Resilience in Real Time: Navigating Change, Authenticity & Evolving Roles

In this episode, we explore what it really means to show up authentically in both personal and professional life. From navigating resilience in the face of frustration to redefining what it means to be supportive in relationships, this conversation is a deep dive into self-awareness, values, and growth.

What You’ll Hear:

🔹 Resilience in real time – How discomfort and struggle can ultimately lead to empowerment.
🔹 Authenticity vs. conformity – The challenge of living in alignment with personal values in a world that often pushes for sameness.
🔹 Parenting and leadership parallels – The shift from being needed to being a supportive presence and why awareness of these transitions matters.
🔹 Self-reflection as a tool for growth – How recognizing shifting paradigms in life and work can lead to more intentional decisions.

Notable Moments:

💬 "Resilience doesn’t always feel like strength in the moment—it often looks like frustration, but it’s shaping us." (33:45)
💬 "There’s a difference between being needed and being truly supportive. Learning that shift is part of the work." (08:30)
💬 "When you live in alignment with your values, you find clarity—not because it’s easy, but because it’s true to you." (40:02)

Whether you’re navigating career transitions, evolving family roles, or just trying to stay true to yourself, this episode offers insights to help you move forward with intention.

Tune in next week as we dive into the idea of self-perception and strengths—we can’t wait to unpack it with you!

Transcript

Lisa (00:02):
Hey. Hi. Hi. Hello. It's so good to see you. I haven't seen you all. I mean, I've seen you all week. You haven't seen me all week.

Jess (00:11):
I know you've been sick and we've been not our normal cadence.

Lisa (00:16):
I have been sick. I have been so many things. My mom is here this week, and so every spare moment that I have, I want to give to her for being so generous with her time as to be down here with us. So every time I come out of my office for a break, she's there and I want to spend that time with her. So normally I would be contacting you and I just, yeah, I haven't gotten that, but luckily you've been very nice and communicative with me and telling me all the things that you're up to. And so it's a very one way conversation. Unfortunately, you're not getting anything back from me about it until now.

Jess (00:55):
But I love that about our relationship that I think there are some people, I think we've talked about it here, that we communicate a lot over Marco Polo, not Marco Polo sponsored, but it really works for us, not

Lisa (01:09):
Sponsored. Happy to be sponsored.

Jess (01:11):
Happy to be sponsored, yes. But it is so much a stream of consciousness and you just give, you're my safe space that I know that whatever is happening in my head, I can just say it out loud and I never feel, and sometimes that's reversed. Sometimes I'm really busy and you're the one who's leaving messages for me. I never feel like there's pressure around that. It's like I'm putting it out there because that's the place where I can put it and I know that you're there to catch it. And it's so funny because pretty much as soon as it's there, I forget about it. It's like it has done its job. It's out of my head. And so I don't even know what I told you about what happened this week.

Lisa (02:00):
I wish I was a better catcher for that information that I could tell you right now, everything that you've told me about your week, and I can't exactly do that right now either. But I know there's been a lot of good stuff and you've had a lot of good stuff going on, so I've just been happy to be a slight tiny hole in the wall sort of witness to your week.

Jess (02:21):
I think we often talk about our conversations on Marco Polo just being the witness to the mundane

Lisa (02:28):
In

Jess (02:28):
What's happening in each other's lives. And so for our listeners, this week was pretty kind of weird, but maybe not bad, weird. It was just a lot of different things that are kind of outside the norm. We got our pool table set up. My husband is very excited about that. That has been 10 years in the making since we moved into our house.

Lisa (02:53):
Wow.

Jess (02:56):
I have, of course, more cookie mom, cookie manager, excuse me, manager things. So a lot of cookie picking up and buying and sorting and coordinating and everything that comes with that.

Lisa (03:11):
And

Jess (03:11):
I've had a lot of really good thinking time for my business. I've had some downtime where I was able to read. I've gone through some workbooks around how I want to shape things moving forward. So

Lisa (03:24):
All

Jess (03:24):
In all, I think it's

Lisa (03:25):
Been a pretty good week. What about bads? Have there been any bads this week? I know bads in reading are kind of two of your favorite things to do, and so it sounds like reading has happened, baths, like you sit in a bath like you do. Oh yeah. Oh yeah. I literally

Jess (03:47):
Just got out of bathtub

Lisa (03:48):
Taking a bath. Oh, you did? Okay, good.

