On Purpose with Jay Shetty - Marianna Hewitt ON: How to Create a Morning Routine that Results in Success & Why Energy-Drainers Are Getting in Your Way

Episode Date: February 27, 2023

Today, I sit down with my good friend Marianna Hewitt to talk about a range of topics related to self-care, mental health, and the challenges of being a content creator. She emphasizes the importance of finding a morning routine that works for you, rather than following what works for others. She also discusses the concept of creator burnout and the importance of prioritizing your mental and emotional wellbeing over views and clicks. Additionally, she touches on the importance of quality friendships and the challenges of running a company. Mariana Hewitt is 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. Marianna is also the host of her own podcast Life with Marianna, the number one fashion and beauty podcast. You can order my new book 8 RULES OF LOVE at 8rulesoflove.com or at a retail store near you. You can also get the chance to see me live on my first ever world tour. This is a 90 minute interactive show where I will take you on a journey of finding, keeping and even letting go of love. Head to jayshettytour.com and find out if I'll be in a city near you. Thank you so much for all your support - I hope to see you soon.What We Discuss:00:00 Intro03:19 What is your earliest memory as a child?06:44 The reason why we react differently when presented with similar situations.08:42 The advantage of becoming a parent when you’re fully ready.12:08 This is why you should never rely on anyone for anything.15:41 Marianna shares the life lessons she learned from her parents.18:11 Pursuing the passion for sharing things that you love with an audience.20:59 Every job and experience brings about different learnings.23:24 Falling into the trap of chasing virality.28:54 Marianna explains the balance of having a time off to avoid burnout.33:45 Surround yourself with a group of people that resonates with your core.35:29 Do you really want to run a business because you want to build a company?40:05 Think about what you are uniquely good at.44:23 How do you decipher what you think is important and what’s truly important to you?47:18 There’s got to be a reason why successful people have morning routines and do journaling.50:57 What are you looking forward to in the years to come?53:06 Let’s focus on taking care of our brain health.01:00:00 You can be two opposite things and still be happy. 01:01:24 Marianna on Final Five Episode ResourcesMarianna Hewitt | InstagramMarianna Hewitt | YouTubeMarianna Hewitt | TikTokMarianna Hewitt | TwitterMarianna Hewitt | WebsiteSummer Fridays  Want to be a Jay Shetty Certified Life Coach? Get the Digital Guide and Workbook from Jay Shetty https://jayshettypurpose.com/fb-getting-started-as-a-life-coach-podcast/See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

I am Dr. Romani and I am back with season two of my podcast, Navigating Narcissism. This season, we dive deeper into highlighting red flags and spotting a narcissist before they spot you. Each week, you'll hear stories from survivors who have navigated through toxic relationships, gaslighting, love bombing, and their process of healing. Listen to Navigating Narcissism on the iHeartRadio app app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hi, I'm Brendan Francis Nunehm. I'm a journalist, a wanderer, and a bit of a bond-vivant, but mostly a human just trying to figure out what it's all about. And not lost is my new podcast about all those things. It's a travel show where each week I go with a friend to a new place and to really understand it, try to get invited to a local's house for dinner.

We're kind of trying to get invited to a dinner party. It doesn't always work out. Ooh, I have to get back to you. Listen to Not Lost on the iHeart radio app or wherever you get your podcasts. Hey, it's Debbie Brown, host of the Deeply Well Podcast, where we hold conscious conversations with leaders and radical healers and wellness around topics that are meant to expand and support you on your well-being journey. Deeply well is your soft place to land, to work on yourself without judgment, to heal, to learn, to grow, to become who you deserve to be. Deeply well with

Debbie Brown is available now on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to podcasts. Namaste. Everyone talked about a morning routine and meditation, and I'm like if all of these really successful people that I admire do this, there's gotta be something to it. I need to wake up and work out. I need to wake up and do this, but those things didn't work for me. So it was trying something for a week. Do I feel better? And I got it to a routine of the things that feel best for me. Those five things might not work for you. Hey everyone, welcome back to on purpose, the number one health podcast in the world world thanks to each and every one of you that come back every week to become happier healthier and more healed and I'm so excited to be talking to you today.

I can't believe it. My new book 8 Rules of Love is out and I cannot wait to share it with you. I am so so excited for you to read this book, for you to listen to this book. I read the audiobook. If you haven't got it already, make sure you go to eightrulesoflove.com. It's dedicated to anyone who's trying to find, keep, or let go of love.

So if you've got friends that are dating, broken up, or struggling with love, make sure you grab this book. And I'd love to invite you to come and see me for my global tour. Love rules. Go to jsheddytour.com to learn more information about tickets, VIP experiences, and more. I can't wait to see you this year. And you know that I'm always going to look out for guests who have different experiences, different walks of life, people have built and created incredible cultural phenomenons, and also at the same time, learned lessons

along the way that they can share with us. 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. I'm speaking about the one and only Mariana Heuer, who's a leading voice in social media and the co-founder of Summer Fridays, the skincare brand, whose iconic jet lag mask became an instant bicella. Mariana is also the host of her own podcast, Life with Mariana, the number one fashion and

beauty podcast I got to be a guest. I think right at the beginning, near when the show launched, it's been on an incredible trajectory, amazing guest. Make sure you check it out. Mariana's a dear friend, so I'm loving this opportunity. I just said to her offline 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.

So I hope you feel inspired to interview your friends as well. Mariana, welcome to OnPurpose. Thank you for having me. No, it's so great to have you. I've been looking forward to this and I loved the interview we did for your podcast two years ago. Now, yeah, it was one of my favorite episodes and people loved it so much. And so I'm so happy you're coming back again. Yes.

Yes. I'm excited to come back again. And you know, you've just been on this incredible journey with your brands, your work, the community you spend time with, 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,

it's hard to maintain that. 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 and that's obviously what on purpose is built upon. And I wanted to ask you like, and I asked this often, what's your earliest strong memory as a child? Like, can you remember if you could go back, what's one of your strongest earliest memories and why is it so important to you? And I'll tell you mine as I let you think on yours.

