Playing Big & Beating Burnout

​​In this episode, I have a conversation with Tracy Frederick- a lawyer, certified life coach, and MY mastermind leader !

Tracy is passionate about helping high-achieving women avoid burnout and rediscover joy. We dive into practical self-awareness tools like the Enneagram and Human Design, and discuss Tara Mohr’s influential book Playing Big—a guide for women looking to amplify their voice, creativity, and leadership. 

Main Points:

• Make self-awareness and regular self-care a priority to avoid burnout .
• Connect to a community for essential support, accountability, and encouragement.
• Try new things before you feel completely “ready” and trust both your instincts and future self.
• Make your work visible, embrace imperfection, and detach from external validation. 

Links 

• Join Kelly's Group Coaching Program
• Tracy Frederick Coaching
• “Playing Big” by Tara Mohr.

Let's connect.

I am cheering for you!

Transcript

Speaker 2: 0:00

If you're not living big and living into your your reality, your dreams, like what inspires you? What's important to you? That's what drives me. To push myself to continually learn, continually grow. You don't want to wait, for the invite. Like just do whatever the thing is you want to do. Welcome to the Live A Vibrant Life podcast. I'm life coach Kelly Titz, and each week I'll be here to encourage and equip you with the tools you need to grow in self-awareness and invest your best energy in your dreams and your purpose. I believe self-awareness changes everything. Let's get started welcome to the Live a Vibrant Life podcast. I hope our conversation today really helps you develop the tools you need to live a life without burnout, to live with joy and excitement. Today my guest is Tracy Frederick. She is a lawyer, a life coach, and someone who's leading a mastermind that I'm in. I'm particularly excited to talk to you today, Tracy, because you introduced me to the book by Tara Moore called Playing Big. We're going to talk a little bit about that Thank you for being here today. Thanks so much for having me, Kelly. It's great to see you. I wanted to start just by sharing a little bit about you. My business primarily supports leadership in public defender offices, specifically leadership training and support and continuing legal education. But honestly, a lot of what I do, is support burnout for both my clients and then the lawyers that report to them. Many of us particularly that are, that are drawn to this field, just think that we can keep pushing forward and that we're invincible until we're not.

Speaker: 1:53

I think your story is so interesting how you moved from being a lawyer to being somebody who's trying to help people avoid burnout and enjoy their life in a way that I would describe as vibrant. So tell me a little bit about yourself and this coaching company that you've created.

Speaker 2: 2:08

Sure, thanks. So for many years I was a public defender, both in the state and federal systems. The lawyers that I was working with were managing burnout. Some of us better than others depending on the day or the week. When you're a type A go-getter, you are going to be regularly battling burnout. I think that's just the reality. When I had my third kid, it, I had some health issues with him during birth, and then maybe five months after he was born. I found myself thinking I was having a heart attack while I was playing ice hockey. I did at least realize at that moment that balance wasn't happening for me. I was no longer exercising. I was drinking after work to manage my stress. Just two max three drinks, but I was only drinking after work. I wasn't even drinking on weekends. So I was clearly using it to sort of delineate the line between work and home and all the stressors that were happening and. I was outta shape. I was not doing anything for myself at all. And really stressed out. I had a medical event. I was diagnosed with AFib very young and was medicated for it, and the doctor that treated me at the hospital that came around the next morning said, asked me what I did for a living. I told him and he told me that I needed to get a new career or figure out how to manage my stress. And I laughed at him. I think I told my husband I thought he was an idiot and kind of ignored it, to be honest with you. Which I'm not proud of. Now, in retrospect, it's, it was terrible how I handled it, but I sort of medicated through it and kind of managed things, you know, decently for a couple of more years. Before I stopped trying cases I did make some massive shifts in my life. I got a surgery that fixed my AFib, and when I did that, I decided that I was going to start taking care of myself. So started walking every single day about four miles a day, stopped drinking. At the most, I would have two drinks a week, and many, many times I wouldn't drink for months. I really just cut it out and started just kind of generally taking care of myself. And while that was all happening and things were definitely much more manageable, I wasn't at the level of burnout I had been when before I had the medical event. My son became very ill with an autoimmune disorder and so I took a leave of absence from my law practice and decided that I needed to focus on my son. We figured out what was wrong. We started treating him. Things started getting better. I decided to get certified in coaching. I'd been coached, which I found incredibly helpful. Became certified as a coach and then began transitioning to a place where now. I try to help my clients avoid that before they get to the point.