Jess (03:50):
Yeah, yeah. I thought you said bads. And I was like, well, I think there were some bads. I did just give you some goods. Let me think about what the bads are. And

Lisa (04:00):
I was like, wait, I love that you just were willing to go with me on that weird terminology that I would've just come up with. You were just so willing to be like, yep, she's just made up a word. I'm just going to go with it. Well,

Jess (04:11):
I don't think you made it up. I think that's a legitimate word. But then he said it was my favorite thing and I was like, oh, no, I did not hear that word correctly because bads are not my favorite thing. I like the goods.

Lisa (04:25):
I'm going to blame that on my sick voice of saying the word bad. That's

Jess (04:31):
A tricky word to say.

Lisa (04:34):
Yeah. Baths taking a bath. That's why the phrase is taking a bath

Jess (04:38):
Because I think you are correct. The th sound in the English language is the worst

Lisa (04:43):
Followed by an S bad. Yeah,

Jess (04:46):
Right. I mean, I think my kids struggle with that. Phon e mother becomes mutter.

Lisa (04:58):
Yeah. Okay. So there has been bath taking and reading, which is good that it's probably kind of evening out your week a little bit in terms of making sure you're taking that time that you know, enjoy those moments. Yes. Yeah.

Jess (05:14):
Yes. I think it has been a pretty balanced week. I will say randomly, this is getting older. I don't know how I did it, but I turned and pulled my shoulder out of whack and my back spasmed pretty much since I think it happened on Monday, I have been dealing with this kind of stuck shoulder where it's been spasming in my back. But after the first day, it wasn't really painful. It was a nuisance. But as of this reporting, I am back to normal.

Lisa (05:52):
Oh, good.

Jess (05:53):
Yeah.

Lisa (05:54):
Oh yeah. You can hurt yourself. Yeah, you can hurt yourself in all sorts of ways when you get up there in years. I remember my husband once telling a story about stepping out of bed and trying to put on his slippers and somehow badly putting on a slipper such that he injured himself.

Jess (06:17):
Oh yeah. I think I pulled my hip out of alignment by taking off some leggings, maybe putting on some leggings. It just went, oh god, not great.

Lisa (06:28):
No, not great at all. Well, I mean, it's good for a varied week. Good for a little bit of this lo, I know that the cookie manager stuff has been extra requirements on you, but not necessarily in a bad way. I think you've rather enjoyed some of that work. So

Jess (06:51):
I think the learning curve was really steep and looking back on it, which is kind of tied into what I want to unpack today, but I want to hear about your week. I know you have also had a different sort of week. I think what I was experiencing in the learning curve was really just frustration at not being good at it or not knowing all of the pieces yet. And so now that I see how the pieces click together and I've got a system, it's still work. I still have to do the things, but there's a little bit of zen that comes with that of getting in rhythm and getting all the things. And I had an inventory issue. I had two last night. One, my spreadsheet didn't update properly, and so my inventory was not tracking correctly. And then I had another thing where I had misfilled it, but I caught it. It's fine on we go.

Lisa (07:50):
I'm impressed that you can make spreadsheets that automatically update at all. I think that's a really nice skill to have.

Jess (07:59):
Yeah,

Lisa (08:00):
Yeah, sure. I think you would probably see it as a very basic sort of skill and something that probably everybody should know how to do, but I tell you what, that's good

Jess (08:08):
Stuff. Well, I mean, I had to learn how to do it. So I think it's totally reasonable to expect that it's something that can be learned if you have a use for it. If you don't have a use, if

Lisa (08:20):
One has the motivation to that.

Jess (08:23):
Yes. Yeah.

Lisa (08:25):
Yeah, exactly. So now

Jess (08:27):
You've had a kind of different week too. What's going on with you?

Lisa (08:30):
Well, for those who are catching us, after listening to last week's, my family was real sick last week and I managed to contract not just one, but both of the communicable diseases that my family was tossing around. So both flu and strep landed on me.

Jess (08:53):
Oh, no.

Lisa (08:54):
Yeah, it's been a journey. I've come out the other side of it, I think I'm kind of mostly through it with some coughing and stuff like that. But yeah, I managed to work every day and still kind of take care of all the stuff that needs to be taken care of, which I think probably just about every mom of our audience who's listening will say, yes, that sounds like me. Still having to do the things. There are sick days from work, obviously you can build that in if you have that, but there's no mom sick days. There's only life. There's only the obligations that you see in front of you.

