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Navigating Stress and Change in Personal Life with Mardi Winder-Adams · The One Small Change Podcast

• 0:00
  Welcome to the One Small Change, and I'm so excited that you took
• 0:04
  time out of your your day to be here. And I'm thrilled to
• 0:07
  embark on this journey of exploration and transformation with you. I'm your
• 0:11
  host, Yvonne McCoy, and I bring almost 30 years of entrepreneurial
• 0:15
  experience and a passion for discovering growth through the
• 0:19
  power of really small change. Thanks for joining
• 0:23
  me on this journey. And this week, we are
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  talking with the amazing Mardi Winder Adams.
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  Mardi, I am so glad you're here to share with
• 0:35
  us, some unexpected change that had a, you
• 0:38
  know, remarkable transformation in your life. So
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  thank you for being here. Yvonne, thank you. This is
• 0:46
  really a privilege to be on your show and and have the opportunity to speak
• 0:50
  with you and your audience. So tell us what you do because
• 0:54
  you have a unique niche, and tell us how you
• 0:58
  got into it. Well, that's a very
• 1:01
  long story, so I'm gonna give you a very short version of it.
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  I am a divorce coach, and that's not
• 1:09
  what I started out in my in my professional life at all. I
• 1:13
  actually started out as, believe it or not, a livestock
• 1:16
  buyer. I would go and buy cattle for a packing plant. That's
• 1:20
  what I started out doing. That's and shortly
• 1:24
  after that, I mean, I grew up on a farm, you know, so what wasn't
• 1:28
  that big of a stretch. Then I went into teaching, and
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  I was an elementary school teacher for many, many years.
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  Went back and got my masters, started doing behavior consulting.
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  Long story short, moved from Canada down here to Texas,
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  and stopped teaching and started working as
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  a domestic violence client advocate. So I worked with women getting out
• 1:52
  of abusive, situations. Mhmm. Got really interested in
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  helping people through the divorce. I've been through my own. And,
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  obviously, in abuse cases, divorce is a priority for a lot of,
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  a lot of women. And then I went into
• 2:06
  ICF and BCC executive and leadership coaching, got all certified
• 2:10
  in that, and just loved the whole idea behind coaching. And I found
• 2:14
  that a lot of my clients that were struggling, in their
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  c suite roles as entrepreneurs, as professionals,
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  it wasn't the professional stuff that was so much the problem. It was the
• 2:25
  personal stuff that was going on in the background that was,
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  I say, bleeding into their professional persona and their
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  ability to do their job. So I found that a lot of my
• 2:36
  clients were going through divorce, and this was way back in 2015 before
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  divorce coaching was really recognized, a lot. It it was out
• 2:44
  there, but not really, like it is today. And I went
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  through, got my certification, and this is where I've been ever since
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  because it gives me the opportunity to meld all that stuff
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  together. You know, the thing that that I the the strange thing that we have
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  in common, I guess, is that when I was exec, coaching executive women
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  in nonprofits, and I would say to them, you
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  know, you know, just kind of to see where I was on the mark,
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  I would say to them, what is it that you got that you really that
• 3:13
  really helped you? And, of course, I was expecting them to say, oh, you're
• 3:16
  a wonderful business acumen. And what they said to
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  me was, you kept me calm and you helped me with
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  my kids. Yeah. So
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  Yeah. So that's interesting. So that's that's
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  that's a kind of a combination of a lot of
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  different skills that came together. So what was the change
• 3:41
  that made you say what was the biggest change that's happened for
• 3:44
  you that really had an impact on your life?
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  Well, I think way
• 3:52
  back when I was when I was still living in Canada and I was a
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  behavior consultant, I was doing my work for a school district. And
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  if you know, I'm not gonna go into how teachers and and people that
• 4:03
  work in school districts are underpaid and overworked. I'm not gonna go into it.
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  I married 1. So But it's the truth. But
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  what I found was that I started getting parents
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  who would or people within the school districts, teachers,
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  parents, community members, would come up and say, my child
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  is really struggling, and they've got some behavior challenges. Would you come
• 4:25
  and do an assessment for us privately, and what would you charge?
