Hello, everyone, and welcome back to a brand new episode of The Financial Confessions.

I am your host, founder, and CEO of The Financial Diet, Chelsea Fagan, and also just a person who loves talking about money. And with money, for most of us, an incredibly important subject, an area of focus is our careers.

For most of us, what we end up doing for work is going to define things like our earning potential, where we spend the majority of our waking hours, and how we're using all of our various talents and skills. There is a hot and very rich debate always going on about to what extent you should expect your job to be fulfilling or a dream job, god forbid, or something you love, and to what extent it's more healthy to focus on just minimizing the amount of sheer time and place it takes up into your life and using that time for other things. There's also a huge value in people who's objective financially is to retire very early and totally escape the professional world, Because no matter how good a job might be, it's still not where they want to be focusing the majority of their time.

But for the rest of us, who are not going The Real Housewives route and just marrying a rich 70-year-old, which, honestly, worked to those women, we're going to have to work, and we're going to have to leverage both our skills and our ability to advocate for ourselves in order to not only get the job or jobs that we want, but to also be compensated in a way that is commensurate with our talents. That means both at the interview, and it means throughout your job, because negotiating should be an ongoing thing, and ensuring that you are continuing to move up in any given organization and be compensated accordingly is incredibly important. To that end, we are, as of this Saturday, this coming Saturday, having our second all-day conference.

It is an all-day digital conference. Again, we are still being digital friendly with the COVID protocols. It is called Career Day, and it is an all-day conference around sort of building, improving, entering into, changing, and just sort of taking hold of your career from all angles.

This could be people who are just starting out post-college. This could be people who maybe even didn't go to college, like myself, and are looking to sort of backdoor their way into a certain career. Maybe they're looking to change careers.

Maybe they're looking to get a promotion or negotiate a better salary. Essentially, this is the all-day conference that teaches you how to do all of those things and more. We're having tons of featured experts from all around the career world, including for people who are entrepreneurs or are focusing more on their side hustles.

I will be there. I will be both doing the hello and goodbye, as usual. I'll be moderating a panel.

I'll be doing all kinds of stuff. But our guest today is one of our most featured speakers at Career Day. She is a longtime career expert.

She was both a full time recruiter and an HR manager. She's worked in marketing, advertising. Now, she is full time on the writing, coaching, consulting tip, all about sort of making the most of your career.

So she is the perfect person to speak at Career Day. She's actually going to be in multiple sessions as well as our live mentorship Q&A with some of our featured mentors. I've also been on her podcast.

It's an amazing podcast. And on the subject of career, she has many amazing things to say. So without further ado, I would love to welcome our guest, Jazmine Reed-Clark.

Hi, Chelsea. Thank you so much for having me on The Financial Confessions. This is definitely a pinch-me moment in my whole life.

Oh, stop. We are, as you know, huge fans of yours at TFD. You've been working with us on different things for a while, and we're so glad to have you at Career Day.

Just to kick it off, what are you going to be doing and talking about at Career Day? Yes, well, you guys have been lovely enough to trust me with the opening session. So hopefully, just setting the vibes right, high and good.

And then into that, I will moderate a beyond-- getting beyond the entry level, which I'm really excited about. I think when I was entry level, that's when I made the most mistakes. So I'm so happy to be able to ask questions to women who have mastered it and really be within that space.

And then later, in the afternoon, I will be a panelist, where we're doing a Q&A. And I can answer all things related to career, like getting over professional-- fuck-- I can still curse on your-- Hell yeah, you can. Hell, yeah.

Any, like, professional fuck-ups, and then just really, really progressing. So you'll get to really see me throughout the day, and I'm just really excited to be a part of it. Same.

So what got you into working in the career space, both from a recruiting perspective and an HR perspective? Like, what attracted you to that space? It's interesting.

My dad-- he recently retired, but he was in human resources. I saw what he did. I thought, I will never do that.

That looks so boring. I think your job is being a walking encyclopedia. And I went to school for advertising and marketing, so I was working in social media for a few years.

And it sounds a little bit cliche, I know, but I really just didn't care about what I was doing. I wasn't passionate. I would end up always volunteering to do things with the HR team.

But it really took me working at a super toxic workplace for me to have a corporate caring moment and think, who's in charge of this? Who gets to make the decisions? And I was pivoted to human resources.

And so once I left that job, at that point, I was 25, so I was like, OK, I'm still-- I still feel young enough to try something new. I started applying for roles that were more related to recruiting and office management and human resources. And I really did just get really lucky that I found a founder.

It was a small startup in Dallas, and we made a deal. I would cover someone's maternity leave and continue to do social media. And once she came back from maternity leave, I was able to really make every rookie mistake in the book, but I was a recruiter and an HR admin assistant.

I am so curious about your experience as a recruiter, specifically. When you worked as a recruiter, so were you working in-house at a company, or were you working for recruiting like a headhunting firm? Oh, no.

So I have experience kind of doing both, but mostly in-house. So in-house at an advertising agency, in-house in retail, e-commerce, and right now, I do freelance recruiting as well. And I do that for a PR agency here in Dallas.

But typically, in-house, but a little bit of both. Well, I think this would really kind of apply to both. I'm so curious, when it comes to looking at candidates-- so obviously, you work in industries and have been in industries that are very competitive.

You're probably getting a ton of candidates for limited positions. What are common mistakes that you see candidates making, who are great, are very qualified, clearly could do the job, but are not presenting themselves well? Ooh, I love this question.

And I always preface it with, I'm not in sales, and I am someone who cringes at the word "networking." But at the end of the day, you are selling yourself, and you really have to be your best sales person. And so often, a really great example is I was trying to fill a role for a marketing manager, ironically enough. And she-- her resume just wasn't very great.

However, she was a referral from somebody I had previously worked with. So it's all about who you know, for better or for worse. And I took the call anyway, and she said, hey, I would love just your candid feedback on my resume.

And I said, well, it's really short. You don't tell me anything that you've done at the job. And she said, oh, well, I just thought I should keep it short and sweet.

And to that, it's yes, I do think, keep it one page, short and sweet. But when you have those, they say, statistically, you have six seconds to grab a recruiter's attention. Lead with what you do.

Lead with what you are great at, and what's your bread and butter? Like, why do I need to keep reading your resume? So I would say the biggest mistakes are people underselling themselves.

Another big mistake-- and I made this early in my career-- y'all, I don't need to see the job description that you had for your job. Tell me not what you were paid to do, but tell me how you did it well. So that's another thing is, again, not being very specific, not having metrics.

And then the final thing, and I'm smiling because I definitely did this early in my career, but leaning too hard into gimmicks, like trying to make it look like a social media website, and yes, graphics are beautiful. But at the end of the day, if it's hard to read, it it's hard to follow, or if I feel like you are trying to pad it with fluff, those things are going to end up working against you, not for you. Yeah, I like that a lot.

No, obviously, if your job is social media content creator, you might want to lean a little more heavily into that. But I totally agree that it's a fine line, too, because I always feel strongly that when you're sending a resume and cover letter, just the aspect of having them both beautifully formatted with matching letterhead and very not intrusive but very professional colors, like the thing looks really professional. I feel like that goes a long way, but you can easily overdo it.

