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You Were Never Meant to Be Just One Thing · The Uplifters

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1:20
SPEAKER_03: Hey, Uplifters.
1:21
SPEAKER_03: Welcome back.
1:21
SPEAKER_03: I'm Aransas Savas and I've spent 20 years at the intersection
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SPEAKER_03: of behavior change research and coaching, helping women do big, brave things.
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SPEAKER_03: I hear a version of the same story constantly from women who spent their 20s
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SPEAKER_03: and 30s climbing every ladder they were handed,
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SPEAKER_03: hitting every metric they were given,
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SPEAKER_03: earning every credential they were asked to earn.
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SPEAKER_03: And then somewhere in midlife,
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SPEAKER_03: they stop and ask, wait, Why does it feel like the latter never ends?
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SPEAKER_03: Research into midlife transitions tells us why that question gets louder in midlife.
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SPEAKER_03: We start to develop what's called identity certainty.
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SPEAKER_03: So we know ourselves more clearly and then we start demanding a life
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SPEAKER_03: that actually reflects who we truly are.
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SPEAKER_03: My guest today is Faye McRae.
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SPEAKER_03: She spent nearly a decade in federal law.
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SPEAKER_03: She had all the credentials, three kids, a mortgage.
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SPEAKER_03: And literally a judge warning her not to leave her job because it would be career suicide.
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SPEAKER_03: She left anyway.
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SPEAKER_03: And within five years, she tripled her salary and built something that was entirely hers.
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SPEAKER_03: Today, she's the founder and CEO of Culture and Quill.
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SPEAKER_03: She's the chief communications officer at the National Conference of Bar Examiners,
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SPEAKER_03: a speaker at South by Southwest and Aspen Ideas at TEDx,
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SPEAKER_03: where she gave this really beautiful talk called,
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SPEAKER_03: You Were Never Meant to Be Just One Thing.
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SPEAKER_03: Her forthcoming book, More Than Your Job, comes out next year.
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SPEAKER_03: Faye was nominated by the brilliant Drea Barnes.
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SPEAKER_03: We're going to talk today about how to expand your identity beyond your career
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SPEAKER_03: and why that is both harder and more urgent in midlife.
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SPEAKER_03: I'm so excited to have you with us today, Faye.
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SPEAKER_03: Thanks for joining us.
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SPEAKER_00: Thank you.
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SPEAKER_00: Thank you for having me.
3:27
SPEAKER_00: I'm going to be floating from that read of my bio like for the rest of the day.
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SPEAKER_00: I was like, who is that girl?
3:32
SPEAKER_00: Thank you.
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SPEAKER_00: She's amazing.
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SPEAKER_03: Isn't that the wildest, coolest thing?
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SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
3:37
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
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SPEAKER_03: Like, but we don't get to hear that very often.
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SPEAKER_03: And I think we get so trapped in the day to day and the, I applied for this and didn't get it.
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SPEAKER_03: And the little moments that we don't have opportunities to zoom out.
3:53
SPEAKER_03: So maybe like we just give that assignment to every listener.
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SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
3:57
SPEAKER_03: Go like write the career retrospective from having a
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SPEAKER_00: friend do it.
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SPEAKER_00: Like I think that even, you know?
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SPEAKER_03: Yes.
4:04
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
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SPEAKER_03: And then go update your LinkedIn because it's probably underselling you.
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SPEAKER_02: Yes.
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SPEAKER_03: So, I mean, that alone could be our episode, but let's keep going.
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SPEAKER_03: So take us back to that first major pivot,
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SPEAKER_03: what was happening in your life and in your brain that you were like, wait, like,
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SPEAKER_03: did all this education,
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SPEAKER_03: all this external permission to hold this place in federal law
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SPEAKER_03: And then you said, you started to question why.
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SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah.
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SPEAKER_00: You know, it's funny.
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SPEAKER_00: I always describe that pivot as almost like a decade-long pivot just
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SPEAKER_00: because I feel like the seeds were planted a lot earlier than they began to sort
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SPEAKER_00: of take root.
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SPEAKER_00: And for me, it was going through that first furlough with the federal government.
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SPEAKER_00: And I talk a little bit about it in my TED Talk because up until that point,
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SPEAKER_00: federal work had seemed like the epitome of stability for me.
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SPEAKER_00: I thought, You get a federal job, you can stay there as long as you want.
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SPEAKER_00: I mean, you know, it just felt like there was nothing rocking that.
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SPEAKER_00: And very,
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SPEAKER_00: I want to say within,
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SPEAKER_00: goodness,
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SPEAKER_00: five years of me into that career,
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SPEAKER_00: we had our first furlough,
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SPEAKER_00: which again, nowadays people are like, what, you were surprised by this?
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SPEAKER_00: But up until that point, we had not experienced something like that within federal employment.
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SPEAKER_00: And we were all just sent home.
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SPEAKER_00: And it was like, you get your check when you get your check, you may not get it.
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SPEAKER_00: You know, it was just a very...
5:33
SPEAKER_00: Right.
5:33
SPEAKER_00: Right.
5:34
SPEAKER_00: Right.
5:34
SPEAKER_00: Right.
5:43
SPEAKER_00: And, you know,
5:43
SPEAKER_00: just because of how I was raised,
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SPEAKER_00: I had spent so much time working really hard to fit in those boxes,
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SPEAKER_00: you know, to kind of show up in those places as who people needed me to be.
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SPEAKER_00: And there were other sides of myself that I loved and adored,
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SPEAKER_00: you know,
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SPEAKER_00: prior to entering those roles,
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SPEAKER_00: but there was no room for them in this kind of world that I had sort of created
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SPEAKER_00: for myself.
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SPEAKER_00: So what that furlough did was give me permission to kind of put my head up
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SPEAKER_00: a little bit and say, oh, you Maybe I should think about these other things.
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SPEAKER_00: Maybe there's nothing that's the realistic choice or the stable choice.
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SPEAKER_00: Maybe there are just choices that you put your all into.
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SPEAKER_00: So I would say that was the beginning of that tip for me.
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SPEAKER_00: That's when I started looking around.
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SPEAKER_00: That's when I started To meet people who were outside of my industry
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SPEAKER_00: and not just bluff it off as, oh,
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SPEAKER_00: this is a hobby or this is kind of a childish thing that I do in writing
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SPEAKER_00: or things like that.
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SPEAKER_00: I started to take these other parts of myself seriously.
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SPEAKER_00: So I would say that was kind of the moment for me.
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SPEAKER_00: That was the impetus of, wait a minute, let me think about this a little bit more deeply.
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SPEAKER_03: I love that point.
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SPEAKER_03: Now, I think what happens for so many of us when we...
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SPEAKER_03: Start to have those questions and we think, did I do the right thing?
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SPEAKER_03: Am I on the right path?
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SPEAKER_03: We get a bit of a sunk cost fallacy.
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SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
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SPEAKER_03: And we say, well, I've already put all this energy in here.
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SPEAKER_03: It's too late for me to pivot.
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SPEAKER_03: Did you have any of those thoughts or fears?
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SPEAKER_03: Oh, absolutely.
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SPEAKER_00: And not only did I have them, a lot of people around me had them.
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SPEAKER_00: I know you'd mentioned the judge, my family.
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SPEAKER_00: I was the first lawyer in my family.
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SPEAKER_00: So it was a huge deal that I was holding this role in this title and this idea
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SPEAKER_00: of me walking away from something that I had worked so hard for,
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SPEAKER_00: but that had made my family so proud.
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SPEAKER_00: Can we still call you our lawyer?
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SPEAKER_00: You know, or like, Are we still able to do these things?
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SPEAKER_00: I mean, it was terrifying to sort of face that.
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SPEAKER_00: And to your point, again, you invest so much.
7:37
SPEAKER_00: And I think I was still paying my loans back from law school.
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SPEAKER_00: So the idea of me walking away from something that meaningful and significant,
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SPEAKER_00: you know, felt like, is this now going to be a waste?
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SPEAKER_00: And I think,
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SPEAKER_00: and I know I should say what I ultimately told myself is that there are no wastes,
7:55
SPEAKER_00: right?
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SPEAKER_00: Like I wouldn't have ended up in the places that I've ended up for,
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SPEAKER_00: but for those years of my career.
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SPEAKER_00: I'm practicing law and sort of the weight that it gave me.
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SPEAKER_00: So it all made sense in the end.
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SPEAKER_00: None of it was a waste.
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SPEAKER_00: I mean, even contributing to where I am now is just sort of wild.
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SPEAKER_00: But yeah, in it, it was a lot.
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SPEAKER_03: I hear in that question, do we still get to call you our lawyer?
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SPEAKER_03: There's a concept called hypervisibility.
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SPEAKER_03: Are you familiar with that?
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SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah.
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SPEAKER_03: And this idea that like you're carrying then the expectations of your entire community.
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SPEAKER_03: So how did you help them see that, oh no, this is not Faye shrinking.
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SPEAKER_03: This is Faye expanding.
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SPEAKER_03: Yes, I am still your lawyer and I'm so much more.
