Laura Bo Creative

Tag: perspective

  • A name is a name – but what’s up with the personal branding BS? What happened to self-identity?

    I have changed my name a lot. Some were nicknames, some were legit, legally on paper (read part 1 here). I have also built my own brand at least a dozen times — Each time I would tear down the previous version, and start from scratch, rebuild it to something completely new… Only to feel “over it” by the time I got to the end. LOL for me.

    Only a handful of those have ever seen the light of day. Most only briefly. A moment where I was so proud and so excited of my “new creation”. And ya know I would go and share it with some people (like a special sneak preview). I would share it with my besties who would say “WOOT that’s awesome! I don’t get it, but it’s awesome!” And I would share it with a person in my industry/field, usually someone that I respected or admired. Sometimes I would show my mom – that ended pretty early –

    Anyway, those brand versions were really just my identity all packaged up. Which would change every few years based on whatever current special interest I had, or visual I had locked into.

    Now, I would imagine You’ll have the people coming for me saying, “Well, you shouldn’t care.” No shit. I’m working through that. I’m 36. I’m a mom now. Or the people saying “oh, well it just wasn’t the right timing” Sure, no problem.

    You can tell me whatever you think I want to hear or perhaps whatever you think you want to hear.

    As far as why past brand iterations didn’t work? I don’t really care. Trying to understand why is not helping me today or tomorrow. All I know is that my biggest mistake, my biggest failure and regret is not just doing it. Waiting for external validation and approval…

    Here’s the thing when it comes to “just doing it”. Once upon a time, I had this extreme sense of “Fuck the world”. And my mother would tell me “you’re so angry and you hate the world” and blah, blah, blah and like, yeah, maybe I did. Because it was hard as a teenager and try to wrap your head around the fact that your own mother who adopted you HATES you.

    I absolutely am angry. I have every right to be.

    THE BO YEARS – no W
    I used to try and make my whole brand, my identity. Uh maybe you knew me at the Laura bo phase. Uh, for those of you don’t know,
    My middle name is not BO. I have five bow tattoos, I have five ribbon tattoos, right? And I got three of them the summer just before I went to college my freshman year and two of them within the first year of college.

    It doesn’t matter. The point is, is Why was it Bo not b-o-w? Because the first time I had it as “bow”, people said oh it’s “Laura bow” like the pronunciation was BAO. They assumed it was my last name. So I dropped the W. Back then my last name was still my fathers, MARFILIUS.

    THE FIONA YEARS
    I was just barely 18. Took me three more years to take my mom’s last name. Maybe you met me in high school during my Fiona years, right? Uh, it technically. Started, when I went to Camp, Sleepway camp, the same year I got kicked out of camp.

    But I decided that, hey, I don’t know these fucking people. I see them for a few weeks out of the year and I don’t want to be Laura right now, right? Because I thought Laura sucked. And so I said, fine, I’m going to be Fiona and I was Fiona. Up until my freshman year of high school, where there was already a Fiona.

    Her real name was Fiona. And obviously F comes before L in the in the alphabet. Um, and so I decided to go by Laura that year. That blip. The following year when I was shipped off to boarding school in Vermont, I went back to Fiona. I didn’t grow up with the name, Fiona, I didn’t have nicknames. I always wanted a nickname. I didn’t know the, uh, the the ugly side of nicknames.

    To be continued…

  • What Makes A Good Parent?

    In the midst of my increasingly ugly divorce with my soon to be ex-husband we continue to “disagree” on some seemingly universal basics. Now while some of you may be thinking — just don’t talk to him. Move out. Be the bigger person. Please kindly and disrespectfully fuck off. Three years of silence and being the bigger person got me here to this exact point.

    So after a quick google search of “what makes a good father?” for the comic relief, followed by the same search of “what makes a good mother?” it has occured to me that society in this country is FUCKED. (As if we didn’t already know this.)

    Below are the two images of the top things listed for each search as prepared by google.

    As noted these were compiled from various sources across the web. WHAT IN THE ACTUAL FUCK THOUGH?

    *Please note I am fully aware of what MY definition of a good parent is on both sides. We will get to that.

