What Happens When You Stop Surviving Your Story and Start Telling It with Alexis Carpenter

Some stories shape your life long before you're ready to tell them.

In this episode, I'm joined by author, speaker, and mentor Alexis Carpenter for a deeply honest conversation about identity, trauma, loss, and what happens when a woman stops performing her life and starts telling the truth about it. Alexis shares her journey through addiction, foster care, devastating personal loss, and the collapse of multiple identities that once held her together.

We explore what it really means to move from survival into self leadership, and how telling the truth about your story becomes a powerful catalyst for healing, purpose, and reconnection to self. This conversation is raw, human, and deeply validating for anyone who has ever felt like they've been rebuilding their life from the ground up.

In this episode, you’ll hear:

• What it means to stop surviving your story and start telling the truth about it
• How loss can completely reshape identity, purpose, and self perception
• Why high-capacity women often build lives from survival mode without realizing it
• The difference between performing a life and actually living it
• How vulnerability and truth become a pathway back to self connection

Connect with Alexis:

• Dive into the first 18 pages of Changing The Reflection when you join Real Talk Sis Waitlist
• Substack: The Truth Telling Experience
• Website: raisinghopellc.org
• Instagram: @alexismcarpenter | Facebook: Alexis.Carpenter

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Join the conversation on Instagram: @_brendajohnston

Substack, The Limitless Life Uncensored, for deeper conversations beyond the podcast.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:54

Welcome back to the Limitless Life podcast. I have a guest with me today again, and my guest today is Alexis Carpenter. She is an author, a speaker, a mentor, and the founder of two organizations, Raising Hope and Real Toxis. And she's also been featured on the Oprah Winfrey podcast. Her work is focused on helping at-risk youth and high-capacity women reconnect with their truth, rebuild their identity, and create lives rooted in purpose, healing, and real connection. Everything she does is grounded in her own story of loss, resilience, leadership, and transformation. And the thing I want to talk to her most about today has nothing to do with strategy and has everything to do with what happens when a woman stops surviving her story and she starts telling it. Alexis, welcome to the Luminous Life Show.

SPEAKER_01 1:45

Hi, Brenda. Thank you. I'm so, so excited for this conversation.

SPEAKER_00 1:49

I have been looking forward to this conversation ever since you came into my world and I started exploring what you do. And I was just like, okay, this conversation is seriously needed and it's going to be very epic. And I think a lot of people need to hear it. But before we get into like the work you do, I want to go to the human underneath it, because that's where this conversation has to start. When you look back at who you were before you were doing this work, before Raising Hope, before Real Toxis, before the book, what was the story that you were living inside?

SPEAKER_01 2:30

Honestly, I was hiding. I was pretending to be anybody but who I truly was. So my background, I was born into addiction, literally, and I was in foster care. I struggled with my own addiction. I lost one of my brothers that way. And then I was in corporate and somebody, they saw something in me, which is crazy, right? Like my whole life, I just thought I would be like the bottom of the bottom because that's what I had always heard. But this one person was like, hey, I think you'd make a great admin. And I'm like, wow. So that for me just kind of like sparked something like, okay, maybe there's something more to that. So then I just became an achiever. I became that high capacity person, the one who was like, let me hold everything, but never ask for anything. Let me put on all the personas and pretend like the old version of me, the addiction, none of that ever existed. And so I literally just started creating this made-up life. And the only time I was actually a Lexis was when I was home with my family. And so it's really insane to think about that. But the moment that literally brought me to my knees was a couple of years ago. I lost my stepson. So he was 20 years old. Shortly after that, my counselor retired. Then I lost my job. Then my older brother passed away. Three days later, my aunt passed away. The following year, my younger brother passed away, and then another aunt passed away, and I lost the second job that I had. So, like all of these careers, all of these things that my identity was wrapped into, all of these people I loved so much were literally just ripped away. And it kind of clicked in a moment of wow, nobody's ever actually gonna know me. And what happens when I die? Will people ever say my name again? Because they never actually will have known me. It was really like my stepson that I was like, gosh, he was 20. And people are never gonna get to know a story unless we talk about it. And that's really where the book came. And I kept getting this download of it all starts with the book. And I thought it was like, it starts with the book, you'll be speaking on stage, you'll be doing all these epic things. But really, it was in the pulling out all of my deepest, darkest secrets and exposing them. And so it was like this ripple effect of like, holy shit, I told all of this story of every secret I was so ashamed of. And the thing that I got out of that was so much freedom. And I wish more people talked about that and just kind of shared their truth in the pain and the brokenness. One other thing I'll say is just can Sigu, oh my gosh, I don't know how to say the word, but it's basically in Japan, if they break pottery, they fill it with gold, platinum, or silver, and it exposes all of the flaws and creates beauty. And I realized that that was literally my life. I tried to keep this beautiful bowl, this vase perfectly together and create this image of beautiful art, what I thought that was. And it wasn't until I actually exposed all the cracks that people got to see me. And I had so much acceleration of connection, and people are like, I want to know more of you. Then I got to reflect that back to other people. And I thought that for me, that was so cool to see like, wow, the ugly parts that I thought were so ugly. People were like, I have those ugly parts too, or I have something similar and it created something really beautiful.