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SPEAKER_00: Yeah, you know,
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SPEAKER_00: I think the people who were open to being convinced of
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SPEAKER_00: that were convinced pretty quickly.
8:47
SPEAKER_00: And the people who were still stuck on the titles of it all,
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SPEAKER_00: I kind of had to learn that they didn't need to come along to the ride, you know.
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SPEAKER_00: Like, I think more than anything, I needed to be convinced.
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SPEAKER_00: And I needed to feel of value, you know, without the title, you know.
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SPEAKER_00: I mean, there are people, I mean, I still, you know, I'm still licensed in New York.
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SPEAKER_00: I still kind of pay my bar dues.
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SPEAKER_00: I always say I keep my license around just in case somebody gets in trouble
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SPEAKER_00: that I know in New York.
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SPEAKER_00: But I had to be okay also just relinquishing the parts of the title that were tied
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SPEAKER_00: to my identity, you know?
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SPEAKER_00: And like I said,
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SPEAKER_00: I think the people that I wanted to come along for the ride,
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SPEAKER_00: who understood me, understood that process.
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SPEAKER_00: And the people who didn't, I kind of had to just sort of believe where they were, right?
9:31
SPEAKER_00: You know, even just mentally, like this opinion doesn't really matter as much to me.
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SPEAKER_00: Like my own happiness and my wholeness matters more.
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SPEAKER_00: You know, that what you think this means for you and me.
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SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
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SPEAKER_03: I think at the core of this, this is a question about extrinsic and intrinsic validation.
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SPEAKER_03: A hundred percent.
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SPEAKER_03: And meaning.
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SPEAKER_03: And so, like,
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SPEAKER_03: were there moments in there where you were like,
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SPEAKER_03: who am I without being fancy pants lawyer?
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SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
10:06
SPEAKER_00: Yes.
10:07
SPEAKER_00: And it's so funny.
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SPEAKER_00: I haven't thought about this in years, but I was having it.
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SPEAKER_00: It was with my husband.
10:11
SPEAKER_00: We were at some like family event in the South.
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SPEAKER_00: And I remember it was a young woman in his family who was thinking about going to law school.
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SPEAKER_00: And I just so happened to marry into a family full of lawyers,
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SPEAKER_00: like my mother-in-law, father-in-law, my sister-in-law.
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SPEAKER_00: And I met my husband in law school.
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SPEAKER_00: So he was talking to her at the time.
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SPEAKER_00: I think it was like getting food and a plate.
10:29
SPEAKER_00: And, you know, he said, you're about to kind of go on this journey.
10:33
SPEAKER_00: You should talk to my mother and my sister about becoming a lawyer.
10:36
SPEAKER_00: And it was kind of shortly after I had taken this lead.
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SPEAKER_00: I remember feeling like, well, why didn't you say me?
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SPEAKER_00: You know, I practiced law.
10:43
SPEAKER_00: I was there.
10:44
SPEAKER_00: And I remember saying to him later, like, why didn't you think about me?
10:47
SPEAKER_00: And he was like, I wasn't, you know, getting tripped on his words.
10:50
SPEAKER_00: My poor husband.
10:50
SPEAKER_02: I just was answering the question and you're doing this.
10:54
SPEAKER_00: You know, but I remember feeling like so like, oh, like that this didn't matter.
10:59
SPEAKER_00: I did this for 10 years.
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SPEAKER_00: I'm still, why wouldn't you tell, do you not think I was successful at it?
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SPEAKER_00: It kind of got all these things in my brain.
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SPEAKER_00: Thankfully, that hasn't happened since.
11:09
SPEAKER_00: But I think in that moment, that was a sign of I was still very much.
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SPEAKER_00: Unsure, right, about kind of what that worth and value was.
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SPEAKER_00: And, you know, I wasn't litigating.
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SPEAKER_00: I mean, my mother-in-law and sister-in-law were in a better position to talk to her about it.
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SPEAKER_00: But it's hard.
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SPEAKER_00: There's a lot of, like,
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SPEAKER_00: internal work,
11:27
SPEAKER_00: right, that goes into you have to convince yourself, I should say, first.
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SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
11:32
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
11:32
SPEAKER_03: How do you do that?
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SPEAKER_00: I mean, I would say a lot of it was was getting quiet, you know, with sort of what I wanted.
11:38
SPEAKER_00: Like there was a difference for me between the external validation and the internal validation.
11:44
SPEAKER_00: I was having a time of my life when I first started like my little trickling into journalism.
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SPEAKER_00: I was still working full time as an attorney,
11:53
SPEAKER_00: but my kind of gateway was writing movie and TV and film reviews.
11:57
SPEAKER_00: Right.
11:57
SPEAKER_00: Oh my gosh, I would be going while I was writing.
12:00
SPEAKER_00: Like I was just loving those moments of being able to do that.
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SPEAKER_00: I was meeting people that I found fascinating and interesting.
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SPEAKER_00: It was like this whole other world was opening up in front of me.
12:10
SPEAKER_00: And I had never really allowed myself to entertain the possibility of journalism
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SPEAKER_00: because the lawyer title became so impressive so quickly.
12:17
SPEAKER_00: The minute I said I wanted to be a lawyer, it was...
12:20
SPEAKER_00: She's going to be a lawyer.
12:21
SPEAKER_00: She's going to be all these things for the family.
12:23
SPEAKER_00: So I didn't think a lot about what this kind
12:25
SPEAKER_00: of writing journalism pathway could take me at the time.
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SPEAKER_00: So when I started doing it as an adult, it was just so much fun.
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SPEAKER_00: You know, I was having a blast.
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SPEAKER_00: So I had to sit with the fact that like, you know, what is it that I'm losing here?
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SPEAKER_00: Because I feel like I'm losing so much, right, from exploring these sides of myself.
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SPEAKER_00: But it was,
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SPEAKER_00: you know,
12:43
SPEAKER_00: I think like anything, right,
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SPEAKER_00: it requires the introspection and the willingness to go there with yourself,
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SPEAKER_00: to really start to think about it.
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SPEAKER_00: One of the things I love about writing and the writing process is it's extremely cathartic.
12:55
SPEAKER_00: You know, you are thinking about, why do I feel this way?
12:57
SPEAKER_00: Why does this person feel this way?
12:59
SPEAKER_00: You know,
13:00
SPEAKER_00: so I think being able to sort of interrogate that thought process was a long part
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SPEAKER_00: of it.
13:05
SPEAKER_00: And leading into my second pivot even,
13:08
SPEAKER_00: you know,
13:08
SPEAKER_00: I feel like that comfort with myself and change,
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SPEAKER_00: It's an ever kind of evolving process,
13:14
SPEAKER_00: but certainly a lot better now,
13:16
SPEAKER_00: sort of, you know, in my 40s than it was like in my 20s and 30s.
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SPEAKER_00: You know, it just it feels like I'm being honest with myself.
13:23
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, I think this idea of like getting quiet with ourselves can feel
13:27
SPEAKER_03: a little like amorphous, a little like what?
13:31
SPEAKER_03: And so I think I take from that that like one of
13:33
SPEAKER_03: the questions we could ask ourselves is where am I actually finding joy?
13:38
SPEAKER_03: Not where do I think I should find joy or where did I once find joy,
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SPEAKER_03: but like Where is this happening?
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SPEAKER_03: And like, why am I not honoring that?
13:49
SPEAKER_03: And I'm so worried about honoring the thing that I said I wanted
13:55
SPEAKER_03: because I said I wanted it before.
13:57
SPEAKER_00: Right.
13:57
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
13:58
SPEAKER_00: A thousand percent.
13:59
SPEAKER_00: I think joy, I think ease is another one.
14:01
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
14:03
SPEAKER_00: I feel like,
14:04
SPEAKER_00: I don't want to throw away my legal career as if it didn't mean anything
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SPEAKER_00: because there were certainly valuable parts of it, but it was a curated identity.
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SPEAKER_00: It was a constant sort of interrogation of what am I saying?
14:15
SPEAKER_00: How am I behaving?
14:17
SPEAKER_00: I'm in this group now.
14:18
SPEAKER_00: This is how I have to dress.
14:20
SPEAKER_00: This is how I have to speak.
14:21
SPEAKER_00: You know,
14:22
SPEAKER_00: and I would say when I first started entering spaces in journalism,
14:26
SPEAKER_00: I abandoned a lot of that curation.
14:28
SPEAKER_00: I was just kind of who I was,
14:30
SPEAKER_00: you know,
14:31
SPEAKER_00: I wasn't overthinking how it was showing up because it felt natural to who I was
14:35
SPEAKER_00: and, you know.
14:37
SPEAKER_00: Who I ultimately wanted to continue to become.
14:39
SPEAKER_00: And that was something you just feel.
14:41
SPEAKER_00: You know,
14:42
SPEAKER_00: you know what it feels like to be in a space where you're,
14:45
SPEAKER_00: you know, not your whole self.
14:46
SPEAKER_00: You're not showing up authentically.