Jess (09:41):
And

Lisa (09:42):
I've been lucky enough that my mom has just randomly happened to be here this week. And so that was really, really nice that I had that backup because I don't normally, my mom does not live in the area, and so I don't typically have that support. But I had it this week, which was great, and my kids absolutely adore her and think she's everything because she is. Yeah. So that's given me a little bit of relief, but there's still been all of the of the same things come calling. And we got my daughter, my baby, my now three-year old, she turned three over the weekend. My now three-year old's cast off. She had something called a spike of cast for a long time as, and we got that off on Monday. So I had 102 or something degree temperature going to the hospital to get her cast off, but I was not going to delay that process. I was not going to miss it. It was going to happen. So I was able to be there for her with that sort of momentous event of shedding this huge chest to ankle cast that she's been dragging around for the last six weeks. So it was really nice, it have that finality of something that's been such a process for so long,

(11:09):
It's really meant a huge change in all of our, everyone who lives in our house. It's been a change for everyone to deal with her and to kind of make accommodations for her. And now we still have to make accommodations. She can't walk, but she's going to have to relearn how to do that. And so it's been a lot of that too underneath all of the sickness and all of the unusualness of this week. There's also this other thing, which is like it's so great that she's now has her cast off, but oh boy, we have this other hurdle which is you have to learn how to walk as a three-year-old and the stuff doesn't work. You remember it working. Right, right. Yeah.

Jess (11:54):
I think for you all going into this, you knew it would be six weeks, and I think it felt both very quick and very long during that time. It's long days, quick weeks, maybe

Lisa (12:11):
A way to categorize it or it felt very time warpy in that way. And it's going by so quickly. We keep taking pictures of her saying, this many weeks left or this many weeks left. And those seem to be happening quite quickly, but everything felt slow, almost in reverse in other senses where we're waiting for this thing to happen, which is to get this cast off and start the next phase.

Jess (12:35):
And

Lisa (12:35):
Now the next phase is here, but it feels like it's going to be even longer than six weeks, potentially much longer than six weeks doing this next phase of things.

Jess (12:45):
And I think maybe that's the realization is that it's the end of the cast era and the beginning of what's next and what's next is a lot more nebulous because a lot's going to depend on how quickly she

Lisa (13:02):
Relearns

Jess (13:03):
And how much work she puts into it.

Lisa (13:05):
A huge benefit in being three because three year olds are sort of classically stubborn and need to do everything for themselves and want to do all of it. And I think this is going to be a real benefit in her recovery because wanting to do it all and do it all fast and have it be done by her is going necessitate her, relearning this process quickly. So I'm actually really grateful for that. This morning I tried to get her down out of the car to go into her daycare and she was like, no, I do it by myself. And I was like, you know what? You do that you get down out of the car by yourself now she can't use one of her legs. It just doesn't really work. Watching her just figure it out has been kind of fun and been kind of challenging. It's hard not to rescue,

Jess (14:05):
Right?

Lisa (14:06):
Yeah, it is. And there are times when I kind of have to rescue because she could hurt herself. And as we're walking her, she decided she had to walk into the school today, so she's holding onto me and she's basically kind of limping with her not great foot. And she just slowly starts sinking further and further to the ground and can't stand quite as tall with every single step to the point where she's almost flat on the ground. And that's the point at which I decided, okay, I'm going to pick you up now and take you the rest of the way. And she was fine with that because she was exhausted by that point.

Jess (14:45):
Right. I think her tenacity is going be a really big asset to her recovery.

Lisa (14:53):
Absolutely. It is. And being there, and we haven't exactly transitioned into what we're unpacking, but this is stuff I'm unpacking is how to be there for her and how to be the right amount of cheerleader and rescuer and just silent support and how to strike those balances when your kid is doing something really, really hard and potentially painful and potentially really frustrating. And so it's physically hard, it's mentally hard, and I think it's a good thing for us parents to have practice doing of where is that balance for our kid? And maybe it's where is that balance for our kid today versus tomorrow versus yesterday.

Jess (15:50):
Right. I agree. I think it's always changing and there's an evaluation that happens and then as parents, we're balancing what is that instinct that we have and then what's driving that instinct. And so with this, I'm wondering what would be different if she hadn't had this experience and she were doing these things by herself, where would your line be with her for when to swoop in and rescue or cheer lead

Lisa (16:20):
By nature, I'm not much of a rescuer by nature. I tend to let the natural course of events kind of go as it will. And sometimes that means kids get hurt and hopefully not super hurt, but that lessons are learned and things like that. So I think because I am so I'm going to have to untrain myself, and maybe that's the lesson here is untraining myself from her when she had the cast on where I did have to rescue her because she was incapable. It wasn't a matter of tenacity, it wasn't a matter of stick toit or mental fortitude or resilience. I was required to do these things for her basic things that she's been doing for years. Going to the bathroom, I had to physically do all the things for her to get her where she needed to go and all of that. So now it's a matter of untraining myself

Jess (17:21):
When

Lisa (17:22):
It comes to her. And maybe even kind of on the flip side, retraining myself to focus on my other two kids a little bit more and focus on other aspects of our lives where I've really been focused on my baby and really been focused on making sure that she has what she needs to be post-surgery in this cast situation and making sure that every comfort for her is given so that she can have that healing process. So refocusing on all of the other aspects of our lives that are important and letting her take those next steps literally and metaphorically. Yes.

