Brittany Piccola 00:00:00  I had given so much of myself throughout the school day that I had zero left. So when my mom went to the hospital that week, I was like, what the fuck am I doing in this classroom right now? Why am I not at my mom’s bedside? So I left and it was like the kick in the ass that I needed. You could do something else. You are capable of doing something else. And sometimes you just need that other person to say, hey, you know what? Just grab the bull by the horns and go do something else. If you are not happy with whatever you’re doing.

Katy Ripp 00:00:32  Hey there, fellow rebels, welcome to #ActuallyICan, the podcast where we say a hearty hell yes to designing life on our own terms. I’m Katy Ripp, a lifestyle coach, business mentor, and serial entrepreneur here to guide you through the wild ride of defining what society expects of us and embracing our authenticity. On this show, we dive deep into taboo topics like death, money, spirituality, entrepreneurship, unapologetic self-care and personal development, all while swearing and laughing along the way.

Katy Ripp 00:01:04  Expect down and dirty conversations, plenty of humor, and a whole lot of exploration, leaving you feeling empowered to be your truest self. Whether you’re craving a good laugh, seeking unconventional self-care tips, or simply looking for some camaraderie, you’ve come to the right place. We only get this one short life, so buckle up and let’s design yours on our own terms. Ready to dive in? Let’s go.

Brittany Piccola 00:01:31  Let’s just start with your story. Tell me why.

Katy Ripp 00:01:34  You reached out. To even be on a podcast like this.

Brittany Piccola 00:01:38  Honestly, I am all about stepping out of my comfort zone at this point. I feel like even though I am just some girl from Jersey, I. My story probably resonates with a lot more people than I think. And grief is talked about so little and I feel like that is so important to talk about, because it really changes you as a person and really can consume your life if you let it. You know you allow it to at one point. So here I am, just trying to share my story, and if I can help one other person change their trajectory to make them happier than hey, you know what it’s worth? Me speaking on a podcast or sharing my real.

Brittany Piccola 00:02:24  Because you know what? That’s what ended up changing my life was a freaking real. Oh yeah.

Katy Ripp 00:02:32  Tell me about.

Brittany Piccola 00:02:32  That.

Katy Ripp 00:02:33  I mean, go into your story about, like, why you were even looking for reals.

Brittany Piccola 00:02:37  Yeah, but I wasn’t, like, that’s the thing. This is what’s crazy. So I’ll bring this up. It’s such.

Katy Ripp 00:02:41  A cool thing.

Brittany Piccola 00:02:42  Right? So let’s go back 2010. I met my husband at a bar. Same old school, old fashioned, you know, not online. Loved it. Whatever. Fireman. He just got hired full time. I ended up just getting a job as a teacher. Great. You know, this seems like a great all American couple. All the things.

Katy Ripp 00:03:05  Yeah. Check, check.

Brittany Piccola 00:03:06  Right. Yeah. We’re checking all the boxes. Yeah. And life goes on. You know, when we’re fine, get married, all the things. Have two kids. And then literally the weekend of Covid. My mom has stomach pain.

Brittany Piccola 00:03:19  She goes to the emergency room. They end up opening her up because they see there’s a blockage in her intestine. They open her up, they remove it, and we’re told that, oh, it’s cancer devastation right off the bat. But this is the best kind of cancer you can have, is what we’re told. You get rid of it and it’s. You’re good. And I knew in my heart of hearts that this was not correct. Like this couldn’t be correct. It was a rare. It’s rare, but it’s actually not a rare cancer. Neuroendocrine tumors is what she has nets. Apparently, Steve Jobs had it. Oh, I think they called it pancreatic cancer, but technically it was nets, tumors that caused this. There’s a lot of people that have this, but it’s just it goes undiagnosed because people come go to the guy and they’re like, okay, I have stomach issues. Okay, well, maybe it’s a stomach bug, maybe it’s IBS. All of these things.

Brittany Piccola 00:04:15  My mom was told, lo and behold, it ended up being cancer. So they removed it. They said, oh, you can come back, let’s do some Pet scans every, you know, couple months, whatever. I tried to push her to go to a specialist that was in the city in New York City by us. And she like, wasn’t budging. She was like, okay with what she heard. And I it’s almost like now that I think back, I’m like, I wonder if she just knew, oh, like, this was her demise. Like, this is how her story was going to end. And again, we carried on with life. Fast forward two years later, February 2022. She has severe pain. Her stomach issues were coming back again and she was in and out of hospitals. She went back into the hospital. They ended up having to open her up again. They had said that there was some cancer that they had found through one of the scans, but like little.

Brittany Piccola 00:05:15  Not much. They opened her back up. She was riddled with cancer. They took 17in of her intestine and gave her an ileostomy bag. And basically it was the beginning of the end for her. And so she was small to begin with. Very active. You know, it was very difficult for her to get nutrients back when you have in the bag like that. So then she was put on chemo, all the things, and it seemed very much more like insurance doesn’t give a fuck. Doctors don’t give a fuck. You’re just a number. And that no one cares. How old was she? 72. But I’m telling you, you would not have thought that. You saw it?

Katy Ripp 00:05:59  Yeah. 70 is the new 50.

Brittany Piccola 00:06:01  Yes, 100%. Yeah. You know.

Katy Ripp 00:06:04  A lot like that.

Brittany Piccola 00:06:05  She was, like, at the max every morning. Like, you know, living life. So that happens. And, you know, she fights the good fight basically until Thanksgiving. And I remember that weekend, I was like, oh, I have to go down to spend Thanksgiving with my mom.