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  And I had honestly I grew up in a family. My dad was a police
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  officer. My mom worked for a department store. She had health
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  issues, and I just grew up where you just worked for somebody. Like,
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  that was security. Right? There was retirement. I mean, this was this was a long
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  time ago. There was retirement. There was pension. There was you know,
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  you kinda all your life at one place. It wasn't this jump
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  around to a bunch of different jobs. And I think the one small
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  change was just coming to the realization that your
• 4:58
  skills, your knowledge, and your experience is of
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  value to other people. And you have
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  to just trust that they are going to you know, if
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  you offer your services. Once I started doing that,
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  I just loved it. I loved being my own boss and that even though it
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  was just a little bit of a side hustle, but that kinda geared me up
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  to becoming more independent and and
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  developing my business, on the side. And and I
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  absolutely agree with you. I mean, my when I was doing adult education, one of
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  the things that I would say to people is you're
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  you you should consider yourself an entrepreneur even if you're
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  working for a company. Because everything you learn, everything you know
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  how to do, you can pick up and move. Right. You know? So whether
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  that's a side hustle, you know, or whether that's getting into
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  a different field. And so wherever you're working, you should
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  definitely take advantage of all the educational opportunities
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  that are there to hone the skills that you want. You
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  know, if, you know, if you can stretch the box a little bit so
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  that if you're thinking, I'd really like to be going more in this
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  direction, figure out a rationale for why you can have the
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  company pay for that. And so you've invested in yourself.
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  And having a side hustle, I think, is always a good thing
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  because I always go, you know, if you've got a if you're if you're you
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  think of your finances as a stool
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  and you're in a in a, you know, a marriage and only one income,
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  you've got, like, a one legged stool. If both of you are working, you've got
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  a 2 legged stool. If you've got some other source of income,
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  whether it's passive or it's a side hustle, you now have a 3 legged
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  stool. You know, and each of you have a hustle, now you have a 4
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  legged stool. The more streams of income you have, the more secure you
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  are financially. So
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  so tell me more give me a a story about
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  where you felt like this really helped somebody and and why this
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  is particularly important to entrepreneurs.
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  There's a couple. So I'm gonna answer the second part of that question first if
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  you don't want. No problem. There's a lot of research out there
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  about the impact of divorce on people. Whether you're a man
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  or woman, it it doesn't matter. So there's something called the
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  Holmes Rehay stress inventory, and it is an actual,
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  they use it to predict your level of stress and then the
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  possibility of health issues. So we know the higher level of
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  stress people have, the more risk there is for,
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  stress related health issues, cardiovascular, digestive, mental
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  health issues, that all comes into play. And the
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  most significant the
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  most significant event that people can experience on this scale, which is a
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  100 points, is the death of a spouse. The
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  second highest, level of stress is
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  rated at 70 points, and that is divorce. So
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  anybody that goes through divorce and thinks this is just a legal
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  matter, I can just you know, I'm not in love with that person anymore
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  or maybe even, I can't stand being around that person
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  anymore. They have you have to understand that
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  this is not just a legal issue. You can't compartmentalize your
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  life and go, well, the divorce is just gonna sit over here. It like I
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  said, it it it bleeds into all aspects of your life.
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  And if you are not maintaining yourself,
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  emotionally, mindfully, physically your physical
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  health, all of that stuff can really take a hit during a divorce. If you're
• 8:41
  an entrepreneur and you're not performing, you're not making effective
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  decision making, in a study that I just
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  read from the, I think, the University of Michigan. I may be misstating that, though.
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  But, basically, productivity drops for to up to
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  40% for 2 years on either side
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  of divorce for some people. So these are all things that an
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  entrepreneur really has to think about. You it's not going to be business as
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  usual if you're going through a divorce. So that's why I think it's
• 9:12
  important for entrepreneurs to prepare for this. Doesn't mean you need a divorce coach,
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  but you need to be prepared that those kind of things are gonna happen.
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  Well, I think Oh, sorry. No. Keep going. I'll I'll I'll
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  I'll I'll hold my thought for a minute. Well, I was just gonna say my
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  story that I always love to tell. I had a, so there's this thing
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  called the gray divorce. I'm sure you've heard of it. It's basically divorce for
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  people that are now there's a different number of different groups, but, say,
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  50 plus. And that's actually the biggest growing
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  group that is going through divorce right now are people 50
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  plus. And so a lot of the reasons you know, there's a lot of different
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  reasons for that, but I I think a lot of it is that, people are
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  living longer. And
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  why stay in a relationship in your retirement
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  years, whether you retire or not, where you're not happy
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  and you, you know, you have very different perspectives of what you want the next
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  20 or 30 years of your life to look like. You know, there's
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  typically no longer children involved. It's just a lot easier for or
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  minor children involved. Mhmm. So it's a lot easier for people to go through that.
