Your Story Unwritten

Growing up female in the 60s and 70s meant gender-specific gifts were pretty much the norm. 

I remember things like the Easy-Bake Oven. That was a delight. Basically a light bulb inside a plastic oven that somehow got hot enough to bake a tiny cake about the size of a cookie. And we thought this was fabulous; however, it was nothing but inadequate for the job. 

There were Hula Hoops, which I couldn't make work to save my life because apparently I wasn't the right shape. Mine would hit the floor before one revolution. 

And then there was the GAF View-Master, an educational toy where you inserted a little cardboard wheel and clicked your way through 3D pictures of places, animals, and all sorts of things kids were supposed to be interested in. 

While researching this piece, I stumbled across a 1971 View-Master commercial featuring none other than Jodie Foster, just eight or nine years old, hawking the thing as an "ingenious invention of educational value." [5] 

Jodie Foster. 

At eight or nine. 

Hilarious foreshadowing of the woman she would become. 

But perhaps the most unique, and certainly the most misunderstood, gift we received was the beloved diary 

You remember it. Dear Diary… 

A tiny little book, maybe four by six inches, with ruled pages and those shiny gold edges that made it seem terribly important. Mine was pink and had flowers, rainbows, and butterflies on the cover. 

And, of course, the lock 

A little metal clasp with two ridiculously tiny keys. 

Because apparently whatever a girl had to say at 8 years old needed security clearance. If you lost the key, you were f'ed. 

I could say so much about that little diary now. 

But what strikes me most is its size 

Think about it. 

We were given this tiny little book to contain our thoughts about our lives. 

There wasn't room for much in there. 

And perhaps that was unintentionally appropriate for the time. Girls weren't exactly encouraged to have expansive thoughts about who they might become, what they wanted from life, what made them angry, what they questioned, or what they might someday decide wasn't good enough for them. 

There were expectations. 

Be nice. 

Be pretty. 

Like boys. 

Don't be too loud. 

Don't be difficult. 

Don't make anyone uncomfortable. 

And whatever feelings didn't fit neatly inside those expectations? 

Well, there was always that little diary. 

Write them down. 

Close the cover.

 

Lock them away. 

There's something almost hilariously ironic about it now. 

We were given a tiny locked book for our private thoughts while simultaneously being preprogrammed with a fairly specific picture of what we were supposed to want from life and who we were supposed to become. 

And maybe that's part of why, as a "woman of a certain age," I find myself in almost complete rebellion. 

I'm certainly not alone. 

Scroll through Instagram for ten minutes with the hashtag #midlife, and you'll find plenty of women our age who appear to have reached the same conclusion. 

Apparently the rage comes much, much later. 

LOL. 

Maybe we finally need more than four by six inches. 

Maybe we need room to write things we don't intend to lock away. 

Maybe we need to write about the things we carried, the things we survived, the things we chose, the things we wish we hadn't chosen, the people we loved, the people we lost, the things that still piss us off and the completely unexpected things that bring us ridiculous amounts of joy. 

Maybe the diary wasn't such a bad idea after all. 

We just needed a bigger book to write it in. 

 

I Have Never Been a Journaler 

Confession. I have never been a journaler. 

I wasn't the woman in my 30’s who kept beautiful notebooks beside her bed or woke up every morning eager to write three pages about her feelings. I didn't meditate, do yoga or practice somatic breathing to keep the stress demons away. I learned about all of that later in life, when I was actually old enough to understand why the hell I was doing it. 

For most of my life, if something needed my attention, I dealt with it and moved on. 

That's what strong women do, right? 

We handle things. 

We get through the hard things.  

We carry them because there isn't always another choice. 

Through our lived experience, many of us learned that minimizing pain and desensitizing ourselves to unpleasantness was how strong women continued to grow past trauma and loss. 

Put it in the suitcase we renamed “baggage”. 

Close the lid. 

Pick the damn thing up and keep walking. 

Hell, one day I finally threw mine off a bridge and wiped the dust off my hands. 

 

What Happens When You Finally Have Time to Hear Yourself? 

