Letter from the editor-in-chief
Gosh have we been on a content tear lately! We’ve been reaching out to new contributors and collaborators and have had a rush of inquiries for submissions. Maybe it’s that we’re coming up to the halfway point in the year. Maybe it’s the warmer weather. Maybe it’s the desire to make things happen. Something is in the air and we are here for it!
That’s why we are so excited to bring you our cover story! This young woman is making her mark in a tough industry. She does so with poise and authenticity. What’s more, she got a late start and embodies “if there is a will, there's a way!”
On the other side of that coin is a piece about finding your way back to your dreams and passions when others have influenced you otherwise. It’s a great opportunity for personal reflection and some major goal setting!
Not sure how you can accomplish any of it with the every day weighing you down? We’ve got you covered with that too, with a feature that turns time management on its head.
We hope you enjoy each carefully crafted feature and page. There’s so much here for you!
All the best, Nichole & Send Media Company, LLC team
Woman to Woman is always open to story ideas and leads and conversing with talented writers, photographers, makeup artists and hair stylists! Have an interest in advertising sales or marketing? Let’s chat! Reach out to sendmediacompanyllc@gmail.com.
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Contact Us +(219) 242-8507
www.valparaisomontessori.com admin@valparaisomontessori.com 870 Eastport Center Dr. Suite 100, Valparaiso, IN
Now that I’m a wife, mom, and full-time entrepreneur, the stakes are even higher. I’ve got clients to coach, a son to raise, a marriage to nurture—and I still need time to breathe, rest, and nourish myself. But I’m more peaceful now than I’ve ever been. Why? Because I structure my life around what truly matters.
And I help my clients do the same.
One of my clients—a wife, mom of four, First Lady of her church, and now a six-figure entrepreneur—came to me completely fed up. She felt busy all the time but never truly productive. Like she was doing a lot, but none of it seemed to move the needle forward. She believed she was too busy to go after her dreams. Here’s what she really wanted:
• Read two books a month
• Speak monthly at church and grow her coaching business
• Go to the gym 3 times per week
• Become a consistent, profitable trader so she could leave her 9 to 5
• Teach her kids a weekly life or financial lesson
• Her biggest struggle? Saying no to what didn’t matter, and following through on what did.
She had a breakthrough: If I’m not at my best, I can’t help my family reach their best. She was done letting fear and disorganization hold her back.
Within 90 days of implementing the Overwhelmed to Organized™ method, she achieved every single one of her goals. She quit her 9 to 5 and became a full-time entrepreneur. She reclaimed her time—and her peace.
Here’s the 3-part framework I use to help women finally feel in control of their time and lives:
You can’t manage what you’re not clear on.
Start by defining your values, goals, and your vision for this season of life. What does your ideal day actually look like? And how does it compare to your current reality?
Then ask:
• What beliefs are keeping me stuck?
• What habits or routines are draining me?
• What’s creating stress that I have the power to shift?
Once you understand the root cause of your overwhelm, not just the to-do list, but the expectations, habits, and misalignment—it becomes so much easier to make a real change.
Small, aligned actions done consistently create big results.
If you’re constantly rushing or feeling like you’re falling behind, it’s not because you’re lazy or disorganized. It’s because:
• You’re carrying mental weight no one sees—meals, schedules, reminders, emotions.
• You’re reacting to life instead of proactively planning it.
• You’re stuck in productive procrastination—doing busywork instead of needle-movers.
• You feel guilty asking for help or taking time to rest.
Let’s change that.
This step is all about showing up for yourself daily—even if it’s messy. Whether it’s planning your day the night before, moving your body, or tackling one high-priority task, doing what you said you would builds confidence and momentum. I guide my clients through the Be-Do-Have framework:
• Be: Decide who you need to become. (Disciplined? Peaceful? Present?)
• Do: Act in alignment with that identity—regardless of how you feel.
• Have: Let the outcomes follow naturally from consistent action.
You don’t have to control every result—you just need to stay committed to the process. That’s where the magic happens.
You don’t rise to the level of your intentions. You fall to the level of your systems.
When life gets busy, motivation isn’t enough. That’s why we build supportive routines and systems that make following through easier, not harder.
