How to Set Goals & Be Your Own Sugar Daddy, Act Like a Lady

“Take what is yours. Do it nicely. Look people in the eye. Don’t be shady. Don’t be cunty.”

Wouldn’t it be nice if we could just chill on our couch in a robe with cucumbers on our eyes and wait for the life of our dreams to magically fall into our lap? Unfortunately, a marvelous existence is not handed to you on a silver platter, unless you’ve got famous parents or you’re the heir to Heinz Ketchup. The rest of us commoners have to put our heads down and work hard, diligently plan, and throw money into our savings accounts like our life depends on it. But the very first step to achieving greatness is visualizing your super dope successful future. “Ask and you shall receive” is real, bitches! Whether you’re someone who writes a to-do list, goes and sees a psychic, or has a life coach like Tony Robbins, you get to decide what you want to achieve in your personal and professional life.

Want to start your own business? Move to the big city? Get that promotion? Have eight kids and be like Octomom? Have sex with Chris Pine? Skip town, change your name, and fall off the grid forever? No goal is too big or too lofty! We know that actually sitting down with yourself and enumerating your goals is an intimidating process, but writing down some attainable ambitions is the first step in your journey toward your one big dreamy life!

Look, we don’t live in the clouds over here at the LadyGang. Goal setting isn’t like having a genie in a bottle. Manifesting and vision boarding are great tools for motivation, but it’ll come as no surprise that you need to put in the effort to turn these goals into reality. You can yearn after that diamond necklace at the jewelry store every day until you die, but unless you’re Criss Angel or Winona Ryder, it’s not gonna miraculously show up on your neck one morning.

You can’t wait around for things to happen to you. Manifesting is all about focusing on what you have to do to get out there and get shit done. Hell, even if your goal is to marry a rich man, do your research. Look up the Forbes 30 Under 30, go to vacation destinations rich men frequent, and find your billionaire boyfriend. (But don’t be surprised if he asks you to poop on his chest. There ain’t no such thing as a free lunch, babe.)

Award-winning, TV show–creating, and overall genius Ryan Murphy was a guest on our podcast, and he told us, “It only takes one yes to change your life. It only takes one yes to rewire your brain. And no matter how many noes you get, if you just keep going, the odds are that you will get a yes.” Take it from a guy who has won more Emmy Awards than we can count on one hand. Everyone gets shot down over and over again. Keep going!

And while you’re out there kicking ass, it’s important to learn how to celebrate your wins, no matter how small. Sometimes life is happening so fast around us that we never allow ourselves to take a second to appreciate all of the amazing shit we’re capable of as women. Feel free to hug yourself every now and then, and recognize that you are a bad bitch who is killing it at life. You deserve all the drinks, a round of applause, and a new purse! Revel in the highs because, on the flip side, you have to learn how to deal with…dun dun dunnnnnn…rejection.

But the good news is that all of the successful people who seem to have a dream life probably have experienced far more rejections than wins and far more noes than yeses. Hell, the three of us have gotten rejected professionally more times than we can even count. Remember: you’re only seeing what people want you to see, whether that be through social media or in the news or through a conversation over cocktails. This is real, grueling adult life, and you’re not always going to get a gold star—and you most certainly won’t always get a participation trophy. The secret to all of the ups and downs is allowing rejection to inspire you instead of letting it derail you. If you get knocked down, or get laid off, or didn’t book your dream gig, instead of throwing in the towel or melting down…try to relax. A wise pussycat (Nicole Scherzinger), once told us, “What will break you will make you.” Life never happens the way we think it will, so you have to be able to go with the flow to a certain extent and let it lead you in the direction of your destiny. The key to becoming the boss of your life is perseverance and the ability to (in the words of Taylor Swift) shake it off.

I’ve always known my mind had crazy powers. When I was young, I didn’t really understand what was happening, but I would go to sleep after lying in bed, visualizing something that was going to happen in my life the next day. Without fail, the next day would be exactly as I had planned.

