Here Lies a Woman….
One of my favorite branding taglines comes from the Stylist and Curve coach Judith Gaton. It’s “Confident Women Leave Legacies.”
Does that make your eyes tear up like you just drank an onion smoothie and also gut punch you directly in your solar plexus? It did for me!
So, what about you?
What if you died today?
Or tomorrow?
Would you like the legacy you left behind?
What would your obituary say?
Would it say “Here lies a woman who spent her whole life trying to lose ten pounds and Googling whether cooked spinach has more calories than raw spinach”?
Would it say “Here lies a woman who was a size zero”?
Would it say “Here is a woman who wore black every day, but was definitely planning on wearing her favorite color red once she lost the weight?”
Would it say “Here lies a woman who complained bitterly every day about her life, but never took action to change her situation”?
Would it say “Here lies a woman who spent every day of her life as a project manager, dreaming of the day she could become a full-time artist”?
Would it say “Here lies a woman who stayed in an unhappy marriage for her kids, but was planning to leave once they left for college”?
Conversely, what would you want it to say?
Would you want it to say “Here lies a woman who made big moves, and wasn’t afraid to take risks”?
Would you want it to say “Here is a woman who inspired everyone around her with her positivity”?
Would you want it to say “Here is a woman who traveled to 17 countries and spoke 6 languages?”
My legacy
Many people ask me how I manage to achieve hard things like starting my own business or writing a book.
Well, whenever I have felt stuck in my life—because I couldn’t get a job, because I couldn’t get pregnant, because I couldn’t make someone fall in love with me and ask me to marry them—I would just zoom out to my legacy. I would go to my mental Jade’s Deathbed Bucket List. This is the list of things I know I will regret if I get to my deathbed and haven’t done them. And then I would choose one that I could control, and check it off the list.
I knew I wanted my legacy to be that of a published author. I knew I wanted to dedicate a significant portion of my life to helping women. I knew I wanted to start my own cute feminine business with cute feminine branding. I knew I wanted to have a legacy of optimism, authenticity, daring, and great style.
Now, I am thinking about my next moves. I am thinking about the women I admire in history, and their legacies. Lately, I’ve been thinking a lot about one of my idols, LadyBird Johnson, and how she started The Highway Beautification Project. Her legacy is sprays of colorful poppies down Highway 101 in California. Beauty for people sitting in traffic. That’s a pretty great legacy, if you ask me!
What legacy do you want?
What calls out to you? What instantly sprang to mind? It doesn’t have to be something huge. Maybe you do want to be the next Sojourner Truth. And that’s great. But maybe you are like me and just want to see a few more flowers on the highway. That’s great too. Maybe you don’t want to write a book. Maybe you want to get a dog but you never have. Maybe you want to stay up all night and see the sunrise. Maybe you want to volunteer for a cause you care about. Maybe you want to solve the JonBenet Ramsey murder (just me?) The point is, do what YOU want. It doesn’t have to be some valiant thing. Just think about what you would most regret on your deathbed and reverse-engineer from there.
As morbid as it sounds, I dare you to write your dream obituary. What would it say? What Death Bed Bucket List items could you check off today? This month? This year?
This is it. We only get one life. There is no dress rehearsal. You could die in a freak accident this afternoon. Get busy, friend.
xoxo,
jadey