SPEAKER_00 5:41

A lot of women, especially high capacity women, we all have the bits that nobody wants to talk about, right? Loss shows up in your story in such a significant way. And without me leading you somewhere, what do you want people to understand about what loss actually does to a woman's sense of who she is?

SPEAKER_01 6:04

In the moment that it happened, first off, I literally felt like I was gonna die. And it was an actual death. It was a death of a fake identity, and it was like this exposure. But we come to this place of like, okay, you're on the ground and you literally have to rebuild. And I think we have two decisions. We can face the person in the mirror that maybe we've been avoiding forever, at least for the 38 years of my life. That was my story. And we can look at the person and say, I accept you all of it, the good, the bad, the ugly. Or I can be like, let me go create another persona, right? Like, let me go put another mask on. And I didn't want to do that. I feel like when you lose to that depth, it's almost like you can't go back and you're done dealing with bullshit. You're done dealing with people saying you can or can't do something, or you're like, let me give all of my energy, let me expand everything that I am. If you need this, yeah, let me drop what I'm doing for myself. And it's like, no, I don't have time for that. I now know that tomorrow is not promised. An hour from now is not promised. I never know when my phone is gonna ring. I never know when somebody's gonna call my husband and say, oh my gosh, something happened. With that, it shifted my perspective, not just loss in a person, but loss in a job. My income was our primary income. Our whole livelihood was at jeopardy. Never will I put myself in that position. Never will I allow myself to be vulnerable in a way of that type of weakness. And instead, like, how can I grow in a way that says, my husband can contribute, I can contribute, and it doesn't have to fall on me. I don't have to be the person to hold everything. And maybe I can find spaces for women to hold me or to give my husband space to hold me instead of having this fear of if I rely on people, I could lose it. Instead of being afraid of losing something, what about if we just loved it deeply? So when we did lose it, we can say, yeah, it sucks. And I also have a space of I loved so hard in those moments that I have so many moments and so many memories to cherish that I can move forward and I can be thankful and have gratitude and just move to this next level.

SPEAKER_00 8:15

So good. Your whole story leads your journey. Your work didn't come from expertise, so to speak. It came from necessity. I feel like that piece alone changes everything about the way you teach and what you do. I was just gonna say, like, this is the heart of what you do, but like everything has your heart in it, not just that it's the heart of what you do.

SPEAKER_01 8:43

It's so true. I think a survival, right? And I think for a lot of us, we've been living survival for so long that it doesn't seem unnormal, right? Like thinking of not being in that state seems like, no, that's not normal. And so it's like really trying to shift that. Like, how can I look at myself and be like, okay, this is survival? We don't need to do this anymore. We're actually safe. To be able to say that and to actually feel that in your body, I think is very different than just somebody being like, oh, you're living in survival. But most women, well, for myself and women that I've worked with, even kids, they don't know. They're like, what do you mean? That's not normal. Like, this is how I've lived my entire life.