    Can we just talk about the apologize when necessary first?

    To be continued….

  • Word Shit: Exclusive

    Exclusive

    [ikˈsklo͞osiv,ekˈsklo͞osiv] adjective

    1.Excluding or not admitting other things.

    2.Restricted or limited to the person, group, or area concerned.

  • Word Shit: Minimize

    Minimize

    [ˈminəˌmīz] verb

    reduce (something, especially something unwanted or unpleasant) to the smallest possible amount or degree.

    represent or estimate at less than the true value or importance.

  • WORD SHIT: Exclude

    Exclude

    [ikˈsklo͞od] verb

    To deny (someone) access to or bar (someone) from a place, group, or privilege.

    to prevent or restrict the entrance of. to bar from participation, consideration, or inclusion.

  • Stop being so polite..

    Stop being so polite..

    Stop being so polite, and try being honest.

    It has recently come to my attention, awareness, or top of mind that I often find myself surrounded by a bunch of people so worried about offending someone, that nobody wants to say anything at all.

    Enough with the judgement, can we try to lead with curiosity?

    Come from a place of understanding, or wanting to understand. Enough with the judgements, the assumptions, the snarky passive-aggressive bullshit.

    Say what you mean and mean it.

  • Journey Into Imagination…

    Journey Into Imagination…

    One Little Spark is a song, one of my favorites, and extremely annoying at times– it’s THE theme song for the ‘Journey Into Imagination’ Ride at Epcot in Disneyworld. My all-time favorite ride that features my favorite purple dragon. FIGMENT.

    Anywho. I am leaving the lyrics below.

    Journey Into Imagination with Figment version

    For every sound your ears are hearing,
    A thousand thoughts can start appearing.
    And each of us, imagines different things.
    From just a sound, your mind has wings.

    One spark of light,
    Can light your fancy.
    Your mind sees more,
    Than what your eyes see.
    Your sense of sight can make your fancy fly,
    There’s more to sight than meets the eye.

    One awful whiff can send you reeling,
    One lovely sniff can be appealing.
    Your mind can find what enters through your nose.
    That’s how you tell a skunk is not a rose.

    With just a spark of inspiration,
    I’ve made my house an innovation.
    Imagination really clowns around
    Mix downside up, and upside down.

    We all have sparks,
    Imaginations!
    That’s how our minds create creations.
    We set them free and oh what they can do!
    Those magic sparks from me and you.

    Imagination!
    Imagination!
    A dream can be a dream come true,
    With just that spark from me and you.


    One little spark,
    Of inspiraton,
    Is at the heart of all creation.
    Right at the start of everything that’s new,
    One little spark lights up for you.

  • Word Shit: Principle

    Principle

    [ˈprinsəp(ə)l] noun

    1.A fundamental truth or proposition that serves as the foundation for a system of belief or behavior or for a chain of reasoning.

    2. a general scientific theorem or law that has numerous special applications across a wide field.

    Principle is often confused with principal. Coming back to this post shortly.

  • Dear Parents,

    Dear Parents,

    Last night at Family Night I watched a little girl be inherently mean to my kid, over and over. My kid is 3. In an effort to let her “handle” the situation on her own, I would check in periodically, I stayed close by.

    She looked so sad and confused. And then I just couldn’t.  I told her when she was ready to leave we could go home and have ice cream (yes I absolutely bribed my kid to leave). We left 10 minutes later. 

     We all have varying degrees of what’s acceptable, but honestly this shit is getting old. I refuse to accept the excuses that “boys will be boys, and that’s just how girls are at that age.”

    WHAT? Nope. Sorry. No thank you.

    Can we stop making excuses for our kids behavior when its shitty? It seems like as parents we often excuse certain things because it is a direct reflection of ourselves, or we become aware of how our words and actions have shaped our own kids consciously or not.

    I believe we can do better. I know for a fact that a 4 year old saying “You make no sense, I am going to ignore you and everything you say” while simultaneously blocking and pushing a younger kid didn’t come from nowhere. Not allowing my kid to try and make friends with any other kid is shitty.

    let’s take a minute and think of how we can be supportive of each other and our children. I implore you to approach life from a place of curiosity and understanding vs. judgement and assumption.

