73. Reclaiming Joy and Aliveness in Midlife: Laura Baginski on the Dance Party Revolution That's Bringing Women Home to Themselves

There is a reason grown women are crying on dance floors across America — and it is not because the DJ played a sad song. It is because they have finally, finally, let themselves feel free. Laura Baginski is the co-founder of Early Birds Club: a dance party phenomenon for midlife women and gender-expansive folks that started at a Chicago dive bar in 2024 and has since expanded to 45 cities nationwide. It starts at 6pm, ends at 10pm, plays four hours of straight-up bangers from the 80s, 90s, and 2000s, and has been covered by the New York Times, NPR, The Guardian, ABC Nightline, and AARP Magazine. The idea was born at a 30th high school reunion — co-founded by a woman fighting stage four cancer who absolutely refused to slow down.

WHAT YOU WILL HEAR IN THIS EPISODE

🔥 The full origin story of Early Birds Club — born at a 30th high school reunion, built by two women who refused to wait for the right time

🔥 The story of Susie: co-founder, force of nature, and the reason thousands of women per night are dancing their way back to themselves

🔥 Why a four-hour dance party does what years of wellness culture, therapy, and self-help couldn't touch

🔥 What it means to leave all your fucks at the door and meet the rawest, most alive version of yourself again

🔥 How 700 women in a room together create a kind of magic that makes you believe you could move mountains

🔥 The honest confession about seeing other women as competition — and what midlife taught her instead

GUEST BIO

Laura Baginski is the co-founder of Early Birds Club, the women's dance party movement that went from a dive bar back room in Chicago to 45 cities across the country in under two years. Before Early Birds Club, Laura spent twelve years as a magazine editor, then pivoted into nonprofit marketing before COVID cracked her open and she gave herself permission to just figure out who she was and what she actually wanted. The answer turned out to be: more music, more joy, more women dancing together until 10pm. She lives in Chicago and is still coming home sweaty.

LINKS MENTIONED

✨ Early Birds Club: [https://early-birds.club/]

✨ Follow Early Birds Club on Instagram: [@earlybirds_club]

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