THE MOST EXCITING NEWS EVER:

Oh, my loves. I’ve seriously been dying to share this news with you. I cannot believe it’s been such a long time coming, but I hope you’ll see, as you read, why this is THE MOST EXCITING NEWS EVER, and why I had to wait so agonizingly long to share it with you. I am really, really bad at keeping secrets (and probably have the worst poker face ever), so this has been really, VERY difficult to keep to myself.

THE BACKSTORY:

As a bestselling author and founder of this award-winning little company and blog, The Organic Life, I’ve has been researching, testing and writing about organic skincare for nearly seven years. My own journey started in my mid-twenties, when I began facing painful, cystic acne. I realized that not only did none of my dermatologist recommended products work to treat it, but I also realized that they contained high levels of toxins and fillers that further irritated my skin.

As a biologist, I knew that were better, natural way to treat my skin issues. After experimenting in my kitchen at home, I found incredible natural remedies that worked not just to treat – but they worked to cure my skin problems – completely!

Since foregoing conventional skin treatments and taking my health into my own hands, my skincare treatments have been featured worldwide by popular media outlets such as Forbes, Glamour, Teen Vogue, The CW, PIX News, Readers Digest, Womens Health, Livestrong and Womans Day Magazine.

I began receiving emails from blog readers every day, asking me to create skincare around different, intimate, personal beauty needs. All this buzz around my organic DIY beauty creations inspired me to develop toxin-free alternatives to the most needed skincare items.

I began a four-year research and development process, drawing on my own experience as a biologist, woman and organic skincare novice turned guru. Myself, alongside natural skincare veterans, set out to create a conscious beauty line that would address the toughest skincare and beauty needs, from organic body enhancement to fine lines to stubborn acne.

THE BUILD:

Since January, you guys may have seen us steadily growing as I shared many parts of my journey on Instagram: whether I am packing your boxes to ship, hand-making your products, shopping for glassware, pouring your batches, sourcing ingredients, up late nights hand-writing notes or sharing a ten-foot-long list of post office receipts, I’ve been having a ton of fun creating this line and sharing steps of the process with you along the way. I went from filling a handful of orders a week to filling truckloads of orders a day – an exciting (and sometimes terrifying and exhausting!) growth for a small business being run, pretty much single-handedly, by one person.

Through this hard work and dedication, Genetix was born.

So, why did it take me nine whole months to “come out” about having an organic skincare line of my own?

Well, for starters, I simply wanted to make sure people liked it! It can be a scary process when you first launch something – anything! I had some nerves, honestly. This is my baby, and I’d never done anything like it before. I’m a perfectionist (Virgo! Hi!), and I knew from my other business ventures that it helps if you can grow slowly, so that was my largest goal.

THE LAUNCH:

We quietly launched at the beginning of January and I have been involved in every single second of every single step of the business. I’m really proud of the way things have come together, from our customer feedback to our brand mission to our aesthetic, but for the last nine months I wanted to make sure every treasured customer was 100% satisfied. I wanted to make sure what was in my brain would translate into something people would not just buy or like, but use every day and love. I want to help women create new, healthy rituals that can help their self esteem and possibly save their life.

Now, I can definitely, proudly and humbly say I do that. I can honestly say that after doing every single job by myself (including customer service), our flagship product, Genetix Organic Enhancement Oil, has quickly earned cult status the world over. We’ve had thousands of orders (and re-orders!) and our first powerful potion has exceeded everyone’s expectations of quality, effectiveness and customer satisfaction at every turn.

TODAY:

Today, our Enhancement Oil has gained hundreds of positive, five star reviews. It doesn’t just work for me – it works for thousands of people just like me! We are carried and recommended by doctors, dermatologists, chiropractors and celebrity estheticians all around the globe. Genetix has landed to customers in over 100 countries. We’ve even been approached by some of the largest retailers in the world (we are holding off on big box retail for reasons I’ll definitely share with you later down the road).

