In My Shoes Monday: How I Stay Inspired

What I’m doing now is as far away from what I thought I would be doing as you could get. I was a science major who became a teacher who worked on websites who was a stay at home mom. I’ve done a lot of different things and at no point did I really want to be the head of a global company. If you ever asked me the probability of doing that, I’d have said almost zero. But dreams change and paths change and life changes. And what got me here is, as cheesy as it is to say this: a calling. There’s no other way to say it. And it inspired me then and it has continued to inspire me. 

I was doing dishes with my husband and I told him about this idea that had a lot of potential. He told me I had to go for it. And then when things started to grow and change for LimeLife, we could see what it was doing for women’s lives. I remember saying to him, “I’m starting to see that this isn’t just a business but this is a way for people to change their lives and their circumstances.” I was hesitant to continue diving in because as we grew, it was taking time away from my family but my husband told me, “You have no choice. You have to do this.” 

So I think that for a long time, I was dragging my feet at this very powerful thing pulling me. I had wanted to continue being a stay at home mom to my three kids. So for me, getting inspired and staying inspired was absolutely critical in the beginning because I had this resistance to what I was doing. But the inspiration at that time when the company was young was the sales field and the stories of the customers kept me going. Every time I felt resistant I would have a party and start talking to people about the products and I would just hear their reactions about how products changed their skin or gave them confidence. Sometimes I’d go to a beauty show and I’d be so inspired I actually couldn’t sleep. 

When you start talking to women who you think are confident, and then you see how broken that confidence is, like you see them start playing themselves small but other people around them are lifting them up and saying positive things about them, that is inspiring. I remember one woman saying she had dark pigmentation around her eyelids and I told her people buy eyeshadow that color and it gave her this different way of viewing things. We just did a little tweak with concealer so it looked more like eyeshadow, and that one little thing made it look rested and more vibrant and for her that was like this huge moment, and everyone was freaking out because something she had really hated about herself was an amazing asset.

So in the early years getting inspired meant really connecting with customers and that’s still one of the most important sources of inspiration for me. I don’t get to do it enough now that we’ve matured as a company, but I do hear it from the Beauty Guides. And I know that whether a woman has a good experience at LimeLife or a bad experience at LimeLIfe, that experience is actually evolving her to be the most happy, so I don’t put judgment on LimeLife itself. I’m not, like, everyone has to have a good time here, but if they pick up one or two things that allows them to get on a path where they’re going to be really happy then I feel like this is a really worthy mission. 

Outside of the company, I lean on my family, my siblings and my husband and children for support and inspiration. My oldest daughter is 17, and I have another daughter who is 14, and my son is 11. When they know I’m exhausted, they know exactly what to say to either put me back to work or make me energized, like: “Mom we see what we’re doing. We see how you work so hard.” When your daughter says that to you, it’s the most important thing, or when your son says things like, “How are you able to cook dinner and do your job?” You see that he has a deep respect for all the juggling that a parent does. 

I seek other inspiration, too, in the form of Super Soul Conversations, the podcast. I feel like Oprah has such a breadth of experience that when she delivers someone on that podcast you know there is value for anyone who hears that. It doesn’t matter where you are in your life whether it makes you a better friend, communicator, CEO or whatever it is. I’m also a very spiritual person, which is different from being religious. I’m not a religious person. I like to stay connected to sources of love and hope, so that’s why I call myself more spiritual because I can find it outside of an organized religion. 

I learn a lot from the podcast, though, and have learned a lot from Oprah in general. I remember seeing Martha Beck on The Oprah Show when I was a young mom folding laundry. Martha Beck wrote a book called Finding Your Own North Star, and I think it should be required reading for everybody in the world. Of course, everybody has their own sources of inspiration. But this is just I get mine.