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It’s Never 50/50

Creating a true partnership means that it’s hardly ever a 50/50 divide. Life is too unpredictable. We need to be able to flex with our (and our partner’s) needs.  Enter Brene Brown’s daily check-in with her husband: Each of them communicate how much gas they have left in the tank. (If you don’t have a partner, you can do this check-in with yourself.) Somedays he’ll come home and say, ‘I only have 20%.’ To which, she responds, ‘Don’t worry. I’ve got the other 80.’ Other days,

Your Co-mingled Life Plan

This week we’re focusing on holding a relationship check-in with your partner inspired by Uplift client, Morgan Courtney, and sharing some of her (and ours) suggested activities. If you don’t have a partner, you could check-in with yourself. Finally, do a combined life plan. In Morgan’s words… In 2-3 year increments, plan from this year out through retirement (the intervals get longer later in our timeline). Each person gets one color of sticky note, so that you easily identi

What’s on your radar?

This week we’re focusing on holding a relationship check-in with your partner inspired by Uplift client, Morgan Courtney, and sharing some of her (and ours) suggested activities. If you don’t have a partner, you could check-in with yourself. Next, you’ll find out what matters most to each of you: Draw a radar, and each spoke is a different topic: career, health, family, finances, hobbies, faith, etc. Each partner ranks how much each matter on a 1 to 10 scale. Discuss why and

A Relationship Pulse

This week we’re focusing on holding a relationship check-in with your partner inspired by Uplift client, Morgan Courtney, and sharing some of her (and ours) suggested activities. If you don’t have a partner, you could check-in with yourself. Let’s start first with your relationship. (Ideally, you think about these answers before the check-in.) What do you think the other person is doing really in your relationship? What do you think you are doing well? What would you like mor

A New V-Day Date Idea

I kind of hate Valentine’s day. It always felt like a hyped-up marketing ploy to get me to buy an overpriced dinner. That’s why I love Uplift client, Morgan Courtney’s reframing it as an annual check-in on her relationship: My husband and I started our very nerdy (and sort of romantic) tradition of life planning after realizing that common pitfalls lead to divorce—money, intimacy, resentment from missed opportunities that resulted from a lack o

Help, my partner travels all the time!

Today’s question comes from one of our readers: My husband travels the entire work-week. How do I keep my sanity? I want to give you a big, virtual hug. Being a working mom solo is TOUGH. Here are a few tips to help Get help. Book a regular sitter for once a week to give you some downtime. Use that time to go to yoga, dinner with friends, or even catching a movie solo. A mother’s helper can also be a great (and cost-effective) way to help with the daily prep work. Reduce expe

Be Specific When Offering Help

Got a great tip this week from Gretchen Rubin’s Happier podcast: be specific when offering help. Often when you need help the most, you don’t have the energy to even think about the help you need.  (Think back to those first few weeks of motherhood). So when someone asks what help you need, they are just creating more work. When you want to give help, be specific: I can drop off dinner on Tuesday. Does that work? I’m in Target right now. What can I pick up for you? I know you

Believe Them the First Time

Oh, Oprah, I love you. When Oprah calls out her number one tip in life, I listen. When someone shows you who they are, believe them, the first time. We can’t change other people, yet so often we make up a picture in our head of who someone is that is in stark contrast to their actions. Believe the actions. They speak so much louder than our imaginary words. Today, take a few minutes to watch this lovely video of Oprah and Maya Angelou in their PJs discussing this topic. #rela

Host an Instant Party

I love hosting low-key parties on Friday nights. Who has the energy to go out? And, feeling social on Friday stretches out the whole weekend. The trick? Make. It. Easy. Here’s how I can throw a party together in under 20-minutes: I don’t clean my house. On purpose. Trust me, everyone who is coming has a messy house, too. I have a Costco-sized stock of paper plates, plastic cups, and silverware. Clean up is easy. I just order pizza and have everyone bring something to drink.

