Welcome back to She Pivots. I'm your host, Emily Tish Sussman. This week, we're doing things a little differently. It's spring break for many of us parents, so as I'm currently juggling entertaining three children, I wanted to share my episode on a hype Woman, a podcast hosted by the magnificent
original hype Woman Aaron Gallagher. I'm dropping in the full episode here, but you can also listen to it over on her Hype Woman podcast feed, where you can listen to more inspiring women like White House Press Secretary Karine John Pierre and of course she Pivots Daves Daisy London. In full transparency, I'm both a little excited and a little nervous to share this episode. I've become so comfortable on the other side of the aisle as the interviewer,
it feels vulnerable to share me as the guest. But I hope you truly enjoyed this episode as much as I enjoyed doing it. Aarin has an amazing ability to allow her guests to speak honestly and truly hypes them up. Be sure to follow Aaron at we Underscore Hype Women on Instagram and check out her prolific LinkedIn enjoy. I think that one of the real framing mindsets for me and why I go so hard into everything that I do, It's because I do still always feel like I have
to prove myself. I feel like I had to prove myself for a long time. I come from a very prominent New York family, and so people had a lot of presumptions about me. Now, I think we'd call it nepo babies, but they presumed that I didn't earn what I achieved, and for a long time, I didn't feel like I deserved most of it. That you know, I
had a hard time in school. I had very little impulse control in talking in particular what was a big surprise, But so I didn't do that well, Like I didn't fit in, and so therefore I felt like I wasn't living up to the expectations of my family. I wasn't living up to the expectations of the city around me and everyone I came in contact with, and so I was really rebellious because if I couldn't fit in, then I had to rebel against it.
Well, well, well, here we are episode number Lucky thirteen, and this one My Friends is a real gem. I always listen to our episodes three or more times before I write the intros, and on this one, I was cackling out loud each and every time I listened. There is no one like Emily Tish Sussman, no one. She is brilliant in all the ways street smart, book smart, style, smart,
whip smart. Every time I'm in her presence, I learn more about the world and about myself, and I hope you experience the same as you listen to this conversation today. Emm and I talk a lot about her journey navigating her identity as a woman, as a political commentator, as a lawyer, as a mother of three, as a podcast host, a media mogul, an owner of professional women's soccer team, the New York New Jersey Gotham FC, as a member of a prominent New York family have you heard of
the New York Giants. Emma has been underestimated at different points throughout her life, and her response to this she committed herself to being serious and taken seriously. So I want to talk about the definition of serious. It's defined in multiple ways. First, it's demanding careful consideration or application next, acting or speaking sincerely and in earnest rather than in a joking or half hearted manner, Significant or worrying because
of possible danger or risk. And lastly, substantial in terms of size, number, and quality.
But when you think about how.
So many of us shapeshift to fit inside of a serious.
Box, it's limiting.
And for em that box could not contain her light. So as she made herself smaller, more serious, and took away the beauty that is who Emma is, she began to lose herself. And it got me thinking, are being serious and being taken seriously the same thing?
Let's find out. I mean, it's gonna be It's gonna be one for the books today, Isn't that right? Isn't that right? Miss Emily Tish Susman.
I can I feel like I have no idea where this is going to go, but it's we're going to make magic, that is.
I think that's kind of the story of our friendship is we don't know what's going to happen. Neither one of us have the gene of embarrassment or overthinking behavior before doing it, and so it is always entertaining. Sometimes a cleanup that needs to happen. But like, but if nothing else, the most authentic and vulnerable.
Right, one hundred percent. Like I feel like it didn't necessarily serve me that well early in life, but now I'm thriving.
I mean, and I think that's this is the journey that we really want to we want to uncover and sort of go on with you today. And I'm just I'm deeply grateful that we're here together. And as em and I just said before we started, we wanted to just get going because we would probably shoot the shit for too long and we would maybe miss some of what the hilarity that will ensue over the course of this conversation.
Like we could literally never stop talking between the two of us week, we could.
Luckily never stop talking, right. And you know, we have this really.
Interesting background that we didn't know was in common until we were on a panel together for International Women's Day last year, where afterwards you came up to me and said, you know, my team pulled together the bios of the other panelists just so I could have a little bit of framework of what they were all about. And I thought they had incorrectly copied my bio into yours.
And the reason for that is one.
And I was like, I was like, pull it together, ladies, sloppy, you put my bio in for the game. Clappy, sloppy ladies.
Because never ever have I ever come across another person without it being at an event or at our former workplace that has also worked at SLDN. And for anyone who doesn't know what SLDN is, it is Service Members Legal Defense Network. Entire mission was to lift the ban on gays in the military, which we ultimately did, and EM and I were both there at different times but truly formative years of our career.
Yeah. Absolutely, I mean it was my first job after law school. It was my first job after the Obama campaign. It was my first job in Washington working in policy advocacy. And I knew at the time like I'd never have a better job, and I still feel that way that, like I'll never have a better job, like to be able.
Rarely can you be both the direct services, like the actual attorneys of people who are impacted, and also be working on policy change, like it often doesn't happen in the same organization, just the way that organizations are set up. And we really did it there, like we were so close to the service members who were discharged, and we really made impact in the law. So I like for that reason, like I could have never had a better job and never had a better experience.
It is so true.
Is it is such a small, scrappy organization that did it all. And you know, you came in past law school. And so we're serving as legal aid for service members who are either currently still inside of the military and were seeking counsel because they were worried about their safety, they were worried about their career, or they had already.
Exited and they needed to get some counsel on what was.
Best, the best way forward. I this was my first job after college. I thought I wanted to be a lawyer, and all of my friends there were a year ahead said work at a law firm for at least a year instead of going straight to law school.
So I was so lucky to land this gig.
