Why Difficult Conversations Go Wrong - And How to Handle Them Better

What if the biggest factor shaping your leadership isn’t strategy, experience, or authority - but the emotional energy you bring into the room?

Join me as I sit down with communication and leadership expert Beth Wonson, who has spent more than 15 years helping organizations and leaders navigate difficult conversations, workplace conflict, and the emotional dynamics that show up whenever humans work together.

Beth’s path into this work didn’t begin in consulting. It began in leadership roles where she discovered firsthand how challenging it can be to manage teams, hold people accountable, and navigate high-pressure environments without the tools to manage your own emotional reactions.

In this conversation, we explore the real skill behind difficult conversations: learning to manage your own emotional energy, approaching conflict with curiosity instead of defensiveness, and creating dialogue that builds trust instead of damaging relationships.

This is a practical, honest conversation about communication, self-awareness, and what it actually takes to lead people well.

You’ll Learn

⭐ Why difficult conversations are really about managing your own emotional reactions
⭐ How emotional energy shapes the outcome of workplace communication
⭐ Why curiosity is more powerful than trying to be “right”
⭐ The difference between healthy conflict and damaging conflict
⭐ How leaders can share vulnerability without oversharing
⭐ Why emotional intelligence is essential for effective leadership
⭐ How to approach challenging dialogue in a way that builds trust

Key Insights

Leadership Starts With Self-Management
The most important skill in difficult conversations isn’t persuasion - it’s the ability to manage your own emotional triggers before responding.

Curiosity Creates Connection
Approaching conversations with curiosity rather than defensiveness helps build empathy, trust, and better outcomes.

Healthy Conflict Drives Innovation
Friction between different perspectives can create better solutions when leaders know how to hold space for disagreement.

Emotional Energy Shapes the Room
The energy leaders bring into conversations affects how teams respond, communicate, and collaborate.

Communication Skills Aren’t Taught
Most professionals are promoted for technical skills, not leadership or communication abilities - leaving many leaders to learn these skills the hard way.

Timestamps

[00:00:00] – Introduction: Why difficult conversations shape leadership
[00:03:00] – Beth’s early career and lessons from leadership roles
[00:06:00] – Learning to manage emotional reactions as a leader
[00:08:00] – Why workplace conflict usually comes down to communication
[00:11:00] – Healthy conflict vs unhealthy conflict in organizations
[00:14:00] – Vulnerability, leadership, and oversharing
[00:18:00] – Emotional intelligence and navigating workplace stress
[00:22:00] – Understanding emotional triggers and reactions
[00:30:00] – How curiosity transforms difficult conversations
[00:37:00] – Self-awareness, leadership growth, and personal development
[00:46:00] – Career advice for younger professionals
[00:53:00] – What legacy means in leadership

Resources and Links

Connect with Beth Wanson on LinkedIn
Learn more about Beth’s work on communication, leadership, and challenging dialogue on her website

Find host Kristin Belden on LinkedIn or at BeldenStrategies.com

Sign up for Kristin’s newsletter for more stories, insights, and tools for women leaders: BeldenStrategies.com/newsletter

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Hi everyone, welcome back to Kind of a Big Deal. I'm your host, Kristen Belden, and I'm so excited to bring this conversation to you today. We're talking about something that quietly shapes almost every part of leadership, and it's how we handle difficult conversations. My guest is Beth Wants, who has spent more than 15 years helping organizations and leaders navigate communication, conflict, and the emotional dynamics that show up whenever humans come together. What I love most about Beth's approach is that it's incredibly practical. We talk about managing your own emotional reactions, why curiosity matters more than being right, and how the energy you bring into a room changes everything. It's one of those conversations that will make you pause and think about how you show up in your own relationships at work and beyond. I'm excited for you to hear this one, so let's get into it.

SPEAKER_01 0:53

Hi Beth. Hi, Kristen. How are you? I'm doing good. It's so good to see your smiling face. You too. I'm happy to be here. Thanks for inviting me to do this.

SPEAKER_00 1:04

Oh, I'm so happy to have you here. From the moment we met, I think I was trying to pitch you on coming and hanging out with me here and having this conversation. So I'm so glad to finally be making it happen. Yeah, me too. Me too. You know when you meet someone and you think, where's this person been all my life? And how lucky am I that I get a chance to get to know this awesome human? Um, that is best for me. I'm sure we've all had moments like that in our lives where you end up in these spaces and you're in these, you know, same rooms as each other. We're part of this really incredible group here in Sacramento that's dedicated to lifting up nonprofits across our region. So you already know that when you're in these spaces, that great people are coming together. But um, Beth stands out. She has such a presence about her. We finally had a chance to sit down very recently. Both of us agreed we could have sat there for hours. She's hilarious, wicked smart, has a true heart for service and impact. And um we agreed on everything, which is always great too. Including how terrible Sacramento drivers are, we just realized. Um, for those in Sacramento, I'm sure you feel us. I wanted to start by sharing that you have been running your own company. Um, and I believe it's for over 15 years, but you can correct me on that if that is not true. It's true. So, wealth of wisdom and experience. Can't wait to get into it. But I wanted to start with one of the first things that we immediately agreed upon and kind of started chatting about when we most recently met is that no matter the industry, no matter the challenge, no matter the position, it always comes down to the people. It always comes down to humans, and it always comes down to how we can support each other. And you've built a thriving business around helping people really understand the importance of effective communication, how to have difficult conversations. And so obviously that is more needed now than ever, but this had to have started somewhere. So I'm just so curious how this came to be and if that was the original vision for your business or if it evolved over time.

