Today we’d like to introduce you to Courtney Blanton.
Hi Courtney, thanks for sharing your story with us. To start, maybe you can tell our readers some of your backstory.
I am an OG Austinite. Born and raised. I went to UT for journalism/PR, then worked in San Francisco at a PR tech company at the top of the tech boom from ’98-’00. The crazy parties, the glitz and glamour. I got to see it all. I have lots of stories. So many tech stars rising to fame becoming overnight millionaires, then falling from grace in just one year. It was a pretty crazy time. When the parties died and the tech movement busted in 2001, I moved to NYC not knowing what lay in my path, 9-11.
Only three months in, I found myself in the middle of an explosion of heartbreak and fear amongst every single person that I walked by on the streets of New York City that day, September 11, 2001. The city, our freedom was taken from us in an instant. The blanket of ashes fell on the city like the sadness that fell over our hearts. People that didn’t know each other hugged on the streets for no reason and consoled each other. We all cried together. We were all human together for several months after. Gathering together for no reason and every reason. It was the MOST surreal event that I have ever experienced in my whole life and still is to this day.
During that I time, I started working for a restaurant PR firm. I worked with chefs like Bobby Flay, Sara Moulton and Laurence Tourendale. I ate my way through the most exquisite restaurants for free and became a true foodie. After a couple of years and a realization that life can be taken from you in an instant, I found that I was struggling with PR. It was not for me.
Searching, thinking I knew that I needed something much more creative and fulfilling. I applied to Parsons not thinking that I would get in. The Gods smiled on me and I found myself working day and night on a second degree in Interior Design. Parsons has no room for slouches. They literally work you day and night. I learned more in 2 1/2 years than I had in my young life. Upon graduation, I started working with Victoria Hagan. I left after two years to take a job in Los Angeles with Peter Dunham. Both experiences were amazing. In 2009, I decided to start my own design firm, Courtney Blanton Interiors.
Since 2009, I have had a bustling Interior Design career that I love and never looked back.
While at Parsons, I studied abroad in Paris for a semester. We came face to face with the architecture and furniture some of the true historical greats like Mies Van der Rohe and Le Courbusier. I found myself obsessed to say the least with the history of furniture. Since that day, I have collected and become consumed.
I go back to this time because it takes me to the current part of my story, what’s happening now, what makes me the happiest and what I want to do when I grow up :). If you could do anything what would that be? If you sat down with your true self, what brings you harmony with your soul and with the Universe? Mine is the aforementioned semester in Paris, the history, the collecting and travel.
Currently, I have pivoted. I know you hear that a lot these days. No, I’m serious. I am doing what I could do if I could do anything. I am no longer taking Interior Design clients and I have started selling my found beautiful, historical pieces. I am traveling. I am a scavenger. I am happy. Watch out for what’s coming next!
Can you talk to us a bit about the challenges and lessons you’ve learned along the way. Looking back would you say it’s been easy or smooth in retrospect?
I am the co-founder of the Hi How Are You Project along with my husband, Tom Gimbel. Our mission is to stop people from struggling in silence with mental health issues and obliterate the unforgiving social stigma. Mental illness affects the lives of more than a billion people around the globe. This is my personal story and journey as well. The impact of my mental health issues nearly killed me. Since college, my depression and anxiety has progressed and contributed to a thyroid condition, IBS, suicidal thoughts and more. Like most of us, I have had the pressure of having to always be ‘on’. Often, what I and others aspire to present to everyone else is nowhere near the reality of what is actually going on internally.
In college, I experienced my first bout with severe depression. My parents saw me as the golden child. I desperately wanted my friends to think that I was “normal.” NO ONE could know that I received help from a counselor that prescribed me an antidepressant. It was then that I began my journey of shame and hiding which started in the form of an Advil bottle filled with Prozac hidden in my lower dresser drawer. I hid from the world and continued on a path of trying to control the uncontrollable. I found myself yo-yoing on and off anti-depressants. I threw bulimia into the mix, sprinkled with drugs and alcohol to stop the incessant negative thinking, which would springboard into suicidal thoughts and more self-loathing.
I was an imposter. I could barely look myself in the mirror. Everyone else was “normal” and in my experience was— I was not. Something was wrong with me.
In my desperation over the years, I have tried exercise, sobriety, eating healthy, meditation, supplements, anti-depressants, no anti-depressants and on and on. Nothing truly worked, but I silently managed. I struggled and somehow convinced everyone that I was normal because I was somehow successful.
After many crash landings, I tried a self-expression class that a friend turned me onto. To get breakthrough results you had to purge your deepest secrets that held you back from being fully self-expressed. With my heart in my throat, I waited for the class to end.
I approached the teacher, hesitated, and then blurted out, “I take anti-depressants and no one knows.”
“Well that sounded stupid,” I thought “and no need to mention the really dark, ugly parts.” In a calming voice he asked, “Would you wear a cast if your leg was broken?”
“Yeah, of course,” I said.
“What if you had a heart condition and your doctor informed you that you needed to take medication – would you take it AND would you tell others?” he asked.
“Well, yes. I suppose I would,” I said.
Then, he said something that was so simple yet so powerful. “Isn’t your body just doing something chemically and you take medication for it?”
“Yes,” I said dumbfounded. It seemed so simple.
He left me with a mission. “Now, share your story with anyone who will listen.”
The gift of that conversation freed me from my self-imposed prison. I shared my story with my parents and friends who were shocked to learn that I had struggled all that time. I continued to share with others. Every time I told my story, my freedom and power grew. More importantly, I liberated others to open up and tell their own story and find their own freedom.
This is the mission of the “Hi, How Are You Project.”
Thanks – so what else should our readers know about your work and what you’re currently focused on?
I know that I have forwarded the motion of the Mental Health Movement. My proudest moments have been those shared with others talking and listening about mental health whether it be our own or our loved ones. Sharing stories with others frees you from your own prison and helps you and others know that you are not alone in this world. We all struggle.
What we have learned from professionals since starting the Hi How Are You Project is that the most important thing to do for someone who is struggling is to LISTEN and actually hear what that person is saying. People and animals need to be heard. Period. Sometimes that means repeating back to them what they just said to you. “I can hear that you are really struggling. That must be hard for you.” You do not need to say much. You don’t need to be a professional counselor to simply LISTEN.
How do you think about happiness?
Everything. A child smiling. Being stuck in traffic/pausing. My family. My friends. My life. Living. Breathing. Nature. Design. History. The differences and amazingness in everyone and everything.
Contact Info:
- Email: cb@courtneyblanton.com
- Website: theroyalturkey.com, cbistudio.com, hihowareyou.org
- Instagram: theroyalturkey.atx, cbistudio
- Twitter: @hihowareyouproj
- Youtube: Hi, How Are You Project
Image Credits
Leah Muse and Sophie Epton
