About Leticia V. Garay, MBA

Recovering perfectionist. First-gen trailblazer & survivor. Strategy nerd with a splash of sass.

Hi, I’m Leticia — a mental health blogger 🧠, marketing ops wannabe 📊, and (sometimes) proud Latina in healing ✨.

I spent a decade climbing the higher ed ladder 📈—leading cross-collaborative projects, turning chaotic processes into streamlined systems, and collecting new assignments like Girl Scout badges.

But behind the polished résumé? Alice falling into Wonderland 🕳️🐇.

After six years of cheering students on from the sidelines, I realized something was missing — me on the other side of a big dream. While encouraging others to invest in their futures, I kept shelving my own: finishing a graduate degree 🎓 and convincing myself that settling was “good enough” (thanks, imposter syndrome).

Eventually, I got honest, quit the excuses, and dove in. Becoming both a full-time employee and MBA student wasn’t easy and it quickly strained an already eroding 10-year on-off relationship, ultimately ripped apart by rape and betrayal.

But like many women, I gaslit myself about that rape and my participation in it. What I had suspected was burnout before grad school became a spark within the dumpster fire that consumed my identity, thoughts, and self-belief. Still, like many first-generation professionals, I thought that if I could push through every late night, awkward Zoom, and imposter-syndrome-filled moment, it would be worth it. And in many ways, it was. That degree wasn’t just a piece of paper — it was a reclamation. (And yes, I have the three graduation awards 🏅 to prove it.)

But once the confetti settled, high-functioning depression, burnout and an identity crisis pushed through front and center. Life forced me to hit pause ⏸️- because I couldn’t just bury myself under tasks anymore. That unraveling? It became the beginning of this blog.

Now, I write about C-PTSD, burnout, career pivots as a first-generation Latina and the messy, colorful process of becoming myself again 🎨. My blog blends personal storytelling with the same strategy lens I use in my work — because recovery deserves intention, and Latina healing deserves visibility.

I earned my MBA in Strategy & Marketing from UC Davis 💼, where I focused on bridging human-centered storytelling with data-driven decisions — and yes, I still color-code my spreadsheets 🖍️.

By day, I brainstorm of how to streamline marketing, ops and build better workflows. By night, I write to remind you (and me): you’re not broken — you’re becoming 💫.

Welcome to Leticia Living in Color.

Let’s stop performing and start transforming.

P.S. Aren’t I glowing? A million thanks for my personal paparazzi, Eddie Monix. Check out his work at saborsoul.com.