I have been manifesting in some way or other since then. I was obsessed with the big city of New York, and there was something inside of me that knew I did not belong in my little town. I would have conversations in my head on my walk to school in the morning, and later in the day, I would be having those same conversations out loud. I would run around telling everyone who would listen that I was going to do this and that, and then somehow, I’d be that person, without even trying too hard. I don’t know who the hell I thought I was!

My first official magical manifestation happened in 2010. I had recently completed almost two years of living on the road as a professional dancer as I toured with the Rockettes and then started a new show in Las Vegas. Once that ended, I went back to New York to be a backup dancer for Taylor Swift at the MTV Video Music Awards, and then I was back on the road kicking for Santa on tour…again. I had lived out of some version of a suitcase, away from my home base of New York, that entire time—almost two years.

I was burned-out and brokenhearted, and I’d met a guy online who lived in LA. I was convinced he was going to be the love of my life (yes, the same guy you heard about earlier). So, at a time in my life when I was making horrendous life choices, I decided I should move to LA for a guy I had never met.

I moved down the street from one of my best friends, Christina Perri. At that point, she hadn’t morphed into a platinum-selling singer-songwriter, with her hit songs “Jar of Hearts” and “A Thousand Years,” yet. She was simply a struggling waitress who wrote songs, who didn’t dump me five years prior when I very briefly dated her brother (although he did). She helped me find a place to live, and I signed the lease without even seeing it. The next thing I needed in LA was a car. It’s worth noting that I hadn’t owned a car in over a decade and, being on a budget, I decided to buy one on Craigslist for $2,500, complete with blood splatters on the roof from what I can only imagine was some sort of prior accident. In other words, my life was a bit of a disaster.

Shortly after the move, and after two dates, it became very clear I was not the love of this man’s life, and he ghosted me. I called Christina and asked her if she would come over with her guitar and play some tunes for me, so that I could do some “dancing” and make some videos for YouTube. At the time, I had a pretty popular blog that I shared my life on and a little baby following. She sat in the corner and played as I flailed around on low-res video. When we finished messing around, we stood outside my front door on the third floor of the building’s terrace and looked over Los Angeles, staring in awe at the Capitol Records Building. Both of us were unhappy, frustrated with our lives, alone, and full of doubt. As we tried to pull each other out of the dark with an inspirational chat about following our dreams, we came up with the idea to write letters to the universe and ask for what we wanted. We figured that the world couldn’t give those things to us if we weren’t clear about what they were, so we wrote out our lists and shared them with each other. I wish I still had copies of those first lists, but I had no idea they would become so meaningful.

I do remember parts of hers and parts of mine. Mine was pretty pathetic, especially the expectations that I had for myself. I wanted to “quit Diet Coke,” “get bangs,” “stop dating assholes,” and a few other things. Hers was more detailed: “get a record deal,” “play three shows,” and “meet Jason Mraz.” On a whim, I decided to tape my list to the mirror in my bathroom.

This is where our story gets crazy, and it starts to seem like something out of a rom-com or a storybook. Within just a few months, almost all of the things on both of our lists had come true—or were getting close to coming true. Christina got a manager, played way more than three shows, met Jason Mraz, wrote a song with him, and got a record deal. I got bangs and my future husband. That year, it seemed like the secret to life was asking the universe for what we wanted. For the past decade, to this day, my friend and I have followed this annual tradition. I swear, I didn’t make this up.

Since that first list, I’ve gotten more pointed and specific in my asks from the universe, but some of the things I’ve requested have included: “get engaged,” “get a national hosting job,” “work on Entertainment Tonight,” “get a LadyGang TV show,” “buy a house,” “go camping,” and “see three concerts.” All of which became reality.

I’ve never been into the fluffy shit in life. I’ve tried to meditate, and I find it useless. I only do the types of yoga where you sweat at a hundred degrees because it’s actually an insane workout. I don’t have time for that slow-brain stuff. I lie to my therapist almost monthly, and I’ve never completely finished a self-help book before skimming to the end so that I can get the ten lessons from it quickly. I have bought and not finished more than ten different “life workbooks,” and I’ve started and quit at least fifteen “better your life” podcasts. I am such a realist. I am absolutely certain, however, that creating my manifesting lists and looking at them every day for a decade has contributed to my success and the overall happiness of my life. I know that my brain is the most powerful wish-granting tool I have. I know that if I think about something long enough, or visualize it enough times (some would call this a daydream) that it will eventually rise up to meet me in my life.