    The displays of judgement and snobbiness that are infecting this neighborhood are ugly. Your kids see you. We all see you.

    To be continued…

  • Memory Exercise

    Memory Exercise

    For now I am calling this a memory exercise, and perhaps it should come with some sort of warning, because it may or may not unpack baggage.

    Close your eyes and think back to when you were a kid, perhaps sometime in elementary school. Try to find a memory of an event, a holiday party, a school assembly, county fair, but it would be a place where you would be with your family, your parents or caregivers.

    Pick one. They are deep in conversation with their friends, chit chatting away. You catch a glimpse of your name as you pass by, and it peaks your curiosity. What is being said? How is your parent describing you? What words or tone can you hear, feel, or remember?

    This happened to me recently, trying to think back on how my mother used to speak about me, how she spoke to me publicly, privately, how she spoke about me with one friend, vs. how she spoke about me when she thought no one was listening, when she thought I wasn’t listening or when she thought I was… A series of words came up.

    To be continued…

  • WORD SHIT: Inspire

    Inspire

    [inˈspī(ə)r] verb

    fill (someone) with the urge or ability to do or feel something, especially to do something creative.

    I believe that true inspiration comes naturally. It cannot be forced. You can’t forcibly inspire someone, there is definitely another word for that — in which I am currently blanking on. Again, definitions from various sources will provide their own perspectives, contexts, and connotations.

    To be continued…

  • WORD SHIT: Willing

    Willing

    [ˈwiliNG] adjective

    ready, eager, or prepared to do something.

    Today, someone said they were “willing to keep trying”, and within the surrounding context, this was immediately received with a negative tone. Upon looking up the definition, it made me wonder how the word willing has become so overused and/or misused that it now often seems more related to a bare minimum, least amount of effort type situation.

    Depending on where you find your version of the definition of willing, it can be read or misread as something viewed negatively, other words that came up were agreeable, and I realize the comparisons and examples used for the word willing came down to doing something of one’s own ‘will’ versus being forced or coerced into something.
    I found this interesting snippet, which is kind of what I am getting at I suppose:

    “Willing means you will do something if it is necessary or if it is asked of you, even if you don’t particularly want to“

    To be continued….

  • WORD SHIT: BOLD

    Bold
    [bōld] adjective

    1.(of a person, action, or idea) showing an ability to take risks; confident and courageous.

    2. (of a color or design) having a strong or vivid appearance.

    The definition of BOLD, adjective.

  • Questions on a Friday

    Why do people ask “How are you?” if they don’t truly want to know?

    Why does it always feel like someone is offended by the difference of opinion?

    When did the general public get so fucking lazy?

    Who makes all the rules?

    How does advice become cliche quotes/ sayings?

    Why were we told not to burn our bridges down?

  • I don’t tiptoe, I STOMP.

    Everybody is weird these days, maybe awkward is a better way to describe it. But the more I am aware of it, the more I notice people tiptoeing around or dancing around conversations, questions, initiatives, actions, etc. Maybe it’s just me, but I can’t help but wonder WHY — How did we get here? Is it because of COVID and all of the isolation? Is it corporate america taking over? Is it the internet? Is it the apps? Is it helicopter parents? At this point I can only imagine it is some combination of things, and see it from my own perspective, so here’s what i know.

    Why are conversations so hard? Small talk fucking sucks.

    To be continued…

  • A Name Is A Name Is A Name.

    What’s in a name? That famous quote by Shakespeare. I googled ‘famous quotes about names’ and a few stuck out — not sure if I qualify them as famous persay.

    “Names are powerful things. They act as an identity marker and a kind of map, locating you in time and geography. More than that, they can be a compass”  – Bookroo

    “There’s power in naming yourself, in proclaiming to the world that this is who you are” – Brainyquote [i question this source, but will save that for another time.

    “Knowing yourself is the beginning of all wisdom” –Aristotle.

