How Trusting My Instincts Reshaped Leadership And Love

Betrayal does not just break your heart. It messes with your reality. This episode starts at that moment when you finally stop questioning yourself and start trusting what you know.

I talk about when a shiny partnership lost its shine. The therapy sessions that called out the imbalance. The decision to take full ownership of the magazine, not to control it, but to protect it. Equal pay for equal work. Facts over emotion. No chasing the last word. Just closure and forward motion.

We get clear on what partnership actually means in business and in love. Shared vision. Shared risk. Shared responsibility. You can divide tasks. You cannot divide integrity. If you are overexplaining, overfunctioning, or constantly cleaning up, that is not partnership. That is imbalance. And that realization changed how I lead, how I set boundaries, and how I protect the advertisers, retailers, and readers who trust us.

I also share what rebuilding looks like. A tighter team. My daughter stepping into social and marketing. A designer who owns the visual direction. The work is heavier, but it feels cleaner because the responsibility and the vision sit in the same place.

This one is about leadership, love, and refusing to shrink to keep the peace. If you have been carrying more than your share or ignoring what your gut keeps telling you, this conversation will meet you right there.

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:13

You know, before I ever learned how to lead a business, I had to learn how to survive a betrayal. Not just the kind that breaks your heart, the kind that breaks your perception, the kind that makes you question your instincts, your silence, your loyalty, your tolerance, whether you're actually enough. And betrayal doesn't just happen in love, it happens anywhere you ignore yourself long enough. It happens when you explain away imbalance, when you protect someone else's comfort at the expense of your clarity. When you overfunction so something doesn't fall apart, even though you're the one quietly unraveling. And here's what I've learned. The same muscle I use to survive betrayal is the same muscle I use to step into leadership. Discernment, boundaries, self-trust, the willingness to say this isn't working. Betrayal taught me something no business class ever could. If you ignore red flags long enough, they don't disappear. They multiply. And if you silence your intuition long enough, it doesn't go away. It actually waits. And when it finally speaks, it doesn't whisper. It actually yells. So this episode isn't about a magazine takeover. It's about what happens when a woman who once doubted her own instincts decides to trust them fully in business, in love, and in every room she walks into. But before the leadership, there was the breaking, and the breaking built the backbone. You know, I didn't expect this year to look like this. If you would have told me one year ago, when I started the magazine, that I'd be fully taking over the magazine a year later, I probably would have said, nah, that's not gonna happen. But I did wake up and realize that it just wasn't working. And I didn't wake up thinking I I must do it alone. I mean, I already woke up a long time ago realizing I already was. It was a huge discussion in my therapy. And there wasn't like a dramatic explosion on my part, which would have happened many years ago.

SPEAKER_00 2:48

It was an explanation that I needed help, and whether it was her or someone else, we had to make a decision. And those conversations did not feel like fireworks.

SPEAKER_01 3:07

And it was very hard not to retaliate back because there was a lot of anger on her part.

SPEAKER_00 3:14

But I responded in a very businesslike manner, leaving her the choice to stay and do equal pay for equal work or decide to leave.

