Dealing With Insecurities with Rina Takikawa- CR96

Career Relaunch®

Making any major career pivot involves a lot of bravery, risk, and complication. You’re dealing with not only the practicalities of switching career paths but also the insecurities associated with starting over.

On Career Relaunch® podcast episode 96, professional ballerina turned Mooch product designer Rina Takikawa describes what triggered her to walk away from a career that was years in the making and the surprising links you can find between two seemingly unrelated careers.

This sort of decision to let go of a dream you once held onto so tightly turns out to be quite a common one amongst the clients, listeners, and audiences I cross paths with in my line of work. Rina and I talk about why people make these brave leaps, what you can do to manage the pivot, and how much you end up learning about yourself when you’re forced to reconsider what truly makes you happy.

During today’s Mental Fuel segment, I’ll also share a few of the insecurities I wrestled with when I started over in my own career.

Key Career Takeaways

1. Your goals can change over time. When you lose the passion you once had for your career, you owe it to yourself to try and move on.
2. Making the decision to walk away from a lifelong dream is never easy, but if you can manage the complexities of letting go of the investment, you may just end up finding much more career fulfillment.
3. If you look hard enough, you can find the surprising, common threads across your seemingly disparate professional endeavors.

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Listener Challenge

During this episode’s Mental Fuel® segment, I challenged you to identify, name, and share one of the insecurities you’ve felt recently in your own career so you can identify it when it shows up, accept it, and not allow it to paralyze you.

Remember, having doubts doesn’t mean you’ve made the wrong choice for your career. It just means you’re dealing with a common dynamic that emerges when you make any unconventional move.

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About Rina Takikawa, Ballerina Turned Product Designer

Today, I’m speaking with Rina Takikawa, a product designer based in Los Angeles. She’s one of the founding members at Mooch, a fintech startup building a Gen Z budgeting app, where she leads design and product experience.

Rina has been featured in press outlets such as Business Insider and Built In and has spoken at the University of Arizona, UX Copenhagen, Ideate Labs, and CareerFoundry among others. Before transitioning into the tech sector, Rina was a professional ballerina for the Ballet de Catalunya in Spain.

Follow Rina on LinkedIn, Twitter, Instagram, and her newsletter.

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Interview Segment Music Credits

• Podington Bear- Pives And Flarinet
• Podington Bear – Puppy
• Podington Bear – Trillium
• Leimoti – Leave a Mark
• Podington Bear – Jetsam
• Bio Unit – Across the Valley
• Scott Holmes Music – Ambient Meditation
• Scott Holmes Music – Life In A Moment

Episode Interview Transcript

Joseph: Hello, Rina. Welcome to the Career Relaunch Podcast. It is great to have you on the show.

Rina: [03:18] Thank you for having me. Very excited to be here today.

Joseph: Me, too. Alright. Let’s get started here by, first of all, talking about what you’re up to right now. And then, we’re going to go back in time and talk about your former career. I would love to start off by just finding out what you’ve been focused on recently in both your professional and also your personal life.

Rina: [03:39] I am currently a product designer at a financial technology start-up called “Mooch.” We are a budgeting app powered by Blockchain, and we focus on budgeting for Gen Zs. So, we have a big Gen Z community of over 50,000 people. In my personal life, I enjoy participating in speaking events. I’m also focused on writing a newsletter every week. I do content creation here and there as well. I’m just very passionate about overall personal branding and sharing my story. So, that’s a little bit about me.

Joseph: Now, as I understand it, Rina, you are a product designer at Mooch. In layman’s terms, explain exactly what does a product designer do?

Rina: [04:25] A product designer is focused on the product development of an app. On top of actually designing the actual app, I’m also focused on the partner’s experience using the app. So, I mostly focused on how can we design a seamless experience for these people. So, it’s a little bit in factoring everything about a business and a product and experience, in general.

Joseph: Do you also get into user experience? So that UX versus product design, do they overlap? Are they related?

Rina: [05:04] That’s basically, the partner experience that I was talking about. It’s essentially user experience. What is the experience like during onboarding, during their sign-up process? What is their experience like using an edit functionality? What does your experience look like creating something on an interface? How does the feature function? Whereas, user interface is more so visual designs. How does the layout work? What do they see on the actual app? Product design is basically a coupling UX and UI together, but also focusing on the actual product division and business goals.