If I think about my earliest, earliest memory, I can probably remember holding my sister when she was born. 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 preparing me for this moment, but they were like, you gotta pray for a new little friend

to be in your life. And so like for weeks on end and months, I was praying so I was prepped. 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. And then finally when I held my sister,

it was like such a moment. 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. 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 father 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 wanna know who you are. We have a mutual friend, Audrey. And she was asking me the other day, like, how far back do you remember? And I'm like, I remember my first day of kindergarten. And she's like, you do?

And I was like, yeah, I can remember waiting in line. I can remember my backpack. I remember going into school. And it really was memories from six on what or I remember a lot. At the time, my parents got divorced. I was six. So this is very early nineties before a lot of families were getting divorced. 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 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. Wow. So my dad used to take me to the airport.

This is before TSA pre-checked. This is how long ago it was, or my dad used to take me to the airport. This is before TSA, pre-tech. This is how long ago it was, or 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 kid. So 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 out of phase in their life where they were a little bit

more grown up. They had figured things out themselves and they said, this is the way I want a parent. I'm not going to smother you. I'm going to let you be your own person and figure things out. And I think that independence has really gotten me to where I am today. And so when people are like, how do you travel all the time for work? I've been traveling since I was a baby. So it's something I'm so used to. I love that. I did not know that. And I think it's really interesting. I don't live in my past that much. And 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, that going back and forth would have made travel really scary. And they would have been like, God, my parents got divorced. Like it was the worst and I had to go back and forth.

Whereas your story is, I'm independent and I travel. Do you think you had to reflect or did you do any work to get there 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 is the life happening to us versus us choosing what life does to us. Yeah, I think there's two scenarios here. So I have a friend who is really bad flight anxiety. Like she cannot get on a plane without taking something first and we talked about it recently and she's like, I think because my parents were divorced and I

I thought every time I got on a plane, it was that I was leaving one parent and going to another one. And so she has a really bad time flying now 30 years later because of those experiences. 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 a divorce. And this is 30 years ago. So you have to think I was six years old and my parents said, okay, we're gonna separate. We're gonna give you someone to talk to. And so at the time, I could actually process my emotions, not really remembering like what was happening, but they were 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. They're doing these things because they love me and they wanna be happy people independently. And so the way they handled it then reflected on who I am as an adult today. So I think as I think about one day becoming a parent, all those things from someone being sick really does reflect on who they are as an adult. That's incredible. Yes, your parents are super mature. That's it. This is like parent goals

every year. Yeah, but the youth I think then people weren't getting divorced. People were not going to therapy. Parents weren't co-parenting, there's not even really cell phones at this time, so they were trying to co-parent in different continents without Wi-Fi, without cell phones, 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.

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? Yeah. Because of how they, what was 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, what else, I'm just so intrigued by how incredible your parents are. Like, 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? They always made sure, like, no matter what, this was the schedule. I spent my summers with my mom in Europe. I would go see her during holidays. She would come back to see me.

And so my mom was always planning work trips about coming back to where I was. And so she would make sure she was present at school, even though she didn't live in the same state as me, she would come to different things. And so that time is really important. And I remember more the days that she was there than she wasn't there. And so now I'm so close to both of them. And they're really like friends to me now at this point. It's not really like a parental relationship.

If anything, I probably parent them a little bit too much. But they're just so incredible. And I think hindsight is that they're older and I have the gift of age from them. 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. 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 my mom waited till she was 36 to have me. My dad was 49 and I think they were in a place where they were fully ready to become parents 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. Like, oh, I'm 30. I have to do this thing now, but they don't feel ready because society keeps telling us we have to have kids by a certain age, but I think they waited and that waiting made them

better parents to me. Yeah, wow. So not only were your parents open to therapy, you get divorced from a country, your dad being the primary caretaker, and then your parents were actually having kids late, which was so not normal then. Yes.

So it sounds like they were breaking all the rules. They were doing all the things that I want to do now in life, but a long time ago before it was like normal life. Yeah, tell me one of the ways that you feel you parent your parents now that they're older, and of course, you know, what's been one of the most beautiful ways that you've got to return that. I do every time I do so much for them now,

but it's like such a blessing to be able to do that for them. And so my parents are so grateful for anything if I buy them a flight or book much for them now, but it's such a blessing to be able to do that for them. And so my parents are so grateful for anything if I buy them a flight or book something for them. But now it's like travel. I wanna make sure that they're very comfortable. So it's just making sure that they have everything that they need. So I have a half sister who's older.

She lives in Connecticut. So my dad wanted to see them for Thanksgiving. So he's like, oh, thank you so much for this flight. He has so much gratitude for a flight that I could book for him. 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 my mom to be able to go on a trip and do the things that she wants to do. So now they're probably annoyed with me because I'm like, don't do this, don't do this, don't go here, remember this? It's like, where your face mask? Like I'm telling them all of these things. But I try to do it a little bit less,

but they're like, my dad even text me that I think, okay, thanks mom. Like, so they're cute. I love that. That's so adorable. It's so beautiful, I think, for all of us who can support our parents in any way. It is such a blessing. One of the things that you brought up there that they 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. Do you feel like you didn't grow up with a lot of limitations in your mindset or boundaries? 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. And I think time and society place a lot of these boundaries and barriers. Did you feel more free from them because of how you were parented or did

at any point in your life? Did these become a part of your education as well? There's a couple of things. So one, my dad grew up really poor. He was born at the end of the Great Depression and grew up. My grandpa was a preacher. They had no money. Like very, very poor.

My dad only could go to college because he joined the Air Force and was able to go on a GI Bill. My mom immigrated to the US during the Vietnam War and came to the America with literally nothing. 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, I can do anything possible because they've given me this great life that I could have that anything is possible here. 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. 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, go to school, you need to graduate, you need to get a job, but she also taught to me independence. And what she told me was never rely on anyone else for anything. You need to be able to fully support yourself, 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.

And maybe I took it a little far, overly independent in my life. And so growing up, I told my parents, I wanna be a television host. And then my mom was like, okay, you need a realistic job. Like being on TV is not realistic. So I said, okay, my backup job is gonna be PR. So I went to school for journalism. My backup was PR.

I interned in PR in college. It was my first job out of college. I was taking celebrities to interviews. And I was like, I still wanna be the one interviewing them. Like this is, I don't wanna be behind the camera, I want to be in front of the camera. And so I started working as a TV host and then Instagram and YouTube came around in 2012. And I had a real and to send my real places I needed to upload it somewhere. So I uploaded it to YouTube.