01

SPEAKER_01 3:29

And then I was shown the cards that I couldn't force her out. So then I decided I could not mentally work this way. So I was leaving. And that's when things started unraveling. So we discussed it, we had a third-party intervention, and I decided that this is my dream, this is my passion. I've always wanted to own a magazine, and then I wanted to forge ahead and continue with it, and she agreed. So now we're in the process of shutting things down while I'm building s it back up simultaneously. You know, clarity feels less like fireworks and more like a slow exhale. But you kinda look around and think, oh, I've been carrying this for a long while. And it's no different when I left my husband or I left my partner. All of these decisions are very tough to make, but once you start drifting away from them, you realize how right you were to move on. And you know, we romanticize partnerships. In business, in love and friendships. We assume if two names are attached to something, it must be shared. But that's not how it works. A partnership isn't one person absorbing the stress while the other absorbs the comfort. It isn't one person protecting reputation while the other protects their ego. It isn't one person overfunctioning while the other underdelivers. A real per partnership is shared responsibility, shared vision, shared risk. And in business, you can divide those roles, but you do not divide accountability. And in love, you can divide strengths, but you do not divide integrity. And boy, oh boy, have I learned this the hard way. If you are constantly overexplaining, overcompensating, or cleaning up emotional or operational messes, you're not in a partnership. You're in an imbalance. An imbalance always surfaces. It might take months, it might take years, but it surfaces. You know, I had some pretty strict boundaries at the very end of my last partnership where it was like, no, I seen the abuse and I received the abuse, and so did you. And there's no way I'm accepting a specific someone in your life again when I know that they rock boats. So I stopped the intimate side of the partnership, and he continued it. And with that the partnership had to end, and I had to move forward because I respect myself, I have integrity, and I need to breathe. And when I'm with someone, whether it's a friend, a partner, or a lover, I need to feel safe, and I need to be able to slowly exhale. So getting back to business, when I step fully in ownership, it wasn't about control. It was actually about stewardship. The magazine isn't just paper and ink to me, it's relationships. It's the businesses who trust me with their money. You know, it's the charitable partnerships that I'm creating. It's the retailers who show up month after month because they believe in community. It's credibility, and credibility is fragile. It takes a long time to build credibility and trust when it comes to sales and when it comes to owning your own business. And keeping your reputation is so very important. When I realized I was already the one protecting all that, the decision, it just was obvious. And the paperwork just caught up to the reality, and it's and heavier now, it's a lot of work. But man, my team is having fun. And I've hired a girl to be my assistant because I'm getting older and more forgetful to keep me in line. And my daughter's joined on to do the social media and the marketing, and we're having fun. We're having our challenges, but we're we're having fun. It's it's actually feeling like a clean slate, a new beginning. And it's something I'm very, very excited about. And there's something peaceful about knowing that the vision and the responsibility sit in the same hands. There's no more confusion, no more crosswires, no more silent treatment. It's just wonderful. It's clear. I see nothing but happiness and prosperity going forward. I can have that positive vibe, that positive outlook that it's on me. The success is on me. Now I'm fully in charge of making sure that this magazine runs and operates and makes readers and advertisers absolutely happy with the product that I'm delivering. And here's something that changed everything for me. Leadership is not just about making decisions, it's actually about leading the conversation. Because chaos thrives in back and forth. You defend, they defend, you clarify, they counter, you respond emotionally, they escalate emotionally. And suddenly the goal isn't fairness anymore. It's all about winning. And winning never closes anything properly. I had to decide that I wasn't going to participate in chaos cycles. And that's the way it seemed each and every day. I wasn't going to match volume above volume. Instead, I'm I asked myself, what outcome am I protecting? And for a while it was very blurry. Am I leaving? Am I taking this over? No, Trina, you're protecting a burnout. You're protecting your clients that you build a relationship with. And you're protecting something that you absolutely care for and dream about. And I asked myself, do I want closure? Do I want the last word? Because those goals are very different. Leading the conversation means anchoring to facts, and it means staying calm. It means sometimes saying less instead of more. It means protecting the brand instead of protecting your pride. And this was a humongous learning lesson because normally in our personal relationships, we tend to retaliate, respond with sarcasm, you know, hit their pressure points. And this time I handled it so maturely that I felt so proud of myself because I know going into any love partnership going forward, if we can't have that conversation and that back and forth without being petty, I don't think I want it. Because chaos is loud and leadership is quiet, and I chose quiet this time. And that choice changed how this chapter closed. And you know I can't talk about business without talking about love. Because the patterns are identical. In business, if you're only protecting the brand, it's not partnership. In love, if you're the only one protecting the relationship, it's not partnership. You should never have to convince someone to show up. You should never have to beg for effort. If it's aligned, it moves. If it's forced, it's fractures. It's just that simple. I used to think effort meant proving myself. Now I understand effort means matching energy. And growth requires you to admit not just where someone else failed, but where you intolerated imbalance.

SPEAKER_00 12:26

And that's really the mature part of the lessons I learned in this transition.

