[00:00:05] Jake White: Welcome back everyone to another episode of Party Talk where we empower leaders in youth drug prevention. Today, I’m chatting it up with Mary and Jill and they run an epic organization called “Girls Mentorship”. Will you do us the honor of introducing like the scope of what you do and what you’re passionate about?

[00:00:26] Mary: Of course, like you said, we are the co-founders and the faces behind a company and really what’s growing into a brand, not necessarily what our intention was of a company called “Girls Mentorship”, and we teach life and personal development skills to teen and tween girls. So realistically, we want girls to leave our presence, our events, the things that we do for them, feeling more confident in who they are feeling like they have a better sense of self awareness, understanding more about their self-esteem, really able to walk away being the leaders in their life, not someone who is a follower or someone who is easily succumbing to peer pressure. We want girls to understand who they are and what they stand for.

[00:01:19] Jake White: That is incredible. And before we get into how you do that, tell us a little bit about you personally, and what made you passionate about this work?

[00:01:28] Jill: Well, you’re gonna hear two voices. So Mary was the one who just spoke, I’m Jill. We are stoked to be here. And we love talking about what we do. How we came about this company? Honestly, it was born in 2020, in the middle of the pandemic, as we all remember, everything was shut down. People were stuck in their houses. And there was a need from parents around supporting their daughter, in getting her involved in something that was almost like an extracurricular activity. But obviously, we had to be online for that. So I would say this was my former job. I actually was a performance coach for teen athletes. So I focused primarily with girls, high school age, I would come in and really develop them on the mental side of the game. So that their confidence in whatever sport that they were pursuing, that it matched their physical skills, match their mental skills to be really at their peak performance. And when COVID hit, parents came back to me and said, are you hosting anything or doing anything for these girls? And at the time, I was neck deep teaching a preschooler and a kindergartener online learning. So I wasn’t thinking about doing anything. But what happened was, I got the request enough, where I said, maybe I should explore this idea. So I created an online call series. We call it camp social. And I put something out there for four weeks where we would bring girls on a call. And I opened it up for all girls, because at this point, athletes were also stuck at home, as all girls were. So I said, “Anyone who wants to come between the ages of 10 to 14, or whomever come on this call, and let’s just jam and spend time together for four weeks.” And I knew I didn’t want to do the call alone. So that’s where Mary comes in. And we work together at Lululemon formerly. So I knew I wanted to bring her in as a guest speaker. And after that first call got over, I invited her back for the remainder of camp. And after those four weeks, we looked at each other, and we were like, “Oh my gosh, that felt electric. And that was incredible.” We saw girls just transformed but before our eyes, which was wild, and we knew that we couldn’t just sit on that idea that we really had to move forward in creating more of these experiences for girls, and that’s how “Girls Mentorship” was born.

“The Journey of “Girls Mentorship” from Seed to Success”

[00:04:27] Jake White: Wow. What did you think initially when she came to you with the idea?

[00:04:33] Mary: Honestly, this was something that came to fruition in 2020. But it had been brewing in us for the previous decade with the work we were doing on who we were. So, Jill and I apart from one another had really invested in our own personal growth and development. We both came from totally different backgrounds from one another but backgrounds that desperately needed to take a look in the mirror to it’d be like, where am I holding myself back? Where am I victim blaming? Where am I not taking personal responsibility for my actions and how has that held me back? So outside of one another, we had invested 1000s of dollars hours’ time energy effort into going to personal growth and development seminars and workshops, and really investing in ourselves. So by the time 2020 came around the question of “What would we have done with these skills when we were 10, 14 18, whatever the age was?” So when the call came through, it felt really natural. It almost felt like a gift from God to be like, here’s your opportunity, like you want to seek purpose, or you want to make meaning of the things that you’ve gone through in your past, here’s an opportunity to really flesh that idea out and see where it leads. So it was a hell for me from the moment I answered the phone, because not only was Jill, my boss at Lululemon in a previous chapter of our life, but she was somebody who became an incredible friend of mine. And we, we spent so much time together over 2020, that it was a no brainer to be like, Well, I’m not doing anything, why not give back to humanity or do you spend time to write? So it was a hell yes from the get.

