the bossbabe podcast - 64. Wounds To Wisdom: Turning Grief Into Action, Creating Authentic Content + Finding Your “Why” With Mandy Ansari

Episode Date: December 11, 2019

What is your “why” for showing up every day? Especially on those days when you don’t have the strength to.  Join us in this honest conversation about mental health and authenticity in a digital world as Danielle Canty, COO of BossBabe, and Mandy Ansari, lifestyle blogger and mental advocate get real and vulnerable about their experiences.  Following the death of her best friend, Mandy shares with us her journey on how she turned her grief into action and wounds into wisdom. Using this experience as her North Star, Mandy’s passion and commitment to mental health has helped influence how she chooses to authentically show up in life.  A believer in the notion that you are never too old and it is never too late to do something new, Mandy serves up some much needed inspiration for anyone wanting to make a pivot in life and career. Be sure to tune in because this is not an episode that you want to miss! This episode is sponsored by PicMonkey. Using PicMonkey, you can create powerful designs for social media, marketing materials, advertising, and much more.  Get 1 free month + an exclusive set of templates offered by PicMonkey and BossBabe. Explore more: picmonkey.love/bossbabe

The more you're open, the more you're forthright about the good, the bad, the great, and the terrible, the less people feel alone. If you love something, you can truly turn that into a career. You can monetize it. When we're not focused on our why, we crave that outside validation. Welcome to the Boss Babe podcast, the place where we share with you the real behind the scenes of building successful businesses, achieving peak performance, and learning how to balance it all. Danielle here, co-founder and COO of Boss Babe, and your host for this podcast episode,

where we are chatting all things social media but not in the way you often hear us talking about at Boss Babe because on this episode I was joined by Mandy Ansari also known as Girl and the Bay and although Mandy is an amazing digital marketer and self-confessed tech nerd who actually helps a wide variety of businesses from startups to fortune 500 companies and she helps them increase their reach and build their audience you'll hear in her story that social media means so much more to her than that and you'll hear why she is so passionate about the impact of her social media she wants it to be positive she wants to have influence people's mental health for the better and spread joy and a

little more happiness which if you know me you'll know I think along exactly the same lines. So I know that this interview is going to give a lot of you a fresh perspective on how to use and look at social media and so the quote I've chosen for this episode is visualize your highest self then start showing up as her every single day and as you listen to this interview it will make a little bit more sense as to why I've chosen this quote. So I hope you enjoy this episode and I'd love to hear your feedback. So please share with at bossbabe.inc, at Danielle Canty and at Girl in the Bay. A boss babe is unapologetically ambitious and paves the way for herself and other women to rise, keep going and fighting on. She is on a mission to be her best self in all areas. It's just believing in yourself. Confidently stepping outside her comfort zone to create her own vision of success. Hey, it's Danielle and I just wanted to jump in here and

tell you about the sponsors of this week's episode, which is by PicMonkey. Now we've been using PicMonkey at Boss Babe for a little while and we use it to create powerful designs for social media, some of our marketing materials and advertising and so much more and what we really love about utilizing PicMonkey is you can actually design and create mood boards and then off that you can design Pinterest pins or your blog images and so on. And recently we used it to create a mood board for our brand new Instagram account at shopbossbabe.inc. And we're so excited that as one of our listeners, you actually get one free month on PicMonkey plus an exclusive

set of templates offered by Boss Babe in partnership with PicMonkey. So go check them out at picmonkey.love forward slash Boss Babe. Welcome to the Boss Babe podcast, Mandy. It's a true honor to have you on here today. I am so excited to be here. I'm a longtime listener, so this is just a really exciting opportunity. Yay, I love it. And I'm really excited to be chatting with you because I feel like we have so many things in common, like our love for social media and building kind and happy communities. And I'm really just like ready to like lift the lid on it all because I feel like poor social media gets a little bit of a bad rep at times, but I feel like they can be utilized for so much good. So I'm excited to, as part of

this conversation, really kind of dive deeper into like how you've built a business, but why you chose to build the business that you have, because I know that your story is so, so powerful. There's actually so many people actually relate to it too. So starting from the beginning, I'd just love for you to share like where your love of social media first came from. Absolutely. Well, first of all, I've always been obsessed with technology. My dad has a PhD in computer science. And while most kids bond with their parents over different interests with him, it was like, let's build this computer together. And I remember at the age of four, he was building one of the first Mac prototypes. And I thought it was a piggy bank.

