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The Bold Lounge
Everyone has a bold story, and every story is important. This podcast presents bold stories that will inspire and enable you to free your own boldness. There is a continuum of boldness where each of these stories belongs. From true vulnerability and service to making the tough choices and taking the big leap, each episode will feature an extraordinary journey of hope and perseverance. So tune in and take your seat at The Bold Lounge, the place where bold stories are freed.
The Bold Lounge
Denise Brown: The Bold Prescription for a Good Life
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Content Warning: loss of parent, grief, mention of loss of child/sibling
About This Episode
Dr. Denise Brown shares how choosing herself shaped her journey to physician and CEO, beginning with a bold residency transfer and losing her mother at 25. She challenges the myth of “linear womanhood,” opens up about leaving a toxic job, and redefines success around courage, authenticity, and prioritization. Drawing on her book The Fairy God Doctor’s Guide to a Good Life, Denise offers wisdom on letting go of balance, enforcing what matters most, and making bold choices that align with your deepest values, reminding us that “bold is choosing you.”
About Denise Brown
With over three decades of experience in healthcare as a physician, CEO and Chief Strategy Officer, Denise S. Brown, MD is a transformative leader who helps women in business learn how to prioritize and avoid maternal overwhelm. A thought leader in self-care activities for women, she brings her expertise to books for successful women. A graduate of The University of Chicago's Pritzker School of Medicine, with training at Stanford and Vanderbilt, she lives with Alex, her childhood sweetheart of 28 years, and their sons Will and Hank.
Additional Resources
Instagram: @thefairygoddoctor
LinkedIn: @DeniseSBrownMD
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Stay Connected
Follow Leigh on Instagram: @theleighaburgess
Follow Leigh on LinkedIn: @LeighBurgess
Introducing Dr. Denise Brown
Speaker 1Welcome to the Bold Lounge podcast. My name is Leigh Burgess and I will be your host. If you're anything like me, you love hearing inspiring stories of people who have gone on bold journeys and made a positive impact in the world. This podcast is all about those kinds of stories. Every week, we'll hear from someone who has taken a leap or embarked on an extraordinary journey. In addition to hearing their stories, we'll also learn about their bold growth mindset that they use to make things happen. Whether they face challenges or doubts along the way, they persisted and ultimately achieved their goals. These impactful stories will leave you feeling motivated and inspired to pursue your own bold journey. I believe everyone has a bold story waiting to be freed. Tune in and get ready to be inspired. Welcome to the Bold Lounge.
Speaker 1Today we have Dr Denise Brown. With well over three decades of experience in healthcare as a physician, ceo and chief strategy officer, dr Denise Brown is a transformative leader who helps women in business learn how to prioritize and avoid maternal overwhelm. A thought leader in self-care activities for women, she brings her expertise to books for successful women. A graduate of the University of Chicago's Pritzker School of Medicine, with training at Stanford and Vanderbilt, she lives with Alex, her childhood sweetheart of 28 years, and their sons, will and Hank. Welcome to the Bold Lounge, denise, so excited to finally have you in the lounge and to dig into your journey of boldness. I'm excited to be here, finally, finally. So let's just start with your definition. What does bold look like in your life?
Speaker 2You know, I feel like it's a word that's followed me around for a long time and I think I was probably doing lots of bold things but never would have maybe been bold enough to call them bold. You know what I mean. I think bold is choosing you, and that can look like a lot of different things at different times, but I think ultimately, it's about making a choice. That is not for the rest of the universe or for what you think you're supposed to be doing or should be doing. It's choosing you, and so, whether that's, you know, me, moving my residency to a different place, or choosing to leave a job that was making me miserable lots of different examples but I think the through line is choosing me and what was sort of deeply satisfying in my soul. So that's my goal.
Defining Boldness: Choosing Yourself
Speaker 1OK, I love that. I'm excited to get into that and how that feels. So when's a time in your life that you chose you and you did it for you?
Speaker 2Well, I think a lot of times people make these choices that some on from the outside may look like concessions, and that's one of the things I really try to get into in my in my book, which is, you know, concessions aren't necessarily a bad thing. They can be really good for you because if they're conscious and deliberate in the moment, it might look externally like you're giving something up, but ultimately you're getting something that really mattered. And so, for example, in my book I tell a story about my husband and I were just like ships crossing in the night. His career led him there and mine was here and we were kind of bouncing back and forth and at one point we were married but not living in the same time zone, and it was lonely.