“The Impact of “Girls Mentorship” on Thousands of Lives”

[00:06:17] Jake White: That is so cool. And it’s hard for me to contain my excitement, because I know some of the answers of these things. But can you take us just fast forward to today, because that was in in 2020, when the seed was planted initially. And y’all got to work on this idea of “Girls Mentorship”, and what you had called the social camp and the social club. Can you take us to 2023, and what year it looks like, as far as how are you impacting your mission out there?

[00:06:50] Mary: I think for anybody who’s ever experienced entrepreneurship or following a passion or trying to really discover your purpose, it looks like a lot of writing on the wall. It looks like a lot of ideas thrown out there and trying them and pivoting and nixing this and opening that, and it looks like add it looks like so many text messages, too many tabs open lot or computer and in your brain. So in this very moment in time, like  at the center of this conversation, Jill and I are getting ready to host our second annual summer camp, which we’ve dubbed pursue more. So we’ve got the tagline pursue more individuality, pursue more compassion, pursue more friendships, pursue more positivity. And we hosted our first summer camp last year, we saw 140 girls come through. So we’re hosting it this year, hoping for similar numbers, similar turnouts. But we’ve really gotten to expand our entire program, including what this camp looks like. So a lot of experimentation has really turned into us being able to touch, move and inspire and inspire around 3000 girls in their families at this point. So we’ve worked with schools hand in hand, meaning we’ve done teacher trainings, student trainings, we’ve done parent specific trainings, we go in and work with sports teams on their mental game. So a little bringing Jill’s past into this current business. We host our own monthly workshops, and one on one coaching, we’ve really tried a lot of things in order to figure out what creates the most impact, and what creates the most results. Like I said, when we opened we really want girls to understand that they have the power of their own life, because so much of what girls go through in this really integral age is succumbing to other people’s expectations of them, or comparison, not enoughness, that imposter syndrome, where you think you’re center stage, and you’re naked, and everyone is looking at absolutely everything you’re doing. And that’s just not the case. And we want them to understand that because that means that they get to take the power back in their own life, not the other way around the world having the power over them. So right now we have a hustling and bustling business that has grown tremendously over the last three years to where we joke that we’re not even in control of this crazy train anymore. We’re along for the ride.

[00:09:27] Jake White: Wow. And what I love about it so much is that when being in the drug prevention field, is a lot of people will say we need to stop this vaping or marijuana or THC, alcohol, these young people are getting in their hands. If you look at the root of that problem, those are the stuff that you’re really pouring into for these young girls is like you’re doing drug prevention work. You’re doing it so much in prevention that some people wouldn’t even call it that but it actually is  So what I would love to know is what are the some of the things that knowing that our audience is people who are working for communities, maybe they’re working with schools, and they want it to be a safe place, a safe culture for students to learn and grow, is how are how are your results or your activities, contributing to that kind of work that they might see as a community or a school?

“Spreading Positivity and Fun: The Energetic Personalities Behind “Girls Mentorship”

[00:10:22] Jill: It’s been really interesting, because when the more that we’ve worked with girls, we’ve realized that a lot of the girls struggle in the same areas. So as unique and probably troublesome that their experiences are to them. At the end of the day, we’re realizing that they’re struggling with the same things, they’re struggling with confidence, they’re struggling with friendships, they’re struggling with comparison, and social media and being bullied online, and all of those things. So when we can come in and make an impact, and teach girls, the tools and strategies around combating that and responding in a healthy way, and being resilient, because we always say the work that we do is not we’re not a magic pill. However, what we are is teaching them that they are capable of bouncing back. So it’s shortening the gap. And when girls can bounce back faster, they can feel more confident to speak up in class or to go after that position that they want. And that builds their street cred that builds their confidence, their self-esteem so that then like, if we’re continuing to grow with them, like they’re growing in their adulthood, and they’re going to be the ones that are going to be change makers. And the ones that we’re that we desperately need when we get older to say  what, but these skill are, these girls have the skills and the wherewithal to really guide and lead us. So it’s focusing on developing the girl as herself. But then having her realize that when she is whole and complete, she then can lead others. And then it’s a movement, the ripple effect is massive. And then as a community it’s like, “There’s more people speaking the same language, and we want to do good and make a greater impact.” So touching one girl’s incredible. But if we can have multiple girls be a part of this conversation and realize that challenges are a part of life. And failure is a part of life. And that’s right, but how do we come together and empower girls to say that you you’ve got this, we believe in you. And if we can foster and nurture that year, after year after year, she’s going to start believing that herself and that’s only going to impact everyone around her in her life.