Absolutely, and a fun fact is a lot of companies use applicant tracking systems, ATS. So like Lever, Greenhouse, and those-- it's AI. They can't always read past the beautiful fonts, so there's a lot of free resources you can use, if you're like, hey, what does mine look like?

That's actually how I found out that my very beautiful resume looked like gibberish in an ATS system. So also make sure you're leveraging those tools. If you were ever going to send an email, send the gorgeous resume.

But if you're applying online into what I call the black hole of applicants, you sometimes want to use the more basic resumes so that it actually is read by the ATS system. That is a really hot tip. I actually didn't know that myself.

Hot tip. That is a hot tip. Now, when it comes to the sort of, like-- it's interesting that, obviously, you're a career coach now.

And actually, I have a friend who was going to, who was going to therapy for several years. And she stopped going to therapy, and she did like two sessions with a career coach. And she was like, wow, that was so much more helpful than multiple years of therapy.

She was like, the first year of therapy was good, but after that, I feel like I was just kind of running circles. And the career coach kind of woke me up to the fact that a huge part of my mental health problems was that I was in a job that was so wrong for me and that I really wasn't advocating for my self professionally. And we often think of mental health and professional life as being very separate, but when you consider that that's where you spend the majority of your waking hours, that is so important.

So when it comes to candidates presenting themselves and whether they're in the application process or they haven't even considered applying yet or they're debating whether or not they can apply, where do you see mental health factoring in to how people present themselves and how they approach opportunities, especially women? Incredible question. The short answer-- every stage.

But to elaborate a little bit more, I will see candidates who don't even want to apply for jobs, because they are afraid of rejection. They feel like this is their only shot at a certain job. And one thing that I really learned, just as an individual, is the confidence, your relationship with yourself, and your own journey with confidence has to start I mean, like, yesterday.

And it really transcends, like I said, every part of the process. Or when people do get rejection, it's interesting the narratives they'll tie to it and why they feel like they [? can't ?] go out for that next position. So I think mental health really starts at every single stage.

I think the biggest thing I've seen, Chelsea, is people don't-- they feel like they're bragging when they talk about the metrics. They feel that-- their imposter syndrome, I think, shows up the most. And it's like, well, I don't want to put that on my resume, because-- just to kind of give a more helpful example, let's say that you have a quota.

You met your quota, and I'm like, hey, why isn't that on your resume? You tell me that you did administrative processing. Why didn't you tell me that you met your quota for the entire year of 2019?

Well, I mean, my quota wasn't really that hard. It's that sort of talking yourself out of it, wanting to shrink yourself, because maybe you want to look humble, or maybe you just genuinely didn't think it was a big deal, but what might not seem like a big deal to you could be huge to someone else. And I'll pick on myself for a moment.

I don't think it's that impressive that I do public speaking. To me, it's like, let's just talk. I pretend that I'm talking to a friend, like you, Chelsea.

In my mind, we are very good friends. In my mind, too. So to me, it feels very natural.

But someone like my husband or one of my best friends, they feel like that is a really incredible skill set. So it's leaning into that, being proud of it, and being proud enough to put it on your resume and speak to it in an interview. So more simply, mental health at every stage, but the way to get over it-- or I didn't even say, get over it, but really look at the narrative you're telling yourself at every process.

And I would really, really recommend keeping a work journal. At the time, I didn't even know that's what it was called, but writing down your highlights. I keep on now-- I still battle with imposter syndrome all the time.

So when you do have a small win or a big win, keeping that work journal. You can also reference that when you're creating your resume. And then, more than anything, I was really unhappy during the pandemic.

I had a job I just started, and I kept another work journal just to say, why do certain interactions make me feel small? Why did I hate going to work? Why was I crying every day.

And then I could also see different themes and patterns to know, all right, is it the job? Is it the industry? Or is it myself?

There's a lot in there. I have to-- Sorry. No, no, no, in a very good way.

You know what's funny about the imposter syndrome thing? I recently-- like, not recently, recently, but as of a year ago or two, I'm like, fuck no, I don't have imposter syndrome. I think I'm way more qualified than half of these-- no offense-- but completely-- I mean, maybe they're good at whatever the technical skill is, but socially, completely incompetent male executives.

And I'm not going to get really into it, but one of my favorite business idols-- and I don't have many, because there's not many good ones out there, but they recently just, like, crashed and burned there. They lost, like, I think half of their employees over what was a completely avoidable error on an HR front. So I mean, even just amongst other executives, I'm like no, most of these people are not better than me.

Let's just say that. But I also think that that's so true of most women, and it's mostly women, I feel, who have imposter syndrome. It's like, if you go to any Fortune 500 company, I guarantee you there is an entire class of especially men, who are in the late Gen X boomer age, who can barely operate a piece of software and who are being paid four times as much as you.

And it's like, those fuckers don't ever have one second of imposter syndrome. Girl, OK. You want to really get into it?

All the tea about to spill-- I can't name names. I am a ghostwriter for some of the biggest executives in big tech. The amount of typos I get in emails, the fact that they can barely work an iPhone, and you're in big tech, and I'm writing these words.

And you see the comments, like, oh, my god, this is amazing. And I'm like, LOL. It's like-- I'm 30, so I'm like, it's just a 30-year-old girl who is throwing around some buzz words, and then people fall over it.

So, if anything, becoming an entrepreneur has shown me most people don't know what the fuck they're doing. They're making it up as they go along. I was just telling Jordan, because I'm ghostwriting for people who want to charge a gazillion dollars to do retreats, where you basically take psychedelics and heal your inner child.

And I'm just like, I can do that. I'm like, what the hell? Why am I still over here struggling to make rent some months?

So all I'm saying is, Chelsea, amen, hallelujah, and I have proximity to that truth. And yeah, so men don't care. And then also, just even being married to a white dude, the thing-- the things he'll say sometimes.

He's like, oh, yeah, I just told my boss, no, you can't check for me after 5:00. And I'm like, you did? You set boundaries with your boss?

So I think it's really just being able to see even how your average white guy navigates corporate, to then ghostwriting for some executives. I believe that your confidence will rise. 1,000%. Also, we need to get you out to New York for a long champagne lunch, because I really want to hear the unedited version of that big tech anecdote.

Let me tell you that. But it is totally true, and I will say, so recently, there was a CEO, another fucking CEO who went viral on Twitter, because she was posting this whole thing about, my best investment as a CEO-- and it was a woman doing this. I was like, you know what it feels like to be exploited and underpaid, probably, for your work.

How dare you? But she was bragging about how the best investment she ever made was her virtual assistant. And she proceeded to describe her virtual assistant basically doing her entire job, which is a very common thing.

It especially became popular after like the whole Tim Ferriss, outsource 90% of your life to someone who's being paid like $0.25 an hour in India or whatever. So problematic. But suffice to say, the executives and even, I would say, upwards of middle management at all of these companies have a mentality of, they're actively trying to work as little as possible and have no problems outsourcing everything to everyone else.

