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I was about six months pregnant with my daughter and a neighbor asked me,
Julie, will you go back to work after the baby is born?
All I could think was.
Are you kidding me?
Of course I'm gonna go back to work after the baby's born.
My identity was tied to my career's success.
But it was only a few short months later.
I was holding my daughter.
And all I could think was are you kidding me?
Of course I am not going back to work.
[LAUGH] How was I to reconcile these 2 identities?
How was I going to define my own happiness?
I realized then that the page wrote in front of me didn't lead to my happiness.
I was going to have to blaze my own trail.
Now what do I mean by that?
I mean societal norms had left women choosing between staying at home and
career oriented.
But I guess I just didn't see the world as so black and white.
And I needed to figure out the way to my happiness.
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So I've spent the last 13 years blazing my own trail.
I've cofounded a company and I've raised a family.
And the trail is far from complete.
But I've learned a few things along the way.
I've learned that first and foremost, you must define your own happiness.
Ignore the critics.
I've learned that creative solutions are often times the key to success.
And I've learned that it's worth it.
It's worth the blood, sweat, and tears in order to find your own happiness.
So, how will you define your happiness?
Will you blaze your own trail?
I stand here before you, with the experiences of a mom.
But, the reality is that dads often times have the same questions.
Not to mention, the need to love and support the mothers in their lives.
Understanding what would make me happy, was a journey.
I spent long hours at a hedge fund and tried to balance that with a family.
I was miserable.
And when I tried to just stay at home, I wasn't content either.
I needed to find a way, to a, for a creative solution.
My husband and I cofounded a company.
And the naysayers said we were crazy to start a family with a young,
to start a company with a young family.
But they didn't share my priorities.
As my own boss I had the leverage to create value and
a license to pursue my ideas.
But at the same time I had flexibility to work half days and
be at home with my daughter.
We kept strict rules.
Between 5 and 8 p.m.
was sacred.
We had dinner together and we traveled very little.
And, yes, there were days when we had to tell clients that we simply couldn't make
it to a meeting.
One crucial and important meeting,
we missed in order to be at our son's kindergarten graduation.
As I stand here now and look back, with hind sight being twenty twenty.
My choices seem obvious to me.
Let me be clear, it wasn't easy.
We sacrificed company growth for our family priorities.
And there are so many times where I felt like I sucked both at being a mom and
a manager, or today a student.
But we stayed committed to our path.
Now, there's a term for this lifestyle choice, the Mompreneur.
>> [LAUGH] >> Lisa Stone rocked this model.
After the birth of her son,
much to everyone's surprise, she left her job in the newsroom at CNN.
In order to blaze her own path.
Her creative solution?
BlogHer.com.
Now again, the naysayers said, she's crazy, women aren't going to go online.
But she leveraged the fact that she was a single mom to a one and a half year old,
in Silicon Valley, to know that this really was a possibility.
But this talk is not about being an entrepreneur,
working full time, working part time, or staying at home.
It's about knowing if you keep an openness to creative solutions,
the possibilities are endless.
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So there was another pivotal moment in my life.
[LAUGH] I had three school aged children.
I was on the verge of selling my company.
And I'd been accepted to the GSB.
On many accounts, I had accomplished what I set out to do.
It was the day before April orientation, and I found out I was pregnant.
[LAUGH] And holy crap, twins.
[LAUGH] As I began to look up at my new reality.
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I was prepared to set aside my life long dream of attending Stanford.
I was a mom.
I knew what I had to do and I was prepared to do it.
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When we sat down to tell our other
children about the twins entrance to our lives.
My daughter, about eleven years old, looked up at me and
said, Mom, you're still gonna go to Stanford, right?
You have to.
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So I stand here now, blazing through my own doubts.
Blazing a path.
As the mom with the most number of children at the GSB.
[LAUGH]
Perhaps ever.
But, but this was my dream and I knew I had to do it, when my daughter asked me,
I knew I would have to figure out a way to come and I'm here.
Theresa Taylor in her book The Balanced Myth
says blending your life together is really about being authentic all the time.
I don't think of myself as someone with two different lives or
two different places to be.
This is me.
This is who I am.
I love this notion.
I subscribe to it completely.
My li, my family is a part of everything I do.
They're a part of my authentic self.
So when I started writing this talk a few months ago.
Stanford assigned me a speech coach.
I knew even then that I wanted to include my family as part of the talk.
I excitedly told him my plan, but he was less than enthusiastic.
>> [LAUGH].
>> But, Julie, so much could go wrong.
And he's right.
My twins might get up here and start crying.
My teenager daughter, she's unlikely to smile.
And my boys, well they could poke at each other in front of all of you.
But how was I to get up here and
give a talk about integrating work and
family while ignoring the naysayers,
without doing exactly that?
So let me introduce to you.
[APPLAUSE] [APPLAUSE] This is Josh, Helen, Max,
Ryan, Sam, Luke, and my niece Claire.
[APPLAUSE] Without whose help, I wouldn't be here.
I'm so glad they're here, because I need them and I need you to see them.
So now when you see me on campus with perhaps some avocado on my sleeve or
bags under my eyes, you'll know why.
But, [LAUGH] but in this avocado filled sleepless world I'm pursuing my dreams.
And no, I don't have everything.
I miss a lot of things at the GSB and
occasionally I miss some things at home too.
But I'm happy.
So, your path won't look the same as mine.
And [LAUGH] okay no clapping for that part.
[LAUGH] And then likely, will look different than even what you'd expect.
But in those moments, when you're facing the paved road in front of you.
And you realize, that it doesn't lead to your happiness.
Know that if you trail blaze your own path.
The possibilities are endless.
Figure out what feeds your passion.
Refuse to accept can't, or not possible.
How will you define your happiness?
[LAUGH] Will you blaze your trail?
[LAUGH] Okay.
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