[00:12:58] Mary: Additionally, in terms of that question, what we’ve realized is girls, obviously aren’t the only ones that need to pick up on these skills. So when we have an impact on one girl, she absolutely impacts the community. But what we’re also finding is that the parents, teachers, coaches, so on and so forth, that we have conversations with, oftentimes are not well versed in these skills and tools as well. And we find them leaning into these conversations more, which helps expand that conversation to the community level that Joe was just talking about. So we are on the same page. So we are speaking the same language, and everyone’s working towards a common goal.

[00:13:44] Jake White: In case someone hasn’t only recently, thank you is not only like you said, you’re influencing a student who is influencing their families, and the work is touching different parts of this community. But it even comes down to saving students’ lives as we know that the suicide levels in this country, aren’t just because it’s because we might feel isolated or like there’s no hope. So the work that you’re doing is building confidence. It’s creating community, it’s actually lifesaving work. And so for the schools that get to work for you, maybe they don’t even know it yet, or they can’t quantify it because it’s preventing negative things from happening while producing positive results. And that’s hard to measure sometimes because something didn’t happen. The bullying didn’t happen, or skipping school didn’t happen. The suicide didn’t happen. The drug use didn’t happen. So in case someone hasn’t told you recently, I’m like tearing up a little bit. I just love what you’re doing. And thank you for what you’re doing.

[00:14:49] Mary: Thank you. I think that’s such a beautiful call out and something I heard in a sermon yesterday was we often thank God for the prayers that did get answered. But we forget to thank God for the things that we don’t even nowhere at our doorstep, we forget that there are things that could have come for us that were prevented in some way, shape or form that we didn’t even know about. And I think that’s a really beautiful call out because we were so hung up on the statistics and how crazy off the charts things like anxiety, depression, attempted suicide rates are that we often forget that when we can negate those things from happening, it kind of goes out of sight out of mind, as to why.

[00:15:30] Jake White: I want to steal a little bit about your personalities, because you told me that fun is vow of yours. And whenever I’m with you, you just have the best smiles on your face. You two are always having fun together. And I don’t because it’s just because you are or if this is a learn thing. But people that are doing life changing work like you are out what can they learn from your fun attitude, or posture, or whatever it is?

[00:16:00] Mary: I think it’s a little bit of both. I think it’s definitely learned, but there were definitely both rooted in it. And what I say learned is we had to really figure out how to funnel it because when we were in high school, middle school, I think both of us can attest to the fact that it wasn’t fun for teachers to have us in class. We were the chatty Kathy’s we were the outspoken ones. We were the ones who blurted we all know kids who blurt and interrupt they turn into adults who blurt and interrupt. So I think with the work we’ve done on ourselves, it’s really helped us like rope in our personalities. Because they can be a lot for people. And I think that’s one thing we want girls to know is to be in this work to be world changers to be self-changers. You don’t have to be extroverted and exuberant and out there like us. But with the work that we’re doing, it pays to have these bubbly, inviting personalities, because that’s exactly what it does. It invites girls into our world and our personalities, and it helps bring their walls down really quickly. So something that is incredibly important for both Jill and I, as friends, as partners in this business. And as individuals is making sure that we see value and hear people, we want to make sure that regardless of who you are, if you cross our paths, and we have an interaction with you via FaceTime via in person via email, we want to make sure that you feel that we value who you are, and we leave you better than we found you. And I think that really came clear for us while working retail. Because so often you can be a customer in a retail situation and have an attitude that’s negative towards your experience, . And then you go home, and you talk to your spouse or your significant other or your friends about this negative experience that you had. I’m never going back to this restaurant because this happened. I had an awful experience with the sales associate at this particular store. And as humans, the negativity sticks in your brain a lot easier than the positivity does. So I think working retail we were challenged to find the fun or the sparkle in certain interactions with people who may have come across us with frowns on their faces. And I think we’ve just always made it a point in those situations to try to turn those frowns upside down as cliche as that sounds. But how do you turn someone’s day around and have them go home and talk about the positive experience that they had with that sales associate? I walked into the store and I was pissed, but I walked out and that girl told me a joke that I’ll never forget like she made prices is right quip at the register. And that made my whole entire day and that’s what I’m gonna remember. So our sole purpose is truly to make people better than we actually found them before their interaction with us and that’s really where the energy comes from to continue to do this work and we just want people to know that we care.

