EP 01: My Lobster Moment: Growing Through Life's Crossroads

Since this podcast is all about wake-up calls and pivotal moments, I thought it's only appropriate that the first episode be about my own pivotal moments.

In this episode, I'll share my journey toward self-alignment, authenticity, and how it led me to being an entrepreneur.

Instagram: @carlyschade
Free journal prompt download HERE

About the host
Carly is a enthusiast, adventure-seeker, and mindset coach on a mission to get the most out of life.

Her passion for science and the body led her to earn a Bachelor of Science in Human Ecology and begin a career as a certified nutritionist. After seeing the limitations of conventional healthcare, she knew her impact was going to be made elsewhere. To Carly, being healthy isn’t just about living longer, it’s about having more life in each moment. So she ditched the healthcare world and followed her first true passion at the time: travel and outdoor adventure. From guiding hundreds of travelers across Southeast Asia to teaching Wilderness First Aid & Outdoor Leadership in the Cascade Mountains, Carly has learned a lot about the mind, body, and soul.

She now has her own business helping others create a life they’re proud of. Her unique framework will retrain your brain and bring awareness to your body so you can overcome anxiety and shift into the confident and intuitive person you are.  She provides everyday tools and habits that help with overwhelm, time management, burnout, low energy, and so much more. 

If you’re ready to take ownership over your life, free yourself from old habits and live a life you’re proud of, you’ve come to the right place.

💌 Get fresh perspectives and actionable tips delivered straight to your inbox. Subscribe to ☕The Weekly Brew and start creating a life that feels as good as it looks. Click Here to Sign Up!

Transcript

0:00:00 Carly: Foreign welcome to Coffee with Carly, your weekly wake up call to a happier, healthier life. I’m your host, Carly Shade, and I’m here to uncover how good life can get. Good morning, good afternoon, wherever you guys are. This is officially the very first episode of Coffee with Carly in terms of the one being aired. So I’m sitting here, I have my Coffee with Carly mug that I know all of you guys want. That will absolutely be part of our giveaway.

0:00:45 Carly: Here it is. There you go. You can see it for those who are watching the video. And I am just, I’m nervous, I’m a little nervous, I’m a little excited. Like many of you guys know, this has been a very long time coming. So I just can’t believe that it’s here. And as I sit here, just so, like I said, excited, nervous, grateful. I figure it’s only appropriate that my very first episode shares a little bit more about me, my story, how I ended up here.

0:01:16 Carly: One of the questions that I will definitely ask every single one of my guests is to really share a pivotal moment in their life. So. So I figured that I need to do the same. So grab your cup of coffee, sit back, and I hope you enjoy this very first episode. So let’s take it back to 2016. My first big crossroads, really. I was in grad school, just months away from becoming a certified dietitian. I had spent the last five years investing really all of my time, energy, money into this career.

0:01:51 Carly: But with each passing month, the closer I got to graduation, there was just like this feeling that I had really had for a while, but it just started to get stronger and stronger. And in grad school, we have this supervised practice. You have 1200 hours. And with that, I had a new job placement every three to six weeks. And during that, I saw a lot of different versions of what my future as a dietitian might look like.

0:02:18 Carly: And guess what? I hated all of them. I saw women who had worked at a hospital for 20 years only to have two weeks of paid vacation. I saw people doing the same job day in and day out, punching numbers, calculating macronutrients. I saw hierarchy in a healthcare system that I just wasn’t passionate enough about to change. And so I just couldn’t ignore this nagging feeling in my gut. Was I really going to commit my life to something that just didn’t light me up?

0:02:48 Carly: You know, I was what at this time, 21 years old? Like, was I really just gonna go into this career path that truly made me feel the opposite of Alive. But the alternate alternative was terrifying also, right? Like walking away from something that I had worked so hard for. There was the classic sunken cost situation. Like, was I crazy for throwing all this away? But the idea of staying felt worse. And so I made the call.

0:03:17 Carly: I finished grad school, I passed my boards, and I hopped on a plane to Southeast Asia, never stepping foot in a hospital again. And so that one bold decision really launched my life in a direction I could have never dreamed of. So eventually, I found myself in Laos, which is in Southeast Asia, in a tiny little village on the Namu River. I was working for a company I believed in, surrounded by people who inspired me, and I poured myself into meaningful work.

0:03:44 Carly: You know, I was living my dream life. I was having my dream job. I spent my days with my best friends building relationships in this tiny, small, magical village. And then when I came home and, you know, I would spend my summers abroad, and then I would be here in Washington, and. And I was just. I was growing and I was changing, and I was being challenged, and, you know, I felt free, and there was connection and there was purpose. Like, it was amazing.

0:04:11 Carly: Everything that was missing in the dietitian kind of route I had found in this new job. So years go by. Life is good. And then Covid happened. We all know where this is going. And Covid didn’t just change the job. No more travel. Started to live behind a desk. All that. It changed me. You know, all the challenges that came with guiding, the discomfort, the uncertainty, the travel, new problems requiring new solutions, all of that stopped.

