EP #65- Wellness Trends From "Try Living with Lucie," with Lucie Fink, Video Creator and Entrepreneur

(gentle music) I would say my content definitely started off in the world of lifestyle trends, things that were just gonna go viral on social media, and then transitioning towards, what do I actually wanna try that's good for me and healthy for me and how can I actually influence people in a positive way instead of just picking videos that I think are gonna go viral because they're so wacky and weird. Welcome back to another episode of Everyday Endorphins. As someone who is very interested in health and wellness, clearly through the production of this podcast, I'm also a yoga instructor. I did rowing in high school, like my life has always very much been health and wellness oriented. I'm always looking for new trends to try or practices to adopt in my day-to-day life, which is why I've been obsessed with the YouTube series called Try Living with Lucy since probably high school. I think that's when they started to come out, like when I was in high school. So I've been watching them for a while now, and this was a series of videos on Refinery29's YouTube channel where Lucy Fink, who is a content creator and video producer, would try and challenge herself to adopt a new habit for five days, and then she would report on how that habit had impacted her quality of life, and anything interesting she learned from it. So she is obsessed with pizza, and she did a challenge where she would only eat pizza for five days, like for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. So she would talk about like all the creative ways she would have pizza, essentially, for three meals throughout the day, or she would talk about five days of meditating, or five days of hot yoga. And it was always really fun and entertaining for me to watch, and I felt like I was definitely entertained by it, 'cause Lucy has such an amazing presence on camera, but I also felt like I was learning something valuable. Like, okay, what is five days of meditation actually going to do for you? Like how is that actually gonna impact how you feel the rest of the day, how you feel by the end of the week? So it was always really something I gravitated towards, and clearly have been kind of obsessed with ever since I started watching, and have followed along Lucy's career trajectory at Refinery, and now going off on her own, pursuing her own content creation. It's just been so exciting to kind of see where she's landed, and I've always wanted the opportunity to actually get to speak with Lucy about her inspiration for starting the series. So I am thrilled to share that this week, I have the chance to sit down with Lucy, and talk all about how she got started with the Try Living with Lucy series, what types of lifestyle habits she's continued to incorporate in her life, that boosts her wellbeing, and bring her some sense of endorphins, and how her life has now changed as a new mom. It was absolutely a pleasure to get to have her on the show, I am really excited for you guys to hear this interview, but before we get into it, I have a brief message from my sponsor, Inker. Hi, Lucy, thank you so much for coming onto the podcast. Hi Stella, thanks for having me, I'm so excited to be here. Almost, I guess, two years later now, we've reconnected, and you know, when we first had the chance to speak and do an interview with the Power Thread back in, like 2020, 2021, I was so thrilled to get to talk to you because you were a content creator that I had been following at the time for so long, like since high school, and I really started out with the videos you were producing for Refinery 29 on Try Living with Lucy. Like that was my first taste of everything that you were doing, and I fell in love with it, and so it's just such an honor to get to be sitting here virtually with you and to have you on my podcast. Oh, that's so sweet. Thank you, you're an OG fallover. Yes, I like to think so, and you know, I'd love to start basically there, you know, at the inception of when you were working at Refinery 29 and producing that Try Living with Lucy's segment. So can you tell my listeners a little bit about what you were doing at Refinery 29 and what that segment looked like, and then kind of how your career evolved from that moment in time. So I started working at Refinery 29 in 2015. That was one year after I graduated college, and for that first year out of college, I was working at an advertising agency, and I actually met a woman at the advertising agency who ended up becoming the COO for Finery 29, which is how I ended up getting there through networking and meeting her. And when I started at Refinery in 2015, it was the very start of their video division. So they had made some video content before, but never really dedicated YouTube series. They didn't have any faces that were recognizable on the platform, and I kind of showed up and showed them the video content that I had produced in my college years, and some clips on live television that I had the opportunity to do in college. And I sort of just told them, you know, I'd love to produce and host a YouTube series for you. Actually, to correct myself, I didn't say YouTube because I had no interest in YouTube, and I had no, I personally was not a YouTube viewer. So I didn't think YouTube was really anything great at the time. I kind of preferred to be on Facebook Live, which is kind of laughable now, and I preferred to be on Refinery's website. I just thought YouTube was like the throwaway content, which is pretty comical, given that now it's like the number one video platform, and it's been the longest lasting and has brought the most revenue to my career. So pretty funny, but I kind of was thrown onto YouTube. They gave me the free ring to pick a series that I wanted to produce and to host it, and very little direction and very little handholding and very little red tape in terms of like what I could do and who I was reporting to, and I pitched a handful of series to them, and we sort of mutually agreed on the five day challenge format, and we called it "Try Living with Lucy," where I was trying five day lifestyle challenges every single week, and a new video went up on YouTube every Friday for about four years, five years almost, and I tried everything from, you know, anything that was being talked about in the social media sphere or online or in magazines, everything from, you know, health trends, like, cupping and acupuncture and cryotherapy to all the food trends, veganism, paleo diet, juicing, and then weird lifestyle trends, like sleeping on the floor, and wearing the same outfit every day, not washing my hair for two weeks, and I basically just challenged myself to experiment and explore, and at the same time, was documenting it all kind of log style, and sharing it almost like, I think I called