If you told me last year that I would have a personal blog, one that is all about ME, with a lot of pink on it, much less a logo with pink, I would scoff. Not a polite, hidden-under-my-hand, pretend-sneeze kind of scoff but an emphatic one, bordering on a grunt, and definitely followed with a “ha” in disbelief.

Pink and I were never friends.

I grew up a tomboy, keeping pace with my brother and 3 boy cousins as we played wiffleball in my backyard and touch football in the front. I was as tough as they come (or so I thought) and Pink was way too girly for me.

I always saw Pink as frou-frou, frilly and frankly, weak. I was above Pink; she was not going to define me or my child. When I was creating the baby registry for my daughter, I chose as many green, yellow and grey items as possible. I gave my mother-in-law a hard time for getting my daughter a pink poofy dress, and unapologetically asked her to return another pink dress that she got my daughter. I look back on those instances embarrassed of myself for many reasons.

My temperament on Pink has changed in the past year. What I have come to realize is that I don’t actually dislike Pink, the color, I hate the commercialization of Pink and what companies have made it out to be.

Let’s face it, Pink has been whored out.

Sweet, innocent, beautiful Pink. Corporations have used and abused her for their own gain. So that they could claim more market share, take advantage of female buying power, and make it easier for men to get women gifts. Fun fact: women drive 70-80% of all consumer spend!

Those companies think that by wrapping their products in pretty pink bows, tiaras and sparkles, they can be made more appealing to the feminine spirit. Or even worse, make the buyer think that they are supporting a cause for women. I’m looking at you Breast Cancer Awareness Month!

[bctt tweet=”Let’s face it, Pink has been whored out.”]

Corporate use of Pink leaves a bad taste in my mouth. Deceiving consumers. Pigeonholing and stereotyping women. Making little girls look outside of themselves to fit in. I love the business world but damn its capitalistic ways that bastardized Pink!

In reality, Pink is the all unifying color.

Every person, Black, White, Asian, Latina, young, old, healthy and sick, is Pink. Give each one of us a paper cut and you will see the real Pink that is our flesh. We have come to forget this and think Pink lives outside of ourselves.

Pink is within. It is our strength, our tenderness, and our humanity.

I want to tell little girls, embrace Pink but embrace the Pink within yourselves, not the shades that adorn dolls and plastic toys. Don’t let a color, any color, define who you are. Don’t fall prey to think that embracing Pink instantly makes you more girly.

Pink is defined by the person wearing it, using it, even coloring with it – not the company that puts it on its products.

Wearing pink is a form of self-expression and if you want to wear it, do it in your own style. And if you are feeling pink one day and hunter green the next, it’s a-okay.

Let’s empower our little girls to embrace Pink the right way.

Tell them and help them to get in touch with their inner self and to look inside to understand what true beauty is and to understand the power that Pink represents, the tremendous power that they possess.

On my motherhood journey, one of the most surprising outcomes is my reclaiming Pink. Having my daughter, I know better. I have seen that it is natural for us to choose Pink, just as it is natural to choose blue or red or brown. Pink is a pretty sassy color but can also be soft and feminine. Why wouldn’t we want to wear it?

I do not want to be the one defining whether or not my daughter is girly enough to wear Pink. I want to teach her that wearing Pink and being a girl are two different things.

How about you? Growing up, did you have a public aversion to Pink but privately loved it? Always hated it? Or have you always been a Pink kinda girl?

[bctt tweet=”Pink isn’t just for girly girls. Here’s why I’m reclaiming pink.”]

Over the past six years, I have tried half a dozen unsuccessful business ideas.

I work 9 to 5 and have been desperately trying to do something, anything, to create a business on the side, and it just hasn’t been working for me. Last October, I was getting burnt out from my endless and somewhat, mindless pursuit of entrepreneurship. I felt like nothing was in alignment and questioned why I was trying in the first place.

One of my dear friends suggested I take a sabbatical.

At first the idea was incomprehensible. My time is already so tight, how could I spend precious time away from my projects?! She lovingly convinced me, and I settled on a month. I thought, in the grand scheme of it, taking four weeks off wouldn’t kill me.

Even though I was taking a break, I knew I still needed to do something to fill the time but not something that would cause me more stress. I looked at my bookshelf filled with books that I would read “one day” and decided that one day had come.

Reading was my new post-work agenda.

Serendipitously that week (don’t you love when that happens?), Marie Forleo’s interview of Elizabeth Gilbert came across my Facebook newsfeed. I loved Elizabeth Gilbert’s Eat Pray Love in 2008. It opened up a whole world of spirituality, vulnerable rawness and feminine realness in my life.

The interview titled “What Elizabeth Gilbert Wants You To Know About Big Magic” could not have been more intriguing. I watched the whole forty-seven minutes hanging on every word. After watching the interview and reading the first chapters in Amazon, I knew that I had to read Big Magic during my sabbatical.

The book has been a total game changer in how I now approach my creative projects.

The biggest concept I took away from it was to create for myself and do what I do because I enjoy it, not to help others.

Here’s an excerpt from the book:

“It’s okay if your work is fun for you, is what I’m saying. It’s also okay if your work is healing for you, or fascinating for you, or redemptive for you, or if it’s maybe just a hobby that keeps you from going crazy. It’s even okay if your work is totally frivolous. That’s allowed. It’s all allowed.

Your own reasons to create are reason enough. Merely by pursing what you love, you may inadvertently end up helping us plenty…Do whatever brings you to life, then. Follow your own fascinations, obsessions, and compulsions. Trust them. Create whatever causes a revolution in your heart.

The rest of it will take care of itself.”

I felt like I finally had the permission I needed to do whatever the heck I wanted to do.

I had placed too heavy a burden on my ideas to support my and my family’s dreams.  Can you relate?

That pressure was paralyzing me from creating anything sustainable. I was primarily creating for my ego, to make money, and to make a name of myself. I thought I was serving my soul and my passions but I had completely forgotten about them in my pursuit of doing. Doing is busy work that feeds the ego. Creating feeds our soul.

[bctt tweet=”Doing is busy work that feeds the ego. Creating feeds our soul.”]

This is how I now approach my projects. They’ve gotta light me up on a soul level, not make me see dollar signs. I no longer place that pressure on my ideas and I have never felt more free.

How have you been approaching your projects? From your ego or your soul?

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