And I every single day was putting coins into the drive. And one day he was like, why is my prototype not working? Opened it up. And there was literally 500 pennies inside this computer. the drive. And one day he was like, why is my prototype not working, opened it up, and there was literally 500 pennies inside this computer. So from the very beginning of life, even when I didn't understand technologies, uses, I it was around me, and I loved it. It just was something you know, when you're younger, you're like, I don't want to do what my parents do. And you want to forge your own path. I never really saw technology being and it's evolved so

much through the years as my main career path, because it's what my dad did. I wanted to do my own thing. But over time, it was just embedded in me and the evolution of technology was something I grew up with. And I remember when I was about 12 years old, I really loved dabbling in graphic design. And I would go into these news message boards and America Online chat rooms. And I started selling custom themes, wallpapers for your desktops. Eventually, when MySpace came out, I was selling custom HTML. If you remember when you could add your own music and your own wallpaper and different fonts. And I was doing that. And I remember being like 13

years old, and my parents finally catching wind and saying, Why are you receiving so many personal checks in the mail, and I kind of had to tell them that I had the side hustles. So technology and truly entrepreneurialism has just been second nature to me. You know, it started with web design. And then when social media came about, I realized I could use my love for message boards and having emo blogs that nobody would see. You know, back then it was like LiveJournal or Zynga, being able to make those a part of my career. And so it was something that kind of just happened. And it

wasn't until a little over three years ago, my best friend at the time committed suicide, she took her own life. And she had battled with depression her entire life, but just a really beautiful, colorful human who really loved the internet. And that was one thing about her is every single day, she would send me inspirational quotes, she would send me things that would make her happy memes that would make her laugh. And you know, sometimes what we don't realize about depression, and those that are battling with it is they are fighting the hardest to be happy. They are working really, really hard. And maybe relate, we have that when we are going through a bad breakup

or when we're having a lot of problems at work or maybe your parents are getting divorced. Maybe you're getting divorced. Whenever we're in those rougher times, we are trying so hard to stay afloat. We are trying so hard to smile in the moments where we're not thinking about those disasters in our life. And so when she passed

away, I quickly wanted to honor her. I wanted to do something that would help me also turn my grief into action and turn my wounds into some sort of wisdom, but also pay it forward for those who are also dealing with, you know, severe anxiety and depression, but also just bring awareness around that a lot of times we don't realize we might be headed down a slippery slope to more serious depression or more serious anxiety or stress that can be debilitating. And so that's really when I was like, you know what, instead of consulting for every single other brand and helping them build their social media, I want to invest in a blog where I can basically have all of my thoughts and bring awareness to these issues. So that's kind of where it was all born.

That's so beautiful. And I love that story all the way from the beginning when you first started messing with tech. I suppose the right terminology is. And you really remind me of Natalie, actually, that entrepreneurial spirit from such an early age. And I know that she used to do coding on MySpace. Yeah, that's exactly what I would do. I didn't even like, for example, I wasn't really into wrestling, but my cousins were obsessed with wrestling. And so I knew there was a market. And my little 12 year old brain was like, I'm going to go online with my, you know, 28 megahertz speed modem speed and find these people who love wrestling. And then I would sell them custom themes for their websites or the background for

their desktop. And it was so funny, because from a young age, I was like, Oh, people like this, or people like emo music. So let me make custom themes that would appeal to them. And finally, my parents were like, what is going on, you're spending a lot of time on the computer. And now you're getting personal checks in the mail. Because you have to remember back then there was no PayPal, there was no Venmo, no Bitcoin. So it was a very interesting barter system. And so over time, we've really evolved and now peer to peer networks and marketplaces are a huge way of life, right? But back then it was very different. Totally. And I just think that's like a great example of like spotting gaps in the market. And I know obviously we have a lot of entrepreneurs listening to this and just always being able to kind of look at things and go,

okay, well, what's missing here? What could I offer? Because I think all of us have a value. And in this day and age, I think it's, there's so many different ways that you can make money and repurpose skills to transfer careers. And We have so many members in the society, which is our membership, who are transitioning careers and they're learning new things that they can do and apply. And, you know, just hearing examples of it, even from an early age of 13, I just think it kind of shows not only your creative spirit, but like the tenacity to like get things done and take action and figure it out as you go along. And I really think that's a good lesson in life, really. We're all just here to figure out as we go along and take action where

we can. I love that. And I love what you said about the community. It's so many times we have, I mean, right now we're living in a world where so many things are possible. If you love something, you can truly turn that into a career. You can monetize it. And a quote that has really, really helped me the last couple of years is, it's never too late and you're never too old. And I think, especially as women, we feel like we're on a timeline. We feel like we have to rush to the next step.

If we're not in a relationship, everyone's asking us when we're gonna be in a relationship. When we are in a relationship, they're asking you when you're going to get engaged, then married, then children, then your third child. And if you're in school, it's like, when are you getting your graduate degree? Are you getting a PhD? I mean, it just, the list goes on and on. And I think we pressure one another to be like, what is next? And it's so funny, as I mentioned, my dad technology was his life, and it became my hobby, but I never really thought to make it my career because that was his thing. And so my path in my career was not straight at all. And I was actually a school teacher that I was a school principal. And then I finally pivoted because I could live and retire

in this career, because that's kind of what you do in education. It's like, once you're in that, you're in it for life, because it is a beautiful field. And it's very relational. But I had this passion for technology. I'm obsessed, especially as the internet evolved and became a bigger part of our daily lives, I realized people were making money making websites that I was selling on the side. People were making money creating apps. And I've had this inkling, this desire that I wanted to also do that. And so I remember thinking at 25, well, it's too late. I'm too old. I've already put in and it's so silly looking back, right? But hindsight is 2020. I thought, well, I've already spent five years in this career path.