Speaker: 5:16

And I think, like you said, part of how you end up there is when you're in your twenties, in your thirties and you have this great physical energy, you can go past your limits and recover easier than you can in your later thirties and your forties. I think vibrant lives begin with self-awareness. I think most of us don't know why we think and feel and do life the way we do. So here you are, you know, as you said, type A going to keep moving a little bit faster than maybe the people around you and. That's pretty common for people to become lawyers. I was a teacher, we had a lot of people in my field that were overgiving emotionally and not aware of that. And then you go home and you deal with that stress maybe by, you know, making dessert every night or something. So I think different careers draw different types of energy, but most of us are living lives where we don't even know why. Why am I thinking and feeling and doing this on repeat, especially when it's creating burnout. So have you done any work to discover maybe your Enneagram or your disc, and has it given you any insight into you and why you do things the way you do?

Speaker 2: 6:16

Yeah, I definitely have. I've even done some with you. Which was really fun. And I, I've definitely dove into it a bit. It's really actually crazy how much the Enneagram and human design, at least in my experience, were so incredibly accurate and, it, I found it really beneficial because I'd done a lot of this deep work before, and so when I, I felt like I knew myself pretty well, but when I just gave someone my birthday and the time I was born and then they literally gave me this litany of things back that were absolutely spot on, I was pretty flabbergasted by it. So I'm a generator. Which I think if my understanding of it is correct, I'm just, I'm always trying to do things and make things and, and, create things, but not from the get go. Like someone can create it and then I'm the one that's going to

Speaker: 7:06

launch it off. Yes, you're right. So there's someone who's the fire starter and you're that sacral powerful energy that's going to come and move things along. And so you probably have seen that all through your life, that you have the energy that people attach to because you have that movement that sacral. And it also gives you wisdom. Like if you can trust your gut, it's going to move you in the direction you're supposed to move in. But. A lot of women were not brought up to trust our gut. We were told, maybe you're too much, or, you know, I don't know why you're doing or thinking this. So the human design in particular, letting you know you're a generator in the Enneagram, we've talked a little bit, you're an Enneagram three. So being productive, being successful is a driving force behind why you think and feel and do life. And you know, you have a spouse and kids and coworkers, they might have different reasons for why they do things. So knowing that is helpful. Like you said, it kind of all goes together, so learning your human design with your Enneagram can be pretty beneficial. Has there been anything that has helped you particularly avoid burnout by knowing a little bit about yourself? Like has it taught you, hey, generators are just going to keep going and going, and I have to put some boundaries around my own life, or I'm just going to keep going?

Speaker 2: 8:14

Yeah, it definitely I remember reading about the, the thought that you can keep going until you just can't. Yeah. But generators often do that, and that is absolutely how I've operated. So now what I really do consciously is at least every two weeks, I kind of just have a quick check-in with myself at the end of the week and say, Hey, listen, how are you sleeping? How are you eating? How are you just feeling? Mm-hmm. And are you feeling like there are too many things in your plate right now? A little bit overwhelmed. And if so, then I will back off rather than waiting until I have to back off where I'm just crashing.

