Hello friends!
Welcome to our Substack, which we moved our newsletter to from our previous email service. We hope that is ok with you.
So, have you heard about the latest viral work trend?
No, not quiet quitting.
No, not actual quitting (cough cough the Great Resignation that wasn’t).
This one is all about #lazygirljobs.
The term was coined by Gabrielle Judge on TikTok and actually refers to the type of job that meets four criteria: “a sense of safety (no long shifts, arduous commutes or dangerous working conditions); remote- or hybrid friendly; a “comfortable” salary; and a healthy work-life balance.”1
You know what? We’re not sure we’d call those #lazygirljobs so much as #jobgoals.
We last wrote to you in December. We said we were planning a pivot for Olen Organic, our former baby clothing brand. We promised an update soon.
But you know what? Life got in the way. Parenting got in the way. Our “real” full time jobs got in the way. But also: traveling got in the way. Reading rom coms got in the way. Walking and jogging and hiking got in the way. Having lunch after not seeing each other for months and catching up on our upcoming vacation to Wyoming instead of brainstorming ways to increase our site traffic got in the way. The actual, elusive, rarely spotted in the wild work-life balance got in the way.
Yes, we’ve taken our foot off the gas a bit. We’ve slowed our hustle. We’re smelling the roses. Seriously. We are. And the sage brush and the salty ocean air. And also the New York City summer stench. (Could kind of do without that.)
And it’s been pretty great, overall.
But it’s also been a little uncomfortable. Ok, a lot. We’re recovering Type A’s. We’ve had to let go of finding meaning from external sources and definitions. Job titles. Sales records. Likes and tags and comments. Bonuses. Bosses. Random acquaintances. Other moms. Classmates at our high school reunions whom we haven’t talked to in decades.
All this is to say, we don’t have much of a path yet for Olen 2.0. (Suggestions? Leave us a comment!) We’re still selling the rest of our inventory. (Still 50% off. Still safer, softer, better. Maybe you need to stock up?) We’re still figuring out what we want this brand to be. A business? A resource? A community?
We do want Olen to continue to be a source of connection. Inspiration. A spotlight on stories.
We also know we don’t want it to be heavily reliant on social media. We don’t want to bombard people with quantity over quality when it comes to content. That’s partly why we moved to Substack. We’ll show up every once in awhile in your inbox, and it’s up to you if you’d like to read what we’ve written.
Do you prefer reading emails and newsletters to watch Reels and TikToks? There’s no wrong answer.
In fact, here’s the link to the original #lazygirl TikTok, if you’d like to watch!
So yea, we’re going to go slow, but we hope you’ll join us for our amble through the digital landscape.
Until next time,
xx
Lindsay and Chelsea
https://www.bbc.com/worklife/article/20230725-how-the-lazy-girl-job-took-over-work-tiktok