Jess (18:08):
It's just so interesting because in the grand scheme of things, this was six weeks of your life, and as you said, she's three. And so I don't know what my rough napkin math is on that, but it's not a lot. It's a huge proportion. And so what would it take to get back to that place that you want to get to? What do you need to do?

Lisa (18:35):
Well, that's the other part of the time warp, I think, is that I can't remember a time before this cast.

(18:42):
I don't have a sense memory for what life was like prior to her going under this metamorphosis that she did for the last six weeks. I recognize empirically and rationally that doesn't make a lot of sense, but to me it kind of is almost like the changeover from BCE to AD or whatever. It feels seismic in that way that, oh, this became this very anchored part of her life and therefore also part of our family's personal history of this cast being put on. And what this meant for us as a family and how this kind both bonded us all together and made everything different. And now post cast, there was no life before cast.

Jess (19:40):
Right. I totally understand that before times and after times kind of phenomenon that's happened. And so then maybe the question is not what do you need to do to remember, but how do you want to be moving forward?

Lisa (19:54):
Yeah, yeah. That is the real question I think. Exactly. How do I want to be moving forward? I think I want to be less, I want to let her be her. She is, as you said, kind of a force, and we took her to physical therapy this week and she didn't look back. She went with her physical therapist and they did monster feed across the floor and they were kicking balls to the extent that she really could. And she was completely doing her thing. She did not act the same way that she did when she was in the cast where she would look at me with those helpless eyes like, I am stuck in this thing and you are my only option. She didn't look at me like that. She didn't look at me at all. She did her thing. And that's the paradigm shift that I need to get to of we are in the after cast times where she is going to do exactly what she is going to do and I am there for when she does look around for me and she is looking for a hand to hold, I am perfectly fine being that hand.

Jess (21:12):
Yeah, it sounds almost like there's this letting go that needs to happen that her looking at you, you are my only hope. And that probably does something to you also to be in that position where you are absolutely wanted and absolutely needed. And so I'm curious if there's any sort of grief that might be coming up in this of letting go being that person for her.

Lisa (21:43):
I would not have thought that necessarily, but I think there has been some amount of enjoyment that has come with being so needed by her. She has always been so independent. She has always been so, I don't know. Dunno, she loves her family. She loves me. I mean, I'm her mom, of course she does. But she's always been so uniquely herself and uniquely independent. And when she was in her cast, she was really dependent, truly on all the things and wanted to be as velcroed to me as a three-year-old can possibly be. And you're right, I think there was some no small amount of happiness on my part that I was able to be that for her, that comfort blanket or whatever. And it is of course, ironic that you use the term letting it go because she is desperately and forever attached to frozen and that whole genre. So that's funny that you should use that phrase.

Jess (22:57):
And if there's not grief, I think that's okay too. I throw it out there and without really being attached to the idea, I can just imagine how that shift must feel to go from being the Velcro buddy

Lisa (23:12):
To

Jess (23:12):
Being kind of back to as usual when for you, there is no as usual anymore.

Lisa (23:20):
I think I am excited at the idea. I just didn't make that shift mentally until now. I am excited at the idea of her not needing me in that same way because that means that she's back to being herself.

(23:37):
The cast times were exclusionary because they had to be. And it was a time period with parentheses on either side and I was fine with it, whatever it was going to be at that moment. And I am excited that she is returning to herself now that she's free of this impediment. So I don't feel grief about it, but I think I did need to mentally take the time to check that switch and to say, oh, things are different now. And she doesn't need me in the same way, even though she does still need me because she's going to have to learn how to walk again and it's going to require that she has some support, but being support rather than being needed. It's a good shift and it's good for me and it's really, really good for her and it's the right thing. And it really does mean that we're kind of moving out of that parenthetical part of our family's existence. And I'm sure my other two kids are very excited about it too, although they have been absolute champions the whole time. But

Jess (24:59):
Right. Just when you said parenthetical, I realized that the word parent is in the word parent parenthetical. That's true. And something you said, this is obviously a very kind of big shift, but there are so many parallels in just everyday parenting where we have to navigate this transition from being needed to being supportive. And so I'm wondering, knowing that this won't be the last time this happens though, hopefully it will be the last time that it happens in this dramatic way for you, what is something that you can take from this experience of reframing into the next time you need to reframe with shifting what support looks like with your kids?