And I had to send the link to places to go on interviews. And so I would send them this link. That was my first YouTube video. And then I had a channel. So I was like, I may as well start uploading makeup tutorials because I have this place. This is very early YouTube days, 10 years ago. And after two years, I was able to do it full time

and I told my parents I'm gonna quit to do the internet. And they were like, quit to do the internet. Like, what is this? 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, but I didn't know at the time that I could make it a career for myself. And they were definitely a little bit skeptical. Now they're like the most supportive people. But at the beginning, you

know, it's like internet full time. Like, what is this? Parents always want us to be safe. Like parents always want their kids to be safe, but it's almost like the safest thing parents can do is let kids take their own risks. I feel the same with my parents. Like my mom moved to England when she was 16 and they built their life. Her brothers were like 18 and 19

and they built a life. Whereas when I was moving to New York at 28, it was like, no, no, no, no, like are you okay, my baby? I'm like, mom, I'm 28 years old. You were 16, but they forget that. They forget the pain and the sacrifice and the risk they took on, and they want to shelter you away from it.

When you made that decision, were you so convinced that 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 creator, mum and dad. Look at what XYZ are doing. There weren't any role models at that time. And so when you did that, it was even a bigger risk than it is today. But I find so many people who listen to this show today

struggle to break out of what their parents think of them. So when your parents, it sounds like you have such a close relationship with your parents, they love you, you love them. Was there a part of you that felt you were letting them down by doing this or did you just, yeah. Never letting them down. I was never worried about letting them down. I think I just had to prove them.

So like my dad is very much like, okay, go do whatever you want. Like this is great. Like he grew up in a time there's not even phone. So like to have a job on the internet seems so insane to him. But my mom is very much like, show me what you can do and then I'll support you. And so I had to show her these opportunities. 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. You could go places I went to Thailand and I took her with me. And she couldn't believe that you could have this job on the internet and create this for yourself. And so I was never worried about disappointing them because I always believed in myself. Like if I want to do something, I know that it's possible.

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, but at that time, there was no one to, we were figuring it all out at the same time and luckily, it was very early days of like influencers having like managers and teams and I happened to get an agency and I think that helped legitimize it to my family and then they saw over time like, okay,

you can actually like make money doing this and here we are a decade later. So that's amazing. Congrats on having the strength at a time. I think that's underplayed like how hard it is when something is brand new to kind of bet on it because you didn't have the, you didn't have the benefit of hindsight

of how successful this thing was gonna be or how big it was gonna be. No idea at the beginning, people were pay piling me $50 to post something. Wow. So I was like, that's how early it was. And I was like, you would pay me $50 to post something. Let's go. I was so excited.

Yeah, that's incredible. 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? Like that's what you want it to be. Then you go into PR, realized that being behind camera doesn't work. Then you do makeup tutorials, was doing makeup tutorials, fulfilling somewhat of a passion of being in front of camera. Like, that obviously wasn't being a news anchor, but there was something about it that was

feeling right. Yeah, I always had a passion for sharing things that I loved with an audience. 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. When YouTube came around and I'm like you can upload videos and talk about whatever you want and people can watch it, it was always the things I felt I wanted to do in my heart when I grew up but when I grew up there was no platform to do that. And then at the time when I was auditioning I was going to a lot of shows to be a host 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. And I'm like, well, how am I ever supposed to be known if I don't get the opportunity? With the internet, we're in such an amazing place where we can take our careers into our own hands. There's no one to tell us no. You can create the content. 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. And so download, they will follow, they will listen. And so it was everything I wanted in this new platform. And it finally gave me a place where I wasn't getting told no in an audition.

That someone didn't have to say yes to me. And I could prove and show that I had this audience online. And so I love it so much. And it was everything I wanted to do when I grew up. I just didn't know that's what it was. And I always had a love for beauty. And my dad used to take me to beauty counters. 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 and he would take me to an essay lauder counter and say, okay, here's my daughter. Like, can you show her how to use her and makeup? Can you show her what products to buy? Because he had no idea. What a great day. I know you're the best. And so that really was my love of beauty from a really young age. And so I started learning about beauty from the experts, these people at counters who were telling me about products. And that was in middle school and high school. And then I took that love into creating tutorials

for myself and then starting our own brand. 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 I Went to public speaking school from 11 to 17s public speaking drama school age 11 to 8 7 age 18 sorry for seven years 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. 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, 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 where they use it. 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 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 being a hostess, maybe you don't think

it's connected to the job I have now, but I had to stay in front of a restaurant. I had to talk to strangers. I stood on my feet for a long time. 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. 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. 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, I was saying to someone, my first of a 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. And I remember just stacking shelves and everyone's like, well, what did you learn then? I'm like, I learned how to memorize what was in every aisle. If anyone asked me where anything was,

I knew exactly which aisle it was in. I learned how to turn up to work on time and leave on time and I learned that over time you got paid more. Like you learned so many basic things. And what you just said, you learn how to work with different people. I was 15 years old and I learned how to have a boss and how to have a good relationship with my boss. And all of these techniques and skills that you would never learn covering just about anything you and I can imagine.

With Wondrium, you get a huge selection of videos over 8,000 hours. Flexibility to switch to audio only, great for multitasking, superb quality programs that are expert-led, easy to follow and beautifully filmed and that are completely accessible, watch or listen on your phone, tablet, TV and computer. No commercials, no tests or stress, just the enjoyment of learning. Right now I'm diving into the program, Cognitive Behavioral Therapy for Daily Life. Have you ever found yourself worrying so much that you wished you could just turn your brain off? It's normal to worry from time to time, but when worrying disrupts your everyday life

CBT tools can help you regain control Professor Jason Satafield shares several techniques from distracting yourself to scheduling official worry time That can help you redirect your thoughts You experience emotions every day and they influence everything you think and do. This program teaches you the skills you need to take control of your daily life so you can better handle stress situations and feel more mentally balanced. Learn about what you love and love learning about it with Wondrium. Do what I did, sign up for Wondrium now.

