My Lightbulb Moment

You may know that I got my MBA from UCLA Anderson in 2010. It was an incredible experience that continues to shape the course of my life for the better. It also gave me a mighty wake-up call and let to my lightbulb moment.

You see, I was behind. Very behind. I came from a university fundraising job where my manager was supportive, the work/life balance comfortable, and the tech minimal. I was considered a power user of our fundraising software just by… well, using it how it was intended!

And then I landed in my first quarter economics class study group, where we would be building the solution to our first case study in a spreadsheet. I was immediately, totally, out of my depth. In fact, the rest of my study group was already so fluent in both spreadsheets and economics that they let me sit there and try to recreate the spreadsheet they were building on my own computer so that I could try to quickly teach myself Excel.

Fortunately, business school isn’t all work, and at several points during the first quarter I ended up hanging out at classmates’ apartments. And I quickly noticed something - a lot of these places were pretty disorganized. We’d be heading out for dinner and a classmate would be flinging things hither and yon looking for keys or a jacket or a wallet.

Pictured on my last day of classes at UCLA Anderson, we had these name cards in front of us in every class and it was tradition to tape them to the brick wall in the courtyard once you finished your last class.

And I realized: the only reason I was keeping my head above water was that I had a well organized apartment to fall back on. I didn’t get home from a long day of classes, meetings, and interviews to a cluttered place that sapped my energy and demanded my time. Instead, it was a cozy oasis where I could retreat from stress and do the work I needed to do to catch up with my classmates.

That’s why I call an organized home a secret weapon. It frees up precious time, energy, and space to use on the things that are really important to you - whether you’re a 26-year-old grad student like I was, or a busy professional and parent like many of my clients today!

Let’s give full credit to my classmates: they inspired me far more than their apartments did! Many of them were starting businesses while still studying full time, which made me believe for the first time in my life that I could do it too. So when I graduated with my MBA. started interviewing for more fundraising jobs, and quickly became disillusioned, I knew I had options. Without the example and encouragement of my brilliant and talented classmates, that continues to this day, LMW Edits would not exist.

If you could use a secret weapon in your life, please reach out. I’d love to help you make your space the oasis you need to perform at your best!

LMW