Speaker 2And I had a patient, claudia, who kind of just said well, why are you here? And I was like well, what do you mean? I'm at work. She sounded like a bold lady. She was a bold lady, but she was I don't get it Like you're not where you want to be with the person that you love most deeply in the world. So why are you here? Here? And you know there's no honesty, like a person who's dying honesty. And she blew my mind, and so I think that was probably the first biggest bold move that I made, which was, quite honestly, to be brave enough to ask my residency advisor like what would it look like if I tried to switch my time from Stanford to Vanderbilt?
Speaker 1When I read that I was like oh man, like that's it's not done. People don't do that. Yeah, but why not?
Speaker 2try. Yeah, people don't do that, but I did and it worked out really great because then I ended up living with my husband under the same roof. It was very exciting, Got a puppy, bought a house, you know, had this kind of deep satisfaction but I that. So that was kind of, you know, probably the most scandalously bold thing that I that I might have done because it just wasn't what was done. And I think that's just it right. Being bold is like, well, I don't care what is supposed to be done, I care what actually matters to me. So right.
Speaker 1So when you go through that process, so I it's a whole lot of gears, I think, of mindset making that decision, moving across country. But when you go through those gears of choosing yourself, what are some of the things you had to move through? Because, whether it was that moment or maybe you know multiple moments that you've had it is like, oh, I'm choosing me, I'm done, yay, and I did it. You know, it is like we go through. Maybe it's like I talked about, okay, that's selfish, no, it's not. You know, being healthy, being, you know, having a positive relationship or a close relationship, that's a good thing. You know kind of going through that for you. What did that look like as you were shifting mindsets and getting to that place where you can choose yourself and it's okay, or did you not have to go through any of that?
Speaker 2Well, I mean gosh, I mean and there's a lot of this in the book, but I, I think and this will sound kind of horrible, but I mean it with all honesty like losing my mother, probably the year before that, as a 25-year-old, was the impetus for me being able to feel brave enough, if you will, to ask, because I sort of recognized, as I was finishing my medical school career, how truly short life is and that there really isn't any time for you to be miserable if there's anything that you could possibly do to change your circumstance. And so I think, when Claudia sort of blew my mind I mean obviously it had to crack open Then I sort of I think the first step for me in anything is imagine the possibility. And I didn't demand a change, I didn't walk into the office like I have to do this and you have to help me, or whatever it was. What would it look like if you know this thing happened? What would that look like? And once they were, you know Dr Skeff was stunned, but he was like, well, no one's ever asked me that, but let me think about it and I'll get back to you. And so the next day, like I called my counterpart at Vanderbilt and here's what we think we could do. And so then I was like, well, that would be great.
Speaker 2I took some intermediate steps and then I did like my electives as a second year resident at Vanderbilt, instead of, you know, staying at Stanford or whatever. And then by the time my third year rolled around, you know they had sort of made a space for me and I moved over officially. So there was some intermediate step work. But I think the first biggest step is like imagining the possibility. And if you can imagine the possibility, then what do you feel like if that happens? And it's not like, oh, what if it doesn't happen? It's like, well, when it happens, what am I going to feel like? And so I think that that's that kind of mindset stuff, to be like there's nothing that can't happen if I am willing to work at it. And so off I went and it ended up being even better than I ever could have imagined. So I think that's the first one. And then obviously there's logistics of stuff you know, and you have to work with them.
Speaker 1That's the tactical stuff more so the mindset shift. And I don't know if you know, like my first job at Duke I worked in the residency program for GenMed and so the sense of that's why I was like people just don't do this, you know so, like when you're in a residency and all the hype up to that moment of like getting chosen and getting selected and match day and all that jazz. So that's what it was a very bold move and you know, you take like here's the yin and the yang or the pro and the con of this, and like the pros outweigh the cons and I'm at it and you have conviction when you take that bold step.
