Gabrielle Garofalo is a seasoned professional with over 25 years of experience in advertising, branding, high-profile media, events, and personal development. Gabrielle has produced events such as Oprah LIVE!, the New Yorker Festival, and the Billboard Music Awards. She launched the branded content division as the Global Director of Branded Content for the Wall Street Journal and managed offices in New York, London, and Beijing. She also co-owned and operated a local food festival in Portland, ME, while writing a food blog for Jerseybites.com.In 2018, she shifted her focus and added a coaching certification to her expertise, integrating multiple modalities inspired in part by Abraham Hicks, James Clear, Gabby Bernstein, and others, Gabrielle's coaching approach is comprehensive and effective. Passionate about helping individuals, founders, leaders, and Fortune 500s imbue joy into their daily lives to overcome challenges, Gabrielle has developed The Sustaining Joy Initiative aimed at helping learn how to overcome daily stress, anxiety and overwhelm by prioritizing joy as a daily practice. Gabrielle continues to run her strategic marketing consultancy, serves on the Advisory Board for Marketing at We Global Studios, and finds time to speak at events and collaborate with individuals and organizations committed to mental wellness in the workplace and beyond.
We Live in the Juxtapositions
We are taught life is binary yet we live in the juxtapositions
Good/Bad
Black/White
Female/Male
Married/Single
Individual/Parent
Healing/Healed
Rich/Poor
Democrat/Republican
Success/Failure
Weak/Strong
Bound/Free
Awake/Asleep
All/Nothing
I'm not sure when I started to realize that life isn't binary at all. Being a human just isn't that neat and orderly. I think it's evident in society that the lines between all kinds of things are becoming more and more blurred.
We are humans of many colors and ideas. We are many genders, We have varied family stories and life experiences. We have felt many levels of loss and joy, success and failure. For many years I was convinced I needed to live solely according the roles I had and the expectations of doing a good job at all of them (daughter, friend, wife, corporate executive, mother, etc.).
While I embraced each and every one of those roles, I also felt a part of myself slipping away and disappearing into them. I wasn't feeling fully myself after a while, and at first I hardly noticed at all. As I embraced the expectations of me and rose to meet or exceed them, I simply got lost as I chased a life I thought I wanted. Then it dawned on me, my life and relationships have too many facets to simplify things into "this is the way it's supposed to be" kind of thinking. My life and relationships and how I thought about business was too unique and too much my own to fall neatly into success or failure; good or bad, healing or healed.
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We are often grieving a significant loss (actual death, a loss of a job or relationship, selling a home, kids leaving the house, etc.) and yet still have the capacity to laugh with a friend until our belly hurts. We can be having a crap day and check out a cute puppy video and immediately feel a bit better.
I believe the journey from unwell to healed is more like a continuum than a destination.
I believe that we can experience success and failure at exactly the same time.
Think about it. Isn't it freeing to consider that we might not only live in the juxtapositions but thrive there?
What might life be life if you started to embrace the messiness of it all a little bit more?
What might life be like if you decided to prioritize pleasure no matter what else may be going on?
What if you asked yourself what you really wanted for yourself?
What if you really took the time to indulge in some serious fun this summer even if other parts of life are really hard right now? What if you didn't have to have it all figured out?
What if now was the only moment you ever had? Wouldn't pleasure sound like a good idea?
If that resonates then please join me. A week from today in fact, I am hosting my next 90-minute introductory pleasure workshop locally in Monmouth County, and I'd love to see you there. I introduce you to why pleasure matters, how if can help us rewire our brain, and how the 14 pleasures I've identified may lead you to a summer full of smiles! Click her to register - only have 15 spots left!
To all the dads out there. Happy Father's Day! You do important work in the world - keep it up!!! Keep smiling my loves, I'm rooting for you now and always, xo Gabrielle
Gabrielle Garofalo
Gabrielle Garofalo is a seasoned professional with over 25 years of experience in advertising, branding, high-profile media, events, and personal development. Gabrielle has produced events such as Oprah LIVE!, the New Yorker Festival, and the Billboard Music Awards. She launched the branded content division as the Global Director of Branded Content for the Wall Street Journal and managed offices in New York, London, and Beijing. She also co-owned and operated a local food festival in Portland, ME, while writing a food blog for Jerseybites.com.In 2018, she shifted her focus and added a coaching certification to her expertise, integrating multiple modalities inspired in part by Abraham Hicks, James Clear, Gabby Bernstein, and others, Gabrielle's coaching approach is comprehensive and effective. Passionate about helping individuals, founders, leaders, and Fortune 500s imbue joy into their daily lives to overcome challenges, Gabrielle has developed The Sustaining Joy Initiative aimed at helping learn how to overcome daily stress, anxiety and overwhelm by prioritizing joy as a daily practice. Gabrielle continues to run her strategic marketing consultancy, serves on the Advisory Board for Marketing at We Global Studios, and finds time to speak at events and collaborate with individuals and organizations committed to mental wellness in the workplace and beyond.
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