It's too late for me to pivot. Who's going to want to hire me? I have no real life marketing experience. I have no real life web or digital experience. It's always been a hobby. And I realized, you know, it's never too late. And I'm never too old, I can pivot. And it's so interesting, because my career has been able to pivot in so many different directions, depending on what I'm interested in. And I think that's something I would really love for us as women to really take hold on is to not be discouraged by these false timelines, these false narratives that society wants to put on us. Yeah, 100%. I couldn't agree more. And I think what happens is we've all kind of put these time runs on us, those pressures that make us feel like we have to have done something by a

piece of time. And then when we haven't, we struggle with that. Or we kind of think, hang on a minute, I should be at this point in my career so and so's at this point in the career and I'm not and it's all like that warped impression of what time actually is and I hear 20 year olds saying that they feel so old 30 year olds feel old 40 year olds feel old and actually the truth is that you are like 20 years young 30 years young 40 years young you know my grandmother is in her 80s and it just makes me think like I'm not even halfway through my life yet like why on earth do I sometimes think I me think like I'm not even halfway through my life yet like why on earth do I sometimes think I'm old or I'm too old to change something or I'm too old to try

something new it's not true at all it's a myth that we've bought into and it's a timeline that we've bought into that really doesn't need to exist we see time as we choose to see time and I think that's another thing like whether it's on like a long-term path and like you say you know relationships and children or whatever or those those short-term, hang on, there's not enough hours in the day I'm choosing. It's like, you have a choice where you spend your time. I think just making peace with that is just really important. But I want to just pull you back to a couple of things you said earlier, because as you're sharing your story and you spoke about like growing up and enjoying the technology and starting the marketing side, you also shared about

your friend who you lost to depression and I want to quote you on this because this is just a beautiful sentence like turning wounds into wisdom and how you started leveraging your social media accounts and your marketing expertise to support people because for me I feel like depression is really like not spoken about we create these you know since we've started on social media Instagram facebook we create these highlight reels of amazing things that happen in our lives and one thing one of our values at boss babe is you know internal and external to company is transparency because we believe that you should be not only sharing the good things but you should be sharing like if you're going to share the good things i should say because not should like if

you're not sharing anything at all it's absolutely fair enough but if you are sharing the good things then you should also be willing to share more of the painful things so that people just don't think some go through life painlessly and everything is glorified all the time I think that's really important so how you started leveraging your channels to support people who are perhaps coming to you with anxiety or depression or sharing some of their challenges? Yeah, absolutely. I love what you said about the highlight reel. I think we hear that a lot. And actually right now with self-love and self-care, and we hear the word authenticity right now a lot. And I think those words are trending and it makes me excited because I think people are craving

reality. They're creating that genuinity, you know, that sincerity. And I think things like reality TV or Instagram stories or TikTok, Snapchat, we're getting a peek into real time access into celebrities' lives or one another's lives. And I think it is pulling us to a place where we are craving more of that behind the curtain kind of look. And what we need to realize is I really love the quote, be the change you wish to see in the world, because I do hear a lot of complaining on the internet or amongst my friends or my colleagues of I get depressed using social media. I have a couple of friends that are new moms and they talk about how they feel a lot of mom shame. Someone posts a picture that their kid is sleeping through the night, but here they are waking up every 45 minutes

with a colicky baby. And I think it comes back to, I really believe comparison is the thief of joy. And social media gives us a bird's eye view into everybody's lives and gives us an opportunity to compare. And I think the change that I want to see in the world is I really believe that the root of depression is feeling like you are the only one. You are alone in that feeling. You are the only one going through this circumstance. And you're very concerned about yourself and feeling hopeless. You're feeling alone. The and feeling hopeless, you're feeling

alone, the more we are, and you said transparency is a value to you guys. And, you know, the more you're transparent, the more you're open, the more you're forthright about the good, the bad, the great and the terrible, the less people feel alone, the more people feel understood. And I started realizing, the more I shared about my really bad days, the days where I couldn't get out of bed, the days where I was so excited about a career milestone and celebrating those two. But that wasn't just me. Yesterday was having a rough day and I was grieving, you know, the loss of my friend. But today I'm really excited because this really cool thing happened in my life. I think the more we share

that holistic view, the more people feel they can relate, they feel less alone. As much as a society we're looking to steer away from labels, you know, I think that that's very much a thing right now. We want to steer away from labels, whether that's in gender, whether that's in sexuality or race, but we're creating a lot more labels in that act. And I think it's important for us to realize that depression, anxiety, happiness, success, they don't all look the same way. And we are holistic people with lots of different emotions. And we would be really doing ourselves and others a disservice if we only chose to focus on one part of that. And so I really believe that the internet and your footprint online and what you're choosing to share with the world. And of course, there's