Lisa (25:45):
Yeah. I think it's not missing those moments, not letting the busyness or in my case, the sickness of life kind of paper over those big moments so that you miss when paradigm shifts do happen so that you can stay on top of the paradigm that exists.

Jess (26:08):
At least aware of it, right?

Lisa (26:10):
Yeah, aware of it. And saying to yourself, even if it's just for a second, I wonder if my kids' needs have changed now that this thing is changed, I wonder if my needs have changed. I wonder if not being needed in the same way how that affects me. And just taking those quiet moments to reflect. And it is probably the easiest thing in the world to not take time to reflect. I mean, nobody's life is so slow that they're just like, golly, I just have all this reflection time and I don't know what to do with it. Said nobody ever. And so making mindful choices to have those reflection points and say like, gosh, lease, your kid was wearing a cast for six weeks after surgery and is no longer doing that. I wonder if her needs have changed and how you can best be there for her. That's like a max five minute self conversation that I can have, and maybe I wouldn't have gotten anywhere to, I dunno, crazy too, I dunno what the word is,

Jess (27:34):
Earth shattering, groundbreaking,

Lisa (27:35):
Yes. That those earth shattering, but I would've taken enough time to think about it. It's a great thing about this podcast this time that I get with you is that I get to actually take those moments that I didn't take five days ago when I probably should have when the cast came off. Now I can.

Jess (27:58):
Well, you had some things going on, but I think this you did. We notice as parents, I think I can probably generalize here, that we notice the frustration or the annoyance or the kind of distressing emotions first when we reach one of those paradigm shifts, but we haven't acknowledged it. And so all of a sudden our expectations have changed. I expect my nine-year-old to be able to get their own snack. So when she interrupts me and says, mama, can I have this? Can I have that? And I get frustrated like, you can get that for yourself.

Lisa (28:37):
And

Jess (28:37):
I realized the other day she said, I just wanted your permission. And I said, oh, right, okay. So this paradigm has shifted and it has shifted for both of us, but neither one of us acknowledged it. And so we had this, she probably shorter than it needed to be tone with each other. I think I was running out the door and I said, I'm not the grownup to ask about this right now. And she's like, I just need your permission. So yeah, I think that happens. But acknowledging it, and as our kids get older, we can even start to have those conversations with them of, Hey, it seems like you are capable of knowing what you would like for a snack, what the ground rules are for snacks in our household. I would like for you to get those for yourself unless there's something you can't reach.

Lisa (29:29):
Yeah, I

Jess (29:32):
Have that snacks very different than learning how to walk again. But

Lisa (29:35):
No, I mean, like you said, there's a million, we each have three at all different stages and these things are happening and I think this is sort of the central thesis. These things are happening without our notice a lot of the time. And by putting in a slight amount of notice, we might be able to let some of it not bother us in the same way or let some of it not ride on the surface of our life in that same way. It can just disappear entirely or can shift entirely. And then it's just a new paradigm that we're just operating with.

Jess (30:14):
And then how much more enjoyment do we get out of when they ask for us to be the big support because we know that they don't need us, but that they want us and it's a different kind of invitation into their

Lisa (30:29):
Life. I hope I'm always needed in some way or another. And I think given that I still need my mom, it's probably a good bet that my kids will still need me in some way, shape or form, maybe with some large breaks in there somewhere, like 10 year breaks or something. But yeah, so that's kind of what I got going on. What are you unpacking this week?

Jess (31:05):
I feel like there's a lot to unpack and also relatively little to unpack. And so I will bring something that occurred to me this week. As I mentioned, I had some downtime to think and plan and be a little bit more purposeful in how I think about myself as a coach and in my business, but it all ties together under the umbrella of resilience. And so that's what I want to talk about. One of the articles that I read this week talked about having your philosophy or why your purpose or what and your process, and probably people are somewhat familiar with Simon Sinek, start with Why and how important it is. And the article that I read kind of highlighted all of the ways that it should really be in alignment for you to be consistent in forward facing and inward facing and how those things should align with your values. And so I did some work on my values and really, I think I knew my values, but I have kind of a top couple and they shift a little bit over time, but they're all generally important. The same values kind of occur again and again for me. And I realized that resilience isn't really one of the values that I have, but I mean it is a value, but it's the through line in all of my other core values.

