Motherhood can be a long and winding journey, and often our own self-care as mothers can get pushed aside or lost; we’re excited to introduce you to new app for mothers that’s changing the way we take care of ourselves (spoiler alert: and thus, change the way we help our families, too!). Maven Mamas is dedicated to helping mothers on their self-care journey; their app, Mama, sends daily affirmations and encouragement directly to your phone! With the simplicity of a push notification the Mama app offers a simple encouragement each day. Behind each notification is a beautifully designed wisdom with additional self-care empowering resources for mamas. We love that! We’re excited to introduce you to the founder of the Mama app, Sahra Cahoon, as she shares about starting the app and why she’s so passionate about helping moms.
1. How did you decide to launch your business? Tell us a little more about Mama, the app.
Honestly, we needed Mama the app in our own lives (and we both use it)! We were both running businesses and parenting plus trying to figure out how to have any form of self-care and all the while being one another’s confidants and cheer leaders. “Can’t someone just make an app that reminds me that I’m doing a amazing job, that I’m a rock star, and that motherhood is hard and amazing at the same time, and it’s ok to admit that???” This was the conception of Maven Mamas. Two exhausted, passionate, entrepreneurial mamas got together just to have coffee to catch up on life – and two weeks later the plans were coming together for an app to support mamas and remind them how beautiful, powerful and amazing they are. We floated the idea by a few friends and they said, yes, do it! And so we did.
2. You get to see a lot of affirmations and self-care tips every day, what’s one piece of wisdom that really resonated with you personally?
My favorite piece of wisdom is one that I wrote before our third daughter was born, we had no idea how much more true it would become in our home. “embrace the chaos” Sometimes as a mom, wife, entrepreneur, woman, I get stuck in wanting things a certain way or thinking that my house will never again be clean and orderly. We a one month old baby and a 3 year old who has all the sass our lives are never anything but organized (or not so organized) chaos. It is messy and beautiful. Instead of constantly fighting against it I am truly working on allowing it to just be.
3. If a new mama could say just one mantra to herself each morning to help her brave the journey of motherhood, what do you suggest that mantra be?
Breathe, you can do this, just breathe. Our breath is essential for thriving in motherhood. It not only allows that pause that can be exactly what I need in the middle of the chaos. It helps with creating space when things feel overwhelming or out of control. I realize after the last month of not sleeping just how sleep deprivation messes with the mind and when i can remember to stop and take a deep breath, I am less reactive, more present and don’t have to apologize so much because i am just more connected and kind. I also use Brene Brown’s: don’t shrink, don’t puff up, just stand your sacred ground as a mantra when i am going into a group or PTO meeting. It really helps me stay true to myself and not get so wrapped up in the drama of preschool parents.
4. How do you balance work and family?
I don’t, I gave up trying to balance it around the birth of our second daughter. If home life is in balance work life is likely out of wack and visa versa. The thing is at our house we want our girls to know that they are loved and we have time for them. We eat dinner together almost every night around the table with no technology. Sometimes our toddler watches PBS so that I can do a conference call – or write a Q&A for an awesome blog partnership- sometimes i have to wake at 5am to get started before the mom day begins and sometimes I have to skip family dinner to go to hot yoga so that I can stay sane. There are weeks when I travel or my husband is working on a project 10+ hours a day and there are weeks where we visit the museum take a family hike and then make homemade ice cream. Maybe the balance can be seen when looking at the years instead of the days.
5. What’s the best part of being a mompreneur?
The opportunity to create. I love that there are no limits, we dream up new ideas and then figure out how to make them a reality. Working with other mamas, the love and support that mompreneurs show for one another and the incredible things being brought to life from apps to hands-free breast pumps, women are amazing and powerful – including my badass business partner Christy who has such a huge heart and serious business savvy, she is stunning.