A connection because my mom was in the Coast Guard for twenty five years and so we had a connection to a board member who was there, and.
They gave me a shot.
I was the intake person, so I was the first sort of line of receiving the call from the service member and getting an understanding of what was happening for them, and then I passed them off to your brilliance and the brilliance of other lawyers there who could really help them navigate the system.
But you're right, it's.
Never like I have up on my wall like the sort of going away note that they gave me and like never never a better job. So I just I love that we have that in common.
Yeah, it was so scrappy. I feel like I didn't know that that organizations and offices could actually be that scrappy. And like all of our furniture had been donated, so I don't. Do you remember the conference room? This was my favorite thing that the conference The table in the conference room was as big that we said like one hundred times a day it had been sawed in half
to get through the door. Yes, and so it was just like an open conference table with like a big saw in the middle and like from the bottom, yes.
Right, and it's like and and it was so big that you almost like had to slide in to just get into the room. Because again, this wasn't this isn't like in a space where a designer comes in and goes okay, what's the ideal you know, size table for this room. It's like, no, no, here's the table and the room and they both have to work. And so if it means cutting it off in the middle, we do it. That is what it is to be an entrepreneur.
It is what it is to be sort of scrappy and to have a mission that you don't let anything get in the way of. Yeah, so what I would love to do to start off is to read.
Your Hype Women headline.
And this is my attempt to synopsize in two sentences, which is really difficult because of the impact that you've had over the course of your career in life, who you are, what you're about, what the world knows you as, and what I want you to do, because I think it's really difficult when you are a person like you are, who is involved in so much, who cares so deeply, who is ambitious, You're constantly moving, You're constantly onto the
next thing. I want you to really use the thirty seconds of me reading this to hear what you've done, to take it in, and then we're going to talk about the subtext.
Okay, okay, all right, here we go.
Emily Tish Susman is a purple haired unicorn, the creator and host of the award winning podcast She Pivots. A Tony nominated producer, a Marie Claire contributor, a Democratic political strategist, member of the New York Bar and co owner of Gotham FC, the twenty twenty three National Women's Soccer League champions. End of Sentence one, Sentence two. A mother of three, and former VP of Campaigns at the largest Democratic think tank in Washington, d C. Emily has produced Broadway hits,
including Shucked and How To Dance in Ohio. Is a founding member of her local Mom's Demand Action Chapter. Has served on the board of the Ethical Culture Fieldstone School and the Raw School. Is a member of the Artist Council at the Whitney Museum of American Art.
And the Director Circle at the Church.
Yeah.
If I looked at this, I would have been like, why'd you put six people's bios into one?
And is like, no, no, no, that's all accurate. M What is happening here? What's happening here?
Yeah, when you read all like that, it does feel overwhelming a little, Yeah, it does feel overwhelming, but yeah, I mean I think it's because I kind of go all in when I do something, like it's just I drink a lot of coffee, that is for sure, yep. But you know, when I do something, I go really really hard on it, and I feel like I can't do it halfway. So if we're going to do it like we're fucking doing it, We're fucking doing it. Yeah.
It is such an interesting mix though, right that your interests, your skill set.
Your true brilliance.
It really spans very different sectors that most people would pick a lane and kind of stay in that one, whereas I, like I wrote down, I was like, maybe this is your memoir women.
Aren't politics and purple hair?
You know, because like, and the reason I'm talking about the purple hair is because you want do.
You want to know what my Real Housewives tagline would be?
Yeah?
I do? Wait wait is it? Oh okay, I might be left, but I'm always right.
Oh yeah, yeah, so good.
That'll be my replacement.
Now okay, that's good.
And also I will make that sure and have it up by the end of day, so incredible. We can make sure, we can make sure that that is in the hands of people. No, that's that is that is so good and so right that but again, when you think about those categories, right, politics, women aren't just true media you are, You're crossing all of them and you're
but you also continue to participate in them. How do you show up as m in each of those spaces that many times have a very specific way that they expect people to be.
That's a I really like the way that you. I think it's a really good question. That's a really good question, and I think that it's been like a big evolution for me. I think that one of the real framing mindsets for me and why I go so hard into everything that I do, it's because I do still always feel like I have to prove myself. I feel like I had to prove myself for a long time. Come from a very prominent New York family, and so people
had a lot of presumptions about me. Now, I think we'd call it nepo babies, but they presumed that I didn't earn what I achieved, and for a long time I didn't feel like I deserved most of it. That you know, I had a hard time in school. I had very little impulse control in talking. In particular, what
was a big surprise. But so I didn't do that well, Like I didn't fit in, and so therefore I felt like I wasn't living up to the expectations of my family, I wasn't living up to the expectations of the city around me and everyone I came in contact with, and so I was really rebellious because if I couldn't fit in, then I had to rebel against it. And then that kind of got flipped when I worked on a political campaign right after college and I thought, oh my god,
I'm really good at this. This is the first time ever in my life I've believed that I was good at anything, and I had to really prove every minute of every day that I earned the right to be there, earned the right to be in my position. And that led me to law school right after. Like I had
my college advisor. My college degree was in social work, and my college advisor pulled me aside senior year and I said, you know, I was meeting with her and I said, you know, I'm thinking about going to law school and she said, well, that's really for the smart people like this girl, lindsay, like, you're really never going
to amount to anything. You're always going to have to buy your way in and she she hit me where it hurt like she hit I'm looking to cry it out like it still sings, because so.
Can we can we find her?
Because I have something I would like to say to that, to the like that is a horrific I know that's a horrific thing to say to anyone. So I'm sorry that she said that, because you never deserved that.
It's not true, but you know what she said what I was most afraid that people were saying about me, and so it really hurt, but it also gave me a real drive. I was like, you know, I'm I was on the next ten year, fifteen year drive. That was always in the back of my mind that people always thought that about me, and yet I had this passion to be changing the world. I felt like if I was given so much, then much was expected of me.
