The Pink Glittery Shield, and Other Things I've Learned About Leading With Resilience
This is adapted from an interview I gave as part of being named one of the 2026 Most Influential Women in Beauty and Cosmetics.
People ask me what I attribute my success to, and my honest answer is resilience. Not the polished, motivational-poster version of it, the real kind, the kind that comes from brain surgery, depression, and moments where starting over felt genuinely impossible. Resilience isn't pretending the hard parts didn't happen. It's letting them shape you without letting them define you.
The Shield
The best career advice I ever received came during one of the hardest seasons of my life. I was a new mom, drowning in overwhelm, barely able to make a decision, let alone remember who I was outside of it. Every comment, every bit of criticism, every unsolicited opinion just soaked in and stuck.
My coach told me to visualize a shield. So I built one, in my mind, pink, glittery, unmistakably mine. I pictured hurtful words bouncing off it instead of sinking in. It sounds almost too simple to work. It changed everything. I learned to set boundaries, stop taking everything personally, and finally choose what actually got through to me. Caring less was never the goal. Choosing what I let in, that was.
What I'd Tell a Woman Just Starting Out
Focus on yourself first. It's easy to get caught comparing your pace to someone else's, but your path was never supposed to look like theirs. Support other women, genuinely, this industry has room for all of us, and nothing is more powerful than a woman who lifts others up instead of competing with them.
Chase your actual dreams, not just the profit. If you build a business around sales numbers alone, you'll eventually burn out chasing a version of success that was never really yours to begin with. Build your confidence as you go. You don't need everything figured out before you start.
Competing Without the Budget
One of my biggest challenges right now is genuinely simple to name: I'm competing online against brands with marketing budgets I'll never match. They can dominate ad space and reach people faster than I ever will alone.
So I stopped trying to out-spend, and started focusing on out-connecting. I can't win the budget game. I can win the authenticity game, showing up consistently, actually caring about the people I'm reaching. It's a slower way to build something. It's also the only way I've found that actually lasts.
What Actually Matters to Me
Ethics, compassion, and authenticity, in that order, on the days it's hard to remember. I'd rather tell the truth than sell a bigger promise. I check in on people because I care, not because it's good for business. And I won't ask anyone, myself included, to perform a version of confidence that isn't real. People can always tell the difference. That difference is what builds trust that actually lasts.