Something changes when you step away from a corporate career that has structured your days, responsibilities and, to some degree, your identity for decades. 

There is suddenly space. 

And space can be uncomfortable. 

You’re now building a business. You may be excited about what comes next. You may finally have the freedom you spent years wanting. 

But you also have something you may not have had in decades. 

Discretionary time. 

Time that belongs to you. 

How do you spend it? 

Who are you when nobody else has scheduled your day? 

What do you want when the answer doesn't have to consider what your company, boss, employees, spouse, children or anyone else needs from you first? 

And what happens to everything you've been carrying around in that suitcase? 

Some of it deserves to come with you. 

Some of it needs to be examined with discernment. 

Some may need professional help to go through its contents. 

And some of those contents may finally be ready to be left behind. 

I'm not here to tell anyone how to take care of their mental health. I simply began wondering whether we give ourselves enough opportunity to hear what is going on inside us before we automatically reach for something that makes an uncomfortable feeling easier to ignore. 

For me, unexpectedly, one of those opportunities came through writing. 

 

I Discovered Journaling Without Actually Journaling 

I've written blogs for years. 

As a marketer, I understood the mechanics of content. Keywords. Search engines. Algorithms. Search intent. What people were looking for. What Google wanted. Jesus, Google is a pain in the ass.  

There was a purpose behind every word. 

But eventually I started writing differently. 

I wrote because I had something to say. 

I wrote about things I believed. Things that bothered me. Things I'd learned the hard way. Things I thought another woman might need to hear. 

And something happened. 

Writing wasn't simply helping me communicate what I thought. 

Writing was helping me understand what I thought. 

Putting something on paper requires you to stay with a thought a little longer. 

Sometimes you begin writing about one thing and three paragraphs later discover something completely different underneath it. 

That made me curious. 

 

There Is Science Behind Putting It on Paper 

Recently, I listened to a discussion about the neuroscience behind journaling and what happens when we put our experiences into words. 

It sent me down a rabbit hole. 

And there is real research behind this. 

A 2022 systematic review and meta-analysis examined 20 randomized controlled trials involving journaling and mental health. Seventeen of those studies used expressive writing, which typically involves writing about your deepest thoughts and feelings for about 20 minutes at a time. Overall, the researchers found a statistically significant improvement in mental health measures among people who journaled compared with control groups, although they were careful to note limitations in the quality and consistency of the available research. [1] 

What interested me wasn't that journaling was some miraculous cure. The researchers certainly didn't say that. 

What struck me was how little it required. 

A piece of paper. 

A pen. 

Twenty minutes. 

Permission to write honestly about what you're thinking and feeling. 

The same review found that expressive writing was the most commonly studied form of journaling and reported improvements across a number of the outcomes involving anxiety, depression and PTSD. But the researchers also emphasized that more high-quality research is needed before sweeping conclusions can be made. [1] 

That's important to me because I'm careful about saying journaling "rewires your brain." Neuroscience is considerably more complicated than a catchy headline. 

Journaling isn't magic. 

It isn't therapy. 

It isn't a replacement for professional mental health care when we need it. 

I'm interested in something much simpler. 

What might happen if we gave ourselves a regular place to tell ourselves the truth? 

Not perform it. 

Not polish it. 

Not post it. 

Just write it. 

 

Maybe We're All Getting Tired of Performing 

There's another reason I've been thinking about this. 

Look at what's happening with Substack. 

Millions of people are choosing to subscribe directly to individual writers. In March 2025, Substack announced that it had reached 5 million paid subscriptions, after reaching 4 million less than four months earlier. [2] 

People are actually paying to read what other people think. 

Why? 

I don't think we've suddenly developed longer attention spans. 

I wonder if we're hungry for something else. 

For years we've been trained to create content for machines as much as people. 

Keywords for Google. 

Hooks for LinkedIn. 

Reels for Instagram. 

Trending sounds. 

Algorithms. 

Character counts. 

I've done it. 

I've taught it. 

I understand why it matters. 

But somewhere along the way, we started editing ourselves for the algorithm before giving ourselves an opportunity to figure out what we actually wanted to say. 