Joseph: I know that this is a big part of your life right now and definitely what you’re focused on at this moment. You haven’t always been a product designer in the FinTech space, and this show is all about changing careers. I understand you used to be a professional ballerina. Let’s go back in time and talk about your former life as a ballerina. And then, we can talk about how you transitioned into FinTech. I’d love to go all the way back to the beginning. How did you get interested in ballet?

Rina: [06:11] I started ballet when I was 5 years old. I believe the reason why was my aunt was a former ballerina as well. And so, she persuaded my mom to put me in ballet classes.

Joseph: This was in New York. Is that right? Is that where you grew up?

Rina: [06:30] I grew up in New York, but I was born in Singapore. I actually started my baby ballet classes in Singapore.

Joseph: Do you remember those classes? Like, do you have memories of being in?

Rina: [06:41] I do!

Joseph: What was that like? Did you like them? Did you think it’s different from the other activities you were involved with?

Rina: [06:47] Oh, my gosh. Yeah. Lots of great memories there. Very happy memories. I know my parents were quite busy when I was young, so I couldn’t go to ballet classes every week. It was more so like once in three weeks. But, I was always very, very excited for my next ballet class. I remember all the ballet kids would exchange candies after class, and I would bring a whole bag of chocolates, and I would just give them to the other kids. It was very wholesome.

Joseph: I can’t remember if I talked with you about this last time, Rina. I’ve got a daughter who’s 5 and 1/2 years old. We took her to baby ballet right down the street. I would take her once a week. It was pre-pandemic. She was going at like the age of 3. We’re not doing it anymore. I guess the question that’s running in my head is, at what point does this go from being kind of like a fun thing to do as a kid to something that became more serious for you. When did that happen?

Rina: [07:47 8 to 10, when I first started going to point classes, when I first got my point shoes. It was difficult, but it was a challenge that I was excited about. From there, I was kind of imagining my future already as a ballerina. And then, I moved to New York. The teachers there were also very inspiring. That is the real moment where I was like, “I want to be like my teacher.” My teacher was my biggest role model when I was like 12 years old, all the way up to 20. I remember always looking up to her, always fascinated whenever I see her dance. I’m like, “I want to be like her when I grow up.” That was when I was, “I really want to make it to this ballet world.”

Joseph: What does it take to make it in the ballet world? Did that become clearer to you from the start? How do you assess whether you are one of the, I guess, few ballet students that can make it professionally in the world of ballet?

Rina: [08:48] Ballet is a very, very competitive industry. There’s a lot of females, so it’s very competitive. All I knew at that age of like when I was trying to plan out my future and kind of break down the steps in order to go professional, is I have to keep being persistent, keep training, go to competitions, get awarded, get scholarships, get exposure to international schools and companies, go to summer intensives, and get exposure from other prestigious schools so that directors can start seeing me.

I never once had a summer vacation. I’ve always been training every weekend, every day, every holiday, every summer vacation, “vacation.” I would be at a summer intensive at a different school. You don’t go to college if you are pursuing to be a professional ballerina. Just because if you want to be a professional ballerina, you have to start young. Usually, people aim to sign with the company at the age of 18.

Joseph: It sounds like this is the level of commitment that it takes in order to break through in that industry. I know you mentioned school before, so it sounds like your schooling was actually focused on the performing arts. Also, you went to the Frank Sinatra School of the Arts for high school. You eventually would go on to the University of Cincinnati. Is that correct? To do your BFA in ballet.

Rina: [10:21] Yes.

Joseph: Could you give us a glimpse into your journey as a ballerina, and how that evolved then over time? Going from high school, through doing and studying ballet at the University of Cincinnati.

Rina: [10:32] I got accepted to Performing Arts High School in New York. My schedule when I was in high school was a lot of dancing. I would dance in the morning. I would go to education classes. Your regular high school, like English, Math, Science, those things. After those, I would go to rehearsals in school. And then, after rehearsals, I would go to my pre-professional intense training studio and train more there.

And then, came the decision to make on whether I should be auditioning for studio companies or applying to college. That was a big, big question. Because if you’re not a prodigy, you need a plan B. Ultimately, my decision was go to school. Because, I guess, I could make my parents happy, plus also get the ballet experience that I wanted.

I chose the University of Cincinnati College Conservatory of Music. Because from what I saw, they had a good reputation of graduates going on to professional companies. It was a really good experience. I went there for two years, instead of the regular four. Just because at the age of 19, that’s when I signed my first professional contract. I decided to drop out of school. Just because being a professional ballerina was the ultimate goal, and I signed that contract which was my dream. When I signed that contract, I dropped everything and I moved to Spain alone to pursue this full-time.