So don't you dare feel imposter syndrome against them, when, chances are, you are working 5 to 10 times as much as them. Yes, yes, yes, and when-- OK. So you know me.

Well, this is The Financial Diet, so obviously, I'm happy to speak about money all day, every day. At the highest, I was making $90,000 a year, and I was reporting in to the CPO and the director of HR. And to give credit where credit is due, they were both incredible women in business, incredible managers, and mentors, and sponsors.

If there's one thing I'd love to get into, whether it's today or during Career Day, it's the difference between mentorship and sponsorship. But they were really great examples on that. All that to say, I got to really be behind closed doors, and, y'all, no one is a rocket scientist in the boardroom.

And I guarantee you, it's like when I was making the most money, and I had a team to delegate the task to that I had the most free time, and it's when I've been entry level or mid-level that I feel like I'm doing three jobs at once. And no one can bother to learn my name. Actually, that's an interesting digression.

But talk a little bit about the difference between mentorship and sponsorship, in your view. Yeah, I feel like I've been-- not feel like-- the difference between a mentor and a sponsor, a mentor is a person who you can-- here, I'll use you as an example, Chelsea. Maybe I'm like, hey, can I treat you to a virtual coffee, and we talk, and you give me advice, and you tell me your different stories of your youth, and we have a jolly old time?

But sponsorship is what you can give your employees. So just because I know Holly's in the room and she works so closely with you, it's advocating for Holly when she's not in the room. So if you know that she wants to try her hand at more design work, now that she's the creative director, it's advocating for her when you're having those really intimate conversations with Lauren.

And maybe Lauren wants to live internationally again. And so you say, hey, let's try something where Holly takes over a project for you for a week. Or even if it's not something that's as tangible as taking on a project, it's really speaking up for Holly when she's not in the room or helping her with that different connection that she could really, really benefit from.

I think mentorship is when you're giving away free advice, but mentorship is when you are connecting incredible connections, resources, and really giving somebody that opportunity so that they can level up at work. And I would really challenge everyone-- I mean, you can be a mentor or a sponsor, if you're 22 or 52. But really, try to think of the difference, and on a much more woo-woo level, I really think my gifts of abundance have come when I've aimed and strived to be a sponsor and connect people.

And then, It's just-- I don't know-- it's a good cycle to be a part of. But that's the biggest difference. And really look around.

A lot of people are cool to be your mentor. A lot of people don't want to be sponsors, because, unfortunately, we still live in a culture where competition [INAUDIBLE] collaboration, and that's also another thing I can talk about over champagne for [INAUDIBLE] years. A dream.

Also, between Lauren-- the Lauren living abroad and Holly anecdotes, you are caught up on the TFD lore, I have to say. [LAUGHTER] I can write the fan fiction. It's fine. Yeah, I think that's a really good point.

And I think, also, so one thing I want to talk to you about, especially as it comes to people navigating their career who have not thought-- and I think this is, again, especially common in women-- who have not thought proactively about advocating for not only themselves, but also thinking a few steps ahead in terms of their career. I think it's very common for people to get a job. It's like, it's just good enough.

It pays just good enough. And you sort of get really stuck in it. You get used to like, maybe they're giving you a little above a cost of living raise every year.

Maybe you get this or that perk. So it doesn't even really occur to you. I feel like a lot of people only really think to look outside their job when they're in a bad situation.

So when it comes to people who have a job that's maybe just OK, and maybe they're being-- especially if they've been at the company for a while and started at a fairly entry level position, chances are they're probably not being paid super competitively compared to what they could go out and get. But let's just say, for a lot of people, they're in a job that's OK. When do people know that it's time to start looking elsewhere versus I need to advocate for myself to get in a better situation at this company?

That's a great question. I've written about this before for other publications, and there's a few answers. One is, when you no longer want to be promoted.

I know when I finally made the decision to go from social media into human resources, I was sitting down with my manager at the time. And kind of similar was I was meeting quarterly goals. I was happy with my salary, but I was not happy in the role itself.

Didn't really know how to change industries at that point. I definitely learned to do so along the way, but I remember sitting down with her, and she said, you don't want to be the senior social media manager. So to me, that's kind of proof that you might be in the wrong field.

And it could have been a flippant platitude at the time, and maybe it was for her. But that really proved to be true. And when I was in human resources full time in corporate America, I climbed the ladder, yeah-- let's be real-- a little bit out of my own insecurities and wanting to prove myself and being a woman of color and wanting to be like, hey, I deserve to occupy space here.

But it was also because I wanted to climb the ladder, because I want to work on that program. So really see, where is your hunger lying and satisfaction? But another way to look at it is, I mean, you-- actually, it was a TFD article that really put this in perspective.

When you are leaving companies, many times, you are leaving money on the table. We have compensation bands. If the company grows, can compensation bands grow?

Sure. Have we brought in outside consultants when I worked in tech and realized, hey, we should be paying this role more? Yeah.

Then, were we like, oh, we should actually be paying this role less? Yes. And I know people who, once you hit that band, worked at the company for years and just never saw more money.

So I would also look and look at your financial planning. Are you leaving money at the table by staying at this job? And then, finally, where do you want to grow professionally?

If you are like-- my husband's a really great example. He is, if anyone's into the Enneagram, he's an Enneagram 9. He's somebody who can set really healthy boundaries with work.

He doesn't get his self-confidence from work. So instead, it's OK, what relationship do you want to have with work? And then that's how we were able to make decisions when his last company was affected by COVID.

OK, let's make a sound decision, or if you're not chasing a dollar sign or a title, all right, you want flexibility. Great. Let's figure out what that's going to look like for you.

So it really all goes down to planning, so whether it's you're planning for finances, goals, happiness, that's when I think you're able to really navigate what your next step should be. In terms of specific phrasing, I'd love your script for two situations. One, you're being hired-- you're being offered a job, but the offer is too low.

And the other is you found out that you're making 20k below what you should be making on Glassdoor and want to advocate for a substantial raise. OK, now, let me ask you this. Are you already working at this company, or are you a candidate, like an interview candidate?

So in the first situation, you're in the process of being offered a job, so you're being hired. And in the second situation, you've already been at this job for a while. Maybe you started at a low salary, but you're finding out that after several years, you're not commensurate with what you should be making, and you need to advocate for a big raise.

Mm-mm-mm. So the first, as a candidate, and you find out Glassdoor-- so this has happened to me. The script would be something to the effect of, well, OK-- and I'm actually going to throw a little curveball in there.

If you have already set your salary requirements, that can get a little bit trickier, but I have done this. After interviewing with the role, and now that I understand more of the scope of work, I believe that this role is worth X to X. And that is my compensation requirement.

And if they come back and try to negotiate with you, I mean, I feel like there's like this whole other road we can go down. But the starting script is, if you've already given your salary expectations, but then it's not until after that you've done your homework, and you realize that it's 20k less, then, hey, based off our interviews, I realize that the scope of work is really going to demand more strategic thinking, more of my background in blank and blank. Therefore, my new compensation requirements are as follows-- fill in the blank.