Speaker 2I feel like it's a great example of being bold on kind of a multi-level way to look at it and I think the kind of like underlying framework is deciding what actually matters to you and being specific about it. It can't be like, oh, and I want the you know rainbows and the unicorn in my backyard, you know. It has to be really specific about you know what matters. And for me it was like I don't mind coming home to an empty apartment in my house plants, but I know that there's a different path, where I come home and I'm with my dog and my husband or whatever, and that mattered more to me than the ego of, oh, I'm a Stanford person or whatever. In the end it just didn't matter as much.
Speaker 1You don't lead with it. I think you know those are all wonderful attributes of you and things you've done and you know degrees you have and impact you've had. But I think I've, you know, since I've known you, you've never led with that and I think that's what I've always loved. You lead with what matters and really I think that's what I took away from your book and you know it's called the fairy God doctor's guide to a good life, a prescription for the working woman. You know, that's just something that came to me as, like you know, leading from you, like leading from the point of you.
Speaker 2Yeah, not what you do, not what you have.
Speaker 1It's not what someone tells you right.
Speaker 2You are, and I think I do think that that is the take-home message. So, yeah, you get an A plus, but no, that doesn't matter. The fact that you got something from it is what makes my heart sing, because it takes everybody different. You know periods of time to get there, and I think one of the great joys of menopause, if you will, is that you start caring less about what everybody else has to say and what everybody else has to think and you kind of lean into being able to do your own thing. But I wrote this book to give all the other people who are younger like a little headstart on that kind of a leap forward for my fairy goddaughters.
Speaker 1So, yeah, I love that. So you did mention your mom. So at 25, losing your mom, I can't even imagine that level of loss and I'm very sorry for that that it happened to you. I feel like it created, obviously, a moment in time, but also one that lives with us as we continue on right and when you read the book you'll, you know, see the background to even how you discovered she was ill. So when you think about the impact of that now and after writing the book and sharing a very vulnerable, lots of vulnerable moments in there, but I mean that one probably being the highest level at the at the beginning of the book For you, what made that necessary to include For you, why did you want to share that and what has it meant to you to be able to share it?
Speaker 2Yeah, well, I mean clearly probably the most foundational event really of my life, and you know there are plenty of motherless daughters out there. I think we're in a club that none of us want to be in, but everyone in the club would tell you that it's probably the most profound thing, that that happens to you and it certainly was for me, and there's a very concrete before and a very different after, and I think that kind of emerging like it could have gone. It could have gone a lot of different ways.
Speaker 1Let's put it that way. Of course, yeah, but I mean, one of the things you talk about is this you didn't even feel like yourself anymore. Your confidence it wasn't there or wasn't like it was, and of course, it's going to impact you but probably in the best possible way.
Speaker 2I mean, I think I was probably like a little bit of an asshole. I mean I I mean in all on the after, no, I think that before you know, I was kind of like the little Miss Goody two shoes, Like I put my hand up, I got all A's, I was the valedictorian. Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. I'd probably want to flick myself in the forehead, you know, if I saw that now, but that was like talk about pulling the rug out.
Speaker 2You know, being like the ultimate thing, that kind of humble is not the right word, but just to recognize like, oh my God, like we are here for such a short time and I need to be ready to go and ready to give more of myself to the people who matter, whether those were my patients at the time or my then fiance, whatever it was.
Speaker 2That was, I think, the big kind of slap in the face that it was time for me to not only seize the day and recognize that life was short, but also to make sure that I was going to be living my best life every day. And I think I was going through the motions and felt fairly like all early 20s people do. They think they're the smartest people in the world. You know, and I quickly learned that I wasn't, and so that was great. It made me a much better doctor, maybe a better friend, a better daughter. You know better, everything, and so you know, like Dickens says, it was the best of times. It was the worst of times, Best thing that ever happened to me.
Speaker 1Worst thing that ever happened to me exactly so I think you know I don't have a comparable connection to that, but you know, obviously I lost my brother when I was six and I watched my parents go through that loss of their 11 year old son unexpectedly and it is a profound loss. But it is where my yolo really was, was started right, because it wasn't like, oh, only old people pass away, no, my brother, what just happened. I was in first grade. So one of the things I think that happens with that too, and this is something I learned from writing my second book was different types of stress at certain points in your life affect your brain or how your brain, you know, will develop or wire itself.