Joseph: Before we get to your time working as part of that company in Spain, can you give me a sense of some of the roles that you had up until this point as a ballerina?

Rina: [12:23] I was “Kitri” in Don Quixote. Very, very exciting. One of my favorite ballets. In the University of Cincinnati, I had a lot of soloist roles. I was “Cupid” in their Don Quixote production as well. I was the “Silver Fairy” in Sleeping Beauty. I was one of the fairies in our Cinderella production, in collaboration with the Dayton Ballet’s artistic director.

Joseph: “Winter Fairy,” is that right?

Rina: [12:53] “Winter Fairy,” yes. Thank you. I was one of the fairies. I forgot which one. Another role I was part of the quarter ballet in La Bayadère. I was the first person. This is like all ballet terminologies. There’s this part of the scene in La Bayadère where every dancer has to do an arabesque to penché, and I had to do that 36 times because I was the first person. That was also one of the main highlights of my time at the conservatory.

Joseph: I want to switch gears here, Rina, and talk about your time in Spain because here you are as someone who has now left college. You are 19 at this time, so a teenager still. You move to Spain all by yourself. Can you take me back to the moment when you landed in Spain, what was running through your head? First of all, being in a new country. But also, getting ready to sign this contract to join a company there.

Rina: [13:52] It was very exciting. It was like a dream come true. Especially, when I got to Spain. We could also talk about the whole annoying process of getting a Visa, and getting an apartment, all in Spanish. That was a real pain. Especially, doing it alone at 19, too. It was very overwhelming, I remember. I don’t know how I did that. I don’t think I could even do it right now, to be honest. I give props to myself for that for handling that whole situation alone.

I remember being very, very happy. I’m like, “Okay. This is the start of my professional journey. I’ve made it through pre-professional training. All those long hard years of working hard, and I finally made it to my goal. This was the moment that I’ve been waiting for since a very young age, and I’m here now. I can’t wait to work hard.” And so, those were the feelings that I was feeling when I first landed in Spain.

Joseph: Now, I don’t know a ton about the world of ballet, Rina. I guess my only real exposure to it was, I went to Northwestern University as an undergraduate student. Between the school of communication and the school of music, there are actually a pretty sizable group of students that are focused on the performing arts. I was actually an R.A. my junior year at a Humanities dorm that was very popular among students majoring in things like dance or theatre. I got a bit of a glimpse into how hard it is to make it as a dancer. Especially, when it comes to ballet, I feel like it’s typically portrayed as extremely competitive, almost cut-throat, at least in the popular press and in Hollywood. I’m thinking about things like “Black Swan.”

Let’s just talk reality here. The good, bad, and ugly of your time at that company. Maybe it’s best to, first of all, start off with the good. Because it sounds like you landed there, you’re very excited. What did you like about being a ballerina in a professional company?

Rina: [15:55] I was definitely very humbled. It was hard work getting to where I got. I didn’t want to take anything for granted. I consider myself very lucky too because, as mentioned, this is very competitive. Even signing a contract to be with a ballet company, I was over cloud nine. I consider myself very lucky, very grateful for this opportunity, and very humbled that I’m even at this spot because a million girls would kill to even have this spot in the company. Those were my emotions.

Joseph: What was your relationship like with the other competitive, I’m assuming, girls who are also part of your company?

Rina: [16:40] The reason why I was so grateful and humbled, not of course being in the ballet company, but aside from that, it was because I was surrounded by people that were so talented. Never in a million years would I have ever thought that I would be training or dancing next to people that were training in the most prestigious schools in Europe. Like, schools that I could never get into, I was dancing next to them in a company together.

That was when I would step back and I’ll be like, “Wow! I can’t believe I’m dancing with all of these talented people, almost prodigies, that we’re at the same company dancing together. What’s going on?” That’s why I felt so lucky, so grateful, so humbled. I learned a lot from them. They were very nice people. I definitely knew my place at the company. I’m not trying to be cut-throat here. All I wanted to do was learn from them. That’s part of the good news that we’re starting with, is that I was exposed to a lot of very talented people and nice, nice people.

Joseph: What was the hardest thing about being part of that company?

Rina: [17:53] Especially, since we’re talking about an international company here where I don’t speak the language, it was extremely hard for me to even be in this country because Spanish was the only language that people were talking in. Building upon that pressure, I ideally wanted to have more support from the leadership team, but it’s not very common unless you are a very big government-supported company that I feel like the leadership would be good. I was kind of expecting not being too supported, but it really hit me when it was my first professional year. I’m like, “Oh, it is very hard when there’s no strong base of leadership.”