And right now my listeners can get two years of Wondrium for the price of one, a fantastic deal. But it's only available if you sign up through my special URL. Go to Wondrium.com forward slash J. That's W-O-N-D-R-I-U-N dot com forward slash J. Wondrium dot com forward slash J. When you are going through this journey, you take this decision to make YouTube videos, to make content. Did you ever get wrapped up in like views? How beautiful am I make up? Because

I feel like that can get so toxic for people. And I think now what we're seeing so much of is creator burnout. So there's one side that I want to talk to you about, which is like likes, views, comments, engagement. Like how do you deal with the pressure of that? Like you upload something and it doesn't get views. 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, but we meet so many creators today who just say, I'm tired of putting stuff out. Like I'm burnt out of having to upload every day to three different platforms. I never worried too much about views. 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.

And that really is how we're valued. But at the time on YouTube, I started my very first videos with products I used today in my skincare routine. And that's 10 years ago because I genuinely loved these products. I was shopping at Sephora. I love prestige beauty. I was a little bit older in the YouTube 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 found to this trap of I care about virality I care about what's trending and I'm gonna 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 gonna create videos around this content

and I'm not gonna be the fastest growing and that's okay because it's true to who I am. 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. And it was more important for me to people to like me for what I genuinely wanted to talk about because I can't really create content if I don't love it, and I just won't do it. It's just not something that I like, and I think that was a problem I had when TikTok first started was I didn't want to create content just for the sake of virality. And so on YouTube, I grew a little bit slower. But I started working with luxury beauty brands. 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. And then I ended up getting to work with

them because there wasn't a lot of people sharing it. 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. 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 wanna do is create content that's just for the sake of being viral. And then, well, what happens then?

I have a friend who, she used to be an editor and she left and she's creating content full time now. And there's this trend of people kind of taking like editorial beauty news content and regurgitating it into TikToks. But then you're just retelling a news story and there's nothing personal about it with you. And sure, people are going to watch it and make it millions of views, but you're not really building your personal audience.

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. 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. There's no hours. There's no health benefits. We have no teams a lot of times. And so it is the 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. And so you want to do all the things that you can.

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. But I know it's difficult, especially if you're just starting out because you are really based and judged on a number. 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 explain something really beautifully that you can have a lot of views 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. And actually it doesn't mean influence at all because if people only see you as entertainment, they're not gonna 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 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 in my audience. 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. When it gets to burnout and everything you just mentioned about, no benefits, no work hours, like that's so real, I think burnout comes from doing too much of what you don't feel is true to your core. It doesn't come from doing too much of what is very aligned with you. Would you agree with that? Oh, yes and no, because I think there is a balance of having time off and so Yes, we want to do all of these things and we want to work really hard and create this life for ourselves

But I cannot do those things I need to do if I don't also take time to rest and one weekend I just always like work through the weekends I'm like oh, it doesn't really bother me if I answer emails on the weekend. It's not a big deal But then one weekend I actually took that weekend off and didn't answer my emails. And Monday I felt so much better and more refreshed. And so now it's really important for me to take those breaks. So I did go through periods of burnout of over creating and going to too many things 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. And so I know that I need those periods of rest, but I know it's hard when you're freelance. I know it's hard when you're a creator. And there's so many jobs who are freelance who don't have certain hours set for themselves.

So it is important for them to wanna make an income, especially if you're solely supporting yourself or a family. And so I know this things are difficult. You've talked about energy drainers and energy givers before. 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. Walk us through your version of that. Yeah, my energy trainers are saying yes to too many things. So saying no to me is what gives me energy. 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. But saying yes to things I absolutely want to do has been so helpful. I am 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 nose 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. 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. 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, 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 to make you feel your best.

So maybe it's at work you don't sit next to that person or you 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 eliminate energy trainers 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. 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. 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. Like, who do I hang out with? And I feel better after I leave them. Like, who makes me feel happier and whole, motivated, energized, and I always love being around you. Because whenever I see you, you make us feel so great. You're such a great friend. A friend Audrey is another one of them. I was gonna say Audrey. Yeah, you guys are like, I gave it to my mind with Audrey. I was like, Audrey, we love you. We love you. Audrey. And she really is one of those people

where you want to be around people who are good, like that. You want people who make you feel your best. And so as I've gotten older, it's less about quantity of friends. It's quality of friends. And I choose to spend time with the people in my life who give me energy and make me feel my best 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, like it's okay to start like phasing out people and love them from afar. Yeah, I couldn't agree more with that. I saw this tweet that said,

my circle is shrunken size but increased in value. And I think that that's the mindset that you're sharing then. I think that's something people struggle with. 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. Like when you move on from a group, you're often worried about the perception that those group of people are going to think, oh, Jay or Mariana, I 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. 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? I have a core like five people who have been with me for like over a decade. So that's, like, these are constant in my life. Like Audrey, we met in 2006. So that's like 16 years ago. So we've been friends for a very long time.

So it's like, I have this core group of people who are very Quarty who I am they know me in my personal lives This is who I want to spend my time with like it's not about content or online or anything It's just like who do I want to 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. And I think a lesson that I learned now

in my 30s was that a smaller circle is fine. In my 20s, I think, you move to Los Angeles, you wanna make all these friends, you wanna be around all these people and then I'm like, wait, I don't feel great when I'm around them. I don't feel like myself. I feel like I'm trying to have to be someone I'm not or prove to them that I'm something

and I don't want to do those things Like I want to be truly who I am authentically and as I got into my 30s I realized it's okay that my circle is smaller like it's okay to have these people who I know Love me and are there for me no matter what and then everyone else is a bonus Yeah, absolutely and I love that you did that 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.

I am Yomla, and on my podcast, the R-Spot, we're having inspirational, educational, and sometimes difficult and challenging conversations about relationships. They may not have the capacity to give you what you need and insisting means that you are abusing yourself now. You human! That means that you're crazy as hell, just like the rest of us. When a relationship breaks down, I take copious notes, and I want to share them with you. Anybody with two eyes and a brain knows that too much Alfredo sauce is just no good for you.

