Even rich people wonder. 💰

June 6, 2026, Letter #23

Dearest,

I recently attended a reunion for one of the companies where I had some of my coolest work victories. After the initial pleasantries, a former peer pulled me aside and said something I wasn't expecting.

"I'm not your target demo," he said. "But I find myself watching your content because so much of what you say really lands with me."

I asked him what part.

"Wondering even in adulthood if you could be doing something else."

I was surprised that he shared this with me, because rarely do wildly successful people admit out loud that they pursued a path that looks great on paper while something inside is still very much unsatisfied.

I said to him: every time I did something for myself that went against what makes sense for others, I grew in a way that no traditional path could teach me.

I don't know why we tell ourselves we can't change our minds, experiment with life, or be more than one thing. As if reinvention is something to be ashamed of.

He said: "I appreciate that. Because your videos bring me comfort."

My flex is not anything material or career wins. My flex is my heart. How I see people. The thousands of lives I know I have touched. I feel so good about that.

And if every year the question becomes "what is she up to now", I am completely at peace with that. Because I spent far too long not being audacious enough about my own dreams.

📢 You don't need permission to pursue the thing you've always desired.

You just need 1% more conviction than the version of yourself who keeps waiting for the right time.

Which brings me to something I told my Glow Up community last week ⤵️

June 11th is the last Glow Up.

I have been hosting free office hour sessions every single month for 4.5 years. That’s 54 months of expertise and value. And I carry genuine gratitude for every woman who showed up, every conversation that went somewhere deep, every email that said something in that room gave her life.

I share this with you because one of my life's missions is closing the power and wealth gap for women.

I believe the women's economy grows when women stop undervaluing what they carry. I cannot stand on that belief while operating in a way that contradicts it.

👉🏽 And this is what I know about the women reading this: you have been doing some version of that so it can be seen as service, as supportive. But it’s just a disguise for undervaluing, waiting and adjusting yourself to fit a season you've already outgrown.

You are allowed to change your mind. You are allowed to want something different than what made sense five years ago. You are allowed to be in a different era entirely and call that growth instead of failure.

👄 Jennifer Lopez just reminded the whole internet of this. More on that below.

There is no right time. There is only the decision.

The women who have moved in my world are the ones who invested in themselves when it wasn't convenient, when they weren't fully ready, when the timing wasn't perfect.

The Table is where we make choices that propel you forward.

​Join The Table, we start on June 18th →​

(Last day to enroll is Sunday, June 7th)

What's Moving​
​What's moving the needle for the women's economy

💰 Visibility is currency.

Women who are making real money right now are not only the ones with the biggest audiences. They are the ones who decided to be visible before they felt ready.

A creator recently took a concept teaching people how to show up and “yap” on camera, charged for it, made it her own, and generated over a million dollars in a single launch. The internet argued about whether the idea was original. She made a million dollars. That is the story.

I personally know women doing this at every level. And almost all of them have said the same thing to me: Vanessa, you create spaces for women to be seen. Why won't you let yourself be seen the same way?

So, I have been posting every single day. Not for views and def not for the algorithm but for myself. Because I realized I had been doing for others what I was not willing to do for myself. Let myself be fully seen in all of my versions. Uncategorizable.

💸 The psychology behind why it's important for women to invest in themselves.

There is also real psychology behind why investing in something changes how you show up for it. When you have skin in the game, when you have actually paid, committed, put something on the line, you move differently. You show up differently.

You take it seriously in a way that free access rarely produces. This is not a moral judgment about free. I have given freely for 54 months. It is an observation about what actually creates transformation versus what creates consumption.

Investing in yourself is the single greatest gift you can give yourself. Because proximity unlocks doors, and being in a space surrounded by people showing you what's possible, changes you. (Look up osmosis)

🤑 If JLo can reinvent yourself, so can you.

Jennifer Lopez just sat down with Tefi Pessoa at the premiere of her new Netflix film Office Romance and the internet responded like it always does when a woman who has been through something public chooses herself on the other side of it, with a mix of celebration and judgment.

What she said was simple: "I think I lost my way from her for a while and now I'm coming back to her, which is why I call this my happy era."

She is human. So are you. So give yourself the same permission you would give Jennifer Lopez to lose the thread, find it again, and call the return a victory instead of a failure.

She is in her happy era. I am in my lethal era. Pick yours.

BTW... I got SO many emails about what being in my lethal era means. I'm playing with the thought of creating a special container, an accountability pod for this season, so we can become lethal together. If that resonates, let me know.

Until the next letter.

Vanessa

P.S. The last Glow Up is June 11th. Sign up here →​

P.P.S. I get dozens of emails a month wanting to "pick my brain" or catch up over coffee. While I appreciate the ask and I've been there before, at this stage, to actually be about what I talk about, I have services for that. I consult founders and executives through The Council. For those who prefer to build alongside others, The Table is for you. Book time with me here →​