I learned graphic design to sell a novel.
That’s not the beginning most people expect when I tell them what I do for a living. But it’s the truth. A few years ago, I was an indie author with no budget, no marketing team, and a manuscript I believed in. So I did what you do when no one’s coming to save you — I figured it out myself.
Social media strategy. Video editing. Graphic design. Copywriting. Analytics. I taught myself all of it in the evenings and on weekends — my 5-to-9 — because I needed to reach readers and I couldn’t afford to hire someone to do it for me.
What I didn’t expect was what happened next.
When Your Side Hustle Follows You to Work
Those skills didn’t stay in my personal life. My 5-to-9 followed me right into my 9-to-5. Suddenly, I was the person in the room who knew how to do things most people in corporate spaces didn’t. It created opportunities I hadn’t planned for. Roles I hadn’t anticipated. Visibility I never set out to earn.
I’ve spent years in corporate project management, chief of staff, communications, and learning & development roles, and I can say with certainty that some of the most valuable professional development I’ve ever done happened on my own time, for my own reasons, with no performance review attached.
The Problem With Silos
But here’s the thing I’ve been wrestling with lately: I’ve spent a long time keeping these parts of my life in tidy, separate boxes. There’s Corporate Holly — the strategist, the project manager, the one who builds frameworks and leads cross-functional teams. There’s Novelist Holly — the one who writes fiction, designs book covers, and obsesses over story structure. And then there’s just… Holly. The mom. The person trying to keep it all together on a Tuesday.
For years, I thought I had to choose which version of myself to show up as in any given space. LinkedIn got the corporate voice. My author platforms got the creative one. And the family stuff? That mostly stayed offline entirely.
But the more I leaned into that separation, the less authentic any of it felt. Because the truth is, these aren’t separate lives. They never were. The novelist’s instincts sharpen the strategist’s work. The project manager’s discipline gets the book written. And honestly? Being a parent has taught me more about stakeholder management than any certification ever could.
Why This Matters Now More Than Ever
We’re in a moment where the professional world is asking more of us than ever — and not just in terms of hours or output. With the rise of AI, organizations need people who can think creatively, who can adapt, who can bring a human perspective to work that’s increasingly being automated. We need innovation. We need creativity. We need humans harnessing the power of new tools in ways that keep the human at the center.
That doesn’t come from staying in your lane. It comes from all the lanes — from the messy, overlapping, beautifully complicated intersection of everything you are.
What I’m Doing About It
So I’m trying something. I’m going to stop compartmentalizing. This space — this blog, my social channels, my professional presence — is going to reflect the whole person, not just the highlight reel from one corner of my life.
Every two weeks, I’ll be writing about the intersection of the creative life and the corporate one. Where a novelist’s instincts refine a corporate strategist’s work. Where the skills you build for yourself become the skills your organization needs. And yes, sometimes, where the chaos of family life sneaks in and makes all of it more real.
This is the series I wish had existed when I was figuring out that my creativity wasn’t a hobby to hide — it was an asset to lead with.
I’d love to hear from you. Have you ever struggled to bring all the parts of yourself into one place? What’s the most valuable skill you learned outside of work that eventually showed up on the job? Drop me a comment or send me a message — I think there are more of us out here than we realize.