Speaker: 8:49

Yeah, that's my favorite thing about coaching generators is helping them learn exactly what you just said because they have all this evidence of I can just create some more energy. I am the energy, I'm just going to keep going. And then it's almost like you said. You can do that until you can't, and now you're physically exhausted or you're mentally depleted. Is that part of what made you decide to create a mastermind of other women who are, you know, strong and determined to do things that are important in life? Did you want to share some of those tools with them?

Speaker 2: 9:19

I did. I wanted to share. It was, it was twofold. I wanted to share the tools with them. And I wanted to create a community for myself. You know, I, I knew that these women existed near where I lived, but I didn't really know them. I moved here a few years ago and I'm a generator, so I'm busy, so I'm not really, you know, and as an entrepreneur, I'm really alone in my office, right? So I, I'm very isolated and I think a lot of us are isolated since the pandemic. And so I wanted to create that space where I could. Come in and use some of the things that I'm coaching on one-to-one all the time. I wanted to start creating some group programs. This was a great way to do that. And it's been wonderful because I've met so. So many great women in this group. We are really lucky, I feel like, to have each other at this point. And I've learned so much because everybody in that group brings such a unique skillset and just life experience. So it's been really great.

Speaker: 10:18

I agree, and I think some people listening to this, this might be your encouragement to go find those three to five people that you can do life with. It. It's almost like a breath of fresh air when we come together every month. Like people can breathe out and know it's a safe place to be honest about. Yeah, I have all these balls in the air, but it's starting to feel like maybe too much. Or if I don't pay attention, something's going to crash.

Speaker 2: 10:39

I think so, especially because the type of women that are in this group, and, and these are really like driven women generally, you know, you often feel alone, like you're running your own company, you're running the house you are, if you're not running your own company, you're high up at another company and. That gets very isolating. Mm-hmm. I see that from my clients all the time. They don't feel like they have people they can go to, to vent and support them the way they really need. And I think masterminds are an absolute gift for that, that everybody should be in a mastermind. Don't need to be in mind. Find one, make one. You know? Absolute. Yeah.

Speaker: 11:15

Yeah. Because we weren't meant to do life alone and we become like the five people we spend the most time with. So if we can be with people who are, you know, serious about self-improvement and about taking care of themselves so that we have love and joy and peace to, you know, share with the world. So one of the things you did was encourage us to get the book playing Big by Tara Moore. And the subtitle says, practical wisdom for women who want to Speak Up, create and Lead. And I would say for most of my life, I did not have the confidence to speak up. I did not believe I was creative and it was really hard for me to believe that I was created to lead. Now I've had, you know, 180 on that and I see all of that in me. But what does playing big look like for you? I'm sure you've worked with some pretty powerful women who. Might still have this small voice in the back of their head. Who are you to do any of this? Right? So,

Speaker 2: 12:04

oh yeah. I mean, I get that voice on occasion. I can coach on it until I'm blue in the face, but it, that voice will pop here and there. Here and there. You know, for me playing big is owning your voice and trying things out. Even when you're afraid to do so. Just doing it anyway and giving it a shot. Trusting yourself, like you said earlier, like trusting your instinct, trusting your gut. Knowing, knowing yourself and doing the same for the other women in your life too is a big piece of it, you know. What I love about our group is that everybody there is each other's biggest advocate, right? We're all supporting each other. And even if you come up with some idea that your friends outside of this group might think is crazy, no one in this group is going to tell you that you're crazy, right? And I think that's playing big, like launching things, ideas and. Just experiences before they're really ready to be launched. Yeah. They're just doing it anyway

Speaker: 13:04

because there is no other way. Right. We're going to get really good at things. Our hundredth time. Our thousandth time. Yeah. But for some reason, those of us who, especially if we did well in school, think that there's going to be a way to do this and the first time or the second time, it's just going to be easy and it's not. So to be in a group of other women who are cheering you on is so helpful. One of the most important things I think we can do for one another is to share tools that work for us. So she was saying that there are these different practices that can help us, and the first one is tapping into your inner mentor, and that was one of the ones that stood out to you. When you're afraid or nervous, you could look to your inner mentor. And I've had a couple of coaches who've shared this idea of the most powerful person who could help me move forward is future me.'cause she knows how it happened. And I think about that all the time, 20-year-old me, not quite through college yet, if she had any idea, this is how you're going to get married and have three kids and you're going to become a leader. There would be no way for her to know how to do what I've done. But now that I look back, it's like, oh, you do A, and then you do B and then you do C. So what do you think of this idea that there's an inner mentor, there's wisdom inside of each woman who's listening to us today?

