“Workshop: Rewrite Your Bio” Recap
These past few months have challenged many of us professionally and personally, causing us to reflect on who we are and what story we want to share with the world. Last week, we gathered virtually for a night of empowerment, emotional excavation, and radical imagination to visualize our dream selves and redefine our bios through that lens. Jezz Chung, a Creative Equity Advisor, public speaker, and writer, guided us through activities and frameworks to write our stories, carving a path for who we are and what we want our legacy to be.
A huge thank you to Wethos for sponsoring discounted tickets for BIPOC folks and the wonderful Jezz Chung for underscoring why we should invest in ourselves and our bios: 1) to attract (the right) opportunities; 2) to build personal equity; 3) to help make a career pivot; 4) to own our stories; and 5) to manifest the life we want to live.
Keep scrolling to get the gist of what we learned, best bites, and more. 👇🏽
Best bites
- “The timelines don’t have to be ‘I did this.’ It can be ‘I learned this,’ ‘I grew into this,’ ‘I realized this.’ It can be moments where we have mental or emotional pivots or realize ‘I have a passion for this.’” Jezz encouraged us to think bigger and beyond traditional frameworks around what timelines usually entail, particularly for anyone who feels like where they want to go is not necessarily aligned with the jobs they’ve been in.
- “Especially as people who feel like an only or an other in a space, we tend to feel hesitant claiming milestones and we say, ‘I don’t know if I deserve it or it’s worth putting in my timeline’…But when we write it out, we can see objectively. We can see the disconnect between what we did and what we feel and bridge the gap between. So much of the time we just don’t give ourselves enough credit.” Our timelines can help us combat impostor syndrome by zooming out and objectively showing us what we’ve done. There’s a power to writing down our accomplishments that helps us truly acknowledge what we’ve been through.
- “The mantra I always say to myself is: you are on time. No matter what you’re doing, you are on time.” Jezz shared her mantra to remind us to care for ourselves and assure us that there’s no such thing as falling behind in life.
- “If you’re practicing your craft, you can claim the title of that craft.” Disregard your role on paper. If you are actively practicing, studying, or demonstrating that skill, give yourself the permission to own that title in your bio.
Go deeper
Check out Creative Visualization by Shakti Gawain to learn how to tap into the power of your imagination to create your reality.
Follow @ogorchukwuu on Instagram and take Making a Body a Home, a self-guided 12 chapter course designed to help BIPOC unpack internalized racism and explore resources to investigate deep-rooted conditioning as an act of healing and communal wellness.
Run with it
We can’t and shouldn’t wait for others to define us. We need (and deserve) to own our stories and create the narrative for how we want to be seen.
Use this 5-point framework to manifest the life you want to live:
- Get to the point: If they don’t read anything else, what are the main things the reader needs to know about you?
- Acknowledge your work: Leaning into your personal timeline, summarize your career trajectory, learnings, and successes.
- Hit em with a flex: Build your credibility by highlighting something you’re proud of. If you’re not sure what to write, ask a friend! So often, our accomplishments may not seem interesting or noteworthy to us, but an outside perspective can remind and empower us.
- Share your vision: Show people your passions and the legacy you’re trying to build.
- Lead them to links: Where can they find you? Where are you most active? Share your website, social media, etc. to keep the relationship going.
As you think about your story, we want to bring back one of Jezz’s grounding guidelines: We are allowed to dream as big as we want. So, what’s your wildest dream?
Now say it with us, “I conceive it. I believe it. I receive it.” Our bios are a stepping stone to helping us live out the vibrancy and fullness of our wildest dreams. So remember, if it doesn’t bring you joy, scratch it out and write it again. A deep thank you to Jezz (and Marie Kondo 😉) for the reminder.
With love and solidarity,
Team strtgst
the gst /gist/ is a publication of strtgst.co