14:48
SPEAKER_00: Or at the end of the day, you almost feel like you're lifting off this mask.
14:52
SPEAKER_00: And there's always a little bit of that, right, in any professional space.
14:56
SPEAKER_00: But I think, you know, when you're more you than otherwise, it just feels a lot better.
15:01
SPEAKER_03: It's interesting though.
15:02
SPEAKER_03: I mean, I think it does feel better and it is scarier for a lot of people.
15:08
SPEAKER_03: So like lawyer is a costume, as you described it.
15:12
SPEAKER_03: It was an archetype and you were like,
15:14
SPEAKER_03: if I have this degree and this suit and these shoes and this job,
15:20
SPEAKER_03: then I am a lawyer.
15:21
SPEAKER_03: I have an archetype.
15:22
SPEAKER_03: I have an identity.
15:23
SPEAKER_03: But what you're saying is, oh, no, no, no, no, no.
15:26
SPEAKER_03: Throughout my life, I plan on having many different, like, Areas of focus.
15:32
SPEAKER_03: But the goal is to constantly be moving closer and closer to just meet.
15:36
SPEAKER_03: Well, there's no Faye McCray archetype.
15:40
SPEAKER_03: Right.
15:41
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
15:41
SPEAKER_03: So it has to be self-invented.
15:43
SPEAKER_03: And I think for most of us,
15:44
SPEAKER_03: trying to like create within a framework is actually way easier than just like from
15:52
SPEAKER_03: an open canvas.
15:53
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
15:54
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
15:54
SPEAKER_03: And so I'm curious how...
15:57
SPEAKER_03: You tactically got in touch with what was truly you and not given to you by external forces.
16:07
SPEAKER_00: I would say first,
16:08
SPEAKER_00: probably not being afraid of my own growth and my own like plasticity,
16:12
SPEAKER_00: like to say I've changed my mind, you know, about something.
16:17
SPEAKER_00: Which is huge.
16:19
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
16:20
SPEAKER_00: And it's, I've been married 20 years.
16:22
SPEAKER_00: I've had the same best friend since I was 14.
16:25
SPEAKER_00: I am a routine girl.
16:28
SPEAKER_00: I get kind of my people and all of the things.
16:32
SPEAKER_00: So sometimes it can be scary to say, oh, I don't know that I like this anymore.
16:36
SPEAKER_00: Or I don't know I don't want to do this thing anymore this way,
16:40
SPEAKER_00: especially, you know, inherent to it.
16:41
SPEAKER_00: And a lot of that, too, is people pleasing and like wanting everybody to be happy with you.
16:45
SPEAKER_00: So like this idea of being able to confront the parts of me that were changing
16:49
SPEAKER_00: and wanted to change.
16:51
SPEAKER_00: Once I was learned how to do that has been the greatest gift, I think, of my life.
16:55
SPEAKER_00: You know,
16:55
SPEAKER_00: I demand a lot now,
16:57
SPEAKER_00: I think because of that,
16:59
SPEAKER_00: you know,
16:59
SPEAKER_00: but I would say tactically in practice,
17:02
SPEAKER_00: it was being able to look at those things and say, I don't want to do this anymore.
17:07
SPEAKER_00: You know, and I would say also confronting all my fear, right?
17:10
SPEAKER_00: Like I have a newsletter called What If It All Works Out,
17:13
SPEAKER_00: which had been a post-it on my computer.
17:16
SPEAKER_00: Which is great.
17:17
SPEAKER_00: It's on Substack.
17:18
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, definitely.
17:20
SPEAKER_00: And it had been a post-it on like the side of my monitor for the longest time,
17:24
SPEAKER_00: just that statement, because I tend to spiral a little, right?
17:28
SPEAKER_00: Like, what if it doesn't?
17:29
SPEAKER_00: I could think of all the things that can happen, you know, so I'm an A, B, C planner.
17:34
SPEAKER_00: And I think the idea of what if this just goes marvelously well?
17:38
SPEAKER_00: What if you allow yourself to sit in that possibility, you know?
17:42
SPEAKER_00: Then the option of not trying or not doing seems awful,
17:46
SPEAKER_00: you know, because there's this great, big, amazing possibility out there.
17:49
SPEAKER_00: So that kept me from putting one foot in front of the other.
17:53
SPEAKER_00: I have a, I belong to this wonderful networking group called The Board.
17:58
SPEAKER_00: And the woman who leads it, April, you could tell is phenomenal.
18:00
SPEAKER_00: And I remember when she told me that anything she tries, she calls a pilot.
18:05
SPEAKER_00: Because it takes like the onus off of it being perfect, right?
18:09
SPEAKER_00: When you do it.
18:10
SPEAKER_00: Ever since she said that, that's everything I do is like, I'm piloting this.
18:13
SPEAKER_00: I'm, you know, I'm trying, right?
18:15
SPEAKER_00: It takes the stakes away from it.
18:17
SPEAKER_00: So when my growth is calling me in another direction to do something big and scary,
18:21
SPEAKER_00: I'm just giving it a try.
18:22
SPEAKER_00: You know, we'll see what'll happen.
18:24
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, it's very much linked to that idea of needing certainty.
18:28
SPEAKER_03: And that's another thing I think that's particularly challenging in midlife is that we...
18:33
SPEAKER_03: We have built up so much credibility.
18:36
SPEAKER_03: We have invested so heavily in whatever path we've been on that the stakes feel higher.
18:43
SPEAKER_03: It feels like, oh, I'm going to disrupt the lives of other generations.
18:52
SPEAKER_03: It's existential and all that credibility I've built up.
18:57
SPEAKER_03: It's one of the things that I haven't heard you explicitly talk about yet,
19:01
SPEAKER_03: but I think is super interesting,
19:03
SPEAKER_03: especially in your journey, is this idea of permission.
19:08
SPEAKER_03: And like, again, a lawyer, it was like, here's your certificates.
19:12
SPEAKER_03: You passed your bar exam.
19:14
SPEAKER_03: You get to practice.
19:15
SPEAKER_03: But you went into careers that were kind of like, yeah,
19:18
SPEAKER_03: you're going to build up some social proof by being able to say,
19:22
SPEAKER_03: I worked for all these fancy places.
19:24
SPEAKER_03: But first it was you saying, oh no, I'm a good enough writer to write.
19:30
SPEAKER_03: I'm a good enough speaker to speak.
19:32
SPEAKER_03: I'm a good enough coach to coach.
19:36
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
19:36
SPEAKER_03: Because you sort of had to self-ordain on these.
19:39
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
19:40
SPEAKER_03: So talk me through and tell us what skills or techniques you used
19:47
SPEAKER_03: to build confidence and a sense of credibility in this,
19:53
SPEAKER_03: again, more kind of mushy, amorphous work.
19:57
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I mean,
19:58
SPEAKER_00: you know, for me,
19:59
SPEAKER_00: because my resume didn't screen media and journalism,
20:02
SPEAKER_00: when I first took this leap,
20:04
SPEAKER_00: I had to really humble myself and build those experiences on my own.
20:08
SPEAKER_00: So a lot of it was...
20:10
SPEAKER_00: Kind of, hey, you're doing this cool thing.
20:11
SPEAKER_00: Can I be a fly on the wall?
20:12
SPEAKER_00: Can I try?
20:13
SPEAKER_00: You know, hey, this may be awful.
20:15
SPEAKER_00: Want to take a look at this article that I wrote?
20:17
SPEAKER_00: You know, there was a lot of just me trying.
20:20
SPEAKER_00: And I also, you know, I find entrepreneurship to be valuable for so many reasons.
20:24
SPEAKER_00: But I think it is also an interesting resume builder, right?
20:27
SPEAKER_00: When you build something on your own.
20:29
SPEAKER_00: You have sort of a proof of concept that I can do this.
20:31
SPEAKER_00: So I had started a website during this journey about creativity and kids.
20:36
SPEAKER_00: And what I didn't know that I was doing was I was getting really good
20:40
SPEAKER_00: at SEO optimization, which I know now is like whatever.
20:42
SPEAKER_00: But back then it was a big deal.
20:45
SPEAKER_00: So, you know, for me,
20:46
SPEAKER_00: I was building up this skill set, right, kind of in a self-taught, scrappy way.
20:52
SPEAKER_00: But then when I went for these big roles in media and journalism,
20:54
SPEAKER_00: I could say, hey, look what I built on my own with no team.
20:57
SPEAKER_00: Imagine what I'll do if I lead your team, right?
20:59
SPEAKER_00: Like, here are these really cool things.
21:01
SPEAKER_00: But there was a lot of humbling and a lot of being okay to ask questions and a lot
21:04
SPEAKER_00: of like,
21:05
SPEAKER_00: you know, I had already had reached a certain place in my career as a lawyer, right?
21:09
SPEAKER_00: You know,
21:10
SPEAKER_00: where I could brag and I had kind of a chunky salary at the time,
21:14
SPEAKER_00: you know,
21:14
SPEAKER_00: and going backwards a little bit and saying,
21:17
SPEAKER_00: hey, can I be your support person, right, to help on this?
