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I crossed a huuuuuuuuuuge milestone this last month, and I wanted us to celebrate!!!!!

I made the Forbes 30 Under 30 list 🥹

It was such a special milestone to close out my 20s. I’m turning 30 this year, and I genuinely couldn’t be more excited about it.

Today’s newsletter is going to be a little cheesy and not very tech-related (but don’t worry, you’ll find tech resources at the end).

I’ve accomplished pretty much everything I’ve seriously set my mind to.

Not always on the first try. Definitely not in the way I imagined…And sometimes much later than I wanted.

But eventually, I got there.

So today, I want to share the three things that have helped me turn the things I really want into reality.

Be crystal clear about what you want.

But more importantly: make sure you are the one who actually wants it.

This is something I constantly have to ask myself:

Do I actually want this? Or do I just want other people to know that I have it?

Those are two VERY different things.

Because the goals you really, really want, the ones you would still want even if nobody could see you accomplish them, are the ones that put a fire in your belly.

Those are the goals you’ll keep showing up for when nobody is clapping, when things aren’t working, and when the initial excitement is gone.

I am a huge believer in keeping my goals ridiculously visible.

Write them down. Put them on your wall. Talk about them with your friends.

Whatever works for you.

Because life gets BUSY.

You start dealing with work, bills, relationships, laundry, random emergencies, and suddenly the thing you said mattered so much to you six months ago isn’t even on your radar anymore.

Keeping my goals in front of me forces me to ask:

Am I actually moving toward the life I said I wanted?

You don’t need to work on your goal every second of every day.

But you do need to remember where you’re going.

This might be the biggest lesson my 20s taught me.

Almost nothing I accomplished happened the way I originally planned.

There were rejections. Detours. Plans that completely fell apart. Opportunities I thought I needed that, in hindsight, I absolutely did not need.

And for a long time, I thought changing the plan meant I was giving up.

It doesn’t.

Your goal and your plan are not the same thing.

Sometimes you have to be delusional enough to believe the goal is still possible while being practical enough to admit your original plan isn’t working.

Be stubborn about where you’re going.

Be incredibly flexible about how you get there.

Because if my 20s taught me anything, it’s that life rarely gives you exactly what you asked for in exactly the way you asked for it.

Sometimes it gives you something even better.

So, brave human, what is the thing you really, really want?

Hot Smart Rich — The Money Mistakes Every Woman Needs to Avoid Before Marriage! (Laura Wasser) Kim K and Angelina Jolie's divorce lawyer on prenups, power, and protecting your money before you say "I do." Unromantic, necessary. Listen here ·

Aspire with Emma Grede — The Culture War Against Women (Reshma Saujani) The Girls Who Code founder on women's economic power, motherhood, and her documentary No Country for Mothers. Listen here

The Peterman Pod — Retired Amazon VP: How Corporate Politics Work And How To Win (Ethan Evans) A former Amazon VP who saw every kind of office politics finally spills it — empire-building, promotions, and how to actually play the game. Listen here · 170 min

Have Conservatives Taken Sexy Back? (The New Yorker) — Nothing is ever not political, even lingerie. The funniest thing about this article: they even changed Victoria's Secret's ticker from VSCO to VSXY. Read here

The Rise of the Influencer Investor (Vogue) — The influencers are entering their investor era. The smart ones realized a brand deal pays once, but equity pays forever — so they're trading sponsored posts for cap tables, launching funds, and taking a stake in the products they used to just promote. Read here

The Briefing: Tech's News Conundrum — The Information (Martin Peers) — Court filings reveal OpenAI and Microsoft internally acknowledged their AI products create a "doom loop" threatening news publishers' survival — and their own content supply — yet neither has changed licensing enough to fix it

Partner with me for sponsorships or tech talks by emailing [email protected]

HERE IS TO YOU HACKING YOUR WEEK!!!!!!!

Denisse