Brittany Piccola 00:06:24  I was like, I have to, you know, like go back and forth with the holidays. I was like, no. I was like, I gotta be there. And it’s like, I knew. And then she hugged me and it was like, I knew that this was it. So we did that. Now I’m gonna cry. It’s okay. But so that week, she went to the hospital, and here I am. Let’s go back to teaching. Teaching had changed drastically from, like, Covid. I was teaching at home. And then when we went back into the classroom, it was tough. Yeah, kids were brutal.

Katy Ripp 00:06:54  You were teaching high school. Is this.

Brittany Piccola 00:06:55  Right? Yeah, I was a high school teacher. And disciplinary issues were. It was a daily thing. And thankfully, actually during this time period, I had less disciplinary issues because I had higher level. Children like that were a little bit more self-motivated. So that helped. But when you’re going through that and then you’re like, oh, I have to go put on the dog and pony show the next day.

Brittany Piccola 00:07:20  Like, my life isn’t falling apart outside of this classroom. It’s a crazy thing. Yeah. So when my mom went to the hospital that week, I was like, what am I doing here? I got a phone call saying, you know, we were going to get results from something. I’m like, what the fuck am I doing in this classroom right now? Why am I not at my mom’s bedside? So I left I, you know, I told the people I needed to tell, but I was like, I need to get out of here as I was like, just some mess leaving. So I drove down and for the next couple days, I took half days so that I could be there, and we ended up being told she was going to put on hospice the whole bit. So dealing with that, that was a tough realization that this wasn’t it for me. I was like, this sucks. Nobody cares about what I’m going through right now at all. They’re like, make sure your sub plans are in.

Brittany Piccola 00:08:12  Yeah. You know, thankfully I had amazing coworkers that were like, don’t worry about it. We’ll figure it out. But in reality, I was doing the figuring out because that was me. I felt like I was responsible. So my mom goes on hospice, she goes into a coma. And I mean, she lasted a long time in a coma. Brutal.

Katy Ripp 00:08:31  So she was gone before she was gone?

Brittany Piccola 00:08:33  Correct. Yeah. Yes, but she was at my parents or her house. It was a long time. Just ridiculous. So January 2nd, I went back to school. I had put together five days of plans because obviously you grieve only in five days.

Katy Ripp 00:08:50  Yeah, of course.

Brittany Piccola 00:08:51  And you’ll get over it in five days. So especially the death of your mom. So I put five days of plans together, and she ended up passing away January 3rd. And I had all that stuff together. And I’m like, again, what am I doing? And my husband and I have toyed with me leaving because it just didn’t make sense.

Brittany Piccola 00:09:11  The teaching job, yes, on paper looks great, but like it’s really not family friendly. You’re missing a lot of stuff with your kids. You start school, especially if you’re a high school. You’re starting school either earlier or at the same time as your kids. So you’re missing that first day of school. You’re missing school drop off. You’re paying someone to be taking your kid to and from places you’re missing extra hours of time with your family. Not family friendly at all. So there’s that. My husband’s like, I don’t want to pay anyone. And we had no way for our kids to get school unless we’re paying for before care, which even the times didn’t line up with that. Yeah, with how early I had to leave to go to my job.

Katy Ripp 00:09:53  And is your husband on, like a 24 hour deal?

Brittany Piccola 00:09:55  Yeah, he does 24 on, 72 off. But then, yeah, a job that also.

Katy Ripp 00:10:00  Looks great on paper, right? Correct.

Brittany Piccola 00:10:02  Yeah. But it’s so funny that you say that because like eight days a month he works.

Brittany Piccola 00:10:07  But I swear to you, those eight days, we always have something that this falls on and, like, screws up something.

Katy Ripp 00:10:13  Yeah.

Brittany Piccola 00:10:14  Which is crazy, but, you know.

Katy Ripp 00:10:15  I mean, I’m an entrepreneur. I’ve worked for other people. And like, all jobs look good on paper. The best job that doesn’t look good on paper is working for yourself.

Brittany Piccola 00:10:28  Yeah, definitely. Yeah. No, I mean, you’re right. But again, these are things that you wouldn’t know as a teacher, for example, like.

Katy Ripp 00:10:36  Well, the security and the stability of a teaching job with the quote unquote summers off. Right. Like that’s the big thing, especially for my sister was a fifth grade teacher for a long time. And of course, like, there’s a certain number of people in the population that are like, teachers don’t work hard enough, they get days off, they only work 730 to 4, you know. Every weekend, every holiday, you know, all the things that everybody’s always fucking said.

Katy Ripp 00:11:03  I get it. Right. Like I understand how people can perceive it. That correct? I do. At the same time I have talked to. I mean, I don’t actually know the number, but it’s almost 20 teachers that have left for entrepreneurship because it is so toxic, bureaucratic, so exhausting.

Brittany Piccola 00:11:26  That’s what.

Katy Ripp 00:11:27  It is. I mean, so like, not family friendly and not all jobs need to be family friendly. But I know a number of teachers that are still teaching that that’s her biggest regret is she doesn’t get to go to back to school because she’s got to go to her own back to school night. Yeah, that’s something that eventually does wear on you and the grief part of this. Right. Like losing somebody like that. There is a before and there is an after. If you ask me.

Brittany Piccola 00:11:54  100%.

Katy Ripp 00:11:55  I would probably guess that you feel the same.

Brittany Piccola 00:11:58  I’m 100% different than I was.

Katy Ripp 00:12:00  Was before that kind of loss. And there’s an after. Now there’s tons of silver linings for me too.

Katy Ripp 00:12:07  And we don’t talk about that enough. I don’t think there are things that happen in loss in your lives that just change you organically, systematically, internally, externally, like you don’t know it until you’ve been through it, but it does make a shift. There is a before and there is an after.

