Founder and Senior Executive Vice President of The Hot Sox Company, a global Hosiery Company which designs, markets and distributes hosiery under the brand names of Hot Sox, Polo/Ralph Lauren, and numerous private label brands. In 2007, Ellie and her partners sold the company to a very large hosiery manufacturer, taking the company they birthed all the way from a small startup to a major global contender and then to sale. Hot Sox grew to be the leading force in the fashion hosiery industry for over 35 years, with annual sales of $60 million dollars.
Now she speaks nationally helping Entrepreneurs…….
Her Story:
In truth my birth was a miracle. My parents were Holocaust survivors and met after the war, under extraordinary circumstances. Having survived numerous near death incidents, their deepest desire was to create life. I believe I was conceived as a symbol of their desire to create life, to procreate as a panacea to all of the death and destruction they endured.
In tracking my life, I see that my framework has allowed me to see my life as an extraordinary gift laced with endless possibilities. As a result of this, my mission as a coach was born.
My Mission: To help others access their truest purpose and unleash their unlimited creativity and self-expression.
My People: Artists and Entrepreneurs
My Inspired Topics/Stories:
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Unlimited Creativity and Self-expression
When we are young, there are few barriers to creativity. The other day my 8 year old grand daughter was creating amazing bird costume. She was the embodiment of creative expression, adding rainbow colored feathers, an incredible mask. She was holding nothing back, completely inspired, completely in the moment. As we get older and become buried in our disempowering stories we can loose our connection to our creativity and self-expression.
Accessing Creativity and Self-Expression:
- Name what’s so (if there is a disempowering story, craft a new one – see below)
- Get clear on your vision
- Mine the environment for information
- Outfit yourself with the right resources: tools, physical space, people, etc.
- Understand what’s at stake for you if you don’t do this
- Get into inspired action
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The Power of Community: a context for creativity and self-expression
Dance school had an incredible impact on my life. There was a magic to being immersed in so many aspects of creative expression, a huge pallet of options. It ignited a thirst to taste and explore all of these dimensions. It shined a spotlight on so many different ways to be part of a creative process; the entire scope of interfacing, dancing, exploring, expressing, the amazing costumes, and in the process developing your own creative potential. It was inspirational being surrounded by such talented teachers – it helped me find myself. It created a beautiful and compelling context for creativity that I have never gotten over. Creativity and self expression becomes training for you mind, body and heart, there is a discipline, a quest for mastery, a developmental nature to it, it is iterative. The uniqueness of each of us in terms of the greater pallet gets expressed, what is your own unique self-expression, how do you foster your own unique self-expression. In a very real way we recreate the dance school experience within the peer groups, both GoG and WPO. We create a powerful context for creativity! There is an aspect of that context when I work one on one as well. I am always asking myself, what creative context do I need to provide as a coach that will bring out the best in my clients.
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Lessons of Entrepreneurship
When I was in my early twenties, I had an idea to start a business as a side venture (really like a light bulb going on). Along with three partners, we got inspired to start a fashion hosiery company called Hot Sox, which grew to be a very successful trendsetting business. Here are some tools I use to help entrepreneurs:
- The importance of drawing on inspiration. How deep is your love? As your assess your inspiration, you reach a level of what is meaningful to you. Are you passionate about this?
- What is the contribution your business will make?
- Is your business an extension of yourself, an expression of your passion?
- How to go from your idea to making it happen…SAY/DO
- Enrolling and energizing the people who work with you – we magnetized people, people wanted to be involved with us, we had style, passion for what we were doing, our style stood out,
Lessons I learned from my parents when they were mom & pop entrepreneurs:
- Live your commitment every day
- Constantly seek to improve your offering
- Buy something for one dollar, sell it for two
- Put your unique brand on it, express yourself through your product or service
- Have gratitude for the money you make, it really makes more
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Re-crafting your story
My family immigrated to America via freighter when I was four years old. We were sent to Minneapolis and lived in a two-story home with snow literally everywhere. One day, when I was five, I went outside to play with my three-year-old sister. I was very excited. Because of weather conditions, we always wore headscarves that were tied under our neck. As we approached the top of the steps, I turned around and asked my little sister to help me tie the headscarf. I felt a push and the next thing I knew I was flying down a pretty steep stairway. This was jolting; fortunately, I didn’t get very physically hurt. However, I did get impacted mentally and psychologically. Because I made a decision that I was “weak,” and my sister was strong. When I became an adult I was able to see that I was living, in many ways, from this story of being a weak person. So I re-crafted my story and now work with my clients to uncover the stories that are disempowering them and how to re-craft them for a fulfilled life.
Re-crafting your story:
- Uncover the stories you are living from – empowering vs. disempowering stories…which one rules your life?
- Go back to a time when something happened, and as a result you made a decision about yourself
- How has this impacted your life?
- Now that you see the impact, what changes can you make?
- What is possible now that wasn’t possible before?
- What new opportunities are available?
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The “Oracle Space”…we all have a space within us that knows
When I was growing up, I wanted to protect my parents. I felt they had suffered and endured so much in their childhood. I imagined that I could make up for it by being the best little girl ever! What I know realize that it actually caused me to go into my own inner world, and lo and behold I found a buried treasured of enormous value. I have named this the “Oracle Space.” We each have one, and we can go to it at will…it’s absolutely free. This Oracle Space reflects your truest self and is the place to go to get your answers and inspiration.
Connecting to your Oracle Space:
- Take four to five deep cleansing breaths.
- Clear your mind, and go into meditation. Use a mantra, slogan, word, or numbers, anything that intercepts your constant stream of thoughts.
- Once your thoughts have really quieted down, imagine you are on a secluded beach.
- Visualize a movie screen in the sky and you are sitting on the beach looking up at this screen
- Take an issue you are grappling with, something that you need to answer, something that you want to create, and begin visualizing possible outcomes on that screen. That’s your canvas. Imagine the best possible outcome.
Additional themes to cull from:
- Finding your inner artist – we are powerful creators!
- Communication – gateway to fulfillment and empowerment
- Moving from Breakdown to Breakthrough
- Possibility and being open to it
- The manifestation exercise
- Working with your emotional guidance system (law of attraction)
- Answer your calling
- Understanding the power of the present
- Being in tune with source energy
- The bigger the future you want to create, the more of the past you need to work through
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