Build a Life Bigger Than Your Resume

Leyanna Torres

Global Senior Category Manager | Automation & Advanced Technology Lead

Amazon

Being recognized as one of America's Most Influential Women is an incredible honor. It is also a little ironic that one of the most important things I would tell another woman about success is this:

Build a life bigger than your résumé.

I am incredibly proud of my career. I worked hard for it. Really hard.

I built a career in engineering, procurement, strategy, automation, and technology—spaces where women have not always been the loudest or most represented voices in the room. I have led complex initiatives, negotiated major deals, traveled the world, helped build strategies from the ground up, and learned how to walk into rooms filled with people much smarter than me and still trust that I belonged there.

I love what I do.

But I am not my job.

That distinction has become more important to me the more successful I have become.

Success Has a Cost If You Let It

There is a version of ambition that we celebrate publicly but rarely talk about privately.

We see the promotion. The title. The business trip. The award. The polished LinkedIn post. The woman confidently presenting in the room.

We do not always see her answering emails after her children go to sleep.

We do not see the nights when she is exhausted and wondering if she is giving enough to anyone because every part of her life seems to need something.

We do not see the missed moments, the stress, the arguments at home, the guilt, or the times she sits quietly wondering if success is supposed to feel this heavy.

I have had those moments.

I have worked late after spending time with my family because I refused to sacrifice that time with them. I have carried work stress home when I knew I should have left it at the door. I have learned, sometimes the hard way, that being capable of carrying everything does not mean you should.

And somewhere along the way, I realized something.

I do not want to be remembered simply as a woman who worked really hard.

I Want My Children to Remember That I Was There

I want my children to know that their mother was ambitious.

I want them to see a woman who pursued big goals, walked into difficult rooms, took risks, traveled the world, and refused to underestimate herself.

But I also want them to remember me sitting in the stands.

I want them to remember the vacations, the ridiculous family moments, the traditions, the conversations in the car, and all the ordinary days that eventually become the memories we miss the most.

I want my son to remember that I was probably more excited about his wrestling tournaments than he was.

I want my daughter to grow up knowing that being a successful woman never requires her to stop being present in her own life.

I want my husband to remember that through every demanding season, every flight, every deadline, and every crazy idea I decided to chase, we still chose each other.

Those things will never appear on my résumé.

They may ultimately be the greatest things I ever accomplish.

Ambition and Happiness Are Not Opposites

Women are still given some strange choices.

Be ambitious, but do not be too ambitious.

Be an incredible mother, but never allow motherhood to interfere with work.

Build a successful career, maintain your marriage, exercise, volunteer, travel, keep the house together, answer the emails, attend the school events, and somehow remember that Tuesday is Spirit Day.

And please look well-rested while doing it.

I stopped trying to win that game.

I do not believe in perfect balance. Some weeks, work gets more of me. Other weeks, my family does. Sometimes I am completely on top of everything.

Sometimes I am absolutely not.

What I believe in is knowing what matters enough that you notice when your life starts drifting too far away from it.

I work hard.

I also take the vacation.

I protect time with my family.

I exercise because taking care of myself matters.

I laugh with my friends.

I travel because seeing the world makes me feel alive.

I cheer ridiculously loudly for my children.

I give myself permission to disconnect.

And I have learned that none of those things make me less ambitious.

They remind me what the ambition is for.

Your Employer Is Not Your Identity

This may be uncomfortable for some women to hear, especially those of us who have spent decades building our careers.

One day, someone else will have your job.

Someone else will sit in your chair.

Someone else will own the project you once thought could not possibly survive without you.

And it will survive.

That is not depressing. I think it is freeing.

It means we can care deeply about our work without expecting our careers to carry the entire weight of our identity.

Your title can change.

Companies can change.

Industries can change.

Priorities can change.

Your value does not.

I wish more women understood that earlier.

You are allowed to be proud of your career without allowing it to consume every other version of you.

You can be a leader and a mother.

A strategist and a wife.

An executive and the woman screaming from the wrestling stands.

You can close a major deal on Tuesday and spend Saturday doing absolutely nothing impressive.

Both women are successful.

Both women are you.

Make Your Success Useful to Someone Else

There is one more thing I have come to believe about influence.

If your success only benefits you, you are missing one of the best parts of becoming successful.

Every woman who reaches a certain point in her career eventually has a choice.

We can guard everything we learned, or we can turn around and make the road a little easier for the woman behind us.

I choose the second.

Tell her what you wish someone had told you.

Help her prepare for the interview.

Teach her how to negotiate.

Explain the unwritten rules.

Show her how you use technology and new tools to make yourself better.

Give her feedback that actually helps her grow.

Say her name in rooms she has not entered yet.

And when you have enough influence to open a door, open it.

There is plenty of room at the table.

What I Hope My Life Says

I hope my career continues to grow. I still have enormous goals.

There are rooms I have not entered yet, problems I have not solved, and things I have not built.

I am nowhere near finished.

But when this chapter eventually ends, I do not want the best description of my life to be a list of titles, accomplishments, and numbers.

I want people to say I loved my family fiercely.

That I showed up.

That I laughed a lot.

That I traveled.

That I took chances.

That I worked hard but eventually learned when to put the laptop down.

That I helped people.

That I made mistakes and kept growing.

That I made the people around me believe they could do bigger things too.

And yes, I hope they say I was damn good at my job.

Just not before all the other things.

So if I could give one piece of advice to the woman chasing her next promotion, building her business, raising her children, earning her degree, or trying to figure out what comes next, it would be this:

Be ambitious. Be incredibly ambitious.

Chase the opportunity.

Ask for the money.

Take the seat at the table.

Walk into rooms before you feel completely ready.

Build something you are proud to put your name on.

But while you are building your career, do not forget to build your life.

Because someday, your résumé will tell people what you accomplished.

Your life will tell them who you were.