[00:19:10] Jill: And fun really is in flow because our energy is vivacious and bright. We also struggle with because we’re human beings. So as much as we are positive, and we see the silver lining and things. We are challenged and when we are challenged, that is such a moment for us to practice. It’s practice being in flow, it’s accepting. As opposed to resisting it’s like really allowing what it is to be. And then being able to be in choice about that. It’s like, “Am I gonna let this thing take me down or can we laugh about it? What can we learn from it?” So finding flow has also really contributed to our fun.

“The Transformative Power of Supportive Adults in Youth’s Lives: A Key to Building Resilience”

[00:20:00] Jake White: I love that. And I think for the people that are listening to this and they might be wondering, because you are energetic, passionate, old going after your dreams and your cars, your entrepreneurial is some of these principals have to run a school and might feel like they’re entrepreneurial. And they’re dealing with the 10 things at once. People who run these drug prevention coalition’s they sometimes have to start from scratch, or take care of funding, build teams figure out their programming. And you might have already worked with some of them. But the question is, I have this business hack. And I have to deal with parents and the rules and the scary stuff. And then I have this other hat where I have to engage young people. And you two are pros at this, what are some few tips that you can give us to truly engage young people in this positive movement that you’re doing?

[00:21:03] Mary: First off, it’s definitely being ourselves, we’re ourselves through and through 100% of the time, it doesn’t matter if I’m talking to a teenager or I’m talking to a parent, maybe the verbiage I’m using is going to be different in the engagement, but we are 100% ourselves. Second thing I want to say on that is, we’ve done such a good job in the past of creating these generational gaps between Millennials and Gen Z and baby boomers. And we point out things that other generations do that we see as “Wrong” or being a boomer or whatever. It’s really, really important to us to bridge that gap and to ask questions that help us understand, why the verbiage has changed, why they’re listening to the music, they’re listening to why they’re feeling how they’re feeling about the state of the world, when typically people have to close off like, “Oh, those little whippersnappers are just listening to this and it hurts my ears, or I don’t understand that style.” Because we often forget what it feels like to be that age when realistically we were all that age once. So we really try to challenge not only ourselves to put ourselves back in those shoes in order to relate. We also challenge parents to remember what it felt like being that age for the first time as well. Because so many firsts happen. The changes that come along with puberty are cognitive, physical, mental friendship, there are so many things happening within the body of a teenager that we often just write off as selfish, or rude or this or that or the other. We would like study been hard ring? You don’t know hard. What do you have to stress about? You don’t have a mortgage payment. You don’t have this? It’s like, do you remember what it felt like to be 13, I was stressed the test the friends, the social dynamics, there was a lot to feel for the first time that stressed me out. And to just challenge parents or adults even, just to remember what those challenges felt like at that age is easier for the relatability factor and easy for us to be like we see you because we were you. And I never want that to change. I never want to be the old person that’s like, why are they wearing that? Why did you wear what you wore? Because your parents also questioned it and you didn’t appreciate them crushing it? And now guess what, you’re doing the same thing 20, 30, 40 years later that you actually hated. So give them a little grace, give them a little leeway, because they’re not self-centered. They’re self-seeking. They’re trying to find themselves for the first time in their whole lives.

[00:23:50] Jill: And all kids want is to be seen, to be loved and to be valued and to be supported. So if there are adults that are in their corner to say, I see you, I got you and how you’re feeling is normal. Man, you want to talk about walls being just shattered. Coming down. That is so cool for us to just be just change the perspective of how we see our youth is like, man, they are smart. They are so dang, they are so dang capable. And if we can actually show up and be in a conversation with them in that way. , so much so much goodness can come from, from interactions like that when we can really show up as ourselves and just honor where each other are at in the journey.