Make no mistake, there are years I haven’t crossed off all the things on my list. But without a doubt, the universe will make it clear to me why it didn’t work out, or, looking back over my lists, I can see that it was some sort of divine timing issue. The next year, that item will come into my life. For example, I once wrote that I wanted to be a host on Good Morning America. Through the power of manifesting, I met with the GMA team in New York City and screen-tested for the job (waaaahoooo!). I also asked “to move to a job where I didn’t have to get up at 3:45 a.m., like Entertainment Tonight.” Funny enough, writing a LadyGang book was on my 2019 manifest list and you are reading it now. A couple years ago, after working really hard on our podcast for many years and reinvesting every single dollar we made back into the business, I put on my manifest list that I wanted to pay each LadyGang member a certain, still small, salary. Not even four months later, our TV show was greenlit, and when the contracts came in, the fee for us to star in the show was the EXACT amount I had manifested we would pay ourselves. That cannot be a coincidence!

Not all my asks have to do with business and being a LadyBoss. I often ask for personal and physical things. On one of my lists, I manifested that I would have my best body at age thirty-four. It was the best I’ve ever looked as an adult. I’ve since fallen off the train, but I did it! I manifested “growing mermaid-long hair for my wedding.” I have manifested vacations, quality time with friends, saving money, and buying my first home. I manifested getting a dog! There isn’t a one-size-fits-all rule for what a successful, happy life looks like for each of us. I wish for fame, fortune, and puppy kisses, and someone else might wish for babies and wide-open spaces. That’s what makes the list so personal and, in my opinion, so powerful.

So how do I make my lists? In the fall, I start thinking about what I might put on my list for the next year. I keep an ongoing list in my phone, and whenever something comes to mind that I want, I write it down without any judgment. No dream is too big or too small. In December, I start to really look over the items and decide what sections of my life I need to add to. I like to do around six to ten asks per year, and I like a third of the list to be “adult stuff,” like job, salary, and success. Another third is for personal development, like quitting soda and sugar while working out more. The last third I consider my “relationships,” things related to friends, quality time, love, and family.

On New Year’s Eve, I always find some quiet time to make my official list. This is where it gets a little tricky. I have found out that I need to be incredibly detailed in my asks. I never include anything vague like “fall in love,” “be happy,” or “lose weight.” I always ask the universe for EXACTLY what I want. One year, I wanted to improve my health and bad eating habits, so I manifested that I would “eat something green every day.” I am very clear and concise in what I ask. I make my asks lofty but realistic. “Becoming a billionaire” might be in the cards for Kylie Jenner, but it’s not something I could actually accomplish within a year. I try to limit my asks to things that could be accomplished in that year. If becoming a billionaire was my goal, I would break that down to the yearly steps it would take to get there. I find the future and big goals really overwhelming, and it’s hard to be motivated when your dream is so far away. Just like Christina did when she asked the universe to “play three shows”—she ended up playing way more, but three was her goal because it seemed like something she could accomplish.

Once I get my list together, I still share it with Christina, who inspired that very first list. Then I make a few copies of the list and hang them up where I will see them every single day. Right now, I have one list hanging in my closet above my underwear drawer and another in my office at work. Is it embarrassing when someone comes into these spaces and sees my stupid list? Sure. Especially when it’s personal, like this year, when I manifested “have sex three times a week.” But I believe the secret sauce in all of this is seeing the list and having it seep into your brain every single day.

As I accomplish things, I check off the boxes on my list, and there is honestly no better feeling in the world. I am not someone who has ever been able to keep myself on any sort of diet or workout plan for more than two weeks before I give it up, so trust me, I do not have some super ability or dedication to life that you don’t have. I just stay committed to these very specific things for that entire year, and when I forget or lose focus, I see the list and get refocused.