Speaker 1And it's interesting, between five and seven it's a profound time if you have some type of traumatic loss like that or trauma, and so it really did, I think, rewire my brain. So even as I was reading your book and thinking about those things, it's like initially it was like what do I do? What do I do? What do I do Potentially for you to move through it? You just keep stepping on. Certain days you don't know what you're even walking on, but you're moving and you're just really glad you're upright, but you kind of work through that and it to me. I was just visualizing you rewiring right and kind of like, okay, this is my direction, this is what I'm doing.
Speaker 2Yeah, and I think you're right, and for a while it was for and when I say a while I mean 25 years. I just put it all on the back burner and because I have been, I was never not busy right, I was busy enough Like there was enough distraction and I, my brain, was needed, that I think it was good. But also like that was when the sort of healing was starting. Then I was a resident and then I was running a practice and then, you know, and then I was a mom and you know. So all of these things always were there and they seemed more important at the time than you know your heart feels tender.
Nonlinear Womanhood and Breaking Expectations
Speaker 2And then I, quite honestly, I had the a little bit of the luxury of time and sometimes the universe just takes care of you the way it needs to and I had sold a company and kind of I was winding that down and so for the first time ever, having, you know, worked for my ass off quite honestly for 50 some odd years, I was able to take a little time to myself and really work on things you know with, with a fabulous therapist, with all kinds of other you know friends and people, that who care about me and and that's where the book kind of came out of. That was sort of the labor of love of that. But yeah, I just had to keep visualizing this tender spot in my heart. That was actually kind of knitting over, and grief never leaves you Right, you just get a scab, that's what I say.
Speaker 1And some days it gets kicked off and it hits and you're just like what was that? Yeah, what was that. Then you feel a little bit, but it never goes away.
Speaker 2It's a scar and I think I used to just push it off and like, oh, I'll, literally I don't have time to deal with that right now. And then I just got a little bit better and decided to be a little kinder to myself and now I can just sit with it.
Speaker 1Yeah, and the book wouldn't have been possible. If you wouldn't have done that, I don't think you would have written a book in the state that you described.
Speaker 2And I wrote it and it came out on my mom's birthday on purpose, so it was a gift to her. What would she say about your book? Oh, she would love it. She would love it. She would be like, oh, I love all these stories, and I mean, she was just such a kick in the pants I mean talk about a firecracker. I think she would have really appreciated it. I'm pretty sure she does appreciate it. So I've got that going for me. Yeah, so much of my kind of life philosophy was really based on her. But I, you know, I remember when I I must've been like in the eighth or ninth grade we had moved to Texas, so she must've been. She was in her like mid forties and I think that's a tough time for a lot of women, right, when you're kind of like what have I done? What am I doing? How do I feel about that?
Speaker 1Right, yeah, this isn't okay anymore.
Speaker 2That was mine.
Speaker 1I'm like I'm not doing this.
Speaker 2That's what I signed up, for I'd like to stand in a different line now, please. And I think she struggled with that on her own Right, and I think we're lucky now that we all I think societally we have less shame or concern about talking about that kind of type stuff, but there still is this sense that you're supposed to know yeah, can we make that go?
Speaker 1away, I know, and a book is one way to do that right. So, like you had talked earlier just about that, this book really is for younger women to kind of hear from your vantage point what you've now learned that you hope they can take in and make it their own of how they would want to apply it right. So it's very nonlinear, right, and you talk about nonlinear womanhood in the book. What does that mean? What's nonlinear womanhood defined as?
Speaker 2Well, I mean, let's be honest, I think if you talk to any woman over age 50, she'll tell you about all the kind of twists and turns that you know life has taken, some willingly, some maybe not so willingly. But I think, especially when you're younger, you really feel like if A happens, then B happens, and after B happens, then C happens, and we have this complete misconception. But I think a lot, because I talked to a ton of women, sort of from age 25 to 35, as I was kind of writing the book.
Speaker 2What are the things that you, things that you keep coming back to and you think, oh, you're going to go to college, and then maybe you go to grad school, maybe you meet your person, or maybe you don't meet your person, but you're surely going to meet your person three or four years later.