boundaries and there's privacy. And you know, I know there's concerns people have, and that's totally fine. You can respect those, but still show a real 360 view of your life online. And I really believe that when we do that, people can connect with us more. Yeah, I do. I think that's so, so important. I will say that because actually we all have a lot of people listening who do have audiences. So they have followers. A lot of people are doing our Insta growth accelerator and they're growing their personal profiles. How do you show up online when you're not feeling like it? Because I think that's also an interesting topic

because we can do this from both sides. We can do it that, you know, we're watching it and we want to see people. But if we're saying that actually everyone has a responsibility, if you're posting good to share a bit more of a holistic side of things, like how do you make sure that you have that balance and that when the times that you don't want to post,

you do because you know it's going to be helping somebody and that's a let's take a quick pause to talk about my new favorite all-in-one platform kajabi you know i've been singing their praises lately because they have helped our business run so much smoother and with way less complexity which i love not to mention our team couldn't be happier because now everything is in one place. So it makes collecting data, creating pages, collecting payment, all the things so much simpler. One of our mottos at Boss Babe is simplify to amplify and Kajabi has really helped us do that this year. So of course I needed to share it here with you.

It's the perfect time of year to do a bit of spring cleaning in your business, you know? Get rid of the complexity and instead really focus on getting organized and making things as smooth as possible. I definitely recommend Kajabi to all of my clients and students. So if you're listening and haven't checked out Kajabi yet, now is the perfect time to do so because they are offering Boss Babe listeners a 30-day free trial. Go to kajabi.com slash Boss Babe to claim your 30-day free trial. That's kajabi.com slash boss babe to claim your 30-day free trial. That's kajabi.com slash boss babe. Really good question. As we talk to entrepreneurs and business

builders, I coach a lot of brands and companies and personal brands on their social presence and on growing their companies. And consistency, we know, is a huge part of growing your online presence, right? But there are days where you can't be consistent, or you don't want to show up. And something that has really helped me is creating content when I'm feeling really great, and when I'm feeling really inspired. And I'm kind of one of those people where all of a sudden at 2am, I'll be like very inspired, and I'll pump out five or six blog posts. But then I'll have a week where I'm kind of one of those people where all of a sudden at 2am, I'll be like very inspired and I'll pump out five or six blog posts. But then I'll have a week where I'm feeling a little dry, but at least I have that backlog. And something I do is when I'm feeling inspired,

I save drafts. I save them all in a folder on my phone. And in my notes, I write up captions. And because I like to be really real time, if I'm not feeling like it, I pick something that I already have in my backlog, because I want to be consistent. I don't want to fall off my schedule, right? And I'll go in there, and then I'll tweak it a little depending on how I feel. But I've noticed for myself, when I don't have a little bit of preparation, I get anxiety. And I want to make sure my work is always fun. I want to do my part to make sure my work is always fueling me and feeding me. And I'm doing what it can to remain fun. And so for me, I've realized kind of like

we meal prep on Sundays, if we want to be really healthy that week, it's good for me to content prep because I know I'm going to have those days where I'm not really in the mood to pour my heart out or I'm not so peppy and so being prepared and using apps that can help us plan ahead definitely has kept me on track and helped me be consistent yeah I love that as well we do the same we're obsessed with batch content so what we tend to do is no matter which department we're in within market department operations department and boss babe we really try and like I'll have a morning where I do all finances like I don't mix finances and trying to write or finances and like I'll mix that with like processes because I

feel like it's really important to be once your brain is in one kind of gear it's very difficult to shift gears and without like having doing a meditation or going for a walk or really getting out the office to kind of like breathe and like re-energize yourself so definitely a fan of like whatever business you're growing batch content is definitely something that's super super important and you know you've really built your brand with a why purpose, right? So you're so dedicated, like, you know, your why. And how do you feel like other people can really tap into their why? Obviously, your best friend was somebody who sparked your why and how you decided to show up. Like,

how do people really find this? Yeah, I think it's so important with any career, but especially when you are doing something really relational, like if you were building a personal brand online is have a cause, have a why, develop why you're even doing this. It's so funny these days, and you probably get this a lot. I'll have people come to me and say, I want to be an influencer. And it's funny to me that this has become a career path, you know, but it is. And it's funny because you don't wake up one day and say, I want to be an influencer. I really believe that everybody has influence. But why do you have influence? What are you influencing people to do? And it's important, even with you know,

a fashion blogger who does strictly fashion? Are you posting photos of yourself just because you want validation of people telling you you look beautiful? Or are you doing it because you want to help inspire people to be able to create outfits that make them confident from what they have on a budget already in their closet? In every single thing, you can find a why. But it's very important because things like, well, I just want validation. I want people to tell me I look pretty, have a shelf life. But when you dig down, you can build longevity when you really know your purpose. And for me personally, I feel like the brands that have that longer shelf life are the ones that know exactly why they're showing up.