As the year passes, even though my life changes and new goals pop into my mind, I never change the list. It stays up all year long. I file away those new goals for the next year. Once an ask is completed, I move on to something else on the list. I don’t slow down my growth in any way, but if I happen to have a big career goal crossed off at the beginning of the year, then I’ll focus on my personal goals. If the by-product is that more career stuff keeps happening, that’s fine. But I don’t adjust the list until the next New Year’s Eve.

I honestly don’t know why manifesting works. I am a normal person who comes from a normal family with normal circumstances. I struggle with insecurity. I’d rather shop online than work. I’m not a superwoman by any means, but here is what I know: You deserve it. You deserve the life of your dreams. You are the only person who knows those wildest dreams and wishes that your gut asks you for. They may seem so far away, or completely impossible, but admitting that you deserve them is the first step in them coming true. I believe writing them out and showing the universe that you believe you deserve these things is the first step.

Sometimes, it’s embarrassing to give a voice to our dreams. But those are the exact same things that bring us the most joy. Life happens in tiny little increments of days that add up to years that add up to exactly what it is you do with your one magical lifetime. I hate the idea that any of us could be on our deathbed and have regrets about not doing the things we’ve wanted to do. It’s completely okay to be selfish with your dreams and goals. It’s okay to want the biggest, grandest things for your life. It’s okay to want a great love, a great job, and a great life. You do not have to settle for a little life. I strongly believe that you cannot help yourself if you cannot define what it is that you want. On top of that, you have to dig really deep into your soul and believe that you deserve good things. This is some real hippie-dippie shit, and it works.

In the entertainment industry, a common question I’m asked when talking about Glee is “How did it feel to get your big break?” It’s such a weird concept to me, because it makes it sound like my success was a fluke or has to do with some sort of luck that’s similar to winning the lottery. Every time it comes up, I give a polite response and acknowledge how “crazy lucky” I was to get that call from my agent, but I’m always thinking of the decades of blood, sweat, tears, and sacrifice I’ve put into my career, and that it was about damn time! Kidding—sort of. In reality, I had so many little breaks along the way that this “big” one sort of seemed on schedule because of my (slightly delusional) genius theory of the Universal Energy Bank.

I came up with this concept when I was living in my shoebox-size apartment in New York City, chasing my lifelong dream of performing on Broadway and feeling like I was never going to make it. I’ll explain the backstory of my insane theory, and you can call me Tony Robbins afterward if you feel so inclined.

I fell in love with singing and dancing at a very young age (I believe I was four). I used to watch the original Annie on VHS over and over again, for hours on end, learning every song and every dance move. One day, my mom was on the phone with her friend, and out of nowhere I walked over to her, looked her dead in the eyes, and stomped on her foot. I was a pretty wretched child, but this move seemed especially satanic even for me. She was very confused. But, days later, we were watching Annie for the 876th time, and my mom realized that I was acting out the scene in which Annie stomps on Miss Hannigan’s foot. (That wasn’t the last time I used my art as an excuse to be a dick.) So, let’s just say I had a flair for the dramatic and a dream to sing and dance for the rest of my life.

It was the end of middle school when I had to make the ultimate decision. Would I attend my normal public high school, continue to be popular as fuck, join the cheerleading squad, and get fingered by boys after school—or would I attend the performing arts high school, where I would be starting all over with a bunch of theater nerds and hard-pressed to find a boy who even liked vaginas? The only thing that kept me from deciding on the former was that I had a desire inside of me that was so strong I couldn’t deny it. I knew that I would have to sacrifice getting frisky after the Friday night football games for tap dancing all night long at Music Man rehearsals—and that was okay because, deep down, I believed that someday the sacrifice would pay off. I didn’t know it at the time, but that was my first deposit into the Universal Energy Bank.