[00:24:43] Jake White: That is so true. And it’s easy to get trapped in the mindset of like, “Oh, they’re different. I don’t relate.” The music is terrible. They’re on their phones, whatever it is, but you’re so correct. We all were there or we’re currently there. We’re just choosing something different. But we have the same hang ups as they do as adults. I love it. You’ll see in a previous podcast, I interviewed a 17 year old from Ohio. And he seems like the best kid you’ve ever met in your life, he’s in all of these clubs. He’s working a job. He’s on the governor’s board for this crazy program and taking college credit, like the list goes on. And then you talk to him, and think you sound like an adult, and you care about your community like an adult. And I asked him, how are you like this? It seems like you’re an anomaly. And I think the truth is, and like he said, he’s not an anomaly. There are students out there like us that are craving, acceptance, and belong and to feel valued. And if we’re able to help them with that, you get to see the fruit, which is develop leadership skills, confidence, and life skills. And it can transform their life just being seen for who they are by somebody else, because it’s hard to feel it when your body’s changing, and it’s new, and you look online, or it’s all comparison, but to have somebody like you, in our lives to share that is transformative.

[00:26:30] Mary: Just this one little statistic is having at least one relationship with a supportive adult is the most common protective factor for childhood resilience. And from the work we all do, we understand that resilience is a key factor to having positive mental health outcomes. And positive mental health can prevent so many negative outcomes from suicide, to depression, to anxiety to attempts, there’s so many things that having a positive mental health status can give to you in your life that it takes one, it takes one supportive adult, to help build kids resilience. And if you’re a parent, and you’re listening to this, you’re like, “I’m positive, I’m an accepting adult.” You are doing the best that you can with the deck that you’ve been given the hand that you’ve been given.” But do you remember really loving and leaning into your parents as a resource? When you were that age, I would venture to say, “No, you probably hated taking their advice, you probably never went to them with your issues, because you were fearful of how they would look at you or the trouble that you might get in, so on and so forth.” So just know that if it’s not you, it’s okay to invite other supportive adults into your child’s life in order to garner those positive mental health outcomes.

[00:27:55] Jill: And if you’re not a parent listening to this as just an adult, being in this work, so whether it’s administrators or teachers or whomever, leaders in the community, it’s like, wouldn’t it be cool if that was you? What a responsibility to take on to say, I accept that challenge. That’s so me. I want to be the cool aunt for my nieces, I want them to come to me over anybody else. I wear that so proudly, and I also try to be that for my kids. But I also know I’m not going to be that for my kids. So who else? Like Mary said, “Am I inviting in to say these are your people?” These are your safe adults that you can go to them for anything. Because if you can’t go to me, you’re definitely not going to go to your friends. I don’t want them to I know they will. But also we have to weigh out. Where do they go if they are being challenged, if they are feeling hurt, if they are feeling overwhelmed, and it’s just such a beautiful call to say that like that could be you.

[00:29:05] Jake White: If people are on this call and you’re like “Hey, Jill and Mary, “Girls Mentorship” y’all are amazing. How can we learn more about working with you whether that’s a speaking engagement, a training a workshop, sending my kids to your camp? Where can they go and how can they stay in touch with you?”

“How to Connect with “Girls Mentorship”

[00:29:22] Mary: We just recently Googled our own selves and it turns out that our programs are on the first page which is super cool. So girlsmentorship.com, GirlsMentorship on Instagram, it spelled exactly like it sounds. There’s no phonetically funniness happening there with Y’s or Z’s, it’s “Girls Mentorship”, basically, on any platform that you want to find us on not to say we’re super active on all those platforms, but if you search us on those platforms, you will find us but we’re most active on Instagram, and then our website is pretty up to date in terms of the things we’re offering. If you want to be a community partner with us, meaning you want to bring us in to do a talk or a training, all of that information can be found on our website.

[00:29:05] Jake White: Perfect. Well, thank you both for doing this episode with me. And for everyone watching, thank you for tuning into another episode of Party Talk where we empower leaders in youth drug prevention. So if you listened, I know you’re empowered. Please check us out next Monday. And reach out to “Girls Mentorship” if you need absolutely anything. This was incredible. Thank you both.

[00:30:32] Mary: Jake, thank you.

[00:30:34] Jill: Thanks to everyone.