We just launched on the largest e-commerce platform in the world, so we can be delivered same-day to your doorstep! With all this in place, I feel comfortable that we truly have something worth sharing and moreover, seriously have something worth shouting about from the rooftops!

Also, I knew it was totally unrealistic to do all those jobs myself long-term, so I’ve been spending the last few months building an amazing team that can help me through each process. I’ve finally found those people, which has REALLY taken a lot of stress off of me. That was a long time coming. I’m happy to let the professionals do what they’re best at (although I am eagerly learning). Not that letting others help means that I am in any way hands off. Quite the opposite – I have a hand in everything, this is 100% still my baby and I create, touch and inspect every single product before it goes out. But letting others help means that each step gets done correctly and efficiently, rather than quickly or urgently. I finally have time to enjoy my work, and oh yeah – I finally have the time to tell you about it now, too! 😉

Third, of course, is that I’ve been testing and reviewing skincare for nearly seven years now. I am dear, close friends with so many incredible green beauty skincare owners and founders, who I love and respect very much. Maybe it’s silly, but I didn’t want them to think or feel that I would in any way “forget about them” to focus on my own thing. After all, they were the inspiration behind my transition to green beauty in the first place!

So, for the last nine months, while running my own business and inventing, sourcing, labeling, packing, shipping and following up about my own products, I’ve shared about nearly a hundred different brands – literally. A quick search of just my recent press articles I’ve written for various media outlets, brings up literally about twenty-five brands that aren’t mine, just in the last few articles, written in the past few months. Podcasts, interviews and a search through my blog or my instagram brings up dozens upon dozens more that I’ve mentioned and will continue to love and support. That will never, ever change.

Instead of competing with my friends (who, let’s face it, already have a lot of bases covered in the industry), I’ve chosen to fill niches I did not see in my own beauty cabinet. That is why my flagship product is an organic breast enhancement oil – the first and only of its kind. All of our products are completely differentiated from the brands I know and love, while continuing to be effective and pure.

WHAT’S IMPORTANT:

For me, it’s important to grow properly and with focus on our individual customer needs, rather than on profit. I wanted women to have a healthy, natural choice in the crusade for healthy beauty. Genetix products are developed to give women the shape and beauty they desire – without any harmful side effects. As a company, we are committed to delivering 100% organic products that change your life for the better. I’m so proud that we’re a small, woman-owned, woman-staffed company. We are committed to employing and featuring women of color, creating an all-inclusive work environment and a positive social media space. All of our product are vegan and cruelty-free. We don’t test on animals and we are totally safe for humans of all ages and genders. We do not mass manufacture our products, preferring instead to create and ship each and every batch by hand.

(Last year, making the first batch of Genetix Oils by hand in my kitchen. ^^)

Genetix philosophy extends to our supply chain. Our ingredients are hand-picked from organic, reliable sources that we trust and know personally, or grown on our own organic, pesticide-free gardens in Southern California. I believe that the quality of ingredients determines the effectiveness of the product, so we use GMO-free, organic and handcrafted sources only. Our oils are solar-infused to ensure potency and effectiveness.

Whether the issue is humanity, social equality, healthy ingredients, womens rights, poverty, water pollution, population growth or fair trade, Genetix aspires to operate as a model for how a business can have a positive impact in every area it touches. We donate 5% of our profits to social causes that span from cancer to womens rights to the environment.

Our company is big on responsibility and I believe that the way we treat our environment is intrinsically linked to how we run our company. We strive to be paperless whenever possible and when we do hand-wrap our products or send notes, we do so on recycled paper only. I encourage you to recycle or reuse any and all items you may receive from us, as they are all recyclable in nature. I’m actually considering using some document management software from somewhere like FilecenterDMS.com so that all of my documents are stored online rather than having tonnes of paper in my office. I know someone who uses a document management software and they say it works amazingly for their business, so that might be something I look into for the future.

We are change makers. We are women who care about the planet. Our original, luxurious potions perform with timeless herbs that support feminine beauty and health. We aim to be a global standard for conscious operation in business.