SPEAKER_01 3:23

Sure. So um I started out as a high school assistant principal many years ago, probably 30 now, in a public high school. And one of the challenges that I had in that role was my job was disciplinarian. So I was spending a lot of time taking kids to juvenile court, getting them used to being in front of a judge, all these types of things, which was not why I went into public education. I suddenly felt like the gateway drug to the adult justice system. So I um decided to leave there and I went to work for a very large consulting firm which worked all over the world. And I didn't know that much about the work when I joined and the organization, but I loved what they did because it was about building people's strengths, working on culture, helping people stretch, all these types of things. So I was there for 13 years, but it didn't take too long before it was noticed that I was really good at what I did, which predominantly you could call sales, marketing, and implementation. And so I had really good results with that. I was on a team of about seven or eight people, and so it didn't take too long before I got promoted to lead the team, right? And I loved that, that was awesome, except for I didn't realize that I knew a lot about the work I did. I didn't know hardly anything about leading, empowering, inspiring, and motivating, and holding a team accountable. And this was a team I formerly served on. And so at the time I was raising two teenage daughters. I was a single mom. I was trying to hold on to my house, uh, doing all these things and working. And so when I came into work, my emotions were on my sleeve. And I was still hooked into that energy of whatever happened before I got there. It was a lot of pressure about deadlines, goals, hitting budget, all of this. And so I essentially was responding emotionally to the people on my team all the time, and they really didn't know if happy Beth was gonna show up, stressed Beth, Beth, who had a bad day with her kids, who was gonna come in the door. But we hit our goals and we did great work. But as time went by, I started thinking: all right, how much different would the team environment been, our success have been, our work have been, if I understood how to manage my own emotional reactions and how to manage my own emotional energy. And so I began studying social and emotional intelligence, brain-based research, trying to figure out kind of what is the key to leading, inspiring, motivating, and holding people accountable. At the same time, I left there after several years, did another stint at a nonprofit as the COO for three years, and then um I wasn't sure what I wanted to do next. So my neighbor down the street was an HR consultant, and she would say to me, Um, I got this little gig for you. I just want to deal with policies, procedures, handbooks, and all this stuff. You have a knack for dealing with the people, particularly the people who are causing problems with HR, maybe they're great at their job, um, they have a long history with the company, but their communication really throws things off and causes drama and chaos. And so I thought, okay, you know, I can think about that. And the more I started consulting with these organizations, the real life, the more I realized that it doesn't matter what they call me for, if it's culture, if it's a difficult employee, if it no matter what it is, at the end of the day, it all boils down to two things: managing your own emotional energy and being self-aware about where your emotional energy is. So that's when I began developing this program called Navigating Challenging Dialogue, which isn't about how to create a conversation to get someone to do something. It's about how to create a conversation and hold space in a way that you're in partnership, you're building trust and connection, and all parties are focused on what's in the best interest of the good of the whole, not just what's in it for me if I get my own way. And so that's kind of how I got here. I developed a program about 12 years ago or so, when I was out in my garden cutting down a big huge vine, and I thought, oh my God, and I went into my computer and sat down for like three hours, and the whole thing came out. Oh my god, that's amazing. Yeah, that's incredible. And so this is what I've been doing and teaching. It's the premise of all my work, my coaching work, my strategic uh dialogue and planning work and the trainings that I do with folks.

SPEAKER_00 8:58

That's so cool. I there's so much that I want to touch on in that. There's um, you know, I think so much about how on both sides of the coin, right? We are not taught as we move into leadership positions. Typically, from my experience, it's just kind of like sink or swim. And being great at sales or being great at your job does not equal being a great leader, nor does it mean that you have the kind of awareness of what it takes to support people and develop people and you know, to your point, do things on behalf of the whole. And I find it so bizarre that we're still missing that so, so desperately in most kind of corporate settings. And if there is a training, it's like very um, I don't know, like here's your PowerPoint with some words on it. It doesn't really like help develop the human. And then I think on the other side of that too, as you were sharing, that part of what you became incredibly skilled at is helping folks develop that were great at what they were doing, but maybe didn't have the right communication skills or the awareness of how to show up in the workplace. It feels to me that these are things that not only should be taught in the workplace, but just in in general.

SPEAKER_01 10:14

In general. Yeah. We're real socialized to go into this place where we um protect our own needs, we're fearful of getting feedback, we get hung up and argumentative, we want to defend, we want to justify, and we're protecting, and some things are worth protecting and fighting for, and I get that, but we can do it in a way where we leave the room after a really tough conversation and we go get a beer or a cup of coffee or go for a walk. I mean, we're still connected and we still have respect, and hopefully, together we came up with a solution that is so better than what any of us could have thought of individually.