Speaker 2And then you're going to have a great job, and then you're going to move in together, and then you're going to get married, and then you're going to buy a house, move in together, and then you're going to get married, and then you're going to buy a house, and there's all these things that sort of like are supposed to happen serially in your mind. Much pressure, so much pressure because that never actually happens. There's like three people that actually do it that way, but I think there's this, you know, kind of overwhelming sense that that's what's supposed to happen. And I, I'm in this absolutely awesome romance book club and everyone is basically under age 40. I am clearly the we're going to say big sister of the group, but lots of them are struggling with exactly that. They're sort of 35-ish years old and, like you know, they were sold a bill of goods. This was supposed to happen in this order and I'm like, yeah, no sorry.
Speaker 1What's the mindset if it doesn't happen linearly?
Speaker 2I think people think they're somehow a failure.
Speaker 1Failing right. They're not doing it right.
Speaker 2Yeah, there's something that they're supposed to be doing or supposed to have done by now. And then this whole kind of like oh, 40th birthday is a little bit of a crisis because I didn't do all these things, and so I think people just they set themselves up in this comparison, guilt, shame sort of spiral, and that's ideally what I would love for people to avoid. So I try to share some stories in the book about all these different people's journeys and how, really, if you just decide to meander off what you thought the path was, you might end up finding something way more interesting and people who are way more interesting. And then maybe you end up meandering back, but maybe you don't, because it was maybe never the right path to be on to begin with. So I think once you decide that the serial linear is not what you need to be thinking of, then that's really freeing.
Speaker 2And I think once you're freed up from that sense of you're open to a lot more possibility and it becomes kind of a delightful positive feedback loop, the more you realize, okay, these things are going to happen to me and it's going to be okay and I'm going to keep moving and I'm going to find the people I need along the way. Then more interesting things start to happen, more interesting people start to come into your life. It's like you know the old adage, like it's easier to find a job when you have a job you know, because you're not worried about it. You're not projecting that sort of I don't know quiet desperation out into the universe. You're kind of like here I am.
Speaker 1Yeah, I have a saying that's okay to be desperate, just don't act desperate Like don't, don't put it out there into the world. That does not mean ignore it and shame yourself and all those things. What I mean by that is like work on the work, but, you know, not on a platform or not in a space, but it's. It's real in the sense of what you just said, because I think even in my early 50s there's a lot of oh, I should have and I should be here by now. And what was I thinking? And you know, did I not do that right? And you know, is my daughter not gonna have a best life because I made that mistake? I mean, I have that crap going on and there's therapists for that, so, which I highly encourage. Yes, thank you.
Speaker 1I am a big believer in therapy and I think it's important that you know you could probably have that at any age. But when did you figure out like I need to share this? You know, like I met, you believe it or not, it hasn't even been three years. So in the fall, it'll be three years that we've known each other. So, seriously, it feels longer, right, it does. Yeah, when we first met, were you at that point where you realized that nonlinear was okay?
Speaker 2When I first met you, I had just made my other really, really big, bold thing, which was to leave a job that had fabulous golden handcuffs but was literally eating me alive.
Speaker 1And were you burnt out? Or were you just like it just wasn't anymore? It was just toxic.
Speaker 2It was Okay, and I was literally held together by bailing wire and some duct tape and I think I had just done that right when I met you. So that was, yeah, that was probably my big bold move number two. But you chose you again, I chose me, but it was like it took me a long time to get there. It took me five years of misery before I was finally willing to be like I'm either going to do something bold or I'm going to this is going to kill me. I mean, it was literally one or the other you know. So I don't want that to happen to me. Like I want you to do that well, before you can't sleep, and you haven't.
Speaker 2You know all these things Right and and you know what's burnout, what's toxicity, like I think they're all shades of the same color and they're cousins. They're all cousins, yeah, but what really prompted the book was. So then I made this bold move. I left this job that was super toxic and ended up finding something that was really sort of unexpected and fun and like completely took all of my energy and put me in this flow state and then you know running this company, and then you know, of course that has its own associated nightmares and headaches. But and then we ended up turning it around and selling it and it was like holy shit, like a lot of stuff happened, you know, from fall of 22 to the fall of 23.
Speaker 1Like I started the company Like you, lived a lifetime in there.
Speaker 2Like, yeah, no, I mean, it was like I could have had a baby or this. You know, it was like it was. It was definitely, and I was super exhausted afterwards. Yeah, I mean super exhausted afterwards, but it put me in the position to have a little flexibility. And it was actually a woman interviewed me for magazine on exit entrepreneurs in particularly women who were CEOs of companies who had had successful exits there's not a lot of us, sadly and she wanted to know what my legacy was.