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  But I worked with a lady who was in her seventies. She
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  started working with me when she was 68. It took 4 years for
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  her divorce to be finalized. She was dealing with an extremely
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  difficult situation with her partner. And,
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  she told I I always ask my clients to set their goals, which I know
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  that's a big part of of entrepreneurship as well is having those goals.
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  And she told me she wanted to go back to university and get her
• 10:44
  PhD that she was never able to do while she was in the marriage. And
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  so I am happy to report at the age of 73, she
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  got her PhD. And that and, you know, she
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  just said she felt so prepared to do that, with
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  having that clear vision, making the right decisions during the divorce to help
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  her make sure she could fund herself through that course. And, yeah,
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  I'm really excited she got her PhD. That's that's my yeah.
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  Yeah. That is so fantastic. And and I you know, you hit
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  on a couple of things, I think, that I think are so
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  important. One is that we have a tendency
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  I mean, if you're of a certain age, especially people who are
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  50 and older, you know, we were that mindset
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  of, you know, what I call doing the right thing. You know, you
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  went to you went to, high school, you went to either
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  college or training, you got married. I remember my father saying to me, I hope
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  I'm not sending you to college to get your MRS. Right?
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  You know, I got married. I had 2.7 kids.
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  I had a dog, 2 cats, 2 cars, and a house. You know?
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  And then with circumstances beyond my control, all of a
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  sudden, I found out I didn't have a job. Right? And it was
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  like, okay. If I have a chance
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  if if I have to, you know, go find another job and I was at
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  that weird time when my kids were, like, far enough from before they had to
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  go to college that I wasn't really worried about that,
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  And I had a good unemployment thing,
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  and I thought, what do I wanna do? What is it that I've always wanted
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  to do that that wasn't there? Right. Do
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  you know? And for me, I decided
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  that I wanted I always had wanted to
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  help pea adults learn to read. Because as a kid, I
• 12:37
  couldn't do that. I you know, I had a wonderful teacher who helped
• 12:41
  me, and so I decided I was gonna do that. Turns out I was, you
• 12:44
  know, volunteered to do that while I could. Turns out I was really horrible
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  at that. I think it was like a trigger for me.
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  Do you know? It'd take me back to something that was, you know, plus the
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  fact that I couldn't slow my brain down. I mean, I have all the
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  respect in the world for somebody who goes back to school and tries to learn
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  a new skill at at, you know, at an adult age, but I
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  could not I couldn't, you know, the
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  the dog. It was like
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  Right. So I went into workforce development, but my point
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  is that we all we shouldn't have to lose a job
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  to say, what is it that we really want to do?
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  And even if you can't stop immediately to
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  do that, that doesn't mean you can't do some things to prepare for
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  that. Do you know? So if it if you wanna, you know, wanted
• 13:36
  to get your degree, you can take a course. Right. Do you
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  know? Do some other things that you and so you become
• 13:43
  happier, you know, in your let your present life,
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  you know. And I think that's so important because, you know,
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  when my husband and I got married, we eloped.
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  But 4 days after we got married,
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  I said to him, you know what? This isn't gonna work.
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  I'm not gonna be the woman who says I gave you the best 25 years
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  of my life. This you know? I mean, you know? And he just looked
• 14:13
  at me like I lost my mind. He goes, what are you talking about?
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  And so we talked out because somehow or other, when we got married, we
• 14:21
  triggered we we channeled our parents. Suddenly, we became
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  our parents, which is not who we were. So, you know, even though I've
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  been married 52 years, like I just told you, we had 5 or 6
• 14:32
  marriages along the way because we've changed. And I think
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  part of that change is getting closer to you know, we made
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  decisions to get us closer to where we would like
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  to be. So if you were going to give somebody some steps,
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  you know, one of the things that you talked about is that being in an
• 14:52
  executive, you know, they knew what to do there. It was the
• 14:56
  the the other part. And change doesn't happen in a
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  vacuum. When you make a change, it affects everybody around you.
