I know I’m a tad behind, but I’m reading #GIRLBOSS by Sophia Amoruso (shown above), the creator of NastyGal. I’m sure you’ve all heard all the buzz, seen the Instagrams, and even picked up the book yourself by now. Well, in case you haven’t started Sophia Amoruso’s #GIRLBOSS yet, or aren’t convinced it lives up to the hype, I’m here to tell you exactly why it should be next on your ‘to read’ list.
It is an amazing book, so captivating and funny! She had so many issues and shitty experiences, but her whole life ended up helping her create such a fast-growing and successful company.
1. "When you believe in yourself, other people believe in you, too."
Sophia gives this anecdote:
“My mom says that when I was five, I got a red string and ran across the playground with it trailing after me. All of the other kids asked what it was, and I told them that it was a kite. Soon everyone had red strings, and we all ran together, our kites high in the sky.”
Moral of the story: For others to believe in you, you first have to believe in yourself. Now go fly that crazy kite like only you can.
2. “If you’re frustrated because you’re not getting what you want, stop for a second: Have you actually flat-out asked for it? If you haven’t, stop complaining. You can’t expect the world to read your mind. You have to put it out there, and sometimes putting it out there is as simple as just saying, ‘Hey, can I have that?'”
3. “When the going gets tough, keep on going.”
“If you believe that what you’re doing will have positive results, it will—even if it’s not immediately obvious,” Sophia writes.
“I responded to every single comment that anyone left on my page. It just seemed like the polite thing to do. Many companies were spending millions of dollars trying to nail social media, but I just went with my instincts and treated my customers like they were my friends. Even with no manager watching to give me a gold start, it was important to do my best. Who cares if a tree falls in a forest and no one hears it? The tree still falls.”
So get that grad degree you’re dreaming about, even if you’re not sure yet exactly where it will take you yet. Launch that product line—as long as you’re learning along the way, you’ll end up ahead even if the business doesn’t ultimately succeed. Persistence really is the thing that leads to success in so many projects in life. Don’t be afraid to keep on keeping on.
4. “While I truly believe that you must have intentions to fulfill your dreams, I also think you have to leave room for the universe to have it’s way and play around a bit. Don’t get so focused on one particular opportunity that you’re blind to other ones that come up. If you think about one thing, and talk about it all the time, you’re being too obsessive. You might ruin it. If you let yourself meander a bit, then the right things and the right people fall into place.”
5. “Always be a work in progress.”
Sophia writes:
“I never assumed that I’d just done my best job the first time around. Your challenge as a #GIRLBOSS is to dive head first into things without being too attached to the results. When your goal is to gain experience, perspective and knowledge, failure is no longer a possibility. . .it’s actually quite empowering.”
6. “Your challenge as a #GIRLBOSS is to dive headfirst into things without being too attached to the results. When your goal is to gain experience, perspective, and knowledge, failure is no longer a possibility. Failure is your invention. I believe that there is a silver lining in everything, and once you begin to see it, you’ll need sunglasses to combat the flare. It is she who listens to the rest of the world who fails, and it is she who has enough confidence to define success and failure for herself who succeeds.”
7. "You belong where you want to belong."
Think you don’t have the credentials to launch into a new industry? Worried you don’t speak the lingo of other, more experienced people on the path you’re going down? Use that to your advantage.
“There’s a certain freedom to being an outsider. You do what you want, say what you want, and move on when you’ve worn out your welcome,” she writes in a passage explaining what it’s like to find herself working as a CEO, a role she never prepared herself for and one that required a ton of on-the-job learning. “No matter where you are in life, you’ll save a lot of time by not worrying too much about what other people think about you.”
If a #GIRLBOSS isn’t afraid of asking “dumb questions” then we’re all about it, too.
8. “You create the world, blink by blink…You will make sacrifices and compromises, get let down and let other people down, fail and start over, break some hearts, take some names and learn to pick up and continue when your own heart gets broken. But difficult doesn’t mean impossible, and out of the bajillions of things in this universe that you can’t control, what you can control is how hard you try, and if or when to pack it in.”
9. “Unlock what motivates you.”
And chase it.
“I think that part of the reason Nasty Gal has been so successful is because my goals were never financial ones. I believed in what I was doing, and fortunately other people believed in it as well. I cared as much about the process as I did about the results. No decision was too small. Whether it was the word choice in a product description or the expression on a model’s face, I treated everything with the utmost care. At the time this was just because, like I said before, I’m the kind of person who pays attention to something as small as a crooked shipping label. In hindsight, I see that it’s those small things that can make or break a business.”
Like a #GIRLBOSS.
10. “Never let go of your appetite to go after new ideas, new experiences, and new adventures. Compete with yourself, not with others. Judge yourself on what is your personal best and you’ll accomplish more than you could ever have imagined. Life stops for no one, so keep moving.”
