“Cause a rose is still a rose
Baby, girl, you’re still a flower
He can’t lead you and then take you
Make you and then break you
Darlin’, you hold the power”
Last week we lost a queen. And for once I was lost for words. All I could do was listen to her songs and feel my emotions with every one of them. The lyrics to this one kept going on in my head.
I consciously fell in love with Aretha in 2003 when I entered an HMV store in London. Her greatest hits was being played and I not only bought a cd for myself but ended up buying one for my mother and my late grand mother. And every month since then I have listened to her songs.
Why?
Her songs have taught me to be strong, to take care of myself, but most of all to have empathy for other women. We need to look out for each other.
But:
We need to also put on our oxygen mask first. When I get tired I go back to my breathing. That then brings be back to my intuition.
Intuition is a sense that we need to use more often. Intuition doesn’t lie.
I recently watched the documentary called INNSAEI on Netflix. It is the Icelandic word for intuition. The documentary focuses on the different theories surrounding the subject. But what I took away from it is that I have to listen better to my gut feeling.
Because of self care.
Because of empathy.
Because of self love.
All the stuff Aretha sings about in her songs.
If we look at her career, the main personal branding lesson is explained here in her own words:
“We didn’t have music videos. You weren’t an overnight sensation. You had to work at it and learn your craft: how to take care of your voice, how to pace your concerts, all that trial and error.”
Trial and error.
When you fall, get up. When you fail, keep on moving. What ever you do, keep on growing.
“Let your life be in the sunshine
Not the darkness of your sorrow”
Xoxo,
Nancy
Madonna once sang:
“Music makes the people come together
Music makes the bourgeoisie and the rebel”
And this is the truth. I saw this video recently of this Saudi woman rapping her way about finally being able to drive her own car. And it just made me think about how we are all affected by music, and that it crosses all cultural boundaries. But I what I love about the video is that she is using Hip Hop to express herself.
Like Sister Sledge once sang: “We’re lost in music….Feel so alive”.
Every week I get to write you about my favorite subject, personal branding, and music is the tool I use to make things clear to you. And I have to admit music still brings me joy every single day.
If everyone would just discover the healing powers of music then perhaps we wouldn’t be so depressed and burned out. Research says it can heal emotional suffering. And girl, I really believe that. I mean just the physical effects of getting your blood flowing when you dance or not being in your head but just feeling your body.
I even read somewhere that premature babies who they played Mozart to had lowered their heart rate and helped induce sleep in New York.
And a new study even claims that attending a music concert once every two weeks can add nine years to your life. Read more about it here.
Can we deny the effects of music? NOOOO!
So when I feel blue I listen to my 2 aunties: Aretha Franklin and Nina Simone. And when I listen to Sade it always makes me think of my time studying and living in London. I just heard she will be releasing a new album soon. Can’t wait to hear that. Her music is so timeless. It feels like she is the big sister I never had and who I go to for man troubles hahaha.
So who is your favorite music auntie or sister? Who do you listen to when you are feeling blue?
Tell me girl!!
XOXO,
Nancy
PS. Have you registered already for my FREE personal branding course here?
“Mamma mia, here I go again
My my, how can I resist you?
Mamma mia, does it show again
My my, just how much I’ve missed you?”
Here we go again! 10 years after the first Mamma Mia film was released in 2008, they released a sequel this week. I was invited to see the movie and I will be honest: I did not have high expectations, I thought the first one was an ok movie. But ……….. this one ROCKED!! Way better than the first one and such an amazing feel good movie. If you like ABBA, romance, adventure, mother daughter films and Cher, then you are at the right place.
Don’t you just love Cher? Remember when she said this?
“Mother told me a couple of years ago, ‘Sweetheart, settle down and marry a rich man.’ I said, ‘Mom, I am a rich man.'”
She really said it, hahahahaha! Look at the video here.
Ok back to the movie. I love how it is about motherhood and the relationships mother and daughters have. Our mothers are our first role models. Especially for women they play a pivotal role. In fact I know that working women are great role models for their daughters.
I read this: “In 2015, Harvard Business School released a working paper that helped many professional women, intellectually at least, see that there is a silver lining; that in fact, it benefits our children (especially our daughters) if we have a career. Researchers found that, on average, the daughters of working mothers were paid 4% more than their peers and they were more likely to be promoted into senior positions. One in three daughters of working mothers were in manager positions, compared with only one in four from non-working mothers.”
So drop the guilt and just have the career you want. In fact I didn’t need Harvard to tell me that I just followed my own amazing mom who taught me this amazing personal branding lessons.
Be confident about who you are.
My mom always used to say: love yourself, because if you don’t, who will? And by doing this, she always was perceived as a confidence woman. But guess what always gave her confidence. When she used to go out she wasn’t insecure about how she looked, in fact we nick-named her Alexis Colby (from Dynasty), because she always used to dress like she owned the place hahahaha. Love her. Yes, confidence makes people believe in you, because they know you got it handled because you believe in yourself. It is the same in the Mamma Mia film, Meryl Streep character is a single mom who was not afraid to live by herself on a Greek island.
You need to be confident to do that. And that leads to my next lesson which I learned from Meryl Streep (another great mother to 3 daughters).
Surround yourself with the right people.
When director Stephen Frears approached Streep about starring in Florence Foster Jenkins, she knew it would be a “yes” before even reading the script. “I said yes because Stephen said he had a project. And I’ve wanted to work with him forever,” she remembers. “So he said, ‘I’ve got a film for you.’ And I said, ‘OK, yes.'”
But I really LOVE this lesson from her:
“What makes you different and weird, that’s your strength.”
Anyway, Mamma Mia is a lovely film for music lovers and weird people like me. Go and see it. I don’t have stocks in the film, so this is just me, a weird musical loving woman, talking.
XOXO,
Nancy
PS: Have you signed up for my free personal branding course yet? Get your lessons here!