SPEAKER_00 11:01

Well, and I wonder if you also have seen that it then ultimately creates a foundation of strength, right? Because if you've walked through something that feels challenging and then you've come out, it's like any great relationship, right? If you're just staying surface level, you're never gonna really kind of get to the heart of the thing. And to do that even in a workplace, I would imagine, then allows for a different level of trust that's been built up as well.

SPEAKER_01 11:28

Yeah. And conflict, you know, conflict is a benign word by itself because you can have healthy conflict and unhealthy conflict. But the thing you have to have in conflict is that friction, because friction, when we come with opposing views or different views, and we're able to hang in there and have the conversation, that friction is what creates innovation, it's what makes us take next steps and all of that. So, so many organizations I work with now, particularly I work in corporate settings, government, and nonprofits. And particularly in nonprofit environments, there's this level of positive toxicity.

SPEAKER_00 12:11

Oh, yes, toxic positivity.

SPEAKER_01 12:13

Toxic positivity, yes, toxic positivity, thank you.

SPEAKER_00 12:16

Backwards.

SPEAKER_01 12:16

No, I got you. Either way it works. Um where people are afraid to give feedback, to state their truth, to have disagreements because we don't want to hurt anybody's feelings. But business isn't personal.

SPEAKER_00 12:34

Yes, I think yes, I've seen that also, and it does not create a culture where folks feel like they can show up and say the hard stuff. So, what is that really doing for anybody?

SPEAKER_01 12:45

It's keeping organizations and companies and teams really stuck. And it's causing people who want to be seen and heard, who want to grow, who want their unique strengths, talents to be able to use them effectively, it's causing them to go find different places to work.

SPEAKER_00 13:04

That makes a lot of sense. Um I'm curious too, your perspective, something I've been thinking about just through these series of conversations, this idea of vulnerability and authenticity, however, you want to define that word for yourself. Um, but what it means to kind of hold the tension of showing up vulnerably as a leader, but also recognizing that you're in a workplace. You were just touching on, you know, you were bringing so much of your personal life to the table while leading. And I'm I don't know that I have the answer for this for myself. And so I'm curious about it from your perspective, how do you find what it means to not have some kind of shield up that doesn't allow folks to recognize that you're a human and also recognize that there are some things that cannot bleed into how you're showing up as the leader?

SPEAKER_01 14:01

Right. Well, I think I don't know if this is going to answer your question, but I think in the absence of information, we all create stories and we put ourselves in the middle of the story. So if you're a leader who's having a really crappy day, or your kids got something going on and you need to keep your eye on the phone while you're running a meeting or whatever, or you're just under a lot of pressure from deadlines, or you just don't know what to do next, it's okay to decode what's happening for you for the people in the room. Not in a way that you're getting attention or trying to manipulate. See, manipulate is a big word for me because sometimes we share our vulnerability from a lens of trying to manipulate or elicit a certain response or behavior from others in the room, right? As opposed to saying, hey guys, you know what? I just want to let you know before we start, I've got a couple things on my mind weighing heavy that don't have anything to do with what's happening in the room, and I can handle them, but I might need to be checking my phone today. I might need support facilitating this meeting. I may be a little more on edge than usual. I might be a little distracted. And so you can decode what's happening for you, or I'm really excited about something that's gonna happen. It's not ready to share yet, but I'm I'm excited about it. And I'm gonna tell you as soon as I can, because sometimes we're waiting to find out if a house we're buying is closing or if a promotion we wanted for somebody else is going through. Who knows? Happy things attract us too at the same time, but simply decoding in a very fact-based, non-emotional way that says this is where I'm at today.

SPEAKER_00 15:56

Yeah, I love, yeah, I love that. As somebody who tends to lead with emotion, I always joke that like my emotions live just right under the surface, and it is not hard for those to be shown. And so that's a nice reminder that you can, it's not about not being honest about where you're at, but there are ways to share information that allows for that space. I have a dear friend, um, actually Michelle, who was on this show recently, and it's not exactly the same, but kind of in parallel where we will, and actually, Michelle taught me this, and I had not done this before in a close friendship, but they'll drop in with a voice note and say, Hey, are you in a space to hold something for me right now? Like, are you in a space to actually be able to hear something that might be hard? Or, you know, not to that I need a reaction or that I need a response, but I just want to make sure that you are also in a place to be hearing this. And I thought, wow, what a beautiful way of being cognizant and aware of those around you. And I think similarly, in a workplace, if we're managing something that feels very intense, other people also likely are as well. And so to dump into that space is maybe not the way. I love that.

SPEAKER_01 17:15

I love that. I'm gonna write that down for me. Because I love it.

SPEAKER_00 17:21

It's so beautiful, right? I mean, we're all learning from each other, and these things can't apply to both our personal and our professional lives. They are not necessarily mutually exclusive.

SPEAKER_01 17:30

Right, right. And I I don't know about now what the messages people get, but when I was working at that company, working for someone else, the message was always we have to separate home from work. And I'm like, that is not possible. No, we are the same human, we react to things in the same way. It's not possible. Now, I do get a lot of calls to help and coach and guide with someone who's oversharing, over-vulnerable, over-emotional, and particularly in nonprofits that are doing the kind of work that's trying to lift other people up and place a lot of value on hiring people with lived experience, which I also think is very important. But sometimes those people that you're hiring, whether they have lived experience or they don't, have not yet learned, because, like you said, we're not taught how to take a beat, assess where I am emotionally, and ground myself, do a little breathing, acknowledge where I am, and then go into whatever meeting, conversation, whatever, leaving that where it belongs outside the room.

