Meet Suzannah Weiss

We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Suzannah Weiss. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Suzannah below.

Alright, so we’re so thrilled to have Suzannah with us today – welcome and maybe we can jump right into it with a question about one of your qualities that we most admire. How did you develop your work ethic? Where do you think you get it from?

I got my work ethic from my parents. They taught me from a young age that there is no excuse not to get done what you need to. My father in particular was strict about productivity — perhaps too strict, but it helped me in the long run. I remember one night when I was 10 years old, my parents were out and my brother and I were at home. The fire alarm in my house was going off and we couldn’t get it to stop. I was so distracted by the noise that I didn’t do all my homework. My dad came home and talked to me about this. He told me that I absolutely could have done my homework despite the distraction if I had made the choice to apply myself. It may have been more difficult, but I could have done it.

This memory sticks out because I often have that same feeling I did when I was 10. Whether I’m tired, I’m burnt out, I’m dealing with health issues, I’m sad about something, or I just don’t feel like it, there’s always some reason not to get done what I said I would. But the only thing really stopping me is my own choices. My word means everything to me. I very rarely ever do not do something I said I would, and if I absolutely cannot, I let people know ahead of time. People who make excuses are hard to rely on. To me, there is rarely any excuse to not fulfill a promise or to be late on it. What motivates me to get my work done is my word. If I give you my word that I’ll do something, you bet I will do it, or else my word will come to mean less and less. And without my word, what do I have?

Thanks for sharing that. So, before we get any further into our conversation, can you tell our readers a bit about yourself and what you’re working on?

As a sexuality educator certified by the American Association of Sexuality Educators, Counselors, and Therapists, I teach courses on consent, pleasure, childbirth, neurodiversity, non-monogamy, and more. I teach two five-month courses: Living Life Orgasmically, a course for women to get into their bodies and feel more pleasure not just in the bedroom but in their daily lives, and Pleasing and Empowering Women in the Bedroom, a course for men who want to show up for women with honor, reverence, and sexiness. You can also check out my free email course The Orgasm Cure, which has daily assignments and information to help vulva owners orgasm.

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?

One skill I learned very early on in my career is to explain scientific, theoretical, and esoteric concepts to everyday people. My first two jobs out of college were as an editor for a site, Footnote, that translates academic research for mainstream audiences and as a content marking specialist for a big data startup. I learned through these positions to write in a way that anybody can understand by stepping back and considering how I might have understood the relevant concepts before I knew them myself. I find it important to write and speak in ways that are accessible to everyone because no one should need a special degree or training to have access to transformative ideas.

Another skill that assists me in my work and life is mindfulness. To me, this simply means stopping and breathing before acting or speaking. Our words are powerful. They are not to be wasted or used carelessly. Sometimes, people might say things to trigger us, and our minds become like oceans in a storm. That’s when we can become careless with our words. If you can meditate, breathe deeply, walk, or do whatever helps calm you, your mind can be more like a river or even a still pond. If someone says something to disturb the peace of the water, it will still make a splash, but you’ll more easily return to baseline than if your mind was already full of wild waves. It’s important to take responsibility for our own mental focus, calm, and clarity because it’s hard to trust someone with volatile emotions. People comment that I am poised and patient in media interviews because I am not easily offended. I take responsibility for my emotional reactions by meditating, focusing on my breath, and taking things with a grain of sugar — finding what’s right or true or good about someone else’s perspective even when it doesn’t gel with mine. This same groundedness helps me express myself in writing with lucidity and precision. I have gained much of my mental fortitude from my participation in dialectical behavior therapy, which I am also training to offer. I would recommend that anyone looking to master their own mind find their way to a DBT therapist or skills group.

The other quality I would name as an asset in my career is open-heartedness. I experience strong emotions, which has led me to oscillate between closing my heart and letting all my feelings out. There is a balance. If you can come to embrace your vulnerability and also express it in a way that does not intrude upon others, you have a superpower. My book (and other books of mine in the works) could not have been written without open-heartedness. To me, this means remembering that my words are in service to love: How is this sentence helping people love one another and themselves? In my relationships, it means letting others in on what I’m feeling and also owning the feelings as mine. People want to see your heart. They just need to feel secure that you are not going to spill your heart all over them and make your emotions their problem. This is a journey I’m still on, but it is one I plan to write about, and one that is also assisting me currently as a psychotherapist in training.

Before we go, any advice you can share with people who are feeling overwhelmed?

I don’t allow myself to get overwhelmed. If I start to feel like there is too much on my plate, I will see what I can take off my plate and potentially cancel activities or ask for extensions on assignments. But in general, I trust that I will get done what I need to. For the most part, the voice of overwhelm is just there to psych you out. I don’t listen to it. I have seven things to do before the weekend’s over? Cool — I’ll start now, get three things done on Saturday, four on Sunday. I won’t worry or complain; I’ll just do it. There are much bigger problems to have. I can’t be bothered to get overwhelmed by everyday tasks. If I’m really overwhelmed by something big, like a breakup or a health problem, that’s when I make moves to cancel and reschedule things. The spa is my favorite place to go during these times.

I also prioritize my self-care to avoid feelings of overwhelm. My advice to people looking to avoid overwhelm is: Take walks on the beach. Put your feet on the earth. Leave the last hour of the day to yourself. Put down your laptop and instead of bulldozing through a task, reflect upon how it could be made shorter and simpler. This will save you time in the long run. “Work smarter, not harder” is a mantra I live by.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.suzannahweiss.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/weisssuzannah/
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/suzannahweiss/
• Twitter: https://x.com/suzannahweiss
• Other: Order my book Subjectified: Becoming a Sexual Subject: https://www.amazon.com/Subjectified-Becoming-Subject-Suzannah-Weiss/dp/150956019X/