After four years of singing and dancing through high school like a major dork, it was time to make another tough decision: Where I would attend college? I was at a crossroads. I could choose a school in the South that had a “great dance program” and ultimately get the best of both worlds (sororities and ballet class), or I could go all in and head to a theater conservatory in New York City. Again, I had to decide between the typical college experience that my sister and every human on the planet raved about or continuing my (sometimes painfully lonely) journey to Broadway. Even though I wanted to experience life as a “normal” person, I knew that I could never live with myself or be truly happy if I didn’t fully commit to my dream. So I packed my shit and headed for the Great White Way, which was another major (subconscious) deposit into the Universal Energy Bank.

Although those “deposits” into the bank were challenging, nothing could prepare me for the years of heartache and sacrifice that came with being an aspiring musical theatre actor. Each day, I would have to wake up at 6 a.m. to get to ballet class after partying my ass off the night before. I would have to use my money to take voice lessons instead of buying concert tickets or new clothes. I would walk into hundreds of audition rooms, stand in front of strangers, and bare my soul just to be told “no, thank you” over and over again. The entire time, it felt like all this effort and sacrifice (and sometimes money) was simply falling into the abyss. I had been auditioning for every single regional theater job or shitty summer stock job that came my way, but I still had nothing to show for it on my sad, blank résumé.

Now, I’m not saying that I was doing something truly incredible or admirable, and I’m aware that there are people out there who don’t have the luxury of being an “aspiring theater actor,” so I don’t deserve a goddamn medal, but I definitely made sacrifices that I doubted would ever truly pay off, and I know that no matter what dream you’re chasing…you’ve been there.

It wasn’t until I booked my very first professional job that something clicked. I realized that all those “failed” auditions and all that “wasted” money weren’t a waste at all. They were simply deposits that I made into this Universal Energy Bank, and I was finally getting my payout. As soon as I started looking at my career like this, it was so much easier to make the effort and exert the energy, because I truly believed (and still do) that even if there is no immediate result or positive feedback from something, it doesn’t mean that it doesn’t hold value and that all the energy won’t add up to some “big break” in the future.

This theory hasn’t just helped me with career stuff; it’s helped with my relationships, too. I recently heard a Hunter Hayes song, and the lyric was “I’m one heartbreak closer to you,” and it reminded me of the Universal Energy Bank. If your heart is in it—your intentions are in the right place, you put forth the effort, you make the sacrifices—the Bank will fill up, and you’ll get your breaks, big and small. Thank you for coming to my TED Talk. You can purchase my supplements and sweatshirts out in the lobby.

Let the Haters Be Your Motivators

“If you don’t have haters, you ain’t shit!”

—Keltie’s mom, and everyone else, ever

Once you start putting in the work, you will feel yourself rising both professionally and mentally. Everyone will start to notice, and it might even piss some people off along the way. Your peers will see you being a boss bitch, and they might freak out because they are intimidated by your professional progress. But remember that they are just seeing the highs of your success, skipping over all the sleepless nights and hard work you put in to slowly climb the daunting stairs to your dream life. Any negativity thrown in your direction stems directly from jealousy. RuPaul once spoke these wise words to us: “If those bitches ain’t paying your paycheck, then pay those Bs no mind.” Surround yourself with people who will rise with you and cheer for your successes. And we give you permission to give the middle finger to anyone who drags you down.

Keep your blinders on, follow your path, and don’t worry about what any of those bitches think.

When I was in high school, I had a countdown on my desk until summer break—and not because I was excited to sleep in till 11:00 a.m. and sneak vodka from my parents’ liquor cabinet. My countdown was for the Vans Warped Tour. For those of you who didn’t rock studded belts and green hair in high school, the Warped Tour was a traveling punk rock music festival that had about forty stops and traversed the United States and Canada every summer between 1995 and 2018. My girlfriends and I would go to the Southern California tour stop to rock out to bands like Blink-182 and New Found Glory while discovering my next new favorite artists before anyone else. And, of course, it also meant that we would always meet some cute guitarists. It was an experience unlike anything else in this world. It was my favorite day of the year.

