Hi, world. Recovering people pleaser here.

“I no longer want this,” I thought to myself a year ago, crinkling like a wad of paper underneath my plush, protective, slightly suffocating duvet cover. 

It was a Saturday morning. I’d just come back from a funeral and flight the night before. I’d been in fetal position for more than two hours since I woke up and had started feeding my brain with distractions like Netflix, doom scrolling, and white girl manifestation podcasts about quitting your job. I’d been marinating in the idea of quitting mine for months, despite ironically, being only four months into my new dream role. 

Up to that point I’d had a successful, fulfilling 15-year PR career that took me around the world working for cool entertainment brands I’d admired as a kid. They were fun full-time jobs that weren’t traditionally “corporate.” Ones that gave me an unforgettable decade in New York and moved me and my spouse to LA where we bought a home we loved. Ones that took me around the world, put me on countless red carpets and green rooms, and brought me face-to-face with my pop culture idols. 

I’d recently started at a dream brand I’d loved for years, was making multiple six figures, and had a cool title that no one outside of the company really understood but I was often happy to explain. 

I had everything I’d ever wanted by manifesting and earning my goals with intention. I should be–and was–deeply grateful. Why was I feeling such unprecedented levels of debilitating anxiety to the point where I was silently crying multiple times a week? 

Suddenly, I got a random Slack notification on my phone from a mass employee channel that I was opted into on my first day without being asked. 

Someone I didn’t know was trying to sell a Coachella weekend 1 ticket. I was mostly frustrated that my muted notifications didn’t carry over from the snooze mode I’d turned on the day before due to taking bereavement leave. Bro. Was technology so ruthless that it lets companies access you the second it believes it has permission? 

It led me down a rabbit hole of catching up on all the other messages I’d missed from being out for one day.

It was a wake-up call that something felt so deeply out of alignment that it kept me awake at night and frozen in my bedsheets late into the mornings. 

After 15 years on the grind, I was exhausted from being so accessible and overstimulated. I was tired of my time and focus constantly being taken from me without my permission. 

I was tired of constantly-shifting company priorities, red tape, and reorgs, albeit grateful I’d survived each one up to that point. I was exhausted from the constant “crises” and brain fog, from endless performative video meetings that required every fiber of my being to feign interest when colleagues were talking about roadmaps and kudos, monetization, MAUs, and other company -isms I wish would just go to sleep. 

I wanted to go to sleep. For a very long time. And I felt guilty and mean for even feeling this way at all. 

My creativity was also shot, which made me low-key depressed. Deep down, I felt myself changing on a cellular level–becoming bleaker, less pleasant, less interested, less impressed, less motivated to climb, less everything, and it bled into my personal life. What was wrong with me? At all my previous jobs, I’d been repeatedly described as a “rockstar” who could go far if she kept climbing. It was the story I kept telling myself until the moment I realized, maybe I’m not even all that interested in the ending at the top.

Mostly, it felt like a part of my life that no longer looked like me. Like a pair of rare, fancy sneakers I’d spent years drooling over that suddenly seemed too flashy, too expensive, and no longer even fit.

I just knew I wanted less of all the above, and much more out of life.

Another thing I knew is I’d always been hesitant to brand myself as my career, because equating my personality to my work felt strangely reductive. Why should I pin my identity to one thing when I love and am curious about so many things? I found issue with the idea of having a lane at all, the very foundation that many jobs hire on and many companies operate by. As a military brat raised across multiple area codes due to my dad’s Air Force job, I’d always been more of a hummingbird with many interests. But when it came time to graduate college and “grow up,” I did what everyone else did and dedicated myself to carving out my professional lane so I’d be taken seriously. Over the years I found fuel in each congrats, promotion, and accomplishment. It validated my efforts to build an “acceptable” way to earn my money and credentials.

But over time, I started missing my younger self who would spring out of bed every day, excited to take on life, not knowing what was in store. Forever curious, undefined, following what felt good, deeply believing the universe always had her back. I knew she was still inside me somewhere. I desperately wanted to wake her up.

And I knew the truth. Without me, all these corporations will undoubtedly continue to grow, break boundaries, make money, and create incredible things. 

I wanted to challenge myself the permission to do the same–without them.

I wanted to live life off autopilot, not on.

Two days later from that fetal position morning, at the height of thousands of industrywide layoffs, I silenced my thoughts and I quit my job. In my late 30s, with minimal savings, a mortgage in CALIFORNIA, no set plan, but!….a curious mind, a desire to build my own dream, and a fire in my heart. Who this B think she is??

Anyway, what’s happened since that boohoo morning a year ago? I spent lots of time generously refilling my cup with family, friends, and living life with my husband. I traveled. I finished my first novel and am polishing it up for submission. I quietly invested in a copywriting course and had a blast becoming a student again, learning a new trade. I let myself play, and do things just because, and surprise myself. I’m now freelancing as a communications strategist and copywriter for income, and my inbox and calendar are light as fuck. I’m having fun, feeling the freest I have in years, and am working hard behind the scenes to build the life I’ve been dreaming of, on my schedule and terms. 

Don’t get me wrong. Some days are stressful as hell, but many are also filled with excitement, wonder, wins, and endless possibility.

I’m also rich! JK. My bank account is so not what it was at the dream brand. Yet. But I’m hellbent that it will be, because sometimes I’m petty like that. But for now, I have enough.

The point is, my life went on. So did the world.

All to say, hi. I’m Gayle, a millennial, recovering people pleaser, ex “corporate baddie” and forever work in progress. Nice to meet you. Welcome to my corner of the internet.

I’m an optimist. I love my family. I’m happily married. I love life. I love food, especially noodles. I love consuming stories that make me cry and laugh. And I love, love, love to write. Nothing gets me out of my head and in my zone more. To me, writing is like traveling across space and time in the safety and weirdness of my own mind. 

This is my space dedicated to imperfect intentional living. About growing, trying new things, and giving yourself permission to change and start over every day. About betting on yourself. About refilling your cup when it’s bone dry. About making room for the good stuff, whatever that means to you. About chilling out.

If any of those things resonate, I welcome you to walk alongside me and explore living life off autopilot, and all its twists and turns. 

If I’ve actually been successful at turning on the comment function and it’s showing up below, will you say hello? 

Thanks for reading. All three of you. Hi, Mom.

G