Flare Sixty under 30

I was up late one night scrolling through my Twitter feed when I came across a tweet for a new lady hero of mine, Sam Maggs. It was a Flare Magazine profile on the geek culture author and her work to get more women involved in nerdy enterprises. Her feature was just one of sixty profiles of awesome ladies, doing awesome things in their respective fields of expertise. I found myself staying up far too late to read all about these amazing women and their passions.

It can often be difficult to not compare yourself to other people (Gah, I’m too old to even make this list anymore!), but I find it much more motivational to get inspired and learn from these success stories. The Flare Sixty under Thirty is a great compilation of Canadian female inspiration in a variety of positions, industries and roles. Social media plays a big part in most of the women’s brands which I think is important to note as we continue to move into an increasingly online and digital life experience. Here are a few of the faves that I’ve discovered:

• Shay Mitchell is a Canadian actress best known for her role on the teen cult show, Pretty Little Liars. I’ve been a fan of hers for a long time and love seeing a beautiful, ethnic woman as cover girl on the magazine. Shay has mastered the art of social media and being a positive role model for the millions of young girls who idolize her. It may not seem like a great achievement in the grand scheme of things, but in an era of Mileys, Kylies, and #selfies, Shay is a performer who relies on talent instead of controversy to be relevant. Now that is a valuable skill in today’s pop culture world.
• Heather Payne founded the Ladies Learning Code, a series of community-oriented workshops that help get women interested and learning how to do computer programming and coding. I’m a big fan of the series as I’ve attended a few of the workshops when they’ve made it out to Calgary. As a blogger, I spend a lot of time making my website look pretty, but the backend is just as important to the experience. Getting hands-on and technical gives you such a sense of accomplishment.
• Rupi Kaur‘s poetry takes a look at hard topics like love, sex, trauma, loss, healing and “taboo” topics like female menstruation. She used Instagram as a way to share her work which has since turned into a best-selling book, Milk and Honey. I’ll be picking up an a copy for myself to check out.
• Marilou Champagne is a Quebec-based food blogger who started writing as a way to share how she overcame an eating disorder. Only 3 short years later, her website is now available in both English and French and she has released her own cookbook as well.

These are just a handful of the women I found super interesting and wanted to learn more about. Check out the full list of sixty profile on Flare and I’m sure you will make your own inspirational discoveries too.