SPEAKER_00 9:23

Yeah. Let's get into what you do. Let's talk about what you call the truth-telling experience. Because when you say truth-telling, you're not just talking about being honest with people.

SPEAKER_01 9:36

The truth-telling experience is literally everything. So it is being honest, but it's also like owning who you are, all of your quirks, all of the things that you're like, this makes me the weird kid, or this makes me the woman who wouldn't get the promotion. I take people through six stages. And this is honestly a cycle of life. It's not even like, here's my framework. Like, no, this is the cycle that we continuously go through. So we have avoidance. There's always something that we're pushing down, whether it's this thing happened, I did this, or I'm ashamed of this. This is my background. I don't want people to know. So we face that. What is the thing you're avoiding? You have to name it. And then we become aware. And most people live in that awareness, which can then heighten all kinds of other things. She's like highly aware of all of this stuff. But then it's like, what do you do with the awareness? And not only just the awareness of like your patterns and things that you consider bad, but like, what about the good things? Like, what do you actually desire in your life? Then there's the denial. A lot of people are like, yeah, I would love that, but that could never be for me. And it's like, well, why not? Right. So, like, let's break that down. Why couldn't that be for you? Yes, your circumstance right now gives you evidence that doesn't look like it could be, but let's kind of like bring up some ideas of how that could be. If there were no obstacles, your circumstance wasn't a thing, money wasn't a thing, your environment, all of that wasn't a thing. Like, what would you actually dream about? And then acceptance. You can accept the things that have happened to you. You can accept your circumstance. It doesn't mean that you have to be like, oh yeah, this happened and I'm totally okay with it. No, it's just saying I accept like that's a part of my story. That's a part of what made me who I am, you know? And people think I'm crazy, but I always say, yeah, I've had a really freaking hard life. And I'm so grateful every day because there's not a day that I don't go through without gratitude, that I don't find something to laugh about, that I don't find something to smile about. And I think it's easy to get caught up in the things that are like life is shit, but really, what can you find that's beautiful? So acceptance, like we accept the things that we've gone through and say, okay, and there's two paths. I can stay in the lane that I was in, or I can go down this other road. And then stagnation. We sometimes know what we need to do, but we're scared to do it. Or I'm just kind of like stuck and I have no idea. And this is a lot of times where people come in and they help direct us, okay, like kind of ideate with you. And then the last part would be activation. How are we going to activate those goals? How can we create a roadmap? How can we give ideas and then actually practice them? Right. Like that's the key is like the practice piece. And so that's what I bring them through for a lot of these, especially like I'm just gonna talk about like teens for a second. For them, it's like they've never had a space and nobody's ever actually asked them, you know, what is something that you're struggling with? Like, what's something that you're scared to tell people? And so a couple of keynotes that I've done, I've asked, who lives in a house? You know, and I'm like, I want you to stand up. And you know, you'll see half the room stand up. And I'm like, who lives in an apartment and half the room will stand up. And then I'll be like, who lives in a one-parent home? And then a bunch of people will stand up. So it like brings them through all of the things that were like, oh, this is a stigma. You thought you were alone in a room of a thousand, but now look, you're not alone. You are one of 500. It really gives them a different perspective on that type of thing. So when I'm talking about like the truth-telling experience, it's literally the full experience of who am I to my core and how can I allow myself to be seen? How can I allow my identity to be what it is, not based on circumstance, but based on who I truly am. I'm a kind person. I love really hard. Maybe sometimes my flaw is I give too much, but it's because I care deeply about people. You know, and it's like really bringing those things out and highlighting like how can we show people who we are and be truthful about it. Even when we're scared we might get rejected, right? Like that's what courage is. That's really the work, and it's the same work for both youth and women, just obviously different types of scenarios that I would walk them through in in that work.

SPEAKER_00 13:36

It's so incredibly powerful, especially for like the youth. I cannot even imagine growing up as a young person in this day and age. There's just so much. What do you feel like? Like, is there something that most women or even younger people what do you feel like they're most afraid of is gonna happen if they tell the truth?

