🔥 Wisdom doesn’t always sound like wisdom.

Sadie Speaks is my personal writing — short, honest essays from the deep middle of things. They started as emails to my list, but they’ve become something more: snapshots of truth, power, and self-return, written in real time.

🎧 Listen to me read it — just the way I meant it.

💬 Prefer to read? Here’s the original text.

A couple weeks ago, my real estate mentor was describing the “best” way to find off-market deals: cold calling. You drive around scouting for distressed properties, look up the owner on the publicly-accessible tax map, then give them a call to ask if they’re interested in selling. 

The first twelve people you talk to will get defensive, spew profanities at you, and/or just hang up. But if you keep trying, eventually someone will say yes, because your no-agents cash offer will be attractive to the person who’s ready to get this place off their plate without all the normal red tape.

I told him that sounded horrendous, having people be mean to you over and over. But then I checked myself, because he’s got a proven track record, and I want to know what he knows. So I shifted into curiosity and then asked: “How do you deal with all those people being mean to you?”

We were at a noisy real estate meeting eating pizza. He was sitting on a bar stool, wearing a T-shirt and a backwards baseball cap. “I tell them thank you,” he said, “for helping me do my job.”

I tried not to look at him like he was crazy.

But his explanation made sense. It’s his job, he said, to invest in real estate – which, at the heart, is a community-focused endeavor. It’s his job to buy places that need a little love and make them more functional, more beautiful, because when we pour our love and abundance into the people and places around us, we all rise. Not everyone will be interested in the offer; some will interpret it like criticism. But you’re not being cruel or manipulative to ask and offer. That’s why you’re doing this work.

Okay, those are Sadie’s words, not his – but the message was his. Promise.

And the conversation was so compelling that it stuck with me.

The morning after that meeting, Lucy had major sass. She’s eleven going on sixteen, and I’ve been trying to buckle my seatbelt on the impending teenager shitstorm I’ve felt brewing for, like, the last twelve or fourteen months. 

On this particular morning, Lucy side-eyed me hard. Slammed the microwave door. Huffed under her breath. (I had no idea what she was even spun up about.) And when she finally spoke to me – I can’t even remember what she said, just that she was incredibly pissy – rather than dish it back, I just responded, “okay.” And genuinely smiled.

That completely unnerved her.

I wasn’t even trying to be sheisty or get the upper hand. I was just applying my mentor’s advice to a different situation I felt was super relevant. 

Because this is my job. My job as her parent is to invest in the places where she needs a little more love. To help her learn to deal with life’s discomfort more functionally, learn how to cultivate beauty in it. Even when it’s not something she wants to think about or engage in. She doesn’t have to like what I’m offering – and I don’t need to absorb her discomfort. 

I just need to show up and do my job. And my job isn’t about managing how she feels about her own situation or my offer to support her. It’s just to keep showing up.

Real estate mentor for the win. 

I don’t think he even knew he was giving me parenting advice. (And I wonder if I should point out to him that it really works! For kids at least. He has some of those, too.)

What I learned through this exchange, aside from the pro tip, is this: wisdom doesn’t always sound like wisdom. It doesn’t always come from grand oracles and mountaintop mystics. Sometimes it’s just a guy in a backwards baseball cap teaching you that receiving others’ rejection (or sass) just means that you’re doing your job – and that it’s working.

With all my wild heart,

Sadie xo

P.S. If something I said resonated — and you’re craving a space to unpack your own story — get in touch with me. I’d be honored to hold that space for you.