Meet Ally Ritch

We recently connected with Ally Ritch and have shared our conversation below.

Ally, we’re thrilled to have you sharing your thoughts and lessons with our community. So, for folks who are at a stage in their life or career where they are trying to be more resilient, can you share where you get your resilience from?

Since I was a kid, I’ve faced several different circumstances and situations where I had no choice but to develop resilience. The other option was to give up and let the circumstances define me and claim a victim mindset, but I chose to be resilient. When I was five, my father passed away. As young as I was, I believe that’s where the development of the resilience I have now began. I saw my mom continue to move through life, work overtime, and still be an exceptional mom despite the circumstances she faced. Watching my mom bounce back and climb over obstacles in life helped to fuel and develop the innate resilience in me. As I grew up and was challenged through middle school, high school, and college, I found myself able to continue moving forward. However, there was a resilience with my personal desires and dreams that I lacked until the more recent years: that kind of resilience to pursue a seemingly impossible and silly dream even when I failed so many times. I’ve failed myself before by giving up, but now I realize that it would be a waste if I didn’t give it everything I have. So now I have a new resilience that keeps me doing what I love every day, even when the end goal isn’t exactly clear. And I think that added resilience came from me realizing I’d be failing myself if I didn’t continue to try.

Great, so let’s take a few minutes and cover your story. What should folks know about you and what you do?

Every day is different, but I spend most of my days simply creating, whether that’s with words, music, or visually. I love the process of writing a song and then being able to bring it to life with production. It adds another layer to its depth and expression. Recently, I’ve been challenging myself to take it a step further and express it visually, which has been more exciting than I thought, because it’s out of my comfort zone and somewhere I’m still learning to be creative. Something else that has been special has been having the opportunity to bring other people’s songs to life through production. It offers the challenge of figuring out how another artist would want to tell a story through sound and dynamics.

If you had to pick three qualities that are most important to develop, which three would you say matter most?

Three qualities or skills that have been most impactful for me that I’ve had to develop have been confidence, creative-thinking, and consistency. With the journey of pursuing a dream in this present reality, you need to be able to think creatively and strategically — very much outside of the box. There’s an oversaturation in media of different endeavors, and a lot of people end up copying other people. It’s hard to stand out, so you need to think creatively in order to set yourself apart, and to achieve what you wish in your pursuit. I also think that confidence is absolutely necessary, or else you’ll find yourself giving up before you’ve even started. Lastly, consistency has been a driving force in my life. I’ve created a consistent routine with a consistent set of tasks, and it has helped me to continue persevering and creating when I’m not always sure what’s next.

Any advice for folks feeling overwhelmed?

Toward the end of last year, I was diagnosed with ADHD, and it filled in a lot of gaps for me such as explaining why I felt overwhelmed so easily. Whenever I feel overwhelmed, I break things down into smaller pieces. I set timers for tasks when I feel too overwhelmed to start. Taking things one step at a time is essential, and oftentimes we are able to do a lot more than we believe. So when you feel overwhelmed, scale back, slow down, and take it step by step.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.allyritch.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ally.ritch
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@allyritch
• Soundcloud: https://soundcloud.com/live-ritch?utm_source=clipboard&utm_medium=text&utm_campaign=social_sharing
• Other: https://substack.com/@allyritch

Image Credits

Aubrey Landess
Will Smitherman