it like edutainment content, so it was educational, and I was hoping entertaining as well, and I was just trying to show people what life was like when you try new things all the time. - I think I was so drawn to that series because it was so, like you said, educational and entertaining to watch you be a guinea pig and try out all these different experiments and test out what worked for you, what you liked about it, what you didn't like, and the videos were like super extensive on kind of like recapping your experience, and I really, I recall you kind of getting into like, the details as to what worked for you and what didn't, and if you were to do it again, maybe what you would have done differently, and something that I really liked in particular, just about the format of the series was how, you were constantly trying something different, and you kept a very open mind to the different trends that you were gonna try out, and so, like across those four years, were there any particular wellness trends that really stood out to you and anything that you've tried to incorporate now into your day-to-day life? - I think the wellness side of things was really the big kicker for me, I guess, because when I entered Refinery29, I was one person in the sense of my health and wellness outlook and just how I live my life, just to kind of backpedal a little. I was not really raised in that much of a health conscious way. My parents always emphasized that we had to have a healthy family dinner every night, so dinner was one meal of the day where I did eat pretty well in terms of, you know, nourishing my body, and we always had like a nice sit down family meal, but every other meal and snack and thing I put in my body throughout the day throughout my whole childhood, I can say with confidence was total crap. - Absolute crap. If I were just to walk you through like a standard day, it was like cereal and eggos and juice for breakfast followed by a grilled cheese sandwich at lunch and pizza with fries and a snaple and a chipwitch, then I would come home from school and have a roll of Oreos and sour straws, and then I had my one healthy dinner followed by ice cream with snow caps and gummy bears on it. So it was like a crazy, crappy food situation. And I think because I have a naturally very slim build, I never gained weight from the food I was eating and I never noticed any physical changes. that were happening in terms of my health either. And I never felt sluggish or lethargic. So I just, I'm kind of, I was always like, what's the point of not eating this stuff? It's not doing anything to me. My refinery, 29 years, that whole span of time there like so much happened in my health and life that woke me up to the fact that I needed to be a little bit more cautious of what I was putting in my body and on my body. And throughout, you know, just to make like a whole long story short, throughout my time at refinery, 29, I discovered that I had gallstones and I had to get my gallbladder removed. A year later, I wound up being diagnosed with celiac disease. And basically just throughout the whole, my whole time there, my, I would say my content definitely started off in the world of like lifestyle trends, things that were just going to go viral on social media and then transitioning towards, what do I actually want to try that's good for me and healthy for me and how can I actually influence people in a positive way instead of just picking videos that I think are going to go viral because they're so wacky and weird. You know, the earliest videos were really those lifestyle trends like being on a $50 budget or I even wanted, we never did this video, but I even wanted to do like five days of not wearing shoes all around New York City. Like things that were just mind blowing. I feel like that would have been so dangerous. Like you don't know what you're going to step on if you're not wearing any shoes. Refinery was like, we'll let you do that. So there were more in that world though and then they started transitioning towards five days of Ayurveda where I was learning how to tongue scrape and the natural remedies and I was getting into the acupuncture and cupping and just learning so much and throughout and the meditation yoga, all of that sort of emerged as I was exploring these different trends and those wellnessy aspects of the things I was trying really ended up sticking and becoming a major part of my life and then my future platforms. You make a really good point around kind of how your relationship with food has evolved based off the different health trends that you were trying because I think a lot of people eat just to see how the food that we consume affects our physical body and whether or not you're gaining weight from what you're eating, you start to kind of realize that what you put into your body affects way more than just like your physical appearance. And so in your perspective and in your experience, you have a naturally very slim figure and so maybe like the sugary foods that you were eating growing up and up until that point at refinery like never really affected you physically but did you ever feel any sort of effect from not properly fueling your body in a more effect on your mental health or just ever seeing that relationship between what you consume and how it actually affects your energy levels and when you're dealing with external stress and I'm assuming that the time you were at refinery, you were in your early to mid 20s, maybe late 20s and in that time period there's a lot of transition and change happening. So that's very multifaceted and there's a lot going on and so I can imagine that maybe like our diet at that point in our lives will start to affect us just beyond the physicality of our bodies and penetrate into every sphere of our life. Yeah, and I have to say I never noticed it affecting me mentally. And I think if it was affecting me mentally I probably would have made a shift way sooner and same thing with the physical nature. If I lived in a body that like society deemed to be the type of body they needed to quote, watch what I eat, I absolutely would have had the effects of what I was eating immediately seen and I would have moved on and changed it and same thing with how I felt like if I had emotionally felt brain fog or depression or any of that like I would have switched it. But if I'm being honest I don't even think I feel, I don't even think I feel like a mental difference from having changed my diet. I think it's more so not the food but the other lifestyle elements, the things like establishing a positive, happy morning routine and getting into meditation and doing yoga and it's more of the physical things that I was doing that really just brings so much joy and like peace to my day and make me feel very much like a put together adult and help my productivity and my career. They