Joseph: I know when we were talking before this recording. You’d also mentioned that there were some toxic aspects of working in a company. Would you mind walking me through just what aspects of it felt toxic to you?

Rina: [18:56] Directors, how they valued their dancers, how they treated them, in terms of just, I guess compensation, but also hours and performance opportunities, and values, and morals. Those things. That’s where we’ll get into why I am who I am today. My values and my morals, it’s deeply rooted in my experience as a ballerina.

Joseph: It sounds like on the one hand being, a professional ballerina, it was incredibly exciting. You’re surrounded by incredibly talented individuals. At the same time, sounds extremely intense, long hours. Perhaps some elements of there being a toxic environment, what was your mental health like during this time? We’ll get to your physical in a moment.

Rina: [19:544] It wasn’t the best, but I don’t know if I have just toxic positivity. I still remember, literally drilling this in my head like, “Don’t think like that. Don’t think like that. You’re so lucky to be here. You don’t have the privilege to even be thinking about your mental health right now.” I still remember telling myself that. Like, “A million girls would kill to be in your spot. Why are you even thinking about mental health?” That’s because ballet is so competitive that just to be in this spot, you should be so thankful. I don’t think I even gave myself the space to even think about mental health. Even if it’s toxic, I don’t care.

Joseph: You’re going to power your way.

Rina: [20:43] I’m here. Yeah. This is the world. This is the reality. I can’t complain. I knew that that was what I signed up for.

Joseph: Kind of comes with the territory. So, why allow yourself to complain? I know when we spoke before, you also said something that really struck a nerve with me. You’d said that as much as you had put your whole life into ballet, you didn’t know if you wanted to keep doing it. What exactly were you questioning at that time?

Rina: [21:10] That was right before I pulled the trigger to make my career change actually. It was a growing pressure of I guess my mental health and my physical health. Just taking a step back to see the experience that I was having in this company, is it really worth it? At a certain point, I was like, “Okay, is this sustainable?” Because I can drill a million positive affirmations into my head, but I just had a breaking point. Even if I change companies and dance at a different company, is this also going to be my experience at that company? The weight of my experience at this company, it being my first professional experience, it just took a big toll on me and it gave me a very scared impression of what I would be going through for the rest of my career if I were to stay on this path. That’s when I really had to face reality.

By facing reality, I had to be completely transparent with myself and what I wanted out of life. It was extremely hard just because I was finally at this path of being a ballerina because I signed my first professional contract and dancing in my first professional company. It’s just very ironic that I was even questioning this. But, because of everything that I was going through, I really just had to step back and see if I would be down to put myself through more of these just to climb a ladder.

That’s when I remember I was just sitting in my apartment in Spain just literally crying a lot. There’s also the investment of my parents and my teachers. They put so much money into my training. They’ve put so much belief in me. They’ve seen my growth. They see my potential. Do I really want to let them down?

Joseph: It’s tough. We talk about this on this show, Rina. You’ve invested so much time into one particular career path, and you almost don’t want to even allow yourself to entertain the idea of walking away from it. Was there a particular moment that you can remember when you did decide that you’re not going to pursue ballet anymore?

Rina: [23:35] After my whole breakdown of me thinking about all these factors in my head in my apartment in Spain, seeing if I should pull the trigger or not, what I decided to do after that was go to Japan to get treatment. Because I was also suffering from an injury that couldn’t really be diagnosed in all the hospital visits in my time in Spain. I decided to go back to Japan just to take a little bit of a break. Because I thought maybe time was what I needed to form a decision.

There were a lot of things that happened in Japan. I remember being so traumatized by ballet that I couldn’t even watch any ballet videos or listen to any classical music. Every time I saw a ballet video on my Instagram page, I had to skip it over or else I would get anxiety. It just ruined my passion for ballet as a whole. That’s when I decided, “Okay. If I can’t even be listening or watching ballet, I don’t know how I’m going to even dance in a company given my mental health towards ballet at this point.”

Joseph: Now, you would eventually move back to New York. Is that correct?

Rina: [24:56] Yeah.

Joseph: And then, you started to think about doing some other things. Can you walk me through how you started to then pick up the pieces and move forward having now decided to walk away from ballet?

Rina: [25:11] When I went back to New York, I started becoming more active in my career change exploration per se. That was when I started exploring courses, and seeing what fields are even outside of ballet. What normal person my age would be doing. I had to re-educate myself on those things and figure out, “Oh, there are internships. There are work studies.” Like, “Oh, these things exist. That’s interesting.” During that process as well, that was when I started also exploring other potential career fields. Such as there’s business, there’s marketing. I took a lot of intro classes just to get my feet wet into different types of industries and fields.