We’ve grown steadily but mightily. Genetix is set to launch our line of melatonin-enriched, scent-free face serums and other beauty products in the coming months, and I hope you’ll continue to support me on this amazing (and sleepless and often frightening and crazy but totally-well-worth-it) journey. We’ve already gotten incredible feedback on the batches we’ve sent out to beauty experts to test, and I can’t wait to share my journey of creating those with you, too! I truly believe that when one person succeeds, we all succeed. I am so proud of this company and so excited for this next chapter in my life.

THANKS TO YOU:

Don’t forget: each one of these products was inspired by you guys! It was inspired by emails I received from women telling me that if I made this or that product, they would love to buy it. Inspired by you sharing your frustrations with skin issues. Letting me test on you. Giving me support. Giving me feedback. It’s been such a community experience, and I couldn’t have done it without you. I’m humbled and thankful and so excited.

Thank you all for your continued unwavering love and support. I’ve never taken it for granted. I’m so excited to share my journey as CEO of this incredible company that I am so, so very proud of, and to watch this baby grow. I know so many of you have been with me for years – some of you for over a decade. I am so happy to share this with you and so incredibly grateful to have you be a part of it.

Stay beautiful and blooming. We’re here now, to help.

Love always,

Tara

How To Turn Your Mess Into Your Message

by Tara Mackey | Blogroll

This week I sat down with Nicholas Bayerle of the How Bad Do I Want It Podcast to share my story of addiction and hopelessness to now vibrant health and hope. I absolutely loved talking with Nicholas about our journeys to better health and a career of our dreams. Our conversation is truly a testimony of what’s possible!

In this interview you will learn:

Why you should have your hour of power everyday and how to do it
Ways to monetize your passion organically
How to free yourself of addiction and find hope
How you can attract opportunities to create your dream life

Take a listen here to find out how to turn your mess into your message!

Want to learn more ways to turn your mess into your message? Grab my #1 bestselling book today!

4 Little Habits That Can Change Your Life

by Tara Mackey | Blogroll, Health

For a long time, I truly underestimated the importance of life-affirming, self loving habits. Since the realization of their importance, they are the very building blocks I’ve used to build my dream life and get to a place I’m very happy with.

Some were relatively simple – like figuring out where to live (“where I would vacation!“) – and some things were harder – like Letting Go. Here are 4 Self Love Habits that helped me change everything and put me on a path to wellness, recovery and renewed self-esteem!

4. Long, Hot Baths

Taking a long, hot, luxurious bath every day and treating myself to some meditation and alone time has been key in developing and consistently keeping deep rooted self loving habits. A hot bath is one of life’s most simple pleasures, and with winter weather afoot it’s the greatest gift you can give yourself! Throw in some jojoba oil, epsom salt, rose petals, lavender or some body oil and you’ve got an at-home spa day!

3. Being Happy With My Body

Hey, I may not have Kardashian Kurves (does anyone, actually?), but I don’t think I’ve wasted a single second of my life hating my body, and I’m really proud of that. I learned pretty early on in high school (and after crying about it only a handful of times) that I was way more comfortable fitting into little boy’s t-shirts than I was comfortable with watching myself try to impress other people. I knew I had other things going for me than what I looked like (which really wasn’t much at the time). I knew if I could build on these things – my talents, singing, writing, reading, humor, and personality – that other good things would come, and that the people who stuck around would be the ones who were meant to be there.

I think this is probably one of the most important things that you can remember, and one of the things I will do my very best to instill in my daughter because even as Grown Women, we so often forget.

Does this mean I’ve never tried to impress anyone? Uh, are you kidding? I was still 15 once…

But it did instill an uncompromising standard in me about what exactly I was willing to compromise and under what circumstances. (I’ll put up with shit from my family, for instance, that I would never deal with from anyone else). But self-hate has always been out of the question.