SPEAKER_00 18:49

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 18:50

So we often drag all of this stuff to the table with us, and then it comes out sideways, and people are like, What just happened? Yeah, what's wrong with her? What just happened?

SPEAKER_00 19:03

Well, and it's a shame because people are then being assessed not for the great work they're doing, right? Like I'm sure many of these folks are incredible at what they do, and if that is outweighing the work, then then that's a real problem.

SPEAKER_01 19:20

Right. And managers um want to support people and help people, but they're not social workers or therapists, and so it gets tricky, particularly when you're a new manager and you don't know how to manage all of this. Yeah. You don't know how to how to deal with it, how to hold people accountable for being at work when they're at work, and also having all this life stuff.

SPEAKER_00 19:49

Yes, I think about that a lot with so many of the women that I support. There are so many things happening in the background, especially as you reach a certain age, whether you're caretaking for children or caretaking for aging parents or managing a community or and and and.

SPEAKER_01 21:13

Breathe in, breathe out, and they're practicing that in school. And you know, he goes to a it's a public school in New Hampshire, and they are teaching the kids these skills of how to connect with your breath. Because when your amygdala, right, which is where fight and flight gets born, gets triggered, and you start to go into either fight, get the heck out of there, or you know, real panic mode, what happens is your adrenaline and cortisol start shooting through your body. And the only way to offset that is to bring oxygen into your system. Yeah. And then ask yourself what are the facts of this situation right now, which is One of the things I teach people to do is to distinguish shifting, we call it sifting, sifting the facts from what are my fears, what are my assumptions, what are my unspoken expectations, what are my biases that I am bringing to this moment that don't belong here.

SPEAKER_00 22:20

Are you finding that you have to also help create language and tools for folks that might not have language for how they feel, or how to even identify kind of what those feelings are?

SPEAKER_01 22:34

Yes. So the process, the navigating challenging process teaches you a self-coaching process to go through all that and work all that out. So yes. Yeah, that makes sense. And then provides the language and the strategies and the ways to think about it. So you're literally changing your mindset about how you show up. And instead of feeling like my emotional energy is driving the show, you get to a place where you're like, okay, I'm managing my emotional energy in a way that's effective and um relevant for this situation so that I can build connections, build trust, and get to an outcome that's in the best interest of the good of the whole. Yeah. I love that. Because so many times when we're in that place, we damage trust. Yeah. We say things we don't, you know, we don't necessarily mean, or we use language that we're not happy about, or we show up in a way, and we actually put dings in those kinds of relationships that we've built trust in. And we we need, we need to be connected right now, and we especially need to be able to have difficult conversations with people who we don't agree with because the problems we're dealing with are so rapid, they're so complex that we have to be able to collaborate and communicate.

SPEAKER_00 24:03

Absolutely. Absolutely. I think about that so much with my both of my kids, but my daughter in particular, you know, she came out the womb just like spicy and awesome and strong, but can also run a little hot, like like her mama. And I have learned over the years how to like really try and hold that for myself, but also use it more as a tool versus the reactionary thing. And, you know, she's nine, so she's in the process of understanding that and how to find the words. But we talk about that all the time. Like your words matter. The words you choose matter. And I know that you're learning and you're testing things out at the same time. You get to have all the feelings, you get to have all your thoughts, but you don't get to be a jerk. Right. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 24:53

Yeah. And it's it's a tricky one and it's essential. And we need to develop these skills because division isn't getting us there. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 25:04

Yes, it was getting us so much further, I think, from where we want to be. But in your we're really going into left field here, but I am curious because you've spent so much time in this research and in these conversations. Like, do you think it's because it's sometimes actually more comfortable for people to sit in anger or dismay or frustration than it is to actually work through those to get to some kind of understanding? I wonder sometimes if we've gotten we're so far from each other as a society that it's almost easier for me to say to other you and say, Well, I'm against that and I know what I'm for, than it is to sit there and actually listen to your opinion and have to potentially even question my own thought process.

SPEAKER_01 25:58

Yes, yeah, 100%. So anger is not a pure emotion by itself, and you may have heard this before, but it's um two secondary emotions, fear and sadness, right? So fear of losing, fear of loss, fear of all the things we are concerned and fearful, so that manifests anger because anger is much easier to deal with than fear. And then sadness, grief, loss, disappointment, heartache, all of those are on the other leg of anger. And so, in all of this disengagement that we have, whether it's in a work environment, a team environment, I mean, there's people walking around companies holding grudges for, you know, years on end over something that was done in a meeting. But if you can stop in those moments when you're feeling that level of anger and ask yourself, what am I fearful of? What am I fearful of losing? And in society, most of the time now as we're arguing over politics and all of this stuff, it's fear of losing our values.

SPEAKER_00 27:12

What I value saying yeah, identity or something. Yes.