And I felt a real burning passion for people who didn't have a seat at the table, people who didn't know how to have their voices heard, which is why I started my career at SLDN after working at Campaigns, and continued to do that at the Center for American Progress and other organizations. But it was always nagging, and so I felt that I needed to pick a lane when I was in politics because I had to prove
that I was serious. Like that was a big thing for me, that I had to prove that I earned it and I was serious and I was smart enough to be in the room. And then it all kind of blew up for me after I had three kids in three and a half years. All three kids were mistakes.
I'm sorry, what's happening. What's happening right now?
I am like the most fertile person on the planet. Like, literally all three kids were mistakes. I cried every time I found I was pregnant, and I was like, not.
Again, again, not again, No.
We can't go back here. And part of it was that I didn't really feel any connection to my kids, because I didn't feel connections to babies. I do now that they're a little bit older. But the biggest part is that I felt like I really, I had really earned my career, like I really had felt for the first time that I had sacrificed a lot for it,
like I had sacrificed physically, emotionally, time wise. I had moved out of New York because I felt like I couldn't prove myself as an individual in New York and it was and I was going to lose it. Like I knew that working at the intersection of politics and media, it's always about like the last thing you were relevant for, Yeah, and I couldn't be relevant and I couldn't do it.
And then three weeks after I had my third baby, we went into a lockdown for the pandemic and I was like, well, now now I'm truly fucked, truly, Like now there's no like I have no child's care. There's just like babies crying everywhere, so.
Many babies, so many babies crying.
Just like everywhere, and I can't use my brain. And that is the one way that I have defined myself that made me feel confident, and that made me feel like I was my own person and not necessarily part of my family, and like I love my family. It's not a bad thing, but but it's it's hard to feel like your feelings are legitimate and like your feelings are valid when everything external says well, really nobody's interested
in the things that you're feeling. And that is something that I still feel like I have to balance, like putting out there, like, you know, I have a lot of advantages for sure, and only as I've become more confident I can say and I still feel these things and it's okay for me to talk about them.
That's exactly right, you know, I think this piece of coming from a prominent family. Everyone has their idea of what that is then, and everyone thinks they know you, which means that no one actually knows you because they haven't given you an opportunity and a chance to show up because they're like, no, no, no, we already get it.
We know what you're about.
And so you know when you I mean the amount of people over my lifetime that have come up to me and said, oh, I'm very close with the Tishes, and I'm like, well, I literally don't, like this is our first head meeting. Oh like, am I close to you?
Do?
I feel close?
Like I don't write feel right exactly. It's that's it's a good point. It's sort of like how we define different words and what they mean. Sometimes it is based on what our ambition is, what we're really there for.
So when you talk about this idea of being smart, right and what that counselor told you and that struggle that you had with feeling that you know, I think I think we are in a really complicated time with our kids who are growing up in a very old school system of schooling and teaching that has expectations that
just don't meet the moment where it is. And we keep saying, if you don't do these three things, then we're putting you in this lane and you're never going to be like someone who can get yourself out of it. And so it's it's a dangerous time where we assume that traditional schooling and going straight to college and all these things are the way, and anything else outside of
that means that you're worthless. So utally, you know, like you say that politics gave you a chance to feel serious and to be taken seriously.
Who were you proving yourself to with that?
Everyone? Like I really did care about that. My colleagues felt that I had earned the right to be in the room. I cared that, you know, politics is like it's not really about money, it's about like access to power and if people think that you deserve to be in a conversation and in a decision making capacity, and everyone around me, I was trying to prove that I was serious too, Like I didn't totally feel serious myself, but in parts of me knew that I did. Like
I did exceptionally well in law school. I graduated in the top of my class, and that was the first time that I had felt smart, and so I was constantly trying to prove to everyone that, like I did deserve to be there. But then I also knew there were these very silly, whimsical, theater loving parts of me that don't really fit into a culture of politics where everyone is trying to be the smartest in the room.
And so I was afraid that if I let that out to the extent to which I feel it, then I would be like cutting against everything else I'd proven about being serious. So I did kind of pick a lane, and I was like, this is my serious lane. And so I started going on TV as a political commentator in twenty twelve for Obama's reelection, and I did Fox
News like almost every day, like all the time. I did Fox News, CNN, MSNBCCB as across the board, And so much of that for me was that nobody could say that somebody else got me in the room like I was on live TV doing the hardest thing somebody in my job could be doing, like I was on like Bill O'Reilly, you know, like right, or I'm.
Like sweating as you're saying that because we know that that's a hot seat, right.
Yeah, totally. And so that was a big piece of it for me that like I didn't need everybody to watch every segment I had ever done, but I knew I had gotten through it, and I had this external validator to show that I had the right to be in my job.
So like you had this period of time where you were so publicly visible your skill set, your expertise, and then when did you say, I'm going to let this other part of me out.
I had to hit a real bottom, Like I really
had to hit a low. And it was when it was during the pandemic, when I was locked in with these three kids and my whole career had evaporated, and I like, I mean, I couldn't work, I couldn't work in my field, and I didn't know if I could do anything else, Like I didn't know not only I didn't know if anyone would hire me for anything else, Like I actually didn't know if I was capable of doing anything else because I had doubled down so hard in political strategy and I didn't know who I was
without it, and that was really hard for me because I had taken that as my identity to replace being part of my prominent family, right, right, it was.
Like, yeah, you were, you were like this.
It's not that you necessarily fixed that need, you just replaced it.
Right.
So it's like the same idea as like addiction, where it's like, well, I'm not a smoke er.
Anymore, but man, I'm an alcoholic.
