The Shift

Hello Reader, I tumbled uncontrollably onto New York City pavements. After our brunch shift, my manager and I, drunk on banana martinis (a breakfast-themed drink I concocted with banana liqueur and vodka we sipped behind the bar), stumbled into stores on Fifth Avenue buying clothes we didn’t need with our tip money from The Morgan Hotel. This same energy poured into after-hours clubs, sweat giving me a natural glow before it became a TikTok thing, my hair covering my face in a brown haze,...

Hello Reader, Fear is a strange dream we need to wake ourselves up from. I’ve been rubbing my crusty eyes recently, stumbling to the kitchen to make a matcha latte as the morning light hits my rosemary plant. A year ago, a tarot card reader gave me a mantra that created a shift: I, Pia Leichter, ask the universe to allow me to recognize opportunities to do what I love and become wildly successful, deeply fulfilled, and filthy, stinking rich. Allow me to recognize opportunities connected like...

Hello Reader, Sweat glistens on my upper lip. I dab my forehead with a folded washcloth. Sigh heavily and lean back into the pillow. Even though I birthed my book in December 2024, I’m still feeling waves of exhaustion and delight. I started writing Welcome to the Creative Club in November 2023. I’ve learned so much from writing and publishing my story. I can’t believe I buckled up for this wild ride almost two years ago. As I’m entering a new phase with the audiobook launch, looking back and...

Hello Reader, The first time I kissed a boy was memorable in all the wrong ways. We were playing a game of tag and kiss in the schoolyard in Montreal. I was torn between hoping I wouldn’t get caught and hoping I would. A bunch of twelve-year-old looking for forbidden thrills. Wondering what the fuss was all about. I accidentally bumped into Costa as we rounded the building, my hands grabbing his Lacoste sweatshirt, twisting the alligator, and we were it. My heart beat fast as his lips met...

Hello Reader, Meditation in the jungle. Palm trees swaying with legs in yoga poses. Foam-crested waves lulling me into an afternoon nap on white sand. This is how I imagined Bali. When I arrived at the crowded Denpasar airport and weaved through hours of traffic to get to Ubud, my driver overtaking cars like he was playing GTA, I realized the Bali in my mind was more fantasy than reality. Isn’t this often the case? Yet, it delivered exactly what I needed: a change in routine. A hard stop. I...

Hello Reader, What stops us from evolving into our next creative venture? Maybe the question is, what blocks us from becoming the version of ourselves who creates something new? We’re constantly changing. Our cells regenerate on average every 7-10 years. A photo of myself in high school, teased AquaNet bangs, safety pins in my jeans, and plastic pink hoop earrings, shows me that. Yet, at some point, the ability to ride with change and uncertainty diminishes. Maybe because the spaces between...

Hello Reader, I woke up this morning with the urge to get going. Most mornings feel like this. I’m a Type A who doesn’t need an alarm. I pop up and out of bed like an Olympian pole vaulter. I hear the usual voice, the one that feels like parents in the 1990s scrambling for Cabbage Patch Dolls in the pre-Christmas FAO Schwarz mania in Manhattan (I did end up getting one). “Let’s fucking go.” A feeling of scarcity. If I don’t get started, then I won’t get whatever it is I might be after. God...

Hello Reader, I used to believe in perpetual summers like love in romcoms and LED face masks. Especially as entrepreneurs and creatives, we’re taught ideas are always in bloom and business grows exponentially, daisies running rampant in a field of dreams. That’s, of course, a myth. Life is cyclical. Seasons change. The moon wanes and waxes. Nothing in our world stays the same. So why would our business or art be any different? Since I’m notorious for manufacturing summers - UV light and...

Hello Reader, We’re in the dark recesses of COVID. I’m not sick, but the blue laptop hue makes me look unwell. Small faces stack like a weird Hollywood Squares episode, but instead of celebrities competing for charity, we’re a group of middle-aged (ish) women gathered together in a coaching certification course. Wiebke, our teacher, with her brown pixie cut and piercing blue eyes, loves cats and freedom (she changes homes frequently). Now, she’s live from Spain, her tabby making the...