Because on those days, like you mentioned, where it's a little harder to show up and it's a little harder to be consistent and to pour your heart out online, when you have a cause associated to what you're doing, it makes it so much easier. And I know you have so much that you do and so much that you pour your heart out online.

And I'm sure it's because you know exactly who you're talking to and why you're there. And so I think it's so important for me. You know, it is. I want to make the Internet a more happier, connected place where people can feel less alone on their journeys. And I say, like you said, I have a very broad reach and I love using fashion, travel, food, all of that career advice as gateway drugs to talk about the things that we don't talk about, to talk about the harder topics like anxiety, like stress, like depression. Because I think, for me, I realized the gap was people don't even know that they're having these feelings. People don't even know that they're struggling with anxiety or, you know, their stress is taking over their life and it's debilitating and it's affecting their relationships

with their coworkers when with potential partners, you know, maybe they're not getting that relationship that the love that they're looking for, because their stress is really taking over their life. And so for me, it was okay, let me take these lighthearted things that we all love, especially as women, like fashion, like food, like travel, or career advice that we're all looking for and seeking and really being able to use this to pull people in, but then to talk about the things that we're all affected by. And that really is my why. A lot of times people ask me, you know, how did you grow your social presence? How did you get so many followers? How do you get people commenting on your stuff? And the truth is for me,

my moral compass is my friend who passed away. Her name is Alicia's. Would this make Alicia happier today? Would this make Alicia laugh? Would it make her feel a little less alone? And that's a very personal compass for me, but that's my why. Because I know that there's a million Alicias out there in the world and a couple hundred thousand that I have their ears and their eyes

and what am I doing to make them have a better day? And if you think about it, if I steer away and take my eyes off my North Star, I'm doing that group a huge disservice. And I'm wasting the time that I have with that audience, because I may be serving myself. And so for me, it's very important to always use that test is, would this make someone smile? Would this make someone feel a little lighter today? It's just so important, no matter what you're what you're doing. Not all of us are mental health lifestyle bloggers, but whatever you're doing, is it always serving your North Star, your why? Yeah, I love that so much and totally relate.

And for us building Boss Babe, we have a statement about what a Boss Babe is and it's about allowing a woman to be unapologetically ambitious because I have a story and I shared it on one of our first podcasts about how I felt intimidated or I felt like I wasn't able to express my ambition. And we also having things in there like a boss babe wants to be her best self. And the way I choose to show up is for me, I'm an ambivert. I'm not an extrovert and I'm not an introvert. I'm like bang in the middle.

I love that because I feel like you relate to more people that way. Yeah. I think I'm like 52% extrovert. So I'm like really on the borderline, but it means that for me showing up on social media, like sometimes I can really do it. And other times I'm just like, oh no, I can't do it. But when I show up and I make myself show up, I'm always thinking about that woman who's following, who's been in my shoes my shoes who is the boss babe who is unapologetically ambitious who is trying to pave the way for other women to shine who's trying to show up as her best self and I think okay I want to show up as my best self but also I want to share the true behind the scenes and what can my experience help somebody out so yesterday I just opened up and shared about overwhelm and how

I've suffered from overwhelm and continue to do so but I've realized it's very much a choice like I can choose to be overwhelmed and I can also choose not to be and like taking responsibility for that and I think sometimes it's not necessarily easy for you to like show up and share something and be vulnerable and put yourself out there but if you think about that person that you're helping the person that's making a difference to and I had so many dms about that, like it being like, oh my God, I so needed to hear this today. Or thank you for sharing this side. Sometimes I think that nobody else gets it.

Everyone else is just finding things easy. And I think the truth of it matters. They're not. And we're not. Having that North Star, like we have our values and our beliefs in Boss Babe. And I have my personal beliefs. And one of my other personal beliefs, and I'll just share it is around doing business differently I personally feel like business doesn't need to be like cutthroat and dog eat dog and always someone winning I genuinely feel like there should be more

collaboration over competition and that's the way I choose to do business and if I come in contact with people who don't fine I'll leave them to their own devices and I'll do me because that's how I want to show up just always having that North Star and you're saying like checking in with yourself going, okay, like, is this how I want to show up? Is this what I want to share? Is this going to help me move towards not only my purpose and my why, but actually, is it going to inspire and support other people in reaching those too? And you know what I love what you just said, you just brought up DMs, how sometimes you'll post something and you'll get hundreds of DMs about it. And while everyone right now is freaking out about Instagram hiding likes, that is actually something very profound to think about. Because when you have

