Women Branching Out Interviews
Women Branching Out: Gretchen Cawthon
Excited to have Gretchen Cawthon on the blog today.
Gretchen’s company, Girls Can’t WHAT?, develops products (apparel, cups, key chains, hats, magnets, etc) to inspire girls of all ages to follow their dreams.
Gretchen learned to draw, use Photoshop and Illustrator, and much more to bring her company vision to life. But, as you’ll see, she’s no stranger to learning new things and accepting challenges.
Here’s Gretchen …
Tell us about Girls Can’t WHAT? What does your company do? What is your role in the company?
Girls Can’t WHAT? was created in 2005 after a business partner told me women can’t do web design. Shortly after leaving that job, I decided I would build my own business, starting with a web site, of course. I checked out books from the library, watched videos and asked for help in forums until I felt comfortable with my skills. A couple of months later I built the entire site myself. I also followed that same format to teach myself how to draw the designs I use on my site. Knowledge is power.
The purpose of the Girls Can’t WHAT? company is to inspire girls to take on their dreams no matter what the rest of the world thinks they can or can’t do. The Girls Can’t WHAT? designs reflect an empowering message that “yes, girls can!”. We also use 20% of every purchase to help other women entrepreneurs reach their dreams. It’s a great feeling to be able to help others help themselves.
My role is quite diversified at the moment. I am the CEO, the secretary, the artist, the janitor and much more. I’ve been a one-woman show up until this year when I hired a friend to help me with product development so I could keep up with demand. Ultimately I would like to be at the place where all I do is work on Girls Can’t WHAT? design creation and delegate the rest. I have a plan mapped out to reach that goal and it’s a process I’m actively working towards. Currently, my time is very limited and I also use my web development skills to help others build their sites. It’s sort of an off-shoot business that developed after building the Girls Can’t WHAT? site. My time is usually divided between the 2 businesses. I guess girls can be web developers after all.
– – – – – – – –
What experiences influenced the creation of Girls Can’t WHAT?
Clearly, my former business partner’s comment was the kick-starter, but it shouldn’t have surprised me, based on my childhood experiences. I grew up in a neighborhood of mostly boys. We played football, shot BB guns, and rode dirt bikes on a daily basis. I’ve never been a “girly girl” and if given the choice between things like baking or shopping versus playing sports or fixing stuff, I’d be outside with my ball bat and glove in a heartbeat. I was always trying to work my way into what might have been considered “boys clubs” because that’s what interested me. Girls sports weren’t nearly as popular or accessible when I was younger, so I joined Little League and made the boys basketball team so I could do the things I wanted to do.
Since my interests were so “uncommon” for a girl, I’ve lived through my fair share of firsts or being the only girl on a team. I was always the only girl on the Little League team. I was one of two girls to make the previously all-boys basketball team in the 6th grade and I was the only girl in the percussion department in college my Freshman year. The list goes on. I guess I’ve always had an attitude of “Girls Can’t WHAT?” which pushed me to ignore gender barriers and just go after the things I loved.
– – – – – – – –
Your designs are often inspired by people you know. What are your favorite Girls Can’t WHAT designs so far?
My favorite is the drummer. It’s on my tote bag, my t-shirts, my travel mug, my laptop bag, and my iPhone case. It represents me and was one of the very first designs I created so it will always be special.
The veterinarian design was created for my sister when she received her veterinarian degree. The pug in the design was my dog, Quest, and the German shepherd and cat represented her pets.
I have fun creating them all so it’s really hard to pick favorites, but I also really like the firefighter, police officer, hockey player, bass guitar player and the snow skier.
– – – – – – – –
What skills did you have to learn to get your business up and running?
A lot of my skill set comes from my natural interests in computers and creating things. I’ve been programming since the 7th grade so building a web site wasn’t that difficult for me to learn. I also love to build things and create systems. A business is a system in itself, so I had a natural desire to learn more about building a business.
Although I have a college degree in music business, I am mostly self-taught when it comes to computers and programming. I like to immerse myself in a topic by collecting resources from the library and the Internet and studying until I feel I have reached an appropriate level of learning for that topic or skill.
To get started, I had to learn how to draw. I’ve always been involved art to a degree but never on a computer. I had to teach myself how to draw cartoons on a computer screen and learn to use Photoshop and Illustrator to prep them for printing. It was quite a process, but I enjoyed learning and improving my skills. My first attempts at drawing were pretty hideous.