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  And I think for entrepreneurs, it's the same. Entrepreneurs are the
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  executive. They're the CEO of their business. And so it
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  is the family stuff, the personal stuff,
• 15:16
  that brings the friction because, you know, you you've got blinders on and you're
• 15:20
  work work work work work work, and and so stuff starts to
• 15:23
  happen. So what have you learned that
• 15:27
  entrepreneurs can use to get their life more in balance or, you know,
• 15:31
  warning signs that they may be in trouble with the, you know, with their
• 15:34
  family? Well, I I think
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  business is important. Making money is important. We all need money to
• 15:43
  live. But when it becomes your priority and you're no
• 15:47
  longer you're no longer able to
• 15:50
  spend quality time, I I'm not worried about quantity time.
• 15:54
  I'm worried about quality time with your partner, with your
• 15:58
  spouse, with your kids. That is eroding that
• 16:02
  relationship. And so as much time as you put in your business,
• 16:06
  think about what is your business of being a a parent, a
• 16:09
  partner, a spouse. You gotta have that business going
• 16:13
  as well. So there's got I don't believe in work life balance. I don't think
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  it exists. There are days when I get up at 6 o'clock in the
• 16:20
  morning, and I work through until 11 o'clock at night. I mean, it
• 16:23
  just happens. But somewhere, you've gotta you've gotta make that relationship
• 16:27
  work, so spending time with your spouse and kids. And then I think
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  and I would have never said this 10 years ago, but I'm saying it now.
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  Doing some kind of meditation,
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  mindfulness exercise, something. Even if it's
• 16:43
  just, listening to, like, an app for 2 minutes that guides
• 16:46
  you through a breathing exercise, like, whatever or or doing it on your own
• 16:50
  if if you're able to do it on your own. I haven't quite reached that.
• 16:53
  I still use the guided stuff. But when you can do
• 16:57
  that, you're just much more present when you're at your business or when you're
• 17:00
  at your home. And I think the last thing is
• 17:05
  to realize that when you're starting to feel stressed and overwhelmed,
• 17:11
  reaching out and getting whatever support you need, maybe it's from your
• 17:14
  church, maybe it's from your partner, maybe it's from a
• 17:18
  coach, maybe it's from a therapist. Whoever that
• 17:22
  person is, that doing that early
• 17:26
  has a way bigger return on your investment than waiting until,
• 17:30
  you you know, your relationship falls apart or you're feeling like you just,
• 17:34
  you know, you've got no energy, you've got no mental clarity, you're
• 17:38
  you're making dramatic mistakes at work,
• 17:42
  those kind of things, if you get help early, you're going
• 17:46
  to protect yourself, you're gonna protect your relationships, and you're gonna protect your
• 17:49
  business. I you know what? I couldn't agree with you more.
• 17:53
  I I have done all those things. I have got had a therapist. I've had
• 17:57
  you know? And I've also had drugs. But, you
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  know, like, you know, for anxiety and stuff like that.
• 18:04
  Right. And I think that one of the things that
• 18:09
  I think entrepreneurs don't realize
• 18:13
  is downtime is not really downtime.
• 18:17
  Downtime is kind of a reset time. It lets you
• 18:21
  reset. If you don't have some space, it's really hard to be
• 18:24
  creative. If you don't, you know I mean, sometimes just going
• 18:28
  for a walk clears your brain. I always go say, if I don't see the
• 18:32
  ocean, you know, every year, I feel like, you know, things
• 18:35
  are not right when the fall happens. And I think the thing is
• 18:40
  finding ways that you can share things. Right? So
• 18:44
  my thing is, my kids always laugh at me and they're adults. You
• 18:48
  know, we have a family call and they're they're they
• 18:51
  got to the point, they were like, mom, we don't wanna hear about business. Right?
• 18:55
  And so finding communities where you can have your, you
• 18:59
  know, have your ideas and stuff like that is, like, the best thing that you
• 19:03
  can do. I mean Yeah. Just so that you have an outlet and people
• 19:07
  who have solved the problems that you have, asking for help is not a
• 19:10
  weakness, it's a sign of strength.