your why really solidified, your purpose of why you're showing up online, your success metrics look different, right? And so sometimes I'll publish a post. And let's say it's about the topic I'm really the most passionate about is suicide prevention. That's a heavy topic and not everyone wants to always hear about it. And also not everyone wants to acknowledge publicly on the internet that it's something they struggle with. And so for me, a success metric is not a like, it's really that DM, it's that private interaction. It's really that deep conversation I'm having with a stranger who read my post, who is now thinking twice about their own personal mental health, or maybe they're really helping support

a family member, a friend, a coworker who is having these dark thoughts, and they don't know how to help. And so I think that's really important is, if my why isn't really solid, and they don't know how to help. And so I think that's really important is if my why isn't really solid and I don't have deep roots and why I'm doing what I do, then if I don't get a lot of likes on a post, I'm like, oh no, Danielle got 800,000 likes on this post, but I only got 200. This was such an important thing that was so deep. I was so connected with and I thought it was an amazing post. If I'm going to compare myself to you on one metric, I could get really down in the dumps and feel, oh, that wasn't successful, that didn't have an impact. But when we broaden our horizon, and we're thinking about the bigger

picture and why we're doing what we're doing, I realized no, actually, the DMS, the things that people don't see are what make me know this was successful and this had an impact and inspired someone. And so I really want to encourage all our boss babes to not get hung up on certain markers that we think are the most important, especially because I feel like when we're not focused on our why, we crave that outside validation. And a source of outside validation we've had on the internet is likes because everyone can see them, right? But if you're connected to your why, it's like you're doing what you're doing for a bigger purpose. And a lot of times that purpose is fulfilled in the silence, in the quiet, in the

places where people don't see. And for me, those are a lot of times in my DMs. And when I'm attached to my why, I'm not really caring about what everybody else sees. I'm caring about that conversation, that one-to-one conversation I'm having with someone. Yeah, it's really going to change the landscape completely and how we show up. So let's talk about showing up for brands because you mentioned earlier that you do coaching with brands and you really help them nurture and build their communities. So what are some of the brands that you've worked with and absolutely loved? You know, I have loved, I've been so lucky to work with a range of different brands. And it's funny because a couple of years ago, I'm really big into vision boarding. Is that something you like doing as well? And like setting goals? Obsessed. Nancy and I are actually bringing

up a planner. We got that obsessed with setting goals. We're like, okay, we have to create our own planner. That's exactly how I feel. And I'm like, so geeky. I love markers and stickers. And I really go all out. I want to buy rubber cement and go back to the collaging days in my planner. Do you remember when that was a big thing when we'd like, plaster the outside of every binder with magazine clippings of Leonardo DiCaprio and all of that. But I'm really into that. And a couple years ago, I was you know what, I am not going to think about what feels within reach and what feels absolutely wild and over the moon. But I'm going to write down the brands that I would love to work with. And it was a big range because I wanted to do things in the mental health and wellness space. But then I also had,

you know, dream brands, I love travel, I feel like it unlocks a different level of our personalities, our hopes and our dreams. And so, you know, I had a couple airlines on my vision board, I had American Express, because I think it's such a cool global brand that does so much and has a huge audience. And it's so cool, because this year, I got to work with Delta Airlines and American Express. And those were two dream partnerships that I felt like would never happen. So you know, there is power in manifestation, there is power in in setting goals. And even when they seem a little wild and out of reach, still putting them out there because you never know what will come your way. But it's interesting. Some of my favorite collaborations have been with nonprofit companies. I just did a collaboration with a weighted blanket brand called Blankwill.

My goodness, I love weighted blankets. Me too. I'm so obsessed. And so I have always loved weighted blankets. So that was a really cool organic fit because it's something I already use. I already love. I already know the benefits of. But what was cool was during Mental Health Awareness Month. And so the tie-in was every blanket purchased that month went with a donation to the National Association of Mental Illness. And so it was something I'm really passionate about.

And so I love working with brands who are also philanthropic. Nivea is a skincare, I love skincare. And Nivea is a brand I have loved since I was a kid. I was born in France. And so Nivea was, you know, really like our bread and butter in the house. We always had some. And so working with Nivea, they had partnered with kindness.org to teach youth to be more kind, to stop bullying, to encourage them that you can be soft and you can talk about your feelings. And it was an amazing plug. And I love when brands, these consumer packaged brands, partner with a cause, you know? And I think that goes back to what we were saying is like, we are humans with a lot of different emotions and a lot of different sides. And I love partnering with a brand that embraces that. They're not just a brand that sells body lotion and deodorant. They're a brand that cares about making the world a better place and cares about making an impact. And so I absolutely love working with brands that do that. And I like that now. I do think that's a real positive that's come from social media is that people are more

conscious now. They're more aware around like the ethos of brands and like what they're striving towards. And I really love, and I think you've worked with them as well, Bumble, you know, their mission is not only are they a dating app, but their mission is really to clean up the internet. And Whitney, their founder, has really gone out of her way to put legislations in place and to like drive awareness on that and I think we all however we're utilizing our social media whether it's our why and it starts at one level or whether we grow

companies that are valued I think Bumble or the group has just been valued at three billion or something you know it's just so nice to start seeing huge huge brands coming at things like you know gone to like the sweatshop days where we think it's just so nice to start seeing huge huge brands coming at things like you know gone like the sweatshop day is where we think it's okay to buy certain like fabrics that have utilized children in poverty-stricken conditions like I feel like everyone's starting to wake up to that and I think it's just really important like who we're choosing to partner with as influencers and what companies we're following and choosing to buy from I love that you just brought up Whitney.

