the meditation that s happening if it s guided or I do like a 13 to 20 minute meditation where there s no music, there s no guiding, I just have like a bell that goes and I m just sitting and breathing and I m never in stillness all day.
6
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I m on my phone, I m on my
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the computer and so having that time for myself really just is like a great way to start the day um and then another thing is the intentions and i mentioned before i like to call them intentions instead of goals because i think we might feel like we didn t meet our goals if we didn t do this thing that we set out on a piece of paper to cross off
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but if it s my intention to do my morning routine every day i m intending to do it but if i don t i don t feel like a failure because i only did it five days this week or if i intend to live a healthier life and eat well and work out because i want to fuel my body that s my intention instead of being like oh i have to be this weight or i want to do this thing or be at this goal i think it s a lot kinder with yourself so then you feel more motivated by actually doing them and checking them off versus
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I didn t complete this goal for myself.
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I think it s also great to set actual tangible goals you can do, but also know that some goals are out of our control.
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Hey everyone, this is Molly and Matt, and we re the hosts of Grown Up Stuff How to Adult, a podcast from Ruby Studio and iHeart Podcasts.
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It s a show dedicated to helping you figure out the trickiest parts of adulting.
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Like how to start planning for retirement, creating a healthy skincare routine, understanding when and how much to tip someone, and so much more.
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We re back with season two of the podcast, which means more opportunities to glow up and become a more responsible and better adult, one life lesson at a time.
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And let me just tell you, this show is just as much for us as it is for you.
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So let s figure this stuff out together.
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This season, we re going to talk about whether or not we re financially and emotionally ready for dog ownership.
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We re going to figure out the benefits of a high yield savings account.
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And what exactly are the duties of being a member of the wedding party?
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All that plus so much more.
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Let s learn about all of it and then some.
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Listen to Grown Up Stuff How to Adult on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
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If you want to hit a certain number follower or a subscriber or a download count, you cannot control that.
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You can create the best content you can, but you can t make someone watch the content.
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You can t make them download or follow.
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So what you don t want to do is say, like, I have to hit a million followers by the end of the year.
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And if you don t hit it.
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be upset.
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You can say, I intend to create the best community this year that I can.
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I want the followers that are there to love me and be happy with the content I create.
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And then you can ask yourself, are they happy?
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Am I fulfilled with the content I m creating?
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And then that intention can be crossed off versus being disappointed that you didn t hit this number that was out of your control to begin with.
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So those intentions are really important for me.
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And then within the business, we do set goals for ourselves of things that we want to do and then set realistic expectations for ourselves of like, what do we think we actually can do?
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Versus like insane goals that you might not get to and then always feeling sad if you re not hitting them.
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I love the way you just described the difference between intentions and goals.
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I hope everyone, because, you know, whenever you re setting New Year s resolutions, you re setting goals, you re setting new quarterly goals, like, that language needs to change, because goals are what you want out of something, and intentions are what you put into something, and you only get out what you put in, and I love that it s so much better to measure yourself against your intentions.
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measuring yourself against your goals will always make you feel like a failure.
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Yeah, and I think something I ve learned recently too is I can have goals and intentions for myself of things that I m working towards because I want great things in life.
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Like I m doing all the things I want because I have these big things that I think I can accomplish, but I can do that while still being present and happy with where I am today.
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And that s come from really being in my thirties.
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So before I was always
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You know, when you re younger, you re like, I have to be married and have kids by 30.
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I have to do this like Forbes 30 under 30.
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I have to do all these things by this age.
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But it s like, why?
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When life is long.
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And one of the best exercises I did for myself was I wrote down everything I wanted to accomplish in my life and the age I thought it might happen.
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When I got to 45, I had nothing left.
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I had nothing left to reach.
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And I m like, if I accomplish all these things by 45, I m going to live for decades longer.
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What more do I have to look forward to in the years to come?
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That gave me so much pause to enjoy the journey I m on, enjoy where I m at today, be happy because these things we have today, the things we get to do, the jobs we get to do, the brands we get to work with, the opportunities we have, we wished for the things we have now.
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So I don t want to rush through them just trying to get to where I m trying to go.
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I want to be
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happy where I am today.
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I know it s going to come in time and if it s a little bit later than I thought it s fine because I have so many more years left of my life to do all these things that I hope to accomplish.
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Yeah that s such a great exercise that if you did write down everything you wanted to do most people would put the end date as like 30 or 40 or 45 and it s like you should have achieved everything and life s so much longer than that and there s so many more gaps in between
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I had a friend who recently found love and his business and his work took a bit of a backburner, but he found someone that he really wants to spend a lot of time with and that s what he was doing.
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And I was saying, you just won, right?