Now, if they didn't ask for salary requirements, but then you go on Glassdoor. You see that they come in with a really low offer. Again, this has also happened to me and other clients.

You say, thank you so much for this offer. I'm so flattered. I would love to have my future be with X company.

At this point, my compensation expectations for this role are blank and blank. How can we get closer to said number? And I also want to give a big note here.

I don't want to say don't get hooked on a number, but more so, you-- look at their benefits program. Look at 401(k) matching. Look at vacation time, flexibility, office hours.

And really, I want you to take inventory. I had a client, who let's just say money wasn't a problem for her. It's, OK, then what matters to you?

And for her, it was an education stipend. So don't feel like you have to follow an old school guidebook. If you want somebody to pay for you to go back to school, and that wasn't something the company offered-- that's what she negotiated-- that's also an option that you have.

And then, going over into side B, and that's you've been working at this company for a few years. You realize you're making 20 grand less. Now, this is where you've got to be careful and buckle up.

Figure out, what is the performance compensation plan at your company? Now, if you've got a larger company, it is something that's going to be pre-established. You can speak with HR.

I've seen this happen where you can absolutely state your case and say, hey, I know that other people make this amount. I do think you are-- I'm just going to give you a peek behind the curtain. I think sometimes that can only create more boundaries for you down the road, unfortunately, with different teams.

I think office politics get involved when that happens. So see what the performance metric is, and I would, instead, have a really open communication plan with HR and your manager. And say where you want to be, and figure out a plan to get there, before you go in with more of a fierce plan of attack.

And the other options you have-- oh, if they don't have a really concrete-- maybe you're working for a startup. They don't really have a performance compensation plan or performance reviews at all. Then that's where you have to have a transparent conversation with your manager and say, hey, I've been working here for X amount.

Explain the worth you already bring to the company. I wouldn't only say, hey, this is what I saw on Zip Recruiter, but it's, this is what I've done for the company. Here's how I've made the company money.

Here's why I'm worth this new amount of money. Also, here's what a competitive salary is. And this, again, is where you need to have honest conversations with yourself.

Do you have a line in the sand number? When push comes to shove, if they say no, are you going to look for a new job? Are you going to tell them you're going to look for a new job?

So I still think there's a lot of internal dialogue that has to happen, even before you take those next steps. Yeah. Yeah, and I mean it sounds like you're also kind of saying that, especially if you're at a company with a lot of predetermined sort of ranges for these types of things, that you might need to just be prepared to move out, to move up to that higher level.

Exactly, 1,000%. And even looking into, are there other positions at the company that you're interested in? Do they have other programs you can take advantage of?

One thing I would love to say, [LAUGHTER] if nothing else, milk the company for all the resources they have. You'd be shocked how many people don't take up employee stipends or conference budgets. Listen, it's there for a reason, especially if a company is, like, venture-backed.

Those benefits might not be there forever. So use a company for everything that they can offer you, even if it isn't salary, and then, yeah, sometimes it is you've got to move out to move up. I love that.

Now, in terms of going back a little bit to that intersection of sort of mental wellness and professional development, which I know is an intersection that you really focus on in your work-- so I actually-- I will say, I'm not just saying this because Jazmine is the guest. I feel like everyone needs to book a couple sessions at some point with a career coach, because I do feel like a lot of people don't even understand what their problems are or what they may not be noticing about themselves until they get that outside look at it. Like, I plan to do it.

And yeah, I think that's very helpful. But in terms of, if people maybe are not at that step right now or don't have the budget for that right now, what are some sort of self-evaluations that people can do and ways in which people can try to get a more objective or external look at their own behavior, specifically as it pertains to in the workplace, in their job? Yes, absolutely.

And because I want to make sure I answer it as best I can, would you say the biggest problem a lot of readers have is just not feeling stuck where they are or just feeling emotionally unmotivated? I would say feeling stuck, in some ways, maybe self-sabotaging or not living up to their potential, one or the other. And I would say, also, as a last note to clarify the question, so obviously, if a person has a great manager, that manager is going to be really a sponsor, as you said, and also someone who's frequently giving them really great feedback.

But a lot of people don't have that, so they're also not able to get that sort of outside perspective, outside of a very limited amount of reviews, in which case the analysis might not be very deep. So often, these people are just, I think, lacking a really good mirror to their own work behavior. Oh, yes, this is great.

So in a perfect world, you would get 360 reviews, which don't get me wrong-- there are pros and cons to every review system. And a 360 review, just for extra context, is sometimes what will happen at a lot of companies is, yes, your manager will give you a review, but also maybe an internal client, external clients, people below you, people above you. So again, as the name kind of insinuates, you get a 360 review of how you are as a professional.

If you're not getting that or you don't have reviews, or if you're just genuinely curious, or maybe you just work with people who don't care for you and you know that, that's where I would really recommend hosting virtual coffees nowadays, but really taking people who you admire in the company or people who work closely with you out to a coffee out to lunch, or just schedule a one on one with them. And explain to them what your end goal is. So I work best with examples.

So perhaps you are a marketing manager, and your goal is to become a senior marketing manager. Well, first, ask yourself, why? Is it that you just want a glossy title, or is it because you understand that they work with the more glamorous external clients?

Let's say it's the latter. So then what I would do is really look at people you admire in the company. I always say, look at somebody who is entry level, because it's a really refreshed perspective, and you'll be shocked.

People beneath you really know way more than we give them credit for, as we said at the top of the hour. Somebody who you admire-- maybe you look up to them. You want their job, or you just want something they have.

And then another person-- and I'll give you a real life example. She was kind of difficult to work with. She was-- I'll put it this way.

Like, I would not want get a beer with her after work. But she was somebody who was able to really command a space. Nobody took her for granted.

I'm someone who can be a people pleaser and a pushover, and she is the opposite of that. So I treated her to a lunch, and I said, hey, one thing I'm personally working on in my professional life is learning to command more of a presence when I'm speaking with the executive suite, which is something she was already doing. I would love to know, how do you overcome the fear of talking to the CEO, or how do you have confidence when you're pitching an idea to the C-suite, and they don't like it?

And then that's when, oftentimes, they-- let's keep it real. They're buttered up. They feel good.

But then they want to give you that advice. And that's where I learned from her the kind of confidence trick she goes and she does before meetings. But to go back to that marketing manager position, let people know, hey, I'm really looking to progress in my career here at X company.

My dream is to be senior marketing manager, because I would love to work with more external clients, who do X, Y, and Z. You give them kind of that framework of, here's where I want to be. Here's why.

Here's the skill sets I hope to acquire. And then say to them, so I would love to learn from you, because-- insert why they relate to your goal. Can you give any advice on getting a promotion or working with external clients, or whatever is going to make the most sense in that particular example.

And then that's where, often, you're going to get valuable advice, free advice. But often, and if you make it more specific, the person is also going to say, here's an idea that you can do. I know someone really wanted to do a role that was similar to mine at a different company.

So I was able give the example of, hey, I think you should get more involved with ERGs and more of our diversity and inclusion efforts if you want to be a DNI program manager. Right now, you're not involved in anything, so that doesn't-- it doesn't align. So that's really the script I would take, the approach I would suggest to a client if they were coming to me with this issue.