Here’s one I recommend to every client:
• Block 30–60 minutes each week for a planning session.
• Start with a brain dump of everything on your mind.
• Cross-reference that list with your goals—what really matters this week?
• Choose your top priorities and time-block them into your calendar.
Personally, I love using Sunsama for daily planning and Google Calendar for visual time-blocking. These tools keep me aligned, not just organized.
And most importantly: structure your week around your real life—your rhythms, your energy levels, and your family’s flow.
If you're ready to reclaim your time now, here’s where to begin:
• Audit your time. Track your hours for 2–3 days to see where your time is actually going.
• Plan your week. Choose a time to brain dump and schedule your top priorities.
• Pick your Daily Top Priorities. Every day, focus on completing these tasks as early in the day as possible.
• Say no to one thing. Choose one task, event, or obligation you can let go of this week.
• Celebrate small wins. Progress is built over time. Acknowledge the milestones along the way.
You are capable of living a life that feels peaceful, powerful, and on purpose.
When you learn to manage your time with intention, everything else becomes easier. And when you do it with grace, not guilt, you show up better for the people and dreams that matter most.
Let’s build that life. Peacefully.
Sade Kelly is the CEO and Founder of The Fire Inside, a time management coaching company that empowers ambitious people to take control of their time and build lives they love. Before launching her coaching business, she managed multimillion-dollar marketing campaigns for Fortune 500 companies. As a high performer herself, she once juggled a demanding full-time job, three side businesses, and a personal life—until burnout forced her to rethink it all.
She turned her strategies into a proven coaching framework that has helped her clients save 28 or more hours per week and reach their goals six times faster. She believes when you learn to leverage your most valuable resource, your time, you can be and do anything you desire. Now, as an entrepreneur, wife, and mom, she’s passionate about helping others balance work, wellness, and personal priorities with peace and purpose.
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Swedish massage is ideal for anyone looking to de-stress or take that first step into bodywork. It’s also a beautiful choice postpartum when the body is still healing and adjusting. For medical needs, the same soothing techniques can be adapted to focus on specific areas like the neck, hips, or lower back, helping correct imbalances from repetitive motions like nursing, lifting kids, or working at a desk.
Enhancements like hot stones, warm bamboo, steamed towels, or aromatherapy can deepen the relaxation and help tired muscles recover faster. This is the go-to modality for pure relaxation with therapeutic benefits and what you will typically find when scheduling general massages at any professional massage therapy business.
Ashiatsu / Barefoot Deep Tissue Massage
Prenatal Massage
Tailored specifically for pregnancy support, prenatal massage relieves back pain, swelling, leg cramps, and fatigue in a safe, supportive environment. Moms-to-be are positioned side-lying or with a pregnancy bolster system to ensure full comfort. Gentle pressure helps reduce fluid retention, ease hip tension, and soothe the nervous system—which benefits both mom and baby. Typically we offer sidelying with a full body pillow and pregnancy wedge.
It’s also a nurturing emotional experience. Many pregnant clients tell us it’s the first time they’ve felt truly held and cared for since becoming pregnant. Regular sessions can help with sleep, circulation, and even labor preparation.
If you struggle with deep-seated tension or posture issues, Ashiatsu might be your best friend. This modality targets the deeper layers of muscle and fascia through slow, even pressure delivered with the massage therapist’s feet. Using overhead bars for control and balance, the therapist glides across your back, legs, arms, and shoulders in a rhythmic motion that feels grounding and thorough. After all, our lower body is usually always stronger than our hands. It’s particularly beneficial for those dealing with chronic pain, scoliosis, tech neck, or tension. Unlike pointy elbows or knuckles, the broad surface of the foot allows for deep work that feels smooth and satisfying—never sharp or jarring.
Sports Massage
This dynamic style blends deep tissue, active stretching, and performance recovery techniques like cupping or muscle scraping. It’s not just for athletes—many of our active clients benefit from sports massage after yoga classes or weightlifting for instance.
It helps prevent injury, reduce inflammation, and improve range of motion. You can also expect a more interactive session. Sports massage often includes feedback, guided stretches, and breathwork, making it a great choice for moms who like a hands-on approach to their wellness routine.
