The Pivot

This episode in The Lux Lounge, we're talking about the art of the pivot. We share the leaps of faith that changed everything for us, from starting a health journey and moving 2,000 miles from home to jumping into wedding photography with no experience and figuring it out along the way. We talk about balancing risk with responsibility, trusting your gut with clients, letting go of what no longer fits, and betting on yourself. 

Here is the spoiler: Life is short. 

Stop doing what you don't enjoy and start leaning into what makes you happy. 

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:09

Welcome to the lounge, ladies. Welcome back to another episode of Lux Lounge. Today we are going to talk about the art of the pivot.

SPEAKER_01 0:19

The pivot, all I can think about is the friends.

SPEAKER_00 0:21

Pivot! The first one that we can ease into, and when was the last time you took a big leap of faith in your life?

SPEAKER_02 0:32

I didn't really, I don't really know what to say here. Like I've taken a few big leaps of faith, but my most recent one, I guess, was when I started my health journey. Last year, I decided this is gonna be my year to finally do it, to finally change, to feel better about myself, to be able to chase my kids around. I want to be the 80-year-old grandma that can still play on the playground. So I kind of just went all in head first, changed everything about my life and hoped for the best. So yeah, that really was that's amazing. Yeah, my the last leap of faith I took in it.

SPEAKER_00 1:15

And look at you now. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:17

I feel so much better, and I'm so glad that I did it. It was fucking hard, but you did it, girl. We're here, we're still on a journey, but yeah, we're making it happen.

SPEAKER_00 1:27

I would say for me, it's a long time ago, but it was when we decided to move to Bakersfield. Moving to Bakersfield changed everything for me. Um my identity before Bakersfield was my care my well, at that time, I don't know if I'd call it a career, but like my job and my kids and moving away from everything makes you really take a look at who you are and your life and what you want out of life. And I didn't work when I lived there, so I had a time a lot of time to like think about that and reflect on like what was important to me. So I think it made me a better mom, and it made me realize that you have to do things that are out of your comfort zone because moving 2,000 miles away was way out of my comfort zone. So then after that, moving back, it was like, okay, like why can't I apply for that job? Or why can't I just because I don't have a schooling, why can't I get into marketing? Um so that that changed my my confidence in how I approach things.

SPEAKER_02 2:39

And that's that, yeah. I think it's so important to do things out of our comfort zone. I think there's no growth. You gotta push yourself, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 2:45

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, I don't know. When we were talking about like what's the big pivot you made? I don't I don't think I've taken any like huge leaps. It's been a lot of little steps.

SPEAKER_00 2:58

Um I honestly lie. You're lying. Yes, you're you move. You move Yeah, that seems little. That's huge, Josie, especially with three little ones. The freaking Van so many times that I just it's just like you are the most resilient, one of the most resilient women I know.

SPEAKER_02 3:19

Oh like did you have Jackson in Vancouver Island or you moved when he was like the teeniest little baby? Like, that's ridiculous. I guess. You're nuts. I don't know.

SPEAKER_00 3:32

Your your tiny moments or pivots are huge to Tesla.

SPEAKER_02 3:36

And she says, I don't thrive in chaos.

unknown 3:39

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 3:40

Yeah, I don't know. I don't I guess I just don't see them as huge things. They just add up to to me, because it like when I make my mind up that I want to do something, sometimes it is ten little steps or what feel like little steps to get there, just because of how our lives are. I often feel not in control. And I often find myself like spiraling like I can't do it, but then I just focus on one thing I can do, knowing what I what I would hope the end result is to be. And I've had to like owning a business that is client-based and not knowing where the next job comes from. I've had to learn how to be okay with that discomfort of not knowing. Because it's it's an awful feeling. Yes. Not knowing where's your next paycheck, and then with our recent move, it became less of a creative job and more there was a financial cloak over everything, and it that first year away, I was not I was not well. No, and there was just I was talking to uh a friend, and I could hear myself being negative about it, like oh, I have to drive back to Flight Staff to film all the time, and see I get emotional about it, yeah, and because I was focusing on like I'm away from my kids and I'm away from my family, and it was so good when we lived here, and now we're away, and I just decided to look at it positive, and I had such a good 2025 because of it. Just that mind shift, exactly, nothing changed. I had the exact same contracts, I had more contracts, I had more clients out this way, and just choosing to see it as a positive and believe it was all gonna work out, yeah, and it did. It did, yeah, yeah. And it's not my forever, like I will not forever be doing what I do, but knowing that I am behind the scene taking the steps I need to to change it, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 5:45