help my home feel like a clean, happy, positive space and that has made a difference because I really used to, in addition to having like a crappy diet I also used to be like a very messy person growing up I was always the twin who was like never folded clothes. I would just shove everything into my closet and my room always had stuff thrown all over the floor. And as an adult now it's like when people come to my house it's everything is organized and my shelves are all styled and I feel like it's my whole ethos of my personality has shifted from these wellness lifestyle like this minimalist approach to life which by the way I'm not a minimalist. I have way too much crap around my home to be considered a minimalist but I do love the minimalist aesthetic and the whole concept of minimalism and so I try to live like emotionally as a minimalist. - Yeah no I feel that it's so much easier said than done like it's so hard to practice that. Like I don't think I fully every watch the Marie condo stuff but when I think about it I'm like oh that's really nice like I wish I could get my life together like that and I know you've produced some content around like Marie condoing up maybe your apartment or just organizing things and it's so pleasing to watch because then I think oh my god like I need to do this and I wanna do this. I felt the same way after watching like the bullet journaling video. - Yes. - That I think was really awesome because it was you know the way that you created this bullet journal like was so extensive and so organized and so detailed and I think for me personally like I really like to journal and just write out like my to-do lists and everything and it was so nice to kind of see a video where you had taken it to the next level and laid out this really organized like detailed format for bullet journaling or just writing down something that a day that you wanted to get done or five things that you were looking for to in the day just having it in a more structured manner. I think was really pleasing to watch and also must have taken a lot of time on your end to like color coordinate everything, put everything together and actually like use it every day. - And you know one thing to go back to your question about you know if it affected me mentally. I think there were other physical things that I did feel changed aside you know taking the whole body, the look of someone's body out of it physically the way I felt is what was probably the biggest change because specifically with the you know the gallstones and then the celiac disease I was having migraines every single day from eating gluten and I didn't even know for like a good few months in my life. I had a migraine pretty much every day and also to get really personal here. I was also having diarrhea every single morning after my coffee and I thought it was just like the body's normal thing to do and I had a couple of friends that also like had diarrhea every morning and we would all like talk about it like it was like oh just having our morning poop this is so normal. And then after I cut out gluten and I made it took probably about two to three weeks before I noticed the effects but like genuinely since that day which was in the very beginning of 2021. I have had diarrhea one time and it was when I accidentally ate ramen from a seerated restaurant. I didn't realize it was seerated. So I got some sort of food poisoning. Aside from that I just my whole you can tell that like my whole digestive system changed and you know I'll be honest it didn't manifest in like clear skin or a slimmer figure or anything like that for me but it was just the way that my like insides felt definitely lit up after cleaning up the diet in that way. - Right and if I feel like digestion is so important because if you're not digesting your food properly you're not actually getting the right nutrients out of it and like I always don't feel good in my body and in myself when I'm not digesting my food properly like I just feel not as confident and I feel like I'm not fitting into my clothes as well as I want to if I feel like something's going wrong like inside my stomach. And so I think like you know that's super important and also recognizing that people have different food and tolerances and I think you know we kind of just mindlessly consume and don't really recognize maybe that we may be intolerant to certain things. There's a lot of value to kind of be more mindful with what we consume, how we consume it and recognizing that you know sometimes it's good to eliminate at a time certain things in our diet to kind of test out and see is this specific food group affecting me or is it a different one? So trying to take out those variables and then kind of get to the root cause of what might be causing some digestive issues or what might be causing changes in my complexion or the way I feel about myself from a food standpoint. - Definitely, and I just feel so much, I just feel internally, like I guess now to change my answer to your mental question. Mentally, I feel a sense of happiness, like knowing that I am doing something good for my body. And to clarify on this podcast, I don't only eat healthy food. If people follow me on Instagram, they see, I bake cookies every single night, and I have gelato, and I definitely, like, I love dessert. That said, I would say that my, because I'm gluten-free, so many, queerly crappy desserts and snacks are just off the table for me. So I do often have to figure out creative ways to make healthier, quote, versions of things that I love. So even though I do have something sweet, you know, multiple times a day, and also every night I'm big on dessert, it's usually not the really, like, worst thing for you that I'm eating. It's like gluten-free cookies or, I don't know, I don't think ice cream's that bad for you. So it's usually, I still love my dessert. I think it's mostly the food throughout the day. I'm really big on cooking, and I'm pretty big on no matter what I'm eating, trying to make sure I'm getting a nice round diet of vegetables and, like, healthy fats and fibers and proteins and just different things in a meal, where, like, I basically don't eat any fast food, or I just don't have a lot of, like, packaged junk. But that's mostly because it's not safe for me being celiac. And I do feel like a sense of, I'm doing something good for my body with my generally healthy way of eating. And especially in the transition into motherhood, I remember, like, when I was in the trying to conceive stage, I just kind of felt like every good nutrient I put in my body was only going to be helpful at actually getting pregnant. And then throughout the pregnancy, I definitely felt a sense of, you know, what I'm eating is what he's eating. So I want to make sure that we're both getting well nourished and now throughout my breastfeeding journey, it's