21:21
SPEAKER_00: Or can I just kind of be a fly on the wall?
21:23
SPEAKER_00: You know,
21:24
SPEAKER_00: it took a lot of humility,
21:25
SPEAKER_00: but I will say I was genuinely enthusiastic about the process.
21:28
SPEAKER_00: I was very enthusiastic about learning a new thing.
21:31
SPEAKER_00: You know,
21:31
SPEAKER_00: it's sort of like the book writing process when you're before you're you have
21:35
SPEAKER_00: the agent and the editor and you're just writing for yourself and you're like,
21:38
SPEAKER_00: oh, that's great.
21:39
SPEAKER_00: You know, you're excited about this because no one's watching, right?
21:42
SPEAKER_00: You're just like this thing that's just for you.
21:45
SPEAKER_00: And that's sort of how it felt at the time.
21:47
SPEAKER_00: The stakes felt really,
21:48
SPEAKER_00: really low because it was just I'm trying and I could be crappy at this, but.
21:52
SPEAKER_00: You know, I'm going to give it a shot.
21:53
SPEAKER_00: But I think that that was sort of the biggest thing for me is just being open
21:59
SPEAKER_00: to sort of humbling myself and learning, right?
22:01
SPEAKER_00: Being a student and not being afraid of that.
22:04
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
22:04
SPEAKER_03: And I think really staying in the moment and that's why I love your book example there.
22:09
SPEAKER_03: I keep joking that writing a book is like a roller coaster because
22:14
SPEAKER_03: when I was just writing for me, I was like, this book is amazing.
22:18
SPEAKER_03: Everyone needs this book.
22:20
SPEAKER_03: Oh my, I can't believe I am writing such a good book.
22:24
SPEAKER_03: And then I realized I had to send my first chapters to my editor.
22:28
SPEAKER_03: And I was like, this book is horrible.
22:30
SPEAKER_03: It is a piece of crap.
22:32
SPEAKER_03: What have I done?
22:33
SPEAKER_03: Oh my God, there's no way I'm ever going to make my deadline for me.
22:37
SPEAKER_03: I mean, like, and literally it was the same pages.
22:42
SPEAKER_02: But when I thought about showing them to someone else and the stakes got higher,
22:46
SPEAKER_02: I talk about it like
22:48
SPEAKER_03: this old dump mentality that you live in New York City
22:51
SPEAKER_03: and you're like,
22:52
SPEAKER_02: This is my gritty deli where the guy knows me and I love all of it.
22:57
SPEAKER_03: And then like your judgy aunt or whatever comes to visit and you're like,
23:01
SPEAKER_03: oh my God, there's rats everywhere.
23:02
SPEAKER_03: There's trash on the street.
23:04
SPEAKER_00: Same smell.
23:05
SPEAKER_00: I never noticed it smelled.
23:09
SPEAKER_03: Why does it all smell like piss?
23:11
SPEAKER_03: Right.
23:13
SPEAKER_03: Same town.
23:14
SPEAKER_03: Thousand percent.
23:15
SPEAKER_00: Yes.
23:16
SPEAKER_00: Different experience.
23:18
SPEAKER_03: And so like,
23:19
SPEAKER_03: how do you get yourself through those moments where,
23:22
SPEAKER_03: because so much of this again is about internal validation.
23:25
SPEAKER_03: You're like, I'm doing the best I can for me.
23:28
SPEAKER_03: And then you have to share it with the world.
23:30
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
23:30
SPEAKER_03: And I think for a lot of us,
23:31
SPEAKER_03: that's where actually like you hear the brakes screech on our projects
23:36
SPEAKER_03: and our progress because it's like, Wait, I'm going to show this to somebody.
23:40
SPEAKER_03: And so then we start coming up with the billion reasons why this isn't the right time.
23:45
SPEAKER_03: I'm not the right person.
23:47
SPEAKER_03: This is redundant.
23:49
SPEAKER_03: This is boring.
23:51
SPEAKER_03: I'm not like, I should go do 10 more years of research.
23:55
SPEAKER_03: So how do you make that leap from this is internally validated and now I'm going
24:01
SPEAKER_03: to externally offer it?
24:04
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, it's funny,
24:05
SPEAKER_00: you know,
24:05
SPEAKER_00: it's probably going to sound a little foo-foo,
24:07
SPEAKER_00: woo-woo,
24:07
SPEAKER_00: but for me, it really is like an actual, like sort of internal battle, right?
24:14
SPEAKER_00: There's a great book called We Should All Be Millionaires by Rachel Rogers,
24:18
SPEAKER_00: where she talks about sort of combating this idea that I cannot be this thing,
24:23
SPEAKER_00: right?
24:23
SPEAKER_00: I can't be a millionaire, like...
24:25
SPEAKER_00: Never happened for me.
24:26
SPEAKER_00: And this idea of constantly interrogating those thoughts and almost arguing with them.
24:31
SPEAKER_00: I have a picture of myself up at my desk of me as a little girl.
24:35
SPEAKER_00: That is the face and voice of the thoughts that come in that say, you can't do this.
24:41
SPEAKER_00: You know, they're not going to like this.
24:43
SPEAKER_00: All of those things,
24:43
SPEAKER_00: it allows me to be kinder to that voice,
24:45
SPEAKER_00: you know, and just say, I hear you, but it's good.
24:49
SPEAKER_00: I got this.
24:49
SPEAKER_00: We're going to be okay.
24:50
SPEAKER_00: We're going to keep going.
24:51
SPEAKER_00: And even if we're not okay, we're still okay.
24:53
SPEAKER_00: But it is a constant conversation in my mind,
24:57
SPEAKER_00: you know,
24:57
SPEAKER_00: of just making sure that I hear the thoughts,
24:59
SPEAKER_00: but I'm also shutting them down because they're going to come.
25:02
SPEAKER_00: And especially like I'm anxious, like just by nature.
25:04
SPEAKER_00: So they come fast and furious,
25:06
SPEAKER_00: like, you know, all the time about like the slightest little thing.
25:09
SPEAKER_00: And it's just like, nope, we can't do this with you feeling this way.
25:13
SPEAKER_00: You know, you got to push through it.
25:14
SPEAKER_00: You got to push through the feeling.
25:16
SPEAKER_00: It's going to be okay.
25:17
SPEAKER_00: You know, I also, you know, I'm still here.
25:19
SPEAKER_00: Right.
25:20
SPEAKER_00: And like, and that is a constant conversation with myself, too.
25:23
SPEAKER_00: Even the toughest moments, I have survived them at this point.
25:26
SPEAKER_00: So as long as I'm still here and I'm still around, you can keep going.
25:30
SPEAKER_00: So, you know, I would say that is probably the biggest, the biggest thing.
25:34
SPEAKER_03: I love it.
25:35
SPEAKER_03: And sort of like that dual,
25:36
SPEAKER_03: like, what if it all works out and what's the worst that could happen?
25:39
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
25:40
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
25:40
SPEAKER_03: And usually when I slow down,
25:42
SPEAKER_03: you know,
25:43
SPEAKER_03: you talk about like getting quiet when I slow down and I get really specific
25:47
SPEAKER_03: with myself about what is it you are actually afraid is going to happen, Aransas?
25:51
SPEAKER_03: I'm like, oh, it's fine.
25:53
SPEAKER_03: As you said, I've survived this.
25:55
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
25:56
SPEAKER_00: And sometimes when you talk it through to somebody you trust,
25:58
SPEAKER_00: you're like, this sounds ridiculous.
26:00
SPEAKER_00: Why was I worried about this?
26:02
SPEAKER_03: And we have to externalize it.
26:04
SPEAKER_03: I think that's really it.
26:05
SPEAKER_03: Like externalizing the limiting beliefs, externalizing the fears.
26:09
SPEAKER_03: And that like, I love that idea of having that picture of yourself.
26:15
SPEAKER_03: I just redesigned my office while you were talking.
26:18
SPEAKER_03: And I'm going to put the picture.
26:19
SPEAKER_03: I've got this wonderful portrait of my great-great-grandmother,
26:23
SPEAKER_03: my great-grandmother, my grandmother, my mother, and me.
26:25
SPEAKER_03: So five generations all together.
26:27
SPEAKER_03: They're all wearing matching dresses.
26:28
SPEAKER_03: It's amazing.
26:29
SPEAKER_03: It's like pioneer people.
26:34
SPEAKER_03: It's really something.
26:36
SPEAKER_03: And we're all the firstborn children of the firstborn children.
26:39
SPEAKER_03: And they all these amazing stories and are so inspiring to me.
26:43
SPEAKER_03: And I was like, I'm going to hang them right on my wall.
26:45
SPEAKER_03: And I'm also going to hang a picture of a little Lorenz is there.
26:47
SPEAKER_03: Yes.
26:48
SPEAKER_03: Yes.
26:50
SPEAKER_03: And like that is right.
26:52
SPEAKER_03: She's worried about us.
26:53
SPEAKER_03: Yes.
26:54
SPEAKER_03: That is the board though.
