Who says you can’t do both?

Lauren LoGrasso is a self-declared multi-passionate creative — she spends her days as an executive producer of some of the best podcasts at Cadence 13 including The Goop Podcast and Lauren Conrad’s Asking for A Friend, hosts her own podcast “Unleash Your Inner Creative” and also dedicates her time to another passion: making music.

“It’s a tremendous amount of focus and work and you don’t have time to get tired because when you finish up one job, you have to go right into the next and make time for both,” the 31-year-old tells PEOPLE. “And I also say, if I had endured some of the things that I went through in my podcasting career in my music career, I don’t know that I would have survived it.”

On Friday, the Michigan State alum dropped her second-ever single “Rise” — an empowering track that speaks on gaslighting and dealing with a toxic partner and relationship.

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“Any time I said the truth, I was punished for how I felt,” she says of the relationship that inspired the song. “Rise is an anthem to myself for when I was in that period of my life. It’s going to get better and you’re going to be okay because you’re strong.”

LoGrasso started songwriting at 23, and thanks to that passion, she found a new way to express her emotions and tell her story in her own way.

“I couldn’t have made it through difficult situations, in my relationships, in the industry, had I not had this way of channeling that energy and that pain,” she says.

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“I can literally start crying talking about it because growing up I never thought I could write music,” she adds. “I thought the only thing I’d ever get to do is interpret other people’s songs. Music has saved my life.”

Growing up, it was lyrics that really connected her to music, and now being able to do the same for other people gives her hope and inspiration.

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“I would look up these lyrics and circle them and be like ‘My God, somebody understands me,’” she says. “And the fact that I get to do that to somebody else is the greatest honor I’ve ever known in my entire life.”

After a slew of live performances at local Los Angeles venues, LoGrasso dropped her first single, “Road to Glory,” in November. But her original move to Hollywood wasn’t for singing — rather, it was for acting.

“Acting really started breaking my heart because so much of your fate is in somebody else’s hands,” she explains.

Her move from Michigan to L.A. may have been for acting, but that impulsive move is something she doesn’t regret. Now, LoGrasso has developed a “loving relationship” with music that she wouldn’t change for anything.

“I did it without thinking,” she says of moving to Los Angeles. “Because if you think about it, you’ll never do it.”

LoGrasso’s single “Rise” is out now.



Source: People.com (https://people.com/music/lauren-lograsso-new-song-rise/)