Sailor Moon Made Me a Better Professional
How this classic magical girl series let me be myself and a professional all at once.
This year marks the 30th anniversary of the classic magical girl series, Sailor Moon. Fans can celebrate this incredible milestone through multiple collaborations and special events. As I wondered if I was ever going to financially recover from buying up all this new merchandise, I realized I’m almost 30, a full-time marketer, and still geeking out over Sailor Moon the same way I did as a child. I remember watching it every day after school and begging my mom to buy me a Sailor Jupiter doll because she was my favorite. Every time I painted my nails, I pretended I was going through the beginning stages of my transformation sequence and yearned to have a magical compact mirror in my possession.
The story of Sailor Moon is simple: Usagi Tsukino aka Sailor Moon and her friends are Sailor Guardians who must protect the world from destruction. One of the reasons this series appealed to me was that there weren’t that many male characters compared to other animated series I watched. What really stood out to me was that when our protagonists weren’t fighting intergalactic baddies named after crystals, they were dealing with the challenges and obstacles that come with being a teenage girl. Usagi and her friends are middle schoolers who smile, laugh, and cry just like the other girls their age. They still have to go to school, study, and worry about school entrance exams. And the best thing is that who they are while in their sailor uniform and who they are in their school uniform are never two different people. The brave guardian and teenage schoolgirl exist at the same time.
In college, I was a business major and during my four years there, it was clear that who you were as a professional had to be almost devoid of all personality. When I looked at guides that showed you what to wear and what not to wear in a professional setting, I couldn’t help but notice how ugly it all looked. Every woman had the same hair and some variation of a suit. If they weren’t slacks, they were pencil skirts, and all in the same drab and muted neutral tones. Every day, we are faced with the struggle to keep our personal lives and our professional lives separate. It’s been repeated to me multiple times, “Keep your personal life and work separate.”, and while I understand the sentiment, I’ve realized it’s turned who we are as a professional into an absolute bore. When I think of what a professional is, I think of dull, ill-fitting suits, boring 90’s politician haircuts, and shame upon giving a “limp fish” handshake.
Apparel aside, the other major aspect of professionalism that has always rubbed me the wrong way was the writing style. Writing as a professional made me feel like I had to write something simple in a complex manner to sound intelligent and educated. For example, if I wanted to say “Because of”, I’d end up writing “Due to the fact” and I’d use “Utilized” instead of “Used”. Throw in the dry dialogue during interviews and networking events, and I was ready to give up my professional life. Of course, this kind of language does have its place like in legal spaces, but I wanted to break into a creative space with my writing and no one ever told me that I could break all the grammar rules as long as I had amazing work.
A few years ago, I worked at the Disneyland Resort in Anaheim, CA. I loved working at the resort and remember my time there fondly. However, when it came to advancing in my department, I was struggling and soon enough it would become clear to me why. In the summer of 2016, I let my manager know I wanted to discuss moving up in the department and she let me know that I wouldn’t be a good fit at the moment. She said I had “too much presence”. I was taken aback and decided to try something out. For the next few weeks, I removed every bit of my personality from my “professional” self. I walked into the office, did my job, and went home. I didn’t chat it up with my coworkers during our breaks or have that typical pep in my step. Lo and behold. My manager pulled me to the side to tell me she was seeing my improvement and that this was what I needed to do to get to where I wanted to be. I was livid. She didn’t want to promote ME. She wanted to promote the shell of the person I was. A couple of months later, I quit.
I spent the next few years trying to figure myself out. And in that time, I binged the original 90’s Sailor Moon series and the new Sailor Moon Crystal series that had been released in 2014 at least twice. I was nursing the wounds of having left my dream job and not knowing what to do with my business degree. And while there was plenty to figure out, one thing was for sure: I would never let “professionalism” erase who I was. And this is what I learned from Usagi and her friends.