Even though I love the challenge of learning new skills, I don’t try to do it all. I have recently hired someone to help me with design development and marketing, and as the business grows I anticipate hiring additional help.
– – – – – – – –
You have a great blog post about Finding Your Super Power. What’s your super power?
In that post, I talk a lot about passion. Essentially your super power is a combination of your passion and what you like to do. My passion is helping people break through gender stereotypes. I also like to challenge people to think for themselves and discover their own path. When you combine those things, my super power turns out to be “challenging women to break through gender barriers to achieve their dreams.” And that is exactly what the Girls Can’t WHAT? theme is all about.
What do you love to do outside of your business?
I have two teenage daughters who are both into sports. I love watching them play and cheering for their teams. I also love taking long walks with my rescued Boston Terrier, Lola, and playing drums in my band Four Wall Flight.
– – – – – – – –
How has creating your own business empowered you?
Creating my own business has put me in the driver’s seat. There is no limit to how I have to spend my time, how much money I can make or what levels I achieve with my business. It gives me the freedom to be me and do the things I love to do and get paid for it in the process.
But beyond all that, it has empowered me to help other people. For every purchase of Girls Can’t WHAT? gear, 20% is given to help empower women entrepreneurs through the KIVA micro-lending program. It’s immensely satisfying to know that my artwork has a greater purpose than selling a t-shirt. Girls Can’t WHAT? is able to change lives. That’s why I use the tagline “Empower a girl… change the world”. That’s my mission.
– – – – – – – –
You can find Gretchen Cawthon at her website: Girls Can’t What? and on Facebook, Twitter and Pinterest.
– – – – – – – –
Comment below: Has anyone ever told you that you can’t do something because of your gender? What was it and how did you prove them wrong?
Women Branching Out: Michele Lisenbury Christensen
So excited to have Michele Lisenbury Christensen of The Hot Love Revolution on the blog today.
Michele is a coach, love doctor, mama, entrepreneur, author, and more, and she’s on a mission to help happy, well-loved women save the world.
Michele serves up steamy advice to help couples communicate better, make more love, and discover and explore monogamy as the hottest place on earth.
Here’s Michele …
Tell us about you and your business. Where are you located in the world? What do you do and who do you love to serve?
I’m Michele Lisenbury Christensen, and I love love. My Hot Love Revolution is a community where I offer provocation – starting with the name itself – for women and their partners to create the aliveness they really want, in the relationship they’ve already got.
The people I coach and teach in my classes are more likely to wear funky boots or clogs than stilettos, but they don’t want to go through life without feeling turned-on and deeply connected. I really love working with sassy women and the nice guys who adore them… because we (Kurt and I are like that!) have some unique challenges and opportunities that are a lot of fun to unpack.
Oh… and I live in Seattle in the 1942 cottage my husband and I renovated into a Craftsman with the covered front porch and meditation room that I’d seen in my dreams.
Why do you think it’s so important for women (and men) to be turned on in their relationships?
Happy women are the heart of the positive changes our world needs. When a woman is depleted – when her heart isn’t overflowing – she doesn’t have the oomph to make the difference she otherwise could. Women’s pleasure pleases everyone. I want to do something about climate change, about human trafficking, about the quality of our schools, about food security… and helping women be nourished is my answer to all of those.
The same goes for men, too… but I speak more about the women for two reasons: 1) a man being happy doesn’t automatically make his wife happy in quite the same way. A happy woman makes a happy home. End of story. 2) because women are so oriented toward taking care of other people and looking after themselves LAST, if we don’t focus on women learning to be nourished, turned-on, and juicy, it won’t happen.
– – – – – – – –
What is one myth about monogamy that you’re helping bust?
The myth of either-or: either you can have security or you can have sensuality. This myth tells us that the hottest sex is with a “bad boy” or a stranger or some unnamed partner in your future… Not with the husband you have.
This myth says familiarity removes the mystery, and the turn-on along with it. And it says that when you turn up the turn-on, the security goes out the window, because libido is a wild and dangerous thing, like a fire hydrant that just sprays all over the place.
All of that is untrue. Our libidos thrive when we focus them at home and bring back to our partners the desires and curiosity the rest of the world might pique in us. Security can be verrrry sexy. And you can ENTIRELY rewrite the sensual, romantic, emotional, and communication scripts you’ve been reading from with your partner, and create a very dynamic NEW relationship with the same ol’ partner.