• 19:14
  So I, you know, I absolutely agree with me. So before we
• 19:18
  run out of time, you've got a freebie for us. Right?
• 19:22
  Yes. I have, it's a journal, the resilience building
• 19:26
  blueprint, and it's a great tool. It's not related to
• 19:29
  divorce at all. What it is all about is it walks you
• 19:33
  through it's a 28 day plan, and it every day, it gives you a
• 19:37
  specific activity to do that like, maybe,
• 19:41
  you know, hold open a door for somebody at at a grocery
• 19:44
  store or at a restaurant. You know? So it's something simple like that. And
• 19:48
  then it asks you to talk about what that experience felt
• 19:52
  like for you at the time. And then at the end of the day, there's
• 19:56
  a reflection question that goes a little bit deeper about how can
• 20:00
  you how did you know, how was that experience going to help you build
• 20:03
  resilience, make you feel more confident, make you feel more connected. So there
• 20:07
  it's a it's a guide to walk you through that, and it goes 28 days.
• 20:11
  You can do it every, like, one a day, or you can just do 1
• 20:14
  you pick one day and do one activity a week and spread it out over
• 20:18
  a much longer period. Entirely up to you. That's
• 20:21
  fantastic because I think, you know,
• 20:25
  I think you need to add something. You need to add an ingredient in to
• 20:29
  make a change. Because if you keep doing what you're doing, you're gonna keep getting
• 20:32
  what you got. So that is fantastic. Alright. So I have a
• 20:36
  question for you. We're talking about adding things. Okay.
• 20:40
  So so when was the last time that you did something new for the first
• 20:43
  time? About 3 weeks ago.
• 20:46
  And do you wanna know what it was? Oh, absolutely, if you're willing to
• 20:50
  share. I booked on a cruise
• 20:54
  and didn't know anybody. I it was a conference thing on a cruise. It was
• 20:58
  a training thing on a cruise, and I booked myself on a cruise. I've
• 21:01
  never been on a cruise before. I had no idea what it was. I didn't
• 21:05
  know anybody that was gonna be in this training, event, and I had the
• 21:09
  most phenomenal experience. Fantastic. I happen
• 21:13
  to love cruises, so, you know, I'm I'm all in on a cruise. Alright.
• 21:17
  So I can't believe that we're out of time
• 21:22
  because we've got so many things in common that we can talk about. We, you
• 21:25
  know, we we didn't even touch on what I call a situational
• 21:29
  awareness, you know, when you when you, you know, that when you're
• 21:33
  making a decision, you need to kinda figure out, you know,
• 21:37
  what you can do, because I don't think you can do everything at once. I
• 21:40
  mean, that's just my own personal thing. So
• 21:44
  alright. So just to take us out of here, you know, I need to
• 21:47
  remind everybody, please subscribe, to
• 21:51
  this podcast and engage with it on social
• 21:55
  media. And, you know, the reason I do this is it's
• 21:58
  my way of giving back to the community because I wanted to I want you
• 22:02
  to have lots of ideas that you can work on. And
• 22:06
  so I'm so glad that you joined me, and even the
• 22:09
  tiniest shifts can yield monumental transformations. And if
• 22:13
  you haven't listened to the first episode, you should because that's where
• 22:17
  we dive into the world of bold vision and innovative possibilities.
• 22:21
  So, Mardi, do you have any last words you want people to remember us
• 22:24
  by? Oh, I think I think that I
• 22:28
  love that thought that you had about surrounding yourself with a community of
• 22:31
  people that can help you get into a a mastermind, work
• 22:35
  with Yvonne, all that kind of stuff. Because when you're around people that are
• 22:39
  creative and supportive, you just flourish, whoever you are,
• 22:42
  whatever you're doing. Fantastic. Thank you so much for that. I love
• 22:46
  that. So remember, change is simple, but it's
• 22:50
  not always easy. And as Marnie talked about, you know, being it
• 22:53
  requires courage and resilience, and a willingness to step
• 22:57
  out of your comfort zone. And that sometimes can be hard because we've
• 23:00
  taken a long time getting comfortable. And so stepping out, it
• 23:04
  does take courage and resilience. And so I hope you will join me
• 23:08
  again next week for the one small change and see who we've got
• 23:12
  for you. But until then, stay curious.