02

SPEAKER_01 12:38

The Climb by Miley Cyrus. Have you ever heard that song? If you really listen to it, it isn't about winning. It's actually about becoming. Because leadership isn't a summit you reach and then relax. It's continuously ongoing. You solve one problem, another shows up. You fix one system, another needs attention. There's always going to be an uphill battle. Of course there is. That's life. If you're building something meaningful, it will stretch you. It will challenge you. And this line, it ain't about how fast I get there. Ain't about what's waiting on the other side. That is the lesson. For years I thought once everything stables stabilized, I'd feel secure, but security didn't come from a rival. It comes from who you become while you're climbing. And this lesson has forced me to become steadier, more grounded, more honest. The climb isn't punishment, it's formation. And so many people look at their hurdles and their climb as something that's uh by bidding you to stop doing and stop climbing, but you're always gonna have things thrown in your way. And today I trust the woman I am and how I'm climbing, and that's the difference, and I'm very proud of myself. And you know what a healthy relationship or partnership looks different to me now, and it's not 50-50, it's 100-100. Some days one carries more, that's life. But the commitment is mutual, it has to be. And there has to be no silent resentment or silent treatment or not speaking to each other for a couple of days. That's where things unravel and fall apart. And there has to be no fear of the other person growing. One person evolves, the other has to feel proud and not threatened. If someone is destabilized by your growth, they were benefiting from your smaller version. And I will never shrink to keep something intact again. Not in business, not in love, not anywhere. You know, and that's how I felt about my two relationships. I felt that I was constantly moving and going, and I'm the type of person that if there's a beautiful sunset, I'm gonna go chase it. If there's fireflies, I'm gonna go find it. If there's northern lights, I'm going out with my cell phone. If there's snowy owls and I have to drive around for a few hours to find one unsuccessfully, I'm gonna do it. Because I don't want to allow life to just stop and be mundane. And that's where you have to understand that when you're a go-getter, there's many people that aren't.

SPEAKER_00 15:58

And they're happy in their world, and you have to accept that.

03

SPEAKER_01 16:08

You know, when I was a little girl, and I don't know how many other people can relate to this, but I'd say I was gonna do something, and my mother would say, You can't do that. And that drove me, that gave me drive to say, Watch me. And there's so many young people out there where they their parents are constantly driving the negative about them or say that they can't do something, and they actually believe it, and that's a very sad reality. And you know, I went through my life always trying to prove that I can, and I've I've pretty much every time I've proved it. But when it came to other people, I think I also thought that I could change them. And you can't change people, you have to let them ride their own course, live the mission that they want in life. And sometimes you have to let them go. And sometimes you become that evil soul that did them wrong. And you have to be accepting of that. And you can't go to bed feeling guilty because they're mad at you or they're talking to other people about what you did. Because all you did was protect yourself. You know, when my ex and I broke up, I was very frank as to why. And I knew, because I knew the system of the town that we lived in, that I would become the bad guy. And I hated it for the longest time. And I think that's one of the reasons why I went bad shit crazy because I was so worried about it turning around and becoming my problem or my fault. And then when I look at it now and anybody comes up to me or or anybody try to come up to me and say, you know, well, this was on you, I would say, you know what, I went bad shit crazy, but there's a reason why I went bad shit crazy. And I tell them because it was a mess. And it started with addiction. And you know what? I moved forward and I got into my own alcohol problems. I attached myself with a man who would never let go of his past, and he was attached to that. But I think I was meant to ride this course to learn these lessons of holding myself back because I always lived with that little squeal of my mother in the back of my head saying, You can't. So I think I had to meet people in different forms in order to realize that you're not the bad guy if you stand up for yourself, you're not the bad guy if you fight for what you want in life, you're not the bad guy for having boundaries. I had coffee with a lady this week, and she'd asked me how everything's going. And I said, Well, good. I'm quite content, but you know, I'm not really in the good books of a few people. And she goes, you know, the more time the more you set boundaries, the more you realize the people that's not meant to be in your life. And she's so on course with that. So, you know, I it's been really fun. I gotta say, I've hired a new graphic designer who I've loved for years. I love her style, I love the way she creates editorial, I love her frankness, I love how she'll tell me what she wants, as opposed to making me lead the graphic way, even though I'm not graphically inclined. She takes charge. I say, you tell me what this should look like, and I will explain to the advertiser, or I'll explain to the person that's sending me the editorial as to why we're going this way. It's such a feeling of I can breathe now. After what is it, seven years? I actually feel that I can breathe. I'm in this beautiful home, this rental, and I'm setting a goal for myself that once I get to the trailer, that I can rent a little office for myself and just move forward, move forward in peace, move forward with happiness. Because this whole story, this whole story from beginning to end, it's never been a revenge story. It's been a learning lesson, and stories are meant to be shared to help people grow. So I didn't lose a partnership. I actually gained so much clarity and self-confidence. And sometimes clarity and self-confidence cost something, but at the end of the day, it gives you peace. So, you know, living local is entering a stronger chapter now, cleaner leadership, stronger boundaries, clearer vision, and personally, it's still the same. I'm not looking for someone to rescue me. I'm not looking for someone to compete with me. I'm looking for someone who understands that partnership is contribution, not convenience. And there will always be another mountain, there will always be another climb. But I'm no longer afraid of the uphill. Because I trust myself now, and that actually changes everything.