Showing emotion does not make you any less of a professional
Usagi, while being a brave girl most times, is the biggest ball of emotion in not only the Juban District, but possibly all of Japan. And I can relate to crying at the drop of a hat, but also to feeling extreme joy and elation. After I left Disney, I realized that it’s okay to show your emotions at work because it allows us to build relationships with other professionals. I’ve bonded with other people both in and outside of my field through shared experiences. And at the core of these experiences is a distinct emotion like anger, happiness, or embarrassment. The situations you encounter in your professional daily life will cause you to feel emotional, but that’s because you’re a human, so don’t feel the need to act like a robot because you shouldn’t have to.
You don’t need to be boring and stiff
My work area at home and in the office is in the process of becoming the cutest, pinkest, and girliest workspaces. I bought a Sailor Moon mechanical keyboard, a mouse pad, and have a baby pink mouse. My desktop wallpapers are also Sailor Moon and will be covering everything in the cutest shade of pink. I love cute and pink things and won’t let the idea of professionalism force me to hide it. Who cares if I keep all my colorful pens in a pink kitten pencil case if my notes are top tier? Who cares if my nails are always a pastel shade of polish and my socks have ears on them? This is who I am and will be incorporating it into my personal brand once I get that going. And this is what you should do too. I know it sounds cheesy, but you should never change who you are to fit anyone else’s mold.
You don’t need to act like a man to be taken seriously
We’ve all heard about disgraced Theranos CEO Elizabeth Holmes’ strange habit of never blinking and deepening her voice to get taken seriously, but you don’t have to do that. I’ve seen a lot of posts floating around on LinkedIn saying that women should do certain things because men do them. And while I get the sentiment, it’s a hard no from me. We shouldn’t aim to be like men to see be seen as strong. The Sailor Guardians never shed their femininity to be seen as strong people. And while one of the Guardians, Sailor Uranus, dressed in traditionally masculine clothing, this is who she was and she wasn’t doing it to look tough for anyone. The choice to dress feminine should only be up to you, and not be dependent on whether it’s seen as professional or not.
You can be kind and friendly and still succeed
The corporate world can be highly competitive and encourages you to be “cut-throat” and ruthless. But I don’t think it needs to be that way. In true Shojo fashion, it’s really the power of friendship that allows the Sailor Guardians to succeed in saving the world repeatedly. They do their best to remain kind. Being kind doesn’t mean you have to be submissive, so I do want to make that clear. Just don’t be mean, don’t be exploitative, and don’t undermine anyone to get ahead. Other people’s wins are not your losses. You don’t need to see other people who do what you do as a threat. I’ve gotten to know other copywriters on Twitter and feel we’re more than just “connections” I made through “networking”. I genuinely love being in the same space as other writers. If you don’t want to make friends, just be friendly. Just be kind.
Your work self and play self are the same person
While the Sailor Guardians physically transform into their color-coded sailor uniforms, they don’t become someone else. They’re still teenage girls who have their own lives, but happen to be tasked with saving the world. The same goes for you. You don’t need to separate who you are at work, and who you are at home. You don’t necessarily need to tell your coworkers your whole life story, but don’t be afraid to be who you are around them. Whether you’re at a networking event, an interview, or an internal meeting, people want to talk to people. Not an alter ego that only exists to adhere to some arbitrary rules. I won’t stress myself out with memorizing perfectly scripted lines for an interview or making sure that I don’t have a single wrinkle on my perfect pantsuit for a meeting. I want the people I meet in a “professional” setting to know who I really am. I want them to see me for me, and not just what I know how to do. My best work happens when I combine what I do for a living, writing, and the life experiences that are unique to me. And I’m sure the same can be said about you.
There is still so much to be said about why the idea of “professionalism” needs to die, but being forced to be someone you’re not just because of work sums it up nicely. Seeing black women being called “unprofessional” for wearing their natural hair, makes me livid and brings me back to my school days where black girls were scolded for being “disruptive” because of the beads or barrettes in their hair. None of us ever cared or got distracted by them, but the teachers still had a lot to say about it. There’s always a central lesson that the Sailor Guardians learn in each episode, but the heart of the series always revolved around being kind, being friendly, and being yourself. So next time you feel like you need to turn into your “professional” persona, think about what that really means and how you can still be yourself while being in work mode.