My musician friends nicknamed Warped Tour the “Punk Rock Summer Camp.” They described it to me as a tight family of about five hundred people, traveling around the country from parking lot to parking lot, living a kind of carnie rock-and-roll fantasy life for two months straight. During the day, everyone was busting their ass in hundred-degree weather and living solely on whiskey and Hot Pockets. You were lucky if you showered more than once a week. Have to take a shit? There’s a boiling hot porta potty over there (and cross your fingers that there’s toilet paper). Everyone was working miserable fourteen-hour days in the sweltering heat and 90 percent humidity. Traveling in a cramped tour bus, you were stacked in small bunks with eleven other drunk idiots, and ten of them will definitely steal your beer. Everyone was literally ALWAYS hungover. The tour lived like millennial pirates, using Adderall as a form of currency and wearing dirty underwear at least once a week. And because of this wacky, unconventional lifestyle, you would create the most incredible, unique bonds with people you would otherwise never cross paths with in real life. But to me, this traveling circus of creative misfits represented something much more. It meant taking the road less traveled. It meant paving the way for my own destiny.

I had been to the Warped Tour during my high school years when it came through Los Angeles, and I spent all the rest of my free time attending concerts all over Southern California. This little music scene was the world I immersed myself in, and the band dudes and crew roadies I met along the way became my new dysfunctional family. When I became a legal adult, I didn’t want to just go to one or two dates of the Warped Tour in my state. I wanted to travel on the entire tour over the summer and live my dream, just like the rest of my new best friends were doing. And, lucky for me, there were a ton of jobs available that were outside of being a performing musician, because the Vanek vocal chords could really give William Hung a run for his money. There were production jobs, roadie jobs, and sponsorship jobs. Working a sponsorship job meant that you would essentially represent a company for in-person marketing or sell their products. Sounds fun—I’m in!

Before we jump into punk rock summer camp, here’s a little bit of my backstory. I was a straight-A student throughout high school and college, with a 4.4 GPA, a scholarship to UCLA, the whole thing. But I always knew deep down I wasn’t going the traditional professional route after graduation to work for someone else. I was way too ambitious and spontaneous and adventure-driven. I knew I was going to build something for myself. I wasn’t exactly sure what that was yet, but I knew it would be fueled by and involve the music scene. So I stuck it out at UCLA and graduated, but then it was Warped Tour on my mind. I applied for a job working for a sponsor of the tour and sent in my résumé, with a ton of experience and great work recommendations. During my high school years, I had interned at record labels and radio stations, and I was the youngest employee of the most popular alternative music website ever, absolutepunk .net (it’s like the TMZ of punk rock). I was photographing some of the biggest bands in our scene for a couple of years, and I had my photos on numerous record covers before I even turned eighteen. Sure, I liked to party, but I took this shit seriously.

So I wasn’t surprised when I was hired for a position (duh) doing in-person marketing for an organization on the tour. I was beyond excited and told all of my friends I had finally gotten my dream job! But I didn’t even have enough time to have a celebratory Vodka Red Bull before I got a phone call from a woman telling me they were retracting the offer.

She told me, “We can’t offer you the job anymore because there are rumors circulating that you have slept with multiple band members on the tour.”

As we previously established, I was a virgin until I was twenty-three years old. And I stayed a virgin for a year after the initial conversation when she rescinded the offer to work on the tour. At the time, the naïve part of me thought there must have been a misunderstanding, and the conspiracy theorist in me thought maybe someone was trying to sabotage me. I had an acquaintance who knew a couple of employees of the company that had offered me the job, so I hit them up and asked if they had heard anything about my situation. “Oh, yeah, everyone thinks you’re a slut and that the only reason you want to be on the tour is to hook up with band dudes. There’s no way any of these companies are gonna take you seriously.”

“Crushed” is an understatement. I was used to dealing with bullying and rumors circulating online. According to the internet, I had been pregnant about ten times before I was eighteen, and had had multiple STDs and multiple abortions from every band dude imaginable. There wouldn’t be anything wrong with those things if they were true, but these were flat-out lies being spread to slander my name. My skin was so thick from dealing with daily lies that it never really bothered me before, but this was different. I didn’t give a shit if Sally from Idaho thought I was a “groupie,” but this was messing with my livelihood and my potential future career. I didn’t even have the chance to defend or explain myself before the phone call was over and my punk-rock dreams flew right out the window. And the absolute worst part of it was that the woman breaking the bad news sounded…satisfied? Like she took some sick pleasure from ripping an ambitious young girl’s dreams right from her fingertips. That’s the one thing that still sticks with me today.