Speaker 2: 14:15

I think that is a very, very powerful concept. And it's, it can be difficult, especially when you're younger. To embrace that voice and it's really about that inner trust.

Speaker: 14:28

Yeah.

Speaker 2: 14:28

You know sometimes I will think about my ancestors. It's almost easier to do it that way. Like, okay, you know, if your grandmother was still here, what would she think? I mean, you went to college, that was not going to happen for her. You are doing all these things. You've changed a career, you know, trying to have this. Sense of strength rather than what we often have the inner critic going in our ears, right? Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Particularly as women, you know, it's so easy to to say to yourself, oh, I should have done that differently. I could have done that better and instead. Try to be your own coach. You know, use that mentor to, to push yourself forward and to be there when things are tough, because they're not always easy.

Speaker: 15:11

No, and, and we'll look back on some of those harder times and say, wow, there's such deep wisdom in what I learned from here. My oldest daughter just. Traveled through Asia for three weeks and she makes it back safely and then decides to do too many things on her morning back. And she goes to the grocery store in the farmer's market and she ends up dropping a bottle of wine and injuring herself. And her sentence to me was, mom, I was carrying too much. And I say, girl, someday I'm going to write a book. And that's going to be the main idea. So many of us are carrying too much. We don't know how to put it down. We don't know how to say, not now. But the lesson of that is I think the whole rest of her life, she'll have just a little check before she goes to do something when she's very tired. Is this going to be too much? And so some of the other tools she offered are to invite love in, which is simply you don't know what to do. Putting your hand on your heart, closing your eyes and saying something like, I'm inviting love into this. Next thing that I'm going to do, I'm inviting. Love to bring me wisdom. Another idea she had is to get curious, and I love that idea from Ted Lasso. Like, can you just be curious instead of judgmental? Anything else that you use on a regular basis as a tool. I know one of the ones that you talked about in our last mastermind is the importance of walking. And some of these tools seem so simple, it's like, why are we even talking about it? But we don't do it. Like, we know to do it, but we don't do it. So is there a tool more powerful than walking or is that the one that you have really connected with? Oh, if I had to

Speaker 2: 16:32

choose one, that's it. Because for me walking changed my life, you know, when, when I first started doing it, I remember thinking, I should write a book about this, but who needs a book about walking? You know, and then I googled it and there were some books about walking already. So you know, it is just so incredible. Incredibly powerful because you can do it anywhere as long as you're physically able. So you can do it. You know, I'm walking, I don't care what time of year it is. If we have hockey at 5 45 in the morning, I'm out walking. It's pitch black. I've got a headlamp on. You can do it when you're on vacation. You can, you know what I mean? It's, there's just no stop. You can do it in the middle of the day. You can throw sneakers in your office, leave for 15 minutes and come back. It's also a built-in meditation session. Right. So you're kind of getting double. Value for it. So for me, if I had to choose one thing above all things, it would be that. And I always encourage people that if you're feeling really stressed and you're really kind of at your breaking point and you have a lot of things going on in your life, whatever that might look like. I just saw a study, I think it was two weeks ago that said 15 minutes of brisk walking completely resets your system. A

Speaker: 17:43

hundred percent. I agree. And

Speaker 2: 17:45

yeah. And so that's, anybody can do

Speaker: 17:46

that. Right? Right. Right. And for me, like one of her tools is to use music. And so I know some people the walk is in the silence and, and for me, I think music moves my energy. And so finding whatever the tool is, they're almost always simple and then we don't pay attention to it. We think it has to be very complicated. But if. Our intention is to say, I'm trying to avoid burnout by honoring how I'm wired. You're a generator. It's not best for you to try to do life quietly and simply like you come with your big, strong sacral energy. So how can you use that? Well, every single day I'm going to take this little walk and I'm going to try to have my brain focus on the trees instead of every problem in the world, I'm going to breathe. I'm going to use it as a meditative practice, and 15 minutes is enough to pivot back.