(32:42):
And I saw a video of Dr. Becky Kennedy delivering this talk about resilience to college students. And it had never occurred to me, but I have experienced this, that when you are experiencing something in which you need to be resilient, it does not feel like resilience. It feels like frustration. It feels like failure. It feels daunting ness in front of you, but it's in retrospect that we can say that was a thing that made us feel resilient. This whole thing is reframing all of the difficulty and frustration that I feel as, oh, that's probably resilience in action and that resilience in outcome look different. I also, yeah, I guess we'll start there. I had another thought, but I just lost it.

Lisa (33:45):
I think it's interesting, the idea of it's, it's an experience that I want to have had essentially is what resilience is. It's not an experience that anyone wants to live through, but it's an experience that you want to have lived through and come out the other side of.

(34:09):
And so because everyone sort of acknowledges and the fortitude and the just betterment that comes with being resilient and the situations that mold one into being resilient, most of which are I think kind of out of our control. But I think what it sounds like is you're saying that you are almost creating values that insist upon resilience and rely upon resilience, which are, as you just described them naturally difficult things naturally challenging, naturally kind of disruptive to your comfort level. And so I think for one, what seems like to me is that you almost are naturally wanting to put yourself as the leader of your company into a space where you're constantly growing because that's the outcome of resilience is growth. Truly. I think there's probably some equation somewhere by somebody like Adam Grant that's smarter than me, that there's an equation somewhere, but the outcome is essentially growth at the end of it. And so your values, your why equals growth at the end, which you can only get through being resilient,

Jess (35:33):
Right? So the values are authenticity, intentionality, curiosity and empowerment and all of those things, they mainline on growth and resilience.

Lisa (35:50):
And

Jess (35:50):
So I think keeping that in mind, that resilience as an outcome is different than resilience as a process is going to be pretty critical to just framing whatever those challenges are. And I think the biggest difference between having a challenge that builds resilience and having a challenge that brings you down is perception of whether or not you can overcome it. And not just by yourself, not just by myself, but how am I resourced, who is my tribe, who are the people that can support me in overcoming that challenge? Because whatever it is, I assuredly don't have to do it alone.

Lisa (36:35):
Yeah. Well, that was kind of what I was thinking when you were talking is that because you are the owner, CEO of your company and the principal coach, you are everything for your company despite the fact that you do have lots of support and you have a great network and all of that. But how are these values for your company differing from the values that you hold for yourself and how do they mix and how do they not mix with each other?

Jess (37:11):
That's a great question. For me, I think they are entirely overlapping almost entirely. I don't think there's anything that I would do in my business that I wouldn't feel good about doing as a person. And that is maybe what the authenticity piece is that

(37:35):
I just don't really think we have enough time for inauthenticity in life. There's too much opportunity for connection and depth and growth, and we spend a lot of it kind of on the surface or trying to be somebody we're not. And the world has a place for us exactly as we are. And so I think that's in myself and in my business, I think the end goal is the same, which is to impact my immediate world around me, the people, the people's lives who are closest to me, the people who invite me into that space so that everyone has more agency and is more empowered to make their own mark on the world

Lisa (38:31):
And follow their own values.

Jess (38:33):
And follow their own values.

Lisa (38:34):
Exactly. Hopefully includes being authentic to who they are. And I think that's something that I've seen a lot more of, a lot discussion of lately in the last, say five years or so about being authentic and feeling empowered to be authentic. But it's funny to me that you say that we don't have enough time to be inauthentic. There are people that live their entire lives feeling inauthentic to who they are for a myriad of reasons. And so I don't think it's worth foot stomping on that you yourself don't ascribe to that Everything that you do is better by being authentic. And I don't know that everyone feels that way. And so I think's worth noting,

Jess (39:30):
It's definitely worth noting, and it's worth noting that there isn't a judgment on what your values are. We can have very different core values and still operate in a true to self sort of way. And I think maybe that's getting a working definition around authenticity could be important here, where it's not saying you put all your cards out on the table because that's not the right thing for everyone. That's not the right thing for me most of the time.

Lisa (40:02):
But

Jess (40:03):
It is acting in alignment with your values and who you are and how you want to show up in this world to the capacity that you want to bring yourself to that space. Not everybody deserves all of you. I don't know. Deserves is maybe not the right word.