During that time, it was actually the start of COVID, too. It was a very scary time. But, even though it was scary, there was also opportunities in terms of everything became virtual. It gave me chances to explore things all online in my own time. It did benefit this exploration period.

Joseph: And then, which direction did you ultimately decide to go in with your continuing education?

Rina: [26:25] I was debating between psychology, languages, and design. I ultimately chose design. The reason why I chose design is because I remember when I was little, I had to choose between design and ballet. I was actually very passionate in creating things since a young age. I loved scrapbooking. I love playing with clay. I loved just designing, in general. But, I loved ballet more, so I chose ballet.

So, when I stumbled upon design again, I’m like, “Okay. Maybe this is my chance to actually take this seriously and learn more about design.” Like, it has some sort of psychological aspect. It has the actual creation aspect. It has this problem-solving aspect. Understanding that, I saw the potential of me actually enjoying it. That’s when I pulled the trigger, and I decided to go to school for it, and I decided to enroll in career foundaries year-long boot camp just to get a better understanding of foundation and more about what this field is like.

Joseph: Last question for you about how you end up going into this current industry of yours before we talk about some of the lessons you’ve learned along the way. How did you end up landing your role at Mooch?

Rina: [27:54] I knew that ultimately I’ve wanted to inspire other people using my career journey. That was when I was being very proactive and investing in my personal branding as well. Doing so, actually led me to a couple of opportunities starting with internships. Also, that eventually became job roles. And then, my first employer found me through LinkedIn. I think that’s because of all my content creation that I was doing since starting the boot camp.

Joseph: You were blogging at the time, is that right?

Rina: [28:28] I was doing a lot of content posting on LinkedIn, on my blogs on Instagram. When I was working on my first full-time job, which was a B2B SAS product, I already knew that FinTech is an industry that I’ve always wanted to work in. That was my goal. I knew I wanted to work in the B2C space as well because I do love to understand how consumers behave and think. I’ve always known that. It’s just very fascinating to me. I knew that my first full-time job was just a transition state just to get my experience going. That’s when a friend of mine actually introduced me to Mooch. From there, I became one of the founding members. I was like number four into the team. I’ve been with the team since pre-launch, and it’s been just an amazing journey. It really feels like I’m building with friends. I can’t be more grateful that I am at this company. I’m building a product that I love. I’m building it with people that I love as well.

Joseph: The last thing I want to talk about before we wrap up, Rina, are just some of the things you’ve learned along the way of your career journey. You’ve gone from ballet, went through a very challenging period, eventually decided to walk away from that career, and then have now landed in a place that sounds like you’re really, really happy I know you recently spoke at UX Copenhagen in early 2023. As I understand it, you drew some parallels between ballet and product design. What are one or two ways that you see the two being somewhat similar?

Rina: [30:11] These are things that I never even thought could be similar when I first started my career change, and it all started making sense when I started becoming more involved in product design. Product design and ballet are both creations where emotions are very important in the process development.

For example, how do I want my audience to feel as they watch me dance, is a big driver as to how I’m presenting my movements and how I am even showcasing artistry while I dance. For example, in Swan Lake, it’s a very sad story. In Don Quixote, I’m very sassy and I want it to be a fun experience when the audience is watching this ballet. In Sleeping Beauty, it’s very happy. If I’m a fairy, it has to be very light and very like staccato, very happy light feeling. And so, the takeaway here is what’s the emotion that I want to express while I’m dancing. Same in product design, what do I want my partners to feel as they go through these screens and go through these experiences?

The second thing I covered was structure, in ballet, there’s a lot of behind-the-scenes that goes on into presenting a movement. From the audience perspective, it might look like I’m just lifting my leg or I’m just dancing on my toes. But, there’s actually a lot of technical sides of how I’m actually presenting that movement. In comparison to product design, how am I structuring complicated technical logic of how this feature is supposed to work into very processable designs where people using the app will be like, “Oh, this is super easy. I just toggle this on and toggle this off.” The hierarchy ways of looking at a specific screen is very easy. It’s very easy to use. The usability is there. The experiences there. Like, we’re not supposed to make people think when they use a design. The result of that is how well do you structure those complicated logics into processable designs.

