Lauren Friedman

Name: Lauren Friedman

3 words that describe you: It’s more of a quote instead of three words… A close friend once told me, “One thing I can say about you though, is that you know what you want and you GO for it.” I live this in every aspect of my life.

What you do for fun: I love to write, read, take photographs, learn, travel, be outdoors, spend time with the people I love. I also have a “slight” obsession with beauty products — makeup, skincare — and I maintain a blog where I can talk about all the things I love: Food, Beauty, Travel, Writing. Also, spending time in Colorado with my family, my best friend and her daughters is always a highlight. That time always centers me.

Your inspiration or life-changing moment: Moving to San Francisco was a life-changing moment for me. My entire family is in Colorado, but I fell in love with the city and had to give it a try. Even if only for six months. But I’ll never forget the first drive over the Bay Bridge straight into the San Francisco skyline. I couldn’t help but say aloud, “Holy shit, I live here.” It blew my mind. Six years later, I’m just as in love with the city as I was the first day. I am where I’m supposed to be right now and that’s a wonderful, freeing feeling.

Favorite daydream: Right now, it’s a bigger apartment! Living in San Francisco always has me daydreaming for more living space. And a garden! I want to garden and take care of a bunch of plant babies. Also, I love to cook, so growing my own fruits and veggies would be incredible.

Favorite food/drink: I have to go with a classic here… My boyfriend makes the best capellini with a red Italian sausage sauce. And loads of parmesan cheese. Basically anything with cheese. 🙂

A snapshot of the future you want to see: Equality. I know that sounds utterly generic and cliche, but I want to see a future filled with love for one another and not dissension or “fear of the unknown.” I want to see a future filled with happiness, a future where children are given the same chance to succeed regardless of where they live or how they’re brought into the world. I want to see a future where women and men are treated equally and are given the same opportunities, a future where we take care of each other and the planet, and not take our world for granted. Seems lofty, but that’s the future I want to see.

Your passion: My passion, at its core, is to build connections and relationships. That’s part of why I got involved in social media as a career — the root of social media is connecting people to people and social media allows us to do that at scale. To meet people we may never have met or interacted with otherwise. The other half of my soul is meant to write. My fifth grade teacher told me, “whatever you do, you must write.” Since then, I’ve followed the path of a writer; majoring in Journalism, creating my own personal blog, moving to San Francisco to work in social media writing content for brands, not to mention personal writing (I have 12 volumes of hand-written journals).

How you recharge: Being outdoors always recharges me. And no, not just at a park on a sunny day. The mountains recharge me. The scent of the Ponderosa Pine (it smells like butterscotch if you haven’t smelled it — it’s heavenly) calms me. The sound of the breeze whipping through the leaves. The black sky filled with starry sparks, so clear you feel like you could reach out and pull one right out of the sky. The lack of cell phone reception doesn’t hurt either.