And I'm not saying that this is exactly like addiction, but it's I probably.
Have a personality of an addict. That's a fair assessment.
Well, but what I think it is is like when we have when we have these expectations of us, especially that are about our lineage, which is truly our identity, and we are trying to figure our way through them. Relevance is always the top sort of need, right. The desire is like am I relevant?
Am I relevant? Do people care?
Right?
And so so much of your work up until that point had been about being relevant to whatever you were throwing yourself into. Being behind the scenes feels real scary because it's like everyone's going to forget about me.
What happens then.
So so, And I couldn't even work behind the scenes. Like the way that I worked meant that I had to be up on, like have the latest information at all the time, at all times. And I couldn't get the latest information because I wasn't working in a way that would give me access to it.
No.
No, And I think when we think about what it was to be a parent of small children in a pandemic, and you have a really almost amplified example of having three children under the age of three during that time, you can't function. There is no functioning that occurs for a parent that is living at home without childcare with three small, very needy people.
How the hell did you get through that time?
A lot of crying, a lot of jumping in mud puddles. We did that about twice a day. We buried a dead bird for a little while. That was one activity. But I just, you know, I just kind of like kept one piece, Like for a little while, I kept my political podcast going, even though it was like I was doing a really shady job of it. No cared anymore, Like I just kind of like kept one piece, just to keep my brain involved. And then I actually gave
myself a pause. I gave myself six months, and I said, I'm going to take this six months to just I had been keeping myself busy, like I've been keeping the political podpast, going to like give me something to hold on.
To, yeah, keep you tethered, right, yeah, right, Like keep me the teathered to myself that was outside of child's care.
Yeah, taking care of my children and figuring out I mean we moved eight times in eighteen months, Like where do they go to school? You know, like give me something that still felt like myself. And then I actually gave myself a really dedicated time to say, let's just do a lot of coffees. And they're probably virtual at that point, but like, let me just have a lot of conversations because I actually don't know who I am anymore.
Like I'm not ready to go out and say I'm looking for this kind of job or I want to create this kind of thing or be part of this kind of system because I actually don't know what I have to offer and I don't know who I am anymore. Yeah, it was a big so it let.
Me like yes, like you like yes, I mean that is I think that so many women felt that during that time.
I really do and and I just started to like make like build roots where we were and just start one thing at a time, Like what do I want to do? Well? I need advice, Like I need to know that like I'm not dead, Like there's no parenting advice out there that resonates with me right now, there's no work advice that resonates for me, because everything was about work life balance, which implied that you chose and I was like, well, believe me, I would have never
chose this. Nope. So I needed to know that I did it. I did create such high expectations for myself and everything that I did that like if it can't be this political career that I've spent fifteen years working my ass off, Like I'm not going to have the bandwidth to work in that way towards something else right now? I just don't. Yeah, So, like, am I gonna be okay? And is everything that I'm going to have done not
just have been a total waste? And so I started thinking about who can give me advice in this way and in the most selfish way possible. I was like I want to talk to my idols, and I want to talk to women who have gone through the shittiest thing I can possibly imagine, and that makes my things seem not that bad.
I mean, listen, it's there's perspective there. There's huge perspective there. And so how did you embark on that? What was sort of like what was the beginning like? And then let's talk about how that evolved into something really powerful.
Well, I put a structure together of what I wanted the content to be like, and the structure has even evolved that. At the beginning, I was like, ten episodes, feels like something I can manage. Let me see if I can create it. I had worked with a production company when I'd done the political podcast and had a not good ending with them, so I was like, if I build something, I'm building it from scratch.
Yeah.
But hello, I'm just sitting at the desk in my bedroom, like, you know, like this is all new for me. So you know, it was a lot of just like walking around and like making notes on my note app figuring it out, and the structure did change, you know. At one point I met someone who was used to doing or who had had an experience doing sales for big events, you know, sort of like Women of the World's kind of events. So I partnered with her to make it an in person award and the podcast would be the
side side offering. And then she told me that she's going to grad school full time and I had to rethink it. At that point when I was ready to launch, I was like, I came up with this thing. Oh, I pitched every media company I could think of. My friend Michelle Juwanda said, Emily, you are the media company.
Do not give your idea away to them. So then I created the media company and pitched it to existing legacy brands to partner with me on and then I launched it so like I had this email list it was created made up of all of my contacts, and I was like, this is really scary. I'm really scary of launching that I'm going to launch this podcast talking about things that are personal and the way that I feel. And I actually don't think that anybody wants to hear
the way that I feel. And I'm not even sure that I want to hear the way that I feel. But I'm trying it, and I'm nervous that people aren't going to see me serious anymore, and then I'm not going to see myself a serious But I'm launching it. So I sent out this email to every person i'd ever emailed with that said, here's my new podcast. It's called Pivot. And within about ten days I got a
cease and desist order from Vice Media. Oh said, you have violated the trademark we hold on Pivot in the podcast category.
You're like, I'm excellent. Well at least someone's paying attention.
That is literally how I kept trying to reframe it. I was like, Okay, I'm totally fucked and I totally botched this roll out like the new me. And they're like, just kidding, it's not listen.
I think a season assists, like you aren't. You haven't made it until you've gotten a season assist. So like so like slow clap for you girl.
Okay, yeah so you So you were like, I got a Pivot my name right now.
And and Edna, who worked for me at the time, and the lawyers kept coming up with like fifty different names that I could use, and I was like, but here's the problem with that name. It's not Pivot.
It's not pivot.
Yeah, so that's the problem with it. Yeah, once again, let me refer back to the season Asis daughter.
Yep.
And then my mom came up with she pivots. Actually, I had initially wanted to keep it just as pivot, which they wouldn't let me because I wanted to be able to include men. And then and I thought that she pivots just made it too narrow. And then when I thought about who I wanted to interview, I was like, I actually don't really care about interviewing men.