    A cliche one for good measure “Be yourself. Everyone else is already taken” – Oscar Wilde.

    There is a common saying that feels ingrained in my head from my younger years “Make a name for yourself” it always felt so intimidating and permanent — until it didn’t. Sure it is still intimidating, but it did not take long for me to realize that a name is not permanent, neither is a reputation. I have changed my name legally 3 times. I just straight up made up a new name when I was 12 and told people at camp that my name was Fiona — I carried that name with me through my high school years at boarding school. I went back to Laura in college, but again, we were in a new place, so I made up my own nickname “Bo” and Laura Bo has stuck with me ever since.

    To be continued…

  • Marketing Lifecycle Metaphor – The Amoeba BB


    Customer amoeba baby – marketing lifecycle metaphor

    Marketing is not a funnel and it’s not a flywheel. It’s like a wave. It’s like a fluid amoeba. Blobby wave, I have to draw it I guess, but And it moves because people come in and out. I may have been. A customer of parenting stuff and then My baby’s not a baby.

    And then i move out of it — I’m not the target now. But maybe if there’s a baby in my life: friends, family, or whatever baby shower, I will suggest it or I will get it for them, you know. I don’t think that always gets accounted for. It’s not really a secondary target group as far as I’m concerned.

    Funnels and flywheels don’t work because you can’t control the path of the target, you can guide it, you can block it, you can try to trap it, but there are all of these “other factors” that you don’t know and/or have no control over because in the end control is an illusion.

    **

  • Everyone loves a good quilt.

    Perseverance and a positive mindset can turn any obstacle into a stepping stone.
    So, keep pushing boundaries, embracing the unknown, and strive to follow your dreams.
    It will make an impact.

    In the end, it’s not just about achieving success or getting rich — it’s about learning and growing along the way. Each challenge faced and each solution found adds to the patchwork of experience that has shaped who I am and what I can accomplish.

    We might not be cut from the same cloth, but everyone loves a good quilt.

  • Curiosity… Why do we stop being curious?

    I have a thing with words, and with context. I believe honesty and transparency are key, if one is confused they should ask for clarification. Not everyone knows everything, but there are things that everyone SHOULD know. Let’s talk about curiosity — and I think before we begin, let’s make sure we are all referring to the same definition.

    Curiosity (noun)

    a strong desire to know or learn something. “filled with curiosity, she peered through the window” According to Oxford Languages Dictionary.

    I found this in a journal from October 2020:
    Another term for experience is the “curse of knowledge” — when we have done something before or feel that we know it, we tend to stop asking questions.

    We don’t go back to the beginning and dig deep to find new aspects of it. We jump to the conclusion much more quickly.


    Basically, we stop asking WHY. We stop learning.
    THAT’S BAD. The cure for stagnation = curiosity.

    When you couple experience with curiosity, amazing things can happen.

    The ability to question things that we already “know”. That isn’t easy to do.

    Insatiable curiosity can be uncomfortable, even annoying… it is definitely annoying. But asking basic questions, and challenging the usual “That’s just how we do it” is the way to create something that hooks people.

    Curiosity is a state of active interest

    Do we like it simply because it’s familiar? Or because it’s the best approach?

    When we are curious, we see things differently; we use our powers of observation more fully. We are able to see a different perspective.

    Why does it feel like as you grow older you stop asking WHY? You stop asking HOW? You just accept everything as it is — good or bad.

  • A Message from My Inner Critic

    Find your style, find your niche, be unique, standout, do this, do that, if it’s not working then you’re not doing it right, don;t be too loud, don’t be too quiet. Blah blah fucking blah. I just want to turn it off. Turn off the noise. Shut it all out. Shut it all down. And say see you later. I want to run to the woods and blast music and throw paint, and get sticky from gluesticks. I want to play in the dirt with my kid. I want to not feel like I am a burden. And I don’t know if I feel like a burden to myself or to my inner critic. 

    Im messy. My story is messy. Currently it feels like a tangle of fairy lights or yarn or something. Trying to piece it together and roll it back so it makes more sense to me, which unlocks things I may or may not be ready to deal with, accept, move past.