Take a New Approach

It's so easy when something isn't working just to do that approach harder, faster, more. Today, stop and pivot. Safi Bahcall on the Tim Ferris podcast shared a significant change in how he met his wife. He had been dating model and fashion folks in NYC and never fully connecting. Enter the pivot. At a party, Safi met an attractive, interesting guy, who mentioned that his ex was a biotech scientist out of Boston. So was Safi. Light bulbs went off—he bet this guy's ex was

Make It For You

I'll be honest. There are times when Joe makes a move when I'm just like, 'Oh no.' I'm tired. I've been serving other's needs all day between work and my kids. I just want to have some me-time. And, that's the issue. I'm thinking about it all wrong. What if him making a move isn't about another person wanting something from me? What if I frame it as the opposite? He's giving me the ultimate me-time. He's trying to give me a few minutes of someone taking care of me. Jus

Uplift Each Other

Women helping women is the best way for us to get ahead. Now the science backs this up. A new study tracked 700 MBA students as they made it into leadership positions, analyzing the make-up of their social network. The finding? 75% of high ranking women had strong ties to a female-dominated inner circle. If you combined this female domination with a wide network, women saw 2.5x greater job placement level than those with a male-dominated small network. So right now, sho

Because Money Dates Rock

Today, my friend and Zeta founder, Aditi Shekar is guest posting. Zeta is an app (mobile and web) that combines a couple’s finances, so you can see how you are doing as a team. What if I told you that you that setting aside 1 hour each month to talk about your finances could help you avoid the number one reason most couples get divorced? It’s true: nearly 60% of divorced couples attribute their breakup (at least in part) to financial issues. That’s why I’m a huge fan o

Tweak that Golden Rule

Today's tip is short and sweet. Tweak the golden rule: Instead of treating others how you want to be treated, treat others how they want to be treated. To bring this home, think about your wedding gifts. A study showed that guests prefer giving gifts not on the registry to be unique or personal. When you ask the couples, the ones in the registry won out. Their registry was their wish list. So next time, don't assume you know what someone wants. Be a bit curious. Just ask. Cha

A Lightweight Way to Keep in Touch

My team is distributed across the globe—in the Philippines, Dubai, Spain, and multiple US time zones. The past few weeks I've been focusing on how to make us feel like a 'team' even though none of sit together. We've started a simple task that has made us all more connected. When we log-in for the day, we each share three words that define that day. Mine today: Coaches: I'm holding a focus group to learn more about how we can make them more effective and their lives easier. C

Find a Friend

Today we are joined on our Instagram stories by Leah Wiseman Fink, the Founder of Classes At, which offers local parenting classes in NYC. She also wanted to share this tip for you lovely ladies. I have a very love / hate relationship with exercise. I hate doing it, but I really love how I feel after. Besides that it's so good for my body, it's also a major part of keeping my mental health in check, especially in the winter months. (Hello, daylight savings!) I have been a

Send Flowers

One of the smartest entrepreneurs I know, Amelia Friedman (co-founder of Hatch Apps, which allows you to build native apps without coding) gave me the simplest tip. If someones goes above and beyond in helping you develop your business, send flowers. She personally claims to be putting Urban Stems in business. I love this. It's simple, not that expensive, and pays dividends down the line. Everyone loves feeling appreciated. So go ahead, make someone's day. #gratitude #relatio

How Was Your Day?

When Chloe started Kindergarten, she stopped wanting to talk about school. She stares at me blankly when I ask, 'How was your day?' I'm sad to be cut off. Luckily, Rowan's school sent home questions for amping up our family conversations, which break through with her. Here are some of my favorites: What was the best thing that happened at school today? What was the worst thing that happened at school today? What was the hardest thing you had to do today? What made you laugh t

How to Split Household Duties with Your Partner

The average American woman spends 44 minutes more than her spouse per day on housework.  This imbalance is insane, adding up to over two weeks of waking hours per year. Even crazier is that when a woman outearns her husband (which is 38% of households these days), this gap widens. How do you feel about your household's division? Here are some tips to start the conversation on sharing responsibilities with your partner: Delete, simplify or delegate. Getting things off your com

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