“Owning our story and loving ourselves through that process is the bravest thing we will ever do.”
- Brene Brown
Welcome to DeeLightful Life! I’m Deanna and I’m excited to have you here and hope you enjoy perusing my site and that you come away with some valuable nuggets of information or even just a smile.
Quick Bite:
Through the utilization of career assessments, goal setting, and decision making, I guide others to cultivate self-growth and encourage them to follow their own “breadcrumbs” of inspiration. Recently, I have begun to explore how to help myself and others live their best life with research in productivity, time management, healthy cooking, exercise, and the list is growing as I type this. So began the idea of having a blog. It has taken me close to 5 years to start this blog mostly because of intimidation and fear. But my passion and hunger for writing and wanting to pass on knowledge to others have overridden my fear so, let’s do this! Want to know more? Read on!
Formally, I currently work as a career counselor and professor at two community colleges. I have absolutely fallen in love with what I do and love helping others to fall in love too. Or at least to realize they are “dating” careers that are not a good fit and to discover those that are! I spent so much of my life feeling lost and as if I was floundering (see below) in different careers that I felt it just made sense to become someone that could guide others in their career and life journeys.
I think it’s important to understand someone’s path so here is a quick synopsis of my career dating life. As in dating, one has to kiss a few frogs before finding their prince, right? Those frogs also often have lessons to be learned if we pay close attention. Some of these career “frogs” I kissed so far in life are:
Barista
Overcame the fear of my own voice by having to yell out people’s names over live music once their decadent coffee drinks were ready. At the end of the shift I often got to take home leftover lemon and raspberry bars, cookies, and muffins! The idea of it is much better than partaking in it however. . .
University Events Center Scoreboard Operator
Where I lurked in the rafters of the sports arena, hovering my fingers over computer keys that would send codes of “DEFENSE!!” or “OFFENSE!!” or “Let’s go ‘Eaters!” to the message board (Let’s see if you can figure out which UC mascot that might be. . .)
Night Shift Data Entry Clerk
Where I learned the true torture of repetitive tasks and data entry. Don’t get me wrong, this may be the perfect fit for some but for me? Nope.
MakeUp Artist
Ahhh. I cried from happiness when I found out I got this job and simultaneously was filled with fear. I had no prior experience and this was a very well known brand. I actually became the artist that customers would come to with the serious statement of “I want a natural look.” This is also where I discovered my love of helping others to feel good about themselves, even if it was over just being able to find the perfect shade of red lipstick. Russian Red anyone?
Middle School Assistant Principal’s Assistant
Raise your hand if you LOVED middle school and would live it over again! Yea me either. Depending on what type of middle schooler you were, you know what Assistant Principal’s were responsible for, and probably know why I had to quit before I was completely jaded about kids forever!
Some things I believe in and love:
- Work/Life Balance
- The sound and smell when it first starts to rain
- Growing into a better person
- Libraries!
- That true growth takes courage, is rarely comfortable, and often resides on the other side of fear
- Fall and all the yummy scents and foods that come with it!
- Mindfulness
- Celebrating who we are and who we are not
- That knowledge never ends and can make life richer
- Scintillating conversations
- Marveling at the way life works and the connections many of us miss
- That the answers to our questions often reside within us and we often just need help coaxing them out
Thank you for being here. I hope that you grab a cup of coffee, tea, (insert your beverage here), get comfy, and enjoy your time here. I realize that nowadays time is something many of us have very little of and how we choose to spend it shows what we prioritize so *applause* for choosing YOU. I look forward to feedback so that I can continue to mold this site into what my audience wants to explore with me!
Deanna