the same. I genuinely feel like everything I eat is, like, I think of it as, like, it gets blended up and it's going into him in the form of my breast milk. And, you know, whether or not he's actually getting all of that, I now feel a sense of, it just brings me, like, a sense of overall positivity and joy to know that I'm doing something good for myself and my son. - Yeah, exactly. And now, of course, there's this different element to it because you are a mom and now you have Milo and you have another being to think about and you're nourishing him as well as alongside nourishing your own body. So, of course, there's different layers to that. And I think that probably has also maybe, like, deep in your perspective on what you consume and, you know, what health means to you. But moving aside from food in particular, you'd mentioned earlier that the wellness practices and the lifestyle practices in particular, were the ones that kind of made more of a lasting impact on, you know, how you define health and wellness and what's brought you happiness in your life. And something that I'm curious to hear more about is how you've managed to maintain those practices after, like, completing the two-week challenge or the one-week challenge. Because, for example, like, I love meditation. And the last summer, I went to Bali to get my yoga certification and it was the best experience of my life. And I was practicing yoga from seven to nine every morning and it was a yoga practice with some sort of, like, breath work or, like, 40 minute meditation. And I was doing it consistently every day for a month. And once you kind of get into that flow, you crave it and you want to keep doing it. But something that I found really difficult now is keeping that up, just keeping up the habit. And so I wanted to hear from you, like, how have you managed to keep up habits that you've actually enjoyed trying out in those series back in the days of her finery 29? And if you haven't been able to keep them up, then, you know, what are other things that you're trying to do to incorporate, like, or slowly incorporate those lifestyle changes in your day-to-day life? Great question. And that Bali trip sounds incredible. That sounds lovely right now. I have not traveled in so long. I think, you know, the early days when I was doing these lifestyle challenges, the things that really stuck out to me were, as I mentioned before, the things like the yoga and the meditation and the Ayurvedic rituals. And there were a lot of things that as a mid-20 year old woman who did not have a kid yet and wasn't married yet and was just like, bopping around New York City, there were a lot of things that I felt, oh, and also pre-pandemic life. A lot of things I felt like were very attainable and, you know, easy for me to do. So I added in, you know, I used to go to a yoga studio four to five times a week with my sister. We lived really close to each other and we had a studio in New York that we loved that's now closed and we used to go all the time. I also was in a pretty good rhythm with meditation at various points where I had different trackers and I would meditate every day for a whole month and then maybe I'd fall off for a week but I'd get back on and I just, I do think bullet journaling was really helpful because once I built this whole habit tracker, I was really inspired to do the habits so that I could fill it out and make it look pretty by the end of the month. And so there were various habits like the waking up early and not looking at my phone in the morning and drinking water with lemon, which who knows if that's a thing that is important but things that just made me feel happy to do and I would try, you know, to scale back caffeine so I would be like, let me put a line item on for a day that I had an herbal tea instead of coffee and basically just built these trackers and habits that I wanted to achieve and I would always say that like my success with these habits has been a roller coaster. Like they're, I'm definitely not just dedicated to doing them all all the time and just stick to them with ease. It's been like one week, I'm really good at it and one week I'm not, which I think is probably more classic of people that like really wanna get into these habits but they keep falling off the bandwagon with it. That's definitely how it's worked for me. And then once the pandemic hit and I was, you know, that was like the end of the yoga studio days and for a little while I had this yoga teacher that I had done some videos within person and so I started doing some Zoom yoga sessions with her and throughout the pandemic I did that twice a week from home and I was trying to meditate 'cause I knew that was important especially with the state of the world and like everyone's mental health going awry and I was trying to meditate but I definitely wasn't on any sort of dedicated schedule and now being a new mom, it's like, I'm definitely, I would say right now, I'm definitely at a low point in terms of like a downward dip of sticking to those habits but that's, I'm not saying that even in a negative way though because it's like just a different season of my life right now where the most important thing for me is not to like make sure I'm meditating every day or exercising every day. Yeah, I know that at some point in this journey like in the next few months, I know there's gonna be a point again when I get incredibly inspired to get back to doing yoga regularly or to get back to meditating every day and I just kind of live in a way that gives myself the flexibility and the freedom to like wait until that point comes and then do it instead of just forcing it when it's not the right time because I, if I look back at my past, I can see it's always common gone and waves and so if it's not here right now I'm not like nervous that I'm never gonna get my drive back. That's a really great point because I think we look to habits to be as that stable and consistent practice that we can keep very consistent while other changes occur in our lives but I think it's also important to give ourselves the grace and flexibility with habits kind of waxing and waning and coming in and out as we hit different transitions in our lives. Like in your case right now you're a new mom and so like you mentioned, the most important thing isn't finding that five minutes a day to meditate. Like you have these other priorities and your child is coming first and so I think that it's just a really great point that you bring up because in like maybe your early 20s when you're transitioning out of college when you're coming into the working world like your environment is completely different maybe you're in a different city, you're around different people you're doing something different in your day to day job and you're not a student anymore and so because so many external factors