Day within the Life: Marcela Marañon, Journey & Life-style Content material Creator

You don’t earn partnerships with firms like Google, Toyota and Clinique and construct a base of two million followers throughout social media by taking it simple, however one of many high classes Marcela Marañon has realized working as a way of life and journey content material creator is that it’s all for naught should you don’t deal with your physique. 

So as an alternative of waking up on the break of daybreak to work on modifying content material, after I spoke together with her, she was having fun with a late breakfast of avocado toast and matcha tea and letting her physique get better from a nasty case of jet lag within the kitchen of her Dallas residence.  

“I’m all the time touring, and my physique is all the time drained,” she says. “I’ve realized that I’ve to take heed to my physique and provides it the time for relaxation. After I’m touring, that’s after I’m working. When I’m residence, it’s my restoration time. I do issues which are going to profit me.” 

No matter routine Marañon adheres to is working for her. Because of her savvy advertising and marketing and entertaining modifying, she has established herself as one of many main way of life and journey content material creators who makes use of a wheelchair. Her content material, underneath the moniker of @thejourneyofabravewoman, reaches tens of millions of viewers each month and has offered a cushty life for her and her daughter.  

Amongst her many accomplishments, she has traveled to all seven wonders of the world, is the primary Latina wheelchair consumer to summit Mt. Kilimanjaro, and has gained quite a few awards for her content material, together with an Emmy. As a lot as she enjoys being a creator, she values her advocacy work much more. 

“What impressed me to create content material was the will to empower others, share various views and present that everybody, irrespective of their circumstances, has a invaluable story to inform,” she says. 

Marañon’s story as a wheelchair consumer started when was paralyzed in a automobile accident at age 20 in 2002. Her story as a content material creator began in 2014 when she was finding out communications at Austin Peay State College. Her professor inspired her to provide you with a model identify to market herself. She immediately knew what to decide on. 

“I all the time wished to make a e book and name it, ‘The Journey of a Courageous Lady,’” she says. “I’ve all the time thought of myself untamed and courageous. Whether or not it’s touring internationally alone or succeeding as a single mother, I simply go and do it. You must be fearless, particularly with a incapacity. Even when one thing unhealthy occurs, I’ll all the time be taught from that.” 

She began posting on Instagram in 2017. Her preliminary content material largely centered on way of life manufacturers, however she slowly shifted to creating extra journey content material as she noticed the necessity and need for extra accessibility data. Whereas she often companions with journey manufacturers and locations and has her lodging comped, she often foots the invoice herself. “It’s crucial to remain true to myself and never simply promote myself as a result of they pay me a examine,” she says. “Accessible journey isn’t low cost, and it’s vital to indicate individuals how I can journey with out breaking the financial institution.” 

Between locations, model occasions and different public alternatives, Marañon is continually on the go. Retaining forward of the demand for content material is essential. 

“I’ve a lot content material uploaded that folks haven’t even seen on social media,” she says. “So if one thing occurred to me for a yr and I can’t work or I can’t journey, I’ve sufficient all prepared.” 

Marañon nonetheless finds time to have interaction together with her on-line followers and says she has been lucky to have a largely constructive and supportive neighborhood. “I need to be surrounded by individuals that actually like my work and actually love who Marcela, is” she says. “I don’t care if I solely have 10 followers, so long as these 10 followers want me properly, as a result of that’s good power for me.” 

Marañon attracts extra assist from her college-age daughter and credit being a disabled mother with getting her the place she is at the moment. 

“Being a disabled mother helped me to only get up each morning, breathe in, and be appreciative of what I’ve — my daughter and my well being. Each time I awakened and I felt wholesome, I used to be capable of go exterior and work and do the issues that I wished to do and deal with my daughter.” 

5 years of heavy touring have taken a toll on Marañon’s physique, however she’s not able to retire the bags simply but. She didn’t need to reveal precisely what she has deliberate however mentioned she is trying ahead to spending extra time in Europe and upping her advocacy involvement. 

“I’ve to pay my payments,” she says, “however I’m not determined anymore to get anyone’s consideration or to attempt to get a trophy or one thing like that. I really feel like I’ve matured and I’m a spot in my life the place I do what I need to do. No one’s telling me what to do.”