Brittany Piccola 00:12:28  Yeah, I 100% agree. I felt stuck before. Even technically, you’re not supposed to make any rash decisions right after you lose someone, at least within the first year or two.

Katy Ripp 00:12:41  Yeah, I don’t know where that timetable comes from. To be honest.

Brittany Piccola 00:12:44  I don’t know.

Katy Ripp 00:12:45  Grief is not linear. It does not give a fuck about your calendar. And three.

Brittany Piccola 00:12:49  Oh, I.

Katy Ripp 00:12:50  Know, five days and we’re talking in the first week of January also. So we, you know, of course we just got through this December 31st. You’re a different person in January 1st or somebody else or you should be. Life does not give a fuck about your calendar, I’m telling you. So like this grief process and we talked about this earlier.

Katy Ripp 00:13:09  It’s been seven years and we’re still up and down.

Brittany Piccola 00:13:13  Oh, and it’s it’s a forever thing.

Katy Ripp 00:13:14  Yes. It just.

Brittany Piccola 00:13:15  Like changes.

Katy Ripp 00:13:16  It just changes and morphs and ebbs and flows and things hit you at certain times and and really good things come out of this, you know, new person, I guess. But that one year thing I think, is it has nothing to do with the calendar and everything to do with where you’re at and it finds you where you’re at. That’s it.

Brittany Piccola 00:13:41  Yeah I agree. I, I think like maybe if you’re working with a therapist. Like, I think that they put some type of a timeframe on it. So you’re not, like, doing anything crazy, chopping your hair off. Whatever. Whatever. Because, like, even literally after unrelated, completely.

Katy Ripp 00:13:58  Unrelated shit.

Brittany Piccola 00:13:59  I want to get my hair done. I think like a month or two later, she’s I told her about it. She’s like, I’m not letting you cut your hair off. I was like, I wasn’t gonna.

Brittany Piccola 00:14:07  She’s like, I wouldn’t let you do that. I was like, and I was like, then you would know there was something wrong. Like, because I always have, like, longer hair.

Katy Ripp 00:14:15  But also, you’re a capable fucking woman. You can cut my hair.

Brittany Piccola 00:14:19  I know, but I that I might have regretted.

Katy Ripp 00:14:21  Okay, okay. Yeah, but you have a hair thing. Everybody’s got something that’s.

Brittany Piccola 00:14:25  Yeah, that I might have. She. She knew me long enough. Yeah. But yeah. So going into this I knew though that I was done. This was the thing I had given so much of myself throughout the school day that I had zero left because of grief, but because of stress, because of the disciplinary issues, because I wasn’t getting enough support from the supposed support staff above. Like, it was a shit show and I just watched as it’s like just circling the drain and I’m like, I am not about this life anymore. Like, I can’t do this.

Brittany Piccola 00:14:59  And when I’m coming home and I can barely handle my own kids, something’s got to give here. So back to the reel. I was lying in bed. I was on my husband’s Instagram for his landscaping company, and I told him I was like, oh, I’ll, you know, help you with your Instagram, whatever. Give me something to do. Give me experience, whatever. So I’m on his account. So it wasn’t like anything about me for the algorithm. And all of a sudden there’s this real that’s for burnt out teachers that you could do virtual assistants. And I was like, what the fuck is this?

Katy Ripp 00:15:30  What is the virtual assistant? I didn’t know what a virtual assistant was until like mid last year.

Brittany Piccola 00:15:35  Well until February. So I was like, Okay. Just getting me thinking about the possibility of doing something else. Like because you are in such a Caps mindset. I’ve been telling this to a lot of people, especially with teaching, you are in a capped mindset. There’s no abundance mindset in teaching because you get steps.

Brittany Piccola 00:15:55  You are a fucking robot. You do the same shit every year because you have to follow whatever. You know, the robot shit that they want you to follow. And again, and.

Katy Ripp 00:16:06  Also, it’s always been sold to teachers that the benefits are so good, right? Like the benefits are great and they sort of handcuff you by your tenure. Your 401 K your.

Brittany Piccola 00:16:17  Pension that you’re not going to enjoy. Yeah. My mom fucking died and she can’t enjoy her pension. I’m sorry.

Katy Ripp 00:16:24  Was she a teacher?

Brittany Piccola 00:16:25  Yes.

Katy Ripp 00:16:26  Oh, Jesus. Yeah.

Brittany Piccola 00:16:27  Yeah, she retired, but it doesn’t matter because guess what? When you could use that money, I don’t want to use it. Then I want to use it right the fuck now. Yeah. So I was like, I have to get out. So I saw that and it was a course. I was like, all right, you know what? I’m gonna invest in me. I’m gonna bite the bullet. I did it, I started it, and in the nooks and crannies of my day, I was doing this course.

Brittany Piccola 00:16:50  I was setting myself up. And in the meantime, I was also talking to a friend of mine who is a business coach, and he has our, like, money, and he does all our money and stuff. My husband would know more than I do.

Katy Ripp 00:17:03  Somebody’s helping.

Brittany Piccola 00:17:04  Yeah, he’s like, you need to get out. And literally I told my husband, I’m like, let’s sit down in the meeting with him. I want to hear what he has to say. And it was like the kick in the ass that I needed. Like, you could do something else. You are capable of doing something else, and sometimes you just need that other person to say, hey, you know what? I’ve been there. You know he has other businesses too. He’s not just financial. He’s like, you can do this. I was like.

Katy Ripp 00:17:29  Sometimes you just need permission.

Brittany Piccola 00:17:30  Okay? Yeah, exactly.