So it's fine, and it's like and again it's like, well, turns out also fifty one percent of the population, half of the labor force is not narrow, and there's going to be tons and tons of opportunity here and.
I think a lot.
Listen, the corporate world wants us to be afraid to say we're just focusing on women, right.
We are continue we continue to be told.
Wah, I don't know if that's a category we can publicly state we are going all in on. And when you look at the numbers, it just doesn't make any sense, especially when we know that eighty five percent of consumer buying power is in the hands of women.
So so I'm so thrilled. I'm I'm thrilled you got that seasoned assist.
I'm thrilled you decided to focus I wouldn't even say narrow in Yeah, to focus on women and to make this about what you really were intending to do from the get go, which is to explore and examine your own journey through the journeys of other women who have dealt with what any of us who have had a career and children know to be, which is those two things coming up against one another and forcing us to make some kind of choice.
Yep, yeah, yes. And and the thing that was very specific for me as I was putting together kind of the thesis of the show is that my story was that my kids killed my career. And by the way, I have a tote bag because my kids killed my career, and if I haven't sent it to yet, I'm going to yep.
But need it, need it?
Yeah, Yeah, you're gonna need that one. But I actually was really specific not to book other women with the same story as me, because there's so many things that happen outside of us that change our perspective that then lead us to something different. And again, very selfishly, I needed to know what they were, like, I needed to know how people got through them. So in the first season, we had someone who came out of trans and was
kicked out of the military. We had a Holocaust survivor. Like, we had a huge variety of stories, and that maintains the most important piece of it for me, is having the biggest variety of stories possible because we're all working within the same frame. Is that, like, I didn't anticipate this thing. It was going to rock me so much. I kind of got gutted out, and then I was better because of it, not in spite of it. Because of it, I was better.
Yes, do you.
Feel like your biggest pivot moment was what happened in the pandemic or was it something else?
No, without question, it definitely was. But I think that even in the three years that I've been doing this show, I've broadened. You know, I went all in on building the media company, went all in on building the show.
And as my team has gotten more efficient and they've gotten and we've gotten professionalized and we've been able to grow, it's opened me up to be able to say, well, actually, I can do other things and I want to, and I started investing in Broadway shows, which, by the way, producing is just investing.
I don't like lead produce, But guess what synonyms are there for a reason, and so producing.
Is what we say.
I know.
I still have like a real insecurity about that too. I'm like, I'm not like creatively putting a show together.
But you know what, you know, it's funny. I don't agree with that, because here's what you do. By investing, you are creating the space for creativity. You are creating room for those on stage and writing behind the scenes to go there. So it is a different form of that idea of being a creative influence, and it matters.
So I own that shit.
You're right, I will own it. Well, So I've done two shows now, and is there a thesis to why I do it?
No?
I love it like I love it. That's that's that's the answer, is that I love it. And I've seen a lot of theater in my life, and I think that I maybe have an opinion about it. So a friend of mine presented this opportunity to invest in the first show to me, for us to do it together, and I said, well, I feel like if I go into a new category, it needs to be on brand, like is there a female director?
No?
Is there a female writer? No? Is there a female lead producer? No? I was like, does it know women? I don't like.
You're like, You're like, is there a woman bringing people water? Like anything?
Just please give me something that I can hold on to, and it ended up it ended up. It did end up being groundbreaking in the sense that Alex Knew a one best supporting actress for the first time as a non binary actor, which is very exciting. But I felt like, even going into this category of theater that it had to be so on brand for me. And then I was like, actually I like it, and also I think it's going to be profitable, so that's good enough. So
I feel that's good enough. But I say, oh, this is the example, like how did I get to this point where I just like, give no Fox and do exactly what I want to do. I think it's evolving, and I think it also feels to me like I have to establish myself, like this is my own insecurities and I'm not going to project this on anybody else. But I still hold this insecurity that if I do something,
I have to do at ten thousand percent. And so I have to be established enough in the thing that I am doing to be able to add.
That is so interesting, right, because that what that will do is it will stop you in a lot of cases from being a part of something that you deserve to be a part of and that they deserve to have you involved in. And it also means that we have to fight this notion that we're not learners and that we have to be experts in the field of
everything that we are participating in. You will get to a point in some of these spaces that you are entering and you are learning about where you do become more established and have more expertise, but you're sure as
hell can't get there on day one. Yea, And so right, And so like, I think there is so much merit to women in particular saying when they're involved in something, I'm here to learn and to be an observer and to witness this as much as I'm here to contribute, because my inherent value is not just in my service to others. And if I view it that way, I
won't do things just because I love them. I'll do them because I feel like I'm serving and like extricating ourselves from that definition is confusing because it's all about our value and our worth and our own mind.
Yeah, totally. I mean even you know, I served on you know, we mentioned that I've been on school boards before. I served on one board as an alum when I was on it, and it wasn't a very gratifying experience for me, Like I lived in a different city, it was hard for me to really participate. I felt like I was they are, quite frankly, as a stand in for my family, so they could keep a connection to my family, which I think is probably why I was there, And I still did the full term, like I did
nine years. Sometimes I was than other I did it. I did it for a long time. But then when it came time for me to enter into a school for my kids, I did have nine years of experience. And so even though the first school board was it kind of made me feel shitty, like it didn't really feel like I was there for my own expertise. It's made me feel a hell of a lot better about
my engagement on my kids' school board. Yeah, because I have a point of comparison and I have experience that quite frankly, nobody else has.
It's true. It's true.
And so sometimes like these these initial experiences that we are sort of judging about whether or not we should be doing them, it's actually it's a it's a stepping stone to the other thing.
The thing that's really going to matter.