But if you're going to eat it, they're not going to stop you. So he's going to continue to give you the Alfredo sauce and put it even on your grits if you don't stop him. Listen to the R-Spot on the iHeart Radio app Apple Podcast or wherever you listen to podcasts. Hi, I'm David Eagleman. I have a new podcast called Inner Cosmos on iHeart. I'm a neuroscientist and an author at Stanford University and I've

spent my career exploring the three-pound universe in our heads. On my new podcast I'm going to explore the relationship between our brains and our experiences by tackling unusual questions so we can better understand our lives and our realities. Like, does time really run in slow motion when you're in a car accident? Or can we create new senses for humans? Or what does dreaming have to do with the rotation of the planet? So join me weekly to uncover how your brain steers your behavior, your perception, and your reality. Steers your behavior, your perception, and your reality. Listen to Intercosmos with David Eagleman on the I Heart Radio app Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. In the 1680s, a feisty opera singer burned down a nunnery and stole away with her secret lover. In 1810, a pirate queen negotiated her

cruise way to total freedom, with all their loot. During World War II, a flirtatious gambling double agent helped keep D-Day a secret from the Germans. What are these stories having common? They're all about real women who were left out of your history books. If you're tired of missing out, check out the Womanica podcast, a daily women's history podcast highlighting women you may not have heard of but definitely should know about. I'm your host Jenny Kaplan, and for me, diving into these stories is the best part of my day. I learned something new about women from around the world and leafyling amazed, inspired, and sometimes shocked.

Listen on the I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. When you decide to make that transition from creating content for amazing brands, prestige brands, and you're making the sweats to being like, I'm gonna be a founder, I'm gonna create summer Fridays. When you're making that transition, walk us through some of the things that you thought about 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,

today the pressure is everyone should be an entrepreneur and found their own company. I feel like that's kinda like the energy and everyone thinks like an entrepreneur and found their own company. I feel like that's kind of like the energy and everyone thinks like they have to launch something or whatever. 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?

What are the insights they should be considering? 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. And I don't think that that always works out. Obviously it's worked out for you. So I'm wondering what were the things you had to think about? I think if I had to go back and tell myself when we started the brand,

what do I wish that I knew? 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? Like the days that we launch a product, let's say we launch Fry products a year, that's five of 365. So the other 360 days, you really want to work on a business. Do you really want to work on a company? Do you want to be a manager of people? Do you want to run the finances and operations? Like, it's all of those not fun things that you do every day. 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? And that's fine. If you don't love some of the other stuff. 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. And once we grew a little bit, after our first couple of years, we have no ego in saying there's things we either don't want to do or we don't know how to do. 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. 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. Those things are not the sexy fun parts of the job and you have to really want to do that because at the very beginning you have very small teams. It's basically yourself maybe a couple other people and you're not making a lot of money for the first few years. 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 and that's definitely not the case.

It takes a long time because whatever you invest into the business and you sell stuff, you're just recouping your money for what you've already invested. 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. 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. So if you're thinking about starting a business, ask yourself, do I actually want to run a company?

And if you do, great. If you don't, then maybe say, like, what am I good at? Like, what am I passionate about? What do I love so much? Why do I maybe want to start a company? Is it because you love the creative? There's so many creative jobs. You could be a creative director.

You could work at an ad agency. You could consult for brands. If you love creating product, maybe you help someone with product development There's so many skills that we learn as creators find what you love best and then offer that as a service to other brands So something I love is like branding and marketing and I think in life This is just one of the first things that I will do of many 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, so I would love to continue to do that over a portfolio of them.

And I know like the actual starting of the business is difficult, so I don't know how many more times I could do that part of it. Now that we're here, I'm so grateful, but 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. Think about the way your team works right now. 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. This is why you need Coda.

Coda is the dock that brings it all together. By putting data in one centralized location, regardless of format, eliminating roadblocks that can stop your team in their tracks. With Coda, you'll never ask, where are the latest project updates? Anyone know where the performance stats are? Is there a report about licenses I can see? This is what slows down productivity and collaboration. With Coda, your team can operate on the same information and collaborate in one place to get projects across the

finish line faster. Coda.io is an all-in-one platform that can do document creation, project management, data analysis and more. What I really like about it is the fact that it's super flexible and customizable so it can easily fit into any workflow. And if you're working on a team project it's got great collaboration features too. 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. If you're ready to join the efficiency revolution with Coda, you can get started today for free. Head over to coder.io-purpos. That's c-o-d-a-dot-io and get started for free.

Coda.io-purpos. This show is sponsored by BetterHelp. 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. Working with a therapist can help you get closer to the best version of you. Therapy is a great way to learn about coping skills, how to set healthy boundaries, empower yourself to make big decisions, and learn how to deal with trauma that could be holding you back. If you're thinking of giving therapy a try, better help is a great option.

It's convenient, flexible, affordable, and entirely online. Just fill out a brief questionnaire to get matched with a licensed therapist, and switch therapist any time for no additional charge. 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. If you want to live a more empowered life, therapy can get you there.

To see my top three reasons why you should try online therapy, visit betterhelp.com forward slash J's top three. That's better, help.com forward slash J's top three and get 10% of your first month of online therapy when you sign up. It's just a great way to look at it because often you, you end up starting something you put a lot into it and then you realize it's not what you wanted. Like you don't want your 90% of your life to be operations, strategy, management, HR.

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. And it's not true, right? Me included, there are so many things I have to do and there are so many things I want to do. And I've accepted that that's how my life is split up. And there's also knowing what to start.

Like when I look at my career, there are things like this podcast that we started, my genius community that we started. 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. They were already solving a problem that I deeply believed in. And I would rather join forces than go and build something to compete with my friends. Well, it's already an existing incredible platform.

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. And so I think you can think about like, what are you uniquely good at? What skills can I offer someone else?

And go work with a company, go consult for people and then see from there, maybe I do want to start my own thing or I can do this with other people. And so if there's a brand you love, maybe reach out to them, like let me create a direct a shoot for you, like let me help you with social 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. 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.

Exactly. Did you ever raise or did you choose not? We raised money. So we ended up raising. Walk us through the choice of that and then that process. So summer Fridays was self-funded and then we ended up raising money in 2019.