Katy Ripp 00:17:32  And not necessarily permission from the closest person in your life. Right? Like. Yeah.

Katy Ripp 00:17:36  It was like. Yeah. Do whatever the fuck you want. Mine is two. I need permission sometimes from people who have either been there before or somebody that doesn’t really know my history, doesn’t know me that well. That’s just like, yeah, you can fucking do it. Go. I’m like, what are you waiting for?

Brittany Piccola 00:17:55  But yeah. So I was like, let’s do this. So I had said, I’m going to put in for a leave of absence. I put in for a leave of absence, which I’m still technically under a leave of absence.

Katy Ripp 00:18:08  Okay. So is this in February of 24?

Brittany Piccola 00:18:11  Yes.

Katy Ripp 00:18:11  Last year. So just about a year ago.

Brittany Piccola 00:18:14  Almost a year. So I was like I’m going to put in for the leave of absence. If they deny it I’m resigning. Okay. I put forth that into the universe. Like I don’t care. Yeah. You know.

Katy Ripp 00:18:26  But we’ll try it this way.

Brittany Piccola 00:18:27  Exactly. So my reasoning was valid because I had to put in why I was like, I’m literally losing it here.

Brittany Piccola 00:18:34  So mentally I’m not stable to like just continue at the pace that I’m going. So with that, they ended up granting me it, but I had done that just really as like a safety net with no intention of going back. Sure. So my goal was by September, I needed to make what I was making. A month now I had summer pay like I. I had broke up my paycheck so that I would get paid in the summer. So I was still getting paid through August. The end of August was D-Day because I wasn’t going to get paid in September. By September, I covered my income.

Katy Ripp 00:19:12  Monthly or the entire year.

Brittany Piccola 00:19:14  Monthly. Okay. I wish the entire year.

Katy Ripp 00:19:16  It’s.

Brittany Piccola 00:19:17  Coming. Your lips to God’s ears, I hope so, but again, like that’s the cap mindset. Like the fact that I would never have believed that any of this is possible, but, like, you know, my yearly salary, I totally can make a month.

Katy Ripp 00:19:30  Well, 100%. And also, when you break it down into how many hours you’re working versus what you’re getting paid per hour, you can probably work half as much for twice as much.

Brittany Piccola 00:19:43  It’s insane. Yeah. And again, and it’s the flexibility of it. Yeah. So in May I had finished the course component. I was kind of floundering, finding my first client. And I don’t have time to flounder. So I found another group that had 1 to 1 coaching a business coaching model for virtual assistants. I jumped into that and simultaneously found my first client at the end of May, who, by the way, I’m still working with to this day, and she has big plans because her business has taken off. We’ve built the plane as she’s flying it together and she’s like, I want you to be my only, okay? I want to be your only client. There you go. So yeah, yeah. She’s like, how much do you want to be making a month? I told her, and she’s like, all right, let’s make this happen. Now on the side, in my mind, my dream goal is like, okay, I’d love to continue working with her and maybe another individual as an assistant type.

Brittany Piccola 00:20:39  And then on the side, my little passion project is helping other teachers realize that they can do something else other than what’s around them in the four walls of the classroom, because they feel stuck. And it kills me that people feel so stuck. Yeah. And, you know, I understand in some ways, like they are stuck, but not everyone is stuck. Yeah. They choose.

Katy Ripp 00:21:05  I mean, you you allow yourself to be stuck. I mean, you can just walk like you can just take your dirty diaper off. You don’t have to sit in it. Or capable women. We know how to take diapers off, just like, take it off and move out. That’s a lot easier said than done. And I totally get it. I’m, you know, in a different world where I’ve never been in a teaching job, I’ve never been in a job that has given me so much security, that and safety that I would continue to get abused every day, right? Like like I hired a teacher.

Katy Ripp 00:21:33  I hired a special education teacher to be our general manager. She is the salt of the earth. She is the best human I know. And she was getting hit at work, and I was like, listen, I probably can’t replace your salary, but I can guarantee we won’t hit you. She was like, sold. Hahahahaha! I mean.

Brittany Piccola 00:21:54  It comes down to that, but that.

Katy Ripp 00:21:56  Is like a reality of our education system. And I’m not educated enough myself to go into a conversation or an argument about the education system. All I know is my experience and my experience talking with really, really good teachers. It is a travesty. We are losing them. Oh yeah. It is a real problem. I’m not saying that there is not really good teachers still teaching. But the amount of work and energy.

Brittany Piccola 00:22:27  There’s no incentive.

Katy Ripp 00:22:28  Safety is the only incentive to me. Right from the outside looking in safety, security and summers off.

Brittany Piccola 00:22:35  There’s no mental stability.

Katy Ripp 00:22:37  But I don’t know if they’ve been so skewed in.

Katy Ripp 00:22:40  It’s okay to be abused like it’s okay to be like this way because I get my summers off because somebody’s telling them that. I’m not sure.

Brittany Piccola 00:22:49  You know, that’s how a few of my coworkers were like, it just is what it is. I’m like, but it shouldn’t be like this. It shouldn’t just be. It is what it is like. We shouldn’t just be bending over and taking it. I’m like, this is terrible.

Katy Ripp 00:23:01  Yeah. And some people don’t feel stuck, right? Like they’re really thankful for what they have there. And like, I love that because we still need really good teachers for our kids. We got kids in there too. But we also need to create a place for them to be able to voice it, to be able to make some change for themselves, for them to be able to take care of themselves so they’re not burning out and overwhelmed, and.

Brittany Piccola 00:23:24  It just has to be more support from the top.