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Like you could see that as like two years out in your business journey.
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And so now his business is two years behind.
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But I was like, you ve just saved yourself years because you found a partner that you re really connected to.
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And I think often we think of it as like they re separate.
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Like there s work and then there s life and it s like, well, no, no, no.
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They re so interrelated.
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The way you just shared that is spectacular.
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Like I hope everyone writes that down, takes that away.
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Mariana, what are you working on right now?
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I feel like you re someone who, because you started therapy at six, which is just like, that s another, another incredible thing.
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But like, what are you working on right now personally?
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What s something that you re grappling with?
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What s something that you re wanting to be better at for yourself, for your friends, your family, whatever, anything around you?
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I think the presence is a big thing for me.
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I think because I used to focus so much on the future and the things I wanted for themselves, that exercise really did change my mindset.
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So having a gratitude journal and writing down every day, I think a lot of times we re busy in our days in our careers like, oh, I have to go do this.
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I have to do this today.
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But it s not I have to do.
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It s I get to do.
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So I get to go work here.
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I get to go to this opportunity instead of I have to do these things.
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And that really changed my mindset of being
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grateful for what I get to do every single day and really focusing on that and not being so stressed about things happening in a certain year or age.
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I m 36 now and I keep feeling like, oh, I m still not ready to do all these things.
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Like I m still so young.
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I think the older I get, the younger I still feel.
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Where when I was in my 20s, I was like, oh, I m getting so old or like, oh, 36 is so old.
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But now that I m 36, I m like, it s still so young.
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So I think focusing on the present, being happy with where I am today, the things I have today and practicing that gratitude each and every day.
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And then I think as I ve gotten older, too, because my parents are older, taking care of my health, it s not about vanity.
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It s about how do I feel my best?
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How do I stay active?
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My parents are really young and smart in their minds and their bodies.
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They still travel by themselves.
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They re very independent people.
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And I think it s because they ve taken care of themselves.
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And my dad does the crossword every day.
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He reads books.
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My mom s very independent.
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And I think keeping your mind young and so doing things for brain health.
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Now that we re getting older, I m like, OK, brain health, our health, mobility.
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Those things are all important of taking care of yourself, not just for vanity sake, but for the health of yourself so that you can be your best self in decades to come.
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Because I hope when I m 60, 70, 80, 90, I m still able to do a lot of things that I don t feel stagnant in my body because I let my age catch up with me.
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I m in the same boat as you.
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I feel like your thirties are really for that.
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We re like your twenties, you still feel like a super person.
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And then in your thirties, you re like, Oh, wait a minute.
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There is something known as getting older physically.
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I mean, and you start just becoming aware of how much your body has been through because you could.
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And then you go, why would I want to put my body through that anymore?
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Like, why would I do that damage to my body?
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And I I m definitely with you on that.
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I m spending so much time reading about longevity
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and learning about longevity and, and because not because I want to live longer or for vanity, but I want to live healthier for longer.
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And I think that s the difference, right?
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Yeah, I think health is so important to us and taking care of ourselves, what we eat, what we put into our bodies, how we spend our time, our brain, our energy, all of these things, because
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we do want to have lower cortisol levels for the rest of our lives and have quality sleep so that our brain health is there so that we feel best in our mind to function every single day and so I do want to live a long healthy youthful smart life where I can do so many things for decades to come and so those things are so important to me so it s like watching documentaries around blue zones and like what are they doing here and how do they
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How do they live longer, healthier, happier lives?
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And so those things are so important, especially our health, because we know like when you don t feel good, there s nothing you can do about it.
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So it s like the second I got sick recently and like as soon as I was done, I was like, wow, I m so grateful for my body.
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I m so grateful for my immune system and my good health, because when you feel bad, you take for granted the days that you feel good.
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So it s really about thinking about
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your gratitude each day of feeling good in your body and the days that you feel good.
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So one of the things I write down in my journal is I am grateful for my body, mind and soul.
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I m happy for my my physical and mental health and happiness, because that s so important to me, because it s not just like my physical health, but like, how do I feel in my mind?
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Do I feel happy?
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And, you know, on the days when you don t feel so happy, you have so much gratitude for the days that you do feel good mentally.
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Absolutely, absolutely.
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And I feel like you re a high performer, you re massively ambitious, you re like optimal peak performance individual.
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And I can relate to that.
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And what that comes with is you naturally have higher cortisol levels because you re doing more stressful things, right?
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Like when
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When Kobe Bryant s playing in the final of a game, it s like he s having to deal with more stress and then perform, but then recover as fast, right?
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And that s what all the best athletes, the World Cup s going on right now and it s the same thing.
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All the best soccer players in the world are dealing with more stress.