So one of the questions or, rather, I guess, more general topics that I wanted to talk to you about-- so a lot of our-- I mean, obviously, the majority of our audience, as you know, is women. A lot are in the age where starting a family is either kind of an active consideration or something they know that they might want in the future. I know, as we've discussed, you are, similarly, on that child free by choice train.

Whoop-whoop. [LAUGHTER] And so it's not necessarily something that's top of mind for you. But I can only imagine that a lot of your clients and the people that you've worked with in recruiting or in-house or what have you are working mothers or are going to be working mothers. In terms of setting good expectations for women, I think this is something that, obviously, we try to do everything we can as a company, and we still have a lot more that we need to do and are going to do to make it a great place for moms to work.

But the truth is that a lot of companies are not that focused on making their company a great place for moms to work. And we live in a country that is not super focused on moms being able to work in a healthy way. So in terms of setting those expectations with the women that you've worked with, talk to me a little bit about sort of reframing the sort of cliche "having it all" perspective and reframing expectations in terms of truly being able to balance career and motherhood for women who are passionate about both.

That is such a good question, and even just the having it all thing, I was thinking about that this morning and that I would love to change a lot of the conversation happening around it. So setting expectations-- let me ask you this. Do you-- and I can answer both, but setting expectations with your employer and manager or, more so, setting expectations with yourself and the ones that you have for and your family?

I would say more for yourself and your family, only in the sense that I think, for many women, they don't have a ton of agency with regards to setting expectations with their employer. There's probably some things that they can do on the margins, but I think-- I'm more talking about setting expectations before you even have the child, with yourself, with your family, for example, with your partner. Yeah, absolutely.

Man. Let me think. So like you said, I am child-free by choice.

However, I can explain, to an extent-- and I just want to acknowledge it now. I know being married with no children and being married with children are two very, very different things. And we have the added privilege of we're both working from home right now.

So we're not even trying to go to soccer practice or breastfeed while we're on a call. But I do know that my marriage, when you are a workaholic and now a freelancer, it absolutely has affected our marriage and our relationship. And we have had to sit down and have those expectations to kind of, I think, be more of an open book.

I know I personally had to sit down and say, OK, what do I-- what do I want my family life to look like? And for me, I know that looks like protected date nights. Again, I know that is coming from a place of privilege that we can even have the luxury of time to have a protected date night.

But it's Friday nights, we usually grab a beer, a Guinness, sit on our porch. It's nothing luxurious by any stretch, but knowing that we have that designated time to see each other and that work can't interfere. Also, having set office hours-- I tried really hard to not have those, but I don't-- I typically don't work before 10:00 AM.

And that is so we can have breakfast together, because I am usually working late into the night. We go on walk-- excuse me-- walks together, but also realizing that I have screwed up. And just this past weekend, we were supposed to go camping together, but I had so much work stuff come up.

And I think that definitely was disappointing to my husband. We have been excited for this camping trip for a few months. So now, it's really setting in place-- again, this is me as an entrepreneur, but setting in, like, PTO days and making sure that I honor those and treating it the same way I would if I was working in an office, but to kind of make it a little bit more broad and something that could be applicable to somebody who's working a standard 9:00 to 5:00.

It's open transparency and having an aligned vision on, what does family life look like? I do know-- [? T is ?] one of my friends who works in HR.

Her goal is to move back to LA in about two years, when she and her fiance are ready to build their family. So they have those conversations, and he's an entrepreneur. She works a standard 9:00 to 5:00, so she takes on that breadwinner role.

And he helps with the dogs and more of the cooking and cleaning, so I think it's really defining the roles in your household operations. That's what is working for us now. But yeah, that's-- it's a work in progress.

I can't lie. I definitely don't have it all figured out. Yeah, I will say, we are, as a company, in such an interesting position, because, essentially, our entire workforce is women who are of childbearing age, and the majority either have children, are trying to have children, or are about to have children.

So for us as a company, it's, like, an absolute competitive necessity to make sure we're exhausting all of our resources to make it a mom-friendly environment. And even in that, we're looking-- we only learned after our first employee took her maternity leave that much of it could be subsidized by the state. We didn't even know that.

So we're trying now to get reimbursed by New York state for the money that we spent on that. So there are state reimbursements. There's also-- we're looking into state reimbursements and tax credits for things like child care stipends, things like that.

And we, even as the business owners, did not know about a lot of these resources and have to actively research them. So one thing I would say in terms of setting expectations with an employer is to, if they're not firing on all cylinders in terms of what's available, do the research on your end, and go to them with, there's this thing that our state pays for. You will not have to spend a dime, and I get access to this, whatever that might be.

It totally varies state to state. But at least do the due diligence of seeing what might be available to you. And see if maybe even your company doesn't know, because it could be a beneficial thing for the company.

Totally. But I'm interested to know, though-- this is such a taboo subject, but. I really feel that we did probably the worst disservice psychologically to women in terms of feminism or in the name of feminism, rather, that we've ever done by giving that having it all message and by telling women that they don't have to choose in a society that absolutely requires them to choose between certain things and absolutely prevents them from having it all in the way that we've kind of framed it.

I feel that we've set an entire generation of women up for just-- I mean not just failure on certain terms, but also, I think a perpetual frustration and disappointment with themselves. And I think it's a little bit changing in our generation, but if you think about that micro-generation of late Gen X, early millennial, where it's like the image of the rail thin woman with her Martini and her briefcase and her stroller, it was like, that is a deranged image. And so I feel like I definitely, when I made the choice to really be on that child-free path, it was mostly because I just am too career-oriented.

I'm too oriented towards other things, and I couldn't-- I know I can't have it all. Is that a factor in your choice? And if so, how do you consult women who feel at that crossroads?

Oh, my gosh, yes. Chelsea, read me, because it was that. It was I grew up an only child, and I-- look, I had two working parents, and I've gone through enough therapy off and on for 11 years to reach the point that I know both of my parents did the best they could.

With what they knew. But I think a lot of us can probably look back and see different core beliefs we developed. And I just always felt, as a kid, I was an imposition, not because my parents were saying that, but it's what their actions were saying.

I always felt like they were having to choose between going to my cheerleading practice or going to bongo night, or I just always felt like I was the imposition. And I don't want my kid, my supposed kid, to have that feeling. Further, I am selfish.

No, I'm selfish. I got to get, like-- I don't want to always put a-- I'm selfish, and I don't always want to put other people above my own. I feel like I do that enough as it is, and I also think we don't talk enough about, I think it's "honest motherhood" is the hashtag on Instagram.

And I'm seeing more people talk about it. But. my god, most people I know who have had children have dealt with postpartum depression or dealt with crying in a pantry by themselves, and it's not to say that, oh, well, if that's going to happen, don't have kids. But rather, let's look at the whole scope.

Like, I think my husband, there's a quote he once heard. Like, everybody wants to be a dad, but not everyone wants to be a parent. And it's, do you really want the responsibilities?

That is huge. I don't. And I love kids.

