{Be Loved} Branding

by: Courtney Pooler

Branding.

I love the concept of branding – the philosophy behind it, the continuity of theme for whatever it is you need to brand. The science of it is creative, visionary, yet has it’s logic and methodology. It’s like the love child of logic and inspiration. Which is my happy place. Happy place like coffee and a chewy oatmeal cinnamon cookie in the warmth of a spring morning sunshine with Ray Lamontagne playing in the background…mmmmmmhhhmmmmmmmm. Oh hi. There you are. Sorry – I got swept up in my own internal Pinterest Board of inspiration and ooey gooey fun feelings, accompanied with a soundtrack. Which, incidentally, is what Pinterest is for us – it’s an inspiration board – but with every board we create, we are branding a bit of what is ‘us’. {Too bad there isn’t a dating site that mirrors Pinterest! Let it be timestamped here: that’s MY big idea! Haha!} But my point is this: people get a fairly clear ‘feel’ for who you are by looking at your Pinterest. The same concept is used in branding. Colors, typography and style of marketing materials communicate a lot about you, your business, your organization, or what-have-you.

The thing with branding is that is requires two things: Commitment and Consistency. Once you commit to it, you can’t change it every few months. You counteract your brand recognition that way. You lose following and/or business.
And you have to be consistent to follow-through. Your cards need to be consistent with your website, which needs to match the banner or cover photo on your facebook, etc. Sure, you can update and re-create eventually, but it’s wise to keep a common thread throughout your journey.

Branding, if you think about it – comes from a more rudimentary history- the branding of cattle…. It consists of burning a life-long symbol into the image of the animal. That way it can be easily identified. Same idea with your organization or business. But that can feel really permanent. Good thing our marketing materials don’t have to be tattooed on us! Thank goodness social media and our current world values staying relevant – we are able to change as times change.

I struggle with branding in life…. I would love to say that my ‘brand’ has stayed the same my whole life, but that isn’t the case. If I were branded with a hot iron every time the ‘brand’ of my life changed, I’d need to be in a burn victim unit.

I’d have proudly been imprinted with a Jesus-fish symbol from the littlest little I was until I was 24. Then I would have probably burnt the flesh off of my body to undo that symbol. I was very angry and disillusioned and set afire to many precious things in my life as a result. Then I would have probably proudly imprinted a big M-E on my chest. I was brilliant in re-creating myself and my life as ‘doing what was best for me’. I lived a very comfortable material life in light of it all, and was looked on by many as smart, successful and rebuilding a sensible, stable life forging my own way and testing my faith, making it my own. Others {family and spiritual family} saw it as what it was…. Selfish and foolish and walking away from Faith altogether. Then, after 6 years of working so hard to validate the new branding I chose for myself, I was struck with the reality of my foolishness. But having gone so long…my fool’s heart was not totally in the clear yet. I branded myself with a new version of self…. Self that would seek the fire of my first love, Jesus… but also chasing after my past in an attempt to re-capture what was once lost. I would say then I branded myself with a big heart and a passport stamp – cause Lord knows I had enough baggage for a trans-continental trip. I was trying but had such skewed motivations. I didn’t use much logic… since that time, I have branded myself as broken hearted, bad parent, full of faith, good parent, great business owner, spiritual seeker, Jesus lover, Scripture-obsessor, meditation and prayer warrior, exhausted follower, misunderstanding daughter of a Father instructing out of love, loving friend, bad friend, unfaltering wife, divorcee, bitter citizen, confused, master of her own destiny, new girl, fun girl, party girl, funny girl, sexy single mom, demure sweet single mom, juggler of two worlds, desperate to move on, – trust me…. I don’t think there’s an inch of my body that would be left unscathed by branding. These labels are hard to admit to you. I cringe that I didn’t mind being viewed as ‘sexy’. {vomit- truly- I’m horrified to even put words to it} But in the wake of turning 35 and feeling I had nothing valuable beyond my career to show for it – trust me – even in the midst of seeking Truth and Love you can get sidetracked with re-inventing yourself to help you feel like you’re in your prime. Temptation in the desert, I’ll tell you. A 28-year old heartthrob who thinks you light up the room {lets be honest- bar} makes the pain of rejection of a husband you loved recklessly feel a little less permanent. I’m the queen of the philosophy that “Where God doesn’t make you feel better in reasonable time, a great outfit and an ‘own the room’ presence will.” Double minded? Uhm, yes.

So many of us do it – from teen to adult…it is part of the beauty of how God created us as women – how vast and diverse and nuanced we are. We fill so many roles and have within us the gift of creation itself! We create homes, love, warmth, instruction, connection… too many things to list. We go back and forth; hipster, fashionista, glam, minimalist, self-sufficient/God dependent, full of faith, doubting Thomas, Mary/Martha. We vacillate between our choices of who we want to be and who we are in process. I believe God loves us regardless.

But all of this to say – I have struggled in the last 2 years to know with these many seared ‘brands’ that I willingly took on…. Am I no more than an over-used, worn out canvas? Sure God loves me, scars and all. But can God re-invent and re-create me in the face of my throwing myself on the barbeque and crispifying myself ? Don’t you run out of chances to re-brand yourself? I mean, everyone has had a front row seat to my many phases- they won’t forget the brands I once carried upon this hide.

The answer is no. Or better stated: It’s not our job to brand ourselves in the spiritual sense. We have all of these labels, and the only label that matters is the one our Father God gives us: MINE. Redeemed.

I believe that I have been a harried PR Exec, Marketing Director, Agent, and Manager for my own life, like a nightmare media-Frankenstein of my own making; and God has anointed me with his own Brand and purpose. I’m gumming up my own best PR Campaign, which I have nothing to do with. I’ve covered up my own God-given ‘x-factor’ that will draw to it exactly as God knows is best. The best gig is yet to come….. and I won’t be able to take any of the credit.

Do you have a brand you want to leave behind? What are you excited about {or even nervous about} that God is calling your heart to?

image by: Kristin Ungerecht