Memorable Quotes:
“Once I realized these struggles are real and I wasn’t alone, the feelings of loneliness started to lift a little bit.” – Mary Lemmer
“My health wasn’t in a good place, I was very fatigued, feeling depressed, had this business I didn’t really know what to do with, and I had to almost force myself to get up out of bed in the morning to do the things I knew I had to do.” – Mary Lemmer
“I looked at my health, where we were with the business, the potential going forward, and made the tough decision to not go raise more money.” – Mary Lemmer
“I come from the world of high-growth high-tech, but also from the world of building a gelato business that is profitable in year one.” – Mary Lemmer
“If I spent another 18 months at it, what would happen to my health?” – Mary Lemmer
“A lot of the health issues I was having are related to stress.” – Mary Lemmer
“Stress is a really powerful force in our lives.” – Mary Lemmer
“It’s hard to prioritize your health when you are trying to prioritize a company.” – Mary Lemmer
“You have a baseline stress when you are starting a company.” – Mary Lemmer
“For the first time, I let myself feel, and feel sad.” – Mary Lemmer
“I found myself wanting to cry for no apparent reason.” – Mary Lemmer
“At some point, you have to let yourself feel, and feel sadness, in order to heal.” – Mary Lemmer
“I felt like I lost a little bit of my identity through a lot of this because I lost someone who was really close to me in my life (my ex-boyfriend), my feeling of being in control of my health, and I lost what I thought would be a great business because I had to face reality.” – Mary Lemmer
“I’m not living the life that my dad wants me to live.” – Mary Lemmer
“I go through these mental cycles of feeling like I’m disappointment people in my life – my investors, my friends, and now my dad.” – Mary Lemmer
“People look at me a certain way and label me this ‘entreprepreneur’. I’m really confused about what that means, and what that means for me.” – Mary Lemmer
“I’m struggling to find purpose again.” – Mary Lemmer
“I know when I have purpose, I can set the world on fire.” – Mary Lemmer
“Sometimes life has this way of kind of slapping us up against the head with a two by four.” – Jerry Colonna
“What if part of your purpose is figuring out who Mary is, regardless of those external north stars?” – Jerry Colonna
“There are a lot of things I would describe myself as that don’t revolve around what I do, but yet that’s not always what people see.” – Mary Lemmer
“There is no north star. There is not right way. There is only your way. That is terrifying and liberating at the same moment.” – Jerry Colonna
“When we build our companies for a purpose that is outside of us and try to define our life and self-worth for someone who is outside of us, we lead to adrenal stress and collapse.” – Jerry Colonna
“It’s liberating and terrifying because recognizing that it might not be your path is one thing, but then feeling pathless is frightening.” – Mary Lemmer
“It’s hard to have questions about yourself, and what path is right because there are so many different paths.” – Mary Lemmer
“Change is hard.” – Mary Lemmer
“All those people out there that pretend they have it figured out, they’re bullshiting.” – Jerry Colonna
“I have tremendous pressures in my life. I disappoint people all the time. I do and say things of which I am embarrassed and ashamed. I have learned that when I pretend I don’t do those things, I make my life worse.” – Jerry Colonna