Reinvent Yourself

#129 If it’s a Passion, then Just Do It (Jennifer Degenhardt)

So here’s the problem. You’re teaching Spanish in highschool for a total of 24 years, and early on you notice your students are bored out of their minds. “I was, too,” says Jennifer Degenhardt. “I said, they need a story.” So she gathered up the “themes” and the vocabulary demanded by the curriculum and made up more interesting stories that put characters who mirrored her students--Hispanic, from underserved communities, a boy in a wheelchair, LGBTQ, or from economic disparities--and put them at the center of the action. “After three to four years of teaching [my first] book, I published it and kept writing,” says the author of now 17 books in Spanish, 6 in English, one in German, and three translated into French. Encouraged by her students, she self-published her first book on Kindle Direct, a subsidiary of Amazon. “It’s made my life very easy,” says Degenhardt. It’s a “step by step process...and you’re in charge of your own products and you can fix your own mistakes.” Her favorite quote which she put on her refrigerator and looked at every day? “If you can’t stop thinking about it, don’t stop working toward it.”  And that’s just what she did. 

#128 From Lawyer to Walking Guru (Joyce Shulman)

When Joyce Shulman, CEO of 99walks.fit (https://www.99walks.fit/aboutus), came home in a bad mood one day during high school, her father suggested she go for a walk. “I didn’t know what was bugging me. I waked out the door and walked for two miles. I vividly remember feeling that when I walked back into the house my whole mood had shifted.”  Shulman now offers her 12,000 members daily walking classes with coaches and meditations, and preaches the research that shows just regular walking can add seven years to an individual's life. But her path to walking wonderland was not a straight one.  Shulman began life as a commercial litigator in New York City. After marrying, she and her husband launched the “world’s first nutrition bar for dogs. which grew to include cats and horses.”  The business eventually fell apart and these serial entrepreneurs began creating the first pizza boxes with 4-color advertising. Fifteen years later they launched an e newsletter for kids and families, and then, upon noticing the health crisis among women, 99walks. “The country was getting bigger and less well,” Shulman says. “And I was watching the rise of the loneliness epidemic…For me, walking with friends and for community has tremendous value.” Best of all, walking engages those “left behind from the fitness industrial complex.”  She says: “Some older women never had a meaningful fitness program. They don’t feel like they have a place for them.” Shulman hopes that walking can also help be an answer to the depression and lack of movement caused by the pandemic.

#127: Rebecca Moses (Pivoting in a pandemic from fashion designer to covid community builder)

Rebecca Moses knew from an early age she wanted to be a fashion designer. Graduating from the Fashion Institute of Technology (FIT), she landed her first job at Pierre Cardin and launched her own clothing line. On a trip to Italy to check out a factory, she fell in love with the owner. For 20 years Moses lived and worked outside of Milan and raised her two boys. But when her husband died suddenly in 2010,  she tells CoveyClub founder Lesley Jane Seymour, her world turned “upside down.” Returning to New York City to raise her boys, she wrote a book (Rebecca Moses: A Life of Style https://amzn.to/3sYyC8k), and dove into painting, illustration and animations for organizations like the Fragrance foundation and Bergdorf Goodman. The pandemic was “a frightening time for the entire world,” she says. “My family in Italy was in a very bad way. I could hear the sirens of ambulances which drove me crazy.” Feeling “helpless” and like she had to do something, Moses went onto Instagram (https://www.instagram.com/rebeccamosesofficial/)  and asked women to share the stories of their lives during the pandemic. She offered to draw them. “Letters flew in—humorous, sad, inspirational from six continents.” Moses “painted like a mad woman and didn’t sleep.”  400 portraits later, her project which she calls the Stay Home Sisters is going strong. “These women come from all walks of life: there is diversity in backgrounds, religion, careers. What happened next is the women connected with each other and said, ‘you’re not alone.’ It became a movement.”  Moses is still taking entries! Some of the series will be shown at the Guggenheim and the portraits of nurses will be touring a hospital. “This past year witnessed lost of people revaluation gather lives,” Moses says. “Ask yourself, ‘is this the life I want to live?’"