Manual Lymphatic Drainage (MLD)
This gentle, rhythmic technique supports the body’s detox process by stimulating lymph flow and reducing swelling. MLD uses light, precise strokes to guide lymphatic fluid toward drainage points—without deep pressure. It’s commonly used after surgery, but it’s also helpful for chronic bloating, lymphedema, sluggish circulation, and autoimmune flare-ups.
Many moms love this technique postpartum or during hormone shifts, when the body’s natural filtration systems could use a little extra support. It leaves you feeling lighter, clearer, and less puffy—physically and mentally.
Thai Yoga Massage
Performed fully clothed on a mat, Thai yoga massage blends assisted stretching, rhythmic palm pressure, and energywork. It’s like a passive yoga class and a massage in one—without you having to do any of the work. Sessions often include gentle traction, hip opening movement, abdominal massage, and deep breathing support. It’s especially wonderful for those who sit for long periods or feel “stuck” in their bodies. The stretching helps release stored tension in the hips and spine, while the abdominal massage can even support digestion and stress release. You’ll leave feeling more mobile, more grounded, and more connected to your body.
WITH PARU VENKAT
Name: Paru Venkat
Age: 56
Job title / company: Underwriting Practices Director at The Hartford Town / city you’re from: Chicago Town / city you live in now: Dyer, Ind.
Describe your family. Significant other? Children? Husband Dr. Kumar Venkat, a Gastroenterologist at St. Mary’s Medical Center in Hobart Indiana; 3 grown boys Rathnam, Easan and Kathir and 1 daughter in law, Shanthi. My children are currently all studying and working. My youngest is currently a Fullbright Scholar teaching English in Mexico.
Do you have a license or degree? If so, in what, from where? A CPCU designation (Chartered Property Casualty Underwriters), and an MBA from Northwestern University
Describe your professional background / history? I have worked at The Hartford in Chicago for 35 years. I have had many different roles with the company over the years, including: Underwriter, Manager, Home Office Director, Learning Consultant and now Project Manager. I am currently serving as an implementation lead for our IT folks to connect our technology investments to our Underwriting businesses.
How did you discover your passion? I graduated with a finance degree from the University of Illinois in Urbana-Champaign and the role of an Underwriter at an Insurance company sounded the most interesting from the offers I had at the time. The insurance industry is incredibly dynamic. There are so many different types of roles that exist within the industry. The Insurance industry is also very stable and offers excellent work life balance.
What mark do you hope to leave on your industry? To effectively use technology to make the underwriting process better for underwriters today and in the future.
What are you most proud of in your life personally and/or professionally? My 3 kids and the long varied career I have built at The Hartford.
What advice would you give your younger self? Another woman on the path to finding her calling? Explore industries you don’t know anything about- you would be surprised where your skill set can lead you and try to do something you may not think you are initially qualified for.
Outside of work, what do you enjoy doing? My family loves to travel to destinations all over the world. I also am currently a member of Service League of NWI raising money for local charities with 30 plus other great women and a board member of Forest Ridge Academy, a wonderful private school in Schererville, Ind.
Recipe:
• 2 eggs
• 2 cups of sugar
• 2 tablespoons of vanilla
• 1 tablespoon of lemon
• 4 sticks of unsalted butter
• 1 teaspoon of salt
• 1/2 teaspoon of lemon zest
• 6 cups of flour
Directions:
First you cream the butter and sugar for 2 to 3 minutes, then you gradually add the eggs, scrape down the sides and mix well.
Add in your vanilla, lemon, salt and zest. Once fully combined, gradually add in flour one cup at a time. Should be a little sticky but not much.
You take some dough, roll it out about 1/4 thick, use your cookie cutters for shapes. Pop the tray in the freezer for 14 minutes.
Preheat the oven to 375.
Once chilled add to the oven for 14 minutes, take out and let cool on tray and you are done.
You can add buttercream or royal icing or just leave it plain.
kitchen, you can find her exploring new recipes, enjoying family adventures, or sharing laughs with friends.
SELF CARE
with
Imagine a young girl who loves to make people laugh. She is witty, animated, and knows exactly how to deliver a perfectly timed punchline. As she continues to grow, she realizes that this is a gift. When she can bring joy to people and get a good laugh out of them, she feels energized and unstoppable!