0:04:44 Carly: And I started to live small. And in order to feel aligned with myself, I changed my behaviors, my actions, my beliefs to fit that narrative. You know, I had to change somewhere because I was living, you know, this. In this dissonance. So I charted to change myself. And just suddenly everything that felt so good and aligned began to unravel. Like, I became frustrated and bitter, and I was blaming everyone and everything around me.

0:05:17 Carly: And I adopted this if then mindset. You know, if we just hire one more person, then I’ll feel better. If we just hire or just implement this new change, then I’m going to feel happy and in the flow and, you know, my job’s going to feel smooth again and inspiring. But months went by, and then even years went by, and those changes would happen. The hires, the shifts. But I still felt exactly the same.

0:05:44 Carly: And I just couldn’t figure out why. Like, why was I still so unhappy? And then one day, it hit me. Let’s just say I woke up, you Know, it wasn’t the job, the people, or the circumstances. It was me. And so, like, in 2016, we’re now in 2023, and I find myself at these crossroads again. Do I stay or do I go? And I did the one thing I never thought I’d do. I left what was once my dream job. But I realized I had outgrown the life that I was living.

0:06:19 Carly: I was like a lobster. Yeah. Yes, Like a red lobster. Not because I was sunburned, but because I had outgrown my shell. And so instead of shedding and finding a new one, I was clinging so damn hard to the old one. I was exerting all of my energy trying to squeeze myself into something that just no longer fit. And I was so tired. I was so exhausted. Like, I felt drained every day. It didn’t matter how well I ate, how hard I worked out.

0:06:53 Carly: Like, I just was tired. Most of my months and days, I was tired. And so here was my very first big pivot. My lobster moment is what we’re gonna call it, and we’re calling it a lobster, because lobsters grow by outgrowing. So there was my lobster moment. I was at the crossroads, and I decided to leave. I took that big step, took the scary risk. It’s 2023, and I was so, so ready for my life to take off again.

0:07:25 Carly: Because that’s what happened in 2016. Right? Like, that’s how it works. I did the hard thing. I walked away. I stood up for myself. I made that decision. And now the fun begins. Wrong. So there was a key difference between 2016 and 2023. When I first left in 2016, I had kind of already had this new shell lined up with this dream job. There was that opportunity that had always been there, and I really had this strong sense of self, right? Like, I knew what I valued, and I knew who I was, and I knew that that that career in dietetics, it wasn’t for me, that wasn’t alignment.

0:08:05 Carly: But this most recent lobster moment in 2023, you know, yes, I had that wake up call. I had that moment, but it wasn’t enough because I was so disconnected from my sense of self that I had no idea who I was without that shell, without that old job, without that old identity. And maybe that’s why I clung so hard to stick around at that job longer than I should have. But for the next eight months after I left, you know, I was stripped. Stripped of my job title, stripped of my identity.

0:08:37 Carly: And I was so exposed and so vulnerable and so unsure of myself. I was like this naked little lobster running out in the world, searching for a new shell. Because I had been hiding behind those roles and those titles for so, so long. It was everything. It was my identity. But this vulnerability was a very, very, very good thing. And even though I was confused and I was unsure, I experimented. I launched an Etsy store.

0:09:08 Carly: You can all go simply Oasis. You can all go try to see if it’s still online. Did not work out. Tried consulting. I took a chat, a class, like a women’s channeling energetics class. I’ve studied the nervous system, and most of the time I felt like I was throwing shit at the walls to see what would stick. But I kept moving. And with each new thing I tried, each step, it brought more clarity. And as time passed, I stopped chasing the external shell.

0:09:42 Carly: Like, right when I first left, it was, what job do I want? What’s my title? And there was so much ego attached to this next role because again, there was just this, like, external shell that I was looking for in a job, in a title, in a role. And I finally stopped chasing the external shell. And it was through this experimenting, right? Like, whether it was the catering gig or the new breath work or the new nervous system somatic work, that I tried, like, every step really did help me reconnect with myself.

0:10:19 Carly: And I. Each step I started to turn inward and further inward and I started really remembering who I was and reconnecting with my intuition. And I stopped looking for that validation in these external things. And then one day, something clicked. I stumbled upon an opportunity. And it was one that felt so different from all the things that I’d been trying the last year. And it scared me in the absolute best way. But it was terrifying. It felt so big.

0:10:54 Carly: And what happened is it was an investment in myself. It wasn’t an investment in some, again, external, conditional person, place, whatever. It was an investment in me. And I had not done that in a very long time. And that’s what made me felt so weird about it. But I was finally putting myself in a room with other people that I admired, people who were living and thinking in the ways that I wanted to, the way that I aspired to.

0:11:22 Carly: So here I am. After months, basically a year of kind of searching and experimenting, I think I found my new shell. But it wasn’t a perfect fit at first. Like, this new shell honestly felt massive. Like there was way too much room for me to grow and. And so I started to doubt. I’m like, is this really the right shell? But that is how you know it’s a good one. Because it felt different, not because it was wrong. It felt different because I had so much room to grow.