Listen, I’m not saying I was an angel either. There probably wasn’t a lead singer I HADN’T made out with. This was the world where I spent all of my time, and these were the people I surrounded myself with, so it was only natural that I’d have a few too many shots of Jameson and make out with Pete Wentz every once in a while. SUE ME. We all drunkenly make out with our friends sometimes—mine just happened to be in bands. Whoops. But the thing that majorly bothered me was…not one single guy was asked if he had slept with girls who were on the tour. Not one single guy was being labeled “easy.” No men on the tour had their work ethic questioned because of their sex life. The guys got high fives but the girls got shunned for the same exact act? That never made sense to me, and I’d be damned if I succumbed to society’s bullshit double standards about hooking up. As long as I was kicking ass professionally, why couldn’t I enjoy a good make-out? Double standards turn band dudes into rock stars and girls into disposable sex objects, and that fucking pissed me off.

The music industry, especially on the road, is a guy’s world. Women are rarely hired for crew, and if they are, they have to have a super hard-ass persona to be taken seriously (as in, act like a dude). Band guys hooking up with multiple girls in a single night is the norm, and cheating on significant others is so common that no one even bats an eye. In general, girls who are seen backstage are often looked at as pieces of meat. I had experienced this kind of disrespect personally, and I had seen it happen to other girls more times than I could count. Obviously, this is a generalized statement that doesn’t apply to all musicians, and I was lucky to befriend a lot of very respectful dudes in an often sexist world.

After all of the dust settled from my heartbreak over the summer that could-have-been, it turned out that not getting a job because of untrue rumors was a blessing in disguise. After that phone call, I was determined to stick it to all these judgmental assholes. So that’s when I started the Jac Vanek brand. I went to the Warped Tour that summer in California and sold bracelets out of my backpack. I made more in that one weekend than I would have made during the entire tour, working fourteen hours a day for the very job I was denied. For the next year, I busted my ass with the goal of going on the Warped Tour, having my own tent, and working for MY OWN brand the next summer.

Wouldn’t you know? The Jac Vanek brand blew up. But when it came time to apply to be on the tour the following year as a vendor selling my own merch, I was again met with double standards and hesitation, for the same reasons as before. I had to speak up for myself and refuse to take no for an answer, and I had to prove to the powers that be how determined I was and how seriously I took my business. Ultimately, they let me on.

That summer, I had a lot to live up to, and I was ready to carpe diem. I still partied and woke up every morning with a wicked hangover, but I was buzzing because I was finally given the opportunity to live out my punk-rock dream. I met thousands of kids, constantly sold out of merch, and made some of the best memories of my life. I was among the top ten vendors almost every day, beating out most of the headliners in merchandise sales. Veterans of the tour would walk past my tent with their jaws on the floor, not understanding why there were hundreds of kids lined up to get a silly rubber Jac Vanek bracelet. I was finally doing it! And I didn’t stop making out with band dudes in the process. I found myself in overlapping love triangles, and I got my heart broken way too many times, but I wouldn’t have had it any other way. The funny thing is, all the dudes I was smooching and anyone who actually knew me respected the hell out of me. They all rocked my Jac Vanek bracelets, and they even collaborated with me for exclusive products on the tour. I was being taken seriously without ever having to compromise anything about myself. And that was the first time I felt truly successful.

My first summer on Warped Tour was the launching pad for my professional career, as unconventional as it may seem. After kissing dozens of musicians, traveling thousands of miles back and forth across the country, and making a killing selling T-shirts at music festivals, I learned a few things. First of all, some people are dicks. You can’t change what anyone thinks about you, and people only have as much power over you as you let them have. Second, there is nothing more valuable than doubling down on who you are at your very core. I was a boy-crazy, wildly determined kid who thought I could take over the world—and I still am. But, most important, I learned that the only way double standards can be eliminated is to fight back against them.