Lisa (40:23):
It's very meta. I love it. Your first value is essentially that your values are important. That's what authenticity means to you, is living your values. So your first value is that your values are valuable,

Jess (40:36):
Right? So the main value is that when you're in operation with your values, life is better. Life is easier because you're not trying to be somebody that you're not. And I also recognize that this world and our society really puts a lot of pressure around being a certain way all the time. And that is, I think one of the hardest things to swallow about where we are right now is that it bristles against that value of authenticity.

Lisa (41:23):
And I think we could easily spiral off into other discussions about likability and what it is to be a leader if you're a woman who is not likable or isn't seen as this or that or something specific, whatever your industry is. So being authentic is kind of a liability sometimes. And I think there's lots of people who would say, me being authentic is for sure a liability. And I think I'm one of those people to some degree. I think I'm less so now, but I think it is something to be conscious of as we move through the

Jess (42:07):
World. Exactly. And I recognize that that is a luxury that I have that I think I feel okay being authentic, which again, doesn't mean putting all of my cards on the table, but I think I'm able to do that because I don't care if somebody rejects me in the same way. Sometimes it stings. I don't love being

Lisa (42:36):
Rejected,

Jess (42:37):
But also I'm not fearful of those kind of repercussions, whereas I think a lot of people probably are and reasonably so concerned that if they show up in alignment with their values, there could be job ending, job changing, perception changing ramifications. And so I am really glad that you brought that up because it is definitely something that I think people can access to different extents in their life depending on their circumstance.

Lisa (43:12):
For sure. So with the values exercise that you went through this week and kind of seeing the through line of the resilience underneath all of that, what are you feeling about your values? How do you feel like that might address or assist you in some way in doing the work that you want to be doing in the next weeks, months, years? Or do you think it was already there always and it was just a matter of putting it on paper?

Jess (43:47):
To some extent? I think it was always there, and I do think these are not written in stone. I think there's a little bit of play in there as I look at it, connection is also really important to me, and I can see how that may also be a through line akin to resilience,

(44:04):
Or it could be a separate value. So I don't think the work is done, but I do think that having it kind of crystallized on paper was really helpful for me to say, this is who I am and how I operate. And for all of those things that I think there are a lot of distractions. I think we talked about how I don't want to be distracted in my work year. It's allowing me to say, does this thing align with these values? And when I'm considering it in the philosophy, purpose, or process, is it in alignment with that? Because if the answer is like, oh, but I could make it work, then no, it's just a shiny object. It's

Lisa (44:57):
Not

Jess (44:57):
Something that I should be pursuing.

Lisa (45:01):
Does it make you feel Sometimes I feel like when I have something written down, especially if I can see it, maybe I'm really old school in this way, I like to have something in my eye line that I can see because then I can feel the fit of it in my life in a different way. Is that something that you do too? My alone,

Jess (45:25):
I do. I mean, I keep looking behind my screen because I've got my vision board up there and over on my other screen I have the work that I did, kind of getting it all written out. I'm not sure how I want to make that update. I think I definitely want to put it on my website. That's been kind of a longer back burner project for me. And maybe the reason it was on the back burner is I just didn't yet have the right words to put on there. So I'm feeling much better about that and how I want to move forward. In terms of the work that I do, like the actual coaching, I'm not sure that it really changes a whole lot, but it feels really nice to say, this is who I am.

Lisa (46:12):
I think being transparent in that way, one, it really helps you be authentic because you're telling the world exactly what they can expect of you and what you see as important. But it also, I think when you put things like that out into the world, I do to some extent believe that that's what comes back to you. And so when you're saying, these are the things that I am, these are the energies that I'm going to put into the world, then those energies tend to boomerang back to you, and that's exactly what you want. You want people who want to be authentic and you want to be helping people and working with people who have those same values of, and maybe are working on those same values. Maybe they don't have those values and they want to, and that's just a matter of crystallizing it for them. So there's so much that can benefit from having those things sort of firmed up in your mind.

Jess (47:13):
And I think we talked, you talked about kind of noticing when the paradigm shift is happening. I think the same is kind of true of values. We're all acting on our values, whether we name them or not. Yeah, that's true. And so kind of giving thought to that, I do think that there's kind of the aspirational value and then the lived value. Those can sometimes be a little out of alignment, but I do think that the shift is possible, but even just having an awareness of what values are driving reactions and behaviors allows us to choose something different, which is whatever intentionality comes into play and empowerment, we can be curious about those things without judging them, without judging ourselves. And I think there are a lot of values, and there are, well, there are probably some bad values that I think are pretty universally bad, but in general, I think it's not what you value is what you value. It's not right or wrong, it's just who you are.