So we had a really great first year but we were running everything ourselves. We had the two of us and employee a couple consultants 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. And it was almost a disservice to ourselves by trying to figure it out ourselves. Like we got us to a really great point, but we saw we have a best seller. It's working really well. What can we do to take our brand

to the next level and not lose the momentum that we had? So when we first launched a brand, people started reaching out to us and raising money is a bit like dating So you want to date and meet everyone and we met any and everyone and then you kind of see like who do you like? Who do you enjoy spending time with like do I really want to talk to these people every day and 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 going to listen to like what I want and not because they're an investor

and they're going to take control of something? And so we ended up going with a group and they have a minority investment, which is very small. So it means like we still own the majority of the business. So we have the majority of the same things but it was two females who founded it and they're incredible and they almost serve like an intermediate president for us and helped us with hiring our org chart what things to do next and it really was the right fit for us and they weren't the biggest place that we went out to they didn't have the largest portfolio with the biggest investment they were making into the brand but

it was two people we trusted. And a lot of our friends are like, you're the only people we know that like your investors and we really do and they're incredible. So they have a great portfolio of brands, including like Westman, Atelier, Soldiers, Genero, and food they have, fly by Jing and Banzapasta. So they focus in like good for you brands and food and beauty. And so we are so grateful to have them. So then after that, after we raised a little bit of money, we were able to hire more people.

And our first big hire was a CEO. And I know a lot of people when they start a business, they have a dream of becoming a CEO and running a brand. And that was never what Lauren and I wanted for ourselves. And we have no ego in saying, I don't want to be the CEO. I don't want to run the entire business because one I've never done this before. That's fine if you haven't and you want to figure it out along the way. We knew what we're going to 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. Someone whose value is really aligned with the things that we wanted. So, a company culture is really important to us. And as we interviewed for the CEO, it was someone who led with kindness,

who people were excited to work for. And so, we ended up bringing on a CEO in 2020 right before the pandemic. And so grateful for our CEO. And so, between them, it's been really incredible to get the brand where it is today. And I don't think it's possible without them And so I think if you are if you have a business and you're thinking about either partners are raising money You really want to make sure that you want this 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 another group wanting something else 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. And then there's all this other stuff that you realize where we have to find someone for that, we have to figure this out, this needs to be shifted. How do you decipher between what's important to you 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. You don't strike me as someone who worries about what other people think of you or what you do. Where does that come from and how do you define or decide what's important to you? I live my life day to day, me, myself. I'm not living my life for other people. So if I'm so concerned with being called CEO,

I'm gonna take on a role because I care that other people think that this is my title, but I have to do something every day that I don't enjoy that makes no sense. So why would I live my life for this title for other people's opinions when 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? 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 it's running the finances of the business, like I don't want to do that. So who can we hire eventually to do this thing? And so it's eventually just like taking less of those drainers off of my plate. And so I can really focus my time on the things that I'm good at and I enjoy doing. I think it's difficult for people, especially women, if you have been calling yourself a CEO in the company,

then you have to make this announcement like oh, I stepped down a CEO because we hired somebody. We never intended to be the CEOs of the business so we didn't call ourselves that in the first place. So if and when the time came, we weren't like, it wasn't that we were stepping down a CEO, it was that we just never had CEOs.

We started the company and a CEO is somebody who can help run the business when it gets to that like phase. And so I think it's about taking your ego out of it 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. It's like whether you're the founder of the CEO or 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 gonna spend your time every day doing something you don't actually wanna do. And you're not gonna be happy. And then the business might suffer because of that. 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, with these things that became just talked about your journaling habit, your intentions for the year, where 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. So I'd love to hear about what is your personal meditation practice and then anyone, other one that you pick, that just walk us through it because I think we see this in successful CEOs,

successful founders, entrepreneurs, and just happier, healthier people that routine and a commitment to practices are really beneficial in their life. What are some of yours that you can walk us through with a bit more of that? Yeah, so on the podcast, I kept interviewing people and everyone talked about a morning routine and meditation. And I'm like, if all of these really successful people that I admire do this, there's got to be something to it. So pre-pandemic, I was just waking up, working going to sleep, working on the weekends, I had no routine and schedule.

That was not great for me. 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. So I started doing a morning routine because I thought other people were doing it. And I think that's where I failed at first. Because I'm like, oh, these people do these things

in their morning routine, I need to wake up and work out. I need to wake up and do this. But those things didn't work for me. So it was trying something for a week. Do I feel better? Yes or no? What thing should I eliminate? And what thing should I keep?

And I got it to a routine of the things that feel best for me. Those five things might not work for you, but it's the things that work best for me. And so it's trial and error figuring out how can I set myself out best for the day. Basically, once I start working in the day, my mind is going at all times and I am always someone who's thinking of 50 different things. 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, I'm on my phone moment, the computer and so having that time

for myself really just is like a great way to start the day. 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. 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 I didn't complete this goal for myself. 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. I'm Jay Shetty, and on my podcast on purpose, I've had the honor to sit down with some of the most incredible hot some minds on the planet. Oprah, everything that has happened to you can also be a strength builder for you if you allow it. Kobe Bryant, the results don't really matter. It's the figuring out that matters. Kevin Haw.

It's not about us as a generation at this point. It's about us trying our best to create change. Lurins Hamilton. That's for me being taken that moment for yourself each day. Being kind to yourself. Because I think for a long time, I wasn't kind to myself. And many, many more.

If you're attached to knowing, you don't have a capacity to learn. On this podcast, you get to hear the raw real-life stories behind their journeys. And the tools they used, the books they read, and the people that made a difference in their lives so that they can make a difference in hours. Listen to on-purpose with Jay Shetty on the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcasts. Join the journey soon.

The therapy for Black Girls podcast is the destination for all things mental health, personal development, and all of the small decisions we can make to become the best possible versions of ourselves. Here, we have the conversations that help black women dig a little deeper into the most impactful relationships in our lives, those with our parents, our partners, our children, our friends, and most importantly, ourselves. We chat about things like what to do with a friendship ends, how to know when it's time to break up with your therapist, and how to end the cycle of perfectionism.

