WHEN LIFE GIVES YOU LEMONS… MAKE LEMONJELLY

This is not really a story about face wash. Okay, technically it is. But LEMONJELLY is also a story about making something. Wanting it so badly you can practically reach out and touch it, pouring your whole self into bringing it to life, and then realizing... it isn't quite what you dreamed up.

It's about living with that disappointment. Making up stories about what it says about you as a creator. Learning to make peace with imperfection, clearing the stale energy, dusting ya self off, and eventually deciding you're brave enough to try again.

It's about what happens when life hands you a whole lotta lemons.

And you make LEMONJELLY.

LET'S GO BACK FOUR YEARS.

When I created MELT Skin + Brow Care, I spent three years painstakingly bringing our Foundational Five skincare products out of my brain and into the physical world. And when I say painstakingly, I mean every. teenie. tiny. thing.

The monochromatic gradient of melty Pantones. Custom molded vessels I hand-designed. Labels meticulously matched approximately 38 reprints later. How each bottle fit in your hand and sat on your shelf. How much product came out with every pump. The tiny travel clips that kept your skincare from exploding in your bag. Every word written from my heart like a little love note to the person who would eventually make a home for my precious by her bathroom sink.

I still remember the day they arrived. It was a rare rainy Monday morning in Scottsdale, and I was inside the Melt Mothership staring through those giant panes of glass like a kid on Christmas while a semi backed up and two buff daddy Santas unloaded box after humongous box.

IT WAS FINALLY HERE.

We ripped them open and started touching, smelling, lathering, spritzing, spreading. Finally melting into this Foundational Five Ritual I had spent years imagining.

Then we got to step one: Lemongrass Cleansing Serum.

Prepare for liftoff!!!

I pumped her into my hands and... UH OH.

My heart sank directly into my butthole.

She smelled divine, but where were my sexy, sudsy, silky lil champagne baby bubbles? Where was the body? The oomf? Sure, she was supposed to be "serumy," but this was thin. Dare I say... watery.

And it was absolutely not what I thought I had signed off on.

The slightly terrifying part? I had poured my own savings into this first massive batch, and now I had THOUSANDS of bottles.

THE THING ABOUT "FINE"

Here's where the story gets complicated, because Lemongrass wasn't a bad product. Not even close.

People bought her for years. Some people were OBSESSED with her. They told us she transformed their skin. We used her in services. We sold her on our shelves. I taught people to mix her with Oatmylk to beef her up a bit. I used her myself.

I liked her.

But I never loved her.

And as the person who had seen the original version so clearly in my brain, I knew the difference. I knew what she was supposed to be, and she wasn't it.

That bothered me way more than I probably ever admitted publicly. In my lower moments, I was embarrassed. I made up all sorts of stories in my head. Maybe people think this product sucks. Maybe they think the whole line sucks. Maybe everything I put my name on sucks.

All because my face wash didn't have the little non-toxic champagne baby bubbles I had envisioned.

A little cuckoo for Cocoa Puffs? Absolutely. But that's also the thing about being an obsessive, attentive-to-detail, deeply caring creative person. You notice things other people don't notice. You know when something isn't quite what you saw in your mind, even when everyone around you is saying, "It's fine!"

And for four years, I never stopped thinking about what I would do differently.

900 BOTTLES + ONE BIG DECISION

By last December, I still had something like 900 bottles of Lemongrass sitting in storage. There was roughly $50K in potential revenue sitting there too.

And I was DONE.

I desperately wanted to reformulate, but I'd been stalling because I felt like I needed to sell through more of what I already had first. Eventually, I realized I simply did not want to carry that stale, stagnant energy into another year.

Did I consider throwing every last bottle into a dumpster? YUP. 😂

Thankfully, my Higher Self came up with a better idea.

It was the holidays, the season of giving and receiving, and I started thinking about what it might look like to actually EMBODY abundance instead of holding onto something simply because there was money attached to it.

So I became my own lil Santa Baby.

I gave every last bottle away for free. All 900-ish of them.

And what happened next was WILD.

People gifted them for teacher appreciation. Babes put dozens into their favorite-things exchanges. Clients came out of the woodwork telling me how much they loved Lemongrass. How much their husbands loved it. Their daughters. How their skin had transformed. How grateful they were to stock up before she went bye-bye.