Speaker 2That was her question. That was, I guess, the point of her article, and I just sort of was like, what are you talking about? And she was like well, your legacy, you know, my legacy and my work have nothing to do with one another. And she was like we were both. It was like she was speaking, you know Polish and I was another language. Yeah, you know, we were both just looking at each other, like, what do you mean? What do you mean? And and she's like, okay, well then, what is your legacy? And I said, well, my legacy are the people that I've made feel better over my life. That's my legacy, whether they are my patients or my friends or my family members, if I've made you feel better and you can think back on me and like, have a chuckle or something like that's my legacy. And you know, I took me a long time to get here and I've learned a lot of stuff along the way. And and she was just like, oh my God, you're blowing my mind. And I said, well, maybe you only usually talk to men, you know, I mean, I don't want Somehow that morphed into well, you know, of those things, what's the most important? I was like, well, that's easy, it's just, it's my family and my kids, my most important legacy that I, you know, I've raised these two kids who actually enjoy my company and want to come home and hang out and their friends come too, like I've done something really right. And I set up to do it that way and I. It wasn't easy and I made very difficult choices along the way, but that was what has always mattered to me most. So if I had to nail it down, that's it.
Speaker 2So we ended up talking for like an hour Cause she was like 33. She was thinking about having a baby. She didn't know. Anyway, we just start talking about all this stuff. She's like, oh my God, I wish you would just write this down. And I was like listen, my editor like looked at this article and we really think you need to write a book. And I was like, huh, not the first time you'd heard that, right, yeah, I was like, yeah, exactly, I believe.
Speaker 2And for me, anytime there's something big that I need to think about, I really actively try not to think about it. I sort of evaluate it and then I let it just sit in the back of my head, I go and do other things, because I have a hundred percent confidence in myself, in my subconscious, and I know that it will all be sorted out. And then the answer will come to me. And maybe that sounds kind of woo woo, but it's been working for me for 53 years, so I'm going to keep on going. And so I was like huh, a book.
Speaker 2And by then it was about March and I had stopped working.
Speaker 2That you know. It was like I this was like the end of my third month off. I had traveled, I'd done some things and I had a trip book to go to South Africa and I was like, well, I'm going to have a lot of captive time on the plane, I'm just going to take some index card. I'm a very index card oriented person, but take some index cards and my trusty pencil and I'm just going to goof around on the airplane and see what I come up with. And when I came back I was like, okay, apparently I'm going to write a book and I think this is the framework that I'm going to use, and so that was kind of what it was. It was like, again, not something I'd ever really planned on, but somebody just kind of like gave me a little shoulder nudge into the off the path I was on and you know, into the bushes, and so I was like, oh, this is interesting. I never expected to be here, but and then I had a lot of fun.
Speaker 1So going back to choosing you. We've talked about, you know, seeing the possibilities, and then you know the things that you've done over the last several years, truly, and you said something that I say a lot, which is I never planned to do any of this. It wasn't even on my scorecard of like what I wanted to accomplish or anything like it, just name it what I've done between quitting my corporate role to now. It was not in the plan, any of it, and so it's very difficult to help others. And now you coach, you coach and do consulting and help other CEOs figure out the path as well, as you know, help younger managers, directors, just in general. People live in their life, how they see things. That might feel a lot of heaviness to them, but it's difficult for someone to see the possibilities or even to let themselves see it. Is there something that you do when you're either working with someone or a friend or, like you know, someone said I just don't. How is that even a possibility, denise? Like, what's your response back to that?
Speaker 2Well, again, I think you get exactly what you're looking for. If you're looking for possibilities, they come to you. If you're pretty sure they don't exist, they probably don't. So it's so much like between your ears and again, I do really feel like that's just what you put out in the world. But I also think you have to be willing to take risks and say yes.