26:56
SPEAKER_03: You're going back to that.
26:58
SPEAKER_03: So when you were going through all of these changes, like you took a major perspective.
27:04
SPEAKER_03: Like financial risk.
27:06
SPEAKER_03: And so since you bring up the millionaire thing and you've talked about the fact
27:08
SPEAKER_03: that you've 5Xed your income, which I'm bonkers inspired by it.
27:13
SPEAKER_03: I'm like, could you go ahead and write that book?
27:16
SPEAKER_03: Because I need it.
27:17
SPEAKER_03: Thanks.
27:18
SPEAKER_03: But I know there were periods, like you had this stable income, you had a pension.
27:23
SPEAKER_03: Pensions are cool.
27:25
SPEAKER_03: If you're a young person listening to this, get a pension at least for a little while.
27:29
SPEAKER_03: Trust us.
27:30
SPEAKER_03: So, but then you describe,
27:32
SPEAKER_03: you've talked about there's a period where your income dipped,
27:34
SPEAKER_03: you weren't seeing the results,
27:36
SPEAKER_03: you weren't like,
27:37
SPEAKER_03: people weren't knocking down your door to come work at their fancy companies
27:39
SPEAKER_03: and consult and give you your old revenue for a tiny project or anything.
27:44
SPEAKER_03: So how did you think about the finances of this and use some of these same tools,
27:52
SPEAKER_03: really, I'm sure, to navigate that financial uncertainty?
27:56
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
27:57
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
27:57
SPEAKER_00: And I'll add to that.
27:58
SPEAKER_00: I don't think I've written about this too, but we had just bought a new house too.
28:03
SPEAKER_00: I don't know, maybe a year before, like I took this leave.
28:06
SPEAKER_00: So we had this big family.
28:07
SPEAKER_00: So it was definitely like my husband was like, it was generally very supportive.
28:12
SPEAKER_00: Are we sure about like, is this what we want to do at this point?
28:16
SPEAKER_00: You know, but,
28:17
SPEAKER_00: you know,
28:17
SPEAKER_00: I think that looking critically,
28:19
SPEAKER_00: particularly at where I was in my legal career at the time,
28:22
SPEAKER_00: I was in a really tight box.
28:24
SPEAKER_00: You know, like my school set was very unique to the work that I was doing.
28:28
SPEAKER_00: It was very hard to tell the story of what I was capable of on paper.
28:32
SPEAKER_00: So even as scary as it was at the time,
28:35
SPEAKER_00: it felt like a risk I had to take because otherwise my earning potential was going
28:39
SPEAKER_00: to be defined.
28:41
SPEAKER_00: And little did I know everything was coming with layoffs and stuff.
28:45
SPEAKER_00: So I don't even know if my job would have survived given the massive federal layoffs
28:48
SPEAKER_00: that happened this past year.
28:49
SPEAKER_00: But, you know,
28:50
SPEAKER_00: without knowing kind of that future,
28:52
SPEAKER_00: just the thought of this is my only path was very scary to me.
28:56
SPEAKER_00: So it went from being something that was like, oh, it's stable.
29:00
SPEAKER_00: I can stay here forever to it being like,
29:02
SPEAKER_00: oh, if this is the only place I can go, I can never try out these other things.
29:06
SPEAKER_00: No one is ever going to see the potential.
29:07
SPEAKER_00: So, yeah.
29:08
SPEAKER_00: I think in some ways it seemed riskier to stay,
29:11
SPEAKER_00: even though it was a pretty big pay cut when I first took sort of a role in media
29:15
SPEAKER_00: and journalism.
29:17
SPEAKER_00: But I also think that I entered that career with the knowledge that I needed
29:20
SPEAKER_00: to be able to nurture transferable skills.
29:23
SPEAKER_00: Like I could never allow myself into that box again.
29:25
SPEAKER_00: For me, my income became more than just one job, right?
29:30
SPEAKER_00: Then it became a You know,
29:32
SPEAKER_00: even though before I was kind of getting scrappy and learning where I could, oh,
29:35
SPEAKER_00: I can earn money doing this other thing on the side
29:37
SPEAKER_00: or I can offer this service here.
29:39
SPEAKER_00: But it all to me was a part of this broader narrative of who I was and what
29:43
SPEAKER_00: the value was, you know, and what can increase my earning potential.
29:47
SPEAKER_00: So for me, it was leaning into those other parts of my identity.
29:51
SPEAKER_00: You know,
29:51
SPEAKER_00: not just as a means of feeling more fulfilled,
29:53
SPEAKER_00: but also thinking about the value that they provide
29:56
SPEAKER_00: and how I can monetize those things.
29:58
SPEAKER_00: So I became someone that just had multiple streams of income just based
30:02
SPEAKER_00: on not wanting to sit in that box.
30:05
SPEAKER_00: It just seemed risky.
30:06
SPEAKER_00: I know I wrote a post recently,
30:07
SPEAKER_00: this is kind of a LinkedIn post about making sure
30:10
SPEAKER_00: that you're not negotiating transferable job titles,
30:12
SPEAKER_00: you know,
30:13
SPEAKER_00: as hard as you're negotiating those salaries because it'll get you stuck,
30:17
SPEAKER_00: you know, and that's how I felt.
30:18
SPEAKER_00: It was very hard to describe what I did outside of that particular agency and
30:22
SPEAKER_00: that particular work.
30:24
SPEAKER_00: So I think thinking about those things and putting a plan in place,
30:28
SPEAKER_00: you know,
30:28
SPEAKER_00: for what that looks like,
30:29
SPEAKER_00: even if you're in a job currently,
30:31
SPEAKER_00: right, you know, and you're Going through a promotion cycle, negotiate that title.
30:36
SPEAKER_00: Make sure it's something that you can take with you.
30:38
SPEAKER_00: But, you know,
30:38
SPEAKER_00: all of that sort of became sort of a key to me being able to bring
30:42
SPEAKER_00: in additional money.
30:43
SPEAKER_03: I love that tactical approach to it because I do think part
30:47
SPEAKER_03: of how we devalue ourselves is we stay so much in pleasing others mode
30:55
SPEAKER_03: that we forget to think,
30:57
SPEAKER_03: like you're talking about, like,
30:59
SPEAKER_03: Comforting that little girl,
31:00
SPEAKER_03: but it's also like,
31:01
SPEAKER_03: I want to take really good care of my 75-year-old self and her to look back
31:06
SPEAKER_03: at my 50-year-old self and be like, thanks, hon.
31:09
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
31:12
SPEAKER_00: Exactly.
31:13
SPEAKER_00: I think about her all the time, probably more now, right?
31:16
SPEAKER_00: As you get older, you start thinking about what I want that era to look like.
31:19
SPEAKER_00: I'm going to be in my grandma bag,
31:21
SPEAKER_00: hopefully baking,
31:23
SPEAKER_00: you know, and at ease, you know, because of the plant, the seeds that I planted now.
31:27
SPEAKER_00: But, you know, but none of it involved me being kind of pigeonholed, right?
31:31
SPEAKER_00: And stuck in one direction, especially now.
31:34
SPEAKER_00: I mean, we see it.
31:35
SPEAKER_00: Just everywhere, not even just in the government sector, but in private industry.
31:39
SPEAKER_00: I mean, media, who,
31:40
SPEAKER_00: you know,
31:40
SPEAKER_00: little did I know,
31:41
SPEAKER_00: media was going to take the turns that it did,
31:44
SPEAKER_00: you know,
31:44
SPEAKER_00: once I came in with sort of what that looks like and how those jobs change.
31:48
SPEAKER_00: So, you know, learning that lesson twice, you know, nothing happened.
31:54
SPEAKER_00: Is, you know,
31:54
SPEAKER_00: 100% secure and the only,
31:56
SPEAKER_00: you know,
31:57
SPEAKER_00: stability rests with you, you know, is you're not going to get it externally.
32:00
SPEAKER_00: You know,
32:01
SPEAKER_00: so what does that look like for you to kind of paint your own canvas,
32:04
SPEAKER_00: you know, and shape your own future?
32:06
SPEAKER_03: I love that.
32:06
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
32:07
SPEAKER_03: And I want to use you as an example here too for so many women because a big part
32:12
SPEAKER_03: of my coaching work is helping women in midlife who are going
32:16
SPEAKER_03: through big transitions find and shape their stories.
32:20
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
32:21
SPEAKER_03: And I kid you not,
32:25
SPEAKER_03: the scariest part of this process for most women is the thought of,
32:29
SPEAKER_00: how will I introduce myself at a party?
32:32
SPEAKER_03: Yes.
32:33
SPEAKER_03: How will I introduce myself when I meet somebody at school?
32:37
SPEAKER_03: How will I introduce myself is so,
32:39
SPEAKER_03: it's like this super tactical moment of truth for so many of us.
32:45
SPEAKER_03: And like going back to your introduction, that's how we do it.
32:49
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
32:50
SPEAKER_03: You say, I am a freaking abundance.