have shifted it's okay to not necessarily have that same regimented structure and routine that you had adopted maybe while in college or when you were younger and I think we tend to be so hard on ourselves with not meeting our own expectations of doing the things that we know are good for ourselves. - On the note of the meditation, 100%, I think the tip I would give people is to just let yourself be really like where you are in that moment, not where you think you need to be based on that moment. And the example I'll give is I remember pre-getting pregnant. I said to myself, when I finally, when I get pregnant and when I like know that I have a baby inside, I'm going to meditate every day because that's the time in my life when I need to be the most grounded and centered at calm. And I just envisioned myself as this pregnant woman meditating daily. Then I became pregnant. And I honestly don't think I'm meditated once in my pregnancy. And I remember like talking to a couple of friends who were asking like, you know, how are you? How are you doing mentally? And I was like, I genuinely feel the least in my head that I've ever felt in my whole life right now. Like there have been so pre-preclancy, there were so many times in my life when I felt like I needed to meditate. Like I really felt like I needed a moment of silence. And every time I would go do something that was like silent related, like just for example, every time I would like be getting my nails done for example, where I like can't be on my phone and I'm just kind of sitting thinking. My head, my thoughts would race and I would think about a million business ideas and the meaning of life and like, what are we doing here? And then post-getting pregnant, it was like, I remember it was, I went on a short trip with my husband's family and I got a prenatal massage and I was like lying on the table, not face down, but I was on my side. And it was the first time like my eyes were closed and I was just in my own head thinking and it was just like peace and quiet and I wasn't stressed or thinking about anything or trying to contemplate the purpose of anything. I was just enjoying the moment and genuinely didn't feel like I needed to meditate and so I had to kind of get out of my head, this vision I had of myself as this meditating pregnant woman because when the moment actually came, that didn't feel essential or important at all. - Right and I think we use these practices as kind of like tools in our toolbox to use when we feel like we're in a time of stress or our mind is racing and our thoughts are going a mile a minute and then we can say, oh, I can go to my meditation practice or I know that I have the yoga practice or I know that journaling in the morning is gonna help me just bring dump and clear my head and then those practices can feel really therapeutic because we see them actually affecting us. Whereas in the moments where you're actually kind of at peace and you don't really feel that need to meditate or to do your five minute journal, then you can recognize like, oh, like I actually don't have to put this pressure on myself to check all these boxes and do all these things that are quote, unquote good for me when I already feel baseline relatively okay, that's kind of an empowering feeling. - And the same thing goes for waking up early. I've actually heard a couple of people talking about it on a podcast recently, but I kind of forget what they're talking about. It was about how different people who are different archetypes have just different natural inclinations to either wake up early and perform really well in the morning or want to sleep a little later and how the people that naturally are inclined to sleep later for them to try to become a morning person just because they like want this vision of, I'm a morning person and I'm up with the sun and I'm doing my five minute journal and you know, whatever you see on these tick-tocks of like that girl routine. Yeah, like everyone trying to do that, it's just really not conducive to you being the best you if you're trying to get into this habit and routine just because you think it's what you should be doing when really there was no problem with you sleeping until 8/30 or not. - Exactly and I think the wellness industry is a whole really does paint this picture of to like what it looks like to achieve health. Like you mentioned with that wellness aesthetic on tick-tock like the that girl trend although they are really pleasing to watch on tick-tock and it's definitely a guilty pleasure of mine just scrolling through those videos. It's like not really attainable and there are days where I do need the extra 30, 45 minutes of rest in the morning and then there are days where I naturally wake up early and I do feel more productive and so I think you have to give yourself the flexibility to listen to what you need in the moment and kind of tune out all the noise on social media that is kind of telling you what you should be doing because when you have that resistance with trying to fit into someone else's routine you're actually gonna be less productive and there's something actually called like chronotypes. I don't know if you've heard of it. Maybe it's what you're referencing. - Like the way it's like the art and the-- - Yeah, exactly. It's like there's different animals and the idea is that depending on like your chronotype or your profile, your energize at different points in the day so you should like schedule meetings at different times and then you should have like your creative heads down work at different times in the day depending on like when you're energized and you know when you're most creative and I think that's so interesting 'cause it shows that you know, health can be very personalized and like the way that you choose to live your life and how you find meaning and purpose and productivity is really like a person by person basis. And I think that's super empowering because then I think you can feel more equipped to actually take a hold of the day and get the things done that you wanna do. - Totally, I agree. And yes, it was chronotypes, not archetypes. But it's similar 'cause I think it's like the archetype that you have is that chronotype. But it's really fascinating to think about that. And especially since now you're a new mom, have you found that like your day-to-day routines and habits have shifted drastically from pregnancy or prior to being pregnant? How have you tried to just maintain your own understanding of health and wellness? Just by having a totally different schedule. - So 100% the whole routine, the whole routine is different and it's just so much more all encompassing than I could have imagined or than I thought. I didn't really know anyone, no one in my family has had a kid, Michael and I are the first on both sides to have a baby. And I didn't grow up with a