Work at Home Moms Talk Radio

For our last intern assignment, we are to write about “The Best Ever”. In my very short WAHM career, everything that can be considered “the best” has happened because of my internship at Mom’s Talk Network and specifically WAHM Talk Radio. This has truly been The Best Learning Experience Ever, I not only learned about blogging, but I learned more about myself and I would like to share what I have learned.

Be Yourself

Starting something new can be challenging, and you may wonder if you have the strengths to actually “make it”. I looked at other WAHMs to see what strengths and skills they possessed and honestly, I was a bit scared. Everyone seemed to be so “corporate” and trying to look professional. Waking up early, blow-dried hair and dressing in suits kind of women. Uh oh, maybe this market was not for me.

Being a much more relaxed, pj-wearing, love to have fun kind of person I worried I would have to change my personality. I wold have to get up early, wear clothes (LOL), straighten my hair. Luckily, after interviewing and speaking to so many great women during the internship and participating at Mom Masterminds, I slowly realized it is perfectly OK to be me. Leslie Truex, author of the Work at Home Success Bible is a proud pajama wearing WAHM. Kelly often tweets about taking naps. People are funny or silly on Twitter. Phew – my kind of people!

Realizing I could just be me and still be successful has given me such relief! I am slowly realizing that at 35, there may not be too many personality changes I am capable of! If you are a new WAHM, I really implore you to look at your role models and make sure they fit with your lifestyle/personality type. I am not the corporate type, nor will I ever be and I am OK with that.

There is a Strong Community

One of the first things after starting this internship was the strong sense of community that WAHMs have. Women seem to have a bad rap about being catty, and yes, I have seen it in my life, but the WAHM community I have been exposed to has been amazing. Strong women working together, encouraging each other, admitting their mistakes and failures, sharing their accomplishments. It is wonderful to see how tight the community is.

Everyone I have come in contact with through this internship has been super friendly, from the other interns, to all of our Buzz a Moms recipients, everyone I have interviewed to the women on Mom Masterminds. No one (that I know of! LOL) thinks “Oh great, here comes more competition”, they genuinely want to help each other out. It is awesome.

Just DO IT!!

There is a reason why “just do it” works so well as a slogan, sometimes you just need to get off of your butt and DO IT!! In this past Monday’s Breakthrough Session (follow Kelly on Twitter) to learn more about these sessions), Kelly mentioned that some mom’s become addicted to learning. Some spending several thousands of dollars on courses without putting anything into action. I admit that I too can suffer from the need to research everything to pieces and then I get overwhelmed with analysis-paralysis.

With this internship, we were given a set of tasks to accomplish every week and we had to do them. I could not research them to death, I just had to do it, right or wrong. And some things were hard, but I just DID IT! Yay me! I had to step out of my comfort zone and ask another blogger (the fabulous Cindi from Moomettegram’s Musings) to do a cross-blog conversation with me, and that was hard. And then she had no idea what I was talking about, so I had to keep clarifying myself, and then she finally said yes. It was a great “putting myself out there” kind of moment.

I also did my first interview for WAHM Talk Radio with Roberta Rosenberg and I was so nervous about that ahead of time. I had never spoken to Roberta before, I had never interviewed anyone. Kelly sent me some resources and I JUST DID IT. Thankfully Roberta was a great person to interview and had lots to say. It was not nearly as difficult as I made it out in my head.

Just doing it has probably been the most influential lessons I have learned. I think it will impact my life in some many positive ways. I am letting go of my perfectionist streak and just trying things now for the heck of it!

No Cheerleaders but You

When I responded to Kelly’s Tweet looking for interns, I really had no idea what to expect. But honestly, I thought we would get a lot more hand-holding than we did. I am a bizarre mixture of the personality types that Kelly talks about – Sanguine and Melancholy. The Sanguine in me likes feedback and positive strokes. In some ways I am a people pleaser, although I am sure my husband would wonder which part of me!

At first I assumed the worst (the Melancholy side), that Kelly hated my writing, and she was just disgusted with me. Yes, I am indeed slightly neurotic, why do you ask? LOL. But seriously, I thought we would be getting constant feedback and I was getting nothing. I was really worried about our first intern meeting, I thought I was going to get called out for my bad posts. Of course that didn’t happen, Kelly was thrilled with everyone’s accomplishments. I realized the Kelly was far too busy to micro-manage 6 interns plus her myriad other projects. She had faith in us that we would figure it out, I had to learn to have faith in myself.

I learned I don’t need a cheerleader, that comments from readers are a bonus, but if I am happy with a post, or an interview, than that is all I really need to feel good. I can make my own happiness – take that Melancholy part of myself! Moms – if you feel the same way, looking for external sources of acceptance in your business, you need to get over that and learn to be your own cheerleader. No one is rooting for you harder :)

The Best Learning Experience Ever has Just Begun

Although my internship with Moms Talk Network is over, it is just the start of The Best Learning Experience Ever. I have learned so much about myself and what I can do, I cannot wait to get started on my own blogs and business. Being an intern has allowed me to grow in so many other ways than just learning how to blog. I feel a sense of confidence that I have been missing for a while. I feel like I am in the right community. I feel like I can tackle anything. I feel like I will be a good role model for my daughter who is being born in a few weeks, and she will one day say proudly “my mom works from home”.

I would just like to thank Kelly for this amazing opportunity, she works so hard on her own sites and projects and the fact that she can give back to 6 newbies for 10 weeks at a time is mind blowing. Kelly – you have changed my life only for the better and I hope I can do the same for others one day.