32:53
SPEAKER_03: I am doing all these things and they are all serving each other
32:56
SPEAKER_03: and they're all making each other stronger because they're all coming through me.
33:01
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
33:01
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
33:02
SPEAKER_00: And the reality is,
33:03
SPEAKER_00: right, when you start to do that, not everybody's going to join you for the ride.
33:08
SPEAKER_00: Like we've all been in those rooms where everyone is sort of scouting for the person
33:11
SPEAKER_00: that can do the most for them, the most impressive person.
33:14
SPEAKER_00: And I learned when I don't leave with being a lawyer,
33:17
SPEAKER_00: right, and it's hard to put myself into a box and say I am blank, right?
33:22
SPEAKER_00: The eyes glaze over.
33:23
SPEAKER_00: Now I'm looking for the, you know, because I can't put you, I don't know what you can do for me.
33:27
SPEAKER_00: I can't put you in a box.
33:28
SPEAKER_00: I have lost nothing by losing those people in my life.
33:31
SPEAKER_00: You know, I think initially there was a discomfort, but like those weren't my people.
33:36
SPEAKER_00: You know, my people were the ones who were going to stick around and have a deeper conversation.
33:39
SPEAKER_00: And then we realized, oh, you're doing this?
33:41
SPEAKER_00: I'm doing this.
33:42
SPEAKER_00: Or I know somebody who's doing that.
33:43
SPEAKER_00: Let's talk about it.
33:44
SPEAKER_00: Oh, that's so exciting.
33:45
SPEAKER_00: I've learned something new.
33:46
SPEAKER_00: Those are the conversations I live for, right?
33:48
SPEAKER_00: The person whose eyes glaze over and now they're moving on.
33:51
SPEAKER_00: Okay.
33:52
SPEAKER_00: Okay.
33:55
SPEAKER_03: Well, I think too,
33:56
SPEAKER_03: so much of this is about what we let go of and that we can't change
34:01
SPEAKER_03: without letting go of some things.
34:04
SPEAKER_03: And yeah,
34:05
SPEAKER_03: it's letting go of that leading with that thing that everybody recognizes
34:12
SPEAKER_03: that Everybody,
34:15
SPEAKER_03: whoever everybody is,
34:16
SPEAKER_03: your family,
34:18
SPEAKER_03: the randos at party, whatever, and leading with who you are and where you're going.
34:23
SPEAKER_03: And I think that's really scary.
34:24
SPEAKER_03: And it does.
34:25
SPEAKER_03: It trips a lot of people up.
34:26
SPEAKER_03: I had a client once who had worked in big financial advisories and she had sort
34:34
SPEAKER_03: of sat at one level for a decade and she was really good at it.
34:40
SPEAKER_03: And she got a promotion and the opportunity to go and do bigger, bolder things.
34:47
SPEAKER_03: And where she stumbled was that she kept holding on to the old things.
34:54
SPEAKER_03: She was so used to being the one everybody called for that stuff
34:58
SPEAKER_03: that it was really painful for her when they were calling her replacement.
35:01
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
35:02
SPEAKER_03: And it was really painful when her replacement wasn't asking her for advice all
35:05
SPEAKER_03: the time on that stuff.
35:06
SPEAKER_03: But it was really right.
35:08
SPEAKER_03: And so like the work for her and one of the coolest breakthroughs I've ever gotten
35:13
SPEAKER_03: to witness was when she was like,
35:15
SPEAKER_03: I don't get to be this next thing until I really actively,
35:19
SPEAKER_03: actively let go of those old things.
35:22
SPEAKER_03: And that's what I hear over and over in your stories.
35:24
SPEAKER_00: It's like moving on.
35:25
SPEAKER_00: I got it.
35:26
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
35:27
SPEAKER_00: Release the attachment.
35:28
SPEAKER_00: I think I needed the ability to be able to confront that grief, too.
35:32
SPEAKER_00: You know, to say, this is hard for me.
35:35
SPEAKER_00: Like, why will I feel this way?
35:37
SPEAKER_00: Because I think there's no ignoring it.
35:39
SPEAKER_00: I think that's what I've learned too from kind of the silence of transition and like
35:42
SPEAKER_00: the quiet that comes with it.
35:44
SPEAKER_00: It's like you have to work through the hard stuff, right?
35:46
SPEAKER_00: You can't ignore it.
35:47
SPEAKER_00: You can't busy it away.
35:48
SPEAKER_00: You can't, you know, work it off, feel the thing, understand why you're feeling the thing.
35:53
SPEAKER_00: And that sort of gives you the ability to be able to move on to the next thing too.
35:56
SPEAKER_00: So there's no shame in that.
35:57
SPEAKER_00: I mean, there's so many reasons,
35:59
SPEAKER_00: right, why we tie ourselves so tightly to these titles and these identities.
36:02
SPEAKER_00: And we can probably have a whole other conversation, right, on all the things that go into that.
36:07
SPEAKER_00: So it's okay to acknowledge when it's difficult too.
36:10
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, such a good point.
36:11
SPEAKER_03: There's so many more questions I want to ask you,
36:14
SPEAKER_03: but I ask our wonderful community what questions they have for you.
36:18
SPEAKER_03: So we have questions from the community here and I'm going to read some of these.
36:22
SPEAKER_03: This first one is from Carissa Beffer.
36:24
SPEAKER_03: I'm going to read it verbatim.
36:25
SPEAKER_03: She says, ooh.
36:27
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
36:30
SPEAKER_03: Because you sound like reading where you've been.
36:32
SPEAKER_03: I think we all hear like, this is the person I'd really like to learn from.
36:37
SPEAKER_03: And she says,
36:38
SPEAKER_03: I'd love to know more details on how she got published with Healthline,
36:41
SPEAKER_03: Livestrong, et cetera.
36:42
SPEAKER_03: And what advice she has for someone he Now,
36:46
SPEAKER_03: Teresa to give you a bit of contact,
36:48
SPEAKER_03: spent her career in finance and was a senior leader in her organization due to
36:54
SPEAKER_03: the effects of paramedopause,
36:56
SPEAKER_03: left her career and now runs a paramedopause coaching platform.
37:01
SPEAKER_03: So she, like you, has moved from corporate to a coaching role.
37:05
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I would say, you know, it's funny, I'll steal from a former editor that I worked with.
37:09
SPEAKER_00: Just shamelessly pitch, right?
37:12
SPEAKER_00: And, you know, just keep coming back.
37:14
SPEAKER_00: You know, for me,
37:15
SPEAKER_00: I know when I got my first article published in the Harvard Business Review,
37:18
SPEAKER_00: I remember, oh, you're in the Harvard, it's so amazing.
37:20
SPEAKER_00: Do you know how long I had to wear this editor down?
37:23
SPEAKER_00: How many pitches she said no to?
37:24
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
37:26
SPEAKER_00: To get to that space.
37:27
SPEAKER_00: But she stuck with me, which is a shout out to Holly.
37:29
SPEAKER_00: She was amazing.
37:30
SPEAKER_00: But it's,
37:30
SPEAKER_00: you know,
37:30
SPEAKER_00: just one of those things where you kind of have to shamelessly keep going for it.
37:35
SPEAKER_00: You know,
37:35
SPEAKER_00: I always say now,
37:37
SPEAKER_00: and I just actually said this to someone on my team,
37:38
SPEAKER_00: I have such thick skin when it comes to like feedback and nose.
37:42
SPEAKER_00: I'm almost more comfortable with the nose,
37:44
SPEAKER_00: which is probably my psychologist would have a field day with that.
37:46
SPEAKER_00: But like, because, you know, it just kind of is what it is, right?
37:50
SPEAKER_00: Like, you know,
37:51
SPEAKER_00: each time you get a no, you're getting closer to the yes, as cliche as it sounds.
37:55
SPEAKER_00: So.
37:56
SPEAKER_00: I would say those personal connections are valuable.
37:59
SPEAKER_00: Who do you know?
38:00
SPEAKER_00: Who knows X person?
38:02
SPEAKER_00: Who can you reach out to sort of get in their inbox versus the slush file?
38:06
SPEAKER_00: But, you know, I would say just keep going back.
38:09
SPEAKER_00: And like I said,
38:09
SPEAKER_00: this editor that I work with recently posted that she has all of these sort
38:13
SPEAKER_00: of pitches in her inbox for different things.
38:16
SPEAKER_00: Some she just doesn't need right now.
38:18
SPEAKER_00: But if it comes up, she knows, oh, this person pitched me on this, even if it's a year ago.
38:23
SPEAKER_00: So none of it is worthless, right?
38:25
SPEAKER_00: You just keep going.
38:27
SPEAKER_00: Was that the answer to the question?
38:28
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
38:29
SPEAKER_00: I think
38:29
SPEAKER_03: that's it.
38:30
SPEAKER_03: It's really just like, get out there and start pitching.
38:32
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, just keep doing it.
38:34
SPEAKER_03: There are courses.
38:34
SPEAKER_03: I'm happy to link to one I took that's specific to like HBR.
38:38
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
38:39
SPEAKER_03: Certainly tips and tricks on how to do that.