– – – – – – – –
How has your own experience with marriage changed your perception of monogamy?
There was a time between our 5th and 10th anniversary when we were practically celibate and I thought to myself, “I CANNOT go the rest of my life without turn-on, without feeling that aliveness and excitement of anticipation and energy and feeling so intensely desired and desirous.”
At that time, I thought time together and the build-up of resentments and differences and shared drudgery that are naturally a part of just about every marriage were the culprits, and that this process was natural. I was afraid I’d have to divorce Kurt to get what I wanted. I contemplated “opening” our marriage so I could be with other people, but he was not (as so many people – especially men – are not) open to that at all. Understandably. I’m all for customizing our relationships, but playing with multiple partners requires a ton of skill and is a meaningful risk, not to be undertaken lightly, especially when children are involved.
My perception today – having buckled down and said, “No, I will NOT go the rest of my life without that excitement… NOR will I give up on this marriage” is that marriage is a very powerful crucible for personal growth if you make those two commitments. I’ve walked through that fire, and continue to do so.
– – – – – – – –
What’s one we can all do today to strengthen our connections with those who are most important to us?
Behold them. We can get sidetracked by our to-do list, by comparing our partners and other loved ones to other people, by our own agenda of what we want them to do or become. But when we really stop and just SEE the magnificence of who they are (even though there are many magnificent things they are NOT), we’re awed, and we are also more available to whatever goodness and intimacy are there in the moment.
You’ll see your partner’s humor. Or kindness. Or methodical brilliance. You’ll see your daughter’s originality. Or independence. Or vulnerability. Or joy. Each of those things is a gift and begin with them – especially if you can then articulate what you see – deepens connection immediately.
– – – – – – – –
How has running your own business empowered you?
2013 is my 17th year in business. Business itself is an art form, and I am an artist of business. That knowledge is empowering. I have recreated my business many times over the past 17 years and I may recreate it again in the future.
I feel so empowered to have a career track that doesn’t require someone else’s permission or hire or promotion to go do what I want to do next. I’ve also geared up and back down again, taking my income to 6-figures plus and down to $50,000 last year when I had a baby. It’s totally mine to do with as I please and THAT is real freedom.
– – – – – – – –
What excites you most about the woman you’ve grown up to be and the life you live?
This sounds wacky to me, but the answer that comes up is the way that I’m softer and messier, in this grown-up, almost-40 version of me, than I ever was in my fantasies. I thought I’d be on this direct upward trajectory (a perfect 45′ angle!): more money, more fitness, more great boots (well, I do have more great boots!), the house, the kids… And it didn’t work that way.
My marriage was awful and I was miserable for a few years. We healed that and had a baby and were so happy. Then I lost a baby at 13 weeks gestation. Both my parents almost died in the same year. My business partnership fell apart. We’ve had money worries in a way we’d never had.
Life has put me through the wringer. And the result? I’m more tender, more compassionate, more vulnerable, more wide-open to the pain and the pleasure of life than I could’ve imagined 10 years ago. My ego’s aspirations were grand, but the reality of my life is even better.
– – – – – – – –
Michele Lisenbury Christensen instigates everyday sensuality using yoga, brain science, and candid tales of personal trials and triumphs. In the past 15 years, she’s co-crafted a playful smokin’ 12+ year marriage, had two happy kids, and been a trusted advisor to more than 2000 couples, business owners, and high-level corporate leaders around the world. Toe-curling pleasure on a daily basis gives Michele the rocket-fuel to serve and scintillate her clients and her readers at The Hot Love Revolution. She delivers daily instigations to more aliveness via Twitter and Facebook. She posts her favorite latest beauty on Pinterest, too.
– – – – – – – –
What are you going to do today to strengthen your connections with those who are most important to you? Leave a comment below!
Women Branching Out: Emmanuelle Lambert
Life coach and yoga instructor Emmanuelle Lambert is our Women Branching Out interviewee today!
Emma trained to become a yoga teacher and coach while working a full-time corporate job. Then, she left her corporate gig to devote herself full time to her own business.
Emma helps new and aspiring women solopreneurs – yoga teachers, coaches, healers, creatives – get started in their own conscious businesses. Her business motto is “Where the Be meets the Biz.”
Emma’s group coaching program Ignite Your Life!, starts March 4.