Speaker 2: 18:34

Yeah, that's the thing. It really is enough. I, I do, you know, a long thing every morning, but when I'm feeling moti, like overwhelmed in any way, I will pop in an extra 15 minute. Walk. And there's so many different things you can do, right? But I think the key to key to the staying ahead of burnout is that with everything you choose, try to do it regularly. That's the most important piece of it. I mean, you're not going to get the benefits of these things if you're doing it once a month.

Speaker: 19:01

Well, and you making it so. So I think so many people rely on the big vacation once a year. They're going to overwork and then they're going to go on this two week trip. And it turns out by the time they get there, they're so exhausted. They get sick the first few days or they can't de-stress and their brain is running. And some people don't get the two weeks, they get one week and just when they begin to like calm down and their nervous system regulates, it's time to pack up and go. Or worse, you bring people with you, whether it's your children or your in-laws. And now it's not a vacation, it's a trip and it's. More work. So just noticing these small things on repeat may be a little bit better than trying to do one big thing once a year. Well,

Speaker 2: 19:41

yeah, I, I definitely agree with that. I think we, we can all get caught in the trap of thinking like, oh, if I can just finish one more thing and then I'll go on this vacation, or, but that is. A very finite piece of time, rather than building something in that's going to generally take your nervous system down a notch. Yeah, that's more valuable.

Speaker: 20:01

A hundred percent. So one of the reasons I think we as women struggle with this is the education system has been set up in general for girls to succeed more than boys because the education system. In general rewards kids who do the right thing quietly, right? So you go home, you study, you take the test, you turn it in, you don't make. The energy focused on you, you're not going to act up and you're not going to do things differently than what has been required. And that sets us up for later in life, not having the toolbox to succeed in the workforce, where you do need to be confident, you do need to speak out and maybe become an entrepreneur and start your own thing. So she describes it as doing good work versus doing good work and making it visible. I would say that has been a difficult part of my pivot. I was such a good student. I was taught to not put any attention upon myself to always just deflect and like, call it humility, but I think it really wasn't humility, it was just not honoring my own strengths and gifts. And so this new idea of do the good work and make it visible, be willing to speak out. One of the places you have is and I'm, I know a little bit of, it wasn't a natural first step, but you started going on LinkedIn and sharing. And those first few times, how did you get the confidence to do something you hadn't done before to show up and make it visible?

Speaker 2: 21:25

I don't really know. I honestly think I just did it because I did, you know, I was very resistant to it. I'm not a big social media person at all, but I felt called to start speaking about this stuff openly because I knew so many people were struggling with it and there just wasn't a lot of talk chatter about it online. And so I initially was still troubled by it and, and uncomfortable sharing. And, but now I, I don't care at all. I, if a picture looks weird, oh, well, it's there, it's out in the stratosphere. I can't take it back. And I, but I'm getting, you know, positive feedback. I don't, I don't need like a thousand likes or any of that stuff. To know from a few lawyers that have reached out to me saying, oh, thanks for speaking about this. No one is, and we're struggling with this. We need people to be putting a voice to it is very rewarding. So I think it's a very good example though of just do it. Even though you're uncomfortable, if you think that you, you want your voice heard, and the thing is your voice has to be heard, right? Like, you might have all these great ideas and messaging, but if no one's hearing it, it's not really that powerful.