lot of babies around me like my mom's and only child and my dad's brothers were all like their kids were way older. So totally did not understand the baby thing. All I knew of babies was when I knew someone that had a baby I would go over and spend an hour with them and I would think that was the best hour of my day. How lucky that they get that hour 24/7. And you know, the things you don't realize, it's just the very cyclical nature of the day with a baby, especially if you like Michael and I do, which is have a very rigid schedule of feeding and like when it's his wake window and then what time we're gonna put him down for a nap and then the whole cycle starts over again until the end of the day. And pretty much the whole day, like on a day when we don't have our nanny here, which we hired a nanny for three days of the work week. And so the other two days are days that I'm basically on duty because Michael is back at work now after his three months paternity leave, which was amazing 'cause that was a nice long time for him. But on those days it really is like the absolute only time that I could have time to do something for myself would be while he's down for a nap, which he's currently not in a very good nap rhythm. Yet he's doing really well at night and he's sleeping through the night, which has like changed our lives in terms of us getting sleep. But during the day he's napping for like 20 minutes and then needs soothing and then well maybe nap for another 10 and he really only will take a good nap if he's in a stroller and I'm wheeling him around. So I can't like put him in his room in the crib and then go do anything in the apartment for longer than 30 minutes max. And the other times that I'm like, quote, relieved from being with him is in the morning, Michael does the morning feed so I can sleep in a little bit but I still have to wake up and pump to get. So I'm not super like engorged during that time. And then at night after Michael's done with work like he'll come out of the office and he'll be able to take over so I can either do something for myself or often the thing I choose to do is cook 'cause I really get inspired to cook and I'm usually like creating content while I'm cooking. So it's like the book ends of the day, I would have help but then like the whole rest of the day is just a schedule doing what the baby needs whether it's playing with him, feeding him, changing burping or attending to him while he's trying to nap and struggling. So it really is just an endless cycle. But what I will say is during the three months maternity leave that Michael and I took together I did, I was pleasantly surprised at how with a partner who is on leave with you, or I guess it doesn't need to be a partner on leave, I guess for someone else it could also be, you know, with family nearby that's really supportive. But if you have other people that are with you and the baby and you're not the sole care taker, it really is, like I really was pleasantly surprised at how much time I still was able to have to myself, contrary to what I had been told by society, like you're never gonna sleep again, or you know, you're not gonna have time to do anything because you're just gonna be doing dishes all day, you won't even have time to take a shower, like that was a big one that I was nervous I wouldn't get to shower and actually postpartum, like having such a helpful husband who was there and available and present, like we would really alternate with giving each other time to do things. So like one of us would be attending to the baby while the other person was able to do things, like take a long shower or go take a walk or go see a friend or do, you know, do their own things. And I think we just really like balanced it out nicely to the point where postpartum, I actually started taking two showers a day, whereas I only showered once a day before. Now I was able to take two showers a day, which I felt like I was very sweaty postpartum plus with the breastfeeding, I just felt like I needed to shower in the morning and night and I was able to find the time to do that and I also feel like I kicked up my cooking game postpartum and like found the time to be able to cook like intricate meals because I had the support of a partner who was able to be watching the baby while I did that. And that was very much like, obviously I was cooking for him too, but I'm like doing something for me that's like a very positive thing for my mental health to be in the kitchen and cook. And so I was surprised that if you do have adequate support and if you, you know, ask for help and have help around you, it doesn't need to be as daunting as sometimes people make it out to be. Yeah, it sounds like you're thriving postpartum, which is amazing. And it's really nice that you do have that support from Michael and from your family and from your friends just, you know, having the ability to take time for yourself. I feel like it's so crucial when you're entering motherhood. And now I know you recently transitioned back into working. How has that been with, you know, being a mom and, you know, having my low-round and just navigating the transition now into like, re-entering the working world? Yeah, well, to backtrack on the, you know, prior to working, we realized that we were going to need to hire a nanny. And so, you know, I want to point out we did, which maybe a caveat for my previous statement too, we did also for the first month postpartum. We had a baby nurse who was living with us 24/7. And then after that month, we were on our own for two months until we went back to work and then we hired this nanny three days a week. So, first thing I'd want to call out on this is like acknowledging the privilege of being able to hire help to be here. And, you know, I know not everyone has that financial flexibility. I know that without paying for it, a lot of people do rely on parents and family to do that. And I actually have a Q&A highlight on my Instagram if anyone's curious about the whole baby nurse situation. I did a whole Q&A about it and kind of answered every question about, you know, the nitty-gritty, like how much it cost, it costed us to have her. Is that how you say cost did? No, that's a very wrong. How much it cost us to have her? And, you know, where she slept and what the dynamic was like with her, I answered all those questions and why we chose to use a baby nurse versus our own parents as, you know, my last grandparents watching him. So I shared all that. But same thing for the nanny, like we now have decided to hire this help while we both go back to work. And I genuinely feel like having the support. It's just life changing support. And even if it was family, it's just having someone other than you and or your partner to look after the baby. It's, I just think it's essential. And people keep sending me like, it takes a