Valerie Foster

I really think my greatest achievement comes from those little moments when individuals share with me what they gained from reading my writings. For example, I once had a parent who read my book about the eating disorder, and she said she has a teenage son and they don't have this problem, but she got so much out of my book on how to have good communication with her child. Those unsolicited moments when someone shares what they gained are what make me feel like I'm doing what I'm supposed to be doing. We're all influencers, whether we realize it or not, and it's a tremendous power when we use it in positive ways. I recently changed my Facebook page to capture that I'm a writer, because I'm trying to finally embrace that and become more aware of the tremendous opportunity and gift that it is for me to make my time on the planet worthwhile.

I would be honest that it's such a hard path to take, certainly in terms of getting published. I've been very lucky to have had two traditional publishers for each of my books. But I've always been sort of a Pollyanna in believing that what you feel you're here to do, you have to at least explore it. So it goes back to the quote: what if I'm scared? And I'd say, do it anyway. There's nothing much more terrifying for me than having a book about to be released, which I do on July 9th, and it's very emotional, but it's terrifying. So I would say do whatever you're going to do, do it for the right reasons, and do it the very, very best you can. And trust that everything else will fall into place. Do it 100 percent, do your very, very best. Sometimes you don't have to change your mind, life hands you all kinds of surprises, so you have to be practical. My daughter has carved out a life as a writer on the side, she still has to have a day job, but she's pursuing what she feels she was molded to do. I think more women need that encouragement. If this is for you, don't let anyone else get in your way. I think all women need that sense of purpose and empowerment. Are you doing it for the right reasons? And I wouldn't tell them what that is, they'd have to decide that for themselves.

I really believe in having meaningful, substantial conversations rather than superficial ones. My friendship with Helen Hamler, the Holocaust survivor, taught me so much about how to have rich conversations, which oftentimes women don't get a chance to have or are afraid to use their voice. In my book about her, it's just two women that sit for coffee and pastry every week and have big conversations, and I ask the big questions, and where does that take us. That taught me a lot about having these substantial conversations. I don't want to waste the time I have, and so I want my conversations to be meaningful. Every bit of time we spend should be purposeful, and the purpose can be fun, it could just be a lightness of enjoying something everybody has in common. It's not that I'm a big heavy traveler through life, but I just don't want to waste time. I'm really aware that we're all influencing everyone in our days, and I try not to squander that role in being able to, in little or big ways, mentor other people, often just through my own sense of self and my own role modeling.