This is how I Faced the Fear of Meeting my Biggest Creative Inspiration
By Jenifer Blanco, 28
It all began in mid 2014 when my friend Victor sent me an interview Chase Jarvis did to Tina Roth Eisenberg aka Swiss Miss, where she talked about side projects. As soon as the video ended I said to myself “You have got to get your ass out of this chair and start doing things”.
The next day, I got to my job and told my boss about the video and asked to get more briefs and more creative projects than usual. It made me feel amazing and immediately I started being much more proactive and productive.
I started doing yoga, painting with watercolor, doing mural art and my fascination for typography began. I started having side projects, lots of them.
One day, my friend Victor told me “You have to do something to get Tina’s attention.” Following his advice I started a blog called I Wanna Work With Swiss Miss where I curate and upload projects I like and some of my own projects. But it was nothing more than an excuse for me to start looking and learning from other creatives out there.
Then, Victor told me “Why don’t you go to New York and meet her?” At first, I felt terrified and I said “How can, I, meet with Tina Roth Eisenberg? How can I contact her? She is not even going to reply, I’m nobody.” Earlier that year I applied for two job openings at Tattly, Tina’s temporary tattoo company, and didn’t get any answer. So, my fear was real, right?
On September I said to myself “Jenifer, you have to go to NYC. You have to at least try, and if you don’t meet her, at least you get to visit an amazing city.” So, I faced my fear and bought my ticket to New York.
In the middle of it all, I started following my now friend Michelle Poler and her inspiring project: 100 Days Without Fear (that you all should take a look btw). Michelle got to meet Tina when she spoke at a Creative Mornings event, so when I asked Michelle about her, she immediately said “Oh yes, if you want to meet her, you definitely should. Try doing something that catches her attention and see.”
So the challenge to grab Tina’s attention and getting to meet her, began.
I had to do something different but most importantly, something real that portrayed me not only as a creative but also, as a person. My parents told me “Whatever you do, if it comes from the heart, she is going to like it”.
I sent her a video telling her a bit about my life in Buenos Aires, my side projects, the blog I did and the upcoming trip I organized just to meet her.
The very next day she replied.
I almost cried.
I couldn’t believe it.
She thanked me for the kind words and even said that “the video thing, was a first for her.”
I couldn’t stop smiling and I hadn’t even met her yet.
Two weeks later I arrived in NY and had the MOST amazing time! I loved the city, the people and absolutely everything about it.
I wrote an email to Tina to set a date for our meeting and shortly after I found out she was in Toronto. I seriously thought it was not going to happen. I decided to email her again saying that I was not going to leave NY without meeting her (in bold letters) and finally, she replied: “Ok, let’s meet today, I have 30 minutes”.
That was it, I was going to meet her.
The day arrived.
I MET TINA ROTH EISENBERG!!
We had such a fun conversation, or at least that’s what I though! We talked about work, life, goals and we even took a selfie together. To top it off, she kindly gave me four sets of Tattlys!!
To celebrate my accomplishment I went to a bar all by myself for the very first time and drank a Royal, the drink Napoleon Bonaparte used to order whenever he won a battle. I saw it on the menu and I knew I definitely deserved it!
This experience was sooo amazingly crazy and made me feel unstoppable. I felt like nobody could tell me that I can’t do something, because if I really want to and I put my heart to it, I’m going to accomplish whatever I want.
So, this is how I faced the fear of meeting one of my biggest creative inspirations, and it felt empowered.
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