Lisa (48:31):
Yeah. Do you think it's worthwhile to explore the delta between aspirational values and actual values?

Jess (48:41):
Yes. Yes. I think it's giving that time at the end of the day to reflect, to say, how did this value show up in my life today? Maybe not even saying how did I act on my value, but just where was this value present for me today? And being able to just observe. And then if over a period of time you notice that some of those values weren't present at all, then I think that's when it's worth asking the question, was this really a value or was this something that seemed really appealing to me?

Lisa (49:30):
Yeah, the kind of person that I want to be, or the kind of person I was raised to be, but never really going on to the idea of actually being at the end of the day or values. I love doing the work to find what they are. And it's something that I've been doing the last couple of years for our family is trying to define our family values,

Jess (50:03):
And

Lisa (50:03):
That's been really fun and a super rewarding thing to kind of put down on paper. I have yet to get it on the wall. I can't find a vinyl printer that has large enough fonts to do them for our wall. But yeah, I think it's a really, to live your values every day is basically impossible, but to know your values very clearly helps you get there.

Jess (50:37):
Exactly. Exactly. And yeah. Yeah. I lost my train of thought again. Oh, you talked about setting your family values, and that's such a leader thing to do.

Lisa (51:00):
Yeah,

Jess (51:00):
It's such a leader thing to set values for a group of people, and I think we can probably all look at our own roles in our family of how we're showing up as a leader in our family and how we can use some of those skills to kind of be the leader we want to be in our family, even though we're also filling this other role of parent and spouse. And

Lisa (51:29):
In the same way that you want your kids to go, I don't do that because it's not part of my family values. Or I do do that because it's part of my family values, and I know it because it's up on the wall, or mom never shuts up about it, or whatever the case may be. Knowing that for sure, it's the same thing with a team to say, how do I know what the right course of action is here without asking my boss every time? Well, let's check it against the values. Where does it match up

Jess (52:00):
Exactly.

Lisa (52:01):
Oh, that makes that decision pretty clear because this is a value that we have. Okay, great. Let's move forward with that. So quicker decision making and more clarity and more sure. Confidence in your steps and your decisions. It's all, I dunno. I love it. I love that you're doing this exercise for yourself, for your business, for your clients, and putting it very clearly as a message, which is brave in and of itself, to be so transparent with your values as to tell every perspective person who might work with you, this is where my values are. If you align with those, if you resonate with those, I might be a great person to work with. And if you don't, you may continue on your journey probably without me.

Jess (52:54):
Yeah. I mean, the fit, especially in my line of work has to be good. And so I think it saves so much of that back and forth kind of figuring out who the other person is. And so, yeah, I think so. I also think I could probably have four different values and still be myself even, because there's so much interconnectedness between them. And so I don't know. I'd never really thought of it as brave because it doesn't seem scary to me at all.

Lisa (53:31):
But just because it's not scary doesn't mean it's not brave.

Jess (53:34):
I don't know. I think bravery requires some amount of fear. But you know what? I will say there's probably a time in my life where that would've been really scary because I wasn't so sure about who I was and me in 10 years, we'll probably listen back to this and cringe about how sure I am of who I am now and how many things will change over the next 10 years. But I think all we can really do is just stay curious and do the next best step, whatever that next best step is,

Lisa (54:14):
And this is yours, and it's to me very natural. Next best step. Well done.

Jess (54:21):
Thanks. Wow. Yeah, we're kind of getting there towards the end. Thanks for unpacking with me today.

Lisa (54:31):
Of course, always, I love hearing where you're at with your business and all the work that you're doing. You're all of the work that you do, you have nobody above you, beside you or below you telling you what you have to do. It's all coming generated from you, and it's so impressive that it's all coming from directly inside of you.

Jess (55:00):
You are my unofficial chief of operations, so not much

Lisa (55:04):
Happens. I rarely give you tasks, though

Jess (55:07):
Not much happens in my business without you hearing about it, because it is. I think that's the thing about entrepreneurship is it is so all encompassing, especially in this field, but even in that, I mean, I am solely responsible for those things, but I also know that I'm not alone in building them because I have you and other colleagues that I can bounce ideas off of, but mostly you who gives me that safe space. So thank you. Love

Lisa (55:40):
Being your safe space. All right. Wow. I'll hit you on Marco Polo for real this time though. For

Jess (55:48):
Real.

Lisa (55:48):
And

Jess (55:50):
We meet up again next week. Talk something

Lisa (55:53):
New. Same time, same place. Check you later, Jess. Check

Jess (55:58):
You. Bye. Love you.