We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Rainn. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Rainn below.
Hi Rainn, so great to have you on the platform. There’s so much we want to ask you, but let’s start with the topic of self-care. Do you do anything for self-care and if so, do you think it’s had a meaningful impact on your effectiveness?
Self care is a toughie for me, because truthfully I’m still learning what it looks like! But I’ve learned enough to recognize how imperative it is to my success.
For me, self care mostly looks like not doing. It’s not face masks and spa days or baking sheets of cookies (power to you if that’s what your self care looks like!) but instead just…nothingness.
Like a lot of folks, I was raised with this pervasive idea that success is defined by productivity. Creativity is great…if you can make a living off it. That idea is wonderful—patent it right now! It’s a natural side effect of capitalism, it seems, that we learn that we are worth more if we are making money, and even if we don’t hit that milestone, at least if we are DOING.
That doesn’t work for everyone, though. Due to a combination of mental and physical health struggles, I am a very, very low energy person. Everyday tasks are things that I have to plan out days in advance to make sure I have the energy necessary to do them. If I cook on Monday, laundry will have to wait until Tuesday, and I won’t be able to sweep the floors until Wednesday.
I think everyone can relate to chores feeling like, well, chores, but everything carries this invisible energetic cost to me. Brushing my teeth? That takes energy. Washing my hair? Ditto. So do the more stereotypical self care tasks. For me, putting on a face mask feels like self care only in name and appearance. Deep down, it’s just another task to tick off my list. It doesn’t make me feel relaxed or calm.
What does is complete nothingness, a hard pill to swallow in a society that’s so focused on do, do, do. But when I can spend a whole day zoning out, just reading the same book or watching the same TV show for the thousandth time—when I engage in behaviors traditionally labeled as lazy—that’s when I actually recharge.
It’s not what I would choose, because I’m still working on deconstructing that concept of laziness. All the same, it’s what works.
What’s more, when I get over myself and the voices in my head telling me I’m not doing enough, when I let myself have those nothing days…I’m so much more energized to DO when it comes time. My head is clearer, and I have more ideas and more fervor to bring those ideas to fruition.
My self care doesn’t look like anything exciting, and my effectiveness still might be at a slower pace than expected, but listening to my body and letting the energy flow naturally means that when I do accomplish something, I do so with pride and confidence.
Appreciate the insights and wisdom. Before we dig deeper and ask you about the skills that matter and more, maybe you can tell our readers about yourself?
In a word, I do dolls.
Growing up being raised as a girl, an introduction to dolls was natural to me. So was the waning of interest as I grew to my preteen and then teen years, except…it wasn’t so much of a waning interest as a growing sense that I should stop caring. That I was getting too old to play with and enjoy dolls.
Through the years, the love would be resurrected here and there, and now at 28 I can happily say—I love dolls! I imagine they’ll always be a part of my life in some capacity. Does that make me a little weird to the general public? Sure, I guess. But it’s fun.
I think the best thing about collecting dolls and creating content around them is that the possibilities and the ways to enjoy them truly feel endless. At first glance, you might just see…dolls. But there are so many brands to collect, both current and vintage. And collecting is only one facet of how I enjoy dolls.
There’s restyling and redressing them to make them your own, organizing and displaying your collection, hunting down hard to find pieces, creating characters from scratch, drawing fanart, making videos, taking photos, telling stories…and best of all, finding people along the way who feel the same passion.
Dolls are great because I truly think there’s a way to connect them to almost any interest. You can use them in so many ways to express creativity, and they can help you retain a little bit of childhood whimsy. That’s something I think we all need.
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?
The first thing that comes to mind is simply empathy. It’s not something that’s doll-specific or creativity-specific, but when I think of who I am and who I want to be as a person, empathy and openness is at the top of the list. Being able to take a backseat, to listen to the voices of others and accept that your reality is not the end all be all, is so important to just being capable of growing as a human being.
I do think empathy was easier for me to cultivate because I am part of a minority group being a bisexual nonbinary person. Inherently, experiencing firsthand homophobia growing up primed me to be more open to questioning the status quo, and to believing and wanting to listen to people in other marginalized groups.
I certainly don’t believe you have to be a minority to have empathy. Generally, I think the thing to do is to accept one key truth: you can be wrong. For some people that’s easier than others, and that’s okay! It’s sort of uncomfortable to admit you don’t have all the answers all the time. But learning to say, “Someone else might have a different reality or know more than I do,” is huge, and once you do that it seems to me that empathy just flows in and you can just grow from there.
The other two qualities I’d like to highlight are curiosity and perseverance.
Constantly asking questions means that you’re constantly learning, and learning means growing. Sometimes what you learn is unpleasant, sure, but I try to think of that as growing pains.
And perseverance? It’s a difficult skill, but one I think we all have more of than we expect. Sometimes it’s begrudging, sometimes it’s fueled by spite, but you literally can’t permanently fail if you never give up. Sure, things might go poorly, even catastrophically, but an endeavor is only ever truly over when you call it quits. I might literally break a doll in half by accident while trying to create a custom; that’s a pretty terrible feeling, a failure. But that’s only how the story ends if I throw my hands up and walk away. The alternative is learning from the mistake, starting over, and creating exactly what I wanted. And I like that option better.
Who has been most helpful in helping you overcome challenges or build and develop the essential skills, qualities or knowledge you needed to be successful?
My husband Tony is the absolute light of my life and unequivocally the best thing that has ever happened to me.
While I try to be as authentic as possible online and on camera, that’s still only a glimpse into my life. And the truth behind the scenes is that I’m messy. I have a lot of struggles and a lot of big emotions…but none of it is too big for him.
In my lowest moments, Tony is always right there. Even when there’s conflict between us, he’s still who I want to reach out to, because our relationship exists with this background feeling of “we will get through it.” He might make me angry and vice versa on occasion, but deep down we are always there for each other, always trying to build each other up, and always wanting the best for our relationship and our individual selves.
A lot of the advice I give others is advice Tony has already given to me. He’s absolutely my rock, always encouraging and at my side. Even when he isn’t capable of helping directly, he will do what he can and guide me towards the resources I do need, whether that’s something simple like food and rest or something more complex like therapy.
He and I are about to celebrate ten years of being in a relationship, and it makes me tear up just to think about. I feel like I’ve known him my whole life, and yet I still can’t wait for the next ten, twenty, thirty years. I’ll never get tired of knowing him and supporting him, and I’ll never stop being grateful for him supporting me.
Whether it’s romantic or familial or platonic, everyone needs a Tony that they can lean on. Just someone to be there who wants nothing more than to see you happy.
Contact Info:
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/faerytaledolls?igsh=c25lc2x5MHhqaHB2&utm_source=qr
- Youtube: https://youtube.com/@faerytaledolls?si=zTIf27-1XqkEajcJ
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