Joseph: One thing we’ve also spoken about before, and something I know you have written about, is this idea that you should prioritize fulfillment in your career and life. Although I know that makes sense intuitively, I also know that fulfillment is not always an easy thing to prioritize because sometimes, it feels at odds with practicality, or societal expectations, or investment, or other constraints that you have in your life. I would be interested to hear how would you describe how you’ve attempted to prioritize fulfillment in your career in life.

Rina: [32:58] It comes down to a lot of things but the first thing that I want to emphasize is values and morals when it comes to deciding what you want to do. I feel very humble to even be able to say this because I am able to prioritize fulfillment in my life, but I know that that’s not the case for everybody. So, in order to understand what fulfillment means to you, I have a very strong basis of what I want from a company and what I want my day-to-day to look like. Transparency and awareness around mental health. I would like to work with in a company that values it as much as I do and doesn’t ignore it because at the end of the day, we’re all human and I want to be in a company where they know that we’re all human.

I really try to evaluate a leadership team before I say yes to what offer, or before I decide to continue or not continue with the company. That drives fulfillment for me a lot, mental health, well-being. Also, are you working towards a vision that you want to work for? For me, modernizing finances has been a goal of mine. Even if I am experiencing hardships at work or work stress, the vision is there. I know that my teammates and I are aligned on our vision together. That is how I persevere and can persevere. Going back to the whole values, vision is also a big part for me. If the team is right and if the vision is there, then I know I can do it. That plays a big role in value, and then fulfilment.

Joseph: Last question for you, Rina, before we wrap up with what you’re doing now. Sometimes, if you come from a very different industry, trying to break into a new sector or job, you might actually see your background as a bit of a liability, especially if you’re competing with more traditional candidates for a specific role.

Rina: [35:10] Tell me about it.

Joseph: I’m just speculating that this may have come up with you. I’m just wondering if someone is struggling with this, do you have any tips on how you can see your background as a strength instead of a weakness?

Rina: [35:25] This is something that I’m still struggling with. It’s definitely a big liability. At a point, it was kind of an insecurity, to be honest. Because after I changed careers, my accomplishments in ballet didn’t mean anything. It was kind of a pride to clear as well. I had to literally start from scratch. Especially getting to that first job as well because again, accomplishments in my previous industry did not matter. Those 15 years of hard work did not matter.

There are workarounds, but also what I did was embrace my background and the way I did that was through personal branding. How do I make myself more valuable by utilizing my previous experience? There were no hard skills that could translate over to technology. I really had to see how I could work with my background, and that was by actually embracing my background and seeing how I can use my soft skills that I learned in ballet, translate to technology. I really tried to market myself through personal branding.

The first thing not to do is to be insecure about your background, like how I was at the very start, and to think that that means nothing because it does. If I were to continue being insecure about my background when I first started career changing, I don’t think I would have given a talk at UX Copenhagen. Because ultimately, my talk at UX Copenhagen was one of the parallels between classical ballet and product design. The reason why I got to do that talk is because I start embracing my background and started trying to break down how I was able to transition into a totally separate industry from ballet.

Joseph: I want to wrap up, Rina, with what you’re doing right now. Tell me a little bit more about your growth newsletter.

Rina: [37:27] I recently, very recently, started writing about my growth and documenting my journey. I’m very passionate in growth in general. I’ve always had a passion for documenting things. I was documenting my personal branding and all of that, and that was how my first employer found me. Even now, even though I do have experience and I have a job and all of that, I still prioritize growth in my day-to-day. And so, I created this newsletter where I share with other people what I’m learning at work. If they are interested in product design or start-ups, I write a lot about that. Even when I have conversations, like the one we’re having right now, I write my takeaways in those newsletters. Basically, it’s a newsletter about life, growth, and everything in between. It’s been an exciting journey.

Joseph: If people want to learn more about you, or if they want to sign up for your growth newsletter, where could they go?

Rina: [38:30] You can search me on LinkedIn or Instagram. It’s just my first name and my last name, pretty standard.

Joseph: Finally, are you still dancing?

Rina: [38:39] Yes. I am dancing. I am. I dance at least once a week just to keep my technique up. It’s been a great time. I made the right decision at the end of the day because I now have my passion back.

Joseph: Well, thank you so much, Rina, for taking me through your life as a ballerina and the steps you took to open up a new path for yourself in product design, during the pandemic, by the way. And also, the importance of prioritizing fulfillment in your life. Best of luck with your role at Mooch, and your newsletter, and also your dancing. Thanks for joining us today.

Rina: [39:21] Thank you so much, Joseph. It was such a great time.