So now I'm wondering for the two of you, what like how do you balance the risk and responsibility when you're making big changes in your life?

SPEAKER_00 5:56

Well, that has changed for me as from when my kids were little to now they're grown and making their own living. Uh when they were little, I definitely focus more on my responsibility. My responsibilities to them and you know, bringing in money and and I almost I think that that made me kind of lose myself. It made me lose my because I was so focused on income and like what I needed to do that I lost my creative self. And now that they've gotten older and they don't need me as much anymore, I am not opposed to like taking risks anymore. Because if something doesn't work out, I'm still gonna be okay and it's not gonna affect them, right? So I think for me, um it's getting really good. Like I'm ready to take risks and see where it goes because I have big dreams, I've always had big dreams, and I've been too scared to go for it, and I'm I'm ready now, like I'm ready to take the leap.

SPEAKER_01 7:09

I struggle with this one as well because it is like I'd mentioned when we moved, I I don't have the same freedom that I used to, and so but I have but I finding the freedom where I can. So when we moved, I decided to hire a run coach. Um, and for a long time I was like, I have no business hiring a run coach, I'm not gonna win races, I'm not going to the Olympics, but I knew I could do that for me. Can I change that? I have to drive four hours for the majority of my clients to film and I have to be away from my kids. No, and then there was all sorts of guilt with well, if I hire a run coach, like I have to be out running. And that meeting with her, I had my uh uh onboarding meeting with her. She I'm sure she probably just said it like off the cuff, but she just changed the way I thought of it, and she's like, It's okay for you to have goals as a mom, it's okay to have you have goals as a business owner because I thought, oh, I already run this business, I'm asking so much of my family, I can't do anything outside of that. And so that really, really helped. Um and and being okay with that risk because I'm responsible in every other area of my life, right? Yeah, and so while I can't take maybe the biggest business risk, I can take personal risks and invent or uh invest in myself in other ways.

SPEAKER_02 8:36

Yeah, I love that. I for myself, I am so impulsive. How I run my life, that's just who I am as a person. So when I really decide I want to do something and I'm passionate about it, I'm excited about it, I'm I'm all in. I'm jumping in with both feet, and it's an all or nothing mentality for me. And I will just figure it out along the way. Like, I I know I have responsibility at home, but I always get that shit done. Like it's it it always works out, and it always works out. If it's meant to be, it'll be, I think.

SPEAKER_00 9:13

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 9:13

I remember like I think my very first big leap of faith was Josie was looking for a second shooter for videography, and I was so unhappy in my job. I was working like an oil field, and I'm like, this cannot be my freaking life. Yeah, cannot be. So I just I was at work and I just sent her the email. I'm like, no hard feelings, it's okay if you don't choose me, whatever. And she finally it took her a long time to get back to me.

SPEAKER_01 9:44

I was nervous, I was like, I can employ somebody, and like I knew you and I was scared shitless of you, and I thought, I'm like, no, she's too cool for me. I have no business hiring her.

SPEAKER_00 9:57

Really?

SPEAKER_01 9:58

I'm trying to find the the email.

SPEAKER_00 10:01

I did not know this about I didn't know you emailed her.