 

#126: Dara Kurtz (When letting go of grief lets you move on)

For 20 years, Dara Kurtz had a successful career in finance. “It was based on society’s definition of success—done with dollar signs and size of house.”  At age 42, the words “you have cancer” stopped her dead in her tracks.  “After that I changed. I decided I [didn’t] want to go back. [Finance] didn’t speak to my heart.” Despite resistance from her husband, Kurtz quit her job and began to write a blog. “I didn’t know what I was doing....I didn’t know how to get from point A to point B.”  Kurtz had always been a journal writer, penning her thoughts about the day to her daughters and placing her journal on their pillows to read. They would write back.  “Going through breast cancer, that stopped. None of us were in that space to communicate,” she says.  Years later she rediscovered the journals tucked away in a desk drawer. Also uncovered, a Ziplock bag of letters from her mom and grandmother.  “I was blown away by how much wisdom they contained. I had a conversation with my mom 20 years after her death. I sat and sobbed... I could feel her personality and hear her words….I knew after reading those, she would have never wanted me to be stuck in grief or let her death impact my life. It was permission to go on with my life.” From that insight, her second book, “I Am My Mother’s Daughter: Wisdom on Life, Loss, and Love” was born. (https://amzn.to/3qkV0pY)

#125: Leisa Peterson (Using spirituality to reinvent your relationship to money)

“I use the heart chakra in relationship to money,” says Leisa Peterson, Founder of wealthclinic.com and author of "The Mindful Millionaire”(https://amzn.to/35ZzkZ8). “The heart is about receiving. How great are you at receiving money? It plays out when you’re running a business and you don’t feel comfortable being paid for the value you offer to an employer or [to a] client. When we understand that this is a symptom, we look inside.” Peterson, who grew up in Northern California, began her career as a fit model to pay the bills, eventually segueing into an MBA in finance. In 2014, after losing her father, she decided to merge her interest in spirituality with her interest in finance and helping others build their businesses, create their brands, and messages. “The journey of maturing in life is what chakras — really an ancient form of psychotherapy —  inspire… I found money is merely a physical manifestation of who you are.”  For some, Peterson says, "fear is what’s under it all.”

#124: Margaret Skoglund (Pivoting in the pandemic from Broadway to Broadband)

When Broadway shut down on March 12, 2020, Margaret Skoglund was on the cusp of realizing her dream—of becoming a Broadway general manager.  She’d already handled big shows from Mamma Mia! to The Lion King. “There are 41 disparate theaters on Broadway,” she tells CoveyClub founder, Lesley Jane Seymour. “There is no NFL, no MLB organization to mobilize all of us. There is a trade organization but no headquarters….I thought, 'we’re not going to figure out how to get back into the theater any time soon'. People thought July…I decided it would be a year.” So Skoglund and a co-founder got busy, setting up a company called Virtual Broadway (www.virtualbway.com)which “connects dancers, actors, music directors to corporate America.”  She started by knocking on the doors of her college alumnae and asking: “Do you need a Hamilton actor to come teach motivational tips?” Turns out they did.  A multinational financial firm celebrated their sales team with 45 minutes of specially designed online content. A group of attorneys were led in a stress-relieving wellness activity from actors in the Lion King.  “The most fun is putting artists together who get to work at a moment that is devastating,” says Skoglund.

