Pod Q+A: Biden 2020's Director of Social And Audience Development

Sitting down to record a What Happened After podcast episode with Sarah Galvez was like sitting down with a friend I hadn’t seen in a long time. We talked through the reality of what “day to day” looks like on a campaign, how rapid the rapid fire response moment around the fly in the Vice Presidential debate actually was, but most importantly, how to make sure you feel empowered to GOTV this November.

I’m a big believer, like Sarah, that everyone has a sphere of influence they can be tapping ahead of November. I’m a bigger believer that most times what stops us from reaching out is how little we may believe in ourselves, our voices, or our ability to use the tools at our disposal. Knowing this, I specifically wanted to have a conversation with Sarah Galvez because in her role as Director of Social and Audience Development for Biden 2020’s campaign, her expertise gives all of us a starting point and honestly encouragement.

blogVivian NunezOctober 15, 2020biden 2020, latina, social media, creativeComment

13 Amazon Prime Day Deals To Support Your Self-Care and Wellness Routines

I’m a big believer that building a self-care routine that makes sense for your life is way more important than buying one-off items that are on trend or only have a one-time use. For instance, I find that having a humidifier in your home that makes it easier for you to breathe can actually help your quality of life exponentially. It may not be the sexiest product, but in a time when we’re spending most of our days indoors and especially as we get closer to the drier, colder months, added items like a humidifier can be the difference-makers between a good day and a dreadful one.

I spent some time on Amazon searching for Prime Day deals that would add more to your days than just the adrenaline rush of buying something new (although, I admit there were a few items that did just that for me).

My goal when compiling this list rested on a few factors — price, long-term use potential, and where and how it could incorporate into your existing self-care routine or help you start a new one.

blog, wellness, lifestyleVivian NunezOctober 14, 2020amazon, amazon prime day, mental health, mental wellness, self-care, self-love, wellness, therapy, at home therapyComment

What It Feels Like To Reset

When someone dies, you learn to fill gaps quickly. You learn to put something, anything, in the place of where that person was. It’s like a plug that fills the bathtub up — the water rising is warm and wonderful at first, exactly what you need it to be, but after a while, when you’re sitting there long enough, it gets cold and it overflows and it becomes less of where you want to be.

That’s how I can best describe a good chunk of my life until now. I wanted and tried so badly to keep the tub from overflowing and to believe that I was enjoying the cold water because I’d filled it with my own persistence, but I couldn’t and I wasn’t. I was drowning in an adulthood I stepped into too soon. I was drowning in a career I constantly had to hustle for. I was brought under water time and time again by a city that made me anxious and a role as the “responsible” one that made it impossible to breathe life into who I am when I’m not serving someone else or something bigger than myself.

mental health, blogVivian NunezOctober 13, 2020cross country move, portland, mental health, mental wellnessComment

Set Intentions That Benefit Your Mental Health

Our decision to move to Portland happened in between seasons. The days were getting warmer in New York City and by the second our space was slowly losing square footage to breathe. I’ve written about it before, but even though I knew that leaving NYC for a bit was in our future, I didn’t think Portland or 2020 were the when and the where. This move took us by surprise, but it also set me straight.

I knew it the moment we touched down at PDX and I saw all the green. It felt refreshing and revitalizing. On our drive into downtown, the roads were lined with trees that were so much bigger than I will ever be. I visited Columbus, Ohio once and loved it because when I stood amidst pine trees I felt human. I felt the most myself I’d felt up until then. The last few days, it’s been like I’m revisiting that feeling and also like I’m learning to keep it. Where New York makes you strive to be the biggest, shiniest human to ever be encountered, Portland humbles you in understanding that while you’re meant to grow, it’s also true that there will always be a tree that’s bigger than you and that’s okay.

The Hard Part Of Getting To Know Yourself

Last week I was sitting on the floor with papers and pictures spread out around me. In my mind I could see the playpen my mom used to park in front of the TV just a few feet away from where I was sitting.

As a toddler, I’d bounce along to Barney. Outside of the playpen, I used the floor as my training ground for crawling and learning to walk.

As a kid, I learned about real estate and the importance of Park Place while playing Monopoly with my cousin and aunt on that floor.

Building piles and pushing memories around on this floor to make room for more has always felt normal and like home. Even though last week didn’t look much different, it was. I was trying to find my birth certificate and social security card because coming home here was no longer going to be an easy, viable option. I couldn’t keep splitting myself between two homes because in a few weeks, my boyfriend, my puppy, and I would be hopping on a plane and moving across the country.

blog, personal growthVivian NunezSeptember 22, 2020cross country move, grief, anxiety, twentiesComment

4 Tech Hacks That Are Helping Me Manage My Anxiety

Back at the beginning of the summer my MacBook Pro’s screen randomly broke. I was in the middle of working on something when the screen went black, but I could still hear the computer itself running. I felt the anxiety, frustration, and stress work its way up from my chest straight to my throat.

I broke down in tears as my boyfriend tried to figure out what was wrong. Ultimately, there were solutions in place that would make it possible for me to not miss a beat when it came to work or life. I knew this and still I could not undo the spiral I was already stepping into.

mental health, blogVivian NunezSeptember 17, 2020 Comment

How I’m Letting Go Of Scarcity Mindset

My head was wrapped around writing something else to share today. It’s a list I’ll share tomorrow about all the financial resources I’m turning to in order to better understand my finances and my own money story. With that post it’s like I wanted to skip to the good stuff without giving you context of how I got there in the first place. I wanted to jump to the part where I tell you about all the ways I’m solving the reality without telling you first about the reality. This is a personal blog though and it warrants personal stories.