SPEAKER_01 10:05

I did, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 10:06

I wondered how your friendship started. I said I was like, you know what? Fuck it. I think this might set my heart.

SPEAKER_00 10:13

Don't still get, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 10:14

So I just did, and she, her, and Sean were like, yeah, come, we'd love to talk to you. And I remember going to her parents' house, and I went in the wrong fucking door. So I was mortified. Like walked right into their living room. I'm like, oh good. That's a great presentation for me. But then it was, yeah, it was crazy. We just clicked in our first wedding together. I was so nervous, but it was just yeah, it was instant. Yeah. And then it just blossomed from there, and then I kind of like everything I know is because of them. They've taught me everything. Oh, like so.

SPEAKER_00 10:50

Did you have much experience with photography prior to that?

SPEAKER_02 10:54

But fuck nothing. No way!

SPEAKER_01 10:57

She started a video, yeah. And then we got asked to do photos at a wedding, and I'm like, okay, and I rented a camera for Tess, and I'm like, well, whatever. And this girl, it was like I wish I could just bottle up that feeling, and I'm like sitting there, like, she this is her, this is now her business. Yeah, she's doing the photos, and she actually took over the photo contracts for the rest of the year. She just like well, you've seen her when she works, and you're a boss, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 11:29

No, fake until you make it. Like that. Absolutely. I no one else will tell you any different. If you walk in confident, yeah, I just decided I want to do this. No one else around me does this. I'm just gonna do this. And this is what I love. And I think it's because one of the first clients was like, Well, they were interviewing me to be able to do um wedding photography for them. Okay, and I wanted the job so freaking bad because I just wanted every job so freaking bad. And they said, Well, did you go to school for this? Uh I said yes. Good for you. I'm like, Yeah, you bet. Sure did. I remember that.

SPEAKER_01 12:07

The school of Josie and Sean.

SPEAKER_02 12:09

Yeah. And I'm like, whatever. Yeah. But I remember I was like on the verge of tears when we went to Vancouver Island to shoot that wedding because we were in a dark hotel room and I could not, I was shaking and I could not figure out my camera settings. Yeah. But Sean was there, he helped me through it all. But I was like having to the rescue full-blown panic attack. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 12:29

But we made it through and yeah, some of those photos are still my favorite. Yeah, yeah. That's probably a biggest one, like when I think about like how I've like professionally putting that ad out was huge. Yeah. Because it was like, if I'm gonna do this, I need help. And like legitimizing it, I guess.

SPEAKER_02 12:49

And to me, yeah, I you guys were famous to me.

SPEAKER_01 12:52

Oh, I know. I was like, holy shit. She emailed me. She emailed me before she said her wedding date.

SPEAKER_02 12:58

Yeah, I did.

SPEAKER_01 12:59

No way.

unknown 13:04

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 13:05

You wanted to do this job. There were other jobs you wanted to do, but this one was like one that you really wanted to do. What advice, like I know the fake it till you make it, but what advice would you give someone?

SPEAKER_02 13:18

It I think for me it's just you you need to have passion. If you decide you have passion for it, then I think you should do that. But I think you do need to research a little bit or like be following photographers on Instagram, kind of know the ins and outs and have someone that you look up to that you can see what they're doing, or how you can implement that into what you want to do. You need to kind of back yourself a little bit and believe in yourself, and believe in yourself for sure. Yeah, yeah. And it honestly it does not matter. You don't need to have anybody else support you.

SPEAKER_00 13:53

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 13:54

If you want to do it, do it, do it, but actually do it. Don't just half ass your shit, because that nothing makes me more mad than that. Than half-assing.

SPEAKER_01 14:02

Yeah, well, yeah, and we got comments like what are what are they up to type thing. And by the time we were done, frick people booked us, tried to book us three years out. Yes. Like we people wanted to work with us, and we didn't know. If we would have job, yeah, if we would have listened to all the negative talk, well, we would we wouldn't be here. No.