SPEAKER_01 27:15

Yeah, yes. So my brother, who I love Madly, who's older than I and has been on the opposite political party of me his whole life, we kind of had a tough time during the first election of the current president that we have. And I was like, Beth, just because these are the things I value. He's the only person still living that has known me since the day I was born. Nobody else does. We share so many experiences and traditions, and we've gone through so many things together. I don't want to lose that connection, right? And so I decided to show up with him, not trying to defend my perspective, but curious about his. Because I know in life he and I want the same things. We want our children, our grandchildren, the future generations to be well and healthy. We want our country to be safe for people, we want to make a living. You know, he was a business person his whole life. We want the same things at the end of the day. So instead, if I ask him curious questions and say, Oh, I hear you, right? Validate first. Oh, I hear that's your perspective. Help me understand how you got there. What informed this point of view? How did you make this decision? Right? Not in an accusatory way, but genuinely curious. Yes, yeah. And so we began talking and we realized, yeah, we aren't misaligned from a values perspective. We both at that time just believed there was a different way to get there.

SPEAKER_00 29:05

Oh, interesting. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 29:06

Now in the second election, he let me know when I visited that he was switching parties.

SPEAKER_00 29:15

Oh my gosh.

SPEAKER_01 29:16

We we didn't have to have a fight or an argument or you know, me not talk to him or keep yelling at him why I thought he should.

SPEAKER_00 29:24

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 29:25

We just had to have a reason to have dialogue, and he could ask me questions, I could ask him questions. Now, a lot of other things happened in that time frame that went against his values that caused him to switch. But imagine if I had destroyed that relationship. Yeah, and now I had to rebuild it around that. That's manipulative conversation. I wanted him to be different.

SPEAKER_00 29:51

Yeah, and we don't get to choose that for people, right? Even the ones we love the most. So yeah.

SPEAKER_01 29:57

The only person you can manage is yourself. So the navigating challenging dialogue program has nine, I think it's nine mantras. Okay. And one of them is the only person I can manage is myself. Uh, be responsible for the energy you bring to the room, and curiosity leads to empathy, and get empathy is the gateway to trust. Those are the three key ones right now that are coming up for me as we're talking. Because this process of showing up like this and being like this is a practice for me constantly because having myself get triggered or feeling left, things that trigger me, feeling left out, okay, feeling not seen and heard, um, feeling like I'm not getting my fair share of whatever that is, right? Those are things that trigger me. So if I don't check in to see what my energy is, I'll be the first one to type off a nasty email or send a nasty text or whatever.

SPEAKER_00 31:06

But see, this is why you're so incredible at what you do, because you are so in tune with your own way of being. But at present.

SPEAKER_01 31:14

Always.

SPEAKER_00 31:14

Yes.

SPEAKER_01 31:15

Well, nobody isn't faster up until I was about 44 years old. Okay, well, I want to hear more about that.

SPEAKER_00 31:24

I think it's, I mean, but truly though, I think the strongest advisors and teachers are the ones that have lived through something and can now speak into something. It's the same as you were talking about with lived experience. It is much different for somebody that has lived through a similar experience in order to speak into that than it is somebody who never has. And so that's part of, I'm sure, what makes you so brilliant at what you do. One of the best things when I was taking on more and more leadership responsibilities was I had somebody on my team that was just really challenging. It was one of the more challenging managerial positions I'd had. And I didn't really know how to navigate it. I was like, I don't know how to show up for this person in the right way. I'm feeling triggered and I'm not totally sure why. And the owner of the company at the time had shared number one, do you want to be right or do you want what you want? You can't have both. And always just ask the question of tell me more about that. If there's something that they're saying that you're like, what on earth? Or what is going on? Or because half the time people really are just talking to talk. It's just like words, words, words, yes. And so to get somebody to have to take a beat and actually think about what they're sharing back with you kind of shifts something. And that is tell me more is like it plastered everywhere for me. Yes, yes. Or what do you mean by that? Help me understand.

SPEAKER_01 32:53

Well, and what I have found, the reason why I'm so committed to this work, and the reason why I'm so confident in doing it is A, because my lived experience, but also because I reduced the drama in my life by probably about 85% when I started practicing this. Okay. Because I thought I knew what was right for everybody else. I thought I knew what they should do. I thought I knew how to solve all the problems and everything. And I know I gave you a copy of my book. When you read that, you'll kind of read the beginning of my journey of kind of how worked up I was because I always wanted to be included. I wanted to be on every team. I wanted to be involved in every problem and everything. And same with my kids, my family, everybody, my friends. I had so many opinions about what people should do. And then one day I realized, you know what? When I see drama happening, I can just observe it like I'm at a movie or a play. I'm not gonna jump up in the audience and go, hey, let me get in there and tell you what you need to do next, right? I can just watch it if it's not my business. If it's not my place to get involved, I can just watch it. And that dramatically changed things because I was too connected to having people see that my way was the right way. And it isn't, it isn't the right way, and everybody has to learn at their own pace. This is their journey. Sure, it's not my journey. Sure. So when I try and get involved in every little thing in everybody's path, I'm taking away their opportunity for growth. I mean, I'm not gonna let someone get hit by a car crossing the street.