My stomach is turning because vulnerability on the internet is still hard no matter how many times you jump into the deep end.

I grew up surrounded by scarcity mindset and consistently being encouraged to embrace risk aversion because in my family’s eyes there was no reward at the end of risk, there was just pain and loss of what we did have, which as an immigrant family was always barely just enough.

personal growth, blogVivian NunezSeptember 8, 2020Comment

Post-It Note Wall Brainstorming Process

My boyfriend and I both run our own businesses as content creators. We’ve always been close thought partners as creatives and bouncing ideas off of each other has always been fun but during quarantine we took our brainstorming partnership to the next level. Before February 2020, we would typically come to each other with ideas that were already half-baked, but now we start with empty post-it notes, sharpies, and a blank wall.

Whether you’re at the beginning of your journey with brainstorming or a seasoned expert, I hope this breakdown helps spark some new ideas or ways to approach ideas.

blog, personal growthVivian NunezSeptember 3, 2020Comment

The Month To Month Breakdown Of Planning Our Move During A Pandemic

Planning a big move in the middle of a pandemic is not how I had foreseen us moving. I always thought that if we left the city, it would be a moment for us. We would be able to have some version of a going away party. We would have a list of things to do in NYC and wouldn’t have to consider what was open for business and what wasn’t. But like most things in 2020, moving has required us to adjust to the reality we actually live in, instead of the one we wish we did.

While we don’t leave for a few more weeks, what has helped us not feel completely rattled by our circumstances is how much research we’ve been doing about big moves in general and big moves during a pandemic in specific.

blog, wellnessVivian NunezSeptember 1, 2020Comment

What I Wish I’d Known When Getting A Puppy In Quarantine

Chauncey Mozzarella became our roommate a little over three months ago. He’s a four-legged burst of energy. He’s got the longest tongue in the world (we’re still checking in with the Genius World Record on this) and the tiniest legs.

He came into our world in the middle of a pandemic, so by default he joined the “quarantine puppy” club. We’d been holding a space in our heart for a puppy for as long as we’ve been dating. Any time we thought about maybe getting one, we’d come back to the reality that we traveled a lot, more than what would make sense for a puppy. But in the long list of things that 2020 has changed, it nixed our travel schedules. We were suddenly home all the time. We had space, the means, and the time to take on bringing a puppy into the fold.

blog, mental healthVivian NunezAugust 26, 2020Comment

3 Home Decorating Tips That Can Help Your Mental Health

At some point in March or April, it became hard to ignore that the two week stay at home order we were under in NYC wasn’t going to only last two weeks. We were in this for the long haul and the fact that it’s August and not much has changed in our work-living arrangement proves this.

I went into quarantine knowing that it would impact my anxiety and that some days would be harder to get myself out of bed. I’ve always struggled with motivating myself to go outside after nesting too long - it’s like my brain tells me the inside world is safer anyway, so why try.

I’ve been working on getting a better relationship with my mental health during quarantine and a big part of this was developing a healthier relationship with our home.

blog, wellnessVivian NunezAugust 25, 2020Comment

What To Expect From Your First Therapy Session

In normal times I would start this piece with a rundown on what to expect when you’re walking into your therapist’s office for the first time, but given it’s COVID-times, this is both a rundown of my experience going to therapy in-person for the first time and what I’ve learned about doing virtual therapy for the first time.

The biggest caveat I want to introduce early on is that I started therapy over six years ago. It’s been a while since I had a first session with a therapist, but I can still remember the nerves I felt while sitting in the waiting room. I was the first person I knew who was going to therapy as an adult and the only other point of reference I had was a horrible experience I’d sat through when I was 11 years old and coping with my mom’s death.

From conversations with friends and strangers, I’ve learned that the two biggest hurdles to actually starting therapy at the beginning are finding a therapist and actually getting to the first appointment.

mental health, blogVivian NunezAugust 24, 2020mental health, therapy, virtual therapy, self care, wellnessComment

You Are More Than Your Hard Days

I’m reading this book right now that’s taking me to church every time I open it. I’m being asked to look (and I mean really look) at my life and how I grew up. I’m being challenged to relive bad days and respond to them differently than I did when I was a kid. Instead of avoidance as a way of survival, it’s like this book is screaming to me — “you can survive actually feeling now, don’t avoid it.”

I keep wanting to scream back, “Are you sure?” A world where surviving and feeling go hand-in-hand is foreign to me. The idea of feeling the range of feelings that both hard and good days bring to my door is more than I’ve ever asked myself to do. I was so scared to pick up this book because I wasn’t even sure I could survive reading it.

blog, personal growth, mental healthVivian NunezAugust 10, 2020mental health, family, relationships, grief, hard days, how to copeComment

What’s Your Happiness Tied To?

I grew up never being asked if I was happy. I didn’t realize this was strange until I got older. I took it as fact that since my family didn’t do feelings, no one else did. They didn’t talk about the hard or the good, so I never thought to even have those conversations with myself let alone someone else.

In retrospect I understand that my family mostly just strived for survival and any extra time in the day was spent sleeping, eating, or going down different spirals that would become intergenerational trauma.

I say this with little judgement because from my family I’ve learned we’re all just trying our best, even when someone else’s best isn’t necessarily how you would do it or live it or heal it.

blog, personal growthVivian NunezAugust 3, 2020Comment