village. Like we used to raise babies in villages and it just keeps reminding me like it really does take a village. I don't know how people just, you know, don't accept help or don't ask for help. And, you know, for the people that live in places where they don't have any family or friends, nearby, like I genuinely feel for them because the experience of doing this alone with either just yourself or you and just a partner, it's like near impossible to maintain your own mental and physical health while you're in this stage because it's so all consuming and like heavy and intense, especially like the emotions postpartum. But to answer your question about being back at work, it, it feels, I was really excited to get back into work. And I honestly, even, even like a week after Milo was born, I was hopping on my computer every couple days and checking my email. And I was still just like funneling stuff over to my talent agents and setting up stuff for when I got back because honestly in that time, being on my computer and answering work related emails made me feel just like so much calmer and more normal because everything else in my life was so abnormal and different that like at least this one thing hadn't changed. Like I still have my email inbox and I still have my team in Los Angeles that's like talking to brands for me and it almost felt like there was this thread of Lucy who like I used to be that was still there and I actually really liked diving back into that. And then of course it was nice to not have to, you know, do any sponsored content throughout the three month period. But as you know from following me, I definitely shared loads of content during my maternity leave because I was feeling just an abundance of inspiration and you know so many new topics to talk about and so many new things that I wanted to share that I was not really offline at all. Yeah, it makes sense how like there is this one consistent thread that maybe felt like it grounded you and it provided some sort of, you know, an opportunity to remind yourself of like the Lucy that existed pre pregnancy and now post pregnancy getting back into that must feel so nice and speaking of work, one final topic I wanted to touch on before we wrap up the interview is following things that you're passionate about and navigating career transitions and taking risks. And so I know that you started out, you know, at Refinery 29 making these series and then eventually you decided to go off on your own and start your own company and be, you know, your own content creator as Lucy Fink. And so that's something that I personally really admire. I think it takes a lot of courage and bravery to do something like that and so I wanted to ask, you know, how did you navigate any challenges with taking a really big risk like that? And how did you kind of fight through maybe experiencing feelings of imposter syndrome or self-doubt to get to where you are today? I think it was more of an emotional risk than, you know, I don't know if emotional is a word, but it was more, I felt like I was more so risking losing like this audience I had built because I knew that people were, people were so into the series that I was doing at Refinery that they didn't want them to end and so me leaving. And I was kind of like, no, when's the next trial of you with Lucy coming out and I got that question, I actually still get that question today. Like when's your next five day challenge coming out and I haven't worked at Refinery 29 in four years. So I think just the nature of the internet, people still see the content and think it was produced like this year and then they want more. And so there was the scariest part for me was leaving this gig that was definitely a very positive experience for me. And the fact that I had the whole power of this media empire of Refinery 29 behind me that was promoting my content and pushing it out every single time I had a new video, it was up on Snapchat for millions of people and blasted across Refinery 29's global platforms. It was playing in airports and in taxis and Refinery 29 just like had the ability to get it everywhere. And I kind of knew that once I was leaving that, I was leaving that support system and anything I produced like I was responsible for pushing out. I didn't have this huge platform that already had millions of eyeballs on it. So that was kind of the scariest, the emotional leap of it, but I will say that financially, I never felt like it was a financial risk because the way that I transitioned out was, it was very intentional in terms of making sure that I was financially set on my own before I pulled the plug. So I basically throughout my whole time at Refinery29, you know, even from before I started working there, I was always working with brands on my own through Instagram and creating content for brands. In the beginning, before I got to Refinery, it was mostly stop-motion content that I was selling to brands. And then after I started sharing more of my face and my life, it was more influencer content that was, you know, always kind of happening in the background on my Instagram. And then at the point at which I left Refinery29, I was already signed with a talent agent and the way I transitioned out of Refinery, I don't know a lot of people know that like my last year with them, which was 2019, was a year when I was kind of like in a hybrid role with them. So I was no longer a full-time employee in 2019, but I had a contract with them. They'd basically were my first client when I went off on my own. So I left to go sign with the agency and my agency negotiated a deal with Refinery29 as my first through my first year. And I was responsible for making 16 videos for them in 2019. So four videos every quarter. And that was like way lower than what I had been doing because I had been doing a video every week for them for the 52 videos a year minimum. So 16 felt like a smaller amount that I could juggle while I was doing my own projects. And I basically like started off that year 2019 with a contract from Refinery29 as like my first client. And then whatever else came was just like icing on the cake for the year. And so, and then it ended up being you know way more than the contract for Refinery29. Like everything else was added up to being way more that by 2020 I didn't even have to do another deal with them. And also by 2020, coronavirus came and Refinery was sold to Vice and everything just kind of ended slowly. But it was definitely like I didn't feel like I was financially diving off the deep end. I felt very secure in the financial side of things. It was more so me being like, is this a good decision? Are people going to still follow me? You know, are people going to be upset? That kind of thing. Right. I mean, it also felt like that it seems like there is the synergy of you transitioning out, but then also still