SPEAKER_00 34:56

We did talk about my my trigger is the people in Sacramento that don't stop at the stop sign. So it's that's real. I love where you're going with this because I think um I'm curious. I have been on my own self-reflection journey over the last, you know, two, two and a half years. And it's amazing what you can uncover as you get to know yourself again. And it can also be deeply uncomfortable at times as you ask yourself some critical questions and you start to unpack some stuff that might not be so flattering. Some of it, great, right? I share this with anybody I work with. I'm not saying throw the baby out with bathwater. This is not about like, oh, who I was is just a bunch of crap and like goodbye. It's right, how do I learn to release the things that are no longer serving me and double down on the things that are? But part of it is you have to do that sifting you were just talking about. Like, what are the things that are there that maybe aren't working in the way I wanted them to or thought they were? What was that process like for you as you started to unpack some of that? Did it happen over a course of time? Were you intentionally starting to unearth some of that, or was it just that it kind of revealed itself to you and you had to think about what that meant?

SPEAKER_01 36:12

Well, the big moment for me when it really hit me was my youngest daughter was getting married and she was having a big, she's a princess, right? And so she was having a big princess wedding. I mean, she's wanted that forever. My other daughter, no, but this daughter, yes. So there was me, there was my former partner, because I'm gay, so I had a female partner that I've been in a long-term relationship with, and then her stepmom and her mother-in-law. So there were four people who had some valid reason for feeling like they had, and it's so silly when I say it out loud, and I know it's silly, but they had a right to a part of Mother of the Bride. And I am not a traditional person by any imagination, but I was so stressed out about that because my fear of someone taking something from me or me missing out in some way. And so I was on a walk and I was on like an hour phone call with my daughter, and we were trying to work through who was gonna go in what limo or whatever. And I finally had this moment, I was like, this is just fear driving you. Why are you trying to control all of the stuff that in the scheme of things doesn't matter? Like, what is the big picture thing that I want from my daughter and for me on that day, which is to just be it full of love and pride and joy. Yeah, but I could feel myself really getting triggered, and so that's when I really started. I came up with the mantras, practiced them. One of them is grace is in the space. And that doesn't mean I'm giving you grace, that means I'm taking a beat to give myself some grace and say, Yes, Beth, you are getting triggered right now, and your emotions are out of control and your behavior is not good. So to shift and do my breathing, and then the other one is that's fascinating. And people are like, that sounds kind of glib or whatever. But that's fascinating is designed not necessarily for me to say it to you, but for me to say when you say something I don't agree with or I feel myself getting tense about, in my mind I go, Oh, that's fascinating. To remind me, be fascinated, be curious, don't go into defensive mode. I love that. So it's practice, and you know what, Kristen? I still rely on those every day, all the time.

SPEAKER_00 39:01

I love that. Yes, because it's constant to your point. It's not, I I do think there's a bit of a maybe misconception that this kind of work, it's like, oh, you do the things, and then you all of a sudden wind up on this other side and you're this whole new human. No, you're still you. Oh me. You just have different tools and an awareness of how to navigate things that are feel tricky and how to give yes, grace to ourselves too, right? We aren't perfect and we do have these human emotions, and all of these things are fine and and good, but it is a matter of making sure that we know what those things are and how we then navigate through those moments. I have been saying this for a while now. It's a bummer to me that it took me this long, or it took me having a major life event, which was, you know, the business I was working for collapsing, to force me into some of these questions. And I would hope for women that are navigating leadership journeys that there might be an opportunity earlier on to just take intentional moments to start asking these questions, not waiting for the moment that your daughter's getting married or the moment your you know business class is like whatever.

SPEAKER_01 40:16

Well, and we we forget that, you know, we study adolescent growth and development and child growth and development, and we forget that adults are continuing on a growth and development path as well. And so around 40-ish, 40 to mid to late 40s, is really when we begin to question who am I? What are my values? Is my life that I've led thus far aligning with who I want to be and how I want to show up? And so if you're a person who has done some self-reflection, done some work, you're relatively grounded, you go through this process, like you said, for two or three years, I'm on this kind of self-discovery process, self-reflection process. And that's very appropriate. And who knows what that might end up turning up for you, right? That you might decide how you want the rest of your life to look. Nobody knows right now. But for people that refuse to be self-aware, refuse to be reflective, and all of that, that's when we see what we call midlife crisis, right? They throw everything out the window, they buy the shiny sports car, they, you know, throw their whole life away, and a lot of people get damaged in the process, and it's very confusing for people. It's normal to have really deep questions at this time in your life about ourselves, but so many people turn them into questions about other people versus about me.

SPEAKER_00 41:57

Oh, interesting. Wait, say more about that. This is not a tell me more moment. I really want to hear more about that.

SPEAKER_01 42:06

I mean, the classic example, right? Somebody all of a sudden decides, and it's stereotypically like a guy decides that he wants the younger woman, he wants a sports car, he raised his family, he didn't get to do enough things. And so he throws that all away, right? Or creates major chaos and drama for everybody, or anybody, could be a woman decides to have an affair, whatever. People decide to quit their career and open a cupcake shop, whatever the case is. But what I'm saying is the shift at this time does not have to be a wholesale change. Yeah, maybe you married the wrong person. I don't know about you. I never met your spouse, so this is not marital advice on any level. He's a good one.

SPEAKER_00 42:53

I got lucky.