Maybe Substack's extraordinary growth is telling us something. 

Maybe we're tired of being fed content. 

Maybe we want to hear from people again. 

Before Your Story Helps Someone Else, It Belongs to You 

That's what began happening to me when I stopped allowing keywords and algorithms to determine everything I wrote. 

I started telling stories. 

And when I wrote something honestly from my own experience, another woman would sometimes recognize herself in it. 

That matters to me. 

Stories create a conduit between people who may never meet. 

This happened to me. 

Me too. 

Maybe she feels understood for five minutes. 

Maybe something you've learned makes what she's experiencing a little less frightening. 

Maybe your story simply reminds her that somebody else has walked through something difficult and come out the other side. 

But before our stories become content, they belong to us. 

Some should remain ours forever. 

Others may eventually become something another woman needs. 

Journaling brings the story inward. Storytelling carries it outward. 

 

What If Being Good at Something Isn't Enough Anymore? 

I've also been watching something interesting happen among women I've followed in the online business world. 

Jenna Kutcher built The Goal Digger Podcast into an enormous success. After nearly a decade and 968 episodes, she paused it. In explaining the decision, she wrote about questioning the places where she continued performing because she was good at something rather than because it still lit her up. [3] 

Not because it failed. 

Amy Porterfield made an even bigger decision and retired Digital Course Academy after nearly a decade, a program that had served more than 28,000 business owners and generated more than $54 million. Porterfield specifically said the decision wasn't the result of burnout or boredom. She had begun feeling pulled toward what she described as the next season of her work. [4] 

Again, not because it failed. 

Think about that. 

How many of us were taught to walk away from something making millions of dollars because it no longer represented what we wanted? 

We weren't. 

We were taught to climb. 

Then climb some more. 

Then protect whatever we'd climbed high enough to reach. 

And I wonder whether women can leave corporate America only to accidentally recreate the exact same thing in entrepreneurship. 

Different office. 

Different title. 

Different paycheck. 

Same measurement. 

Accomplishment. 

At some point, "Can I do this?" stops being the question. 

We already know we can. 

Do I still want to? 

 

I'm Doing My Life This Way 

My goals for myself these days are more organic. 

I'm creating work around thinking that is powerfully introspective. 

I'm also paying attention to things I might once have considered small and have come to understand aren't small at all. 

Fresh flowers on my table every week. 

My passion for music and cooking. 

My eight goats, who could not care less what I accomplished that day. 

Being Nan to my two-and-a-half-year-old grandson, Kash, who can light me up simply by being in the same room. 

These are threads in the fabric of the new story I'm weaving in my heart. 

Sometimes I write them down because I need them preserved. 

Not published. 

Not optimized. 

Preserved. 

Maybe that's one of the things I've finally figured out about writing. 

Not everything we write needs an audience. 

Sometimes we write because a moment deserves to be remembered. 

Sometimes because something hurts and we need somewhere to put it. 

Sometimes because we're changing and want to understand what's happening. 

And sometimes because life is so damn good in that particular moment that we want to capture what it felt like to be there. 

I've had opportunities cross my path that at another point in my life I might have felt obligated to consider. 

Now I can't even pause long enough to consider them. 

 

I'm In Love with My Life

And I'm becoming fiercely protective of the things that make it mine. 

I don't care if I have to churn my own butter, read by candlelight, and eat dinner at home every night instead of going to a restaurant. I don't need another high-earning job. I know there are women out there who will counter this with, "I can have money and joy," and that is you doing you. I learned at a very young age there are tradeoffs with everything. Knowing what to choose isn't always obvious until much later in life. 

I'm doing my life this way. 

That doesn't mean I've stopped being ambitious. 

It means I'm much more particular about what deserves my ambition. 

I no longer want accomplishment at the expense of experiencing my own life. 

 

Vitamins for the Spirit 

This is part of why I decided to create curated visibility experiences just for women. 

Because we show up differently. 

We show up with passion and compassion. We're willing to examine what may be a little broken and dive into what it means to fix it. 

Not simply so we can stand completely upright again. 

But so we can fly. 