It definitely does, and it's actually given me a different context to look back on that time that I spent on that school board and think it really wasn't a waste, that it built me up to this moment that now I can be a much better contributing member because I do care about you know, yes, I will enter a space and say it's okay for me to learn, but I do really care that I'm not just a placeholder.
Like I care that I actually contribute something and then there it's the only way that I get something out of it. It's how they get the best out of me, and I do care about that. But I think a lot of it just depends on like reframing the skills as opposed to the specifics of something I've done before, Like school board to school board is like a pretty clear transferable set of skills, yes, but it could be
something different, you know, the school. The school board that I'm on right now has spent the last ten years trying to get a turning lane because it's dangerous to take a left out of the school. And I basically spent the fall running the school's government affairs getting this turning lane in with a county.
Yeah, you're like, you're like, I have a background in this, right, Like I can pull from some of that, you know, And again, even even when you look at something that is not as easy of a leap to make, where it's like politics too broadway, Well, yeah, it's about community building, it's about making people feel seen, it's about creating space for diversity.
Then then we start to see the connection in the through line.
Yeah, one hundred percent of Actually, there's a lot of people similar to me that worked either in the Obama administration or with the Obama administration where we felt like we moved policy very quickly. Before we had moved hearts and minds. And now we're in a storytelling space because we're so committed to hearts and minds and feel like other people can do the policy moving right now.
Other people can do the policy moving.
Yeah, but we moved it. We moved it too fast.
Yeah.
Now, I love that, I think And again, I think so much of that is like when we feel like everything has to have such incredible meaning, that's it's just it's a lot of pressure.
It's a lot of pressure.
Sometimes we just have to to get up and go and do it and see what happens with it and not have always this end game in mind. And like again, when you're a person who has the background that you've had, it's it's always about like, am I going to package this all up and sort of serve it up and deliver it? And so that can get in the way of actually being present in the process.
Yeah, because because we're just like, what's the output? What's the output here?
Yeah, totally. And I try to reframe things to think about that I'm here to be in this and at the at the back end of it, I'll get out of it what I get or guess the front end of it, like, I'll get out of it when I get out of it, like, and then I'll figure out how what skills I get out of it. But not to try to be framing it. And this is something I've had to work on for myself. But not framing it in that moment of like what am I getting out of this? Is it a name? Is it a connection?
Is it like a bullet you know, resume bullet point, But like to take take myself out of that kind of mindset and go into I'm going to be here and present with it, and I know that everything will build to the next thing, but like I actually will legitimately get the most out of it if I show up very authentically with the skill set that I have for better or worse, like whatever it is, with the
like I now can recognize. I think this is the biggest thing that working on it campaign taught me right after college is that I'm great for vibes, Like I'm great for enthusiasm. You know you are you are?
You are you really?
You know, Like the first thing on a campaign, I was like, oh my god, I'm not smart the way that they are. I don't have the skills that they are. And I was like, oh, but actually I can keep my team working for long hours and like people want to work with my team, and I can attract people with honey or you know, like.
Whatever the phrase is, that's right, And so.
Just knowing that that can be enough, Like that can be it. That's okay, I can I can live with that. That's good for me.
Now, when did that shift happen for you, that you that you felt that that was that was acceptable, that that was actually what you were bringing to the table in some of these environments where you didn't feel like you were numero uno.
It really was on that first campaign that I worked on after college, like everything I had gotten in college had been so reinforcing to me that I was not smart and that I would not be professionally successful, and then I may have to try to nepo maybe myself into the world if I was going to, you know, be working in any serious capacity. You know, my advisor told me I would never amount to anything, so like
it was actually told me quite directly. But it was on that first campaign where I think campaigns are such a good way to start in a career because it really is a meritocracy. Like there's no time, there's no time to consider, oh did they work hard? Like did
they make it into the room? Like right right, Like by the time you have figured out who's sitting at the table with you, you've moved on to the next thing, correct, So you can work your way up very if you work hard on a campaign, you will get that in return, you will see that reflected. And so they gave me a lot of responsibility very quickly on that campaign because I could keep the enthusiasm up and I could keep the trains moving because people wanted to work with me.
And so I was like, oh, actually, is this a workplace skill? Like I think this is I think this is a skill. Perhaps it was not a skill in law school, which was my.
Next right right, which is like very again so old school, so so regimented, and it's like it's literally like by the book where it doesn't exist. So you were you were again coming in as like a hurricane sort of saying, I don't know, why do we have.
To do it like this?
Well, well I didn't at all in law school, by the way, I went like heads down. I was like, I'm terrified. I cried every day of the first year, for sure. I cried every day. And I was like, I just need to buck up this part of me that I'm insecure about. But I'm going to go headfirst into it because I've had this little bit of confirmation for working on a campaign that I think that I might be smart enough to do this, and I had
that glimmer. So I need to overcompensate in the academic part of it now to prove to myself that I'm allowed to be here, to prove to everyone else that I'm allowed to be here, Like I'm not I'm supposed to be here. But so I had to really overcompensate in that. It's the time that I felt the least like myself, But I'm also incredibly happy that I did it. Like my mom's always like, why are you going to be a lawyer? And like that ship is sailed.
It's like it's like, listen, that was just background info that just like helps me know when I should try to maybe see someone.
That's it. I'm literally I like badly read my own contracts. It's pretty much when it comes down to now, right, But I do think it led me to be able to have the confidence to be in a room where serious things are being discussed and serious things are happening. When we worked at SLDN, I had to represent their interests, and when I was in that room representing our clients, they didn't care if I was insecure in my childhood.
What mattered is that I showed up for our clients, and so it was the law school training that gave me the confidence to be able to do it. Yeah.