Katy Ripp 00:23:26  Yes. Yeah, this is a trickle down.

Katy Ripp 00:23:28  That’s the problem. Anyway, I could get on a real soapbox, but I don’t really want to. One of my questions for you is this sounds ridiculous because I am a business mentor. I really just found out what a VA was. I had to Google what is a VA? I didn’t know that there was a virtual assistant out there. Tell me, because probably a lot of people listening are entrepreneurs and assistants. I actually just had a conversation this morning with a very successful, highly achieving real estate agent who absolutely needs a virtual assistant, needs an assistant not necessarily virtual, but needs an assistant. And virtual seems like the best course of Course of action because it opens up the pool and they’re already willing to assist. So can you just give me the fifth grade level of what a virtual assistant does, what they’re capable of, if there’s a limit on what they can do? What’s the ideal like? Give me your virtual assistant pitch.

Brittany Piccola 00:24:40  Honestly, virtual assistants are just way more flexible because you don’t have to pay for an office.

Brittany Piccola 00:24:46  You don’t need to house them. You don’t have to do like a workman’s comp or any of that other stuff.

Katy Ripp 00:24:51  Contractors?

Brittany Piccola 00:24:52  Yeah. We’re subcontracted out.

Katy Ripp 00:24:54  Yep. So for you money people, that means they’re 1099.

Brittany Piccola 00:24:57  Yeah, but I’m doing it. I’m. I’m the one who’s sitting out the invoice, and you don’t have to worry about it. You just, you know, pay it and be done. So depending on each person, virtual assistant might specialize in different things. So it’s up to what the client needs which is who they’re looking for essentially. Yeah.

Katy Ripp 00:25:16  The matchmaking kind.

Brittany Piccola 00:25:17  Of. Yeah. There’s like social media management people also. That could be also a VA. They might be good at, you know, making reels and doing all that social media stuff. You know, Vas can do. Be in the inbox. Sure.

Katy Ripp 00:25:32  Like an email manager.

Brittany Piccola 00:25:34  Responding to emails, cleaning up the inbox, labeling it. Especially if it’s a disaster. What else? Newsletter creation setting up flows email flows can be in the DMs, so I do a bunch of messaging sequences for some of my clients.

Brittany Piccola 00:25:52  You know, there’s so many different names for things. So it’s really what that person wants to kind of like specialize in or niche down in. You know, for my client that I’ve been working with since May, I’ve been putting together her presentations because she’s creating modules for a course. So she got her slides branded by someone. And I take those slides and I take her speech and I condense it down into a slideshow. So then.

Katy Ripp 00:26:22  Yeah. So basically, like editing, I mean, this to me, it sounds like it’s sort of like, what do you need? And I will figure out how to do it.

Brittany Piccola 00:26:31  Correct.

Katy Ripp 00:26:32  Part of my coaching and mentoring for small business owners is like, get the fuck out of the weeds of the shit that you are not good at, or you don’t want to do, and stay in your zone of genius, because that’s where all the money is. Let somebody else be in their zone of genius, which is assisting you to do that, because there’s a lot of people that really love to do that stuff.

Katy Ripp 00:26:56  There are things that I should absolutely not be doing right. Like I’m a visionary. I’m a big picture person. That’s where I make my money, right? Like that’s where I my connection, my the way that I do things is where the money. So there are things that I can do, that I can do, and I can do pretty well, but I don’t wanna. And there’s nothing wrong with that. There is nothing wrong with not wanting to do something. As female entrepreneurs. For some reason, we were sold this bullshit bag of goods that we have to do everything.

Brittany Piccola 00:27:31  Well, I mean, it’s just like motherhood. Yeah, it’s basically just being a woman.

Katy Ripp 00:27:35  And the accountant and the email newsletter person in the social media. It’s probably the number one thing I get asked about is like, what about social media? I hate doing social media. I don’t want to dance in front of TikTok. I don’t, you know, kind of these, like, overreaching things. Yeah.

Katy Ripp 00:27:54  But really, what it means is they don’t know how or that what they’ve done so far hasn’t seen any sort of result. Right? Like there’s no ROI for the time that they’re putting in. But it’s free advertising and I’m making air quotes here. It’s free advertising. No, it’s not like you have to put some money into it in order to get something out of it.

Brittany Piccola 00:28:19  I think that’s with most things.

Katy Ripp 00:28:20  Yeah. And by money, I mean you need to hire somebody that knows what the fuck they’re doing because it is a vehicle that works. It’s not the only way to make money.

Brittany Piccola 00:28:28  But it’s also timely. It’s also a timely thing, like you need to. And it takes time to see.

Katy Ripp 00:28:34  Like the amount of time that people are spending trying to make one real.

Brittany Piccola 00:28:39  Yeah, it’s.

Katy Ripp 00:28:40  A.

Brittany Piccola 00:28:40  Lot.

Katy Ripp 00:28:40  Three hours when you could be making $150 an hour somewhere else. Because Instagram is free does not make sense. Pay somebody $50 an hour to do it and you go out and do the other thing.

Katy Ripp 00:28:55  So it’s really like, I think, changing our mindset around what are we actually paying for? It’s not what we’re paying for people to do. It’s what we can do while the other person is doing it.

Brittany Piccola 00:29:07  The value that’s there 100%. It’s definitely the value. Yeah. I mean, it depends on who you are as a virtual assistant. You know, some virtual assistants might be like, okay, give me the tasks. I’ll get them done. Be done with it. Even like monthly on the type of VA that I want to build a relationship with you because I want to be your biggest fan. I want to support your business. I want us to be a partnership. I want to do this together. I don’t want to be doing the bitch work, because I feel like that’s what I’ve been doing for 14 years, and I don’t want that anymore. So I want to feel valued. And thankfully, the client that I started with, like she up, leveled me from the start like nobody’s business.