#123: Andrea McGinty (Reinventing how we date over age 40 and in the COVID-19 era)

“I've set up over 33,000 dates. And I’m responsible for 4200 marriages.” So says Andrea McGinty, founder of 33000dates.com who says she knows how to psych out the online dating sites in a sophisticated—and now during Covid19, safe—manner.  “It’s about being proactive. If you’re in your 40s or 50s you have to learn to work the system.” McGinty says there are 104 million single people and "great men out there.” But the number one factor for success is to set the filters and, counterintuitively, ignore all those who respond in the first round. Answer those in the next round instead.  Then,  "Do a 5 to 10 minute FaceTime call or video chat—very safe,” she says. "Do[es the guy] look like his photo? What are his mannerisms? Does he smile? Do you like his eyes?” Keeping it short is the key. “You’re not looking for a chat buddy,” McGinty says. "The longer you stay on the phone with someone having fun, the higher your expectations for the date.”  McGinty, who created and sold the dating site for busy professionals called “It’s Just Lunch”, says that during the pandemic you can use attitudes toward social distancing as a cue: ask the potential date how they feel about social distancing. What do they do? “You’ll know if this is a safe person you want to meet” for an outdoor brunch, walk, or sitting around a fire pit. 

#122: Rebecca Warner (From banker to award-winning author)

Rebecca Warner grew up reading Cosmopolitan Magazine, believing Editor Helen Gurley Brown's mantra: You can do anything you want to. “It proved to be true,” she says today. By age 28 Warner had worked her way up to VP at the largest commercial bank in Florida, was raking in the bucks, and buying a condo. “But like lots of women in banking in the 70s, 80s, and 90s,” she says, "I was overcoming sexism and jealousy.” When the governor of the state called a special legislative session to enact stricter abortion laws, Warner was infuriated and sat down to write a book about it. “I stayed in banking but enjoyed the life of writing,” she says. That's even though the book was rejected by publishers. Subsequent years took Warner into caring for her ailing parents. She self-published the rejected book, then wrote another self-help manual for women seeking relationships, and now, “My Dad My Dog” (https://amzn.to/3t1jE1b) about caregiving. “I had the feeling I should be the person to talk about caregiving because I’d done it. I could bring people together with resources and support and lift up these in-home caregivers.” Warner says 1/6 of the country takes on “caregiving in some capacity” and that’s only been exacerbated by the pandemic.

#121: Claudia Mott (Teaching women about money after your own shocking financial discovery)

Getting control of your finances gives you a sense of “independence" and “self-reliance” says Claudia Mott, CFP, CDFA (Certified Financial Planner and Certified Divorce Financial Analyst). She should know. After spending 13 years as a sell-side analyst on Wall Street with copious travel, she burned out and decided to stay home to raise her three kids. Her husband, who also worked in finance, did the taxes and like many women, she says she "simply signed off”.  While driving her daughter to preschool, she heard a radio add for financial planning and decided to go back to school.  One day she looked deeper into her family’s finances and discovered her husband had a secret bank account supporting a girlfriend. For that reason, Mott says she can understand the “shame” very successful women feel who have not grabbed hold of their financial wellbeing. “If I had a dollar for every time women say ‘I’ve been stupid’” she says, she’d be rich.  But Mott believes everyone can benefit from taking hold of their financial security. “The first step is acknowledging , ‘Am I going to be all right?’” she says.  “Lots of divorcing women are fearful of the first year and how to manage the financial picture….But you can learn to be on your own and you’re managing.”

 

#120: Marguerite Oestreicher (From hot shot art gallery owner to Habitat for Humanity)

“I started [the gallery] on a shoe string,” says Marguerite Oestreicher “A friend was an artist in an old townhouse in [New Orleans]. The front half was a gallery and so I set up shop and found artists.” Since she didn’t want to go “commercial,” she says that "the gallery supported itself but it didn’t make money.” To keep herself financially afloat she landed a job as a magazine editor, later, becoming the publisher. She had just moved all her art from her gallery to her home when Katrina hit. It was her home that flooded.  Oestreicher shuttered the gallery  and evacuated with her son to North Carolina where she landed a job working for a conveyor belt company.   “Katrina was a reset—in thinking, in resilience, in reinvention,” she says. "No one died in my family. But seeing how people suffered. I knew I couldn’t do a corporate job. I wanted to do something to make [New Orleans] a better place.” And she did that.  Today Oestreicher is Chief Advancement Officer for the New Orleans Area Habitat for Humanity. Her key to reinvention?  “Find your strengths and ask, where would these skills be good?”