I've had enough trauma in my life to fill a suitcase I probably should have checked at the curb a long time ago. 

I never let it take me down. 

That doesn't mean I always handled everything beautifully. 

I'm not going to pretend I didn't occasionally overcompensate with the dopamine rush of some Blue Bell Homemade Vanilla or a whole bottle of Cab. 

I did. 

But I came out ahead. 

And I believe you can too. 

Not because there's some magical point where nothing hurts anymore. Not because life suddenly becomes fair. And certainly not because one morning we wake up having figured everything out. 

I think part of it is learning to choose joy. 

Each day is a joy. 

I choose it. Joy. 

And if I forget what that looks like, I've learned where to find it. 

I can walk over to the fresh flowers on my table and inhale them. 

I can grab Kash and take him for a golf cart ride while the sun goes down over the deep green countryside dotted with cows. 

I can turn on music. 

I can cook. 

These aren't insignificant things I squeeze in around the important parts of my life. 

They are the important parts of my life. 

My friend Andrea Gibson has a phrase I will probably reference forever. 

She calls these things "Vitamins for the Spirit." 

God. 

Those words peel layers of angst away for me every time I hear them. 

 

A Blank Page Doesn't Have a Deadline 

This is also why I decided the journal accompanying Burn Your Suits™ couldn't feel like another assignment. 

The lined pages aren't numbered. 

They aren't dated. 

There isn't a box waiting to shame you because you missed Tuesday. 

I've divided it into four sections. Each includes a short story I share, a coloring page, a quotable quote. 

And then there are blank lined pages. 

Your pages. 

Maybe you write four pages at 2:00 in the morning and don't touch it again for three weeks. 

Maybe you color. 

Maybe you write something you've never said out loud. 

Maybe you write something hilarious. 

Maybe you realize you're happier than you thought you'd be. 

There is no falling behind because there is nowhere you are supposed to be. 

Four times during the year, you aren't being asked for quarterly KPIs. 

You're being given an opportunity to pay attention to yourself. 

 

Your Story Is Still Unwritten 

I don't believe accomplished women need to be rebuilt. 

We've already been through it. 

We've built careers, families, relationships and lives. We've survived things. We've accomplished things. We've learned things nobody could have taught us in a course. 

Perhaps what we need now is space to decide what we're taking with us. 

What can stay behind. 

What still needs attention. 

What brings us joy. 

What deserves our discretionary time. 

What we're extraordinarily good at but simply don't want to do anymore. 

And who we are when nobody needs anything from us. 

This is the visibility I'm increasingly interested in creating for women. 

Yes, I want your business to be seen. 

I want your ideas, lived experience, and voice to reach the people who need them. 

But I want something else too. 

I want the woman doing the becoming to be visible to herself. 

Before we ask the world to see us, perhaps we need to become willing to look closely at ourselves. 

At what hurts. 

At what we're finished carrying. 

At what lights us up. 

At what we want more of. 

At the life we're finally ready to choose deliberately. 

Maybe that's why I'm becoming such a believer in the blank page. 

Not every story needs to be shared. 

Some stories are ours alone. 

But every once in a while, something we write for ourselves becomes something another woman needs to hear. 

When we're ready, we can tell it. 

Until then, there are plenty of blank pages. 

Your story from here is still unwritten. 

And this time, you get to decide what happens next. 

 

Works Cited 

[1] Sohal, Monika, Pavneet Singh, Bhupinder Singh Dhillon, and Harbir Singh Gill. "Efficacy of Journaling in the Management of Mental Illness: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis." Family Medicine and Community Health, vol. 10, no. 1, 2022, e001154. DOI: 10.1136/fmch-2021-001154. 

[2] Efthimiatou, Sophia. "5 Million." The Substack Post, March 11, 2025. Substack. 

[3] Kutcher, Jenna. "This Isn't Goodbye. This Is the Goal. Why I Am Pausing the Goal Digger Podcast." Jenna Kutcher, December 31, 2025. 

[4] Porterfield, Amy. "The Pivot: Why I'm Closing the Doors to Digital Course Academy." The Amy Porterfield Show, Episode 41, January 6, 2026.