If you’re unhappy with your body, you might not want to look at it. You might obsessively under-eat, and then binge eat, and then feel worse about yourself. You might avoid exercise because you don’t want to even think about the problem. You might eat junk food to comfort your bad feelings, and then make the health problems worse. This can affect school, your job, your relationships, your family life. I’ve seen girls torture themselves for years about something as simple and stupid as a stretch mark or some cellulite, which happen naturally. I’ve seen girls torture ME because they’re unhappy with themselves. What a waste of time!

That kind of anxiety is poisonous to carry around with you! Letting go and being happy with exactly who you are is so important to finding the life you want. Sure – I could probably use 10 squats or so more in my day, even when I’m already doing 50-100 reps as per my plan. But who couldn’t?

(maybe her. ^ she may not need any more squats.)

Striving for improvement is a wonderful goal – but comparison, jealousy or harping on comments from others isn’t helping to motivate you! Not giving a crap if other people are happy with my body has left me so much time to work on other super important things and gotten me way closer to my goals than wasting even a moment otherwise!

At least once a day tell yourself you’re beautiful in the mirror. Even if it seems and feels silly. Say it until you mean it! (Tweet this.)

2. Being Honest

It is impossible to achieve what you truly want if you are denying or deceiving yourself. It took this realization for me to truly change my habits. The minute you feel the relief of honesty with yourself, your life truly changes. This was the first time I really felt that I had “found the feeling” of Oneness with myself. For some people this never pops up as a problem, but many of us tell ourselves lies when we’re unhappy in our lives in order to make things easier to swallow. We do it to stay in relationships, or get out of them. To stay in a job, to stay home, or move out, or feel good about ourselves.

Whatever the case is, honesty is vital to making effective changes and identifying who you really are and what you really want. When you lie about who you are or what you really believe, you reinforce the idea that you need to pretend to be someone else or that you are not fundamentally “good enough”. Worse than that, you undermine virtually every other key principle for self improvement, because they are based on the premise that you have identified as your authentic self and your goals. Without the truth of who you are and what you really want, you cannot have clarity in life and you cannot achieve your dreams because you have no true direction.

You need to practice honesty at every level of your life, not just with yourself. When you are dishonest, you are effectively saying that you are not worthy enough, that you do not deserve good things and that the only way to get things is to lie or cheat. This appears in the form of lying, cheating, boasting, stealing, exaggeration… at the most fundamental level these things are not honest and are a negative affirmation to the self.

1. Forgiving Myself

The funny thing is, I know I have completely forgiven myself for things that a lot of other people have NOT forgiven me for. This sucks. For them.

Once I experienced complete compassion for myself, it was easy to let go of what I had done in the past and use it for exactly what it was: a formidable life lesson for the future.

Once we experience compassion for ourselves, self forgiveness is the next step. When we look deeply enough inside we see that keepings ourselves “unforgiven” is actually motivated by love. We hold ourselves as unforgivable in hopes that we never do that thing again because we don’t want to hurt anyone else or ourselves. This is usually unconscious, and it’s extremely self destructive if not worked through.

I invite you to look back on any experience in your past where you are carrying guilt or shame. Look at what your true intention was when you did what you did. You may have had a limited awareness of options and perhaps made choices that brought yourself and others undesirable results, but you did the best you could at the time. You need to see the truth of this for yourself – that all of your actions came from a basic human survival instinct, which in essence is loving yourself.

If you look deep enough you will discover that your truest intention was to take care of yourself in the best way you knew at the time. (tweet this.)

If you use this as the Life Lesson that all of our past is meant to be, you can use it as a source for good and loving behavior in the future.

Want to find new self loving habits and read my whole self-love journey?

Pick up Cured by Nature today!

With Love,

The Organic Life on Instagram!

by Tara Mackey | Blogroll, Events

Good day, Everyone! Hope your week is beautiful so far! I just wanted to say a quick hello and share a few of my recent Instagram favorites! To stay in touch and see more recent and random little moments, follow OrganicLifeBlog on Instagram! You can also follow my personal instagram at @taramackeymusic.

with love,