SPEAKER_01 42:54

I got not saying get divorced, Chris. But maybe you did outgrow the person you were married to. But you can't have the hard conversation, you can't keep the connection, keep the parts that were valuable intact if you blow everything up.

SPEAKER_00 43:10

Absolutely. I'm so in that instance, when you're saying what really struck me was when you said when people can't ask the questions about themselves, they turn it into questions about those around them. And so are you saying they're now questioning, like, oh, I never maybe wanted that spouse in the first place, or I never wanted this life. Did I did we want, did I want, or maybe that's still a reflective question. So how what do you mean when you say the questions become about other people instead of about ourselves?

SPEAKER_01 43:41

I mean, we've all known somebody who's gone through a nasty divorce or whatever, or a breakup, and all the reasons why they're breaking up that they give you don't have anything to do with themselves. He or she is too controlling, he or she You know, doesn't carry their weight, he or she, whatever. But my question is, I hear that, and what are the conversations you've had about that? How have you been clear in your communication? Or have you just let it simmer and boil? And now the alternative is just to walk away. And believe me, if it's a dangerous relationship, there's violence of drama, yes. That is, I'm not talking about that. Yeah. But we have to be able to ask for feedback, right? Ask people, you know, be curious. I notice you're behaving differently. I notice you're not contributing. All of these things. Can you say more about that? Can you help me see what's going on from your perspective? What are the things that I'm doing that are getting in your way? You can't resent if somebody's not participating, if you become so micromanaging and directive, and this is there's only one one right way to do it. And I see you tried to help with this and you screwed it up. And why can't you do it the right way? Yeah. People are gonna shut down.

SPEAKER_00 45:08

Yeah. Nice. Well, and once you start building up those layers, it feels like it's so hard to find a way back to that core. It's like every layer gets more and more crystallized, it seems, from what I've seen. You can't even penetrate at that point.

SPEAKER_01 45:25

A wall has been put up that's so difficult to even consider trying to climb that it's and it the goal is maybe not to go back, but to create something new.

SPEAKER_00 45:37

Yes.

SPEAKER_01 45:38

That maintains connection, helps us continue to build trust, and is in the best interest of the good of the whole. Right. Particularly when kids and family and all of that are involved. So I'm not a marriage counselor, I'm not a therapist on any stretch, but I just know from my own life experience that, you know, we can get through hard, difficult conflicts and things if we have some self-awareness, ability to manage our own emotional triggers, and some ability to pause and be curious versus being the expert and always communicating from that expert spot.

SPEAKER_00 46:21

Yeah. This sounds like great advice when I was thinking about another question I wanted to ask you, something I've been asking many women recently, based on a conversation I had with a Jen Zier, who's wonderful and amazing and she's fabulous, and asking all these incredible questions. And part of what she was talking about is navigating this interesting moment post-college, pre-career, you know, the world is their oyster, and yet everything feels like it's impossible to get to because there's so many steps to get there. And so if you were thinking back to that time in your life, is there anything that you would share with either, you know, that version of yourself or with her, in addition to what you're already sharing, such incredible wisdom around how to show up as a human, but also in thinking about how you navigate choices around career or the path you might want to choose, would you have?

SPEAKER_01 47:15

I would um I'm gonna go back to something that my boss said to me one time. It was just him and I in the lunchroom. And I was always volunteering for a team, volunteering for this, wanting to be involved in that because of my fear of missing out. And he said to me, Bath, you know what? We see you, we see your strengths, we see your talents, we believe in you a hundred percent, but you have to wait for the right pitch. Because right now you're swinging at every ball that comes your way, and it lowers your batting average. Oh, wow. He's like, So sit back a little, pause, and do a little more assessment and discernment about is this really the right ball for me to swing at?

SPEAKER_00 48:11

Wow, that's such a visual, too. Like, how great is it?

SPEAKER_01 48:14

It is, and I'm not a big sports person, so luckily I got it. But um sports analogies drive me nuts. I'm like, not everybody plays sports people, but um, but that sat with me for so long, and it still sits with me to this day, and I still, you know, you want to be on this committee, you want to volunteer for this board position, you want to get involved with this group. Yeah, I do, because it's super exciting to me, and I love the idea of it, and I don't want to miss the vote, but I'm gonna do an assessment of what I got going on, what my strengths are, what my true interests are, and wait for the next ball. I'm gonna pass on. Yeah, that is a lesson. It took me so long to get that. So long. It's so hard. And I know I still sometimes show up in that way. On our committee for the think tanks that we do, Scott's like, no, no, volunteer for everything.

SPEAKER_00 49:16

But it is, it's so hard when there is so much great opportunity, and it's like, well, yeah, I want to do all the stuff. Like, that sounds great. Right. Yeah, it is a real, this is the next evolution of the it's like there the first phase is a lot around saying I think yes to the things and trying to sort it out and wanting to experience it all. But it is so much harder to learn how to have a kind of critical eye to the things that are coming your way. But the reality is it ends up making those things all the more special because you know that you really gave it some thought and you didn't just say yes because you know you could, you could, right? It's like I know that this means something to me for whatever reason. I've also noticed for me, because I have honed that quite a bit more over the last year or so. Now, too, I find myself showing up for those things very differently because I know they mean something to me. And I can tell you, I'm not even sure that I would be able to put words to why it mattered to me when I said yes, but there was something in my gut that was like, yes, this feels right to me, whether it was because of the person or because of the community or whatever it is. And so that intuition, I think, is also part of that is tapping into like how do you feel when you're around the person that's pitching you. Yeah.

unknown 50:33

Yes.