Here’s Emma …
Tell us about you and your business. Where do you live? What do you do and who do you love to serve?
Bonjour! I am a yoga teacher and life coach living in Brussels, Belgium, but originally from Dijon (yeah that’s an actual city), France.
I am passionate about helping women find what they’re truly capable of so they can design the life they want, without guilt or overwhelm.
I teach live yoga classes and coach either face-to-face or online (thank guru for the internet!).
– – – – – – – –
What does having a conscious business and life mean to you?
It means having a wholehearted/minded/spirited life and being in total alignment with one’s values, it means being aware of our stories and fears and dealing with them, it means finding one’s power and using it for the greater good, it means having a business as a means to full self expression and service. Oh, and having fun too!
How does being a yoga teacher influence your coaching business?
I believe yoga and coaching are complementary and can work really well together for a holistic approach to self development. I sometimes resort to yogic philosophy in my coaching.
I found that the philosophy sustaining the coaching methodologies I use is somewhat very similar to what I would broadly call yogic philosophy, but expressed in a different way, in different words. Depending on who my client is and what they need, I will use one of the other.
Actually, several clients told me they chose to work with me because I had this yoga background. They felt they would be seen and heard without judgement. Basically it means that if someone tells me they feel a lot of energy in their third chakra, I won’t cringe or start laughing!
– – – – – – – –
Why did you decide to start your own business?
I think that somehow, I’ve always known I would be working for myself someday.
It boils down to one word which is one of my core values: freedom.
Working my own schedule, choosing who I want to work with and what I want to do, that was a big deal for me.
Of course, I also couldn’t imagine doing what I do in a fixed structure. I am very good at having my own structure, and again, I get to decide what it is.
There is another reason: I do believe that it IS possible to create the life you want to live, and I want to be a living example of this. How could I teach and coach about empowerment if I’m not walking my talk? I would feel like a fraud.
I am not saying you have to have your own business absolutely and that you should quit your job tomorrow. I am just saying that this was how I always envisioned things for me, and I needed to have my own business, but that’s my choice.
– – – – – – – –
How has running your own business empowered you?
Oh man, it has empowered me in ways I could never imagine!
It has forced me to accept that deep down, I am a leader. See, I used to be shy and I certainly didn’t want to disturb, so I kept quiet for a long time – not to be seen, not to be heard, not to stand out. But deep down, I was not happy. Deep down, I knew I was not fitting in, and that there was more to life than this.
Running my own business had me digging deep inside to accept that I had to be seen and heard, if I ever wanted to be in business and have people come to me.
Whoever said that running your own business is the best self development tool ever was right!
– – – – – – – –
Why did you decided to create Ignite Your Life, your group coaching program?
I’ve always known I wanted to do something special, that I wasn’t really made for corporate life, but I didn’t know what I was supposed to do.
So I settled in, got a job, and was unhappy for years. It was a fight between reason and heart, really: “Who do you think you are? Consider yourself happy. You have a job, a boyfriend, a roof above your head, what else could you possibly want?” (we’ve all heard that one, right ) “But I am NOT happy and I don’t know what to do!”
After years of soul searching I found out. It helped that I started practicing yoga, too. But it took me ages. Years of waking up crying in the middle of the night because I wanted to quit my job but I didn’t know what to do, and feeling so lonely!
And I know there are women out there who feel the same, who are suffering, who don’t know what to do with their lives but knowing they can do so much more! So everything I have learned and used is here, in that program, so they don’t spend that long in that painful state of confusion.
– – – – – – – –
Finish this sentence. I believe…
I believe that we all have the potential and power to do whatever we want and create the life we want to live – so screw excuses and go kick ass!
– – – – – – – –
When Emmanuelle Lambert tried yoga for the first time, she was a frustrated corporate employee and it wasn’t love at first downward dog. Fast forward six years, Emmanuelle is a fully self-employed yoga teacher and life coach. When she is not goofing around on her yoga mat, Emmanuelle can be found playing with her Krazy Kitty and her Lovely Boyfriend, jumping around to loud indie rock or eating dark chocolate – sometimes all these things at the same time. You can find Emmanuelle on Facebook and Twitter. Her group coaching program Ignite Your Life! starts March 4.
– – – – – – – –
Freedom is one of Emmanuelle’s core values. What are your core values and how does your business support them? Comment below!
– – – – – – – –