Speaker: 22:36

And it is really hard to make it visible when you're not used to doing that. When you're used to being the support person or the helper or you know, you're not used to. Like listening to your own voice or looking at your own face without judgment. It's hard to do it at the beginning, but the reality is very few of us judge the humanity in each other. Like we all think everyone wants us to look beautiful, but then we don't really. Find ourselves drawn to the people with lots of plastic surgery who don't look like we like the normal looking humans who are experiencing a normal human life and have something to teach us. Like that is who we are in general drawn to. So when you're sharing your real life, people probably say, thank you so much. Me too. I get it. I appreciate that you're talking about it. They're not waiting for you to be perfect. In fact, nobody is perfect till then you're putting people off. So you have had people say things, and I guarantee you have people who appreciate what you're sharing. And they don't tell you.

Speaker 2: 23:31

Yeah. That's the thing, right? You you learn about in this business of online marketing that, you know, it's, it's really the people that don't ever respond, but that are, they're there day after day. I mean, those are people that have reached out to me. And hired me privately when they were trying to transition out of public defense into private practice or into other areas of the law. I had no idea they were following me. Right? No clue. Right? So so you're probably impacting a lot more people and hopefully in a positive way than you even know,

Speaker: 24:01

and we're never going to connect with everybody. One of my favorite life coaches is Brooke Castillo, and she says, you know. You might be a peach, but some people are allergic to peaches. Like you are just not for everybody. Right? So go and share what is yours to share. It gets easier. You noticed that the first couple times were uncomfortable and now you're like, no big deal.

Speaker 2: 24:21

Yeah. I think it def it's like anything else. It gets easier and then you just become more confident, I think, in owning your voice and realizing it doesn't need to be perfect. I'm not perfect. I know for sure I'm not for everyone. And that's okay. Right. You know, it's, it's totally fine.

Speaker: 24:37

Well, and I love that Tara has this section on this called unhooking from praise and Criticism. And when I left being a teacher and became a pastor after about 10 years of working with children, I actually became the leader of an organization and didn't acknowledge the fact that I was leading. I kept waiting for the leader to come for the four years that I was leading. But one of the most important tools I learned was the people who come and praise you heavily at the beginning without knowing you are probably going to be the most difficult people on their way out, right? They come in, this is the best church I've ever been to. You're the best pastor. And on the way out, everything about you sucks. So you don't want to connect to praise and you don't want to connect to criticism. You want to connect to the truth and the reality. So I find that. I believe every human was made on purpose for a purpose. I think every person is here and their life matters, and when I do my work, I try to. Have it aligned to the values that are important to me. So for my company, that was the very first thing I did. I said, what values are going to drive what I do? And I want to be collaborative and other people don't like, they want to do things in a silo way. I want to have a group of people around me. I want to be generous with my words and my money and my time. And then this one was huge for me. I want to create expeditious. Since I was a child, people have said, you talk so fast, you move so fast. I'm not for somebody who wants slow and methodical. I'm a manifesting generator. I'm from New England. I work quickly and expeditious means to move quickly without rushing. So it's a narrow road. But if you're not looking for something that moves quickly, I might be really difficult. Right? I'm that peach. You're allergic to. So what do you think about the idea that it's important for us to connect to our own identity, our own truth, so that we can unhook from praise and criticism?

Speaker 2: 26:19

I think that is one of the most valuable lessons that anyone can learn. I hope that young women are, are learning this a lot sooner than I did. I spent so much time trying to get praise, you know, it was just. Since I was a, a young kid and and as a trial lawyer, let's be real. I mean, I wanted to win those cases and I wanted the jury eating up every word that I said and loved every minute of it, but. That's not the real world, you know, the real world is just what you said. You're valuable regardless. It doesn't matter, you know, like it, and I, and I should know that, right? I mean, I've represented people that have done reprehensible things and they're still, I don't think I've ever had a client who I didn't really believe was a very valuable human and had some very good things in them. So we all do, and I and I, if we can just spend more time. Just owning that and saying like, yeah, whatever I'm bringing to the table has value. I'm not perfect. I don't need to be perfect. No one is. But treat ourselves the way we generally treat others, you know, as a good start. I know