Like, I have niece-- well, play nieces and nephews, and I have one come over this Saturday. And I'm, like, the boujie auntie who gives them all the toys. I'm cool with that.

But yeah, a lot of things came into play. And to me, it was just also-- and here's a fun, I don't know, some psych doctor can call me up and do a study on me. I thought parenthood would just be one more thing I would fail at.

And that's just me being very candid. And I don't want to put that on myself, because I already feel like I put enough pressure on myself, and I would be damned if I'm going to have my kid-- if I'm going to pass on any generational wounds. I want to try to fix my own generational wounds and figure it out.

But yeah, that's-- part of my career has definitely played a part in my decision making to not have kids. I think, also, just when I-- growing up as an only child, and I know we talked about this on my podcast, I feel like I was never really a kid. So I'm like, eh, this is good.

And then, having it all, it's funny. I do some copywriting for a retirement company. And they were saying how we have pensions put in place for spouses, because there was this time when taking care of the home could be your full time job.

But now that most people are going back to work, we're taking-- we're reducing pension payouts. And it's very interesting to see that we're willing to take other things away, but we're not willing to take emotional burdens off of people. So yeah, I definitely have an issue.

That'll probably be my next big think piece for you guys. That is the idea of having it all is ruining our psyches. 100%. Also, people will never more jump in front of a grenade for you than when you say that you would not be a good mother.

Like, people are like, no. And I'm like, first of all, you don't know me. But second of all, I think we need to also really be honest with ourselves that not everyone would be a good parent, and that's also not necessarily a bad thing, because sometimes the things that make you good at other things would not make you a good parent.

And honestly-- Girl, the thing we talked about on my podcast, the thing that makes both of us good entrepreneurs, like the ADD and the juggling it, a kid does not need to be exposed to that. I would like-- I will-- OK, this is a tangent. Have you ever seen those Oprah specials where the mom leaves the kid in the car seat or in the back of the car?

Yes, I have. And-- because she just had so much going on. I'm like, that is terrifying, but I feel like I would be the mom to forget my baby in a car or something like that, but.

Oh, 100%. Like, I would-- and I leave myself open to the possibility that this could change at a later stage in my life that I'm not familiar with, but I would be like a Lucille Bluth mother. Like, I would hate my children.

And honestly, I feel like, how great would the world be if more boomers asked themselves that question instead of just assuming that no matter what fucking untreated trauma they were all coming from-- because let's be clear that all boomers were raised in what would today be considered child abuse. And none of them were like, should I be a parent? They were all like, I guess we're parents again.

No, and I even have a mental health podcast called Pretty For A Black Girl. But I talk about how my parents, who are both black, both grew up either in poverty or just working class, they experienced social mobility. So to them, they're like, how the fuck can you have depression, if you have a bed to sleep in?

You have food on the table. And then that's your baseline for emotional wealth. You can see where a lot of work had to be done.

So I'm still raising myself, but I'll try again next life, if reincarnation is a thing. Maybe I'll come back and be a mom. But in this life, I'm just trying to raise myself.

And like you said, the fact that I know I wouldn't make a good mom, I think those are the same things that make me a great friend, BFF, wing woman, et cetera. 100,000%. Now, as a last kind of topic before we get to our rapid fire questions, so a lot of what our audience will say to us when it comes to career paths is that they don't feel that inherent spark of, this is my thing. A lot of people, as I'm sure you know, they go to college.

They get a degree in whatever they thought they wanted to get a degree or their parents said they should at age 18. And now they're like, well, I don't want to do that. Or maybe they're not even able to find a job in that field, but no matter what brought them to that situation, the situation they're in is that they don't feel an inherent pull toward any one particular job or career path.

And they're not sure where to even start to find out what that should be or if they should even be a really career-oriented person. So how do you consult people who are in that space? Absolutely.

So kind of a layered question, but to answer it head on, how do I consult people in that space? We definitely get into our feelings when you work with me. So it's, let's talk about your greatest motivations, your core fears, your core beliefs.

And this is likely why your friend said that seeing a career coach is better than or at least similar to going to therapy. I've had other clients say that to me, because once we kind of recognize the relationship we have with ourselves and the idea of work, then we can kind of see how it's showing up or mirroring itself in our relationship and the workplace. So with that, let's peel back and see, what are your motivations?

What do you really want out of life? And then we kind of take it from there. But to kind of go down a few more layers and speak towards my experience when it's like, I'm so lost.

What do I want to do? I know, for me, I just asked myself, when was I the happiest? What job did I love?

And at that point in my life, my favorite job that I had ever had was working at Regal Cinemas when I was 16. I was selling candy and Raisinets to people. And I was like, OK.

Well, I know I don't want to work for minimum wage in a capitalist society, so let's see, what themes did you like? Well, I like that I could give recommendations to people. I loved that I could put a smile on people's faces.

OK, customer service. All right, let's see, how can that apply to the business world? Client relations, client services, marketing-- you can kind of see different themes.

And so one thing I'll even say to clients is rather than be obsessed with a title or an industry, type in a responsibility you'd love to do. I didn't know-- before I became a program manager, I didn't know that was a thing. I just said, culture-- like, employee culture initiatives.

And then that's when I was able to see, oh, the next step in my HR career is program management. And that's when I was able to go down that trajectory and see, OK, what skills should I acquire? What should I be an expert on?

Sidebar-- I took a lot of free classes on LinkedIn. LinkedIn has a ton of free resources. I mean, I can't say it's better than an MBA, because I don't have one, but I definitely feel like I learned a lot of jargon and was able to really level up for free.

And then, I also went down some certification routes. So that's really what I would say, but going back to that, I know I said at the top of the hour, keeping a career journal. And that's going to look different to some people.

I used to kind of cringe, but record my voice and just talk. This is before podcasts were a thing. But just to listen back to it, like I would listen back to it the next day, because sometimes it's kind of enough distance.

And then I would be like, OK, let me pretend this is my friend I'm listening to. What advice would I give her? And then really taking it from there.

But if you're feeling stuck, the biggest thing I can do is think about introspection. Look at different writing prompts that you can find online. There's many you can find for free.

But also something I recommend-- talk to your partner, your support group, your parents, or just your best friend, just somebody who knows you really well. And really ask them to hold that mirror up to you. And they often know you better than you give them credit for.

So they can really help you connect some dots. I also feel like people-- I love that you mentioned the Enneagram earlier, and it doesn't have to be the Enneagram system. But any-- I feel like any personality test that allows you to get closer to what actually motivates you, what do you respond to in terms of incentives-- like, do you need to be accountable to others?

Do you need to see the fruits of your labors every day? Do you need to have tangible results versus can you be more conceptual? I think learning about what actually gets you through a day of work is really important, too, because not enough people stay motivated on a day to day basis.

Life-changing. Life-changing. The Enneagram-- I will die on the hill of the Enneagram.

And I have to ask, what is your Enne-- well, If you're open to sharing? Yeah, of course. I think it's a 3.

OK. What's a 3? Wait, no, hold on.

We're going to do some real time research here. Whatever like-- because I always get the Hitler one. [INAUDIBLE] like-- oh, what is a one? A one is the perfectionist or the reformer.