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It s not that they don t feel stress when they play at that high level.
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So what are some of the things, I mean, you ve given us so many habits,
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But that s just something because it s on my mind too.
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I m thinking that if I, and I m speaking to anyone who s listening who thinks they re really ambitious, they have big goals or big intentions, but then at the same time, then you have to be even more on top of your cortisol levels because you re naturally going to experience more stress.
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This morning I was talking to someone and she was like, what workouts are you doing?
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I was like, I love Pilates.
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Like, I don t want to go into a workout where I feel more stressed going through it because I want something that makes me feel good and rested.
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I always wear my Oura ring, which I m obsessed with.
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I love it.
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And I track my sleep every night and like quality sleep really does make me feel my best the next day.
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I drink magnesium every night before I go to bed, taking like my vitamins and supplements.
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And then really not like I don t watch scary movies.
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Like I m not doing things that are going to make me feel more excited or like feelings that would make me feel more anxious.
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So anything that s going to make me feel more anxious because I already have to feel anxious and stressed in like my job.
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So I don t want these added like books or shows that are going to make me feel a little bit more stressed out.
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And then I m someone who it physically manifests in my body.
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And so one day I was really stressed out.
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I was at the airport.
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I missed my flight.
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I was so stressed because I had to get back for something the next day.
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There was no flights out.
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And instead of just relaxing and like taking a breath, I woke up the next day in a rash on my body because when I get stressed, I so I have to remember like, OK, I think it s stressed out about things I can t control.
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I need to take a breath or else it s going to physically show up in my body when I m like overly stressed about something, especially something like that.
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I made it home.
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It was fine.
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It was all good, but I stressed myself out for no reason.
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So it s like doing all these things that can control it because stress is going to happen in our lives.
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We re going to have stressful days.
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Things are out of our control, our job, our personal life.
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Those things will make us stressed out.
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So it s like, how can I control all of the other things in my day to feel my best?
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Yeah, I love your insight on if you get to have a stressful day anyway, you don t want your workout or your meditation to be the thing that stresses you out more.
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Mariana, I ve learned so much about you today, literally.
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I m so happy I got to do this with you and I recommend anyone who s listening or watching, please do this with your friends because when you interview a friend or you interview a parent or you interview a family member, you realize just how much life experience is stored within this human that you call a friend or a family member.
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You know this very well, Mariana, we end every interview with a final five.
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These are the fast five where you have to answer each question in one word to one sentence maximum.
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But before we do that, I want to ask you, was there something I didn t ask you that you wish I asked you or something you wanted to share that s on your heart that you feel we didn t touch upon?
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I think all good.
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I think I just, this is like a love note to you, but like, I love your content and it makes me feel so good.
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And what I want to put out in the world is content that makes people feel either motivated or inspired or something in their life that adds value.
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And I feel like I always get that from you.
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And so thank you for your content because it makes me feel that way.
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And that s the things that I want to consume every day.
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Like, did I take away something that made me feel better or inspired or motivated?
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And I feel like you always bring that out of your
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You re the sweetest.
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Honestly, you ve given us such a unique perspective and this is why I wanted to talk to you because I find you to be not only a successful business person but you re committed to your self-care and I think that those two things together are really inspiring to me.
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and that s the kind of energy I want my audience to feel that you can be successful and do self-care, you can be ambitious and be affectionate and kind, like you can be courageous but be really sweet and I see that all in you and I really I love people who can like blend these opposites because I think for too long people have been made to believe well if you re bold and brave then you re strong
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or you re weak and meek.
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And I m like, well, no, there s this beautiful harmony in between.
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And so that s my love note back to you as well.
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I love that.
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I m going to start saying that.
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I like that.
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But these are your final five.
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The first question is, what is the best advice you ve ever heard or received?
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Don t be afraid of being told no.
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So just asking people for something.
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If they say no, don t be offended, but you never know who s going to say yes.
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That s a great piece of advice.
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We ve never had that.
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That is very good.
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And I do that a lot, so I m with you.
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Okay, second question.
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What is the worst piece of advice you ve ever heard or received?
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The worst piece of advice was people told us when we launched Summer Fridays not to launch with Jetlag Mask.
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And so I think that was in our gut and intuition the product we wanted to launch the brand with.
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I don t know if it would be what it is today without that.
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So if you have a gut feeling about something you want to do personally or professionally, even if the experts tell you something else, go with what you feel is best in your gut.
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I love that and I love that example for that as well because it s usually the thing.
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I remember I ve never done a lot of brand partnerships or brand deals because my content was always so open and wide that it didn t really, there weren t really industries that crossed over as much in the beginning and I remember one brand reached out to me
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And they said, Jay, we want you to do this video.