Absolutely, it was a framework for you, and like you said, it was a confidence builder because you were like, it turns out I can do this. It doesn't mean I necessarily want to or that I'm enjoying it, but like it was a flex that you needed to do for yourself. That meant, Okay, that part of me has been exploring, But now what am I really here to do?
Do you think.
That being serious and being taken seriously are the same thing?
Ooh, that's so deep. I mean, I guess I would be case in point that it's not, because I do like to think that I'm taken seriously at this point in my life. But I definitely show up not serious, Like I do have bright purple hair, I do dress the way I want to dress, and I bring all of it with me. I mean, you know, I'm on the school board. And I also performed Poor Unfortunate Souls in a drag outfit at the school talent show. So with my children getting around, my children ran around me as the eels.
Yeah, that feels exactly on brand. For what you would be doing in January. I'm twenty twenty four, so no, I think. I mean, my point of that question is you are showing yourself, the world and other people that you don't have to be stereotypically serious to be taken seriously, and that we do actually have to push that definition in those spaces that tend to be much more old school and like historically a certain way because it's not working.
It's not working.
Yeah, So I am I just deeply admire that you are showing up in the way that feels right to you now because it is being taken fucking seriously.
Yeah, well, I appreciate that. I mean, I think that I also think I had to let go a little bit of meeting other people's expectations, even though like it's very ingrained in me, it's hard for me not to. But also the thing that took me to my lowest during COVID and even a little bit preceding that, was that my greatest fear was realized. Like my greatest fear was that people would think that I had nepoed my
way into a room and that I hadn't earned it it. Yeah, and when I found out that people were saying it about me anyway, no matter how much I had sacrificed and how hard I had worked, it was actually really freeing.
Yeah right, because it's like, well, guess what, it doesn't actually matter what I do, because people are gonna have their own narrative. So all we can decide is who has access to us, who we give that attention and time to, and and who we just walk the fuck away from.
Yeah, totally, Like once I had, I had done so much, like such a personal sacrifice to myself to make sure that other people thought that I had earned my place,
and they still didn't believe it. So then I just started saying, well then fuck em, fuck em Like then I'm real, like for real, like I'm actually just gonna do what makes me happy, and people can think that it's serious or not serious, but I'll just keep showing up in the way that I want to show up, and you'll know to take me seriously by what I bring, and if you don't, it's your loss, honestly, because I'm happy.
It is absolutely their loss.
And it turns out that like your joy and happiness should be really from center in your life, right, that should be not something that you work really hard to earn, but it should be the way the way through.
So keep doing that, sister.
Okay, I want us to wrap with this little exercise that I do where I'm going to say three sentences and I want you to fill in the blank with what feels most right to you right now in describing kind of where you've been, where you are, and where you're going. So the three sentences are, I was, I am.
I will be Okay, I was insecure, I am truly comfortable in my skin. I will be owner of the reigning championship team for a long time. Got them FC.
Yeah you will, maybe, yes you will. I was so honored to be with you a few weeks ago in New York when you announced your four newest players, and it was such an incredible day for women's sports, for women in general, for where we're all headed and what you all are doing to shine a light on this important sort of just grounding experience that so many of us have had that have built our confidence and helped us see and feel who we are, and that you're
also telling these stories across other mediums in your Sheep Pivots podcast, and am really in every room that you enter, and.
So we will talk about Can I talk about got Them for a second? Is that okay? Okay, you can. I'm like, we haven't talked about got them yet? Know we here.
We are here to hype you and everything that you care about.
Okay, Well, first of all, thank you so much for coming to the announcement. I thought it was a great day.
It was such a great day.
I mean again, like I wrote about like my you know, twenty six soccer year playing heart like the little girl and me being like I can't believe I am near real live professional soccer players.
This is insanity.
So yeah, I like keep asking them questions. I'm like, what do you lift? Like like I just want to know how strong they are? Right, what do you lift? I'm like so impressed.
It's so fun.
I'm so psyched about it. So this came about. This is really, this is like really my sister's thing. So and I actually didn't play sports, like I was so admiring of your posts that you played sports forever. I didn't. I was like a nerdy theater kid who actually couldn't even make it onto the stage because I wasn't even talented enough to do that so I was a side player. But I love it because because.
Your talent wasn't recognized. That's how I'd like to reframe that, because that's not fucking true.
Well I don't.
That is so wonderful and generous of you. But I also think we can know where our strengths and Okay, I like I like to say in karaoke, what I lack in talent, I make up for an enthusiasm.
That's the damn truth.
Okay, I keep going, We're reframing our Okay, So my sister has a background in sports. My family has been in sports for a long time, but my sister really has a substantive experience. She ran, She built the brand for Peloton in marketing, so she built the global brand. Yes, this opportunity came up to say. She started doing some sports investing on behalf of our family and seeing that women's soccer in particular is like the investment right now, like this is this is what is busting. Yep, this
is what is bumping. And she started meeting with more people and they're like, you're in New York, Like you guys should be the New York team. And so it all came about in some ways kind of quickly and in some ways it didn't really intend to do it. But again, this is like my sister is leading an ownership group on behalf of our family, and so I'm just there to support her. I'm very excited about it. I kind of like the idea of women's soccer, but I don't know a ton and I'm kind of just
there to support her. From the minute we hit the ground and I mean literally hit the ground because this never happens. That we signed the deal on Wednesday, our team was in the championship game. We landed on Friday and won the championship on Saturday. I can't.
I mean, like, what a week?
Like what a week?
Girl?
You're like, I am really glad I bought this bomber jacket because I'm repping this.
Oh oh by the way, that bomber jacket came from one of the staff members. I was like, I don't have enough gear.
Oh my god.