Brittany Piccola 00:29:54  And she’s like, you are my assistant and treats me as such. And anyone else that I’ve actually attracted has been very similar. And if not, then we just went separate ways. Yeah.

Katy Ripp 00:30:06  Yeah. Well, we attract the people that we want. Right. Correct. Or that we don’t want. Because we attract those people too.

Brittany Piccola 00:30:12  Oh, yes. Somehow, somehow, I got one of those.

Katy Ripp 00:30:16  You know, you mentioned something a little bit. The bitch work, right? Like what? My bitch work is not necessarily your bitch work. I think that’s where some people get confused. And I am totally guilty of this. Like, if I don’t want to do it, nobody wants to do it.

Brittany Piccola 00:30:31  That’s not the case.

Katy Ripp 00:30:32  That is not true. I don’t want to plan events. I love the idea of planning events. I don’t want to do it. But guess what? My general manager loves it. She loves that shit. She loves, like, the logistical part of it.

Katy Ripp 00:30:45  Right? Giving people what I consider bitch work is like her treasure. So thinking about, like nobody wants to do this is just not true. Somebody does want to dive into your spreadsheet. Somebody does want to return emails, and somebody does want to deal with complaints and like that’s what they’re good at. Let them do it.

Brittany Piccola 00:31:07  Yeah. Let them.

Katy Ripp 00:31:08  Let them. Oh, yeah. Smell robins. So tell me about what future holds for you. What does it look like? You know, because you’re coming up on a you’re here of your leave of absence. So peace out school district.

Brittany Piccola 00:31:20  Yeah. So I need to put in that letter of resignation soon.

Katy Ripp 00:31:24  What does that feel like?

Brittany Piccola 00:31:25  I’m probably going to cry like of just relief. Yeah. Yeah, I actually was talking to my coworker about it. I was like, I, when I get back from vacation, I’m going on vacation this week. I’m gonna come back and talk to the union rep and see how to go about this.

Brittany Piccola 00:31:41  So I’m vetted into my pension, so I’ll get something eventually, you know, when I’m hopefully still alive.

Katy Ripp 00:31:48  Yeah. Right.

Brittany Piccola 00:31:49  To reap the harvest or I just pull it. I don’t I don’t know how that goes. Yeah. That. And like, whatever days I have left I get some money off of that too. 20 bucks a day. Cool. Yeah. Yeah. And then it’s peace out. I’m done. They don’t. Nobody cares. Nobody gives a fuck about you. No one’s coming to save you. You have to do whatever you need to do for yourself, for your family. So this is a funny thing that you brought up about. New year, new you. I never really like thought of that, especially in the last two years. I was just trying to survive. But this something hit changed. I don’t know if it was December 31st. I don’t know when it was, but something changed in me around this time period about how I am not letting shit affect me like it did every other year before this.

Brittany Piccola 00:32:38  How I’m choosing joy. I am saying yes to opportunity. That’s going to provide value for me. At least open the conversation and then I’m going to say no if it doesn’t fucking align. And I did that already within six days of this year. But it’s funny because my therapist was like she met with me on the second. She goes you look lighter. You look different. In the past two years, she’s like, you look different today than you’ve looked in a very, very long time. And I’m like, this is fucking weird. Yeah. Because, like, even she noticed it like that. I am showing it, exuding it, whatever. All like, the 2025 vibes are a thing for me.

Katy Ripp 00:33:24  I’m putting my mentor coaching hat on now. I think when you sign that resignation letter and you hand it in when you feel that relief, you have no idea what’s going to happen for you. Oh, really?

Brittany Piccola 00:33:38  Almost like give me goosebumps, I just.

Katy Ripp 00:33:40  I am so. I’m such a believer in allowing yourself when you start cutting away the fat you start really getting into.

Katy Ripp 00:33:51  I don’t need this anymore. This does not serve me anymore. All you’re doing is making room for all the good things. And good things can be bad things sometimes, right? Like, hey, there are plenty of things in my life that I have said no thank you to that have also given me the most beautiful silver linings. Yeah. In the most beautiful things that have. When I thought it was a no, when I thought it was a rejection, when I thought it was something that I was really scared to let go of and I let it go. It just it cracks you wide open. Yeah. It can be something as very simple as you’ve already known. You’re gonna leave, but there will come a time where you sign it, you give it to them, you get your pension, you do whatever it is. There’s going to be some action there, that right away you’re going to see some sort of benefit from.

Brittany Piccola 00:34:41  Yeah. The the official ness of it. Yeah. Yeah.

Brittany Piccola 00:34:45  I mean, again, I’ve seen shifts already just in my business, just the way things have aligned thus far. Like even though monetarily at the moment my income has gone down, but it’s because I’ve been making room for something else. Like January is a long month. There’s so much life and possibility here that, like, I’m not even scared.

Katy Ripp 00:35:12  Well, like. And you just started like, we forget. We see, you know, six figure months and shit on Instagram all the time. It takes a while. I mean, and you’ve already replaced some of your salary.

Brittany Piccola 00:35:25  Yeah, I mean, I haven’t gone below.

Katy Ripp 00:35:27  Some businesses don’t make money for five years at all. So also give yourself some grace. I know that’s really hard for us and I don’t love it either, but, like, give it some time. You’ve got plenty of time. But I do think you’re going to end up. March is going to be crazy for you. I just be prepared. That’s all I’m saying.

Katy Ripp 00:35:46  It’s going to be amazing.

Brittany Piccola 00:35:47  Please, I welcome it.