And I lead community marketing on the East Coast in New York City for Bumble. And I just love what Whitney has done. I mean, obviously, money is important. Money is great. And it makes the world go round. We all need it, right? That's what every boss babe has their eye on the prize. But Whitney's why was she started Bumble. And what she originally, her concept was

a compliment app. It was going to be an app that would help you give generate compliment to friends and to strangers. And that evolved into Bumble. But what it is now, you know, networking in your love life in your in friendship and in your career in business. However, you know, originally, she wanted to make the internet a kinder place. She wanted to make the digital technology text messages a kinder place and to really abolish bullying and cyberbullying because that had happened to her. So I love that she's a boss, babe. She is making Bumble this empire, this global empire, you know, it's expanding in India this last year, you know, it's all over the globe and it's really taking over.

But her why was really to make the internet a kinder place. And she spent a lot of time, you mentioned the legislations, and she started small. You know, in Texas now, sending lewd, unsolicited dick pics is now illegal. You know, and that's not, yeah. And that's where she started

because that's something she wanted to ban. And there's ways like on her own app she's created on Bumble, you can't send shirtless selfies anymore and you definitely can't post a dick pic. But taking that into passing it in her home state of Texas, it's definitely a start. And that's not something that is making money, but it's attached to her why. And I think that's really important as a boss babe is you want to make sure that you're excelling in business, but you never lose sight of your why and why you're doing what you're doing and why you started what you started. Completely. And so coming back to our own businesses, and we've talked about

like establishing our why, let's talk a little bit more about like the actual takeaways I love making sure all our boss babes listening I've got so many things to go away with what are some of the apps that you've utilized to grow your accounts for sure we just talked about earlier the importance of preparation you know the importance of like you said you guys prep your content ahead of time an app that has really really helped me is PicMonkey. And it's so funny, I've been using PicMonkey for years. But for me, I love good design. I love visuals that tell stories. If you go on my Instagram, you'll see I will share quotes a lot of times in my stories, I will share quotes that really inspired me. And a part of the reason for doing that is my friend Alicia would probably send me five to 10 quotes a day that really inspired me. And a part of the reason for doing that is my friend Alicia

would probably send me five to 10 quotes a day that would inspire her. And so it's important for me to do the same thing because those were things that really would change the course of her mood for the day, change the course of truly her day, you know, would make her smile, would make her feel inspired and give her hope. And so it's important for me to share those quotes back out there that inspire me in hopes that they would do the same thing as they did for Alicia. And so PicMonkey is really a pillar in my business. It helps me create promotional assets for my blog. It helps me create visuals that I share on my Instagram stories. And as my team grows, and I know Boss Babe has become this well-oiled,

huge machine, this company. And real-time collaboration is so important, right? I'm sure for you guys, you and Natalie, you've got a team and you're giving feedback and you're wanting to create things that are the highest quality for the community. And so editing with your colleagues, collaborating in real time,

a big thing that's important for me is mentoring the next generation of boss babes, the next generation of girls who are chasing happiness. And so I've actually partnered with PicMonkey and her campus to hire interns, college interns, and actually have a high schooler working for me. I absolutely love this part of my job. And that's something that was a big part of my why is I want to mentor other people to know that they can chase their dreams. And the same way, you know, I was having fun creating themes for my space. When I was 13, I want to help the future generation of boss babes be able to use their passions and monetize them. And so it's been really fun using an app like

PicMonkey to help teenagers even and college students realize you can create really compelling, amazing content and visuals with simple drag and drop tools. It's not that, it doesn't have to be that difficult. And I love technology because there's so many things in place that help us be better and do things faster and on the go. And so I love that I use PicMonkey on my phone. I will literally be in a cab and I'll see a billboard that inspires me. And all of a sudden, I'm like, I got to write this down. I got to put a quote and I'll make the story and I'll post it on Instagram that second. Another app that I love is the Happy Not Perfect app. Have you ever used this, Danielle? No, I've not used that, but I will say before we move on to that one, I absolutely love PicMonkey as well. We've actually been utilizing it in Boss Babe 2 and you're so right,

being able to collaborate on it with the team was just like such a game changer because obviously there's a few of us in the team now where we're working on this project, sometimes not all in the LA office. Like obviously I'm based in the the uk really being able to collaborate on it and create really nice images and like create that mood board as well was really really good for us and also i personally feel like this is one thing i always look for in technology is like how intuitive it is like i hate having to watch loads of training videos to work out how to do something i love just like figuring it out and when i find a software that's just so easy to navigate your way around without having to like watch a million training videos. Cause that's basically all super busy. I'm sold there. And then if I'm like, Oh yeah,