I'm your host, Dr. Joy Harden Bradford, a licensed psychologist in Atlanta, Georgia. And I can't wait for you to join the conversation every Wednesday. Listen to the Therapy for Black Girls Podcast on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcasts. Take good care. I'm Dr. Romani and I am back with season two of my podcast Navigating Narcissism. Narcissists are everywhere and their toxic behavior in words can cause serious harm to your mental health. In our first season, we heard from Eileen Charlotte, who was loved by the Tinder Swindler. The worst part is that he can only be guilty for stealing the money from me,

but he cannot be guilty for the mental part he did. And that's even way worse than the money he took. But I am here to help. As a licensed psychologist and survivor of narcissistic abuse myself, I know how to identify the narcissists in your life. Each week you will hear stories from survivors who have navigated through toxic relationships, gaslighting, love bombing, and the process of their healing from these relationships. Listen to navigating narcissism on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

So if you want to hit a certain number follower, or a subscriber, or a download count, you can not control that. You can create the best content you can, but you can't make someone watch the content. You can't make them download or follow. So what you don't want to do is say, like, I have to hit a million followers by the end of the year, and if you don't want to do is say like I have to hit a million followers by the end of the year and if you don't hit it Be upset you can say I intend to create the best community this year that I can I want the followers that are there to love me and be happy with the content I create and then you can ask yourself

Are they happy am I fulfilled with the content I'm creating and then that intention can be crossed off Versus being disappointed that you didn't hit this number that was out out of your control to begin with. So those intentions are really important for me. 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 versus like insane goals that you might not get to and then always feeling sad if you, if you're not hitting them. I love the way you just described the difference between intentions and goals. I hope everyone because whenever you're setting new as resolutions or 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. Measuring yourself against your goals will always make you feel like a failure. 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.

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. And that's come from really being in my 30s. So before I was always, you know, when you're younger, you're like, I have to be married and have kids by 30. I have to do this like Forbes 30 and to 30. I have to do all these things by this age,

but it's like why when life is long 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. When I got to 45, I had nothing left. There was, I had nothing left to reach and I'm like, if I accomplish all these things by 45, I'm going to live for decades longer. What more do I have to look forward to in the years to come? 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. So I don't want to rush through them just trying to get to where I'm trying to go. I want to be happy where I am today. 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. 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 so much longer than that. And there's so many more gaps in between. I had a friend who recently found love and his business and his work took a big of a back burner,

but he found someone that he really wants to spend a lot of time with and that's what he was doing. And I was thinking you just won, right? Like, you could see that as like two years out in your business journey. And so now his business is two years behind. But I was like, you've just saved yourself years because you found a partner that you're really connected to. And I think often we think of it as like, they're separate. Like there's work and

then there's life. And it's like, well, no, no, no, they're so interrelated. The way you just share that is spectacular. Like I hope everyone writes that down, takes that away. Mariana, what are you working on right now? I feel like you're someone who, because you start therapy at six, which is just like, that's another, another incredible thing. But like what are you working on right now personally?

What's something that you're grappling with? What's something that you're wanting to be better at for yourself, for your friends, your family, whatever, anything around you? I think the presence is a big thing for me. 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. So having a gratitude journal and writing down every day, I think a lot of times we're busy in our days and our careers like, oh, I have to go do this, I have to do this today, but it's not, I have to do, it's I get to do. So I get to go work here. I get to go to this opportunity instead of I have to go do this, I have to do this today, but it's not, I have to do, it's I get to do. So I get to go work here. I get to go to this opportunity

instead of I have to do these things and that really changed my mindset of being 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. I'm 36 now and I keep feeling like, oh, I'm still not ready to do all these things.

Like I'm still so young. I think the older I get, the younger I still feel. Where when I was in my 20s, I was like, oh, I'm still not ready to do all these things. Like I'm still so young. I think the older I get, the younger I still feel. Where when I was in my 20s, I was like, oh, I'm getting so old. Or like, oh, 36 is so old. But now that I'm 36, I'm like, it's still so young. 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. 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. It's about how do I feel my best, how do I stay active, my parents are really young and smart in their minds and their bodies, they still travel by themselves, they're very independent people, and I think it's because they've taken care of themselves and my dad does the crossword every day,

he reads books, my mom's very independent, I think keeping your mind young, and so doing things for brain health, now that we're getting older, I'm like, okay, brain health, our health, mobility. 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.

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. I'm in the same boat as you. I feel like your 30s are really for that. Well, like your 20s you still feel like a super person. And then in your 30s you're like, oh, wait a minute.

There is something known as getting older physically, I mean, and you start just becoming aware of how much your body has been through because you could. And then you go, why would I want to put my body through that anymore? Like, why would I do that damage to my body? And I'm definitely with you on that. I'm spending so much time reading about longevity and learning about longevity. And because not because I want to live longer or for vanity, but I want to live healthier for longer.

And I think that's the difference, right? 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 we do wanna 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 wanna 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, how do they live longer,

healthier, happier lives? 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. 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. 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. So it's really about thinking about your gratitude each day of feeling good in your body and the days that you feel good. So one of the things I write down in my journal is I am grateful for my body, mind, and soul. I'm happy for 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 do I feel happy 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 Absolutely absolutely, and I feel like you're a high performer. You're massively ambitious

You're like optimal peak performance individual and I can relate them. What that comes with is you naturally have higher quarters or levels because you're doing more stressful things, right? Like 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 is fast, right? And that's what all the best athletes, the world cups going on right now, and it's the same thing.

All the best soccer players in the world are dealing with more stress. It's not that they don't feel stress when they play at that high level. So what are some of the things? I mean, you've given us so many habits, but that's just something because it's on my mind too. I'm thinking that if I, and I'm speaking to anyone who's listening, who thinks they're really ambitious, they're big goals or big intentions,

but then at the same time, then you have to be even more on top of your quarters or levels because you're naturally going to experience more stress. Yeah, this morning I was talking to someone and she was like, what workout are you doing? I was like, I love Pilates. 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. I always wear my aura ring, which I love. That's what I love. I love it. And I track my sleep every night and like quality sleep really does make me feel my best the next day. I drink magnesium every night before I go to bed, taking like my vitamins and supplements. And then really not like I don't watch scary movies. Like I'm not doing things that are gonna make me feel more excited

or like feelings that would make me feel more anxious. So anything that's gonna make me feel more anxious because I already have to feel anxious and stressed in like my job. So I don't want these added like books or shows that are going to make me feel a little bit more stressed out. And then I'm someone who it physically manifests in my body. And so one day I was really stressed out. I was at the airport.

I missed my flight. I was so stressed because I had to get back for something the next day. There was no flights out. And instead of just relaxing and taking a breath, I woke up the next day at a rash on my body because when I get stressed, I so I have to remember like, okay, I can get stressed out about things I can't control.