Katy Ripp 00:35:48  Coming. It’s coming. So I asked you a little bit about virtual assistants and tell me about what you like to do. Like, what do you specialize in? If somebody was looking for a virtual assistant and wanted to work with you. What do you like to do? I know, like, there’s some things here, right?

Brittany Piccola 00:36:05  Yeah, I mean, I enjoy newsletter creation. I love putting together freebies for Legion. I don’t mind doing some Legion and having conversation with people and socializing a little bit, but I definitely enjoy writing a newsletter, putting together. Like that old school teacher in me wants to put a worksheet together or PDF.

Katy Ripp 00:36:24  I love.

Brittany Piccola 00:36:25  That. Yeah, I have fun doing those things.

Katy Ripp 00:36:28  And there’s plenty of people out here that hate doing that or have no idea, have no idea how to do it and then to have to learn it.

Brittany Piccola 00:36:36  It’s all time wasted.

Katy Ripp 00:36:37  It’s so much time wasted.

Brittany Piccola 00:36:39  Yeah, this is the thing.

Brittany Piccola 00:36:40  I’m not saying yes to things that I do not enjoy anymore. And I’ve realized, like, kind of what I do and don’t enjoy. So like, yes, that’s where we’re at now.

Katy Ripp 00:36:51  Life is too short to be doing shit you don’t want to do. Period. Yeah. Personally. Professionally. spiritually, physically. It just is too short.

Brittany Piccola 00:36:59  If I’m getting agita from having a conversation with you just to have a discovery call. Like it’s why I have.

Katy Ripp 00:37:06  Discovery calls so I can be like, this.

Brittany Piccola 00:37:08  Is yeah, I see the vibes there.

Katy Ripp 00:37:10  Yeah, I need a vibe. I need to know that people are on my wavelength. Yeah.

Brittany Piccola 00:37:15  I had a discovery call the other day with this woman. Mind you, it was like Friday night. I’m like, sweet Friday night. The two of us on here.

Katy Ripp 00:37:23  Oh, yeah, I’m into that. Yeah.

Brittany Piccola 00:37:25  So here we are. And we honestly hit it off. It was the craziest thing. Yeah, but it was just some, like, things didn’t align right away, but I ended up following up, and she’s like, I’m off because of, you know, surgery.

Brittany Piccola 00:37:40  So I’m gonna fix the problem that’s here because I can’t just hand this over. But let’s revisit this again in February. And I’m like, I don’t normally just hang around for these situations. But I was like, there’s something about you that we like really connect. So, so long as I’m not, like, busting at the seams. I was like, yeah, we’re gonna do this. Yeah.

Katy Ripp 00:37:59  So tell me about one of the things that I do myself. And this is a fault of mine. I’m working on it, too, because I preach about this all the time. But the feeling of or the theory of. It’s too hard to teach somebody to do this the way I want it done. I’m going to do it myself. Yeah, right. Of course, I have a theory about that because I’m like, no, no, no, no, we’re not spending time doing that. We’re spending time doing the things that we’re making money at so we can pay somebody else to do that, right? And in my personal life, I have somebody that does my laundry.

Katy Ripp 00:38:33  I don’t want to do my laundry less. All right. Her name is Yolanda. She’s amazing. I have never. Yes. So she comes once or twice a week and does all of her laundry. I want my laundry done. Oh. That’s amazing. I don’t want to do it. And I work, so I pay her. That’s what I use. My money.

Brittany Piccola 00:38:51  I pick One day.

Katy Ripp 00:38:54  Yeah. So fine. But tell me about if somebody has that sort of excuse of. It’s just easier for me to do it myself. I’m so bogged down. I’m so overwhelmed. I can’t even get any, like, a time or a space to talk to a virtual assistant to get them to do stuff for me.

Brittany Piccola 00:39:16  My suggestion probably would be this. So first of all, this other woman who’s basically digging out of the hole that she was in from whoever she had helping her before. Sure. I told her, I’m like, whatever you’re doing, your approach right down in some facet, then you can just hand this over to whether it’s me or someone else.

Brittany Piccola 00:39:37  You have that. Okay, well, I don’t have time to do that. Well, you make time for what you want to make time for. That’s one. But also ChatGPT, if you voice memo to ChatGPT, it can help put this into a nice set of directions for how you want your stuff to align. Like literally. Well, be like, okay, hey, I want step by step directions for this person to set up my honey book to email. You know, X, Y, and Z and make sure that they incorporate this, that the other thing for each email. And then use template two template whatever it is. And then you can list it out on ChatGPT and it will formulate it into a nice little document for you. And here it is.

Katy Ripp 00:40:21  Oh, that is such a good tip. I feel like it’s a really good reel for you. Like I would never. I use ChatGPT for so much, like I don’t copy and paste everything, but I definitely like I need some inspiration, so that’s what I use.

Katy Ripp 00:40:37  Oh yeah, her name is Eden for me. I named her. Her name is Eden. But Eden goes through it like gives me inspiration. That’s really what I ask her for is like, can you give me inspiration for real for this blah blah blah.

Brittany Piccola 00:40:49  That’s good for you. Everything.

Katy Ripp 00:40:52  Yeah, there’s a lot. I use it for everything, and I’ve never thought about that. I’ve never thought like, can you give me a list of things that I think I do for my virtual assistant? That is a great tip. I’m going to take it. And everybody here is listening. You should take this too.

Brittany Piccola 00:41:09  Yeah. I mean, it gets a bad rap, I’m sure. I know it does.

Katy Ripp 00:41:13  Well, whatever. Fuck em.