Speaker 2So my, you know evolution of my career. If you'd ask 25 year old me no way. 35 year old me no way, even 45, you know like it never would have been something I would have imagined. But you know, I was really good at being a doctor. So I got asked to be on the hospital board. I was 29 years old. I said no, I'm not ready. I could have said, oh, ask me again in a few years. I said, well, I'm not sure what I'm doing, but I'm willing to try. And so now, suddenly, I'm on the hospital board. Now, suddenly, I'm interacting with these amazing people in Silicon Valley whose names are on buildings and companies. And because I'm on the board, I suddenly have access to these people to ask them questions.
Speaker 2So when something ends up happening in my practice where they were trying to sell me and I was like, well, you know, I had a person go well, that's ridiculous, you're the only thing that matters Like they can't sell, you go do your own.
Prioritization Over Balance
Speaker 2And I was like, okay, you know. So it was one of those things where but because I kept saying, yeah, all right, I've never felt like I had to have something completely penciled out or fully understood, at least to take the first step. And so then suddenly I'm running my own practice and now I'm sort of starting to do business development for this larger group that we rolled into. And I'm not a business development person, I didn't take any business classes but it turns out I'm really good at understanding people's problems and I don't mind asking them for money, and I can articulate a framework of why these things need to happen in a certain way. Sure, I'll go do that again, you know, and little by little you kind of find these skills that you didn't really know. But it was only because my answer to everything is that sounds great, let me hear some more about it and I'm in, but I need to understand a little bit more, and that happened later in life, or were you always like that?
Speaker 2I think probably all along. I mean, my life is filled with some very wacky adventures and, like I, probably should have gotten pushed off cliffs or chopped into pieces, I'm glad I survived myself. That's not in the book. That's not in the book. I have some interesting stories. Yeah, I, you know, I don't know, it's probably Pollyanna ish but I think the world is a fascinating place.
Speaker 2I think people are genuinely good and I think if you're curious and you give that off, like people want to tell you stuff. Everyone wants to laugh, everyone wants to feel like they're part of something bigger, and I have always just felt that way, and so I think that's the thing I'm the best at is making people feel comfortable, finding humor in just about anything, and like making people feel like we're all in it together, and so I've always just been like, yeah, like when this guy called me and said, would you want to run this company? I could have easily been like, oh, I'm not qualified, or or you know, retreated into my own, but I was like you know what? If you can help me do these three things, then here's what I'm really good at, and let's, let's go do this.
Speaker 1Yeah, so there's the belief piece, right, you believe you can figure it out, you believe you'll learn, no matter what, and you're open to it. Right, and you have a sense of curiosity, too, that I think about you. That's like you said people want to tell you stuff, or people want to like hang out and just see what happens next. You know what are we going to get into, like, what's going to happen, what?
Speaker 2is going to happen next. Yeah, I think the curiosity and then the other correlating piece of that is I know that I don't have to be good at everything- Okay, do you think younger women think they do.
Speaker 2They do. I think they think that they have to be not only good at everything, but they have to do everything. And so, you know, one of my mantras is you can have it all, but you can't do it all. And so I feel incredibly fine with saying that is not my strength. You are amazing at that. Let's do this together.
Speaker 2So I feel like that was a switch that I made, probably again. You know, give a busy woman something else to do and she'll get it done for you. Yeah, but I started to really clue into that when I was trying to run a practice, had two littles at home and I had very strong feelings about how I wanted to show up as a mom. It became very obvious that I was not going to be able to do everything and I was going to have to delegate different things to different people and then also see the control entirely, to not then come in and yell about how it happened. So our you know kind of life philosophy in this house is if you didn't do it yourself, you can't complain about how it gets done. So if I don't put the dishes away and the spatulas are in the weird drawer, that's okay. The spatulas got put away. It's fine, yeah, and I think that's a.
Speaker 2I mean, that's kind of a silly example, but I think that makes you a better leader. It certainly makes you a better manager. Like you have to trust people to do their best work, you have to give them the guidance, then you have to let them go do it, and so my thing is like, well, that's not something I'm good at, but you are, so let's work on this together. Like I'm never gonna be a CFO, but I can read the P&L, I can tell you what it looks like, I can pick up on the themes and distill the important pieces, but I'm not an accountant, I'm not a financial planner, analyst person. But you know what I person, but you know what. I know how to find those people and I know how to get them excited about you know being on a team. So that's the, I think, curiosity. And then I don't know how to do that, but I know how to find someone who does.