I need to take a breath or else it's gonna physically show up in my body when I'm overly stressed about something, especially something like that. I made it home, it was fine. It was all good, but I stressed myself out for no reason. So it's like doing all these things that can control it because stress is gonna happen in our lives. We're gonna have stressful days.

Things are out of our control, our job, our personal life. Those things will make us stressed out. So it's like how can I control all the other things in my day to feel my best? 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

Mariana, I've learned so much about you today literally. 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 your 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 know you call a friend or a family member You know this very well, Mariana. We end every interview with a final five These are the fast five where you have to answer each question in one word to one sentence maximum But before we do that, I want to ask you did I ask 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 want to feel we didn't touch your plant?

I think all good. 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. 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. And I feel like I always get that from you. And so thank you for your content because it makes me feel that way. And that's the things that I wanna consume every day.

Like did I take away something that made me feel better or inspired or motivated? And I feel like you always bring that out of your guest. So, oh, I feel the swiss. No, 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 you 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. 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 or you're weak and weak. And I'm like, well, no, there's this beautiful harmony in between. And so that's my love note back to you as well. I love that. I'm going to start saying that. I like that. But these are your final five. The first question is, what is the best advice you've ever had or received? Don't be afraid of being told no.

So just asking people for something, if they say no, don't be offended, but you never know who's gonna say yes. That's a great piece of advice. We've never had that. That is very good. And I do that a lot. So I'm with you. Okay, second question.

What is the worst piece of advice you've ever had or received? The worst piece of advice was people told us when we launched summer Fridays, not to launch with jet lag mask. And so I think that was in our gut and intuition, the product we wanted to launch the brand with. I don't know if it would be what it is today without that.

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. I love that. And I love that example for that as well because it's usually the thing. 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, they weren't really industries that crossed over as much in the beginning.

And I remember one brand reached out to me, and they said, Jay, we want you to do this video. They didn't give me an idea, they just gave me a vision of like, we want it to be about people living life on their own terms. Like that's the spirit of the video. And I was like, I love that.

I can totally vibe with that. And I can't even remember, I had some like made up feet at the time. Like this very early days, I was like, whatever, it wasn't that much. And I went and made this video. And I put my I had some like made up fee at the time, like when it was very early days I was like whatever it wasn't that much 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 and It was even though the brand deal was tiny. It was just so important to me that I got to make this piece of content And I shared it with them and they were like Jay we don't yeah, this is not gonna work And I was like I put some I put more money into the production

than they were paying me, but I was so passionate about it. And they're like, Jay, it's not gonna work. I didn't have a contract. I wasn't tuned into what I needed. They said, no, we don't want this. We don't think you're the right fit for this. I uploaded the video anyway, because I really liked it.

To this day, it's my most watched video. Wow. It's got 387 million views. Like it's on Facebook. It's one of my biggest videos of all time. It's got 387 million views like it's on Facebook is one of my biggest videos of all time and I love the video it's it's awesome but they didn't get it and that's the video that changed my entire career and I'm really happy that there's no brand attached to it because it's true and real and yeah so yeah but really it's like going with your gut like you

know what's gonna work best. 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 wanna create, put it out into the world, because look, your most watched video are best selling products. You're best selling products, yeah. And I love those examples because I think

we do listen to the experts. And so love that, love that, love that. Question number three, what's something that you used to value, that you don't value as much anymore? Social, a that, love that. Question number three, what's something that you used to value that you don't value as much anymore? Social, a bit, which is weird because it's also our jobs, but I think I used to value what it was on there so much and now I understand it's a tool to do my job, it's not my entire identity and so I have a really good relationship, I think with it now.

What's the biggest lesson you've learned in the last 12 months? I would say just taking care of my health is really the most important. Like, there's no amount of money or anything in the world that you can do. Like, your health is the most important thing you can take care of. 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. Yeah, absolutely. Couldn't agree more. Very true for my year this year too. So I definitely take that to heart.

Fifth and final question. If you could create one law that everyone in the world had to follow, what would it be? Oh, one law. It's kind of a little bit we talked about earlier of like saying yes and no to things. So if you want to say yes to something, it should be an absolute full body. Yes, I really want to do this. 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. And then you end up saying yes and you don't really want to do it anyway. 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 you're gotten your intuition. That's great Mariana here everyone the podcast is called life with Mariana. You know the brand summer Fridays Make sure you go subscribe to the podcast Do follow Mariana on Instagram on all social media platforms that you use and Please the biggest thing I want you to do is tag what you learn from this episode. So take a screenshot right now,

tag me and marry on a both on TikTok, on Instagram, Twitter, whatever platform you're using and let us know what you learned, what you're gonna try out, what you're testing for a week, what habit really stayed with you, a new journal question that you might have gained. I love knowing the insights that you actually apply

to your life. 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?

And I think in Marianas 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 and so focus on application. Mariana you've been so wonderful today as always it's been such a joy having you on I hope we have you on again and and keep track in this incredible journey that you're on and thank you for giving us permission to live long, healthy, successful lives that don't have to end by 45.

Exactly. There's so much life to live. Thank you for having me. Absolutely. If you love this episode, you will also love my interview with Charles DuHig on how to hack your brain, change any habit effortlessly, and the secret to making better decisions. I'm Danny Shapiro, host of Family Secrets. It's hard to believe we're entering our eighth season,

and yet we're constantly discovering new secrets. The variety of them continues to be astonishing. I can't wait to share 10 incredible stories with you, stories of tenacity, resilience, and the profoundly necessary excavation of long-held family secrets. Listen to season 8 of Family Secrets on the I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Hi, I'm David Eagleman. I have a new podcast called Inner Cosmos on I Heart. I'm going to explore the relationship between our brains and our experiences by tackling unusual questions. Like, can we create new senses for humans? So join me weekly to uncover how your brain steers your behavior, your perception, and your reality. Listen to Intercosmos with David Eaglement

on the I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Munga Shatekler and it turns out astrology is way more widespread than any of us want to believe. You can find it in major league baseball, international banks, kpop groups, even the White House. But just when I thought I had a handle on this subject, something completely unbelievable happened to me and my whole view on astrology change. Whether you're a skeptic or a believer, give me a few minutes because I think your ideas are about to change too.

Listen to Skyline Drive on the iHeart radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.