Meet MM Schreier

We recently connected with MM Schreier and have shared our conversation below.

MM, 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?

Sometimes I think my resilience is really innate stubbornness. Like anyone, I’ve had my share of challenges, and yet when presented with a choice I often take the hard path. I’ve built a career in a technical industry that rarely welcomes women as leaders. As a creative, I deal with an overwhelming amount of rejection and subjectivity. As a human with multiple marginalized identities, I get knocked down a lot. Still, I keep standing back up even if my knees are shaking. I’ve learned I have to keep showing up for myself. No one else can do it for me.

Thanks, so before we move on maybe you can share a bit more about yourself?

It’s hard to define a person as just one thing. I’m a classically trained vocalist. I’m on Leadership for a robotics company. I’m a dog mom, a voracious reader, an avid kayaker, a reluctant but skilled cook. I’m the kind of introvert that needs to disappear in the woods for hours at a time. At my core, though, I am a storyteller. I took up writing on a whim at a time when I was looking to reinvent myself. Stories gave me the opportunity to process the world and how I fit into it. As an author, much of my work revolves around emotion and humanity, even when the characters are monsters or robots. I’m enamored with short stories, and have published over a hundred at different venues, including two collections: “Monstrosity, Humanity,” twenty-five horror stories that push the boundary between human and monster and “Bruised, Resilient,” which is thirty tales about how women experience the world.

There is so much advice out there about all the different skills and qualities folks need to develop in order to succeed in today’s highly competitive environment and often it can feel overwhelming. So, if we had to break it down to just the three that matter most, which three skills or qualities would you focus on?

I think the first, and the thing that continues to serve me every day, is the ability to cope with failure. Writing and publishing comes with a lot of rejection. I’m certainly not immune to the sting, but it also fuels me to try again. Every “no” makes me work harder to get the next “yes.”

Many say that creativity is key for crafting engaging stories, but for me it’s curiosity. I’m always asking questions about how things work or how people think and feel and react. I like to see new places and try new things. That inquisitiveness translates into my storytelling. It makes me consider how my fictional world works, what the scene feels like, who the character really is and that allows a rich, vibrant, and authentic tale to unfold.

Finally, I approach the journey with humility, though not at the cost of confidence. In a craft where imposter syndrome is an equal opportunity disease, I think we should all be proud of our accomplishments. I also recognize that I should always be learning. I’m never so good that I cannot get better. Stagnation is the death of a creative.

Before we go, maybe you can tell us a bit about your parents and what you feel was the most impactful thing they did for you?

As difficult as it was, the best thing they ever did for me was to let me make my own choices. Sometimes they were bad ones. Others were terrible. I’m sure I’ve caused them no end of anxiety. Every parent would love to fix all of their kids’ problems, but mine let me figure out my own life on my own terms. It allowed me to find my inner strength and to gain confidence in who I am as a person. I can’t thank them enough for the opportunity to find independence and resilience in a way that worked best for me.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://mmschreier.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/mmschreier/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/nod1v1ng
• Twitter: https://x.com/NoD1v1ng
• Other: https://bsky.app/profile/mmschreier.bsky.social