I can work out how to do this. I'm in, I'm signed up. I'm using it. And you know, actually I love that you brought that up because I think a lot of times as people who are entrepreneurial, who have, you know, I have like 30 ideas a day. I can't tell you how many domain names I've bought over the last decade that I'll never use that are collecting dust. But I know with Boss Babes, we're all entrepreneurial. We're always thinking of the next thing. And I love that an app like PicMonkey gives us the power to create things on our phone, on our desktop, on a whim. I made my first logo myself on PicMonkey. This was like seven years ago. I

created it myself really quickly in an hour. And then I created my own website and my own graphics using apps like this, where I think sometimes it's easy to get tripped up on our head. Again, comparison. I think you don't need to be great to start. You need to start to be great. And we're so lucky that we have things like PicMonkey that are, like you said, intuitive. We don't need to have a four-year graphic design degree to make a logo and to create a beautiful thing. But we need to leverage technology to just help us start because it's when we start that we can be great. Love that. And what was the other app? Because I completely cut you off. So what was the other app that you recommend as well? I love Happy Not Perfect. This is a thing where I remember when my friend Alicia passed away,

it was actually a crazy time in my life because I had just ended a relationship of six years, just three months before that. And he actually got engaged to someone else the same week. I mean, it had only been three months since we broke up and he had gotten engaged to someone else. And four days later, my friend passed away. So my whole life within three months had completely turned over. And it was a wild time in my life. And I remember finally saying, Okay, I need help. Like I'm having trouble breathing. I can't get through the day, you know, and I was I was 31 when this happened. And I remember thinking, Okay, my whole timeline for my life is now obsolete. I thought I was going to get married, you know, in the very near future and start a family and do this or do that and, you know,

move to a certain city because that's what our plans were in our relationship. And, you know, suddenly I had lost my best friend and I had lost my other best friend who was in the shape of a boyfriend, right? So things had really changed for me. And I went to therapy for the first time in my life. And I remember sitting in the therapist's office, and she did a guided meditation with me to help me break down worst case scenarios. And this is absolutely I practice this every single day, which is why I want to share it with you is she was like, Okay, what is the root of your anxiety right now in the breakup? And I remember saying, well, I've always thought I would have kids and now I feel like I'm never gonna have kids.

And she broke it down and said, okay, what's the worst case scenario? We got to this place where I was like, if I still want children by a certain time, I will find a way to bring them into my life. And it helped me realize I love adoption. I think that's a beautiful thing. And ultimately I actually just froze my eggs this year,

which is something I am so excited about, and that has removed so much anxiety for my life. But that one therapy session helped me break down worst case scenarios. And you know, I realized I can't go to therapy every single second of every single day. But I can use it's expensive, and I don't have the time. But I can use technology to incorporate into my life. And so I found the app happy, not perfect, which is a mental health app that helps you do guided meditations and fun actually exercises. They've gamified really the act of meditation and therapy. And I spent five minutes in that app and my anxiety is zapped

for the day. So that is an app that I love, you know, between PicMonkey for my business and Happy Not Perfect for my mental health. It is a winning combo. I love that. And thank you for sharing all those insights. And thank you for being like, so vulnerable on this podcast, Mandy. I think it's like, really important that as influencers and as business women that we show up and we have these conversations and shine some light on kind of the the good sides and the hard sides of being an entrepreneur and I think we've done that today so thank you for coming on and sharing so much wisdom of course it was my honor and I hope this was helpful to at least one boss babe out there that would make

it worth it yeah well 100% have been. And I want to share our handles. Mandy, what's your handle if anyone wants to get in contact with you after this episode? Yes, of course. I would love that. And feel free to DM me if you have any questions at all about anything we talked about today. I really consider myself everyone's virtual BFF online. And so please take advantage of that.

And let's chat my handle is girl and the bay that's bay and then my website is girl on the bay.com oh i love it thank you and guys yeah if you're listening tag us both so tag mandy girl and the bay she just said tag myself at danielle county and we'd love for you to tag bossbabe at bossbabe.inc and we cannot wait to share thanks guys if you loved this episode please subscribe download a few more and please leave us a review i really want to hear what you enjoyed what your main takeaways were and i also want to know what you want to hear us talk about next. To say thanks for leaving us a review, we'll send you a copy of The Boss Babe 25. The Boss Babe 25 is the 25 essential resources you need for personal and professional growth. It covers everything from our favorite rituals,

books, and hacks. If you want a copy, just leave us a review, screenshot it, and send to podcast at bossbabe.com. We will then email you a copy ASAP. And since we love Instagram, you can go to the hashtag the boss babe podcast and find our latest post and leave a question in the comments we love reading through the comments and we'll make sure to answer it on our next podcast