38:42
SPEAKER_03: Well, lots of experts out there.
38:44
SPEAKER_03: But I think you're right.
38:45
SPEAKER_03: It's like most of that you can get from Chagibiti.
38:47
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
38:48
SPEAKER_03: And then just like set yourself a goal, right?
38:50
SPEAKER_03: To start doing it.
38:52
SPEAKER_03: If you need a little external accountability, I do very well with like...
38:57
SPEAKER_03: I'm going to do this every day for 30 days.
39:00
SPEAKER_03: And so a little sprint on pitching could probably be a really great kickstart,
39:05
SPEAKER_03: at least for piloting that work.
39:08
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
39:10
SPEAKER_00: To steal your word.
39:13
SPEAKER_00: Piloting my journalism career.
39:15
SPEAKER_03: No big deal.
39:17
SPEAKER_03: Next question comes from Marisa Crandall.
39:18
SPEAKER_03: She is another person who left corporate to found her own thing.
39:22
SPEAKER_03: She founded this really cool startup in Westchester, New York called Love Is.
39:27
SPEAKER_03: And she hosts Community Genders for free.
39:30
SPEAKER_03: And she wants to know all about your pivot, but how your shift in roles impacted you personally.
39:36
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
39:37
SPEAKER_00: I mean, I think, you know, kind of what we chatted about, right?
39:40
SPEAKER_00: Like realizing that my identity wasn't tied to a single role.
39:45
SPEAKER_00: But, you know,
39:46
SPEAKER_00: I guess a side effect has been,
39:48
SPEAKER_00: I have such a belief in myself, you know, like it's okay to bet on yourself.
39:53
SPEAKER_00: It doesn't seem as scary to kind of lose the thing anymore, right?
39:56
SPEAKER_00: Because I'm going to be okay, you know, no matter what.
40:00
SPEAKER_00: And I think the pivots have taught You know,
40:03
SPEAKER_00: anytime,
40:04
SPEAKER_00: and I have a great friend, Sarah, who,
40:06
SPEAKER_00: she's so funny,
40:07
SPEAKER_00: because anytime I'm on the cusp of doing something,
40:09
SPEAKER_00: it's like, oh,
40:10
SPEAKER_00: I'm thinking about doing this,
40:11
SPEAKER_00: but I'm not,
40:12
SPEAKER_00: you worry, Faye, every time you're about to do it, and then it's fine, right?
40:16
SPEAKER_00: We have this conversation at dinner where you're stressed out and then it all kind
40:21
SPEAKER_00: of works out.
40:21
SPEAKER_00: So, you know,
40:22
SPEAKER_00: I think that has been a pretty amazing side effect of all of this,
40:27
SPEAKER_00: especially being someone who,
40:29
SPEAKER_00: again, self-proclaimed anxious, very much two feet on the ground.
40:33
SPEAKER_00: You know,
40:33
SPEAKER_00: it's just like,
40:34
SPEAKER_00: it's okay to take risks because it's like, you know, you learn either way, right?
40:39
SPEAKER_00: It's going to be okay.
40:40
SPEAKER_00: So, you know,
40:41
SPEAKER_00: I think that that has done so much for me emotionally and mentally to be able
40:45
SPEAKER_00: to rest in that.
40:46
SPEAKER_00: It's just been a beautiful gift.
40:48
SPEAKER_03: That's really a beautiful answer.
40:49
SPEAKER_03: And I think I relate to it so much and that I have a friend like that
40:53
SPEAKER_03: who we joke all the time that like we remember each other's lives better than
40:58
SPEAKER_03: the other,
40:59
SPEAKER_03: better than we remember our own because it'll be like,
41:03
SPEAKER_03: Remember every time you do a big brave thing,
41:05
SPEAKER_03: you have this fear and then you're fine.
41:08
SPEAKER_02: And it's like, oh, you're right.
41:10
SPEAKER_02: I do that every time.
41:13
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, spot on.
41:14
SPEAKER_00: I absolutely do that.
41:15
SPEAKER_00: We need that.
41:16
SPEAKER_03: I'm going to leave this next question anonymous because this person is still
41:20
SPEAKER_03: at her corporate role,
41:22
SPEAKER_03: but she's kind of like doing both her creative work that she abandoned,
41:28
SPEAKER_03: left behind, took a break from.
41:31
SPEAKER_03: Trying to come up with the nicest way to say that.
41:33
SPEAKER_03: The least loaded way to say that, I guess.
41:35
SPEAKER_03: That she left behind decades ago.
41:38
SPEAKER_03: She's now returned to it.
41:39
SPEAKER_03: She does that kind of in her off hours while still working in her corporate sales job.
41:44
SPEAKER_03: And I think under her question is really like, what really made you pull off the Band-Aid?
41:50
SPEAKER_03: But she says, what was your main catalyst that motivated your career change?
41:54
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
41:55
SPEAKER_00: You know,
41:55
SPEAKER_00: I would say that first change was,
41:57
SPEAKER_00: like I said, it was definitely more deliberate, right?
41:58
SPEAKER_00: I planted the seeds and all of the things.
42:01
SPEAKER_00: I think my second pivot was definitely, I was kind of like a tea kettle.
42:05
SPEAKER_00: Like, I was just kind of at my point where I was like...
42:08
SPEAKER_00: I don't know that I can continue to do this anymore.
42:10
SPEAKER_00: I felt it in my body.
42:11
SPEAKER_00: I just felt sticky.
42:14
SPEAKER_00: Everything was hurting.
42:15
SPEAKER_00: I was tired.
42:16
SPEAKER_00: I could barely make it to bed at night.
42:18
SPEAKER_00: I was just so exhausted because I was really running myself into the ground.
42:21
SPEAKER_00: I was working for a company that was West Coast based.
42:23
SPEAKER_00: I was on until late in the evening because I'm on the East Coast.
42:28
SPEAKER_00: So for me, as dramatic as it may sound, it sort of became about survival.
42:32
SPEAKER_00: I was just kind of like, I don't know that this is sustainable for me health-wise.
42:36
SPEAKER_00: Like it just was beyond being in an authentic.
42:40
SPEAKER_00: It just, I was working at a pace that wasn't sustainable.
42:43
SPEAKER_00: And I also felt like, for what?
42:45
SPEAKER_00: Like, why am I working this hard?
42:48
SPEAKER_00: If it's not ultimately kind of, you know, what I envisioned for myself long-term.
42:53
SPEAKER_00: So I would say that was it, right?
42:55
SPEAKER_00: Is that when your body keeps the score, like,
42:57
SPEAKER_00: you know, all the things that they talk about, well, your body will tell on you.
43:01
SPEAKER_00: I was feeling it, you know, and I had to figure out another way.
43:04
SPEAKER_00: It still wasn't a knee-jerk thing.
43:05
SPEAKER_00: I didn't, you know, do the Jerry Maguire and like tell everybody off and leave.
43:10
SPEAKER_00: It was still like a, okay,
43:12
SPEAKER_00: let me kind of figure out when the right time is and, you know, all of those things.
43:16
SPEAKER_00: But that certainly was my impetus for saying, now's the time, like you need to make a change.
43:23
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, I think that's so interesting too,
43:25
SPEAKER_03: like the long lead of it when we look back and may not feel like it in the moment,
43:30
SPEAKER_03: but when you look back,
43:30
SPEAKER_03: it's like,
43:31
SPEAKER_03: oh yeah, I was leaving in some form or fashion for years.
43:36
SPEAKER_03: And I think that's true when people end any chapter.
43:39
SPEAKER_03: Yes.
43:39
SPEAKER_03: Our last question from the community,
43:41
SPEAKER_03: the assistant from Sally,
43:42
SPEAKER_03: co-founder of Red Bird House Retreats,
43:44
SPEAKER_03: and she wants to know more about your retreats.
43:46
SPEAKER_00: I love that.
43:47
SPEAKER_00: It was, you know,
43:48
SPEAKER_00: it was born out of that experience that I told you about,
43:50
SPEAKER_00: like knowing kind of what it feels to heal things physically in your body.
43:54
SPEAKER_00: And paying attention to that, you know, what ended up happening with me is I had anemia.
43:58
SPEAKER_00: Like I found out I had kind of all these things,
44:01
SPEAKER_00: but I was disregarding them because I was just working, working, working.
44:04
SPEAKER_00: So for me,
44:05
SPEAKER_00: they're usually as much as I love because I went to Greece for a writer's retreat
44:09
SPEAKER_00: for a full week after I left my...
44:12
SPEAKER_00: During my second pivot,
44:13
SPEAKER_00: which is incredible, but I also realized people need these micro experiences, right?
44:17
SPEAKER_00: Like just a day,
44:19
SPEAKER_00: you know,
44:19
SPEAKER_00: that they can just step out of the fray for a little bit,
44:21
SPEAKER_00: get up from their desk, take a walk.
44:23
SPEAKER_00: And so for me,
44:24
SPEAKER_00: I started curating retreats through my company,
44:27
SPEAKER_00: Rest and Reclaim, to allow people to have these kind of low entry points.