And instead of feeling like I'd just thrown away $50K, I felt GIDDY. Joyful. FREE.

I'd spent years looking at those bottles and seeing what hadn't gone right. Suddenly, I could see everything they had given me instead.

More importantly, I had made space. Physically, energetically, creatively. I planted a little seed that maybe someday there would be a 2.0, and then I got out of the way.

I made room for some fresh-squeezed juice to flow in.

And whaddyah know... a few months later, the Sun, Moon and Stars FINALLY aligned.

ENTER: LEMONJELLY

My name is Lemonjelly. Jelly for short. Limón if ya feelin frisky. LJ by my closest cuz IYKYK.

And no matter what you call her, THIS is the cleanser I had been trying to make all along.

She's a sudsy citrusy QUEEN. She has the tantalizing little champagne baby bubbles I had been dreaming about for four years, a silky smooth lather, body, oomf. An actual experience.

And those bubbles weren't necessarily easy to create while also staying committed to making something completely clean + green. We landed on a brand-new, particularly unique cleansing combination that feels incredibly special and ahead of its time.

But I don't just want you to wash your face with Jelly. I want you to EXPERIENCE her.

Pump her out. Lather her up. Spread her around. Breathe her in. Let the lemon and sweet orange oils hijack your olfactory system for a second and wake you up to the brand-new day in front of you.

Massage her in slowly. Work her in. Melt away with her. Savor this precious, present moment and maybe even make eye contact with yourself in the mirror for a second.

Like, actually look.

Notice your own light. Brightened. Radiant. Refreshed. Ready for whatever comes next.

Then rinse her away and carry on with your dewy, hydrated, deeply cared-for self.

THAT is LEMONJELLY.

THE LEMONJELLY LAW

Somewhere along this journey, I came across an idea from Tim Ferriss that stuck with me: the energy you create something with is the energy people ultimately experience through it.

I love that philosophy because I think it applies universally to the creative act. There's something about the idea that what we pour into something somehow lives inside of it.

And it became my guiding principle this second time around:

THE ENERGY WE CREATE WITH IS THE ENERGY THEY WILL CONSUME WITH.

Because if I'm being really vulnerable, the road to Lemongrass was LONG and painstaking. By the end, I didn't really believe in that particular product. And I've wondered since whether the people experiencing it could somehow pick up on a little bit of that energy from me, too.

LEMONJELLY has been the complete opposite.

Creating her has been EXHILARATING. She reignited the inner ember of my creativity and fanned the flames of my own confidence. She breathed new life into my dreams and reminded me that my ideas are worthy of being brought to life. That my dreams deserve to be bottled up and shared with the world.

And honestly? She helped me believe more deeply not just in the process, or the product, or the right people who helped me finally bring her across the finish line.

But in ME.

I have been GIDDY like a schoolgirl waiting for everyone to touch her, feel her, smell her, experience her. Because this time around, I KNOW she's all that and a bag of chips.

There's also a huge emotional difference in the way I feel about feedback this time. With Lemongrass, I was guarded. I didn't really want people to tell me they wished she were different because I really wished she were different.

With Jelly?

I cannot WAIT to hear what you think.

 

IT WAS NEVER JUST ABOUT FACE WASH.

MELT has never solely been about giving someone their best brow. And LEMONJELLY isn't solely about giving you clean skin.

Of course I want your skin to feel soft, supple, squeaky clean, hydrated, brightened, plumped up, youthful, and somehow even more beautifully YOU.

I want Jelly to gently help you let go of dull dead skin cells and maybe a few old stories you've outgrown while we're at it. I want her to feed you, protect you, and inspire you to SHINE.

But beyond all of the features and benefits and beautiful things she can physically do for your skin, I want you to FEEL what went into her.

My wish is that with every cleanse, you can sense even a morsel of the love I poured into this delicious new formulation. That somehow the energy I created her with becomes energy you get to feel, too.

Because that's the actual story.

This isn't simply: MELT launched a new cleanser.

It's: I dreamed something up. I tried to bring it to life. I fell flat on my face. I lived with something imperfect and questioned myself because of it. Eventually, I made peace with it. I gave it all away. I cleared the space. I listened. I learned.

And then I tried again.

This time, I friggin NAILED IT.

Life handed me a BIG OLE LOAD of lemons...

and I made LEMONJELLY.

#thezestisyettocome