SPEAKER_01 50:34

And that's the that's another thing. I mean, there's so many things I would say to my younger self, but the other one is probably listen to your gut more. Yeah, take your emotions and your fears and your triggers and everything out of it, and get really comfortable because my gut instinct, the connection, the drawer I feel to things has never hasn't let me down. When I've let myself down is when I have thoughts and questions and I don't listen to them. I try and I'm like, don't be silly, Beth.

SPEAKER_00 51:07

Yeah, yeah, I know. That that one is so, so hard. I think that is the like life pursuit. It's like, how do you continue to hone that in, right?

SPEAKER_01 51:16

The good news I can tell you in the adult growth and development thing is by the time you get to your late 50s and your 60s, you're more clear on what serves you and what doesn't serve you, and you are it's much easier to compartmentalize and set boundaries.

SPEAKER_00 51:33

I am so ready for that.

SPEAKER_01 51:35

Yeah, you've already gone through so much of giving up so much of yourself that you're like, Yep, sounds good, not doing it.

SPEAKER_00 51:44

Well, and I think there's it's so funny. I've definitely shared this story before, but I remember when I turned to 40 and people were asking, like, well, how do you feel? Do you feel okay? It's like, especially as women, it's such a like, well, that sucks. You must be, you know, facing death. Like, I just remember literally saying to the at some point I was just talking about being triggered. I was like, I feel fucking awesome. Like, I feel the best I've ever felt. I feel like I'm getting some version of control of myself and my what I want and what I care about. And I've got these things that are clear priorities, and I I just don't have as many shits to give. I obviously that's never perfect, but it's definitely better than five years ago, 10 years ago. So if the promise is that that just gets even better, I'm like, I'm ready for it.

SPEAKER_01 52:35

Yes, and it's okay. You know, someone said to me when I was really young, Beth, just because you can do something doesn't mean you have to. And I'm like, Oh, yeah, that was around volunteerism.

SPEAKER_00 52:47

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 52:48

And I was like, Oh, okay, thank you.

SPEAKER_00 52:51

Yeah, thank you for that. Sometimes we just need permission, you know.

SPEAKER_01 52:54

Yeah, I don't want to be burnt out and resentful. I don't want to be exhausted. Yes. I want to be focused and do the best I can where I can.

SPEAKER_00 53:03

Yes, a hundred percent.

SPEAKER_01 53:04

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 53:05

Okay, last question for you that I get to ask everyone, just in recognizing that the word legacy can mean something very different to everyone. But just as I've been contemplating my own kind of evolution and the way I like to support women, so much of it is about building and bridging your leadership and personal development with whatever kind of strategy you're thinking about for the career or business that you want to build. And all of that in my mind is in service of the legacy that you ultimately are building towards. So, Beth, I'm curious for you, what does building a legacy mean to you?

SPEAKER_01 53:43

Building a legacy to me means that I can know that I contributed good into the world, and that I hopefully have created some kind of a shift that's going to make for my grandchildren, particularly my granddaughters, um, the world more palatable, more aligned, more loving, more caring, and where people can really come together and have hard conversations that move us forward. I don't think it's a difficult shift. What frustrates me in terms of this is just, you know, I'm one person and getting my message out there because once people hear me talk, or they work with me, or they're in an environment with me, they literally tell me, someone said to me, Beth, once you see it, you can't unsee it and you can't do it differently again. You just can't see it. And I don't know why I got to know this and understand this and why this dropped into me. But um, yeah, I will feel really good and I will feel like my legacy is complete if I have impacted across generations, right? Change the trajectory for the next generation by working with folks now.

SPEAKER_00 55:07

Yes, I love that. And I think there's so much greatness that you have already poured into the world, and I know we'll link out to your resources. You have, did you say multiple books?

SPEAKER_01 55:18

I've written three and I've co-written one, and I have another one coming out sometime towards the end of this year.

SPEAKER_00 55:25

Amazing. So we will link to all of that, um, and of course to your website and to you because getting to know your work, I think, for folks that are interested in this, it is really, really meaningful for people that actually care about leading in this way. So I just think your work is so needed, it's so important, it's so incredible to hear everything that you're doing. So thank you for sharing it with all of us.

SPEAKER_01 55:50

You for the opportunity and for your friendship, which I love. So thank you.

SPEAKER_00 55:56

More of that, for sure. More of that, yeah. All right, friends. So good to see you. You too. Thank you, Kristen. Thank you so much for listening and spending some of your time with me here. I hope our conversation sparked some new ideas for you. If you enjoyed the episode, please make sure to hit subscribe so you don't miss what's next. And if you're ready for even more tools and stories, head on over to beldenstrategies.com slash newsletter. I share fresh insights, stories, and tools for women leaders every week. Until next time, keep building, keep evolving, and remember that you are kind of a big deal.