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They didn t give me an idea.
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They just gave me a vision of like, we want it to be about people living life on their own terms.
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Like that s the spirit of the video.
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And I was like, I love that.
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I can totally vibe with that.
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And I can t even remember, I had some like made up fee at the time.
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Like when it was very early days, I was like, whatever.
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It wasn t that much.
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And I went and made this video and I put my heart and soul into it because it was like one of my first brand deals.
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And even though the brand deal was tiny, it was just so important to me that I got to make this piece of content.
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And I shared it with them, and they were like, Jay, we don t, yeah, this is not gonna work.
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And I was like, I put more money into the production than they were paying me, but I was so passionate about it.
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And they re like, Jay, it s not gonna work.
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I didn t have a contract.
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I wasn t tuned in to what I needed.
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They said, no, we don t want this.
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We don t think you re the right fit for this.
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I uploaded the video anyway, because I really liked it.
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To this day, it s my most watched video of all time.
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It s got 387 million views.
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It s on Facebook.
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It s one of my biggest videos of all time.
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And I love the video.
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It s awesome, but they didn t get it.
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And that s the video that changed my entire career.
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And I m really happy that there s no brand attached to it because it s true and real.
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But really it s like going with your gut, like you know what s going to work best.
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And so even if these experts tell you it s the wrong thing or don t do this, but you know, this is what you want to create, put it out into the world because look, your most watched video, our best selling product.
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Yeah.
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And I love those examples because I think we do listen to the experts.
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And so love that.
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Love that.
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Love that.
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Question number three, what s something that you used to value that you don t value as much anymore?
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social a bit, which is weird because it s also our jobs.
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But I think I used to value what it was on there so much.
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And now I understand it s a tool to do my job.
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It s not my entire identity.
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And so I have a really good relationship, I think, with it now.
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What s the biggest lesson you ve learned in the last 12 months?
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I would say just taking care of my health is really the most important.
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There s no amount of money or anything in the world that you can do.
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Your health is the most important thing you can take care of.
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Things will come, so do everything you can in your control to be your best self and feel your best, because that way, if something were to come, you are in your best shape that you can be.
7
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Yeah, absolutely.
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Couldn t agree more.
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Very true for my year this year too, so I definitely take that to heart.
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Fifth and final question.
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If you could create one law that everyone in the world had to follow, what would it be?
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Oh, one law.
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It s kind of a little bit we talked about earlier of like saying yes and no to things.
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So if you want to say yes to something, it should be an absolute full body.
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Yes, I really want to do this.
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If you feel any hesitation or any no, there might be something in your gut and intuition telling you why I want to say no to this or why I don t want to do this.
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And then you end up saying yes and you don t really want to do it anyway.
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So say yes to the things you feel full body yes to and say no to the things that you don t feel absolutely truly like aligns with you and your gut and your intuition.
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That s great.
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Mariana Hewitt, everyone.
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The podcast is called Life with Mariana.
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You know the brand, Summer Fridays.
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Make sure you go subscribe to the podcast.
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Do follow Mariana on Instagram, on all social media platforms that you use.
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And please, the biggest thing I want you to do is tag
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what you learned from this episode.
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So take a screenshot right now, tag me and Mariana both on TikTok, on Instagram, Twitter, whatever platform you re using and let us know what you learned, what you re going to try out, what you re testing for a week, what habit really stayed with you, a new journal question that you might have gained.
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I love knowing the insights that you actually apply to your life
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And that s what I want next year to be about, the next 12 months of your life, whenever you re listening to this, is not how much can you learn, not how much can you grow, not how much pressure you put on yourself, but how much can you apply.
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And I think in Mariana s journey, I see a lot of applied wisdom and I think applied wisdom has so much more value than knowledge or books read or episodes listened to.
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And so focus on application.
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Mariana, you ve been
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So wonderful today as always.
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It s been such a joy having you on.
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I hope we have you on again.
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Thank you.
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And keep tracking this incredible journey that you re on.
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Amazing.
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And thank you for giving us permission to live long, healthy, successful lives that don t have to end by 40 or 45.
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Exactly.
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There s so much life to live.
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Thank you for having me.
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Absolutely.
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Thanks, Marietta.
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If you loved this episode, you will also love my interview with Charles Duhigg on how to hack your brain, change any habit effortlessly, and the secret to making better decisions.
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A new season of Bridgerton is here.
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And with it, a new season of Bridgerton, the official podcast.
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I m your host, Gabby Collins.
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And this season, we are bringing fans even deeper into the ton.
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Watch season three of the Shondaland series on Netflix.
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Then fall in love all over again by listening to Bridgerton, the official podcast on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
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Subscribe to catch a new episode every Thursday.