I'm on the front page!

Saturday morning I woke up to this message from a friend:

"It's like you're in the kitchen with me!"

A couple hours later, I bought the only remaining copy of the paper at a deli and giggled my way through paying the man at the register, saying I was in it and then fumbling to show him the front page of the Life section of The Poughkeepsie Journal. 

I wish for you to experience a complete stranger as genuinely thrilled on your behalf as he was, exclaiming congratulations and, "I'm glad to meet you in person!" If I could have reached over the counter, you know I would have hugged him. Come to think of it, I may have to go back.

People called my parents. A lovely group of Jehovah's Witnesses stopped me in a coffee shop. Another woman touched my cheek sweetly and whispered, "You look younger in person."

I'll take that!

Thanks to the writer, Brian PJ Cronin, and the photographer, Erica Leman with Sweet Alice Photography, for this beautiful feature about my book, business and the local community I formed just over two years ago, Hudson Valley Women in Business.

I created it after moving back to my hometown in upstate New York and missing other women business owners to hang out with. I believe women do business differently. We bring our full selves. We take personally how our customers feel when they buy from us. In this community we built together, we learn from and support each other, and share honestly how scary it is figuring it all out on our own. Because it is sometimes, and we're doing it anyway.   

It's why I do what I do.

Simply Leap, the book and my business, is about facing fear getting in the way of you believing in yourself and acting like it. Trusting your instincts (because they are right!), feeling less anxious and more confident, and not letting another year...two...five go by and being exactly where you are now. 

Life is too precious and work is too important for you to put it off any longer. And when the oh-my-god-what-did-I-do scary feelings set in after you start to make a change, I'm still right there with you. Because when you hang in there a little longer that's when the magic happens.

Like the front page, for example. 

I'm grateful I get to be featured for helping people through the scary bits to get to the really fun, happy bits after that. Thank you for helping me get here.   

When you're ready to leap, you know where I am. I believe so much in you, in all of us.