Speaker: 27:29

like we say that a lot in the coaching world, you know, picture somebody saying what you say to yourself to like your sweet niece or your sweet daughter, you'd be so offended, but you use those words on yourself. And the funny part about joining your mastermind is I thought, I've done all the work and I'm so aligned and I get, the paper that you had created of who was in our Mastermind. I was on a vacation for the first one and I almost didn't join because I felt so intimidated by everybody's bio. And then I show up and I was so proud of myself for being brave and showing up because we're all equal. But those stories from my childhood just rose up so quickly when I saw on paper, okay, here's an impressive group of women and. I was finding myself connecting back to like this praise and criticism and inner critic and who are you to be there versus I have something to bring to the table and I'm excited to be at a table where I'm going to learn from other people. And so I just want to be honest too, like this isn't a one and done and now you've done these, you know, six tools from playing big and now you're all confident. Like I think it's a dance and you take a few steps forward and then something in life happens and you take a few steps back. But in general, small practices on repeat. Aligning your energy does create in you the kind of enthusiasm and connected, aligned energy that I think we all need. So you are noticing that as well. Like you raise children, my children are now grown, but I think that's so important for them that it's not the criticism of your peers and it's not, you know, what other people say about you. If you can find your own identity, those things lose their power, right? What people are saying loses their power when you're the one that's connected to your own identity and you've got your own back.

Speaker 2: 29:07

Yeah, it's so true and especially for kids. My kids are are younger and it's, you know, between years are rough. They can be tough. And trying to instill in your children your valuable, you know, regardless. And so is everyone that you know in school, including that kid that's driving you nuts and is having, you know, all kinds of difficulties. Just be respectful, you know? Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. We're all, we're all in this coming, you know, from it with our own challenges.

Speaker: 29:36

Yes. One of my favorite pastors says, I'm God's favorite, and so is everyone else. I think that's a really good way to live in aligned energy. Well, the last thing I want to talk about her book is she talked about the idea that a lot of women are held back from doing things that really, I think they were created to do because they believe this thought, well, I'm not an expert. And yet we are surrounded, and I, I'm not here to male bash, but in general, men are a little bit better at doing things when they're 70%. Capable of doing. There's like statistics all over Lean in talks about this, and women wait till they're like 95, 99% able to do something before they go to do that. Have you seen that in your own life, women who are lawyers or in masterminds where they keep holding themselves back, waiting to become the expert? And what advice would you have for someone who just is waiting until they're 99% ready to do something?