Speaker 1Yeah, that's harder for some people to do, right? Yeah, like I've always been like, oh wow, my bad, like I didn't know or I don't know how to do that, but I know someone that does, or we'll figure it out. Like you don't stop it, I don't know. Right, that's key. One thing that you emphasize in the book is prioritization and prioritization over. Use the word balance. So what does that mean to you? And the second part is what do we have to unlearn?
Speaker 2Yeah Well, I mean, first of all, there's no balance right, there is no such thing. You know, I think you kind of do you have to be pretty specific about what actually deeply matters to you. So that requires some reflection and honesty, which is not easy for a lot of people. I think Clarity comes first, like you know, okay, that time with my kids is what matters the most to me. Then you've got to get really specific about what that actually means, and then you have to be savage in enforcing it. And I think that's where people fall down. Like I think everybody has kind of like these good intentions, but then it's easy to sort of kind of let that slide and let the kind of you know, mommy and me sort of culture, wars or the societal expectations kind of slide back in, and so you have to be kind of willing to sort of stand out.
Speaker 2I think the thing about it is everybody feels like they're supposed to be doing these, making these big dramatic gestures. You know, every day, for me that's not how love shows up. Love shows up in the little things. It's like leaving the coffee on the bedside table, you know, whatever. So my thing was even in the thick of, like my practice and being on call every third or fourth night, you know all of that stuff Like I needed a half an hour just me, half an hour with my husband at the end of the day and an hour with my kids to like have dinner, put them in the bathtub, sing them some songs, put them to bed two hours out of a whole day.
Speaker 1That's just not you can do it right. It's a choice and I think that's sometimes people like, oh, I don't have time for that, I don't have time for this. And I always say back to them as well, it's your choice. What are you choosing? Choosing over that Right or what do you? What are you thinking you have to choose to? Right Cause sometimes it's not, they know they don't want it, but they're choosing it anyway. So, like, what's making them choose that?
Imagine the Possibilities
Speaker 1So, as we close out, there is this sense that, no matter the age but probably younger to older Cause I think where I am is like I don't care, but people want to seem like they have it all together, like there's you know lots of reasons why that happens with social media, or how we were raised, or what people think of us, or judge us like we were just talking about. What would you say to, to particularly a young woman right now who's feeling like I gotta have it all together all the time and I can't have any, any blemishes at all, or at least show them to anyone? What would you say to her?
Speaker 2Imagine the possibilities if you, if you did something different. Really, I was at a Boston consulting group book club and they were talking about a meeting it's like a staff meeting that starts at eight 30. And there's a couple of them who are trying to drop kids off and stuff and it's really hard. And they were there, like it's stressful, and I said, well, did you ever ask for the meeting time to be changed? And they kind of looked at me like what I was. Like if you went to your boss and you said this particular time is very difficult for me, is there a way that we could do it some other time? You don't have to give them a reason why they don't need to know. I mean, if you want to share, fine, but like that's all, and then people go, oh sure, I mean people want to be nice and accommodating. Nobody is out to be like. I don't think. Maybe there are a few exceptions. But you have to decide that what you bring to the party is worth somebody maybe moving the start time of the party.
Speaker 1Yeah, so see the possibilities. Think outside the box of like just because no one else has doesn't mean you can't, and chances are seven other people feel exactly the same way you do doesn't mean, you can't. And chances are, seven other people feel exactly the same way you do 100% and be bold in the sense of that of like you're going to say the thing that's unsaid and then, I think, ultimately realizing that you don't get what you don't ask for in those types of situations. So if you never ask, you don't know the possibility.
Speaker 2That's what it really is. You got to imagine it, and then you have to go ask for it.
Speaker 1Go after it.
Speaker 2Yeah.
Speaker 1Thank you so much. I could talk for multiple more hours, so everyone please pick up the book the fairy God doctor's guide to a good life by Dr Denise Brown. Thank you so much for being on the bold lounge.
Speaker 2So fun.
Speaker 1Thank you for listening to the bold lounge podcast. Through the continuum of bold stories vulnerability to taking a leap you will meet more extraordinary people making a positive impact for others through their unique and important stories. By highlighting these stories, we hope to inspire others and share the journey of those with a bold mindset. We hope you've enjoyed this podcast and look forward to sharing the next bold journey with you.