I was like, where's our box of these? Yes, I mean I almost didn't even go to the championship game because I just felt kind of disconnected from it, like it was my I was. So I was there to support my sister and from the minute we got there, it was so clear that this league has just been so underinvested in and the players deserve so much better. Like I was emotionally invested from the second we got there.
We stayed in this like two star hotel with the players, which I'm so glad that we did, yeah, because we really got to see them and see how much they love and support each other, how hard they work, like they are world class athletes and our country has not invested him in them in that way and the league has not now. And so I was again like I had no expectation of being involved in the team until I arrived and they were like, oh, could you help
with this? Can you help with this? And I was like sure, And it did make me realize that the things that I had done, Like you look at my resume, it would not say she'd be doing a great job helping the championship team in their championship weekend, right, Like I don't say I didn't play sports, but you know, it's I do realize that everything in my background has led me to where they are weak, and therefore I
can be of service to them. So like, for example, this women's soccer league every single league when they're champion wins, goes to the White House for a ceremony with the President, including Little League. Do you know who's never been invited women's soccer?
Are you kidding me?
Never? The US team went as part of the World Cup, but the US Women's World Soccer has never been invited to the White House for the championship.
You're like, You're like, hold on, let me text someone. No, that's literally what I did.
Let me text the beep. Okay, Like excuse me.
For a minute. Like by the time we landed back on Sunday evening, I had like eight parts of the White House working on this. They were like, they're absolutely right, this is an oversight. We will get it. Like I actually know now that the White House Political Meetings flags this every week and it's like, do we have this on our schedule yet because we have to have it. Yes, and they're going to fix it. But like, this is this is just an example of how like these are
my friends who work in the White House. I've worked with them for twenty years. That's right. They know that when I text them this, this is important, correct, and then I'm gonna And also they know I have credibility, Like they know that I'm not going to do something that is not aligned with them because I will tell the truth and I come from a place of credibility and I don't take short term wins for long term detriment, correct.
So it was in this moment that I did feel like, Okay, the things that I have done did build me to be substantively be able to contribute here. So that's my Gotham thing.
So girl, it's absolutely true.
And I think I think the lesson here and the lesson that you keep learning as you let your intuition guide you to sort of what's next, is that it's not always going to look like a very clear line connecting something. But who you are not what you've necessarily even done or what you are known for. Who you are is what you are bringing to that organization, that mission, that group, that conference, that.
Event.
People follow will follow you through fire, right, and people trust you and they believe in what you're doing and they want to be around you.
And by the way, that is true for every one of your listeners, Like all of that is true, Like be who you are and people will follow and work with you.
Absolutely, And I think the thing to as we get older. You know, I definitely had that pivot moment when I turned forty, when I just there's this phrase that.
Kept coming into my head.
I will no longer abandon myself in service to others, because I had spent my entire career and even my personal life really feeling like my value, my worth came for my service and whatever I had to do to shape shift to meet that demand.
Is how I was supposed to live.
But when you figure out that that is not the truth, all of the haters, just like you said that, like, regardless of what you do, will always have their view of what you are. Their voice is just fade away, right, And so it is all about doing what you feel is right, like living your truth and surrounding yourself with people that are there for you.
And that is clearly what you're doing.
It's what you've done. It's why I was there, Listen. I know Carolyn, but I wasn't there because of Carolyn. I was there because of you, right, And so I think that's what's important to note is that so many of the people in that room were there because of you, And it doesn't matter that you didn't fucking play soccer.
That's not what it's about, right, It's it's your.
It's your like, your enthusiasm, your light, and also your perspective that is like, okay, we got to follow that. If em thinks this is important, something's up.
Something's up. And so I hope that you continue to feel that.
I love you, Erin, I love you too. I love you.
I'm so proud of you. I can't wait to be at a Gotham game. I can't wait to continue to listen, to support and hype your podcast and show up in all the spaces where you are because you are doing such incredibly important work, not because of the family that you were born into, but because of the human that you have become.
Well now I'm going to cry. Thank you.
Crying is good, It's a it's a cathartic exercise.
Thank you. You are the best, and you truly are you. You truly are the hype woman that you put out into the world. Like I just I really feel that from you on so many levels. No. Remember you grabbed me middle of the podcast party and you said, are you feeling it? Are you feeling it? And I was like, okay, yes, I guess I'm feeling it right.
Right, It's like it's like, look around, everyone is here for you. Like it's so easy in those moments to just be like, oh, I got to take this picture, gotta do this thing. It's like no, no, no, you had an idea, you took the risk, you put your heart out into the world to be received and have commentary on, and then it led to this moment.
These are the things, right.
I say this all the time because I think it's really important, especially for people that dare to tell the world what they think. People with ideas are dreamers, right, and if they do People with ideas who do nothing are dreamers. People with ideas who do something are entrepreneurs. Right. They are founders, They are builders, they are creators.
That is a much.
Harder place to play.
We can think of amazing stuff all the time, and then we are super safe and telling no one and doing nothing. When you put it out there, that's when the rubber me the road.
Yeah, totally keep putting your shit out there, you too, lady, put it out Thanks.
Am love you, thank you, love you.
Thank you for spending time with us today. We hope you feel motivated, inspired and fired up to take on and burn down that patriarchy. We can't wait to see you again next time. Until then, please do your part to Hype Women. The Hype Women podcast is produced by Aaron Gallagher and Melanie Scroggins. Original score by Alex Yuwan. Please listen, subscribe, and rate our show wherever you listen to podcasts the most.
Thanks for listening to this episode of she Pivots slash HiPE Woman. We'll be back next week with our regularly scheduled programming. Until then, best of luck for all those on spring break. Leave us a rating and tell your friends about she Pivots. If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to follow us on Instagram at she Pivots the Podcast or sign up for our newsletter where you can get exclusive behind the scenes content. On our website, she Pivots the Podcast dot com. Talk to you next week.
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