0:11:50 Carly: It was an environment where I had a lot to learn. Like, honestly, I was the small fish again. And I had years of growing ahead of me, but that didn’t mean that it wasn’t right. So I stayed. I chose to expand into this new shell, to trust myself and my intuition and knowing that this was the right fit. Even if it felt different, this was the right fit. And over time, that shell became mine. And guess what?

0:12:20 Carly: I’m still in it with plenty of room left to grow. And that’s how I’m here. I’ve realized I’ve come back to myself and my values and who I am. And I remember that it’s more important to know who you are than what you want. Because when I first left that. That company, what I thought I wanted in life and jobs and the things that I started to search for. Wow, are so different. And I realized that I just. I valued freedom and I valued authenticity, and I want to build a community where people realize that. That they can go live a life on their own terms.

0:12:59 Carly: And that was this new shell that I found. And that’s how I ended up here, starting this business, becoming a mindset coach so that I can help support others through that. But the best part is it’s just finding that new shell that you have plenty of room to grow into. And so why I called this my lobster moment. Yes, I’m very pale, and I get sunburned, but mainly my lobster moment. Because again, remember that when lobsters grow, by outgrowing, I mean, they actually molt and shed their shell about 25 times within the first five to seven years of life.

0:13:36 Carly: This is good. It’s part of the process. We’re supposed to grow and outgrow and change. And we all have lobster moments, right? We’re gonna have these times when life is just. The life that we’re living is becoming too tight, it’s feeling too restrictive, and you end up spending all of your energy trying to fit into something that no longer fits. And I know that it’s scary to leave a shell that’s kept us safe for so long. It’s been our identity. It’s who we are, but it’s no longer serving us.

0:14:06 Carly: Change is uncomfortable. Growth is going to come with pain. There’s a reason that it’s called growing pains. You know, we don’t talk about that as an adult. Kids get Growing pains all the time, but so do adults. And here’s the thing. Staying stuck is even scarier and even harder. You are exerting all of your energy. You’re trying to be something that you’re just not anymore. So if you’re feeling restless, if you’re feeling unfulfilled, if you’re feeling stagnant, maybe it is time to ask yourself if you’ve outgrown your environment.

0:14:36 Carly: Take a look around and then take a look inward. What areas of your life you’re trying to change and what areas are you maybe avoiding? Maybe it’s time to shed the old and make room for the new. Growth is a process. And like I said, we’re all going to have many, many more lobster moments in our life. But the beauty is that with each one, we do get closer to the life that fits us. This is my shell right now. I’m absolutely going to have another shell and another.

0:15:05 Carly: And so remind yourself, when the next lobster moment comes, it’s not the end. It’s just the beginning of your next great chapter. Okay, so here on Coffee with Carly, that’s my story. A little bit about me, a little bit how I got here. I hope you enjoyed the metaphor of the lobster moment. And we are going to share a lot of these pivotal moments, these inspiring stories. You know, my lobster moment, this most recent time, was a big thing.

0:15:36 Carly: Those were two pivotal moments in my life. But I want to take this moment, since this is their very first episode, to also emphasize what happened after, because that’s really where the magic happened. The reality is without all that time experimenting with all the little things, like I said, whether it was experimenting with new job opportunities, but also just experimenting with new experiences in my own life. Like I said, I never would have thought that I signed up for a women’s channeling group, but here I am. And it was huge, you know, or the Etsy store, like all those little things. I was curious, I was fascinated, I was open.

0:16:12 Carly: I was willing to let life surprise me. And I wouldn’t have found this new shell if I wasn’t doing that. It was through the experimenting and through the actions that I found clarity. And so that’s also what we are going to talk about here. We’re going to expose you to a lot of different opportunities that are out there, whether it’s a nutrition fact, a new science thing, a new mindset tool. That is what I really want to share on this podcast because I have truly learned from so many unexpected places and people.

0:16:43 Carly: And so we are just going to expose and talk about a lot of different things. And for those of you who are maybe in the experimenting phase right now, you know, you maybe did have that lobster moment where you left and now you’re trying to figure out what’s next. Well, keep going. That is my advice. Just keep going. One foot in front of the other. Because movement brings clarity, action brings clarity.

0:17:09 Carly: And it’s not until you leave the shell and go searching that you’re going to find what you’re looking for. So that is my message for our very first episode. I hope you enjoyed it and tune in for many, many more episodes. Some are going to be solo episodes where I’m sharing tools stories of my own. Some will be interviewing with guests and just some candid conversations with friends as well. So if you have not already, please be sure to subscribe, follow the podcast wherever you listen. It’s on Apple and Spotify.

0:17:42 Carly: And then be sure to leave a review. I appreciate that. And then of course please reach out again. I do offer one to one coaching. I will be coming out with a lot of other programs and courses that really dive deeper into the topics that we’ll be talking about here on the podcast. So you can connect with me on Instagram. That’s usually where I like to hang out. So if you do want to chat with me, please send me a dm. I’m always here to chat and I look forward to connecting with you next time.

0:18:09 Carly: Thanks everyone.