Brittany Piccola 00:41:14  Okay, well, why? Why waste time? It could think for you, like all the meat and potatoes you’re putting into it. You’re tweaking it, you’re making it.

Katy Ripp 00:41:22  It’s your voice.

Brittany Piccola 00:41:23  But it’s articulating it better.

Katy Ripp 00:41:25  Yeah, well, we could go into that all day long.

Brittany Piccola 00:41:27  Yeah.

Katy Ripp 00:41:27  So I just don’t care what people think about it. Yeah, well, it’s made my life so much easier. And it allows me to do the things that I do and love and share with the world. So, yeah, the big million dollar question is, are you taking clients?

Brittany Piccola 00:41:44  Yes, I am taking covers.

Katy Ripp 00:41:45  How can people find you? How can I set up a discovery call through Instagram?

Brittany Piccola 00:41:52  But also there’s a link for my page on Instagram. Yeah. So you.

Katy Ripp 00:41:56  Have a website.

Brittany Piccola 00:41:56  Right? Yeah, but you don’t necessarily need one as a virtual assistant. You really don’t. But which I might go back and forth with consolidate.

Katy Ripp 00:42:04  Most people finding you on Instagram. Is that how people are connecting. Yeah.

Brittany Piccola 00:42:08  So it’s the wild wild west out there on the ground. Like it is a whole different world for people who are just teachers or just at a 9 to 5 the gram social media is a different ballgame. There is so much flippin potential on the gram and social media truly.

Brittany Piccola 00:42:28  Like, just grab the bull by the horns and go do something else. If you are not happy with whatever you’re doing, like there are so much potential for you.

Katy Ripp 00:42:38  Yeah, I mean, I think you say it all the time or you hear it all the time, like life is too short. But until you get into a loss, you know? Like, you are really grieving. You are really in it. I don’t know that you can really. And it may not be a loss of somebody else, right? Like it may be a loss of a relationship.

Brittany Piccola 00:42:58  Some type of like severe.

Katy Ripp 00:43:00  Some sort of loss of a job, of something traumatic, of something. And it doesn’t have to be like dramatic, traumatic. It’s a loss of something that makes your life before and after, like it has changed my life significantly. It’s changed. My family’s life changed so much for me personally, that when I talk to people that have this kind of reaction or this kind of action to take that, like, I’m actually not going to sit in this dirty diaper anymore because I don’t know how long I have.

Katy Ripp 00:43:38  Yeah. It’s been shown to me that.

Brittany Piccola 00:43:41  That’s the reality. Yeah. And I just I wasn’t going to sit in the diaper anymore. Yeah. Yeah. It’s the whole changing the trajectory. You know, if you’re not happy. Fucking do something about it. Yeah. You have that choice.

Katy Ripp 00:43:55  I love it. This was such a lovely conversation.

Brittany Piccola 00:43:58  Yeah, I really enjoyed it. I’m, like, pumped now. Yeah.

Katy Ripp 00:44:01  Oh, good. I’m also pumped. I’ve got a whole day of Monday stuff to do, so.

Brittany Piccola 00:44:07  I know. So do I.

Katy Ripp 00:44:10  I love me on Monday though, so I have a desk that needs to get cleared off.

Brittany Piccola 00:44:13  But it’s Monday and you’re at home, right? Yeah. It’s different. It’s different when? Last year, I wasn’t here.

Katy Ripp 00:44:20  Yeah. I mean, I think I have, you know, sort of this Love Monday idea in my head all the time. And part of the reason I love Mondays is because I’ve created my life to love Monday.

Katy Ripp 00:44:31  I don’t dread going to work.

Brittany Piccola 00:44:33  No. Sunday. Scaries.

Katy Ripp 00:44:34  Nothing. I love Sunday for sure. I also love Monday. I love to get the routine. Yeah. Because I love my job. Up.

Brittany Piccola 00:44:42  Yeah.

Katy Ripp 00:44:43  I love my life. I mean, I’m not trying to escape it, so. Exactly. There is something to be said about. Yes. You can do all the things to love Mondays, right? Like, you can take care of yourself. You can put appointments on the calendar. You can do that. But if systematically and fundamentally, you do not love your life, you will never fucking love a day of the week except Friday, which basically just gets you at the end of your work week. You don’t love that people love Fridays that much.

Brittany Piccola 00:45:11  Because then you’re trying to escape.

Katy Ripp 00:45:12  It. Yeah. It’s my mission to get people to like Mondays instead of Fridays. Yeah. Yeah.

Brittany Piccola 00:45:18  Because you’re creating a life that you don’t want to escape from. Yeah. Yeah, exactly.

Katy Ripp 00:45:23  I love it. Brittany, thank you so much for coming on. I really appreciate it.

Brittany Piccola 00:45:26  Thank you for having me. It’s been so great.

Katy Ripp 00:45:31  And that’s a wrap on today’s episode. I hope you enjoyed diving deep into the world of living authentically with me. Before you go, don’t forget to connect with me on Instagram. Graham. Shoot me a message at Katy Ripp. I’d love to hear your thoughts on today’s episode and connect with you further. And remember, if you want more details on today’s episode, or just want to explore more about designing your life unapologetically, head on over to my website at Katy Ripp. There you’ll find all the juicy details and resources you need to keep the inspiration flowing. Lastly, if you’d like to join me on the show, whether it’s to tell about your experience of designing your own life, to share your expertise, or if you’d like to participate in lifestyle coaching live on air, don’t hesitate to reach out. Your story could inspire countless others on their own path to living authentically.

Katy Ripp 00:46:17  Thanks for tuning in and until next time, keep living boldly designing your life. And remember #ActuallyICan.