SPEAKER_00 14:24

Okay, so let's picture that this business starts now and all of your experiences that you've gone through, because I don't think negative talk has much impact on both of you now.

SPEAKER_02 14:36

Not anymore. No, no.

SPEAKER_00 14:37

I think you guys would have been okay now. Not that I want you to change anything. I don't, right though, but if you would have had that belief in yourself and like, oh, that's just negative bullshit talk. Like, that's their problem, not my problem. You guys would like oh yeah.

SPEAKER_02 14:55

If we went back into it now, we would do it so differently, and I think we would demand a lot more respect, and people would respect us. Yeah, I think that was a huge issue. They're like, oh, they're just two small town girls. We don't have to respect them. Their contract says this, who cares? We're gonna make them work an extra six months. How many hours? Oh my god.

SPEAKER_01 15:14

Hours and hours and hours we would stay because we wanted to do a good job, and they can you just stay for this?

SPEAKER_02 15:20

And or because someone scary said no, I want you to stay for this. Yeah, I'm paying you. Well, you're not paying me for that, actually.

SPEAKER_01 15:29

I don't like I have a whole slew of advice, but the number one advice for any client-based business, trust your damn gut. Yeah, yeah. You think they might be a difficult client, they are going to be a difficult client. And it's okay to say, no, thank you.

SPEAKER_02 15:47

We our visions don't align, our values aren't the same.

SPEAKER_01 15:50

Yeah, just like and you don't like I'm not available. Yeah, say whatever you want to say, but don't work with them. Yeah. Because it is going to like every single time we had a bad feeling, we had really challenging days.

SPEAKER_02 16:04

Oh, we would get in your van after those days and be like, fuck, we knew it. We knew it. Yeah. So it's gonna go. But look here. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 16:17

Going through that probably was I mean, look at you know, look at where you're at now. Maybe you had to go through that in order to get to where you are today.

SPEAKER_01 16:25

I mean, we we were just growing up. We were young. We've been through we both we've both had our children, we've we've gotten married. I didn't have any kids when we started, like we have really been through it all.

SPEAKER_02 16:39

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 16:40

I've been an outsider for two huge moments in both of your lives. So when you decided to go on your health journey and all this watching you breathe life back into your life, and then Carrie when you decided to move on from Salted. And both of you, like the difference in you and the yeah, it's been I can't even talk about I'm sorry, okay.

SPEAKER_02 17:09

We don't have to talk about it. No, it's okay. Changing your life seems impossible, and yeah, just so when you say change, like what's the biggest thing? I think just how I looked at health. Like, I thought before I'm like, oh, I'm just happy who I am, whatever, but why am I so unhappy all the time? Why do I not want to like be here anymore? So finally I hit like rock fucking bottom and decided to make a change and said I'm gonna do it for myself, and I can't think about what anybody else cares about, and I have to put myself first, like I have to be above my kids because in order to be there for my kids in the long run, I have to be like healthy myself. So, like, it's just like a whole perspective on life needs to change before anything else, really.

SPEAKER_01 18:11

Yeah, but yeah, in saying this, I do believe, and Tess, like you walked away from being creative, yeah, in a certain way. Yeah, Carrie, you have to. There is a time when we have to be okay with saying goodbye or going in a different direction. Do you what would you say to somebody who is thinking maybe maybe they need a change?

SPEAKER_00 18:33

Creativity has always been such a big part of my life, and I've always been that ideas girl. I always have like a million different ideas, and one there was an idea I had to start um a caramel business, and I was driving with my friend, and I was like, we're gonna do this, like we gotta make caramels, but I wasn't thinking about making caramels and standing in the kitchen making caramels. I was thinking about like, oh my god, I like want to get on social media and I want to be creative that way, and then we started really getting into it, and I realized I don't want to be standing in the kitchen wrapping, making caramels, wrapping caramels. I just want to be doing like that marketing kind of creative side of it. So it was really hard for me to make that change and decide that it wasn't for me. But the girls were awesome, they totally understood where I was coming from and so respectful of my decision. And so then I got I focused again back into my career and started learning, you know, kind of putting myself out there. One of my goals at work was to if if we're going to ask businesses to get in front of the camera, then we need to start doing that ourselves. And to be in front of a camera, like two years ago, I was like, oh hell no.