Those are usually the-- I am not a perfectionist. It says, oriented, pragmatic, adaptive, [INAUDIBLE] driven, and image-conscious, the achiever. That's 3.

Yeah, I'm 3. I was right. See, I remembered it, guys.

I get them. [INAUDIBLE] What is your-- wait. What are your guys'? What is Jazmine? 3, 3 wing 4, yeah.

So I'm right there with you, girl. Yay, what about you? What are you, Holly?

Two, wing nine. What the hell is that? What is a two?

Helper, [? wing ?] peacemaker. Yeah, she always gets the Hufflepuff one, whatever that is. Yeah, because she's got that good heart, yes.

It's so funny, because I like to say-- did you ever do the sorting hat, just out of curiosity? Oh, wait. I could not sleep the other night, so I did the official one.

So I always got Hufflepuff, when other people would tell me what house I was in. But I got the one that Harry Potter's in. I was going to say, you seem like such a Gryffindor to me.

OK, that's the one I have. That's the one I got when I took the official quiz. So what are you?

Are you a Gryffindor? Hell, no. I'm a Slytherin.

And actually, the fun fact about that-- now, listen, they get a maligned reputation. And I guess they all are terrible now that we know that JK Rowling is a raging transphobe, but. [LAUGHTER] All houses are bad. But no, Slytherins get a bad rap.

But I just think that Slytherin's defining characteristic is that they're just opportunists. And you can be an opportunist who trends good. I feel like you could even argue that Jesus Christ was an opportunist. [LAUGHTER] But long story short. [INAUDIBLE] one.

The funniest thing is that I'm definitely a hardcore Slytherin, but I would say a healthy 70% of the employees at this company are all Hufflepuffs. [LAUGHTER] It's just like that. We're just very sweet. And what about-- what's Lauren?

A Hufflepuff, oh, my god. She is an-- I love her, but she is not a Gryffindor. [LAUGHTER] She's so Hufflepuff. To me, Gryffindors are fundamentally-- like, they're good-hearted people, but they are fundamentally about the personal glory and achievement.

And that is so the opposite of her. She's so, I want someone else to be the star, and I'm, like, a much more, help-oriented. Anyway.

Yeah, no, no, no. Mm-mm. I'm down with that.

A lot of entrepreneurs-- I'm ghostwriting for someone right now. And I'm like, because, of course, she'll say all the right things. And I'm like, so-and-so, do you want to be the star?

It's OK if you do. Let's just admit that so that we can finally build a strategy for your social media that makes sense. I totally agree.

I totally agree. But it's, yeah, it's important to know what motivates you and all that stuff. So as promised, we have come to the most captivating and thrilling part of any episode of TFD-- TFC, rather, which is our rapid fire questions.

So feel free to pass. Feel free to come back to it, what have you, but whatever comes to mind. What is the big financial secret of your industry?

Oh, my god. OK, well, let me ask you this, because you know I wear too many damn hats. Do you care what industry I pick to answer this, or can I mix it up with different answers?

Whatever you think is the most compelling answer. OK, the biggest financial secret-- honestly, I'm going to answer this as a writer or somebody who's somewhat in the public eye. You're not a millionaire.

Like, I think some of my friends are like, oh, my god, you must be ballin'. And it's, no, you got to pay those taxes. It's you have to negotiate for yourself.

You have to-- and I feel like with writers, we don't always talk about our rates. So you truly sometimes are like, uh, is this a normal thing to ask for? So that's one is there's a lot of ambiguity.

And I will also say, for HR, big secret-- there is a lot of pay disparit-- a big pay gap, which that's not news. But it was really eye-opening for me to see that men, young men have no problem asking for something that's way above the average. And women almost always will preface, like, it's totally OK if I can't have this.

And that would be one thing that I would love to see us really progress past is having to preface asking for what we think we deserve. And I still do it, too. I'm not saying it's easy, but.

Also, like mental framing-wise, if you're applying for a job, the inherent presupposition there is that you think you're the best person for this job. So why do you not think you deserve to make the most money that job can make? Boom, exactly.

Like, you literally think you should beat out every other candidate. Don't you deserve the money? Anyway, also, I feel like your friends probably think you're rich, because you're literally featured on Apartment Therapy, which is the one [INAUDIBLE] that I have yet to pass myself so.

Well-- and by the way, I made no money from that feature. I mean, I got a lot of emotional fulfillment, but. yeah, somebody was like, did they pay you thousands of dollars? I'm like, bitch, no.

Nobody paid me. Oh, well, I'm media poised enough to know that there's no way that anyone's making money off of that stuff. But it is still the ultimate coup.

I will say that. Actually, no. The Architectural Digest feature-- when I buy my home, hopefully, this year or next year, and I redo that thing from the studs upward, I'm going to pull every goddamn string that I have to get that bad boy into AD. [INTERPOSING VOICES] [INAUDIBLE] You should.

I'll help you. It'll be my-- I'll make it another part time job. Hashtag [? @chelsea ?] on Architectural Digest campaign.

But I'm not there yet, but I will be. What do you invest in versus what are you cheap about? Oh, this answer will be very different before I was 30.

I would say now, I do invest in skin care. I did not do that. I was like, yeah, like, drugstore queen.

But, oh, and by the way, a lot of my favorite brands are the natural stuff. It's basically just essential oils. I love Anne's I can never say the word-- Apothecary?

Anne's-- you know what I'm trying to say? Isn't it just apothecary? That.

I can't say-- there's a lot of words I can't pronounce. But I love a lot of different skin care lines. I will invest in that.

I will-- I mean, damn, I need to say I invested in my fitness by buying a Peloton this freaking quarantine. And the things I'm cheap about, hm? Oh, this is disgusting.

I, in the last five years, have only gotten my hair done professionally once. I just trim-- I trim bangs in my bathroom. I trim my ends in my bathroom.

I'm very cheap with other beauty things. That's not disgusting. That's a flex.

If I could do my own hair and have it look good, I would. Shit is so expensive. Oh, I know.

And then, for all my women of color who know about this, then they'll be like, oh, your hair is extra thick. Let me charge you an extra whatever. And I'm like, but that's not fair.

I can't help my genes. So yeah, getting your hair done is just too expensive. Well, let me tell you, that crosses racial lines, because I have extremely thick hair, and I get charged extra.

So-- OK. [LAUGHTER] And I'm like, what's the standard? What standard are we using? So it's just fuckery across the board.

Yeah, like, literally, only people with thin hair don't have to pay the upcharge, except my current hairdresser. You're wonderful, if, by some chance, you're watching this. You never upcharge me.

OK, what has been your best investment and why? Best investment and why. Oh, and I've written about this, too.

I spent a lot of money, thousands of dollars, on a sex and pleasure coach, Michaela Cowden. Incredible. It changed the relationship I have with my husband, with myself, my self pleasure, the way I see myself.

I've also been really open that I gained about 20 to 25 pounds during quarantine. And I'm so thankful that I invested in a sex and pleasure coach at that point, because, I mean, the last thing I felt was sexy. I had new stretch marks, and I just think nothing is by accident.

