Do Something - that would make a 1960's man think your uterus would fall out

Welcome to Weekly Gems, my newsletter that has taken me a while to get off the ground because ultimately I was overthinking it. I wanted whatever I created “next” to be great and that can often lead to a lack of action due to overthinking and imposter syndrome. Ultimately I was stuck in the inaction. What helped me take action: I was listening to a Peloton outdoor run the other day while I was trying to knock out 5 miles and Becs Gentry was doing a Women’s History Run. She started talking about the first woman to run a marathon, Kathrine Switzer, and her amazing story. Back in the 1960’s when she was running, men truly thought that if women ran that far their uterus would fall out.

Even though she was against all odds, she did something, she showed up and kept running even when the race director tried to pull/push her off the course, she did not stop because she knew she needed to carve the way not just for herself to hit the finish line but also for ALL WOMEN. If she stopped or did not make it to the end everyone would have questioned women’s ability to run marathons. I would not have been able to sign up for the half marathon I did this year already and the marathon I will do later in the year. That is some powerful showing up and deep grit.

After I did that run, I came across this shirt and immediately bought it. If you feel you need this shirt like I did, grab it here. Even though it was hard for me to show up over the last few months after a wild year of my company getting acquired, my husband not having a job for half the year, being burnt out, and then leaving my job at The Riveter, oh, and writing a book. After listening to Kathrine’s story, I knew it was time to get myself in gear and start doing something. After all, I wrote a book called, The Future Built By Women, and I know I need to start showing up for those women. We need each other. On that note, I have decided to practice what I preach in this book and launch a place for women to truly build and be together.

Join the Built x Women Community for just $28 (the cost of my book!), yep, that’s the only commitment. Just pre-order the book here, then head to this link and get set up on our app called Hubble. I have been using this app with Robin Arzon’s Swagger Society community I am in and love the functionalities and it feels different than other community platforms. All you need is your book order confirmation number to get access.

Who is this community ideal for:

1. Someone who needs support on their mindset and needs encouragement from others but also a kick in the butt at times. I want to be your Tech/Founder BFF.
2. A founder and business owner who wants a safe space to ask questions on their tech, funding, or business hurdles.
3. Someone who wants to truly build the future together in a community with others.
4. Egos will be left at the door in this community.

What this community is not:

1. It is not here to replace other amazing Female Founder communities, I am a member of many of them and believe we need communities of various sizes and intents.
2. It is not a place for negativity. You can share your struggles, but together we will work through them.

I hope you will join us on Hubble! This community is yours and we will build it together. You will get first access to book launch events both in person and virtual, giveaways, and other amazing things in the pipeline. Invite your business owner and founder friends.

Now to the rest of this Newsletter where I have curated what you need to know about what is going on in Tech/AI/Startup world.

Funding Announcements worth paying attention to:

• Carewell's $24.7 million Series B funding marks a pivotal advancement in familial caregiving, especially for women balancing caregiving with childcare, showcasing a critical investment in the infrastructure supporting families.
• Elektra Health's $3.3 million seed extension funding highlights a significant push towards enhancing women's health by focusing on the under-addressed area of menopause care, showcasing a crucial step in prioritizing and advancing women's healthcare initiatives.

AI Tools that sparked my interest this week:

1. Venus Williams has leaped AI with her new AI company called, Palazzo an interior design tool that makes it easy to bring your unique style to life.
2. Dinnerfy is an AI product trying to give your time back as a parent by helping answer the question “what’s for dinner?”. I am going to give this a whirl this week to see if it is helpful!

AI News to pay attention to:

1. Klarna shared last week that AI handled 2.3 million conversations in one month, which is reportedly equivalent to the work of 700 full-time employees. This has huge implications for the future of work for customer service representatives, as well as shows the impact AI can have on saving money for early startups as well if implemented.
2. Tumblr and WordPress are planning to sell their data to Midjourney/OpenAI. This would be public posts dating back to 2014. So that old account you had or blog you still have could be used for training data. The implications for this could be somewhat positive for all the blogs written by women, as more data needs to be in the AI datasets.

Hear more of my thoughts on Tech, AI, Motherhood and More:

How did I use AI to help me with this newsletter:

1. To give me summaries of news articles

1. To help me get out of writer’s block
2. To edit my welcome subscriber’s email.

That’s a wrap for this first edition. Thanks for reading this far and being with me in this new era of life. I would love your feedback (the good and the bad) on this newsletter and community. I want to create helpful content for you. I would love for this community to grow so if you found this helpful please share the newsletter.

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Until next week,

Brooke Markevicius