SPEAKER_01 20:04

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 20:05

And then I started doing it, and I was like, okay, this isn't actually that hard.

SPEAKER_01 20:10

Well, and I think it's like we said when we were within weddings, like being okay with taking the space and knowing that we know what we need to do the best job and asking for that and being okay with it. Like we've been so scared to ask them to move this, or you know, when Carrie and I are on shoots, like asking we asked a group of random men to cheer. Oh, yes, and the leaf.

SPEAKER_00 20:35

Yeah, we never would have done that when we first started.

SPEAKER_01 20:38

And so I don't know, just being okay with being an expert in what we do, and even if we don't have the schooling or whatever we're telling ourselves in the back of our minds, yeah, it's okay to take up that space.

SPEAKER_02 20:54

Yeah, you walk in like a boss ass bitch, people are gonna treat you like it.

SPEAKER_00 20:57

Yeah, yeah. I am so excited about this journey with you guys and this podcast. Yeah, and I can't wait for people to listen to what we have to say and do some self-reflection and believe in themselves. And maybe they want to, maybe there's someone out there that wants to get on their own health journey or do a renovation. Yeah, or don't do it, or stop, you know, they don't want to, maybe they feel stuck and they're like doing a project or a job that they don't like anymore. Life is short.

SPEAKER_01 21:38

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 21:39

Stop doing what you don't enjoy and start leaning into the things that make you happy. Yeah. And that's what I hope this podcast does.

SPEAKER_01 21:49

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 21:50

Amen. Yeah. Amen. I think that's the perfect place to end this podcast.

SPEAKER_01 21:56

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 21:57

So my two top products for the Lux list this week is uh the Peony Lotion from Pur Soap Shack. Um, this is a very good friend of mine, Jessica Mo's. Um, she has an all-natural like skincare line uh with, and she has like different soaps and body lotions, and you guys, the smell of this is insane. It smells so amazing. Actually, this bottle is like empty, so time for another one. And my number two item is peppermint halo. Um, you can find a peppermint halo in my purse, on my nightstand, by my kitchen sink, um, in my car, everywhere. I can't live without this stuff. It helps me so much. Like if I feel a headache coming on, it's peppermint halo.

SPEAKER_02 22:48

So, my luxe list items for the month would be double cleansing in the shower. So it's more of a luxe moment for me. So, first, you gotta cleanse with duff, unscented body soap to get all the stank off. That's you actually gotta clean. Then you can go in with your smell good one. Like you actually have to clean yourself. So when you do your everything shower or just your body shower, whatever, yeah, you gotta double cleanse. It's important to double cleanse your face, so why wouldn't it be important to double cleanse your body? Like, get that urine off. Get that Bob Marley, you know. Okay. Then my second thing would be uh fitness by Christy. So it's Christy Pollard. She has she runs this fitness program, she uh does workout programs, she provides support, she also does meal plans for you. Whatever you need, she can do it for you. She really focuses on postpartum moms, um, moms in general, anyone with busy lifestyle, women for sure, is her like bread and butter. She's really found her niche here because she's so good at making you realize that this is a lifestyle. Um it's not a crash diet, it's something that you can be able to keep for the rest of your life. Like it's setting you up for success.

SPEAKER_01 24:12

So next is my coffee and leave bag. Um I was traveling with a cheap corner clap or like that forever for work and I finally invested in this. And I have a laptop sleeve and it uh can hold all of my video and for this cute little fork thing with all my all the hard drive. Um, if we can all put together and fast.