When she reaches her pre-teen years, she thinks to herself that she would love to be a comedian when she grows up. She tells her parents about her dream, but they don’t seem as excited as she is. They just wave it off, assuming she will likely change her mind many more times before then. She then tells her teacher about her dream, and he tells her that it’s really hard to be a comedian and she would need to be much funnier. He explains that the industry is cutthroat and that most people who chase that dream never actually make it.
This little girl knows what she is gifted at, she can feel it in her soul that this is something she is meant for, but at this very moment, the moment she is told that her dreams are too big and unrealistic, she gives up on them. She continues her life, settling for the safe path, and ends up sitting at her desk, looking at spreadsheets most days. She rarely has the opportunity to make people laugh. She feels lost and unfulfilled, but she has a steady paycheck, so she thinks, “I should be grateful, right?” Life feels routine, mundane, and those enchanting feelings she used to have as a little girl, delivering the perfect gut-splitting jokes, are a distant memory.
Where did things go wrong here? Those external factors, her parents’ lackluster reaction, her teacher telling her she wasn’t funny enough and that the path was too hard, are the thoughts that sank into her mind. The funny thing about thoughts is, the more we think them, the more we assign truth to them, and they slowly turn into beliefs. Those beliefs then become the lens through which we see life.
Years later, she’s in a social setting and makes ten people laugh so hard they can’t breathe. They all tell her how funny she is, but there’s one person who seems distracted, who doesn’t react similarly, and that signals the belief she created: she just isn’t funny enough. The brain looks for anything that seems consistent with our beliefs and shuts down anything that competes with them. I like to refer to these external factors, thoughts, and beliefs as dream-crushers.
In adulthood, these dream-crushers look like societal expectations, comparisons, and living a life that isn’t authentic because you are too concerned about the opinions of others. The dream-crushing is loud, it’s intense, and it’s very hard to ignore. That external noise turns into negative self-talk, self-doubt, self-sabotaging thoughts, and fear. Each of these stops you from achieving your highest potential and, most importantly, from living a life that makes you feel alive!
More than just crushing your dreams, they are crushing your everyday chances of taking steps closer to living a life that excites you, of exploring that feeling you get when you do something that lights you up and makes you feel like your best self is shining bright. Recognizing dream-crushing in real time, before those thoughts turn into beliefs, is where the magic happens. If you can master your mindset and how you react to these dream-crushers, you can become unstoppable.
I am privileged to work with women to help them get back to the core of who they are, what they are passionate about, and what brings them true fulfillment, not for the satisfaction or praise of others, but for themselves. That little girl who was so excited about the possibilities ahead of her and was met with dream-crushing remarks is still alive and well. She’s now a woman who has experienced so much in life, learned tough lessons, lived through hard times and the most beautifully joyous moments, yet she is not free from those dream-crushers.
They are all around us and within us! Nobody is going to understand your dreams the way you do. That passion and vision are yours and yours alone, and you will never feel the same excitement from others as you do from within. It’s not their dream, they aren’t meant to understand!
We all deserve to live a life that we love, that sets our soul on fire, and that our little girl selves would be proud of, proud that we didn’t hide parts of ourselves to make others feel comfortable, that we were brave and listened when our intuition spoke, and that when we were told our dreams were too big, too wild, too unrealistic, or that we just couldn’t do it, we simply said, “Watch me!” From a young age, Lisa Kaszubski, MCLC, CMP, was energetic and optimistic, always chasing big dreams. She earned a B.B.A. in Human Resource Management from Loyola University Chicago, and her passion led her to the hospitality industry. She has nearly 20 years of experience in hotel management and executive leadership in the meetings and events industry. Despite her career success, she found herself stuck, drained, burned out, and disconnected from what truly mattered. She was living a life shaped by expectations rather than fulfillment. Her passion for mentoring teams and coaching individuals inspired her to earn her Master Certified Life Coach designation. Now, as the Founder & President of Sister, We Hear You, and as a Transformation and Fulfillment Coach, she helps women, both personally and professionally, overcome barriers like self-doubt and fear, embrace their authenticity, build meaningful connections with other amazing women, and create fulfilling lives they love.
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