Speaker 2: 30:31

Yes, I see that all the time. I actually think to some extent that powerful women very successful women, almost suffer from this at a higher rate'cause they're so used to being so successful. And part of the problem is you go through school and there's this very regimented way in which you're supposed to perform. And if you do so, you're probably going to get good grades. As long as you don't have a learning disability, you're just going to move along and check all the boxes and. Do whatever it is you're supposed to do. Once you get into the real world, that is not how the world operates, and now you are going to be tasked with doing things you have no idea how to do, especially as a leader and a manager. You've gotta start from somewhere. So I had a client who was very young and was already pretty high up at this company, but was asked to apply for a president, like position in a very high position in in one of the divisions. And we had a session where she came to me and said I, I can't do this. And I looked at her and I asked her why. She went on, you know, with a litany of things, why she couldn't do it. Nobody would respect her. She's not ready for this. She's too young to do this. She doesn't know what she's doing. And the truth was she'd already been doing it. Mm-hmm. She'd been basically filling in for six months. Mm-hmm. Doing the job. She clearly knew how to do the job so. She wasn't seeing it. And so we worked through it and I said, listen, like you need to apply for this job. It's a massive raise It's, there's so many great opportunities that come with this. If you really tell me you don't want it, right, because it doesn't work for you, that's a different conversation. But if you're telling me you don't want it because you're afraid of doing something you don't know how to do 100%, that's not the path you want to take. She ultimately applied for it and got it and now would, look back and reflected on that conversation with her, she would be shocked, right? That that was like the place she was at. So I think it's it's so, so common and I think you need to really instead say I gain value by trying new things. I don't need to be an expert at all. And I'm going to figure it out. I know as a business owner, especially when I went into something wholly new, I mean, I, I knew how to give me a case. You can call me about any kind of a drug case or murder, whatever. I can give you the lowdown pretty quickly and I could figure it out. I went into something, especially on the business side, where I had no clue what I was doing. And in the beginning that was me. Well, you're not really ready yet. You can't do it. Maybe you're going to have to hire somebody for this. And now it's the opposite. I'm like, yep, I'll figure it out. Yes. You know, and you'll figure it out. And so it's a real gift to get there. You've just got to trust yourself again and force yourself to take that step. The uncomfortable, which,

Speaker: 33:26

which is why communities like masterminds are so important and podcasts like this that share a thought, like everything's figureoutable. I remember the first time I heard Marie Forleo say that, and then I went and bought her book, and then I joined B-School because I had never heard anybody say Everything's figureoutable. And so I was living a life like I don't know how to do 80% of life, so I won't go over there and try. And that was not how I wanted to raise my daughters. I wanted them to be confident and to be able to just go and, you know, face challenges and, and you need other examples of that. And that's an important reason why I want to have a podcast, is I want to bring on people that I'm learning from so other people can hear them say, Hey, I'm just like you. This was hard, but I decided to do something hard instead of avoid it. So as we're coming to a close, you've learned a lot between. Getting yourself through law school, starting your own company all the things you've done with your children to advocate for them. Is there any big idea that kind of pushes you forward, gives you the confidence to try, you know, over and over again? What would your like big idea be if someone came and had a coffee with you and they were like, I just am afraid to try? What would you offer them?

Speaker 2: 34:37

I really think that life is way too short not to do new things and you know, like you. Said at the beginning of the podcast, live a vibrant life. Like, what is the point? If you're not living big and living into your your reality, your dreams, like what inspires you? What's important to you? That's what drives me. You know, really trying to push myself to con, continually learn, continually grow. Realize the, the older I get, the less I know. I mean that is so true. And I think that is, you know, that's really it. It's like you don't want to. You don't want to wait, for the invite. Like just do whatever the thing is you want to do. And if, you're not ready or you want to pick up a new sport at the age of 80, I was skiing last winter and I saw an 85-year-old guy I learning how to ski. Love it. Love It was unbelievable. Yeah. Like he was in great shape, let me tell you. But still, he didn't know how to ski. He was figuring it out. Like you can do anything at any point and nothing is going to limit you except yourself.

Speaker: 35:42

That is so powerful, and that's why I love being in your energy. If someone else is hearing this, they're like, oh, I want to learn more. How could people connect with you?

Speaker 2: 35:50

Oh, thank you. The easiest way to get me is at Tracy Frederick coaching dot com. And I'm on LinkedIn. Tracy Frederick, jd.

Speaker: 35:59

Thank you again for being here, and I hope our time together truly helps you to live a vibrant life.

Speaker 3: 36:07

I hope you enjoyed this episode. I look forward to talking again next week. Thank you for joining the Live A Vibrant Life podcast. I hope our time together encourage you and will equip you with the tools you need to move into the vibrant life you desire. I'm here to help you live a brave, creative, purpose-filled life. And if you'd like to learn more. You can follow me on Instagram or Facebook, Kelly tibbits life coach, or visit my website kelly tibbits.com. I look forward to connecting

Speaker 4: 36:36

again soon.