And I was meant to cross paths with her at that time. And I feel 10 times more confident now, and I know that is something that will transcend the rest of my life. So yeah, so going back to coaches and sometimes how they can be better than therapy, that's definitely my best investment.

Hands down my favorite answer to that question. Actually, sorry, can you grace us? Can you give us one tip you learned from that, and just share it with the rest of us?

Doesn't have to be super revealing. No, no, no. It's good, and it's not that sexy.

Anything can be pleasurable. OK, now I know, I know. It sounds like I'm asking you to touch yourself while you're paying your bills, which you can, if that's your jam, but-- [INTERPOSING VOICES] But yeah, anything can be pleasurable.

Like, one of the exercises I had to do was eat your favorite-- so for me, it's cookies. So eat a cookie, but eat it really slow and sensual. And yeah, you feel like an idiot when you're doing it, but the point that it's making is anything can be pleasurable.

It's not only when you're climaxing or you're helping your partner climax. It's you get to enjoy that walk to the office, or you get to enjoy paying your credit card off in full. And it's all about using all of your senses and savoring every second.

And the more that you incorporate that into the more mundane tasks, the more you realize that life really is this beautiful experience, not just when you're having these crazy highs of promotions and the things that we're always applauding people for. Your life gets to be amazing, even in the most ordinary of days. That is my favorite fucking tip, let me tell you.

I try to live my life that way, and it's so true, and also true because you could die tomorrow. Don't you want to enjoy what you did today and actually take pleasure in it? And I would take it one step further also, because I love your tip about feeling confident radiating into every aspect of your life.

I totally agree. I think a feeling of self-confidence and whatever you can do to help that happen is probably amongst the single best investments you can make in terms of how it radiates. And I will say to that, I have a tip-- not that anyone asked me, but I'm giving it anyway.

Whenever you feel your best, a day that you absolutely feel your best, write down, what are you wearing? What makeup do you have on, for all my ladies or men out there? What does your hair look like?

Did you work out this morning? What did you eat? Literally track down every detail about what brought you to feeling so confident, so good in your skin, and literally, just try to recreate that every day.

And shout out to TikTok. There's this guy on there. I think it's viral.

Some people have probably seen it. He keeps an Excel sheet, and he realized that he's like, 95% of his happy days, the sun is out. I think he gets a workout in and drinks a certain amount of water.

It's incredible how much of that can be just simple things. I totally agree. And also, lastly, as we exit the pandemic, all the clothes you don't feel amazing in, get rid of them.

They're gone. Only A-list clothes. One, Chelsea, yes.

I had-- yes, I read an article by Rachel Varina. But it was for the TFD, how she-- her someday clothes. That article also changed my life, got rid of all my bummy clothes.

And now it's-- you feel cute. I feel cute in a matching lounge set from Forever 21. Yes.

But there it is. So crucial. What has been your biggest money mistake and why?

Oh, my god. OK. The one that always comes to mind that.

I still don't know if I would take it back-- now, it does involve another party. So I'll be a little bit cryptic, but I had something that a family member had gifted me. Well, we had gone 50-50.

I felt like it was being used as, like, a power tool, a controlling tool in our relationship. So although it was a-- I will just say what it is-- a paid off car, which I went to the dealership. I was like, I want to trade this in.

I left with a car note. It was idiotic, because I didn't-- I mean, I was just so entitled, I didn't even understand the privilege that came with having a car that was paid off, and that's very embarrassing, especially now to admit that to millions of people. But once I had that car note, and I got myself into debt, unnecessary debt, that really hurt.

But again, I almost don't think I would change it, because I understood I needed to be completely untethered from a certain relationship, because it was being used as almost like a chess piece. So I still don't think I would regret it, but I definitely learned, run that car-- like, drive your car into the ground, because a car note is not something you want to have if you don't have to. That's a really interesting one, and you can see both sides.

What is your biggest current money insecurity? Right now, I would say my biggest money insecurity-- I would be embarrassed if you saw how many-- and I've actually used the tip that Holly gave years ago. Going through-- I do it weekly-- highlighting what you can't remember.

Best tip ever. I actually just went ahead and gave myself an allowance on a separate debit card, because I was still spending like I was making the amount I was making in corporate America, that I'm just not-- and I'm not there yet. I'm sure I will be in the future.

So I'm a little insecure, if you were to look at my bank statement, and you would see the things I buy from Instagram ads. So still trying to get better at impulse buying. That's real, though.

What has been the financial habit that has helped you the most? OK, two-- one is-- no, no, no. I know my number one.

Set it and forget it. If you're like me, set it and forget it. Like, I still put money into my retirement.

I still put money into other investments. And the thing is, I just don't look at it. I'll usually, on a Sunday, maybe every other Sunday, I'll just make sure that nothing is missing and that my identity hasn't been stolen.

But I love it. I feel so much more relaxed having auto payments, and that's the best thing I can do. And lastly, when did you first feel successful, and what does that word mean to you?

Oh, my gosh. OK, the first time I felt successful was-- it's really weird, because I know Ingrid Nilsen gave this answer. But it's when you get that parking ticket or a speeding ticket, in my case, and you don't have to think about it.

Like, I remember-- this is embarrassing, but I remember having a few toll-- we have tolls here in Texas, but having a few things pile up and having to get my first credit card to pay off my toll tickets. And now, I'm at a point where you don't really have to think about it. So I know that just it felt different.

It just felt like I was in a different part of life at that point. The way I would define success now, I think at one point, and being an Enneagram 3, it was having a really impressive title. I used to get really hung up on titles.

I lost a lot of sleep over it. Something I wish I could go back and tell my younger self now-- the thing I would define success now is truly feeling spiritual freedom. Do you feel like you have the freedom to live your life authentically and on your own terms?

Fan-fucking-tastic. You have-- you've, like, unlocked the highest level of life. So that's how I define success.

And I feel successful now, because I do feel like I can finally live a life closer to what I want, which is making my own hours and talking to amazing people like you, and also feeling like I'm present in my home, which I did not feel that way when I was working a standard 9:00 to 5:00. I love that. Well, Jazmine, as I predicted it would be, it has been an absolute pleasure, probably my favorite interview of the season.

I just love talking to you. It's always such a joy. Please, everyone, come to Career Day this Saturday.

See more of Jazmine. Get more of her amazing nuggets of knowledge. Maybe she'll drop another tip from her sex coach, which I would like, personally.

Wait, we can have Sex Day or Sex Ed. Yes, [LAUGHTER] Sex Day at TFD. Honestly, that's a mood.

OK, so if people love what you had to say so much that they're interested in following you but also maybe getting a one on one coaching session with you, where can they go to do that? They-- OK, follow me @Jazminereedclark, Jazmine with a Z. You can also go to Jazminereedclark.com.

And hey, I would love it if you also read the articles. I've got plenty of them at TFD, and slide into my DMs and say hi. Yes, and we'll link you guys to all of that in the description in the show notes, so you don't have to go hunting for it.

Thank you so much for joining us today, Jazmine. And thank you guys so much for tuning in, and we will see you next Monday here on The Financial Confessions. Bye.

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