being involved with Refinery. But from now, a different capacity and as like a different figure because you are off on your own. So I think that was that worked out really well for you. And it kind of it makes a lot of sense how that transition occurred. And I think, you know, it's amazing that it didn't have to be as big of a financial risk as maybe it could have been. And you know, like I know in previous conversations that we've had, you've made the comment on, you know, the advice that is around making sure that you can like support yourself if you do decide to go off and do something on your own and not necessarily like leaving your full time job until you believe you like actually can. And so I think that's also really great advice. But it's interesting how it was more of this like emotional risk of not knowing if you're making the right decision. Because I think, you know, we hear about trusting our intuition, trusting our gut. And of course, it's so much easier said than done. And it's like, well, how do we actually bring that into practice? How do we actually follow our intuition and make intentional choices and be very deliberate about what we decide to do in our lives? And I think like that's really interesting because it's hard to feel like you're on the right path, especially in your 20s or your young mid in your early mid 20s. Like there's so many things that are kind of coming at you at that time. It can feel very overwhelming and hard to know like I'm carving out the right path for myself. Definitely. I still stick by that, you know, I know tons of creators who, especially now with TikTok, the amount of people that just blow up and start getting brand offers and deals. And they still have a nine to five job doing something else. And I just always encourage them to keep that other job and keep doing this fun side hustle on the side until you know with certainty that weaving is going to allow you to make the same amount if not more than you're making at your job. And like, you know, only obviously only leave your nine to five if you don't like it. But if you do enjoy what you're doing, you can also keep your job and just keep the content as a, you know, fun side hustle. It doesn't need to become a full time job. Exactly. Well, Lucy, you've given such great advice throughout this interview. And I know we've talked a lot about what you've learned from the different wellness trends you've tried with your segment or a fineery 29 and how you've incorporated wellness practices in your day to day life and now being a mother. But my final question for you today is centered around happiness and doorphins. It's something that I ask every guest that comes onto the podcast. What is something that brings you a bit of endorphins every day? Oh, wow. Oh, gosh. I've got to say it's my morning coffee ritual. And I doubt it's actually giving me endorphins. It's probably just giving me cortisol. But that's a good point. Definitely cortisol. I just genuinely, when I go to sleep, I'm excited for the next day because of the coffee. And it's like, it's such a good part of my morning. If it's a sunny day, even better, because then I just can like stand in the sun with the cup of iced coffee and it's always iced even in the winter. But just something about that morning cup, it really just brings my whole day together to the point where if I have something to do in the morning, like a meeting or if I have a call with someone or if I'm leaving the house, I just will actually adjust my wake up time and adjust everything to make sure that I can have a dedicated like five to ten minutes in the kitchen with my coffee because it just really brings me joy. It's really grounding to like having that ritual. I used to be a coffee fanatic and then I stopped drinking coffee the summer and I've pivoted to matcha and I love chailates too. So I think for me, it's really just about having like that drink and having like that ritual. So I can totally relate and I think it's also really important to have time for yourself in the morning to kind of feel centered and feel organized mentally and physically so that you can prepare yourself for whatever the day has to bring for you. So I totally can relate and resonate with that feeling around just having something that's constant in your morning routine that you can go to bed and look forward to the next day. Yes. And you know, let yourself get excited about it. That's honestly one of the main things that helps me get up is knowing that I'm on my way to the kitchen and the coffee is waiting in the fridge in the craft. Exactly. Well, tonight I'll be asleep dreaming about my matcha. Well, thank you so much, Lucy. Where can my listeners find you on social media? You can find me on Instagram and YouTube and TikTok. Those are probably the three biggest platforms and my handles Lucy B. Fink and Lucy is spelled LUCIE. And then also my website is a good place to connect Lucy Fink.com and it shares, you know, info about basically I have all my content there. So it's kind of like a content hub, but it also gives you info about where you can connect with me for different one-on-one services I offer, like coaching and consulting for aspiring content creators and people who want to build YouTube channels and grow on social media. And if you're looking for really cute baby content, definitely go check it out. Yeah, I can't believe I didn't say that for the endorphins. Definitely like baby moments are giving me a lot of endorphins because every, everything he does is just like so awe inspiring to watch him do something one day that he couldn't do the day before. And just to watch him like discover the world around him. As I said, I never, I never had babies around me. So I never knew like what they go through as they're growing, but it's just so cute. He's like currently in a state of starting to realize that he has hand. So he'll just like stare at his own hand in front of his face, like his hands like two inches from his face and he just stares at his hand. And it's definitely making, making me and like a laugh every day, little things like that. I'm sure motherhood brings on just like a whole new meaning of happiness and joy. And I love watching fun baby content. And I love seeing Milo pop up on like my TikTok feed and one of my best friends Nicole, she is like obsessed with babies and obsessed with looking at babies on Instagram, like TikTok, whatever it may be. So shout out to Nicole. And she should also go watch Milo's. Yeah, set out Nicole. Go check out Milo content. Thank you so much, Lucy. It's been such a pleasure having you on the podcast. Thank you, Sarah. Thank you for listening and remember to like, rate and review this podcast on whichever listening platform you prefer. Don't forget to keep spreading in Dorfins. and find things that bring you endorphins every day. See you next time.