44:31
SPEAKER_00: You know,
44:31
SPEAKER_00: points of just,
44:33
SPEAKER_00: I just need to sit somewhere and close my eyes,
44:35
SPEAKER_00: you know, or be around like-minded people.
44:37
SPEAKER_00: But just those little micro breaks that could have made all the difference for me,
44:40
SPEAKER_00: you know, and being able to set that time aside and it's an excuse to do it.
44:44
SPEAKER_00: Come with your friends, put it on your calendar.
44:46
SPEAKER_00: It's just a Friday, you know, afternoon, but just an opportunity to take a break.
44:51
SPEAKER_03: I love that.
44:52
SPEAKER_03: What a great idea.
44:52
SPEAKER_03: Yeah,
44:53
SPEAKER_03: we do an annual Uplifter Summit and I call it a one-day retreat for that reason
44:57
SPEAKER_03: because it's like without that, Yeah.
45:00
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
45:18
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, well,
45:19
SPEAKER_00: it's probably advice you know already,
45:21
SPEAKER_00: but I went into thinking it thinking that I had to be so polished and prepared.
45:25
SPEAKER_00: And I worked with a friend and a coach, you know, and she said, you know, your story.
45:31
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
45:32
SPEAKER_00: You know, so you just go out and tell it, you know.
45:34
SPEAKER_00: And for me,
45:36
SPEAKER_00: that was such a gift,
45:37
SPEAKER_00: you know, because I stopped trying to memorize or hit the points.
45:41
SPEAKER_00: And it was more like, you know, I'm just going to speak authentically.
45:45
SPEAKER_00: And it was fantastic.
45:46
SPEAKER_00: My family was in the audience.
45:47
SPEAKER_00: I looked at my nine-year-old,
45:48
SPEAKER_00: then eight-year-old the whole time,
45:51
SPEAKER_00: which was wonderful because he had a big old cute little smile on his face.
45:54
SPEAKER_00: But, you know, I would say that was probably the best advice that I got.
45:58
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
45:59
SPEAKER_03: The best advice I ever got back in my actor era was from a director who said,
46:03
SPEAKER_03: learn your lines so you can forget them.
46:06
SPEAKER_03: Thank you, Vince Cardinal, wherever you are.
46:10
SPEAKER_03: Faye, I could talk to you all day.
46:13
SPEAKER_03: There's two questions we like to end with.
46:15
SPEAKER_03: The first is, how can we as Uplifters support you?
46:19
SPEAKER_03: Because there is nothing we love more than to support other Uplifters.
46:23
SPEAKER_00: Well, I mean,
46:24
SPEAKER_00: I was like taking mental notes of everyone's business and everybody that you read
46:27
SPEAKER_00: because they all sound incredible.
46:29
SPEAKER_00: So I love that.
46:29
SPEAKER_00: I think it's such a two-way street.
46:31
SPEAKER_00: Follow my Substack.
46:32
SPEAKER_00: What if it all works out?
46:33
SPEAKER_00: We're, you know, rambling about things, but let me know what you think.
46:37
SPEAKER_00: A lot of it are themes that I'm exploring in the book.
46:40
SPEAKER_00: I mean, you can stay up to date with the book when it comes out in June of 2027.
46:44
SPEAKER_00: Like you said, almost a year from now.
46:46
SPEAKER_00: But yeah, I would say just stay in touch that way.
46:48
SPEAKER_00: And I'm on all the things at HeyFayMcCray on Instagram, on TikTok.
46:53
SPEAKER_00: LinkedIn.
46:54
SPEAKER_00: So I just love to meet new people.
46:56
SPEAKER_00: So feel free to reach out.
46:57
SPEAKER_03: Awesome.
46:58
SPEAKER_03: Yay.
46:58
SPEAKER_03: We have a wonderful Uplifters chat right now.
47:02
SPEAKER_03: It's on WhatsApp.
47:03
SPEAKER_03: I'll send you a code to join us and we can all hang out there and stay connected
47:09
SPEAKER_03: and keep supporting one another.
47:11
SPEAKER_03: Every guest nominates another guest.
47:13
SPEAKER_03: Who would you like to nominate?
47:15
SPEAKER_03: Thanks.
47:16
SPEAKER_00: I would like to nominate my dear friend Lola Dada Ali.
47:20
SPEAKER_00: She wrote a book called Unapologetically Whole that just came out.
47:25
SPEAKER_00: The two amazing neurodivergent kiddos talks about that experience through
47:29
SPEAKER_00: a multi-generational lens because her brother also had autism and she talks
47:34
SPEAKER_00: about what it was like to sort of grow up in that household and then I can't wait.
47:37
SPEAKER_00: My daughter was diagnosed with autism last year
47:39
SPEAKER_00: and like we've all just had this amazing year of learning and
48:02
SPEAKER_03: And understanding in so many different ways of ourselves and each other.
48:06
SPEAKER_03: So, I mean, there's a thousand reasons I want to talk to her.
48:11
SPEAKER_03: Thank you.
48:12
SPEAKER_03: What a beautiful connection.
48:14
SPEAKER_03: So, so, so grateful to be connected to you.
48:16
SPEAKER_03: So grateful for this conversation.
48:18
SPEAKER_03: I learned so much.
48:19
SPEAKER_03: I know our community will learn so much.
48:21
SPEAKER_03: Our audience will be so thrilled to hear from you.
48:24
SPEAKER_03: For those of you listening, let us know what you took from this.
48:28
SPEAKER_03: And what other questions you have for Faye,
48:30
SPEAKER_03: we'll continue the conversation over in chat on Substack.
48:35
SPEAKER_03: I'll find you there, hopefully.
48:37
SPEAKER_03: That is at uplifterspodcast.com.
48:41
SPEAKER_03: We've got weekly stories from women like Faye who are in midlife doing big,
48:45
SPEAKER_03: brave things,
48:46
SPEAKER_03: as well as a lot of science to help us understand what's going on in our brains
48:50
SPEAKER_03: and bodies that are making us want to flip the switch or knock the whole Jenga house
48:56
SPEAKER_03: over.
48:59
SPEAKER_03: And really excited to keep learning and growing together.
49:02
SPEAKER_03: I, yeah, sorry,
49:04
SPEAKER_03: Red Cross just started calling and they like break through my freaking silent mode
49:08
SPEAKER_03: of my phone.
49:09
SPEAKER_03: They're very persistent.
49:11
SPEAKER_03: I want to say like,
49:13
SPEAKER_03: that is my goal to be as persistent and dedicated and consistent as the Red Cross.
49:19
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah, I can do that.
49:21
SPEAKER_03: That's a good goal.
49:24
SPEAKER_03: I was like trying to keep talking through it and I'm like, my wrist is vibrating.
49:28
SPEAKER_03: All right.
49:29
SPEAKER_03: See you over at theuplifterspodcast.com.
49:31
SPEAKER_03: If you need some support with getting your big,
49:33
SPEAKER_03: great, brave dream off the ground, you can also find me over at aransasavas.com.
49:37
SPEAKER_03: I'd love to help.
49:38
SPEAKER_03: Awesome.
49:41
SPEAKER_03: Thank you for listening to The Uplifters Podcast.
49:44
SPEAKER_03: If you're getting a boost from these episodes,
49:47
SPEAKER_03: please share them with The Uplifters in your life and then join us in conversation
49:53
SPEAKER_03: over at theuplifterspodcast.com.
49:57
SPEAKER_03: Head over to Spotify,
49:58
SPEAKER_03: Apple Podcasts,
49:59
SPEAKER_03: or wherever you get your podcasts and like, follow, and rate our show.
50:05
SPEAKER_03: It'll really help us connect with more Uplifters and it'll ensure you never miss one
50:11
SPEAKER_03: of these beautiful stories.
50:14
SPEAKER_01: Big love.
50:17
SPEAKER_01: Painted water sunshine with rosemary and tongue.
50:21
SPEAKER_01: Dwell in the perplexing, though you find it vexing.
50:26
SPEAKER_01: Toss the star and hover, be your own best lover.
50:30
SPEAKER_01: Relish in a new prime, plant a tree in springtime.
50:34
SPEAKER_01: Dance with idle hindsight, bring the sun to twilight.
50:41
SPEAKER_02: Lift you up, whoa-oh-oh-oh-oh-oh.
50:45
SPEAKER_02: Lift you up, whoa-oh-oh-oh-oh.
50:50
SPEAKER_02: Lift you up.
50:52
SPEAKER_02: Lift you up.
50:53
SPEAKER_02: Lift you up.
50:54
SPEAKER_02: Lift you up.
50:56
SPEAKER_02: Do do do.
50:57
SPEAKER_02: Do do do.
51:20
SPEAKER_02: Beautiful.
51:24
SPEAKER_02: That little thing you did with your boys.
51:27
SPEAKER_02: Right?
51:27
SPEAKER_02: In the pre-chorus.
51:29
SPEAKER_02: I was like... Mommy, stop crying.
51:34
SPEAKER_02: You're disturbing the peace.