SPEAKER_01 13:59

The two things I hear most is I'm gonna be rejected, or I'm not gonna be seen as for women, it's usually people will think less of me, or I've fought so hard to get here. What are people gonna think? They're gonna believe that I'm weak. And then for kids, it's usually like my friends will disown me, or I'll be called a bad kid. Thinking about like foster youth, right? That's a whole nother scenario of being in the system and being placed in different places all the time. You go somewhere and you never know what your environment is. Sometimes you're separated from siblings and you're with whole new families. And sometimes you have 20 kids that are completely different, you know, from all different families. And so it's never really knowing and believing that they can be safe or that they're lovable, right? Like it's that abandonment wound. It's the loss of stability, the loss of what they know and what they love. And it's like, I'm unlovable. So they believe that they are the actual problem versus the environment's the problem or the behaviors, the problem. And usually the behavior stems from something rooted of like, I just want to be seen and nobody sees me, and you already believe this about me. So why would I change? And so they still believe that. Like, if I tell my truth, really what's gonna be different? And what changes is the perception is you take away somebody else's narrative. They can't write your story if you tell them what it is. I always tell them like people are gonna know one of two stories, the one that they create for you or the one that's truth. And that's the one that you tell them. It's like rejection. I feel like it doesn't matter who you are. I mean, men face this too, right? Like it's all about wanting to feel like you belong somewhere and actually have a true connection. But most people are like, okay, this seems like what they want. So let me mold into that. So it's a lot of shape shifting, right? So I help them break out of that and just show people who they truly are. And I always say if somebody does reject you, just remember like that's not the person you want to be around. And they've got to deal with their own stuff. So find the people that accept you for who you truly are. And then you'll have one, a more effortless relationship, better connection. And two, then you can really just be you. How amazing is it to show up in a room and just be like, I'm gonna shine. I'm gonna allow that to be the thing that people get to see my true personality. And I would rather be me than be judged and unliked than for somebody that I'm actually not.

SPEAKER_00 16:19

I love this. It's so interesting because when I first started to learn about you, I was like, okay, so she works with at-risk youth and high capacity women. That is two totally different populations. But then listening to you speak, I'm like, yeah, it makes sense because the core wound is the same. It's just presented in a different way. And the whole showing up and being you, I mean, I wasn't able to do that until I was in my late 40s. And now that I'm 51, I just don't care. I am just me. But it's a process. So when you take somebody through the work that you do, what does somebody usually look like on the other side of that work with you?

SPEAKER_01 17:00

Usually they become the leader in the room, which that for me is my favorite part. I love the transformation of they go from a place of I could never be to, oh my gosh, I'm living it. And I get to take other people with me. So for the youth, I created Project Rebuild. So this is essentially like a certification program because I want community builders. I don't want it to just stop at the person that I'm helping. I'm only one person. I can only do so much work. So I'm like, if I can certify people, I can bring them through the process, like let you identify who you truly are at the core, give you leadership fundamentals, and then teach you how to go out into your own community. When we think about the, again, I'll just reference at-risk use specifically for this, but a lot of times they don't have those safe spaces. And then their whole community is usually hurting, right? Like when you think of poverty-driven places or different ethnicities that maybe don't have the same resources, but it's really giving them the tools to bring it back into their own backyard. So the way that I thought of it, I was like, okay, as many people as I can bring in here, if I can get even, say there's a hundred and I could get 20 to be certified in this and then take that work out into their communities. Imagine the ripple effect, right? Before you know it, we have 200,000. We have a million, you know, and like that's my goal, 10 years is to actually reach a million kids, whether that's through speaking, through the programs, through certification. But it's not just a me mission. It's a, I'm going to get in front of some of these people. I'm going to expose them to the process. And then they get to expose other people to the same work that they got. It's really like them going into their community saying, I once felt like I could never do anything. And now they're healing their own communities, which I think is such a beautiful thing. And then women, it's the same thing, you know, like you think about corporations, you think about business. It's like, how can I help you get rooted back into who you are and rip off all of the masks because there's layers upon layers upon layers when you can like get bare and sit with yourself and be like, who do I want to be? When you were a little girl, what's that person you aspired to be? You know, like, yes, you're a leader now, but like, how are you leading? Do you have a dependent team where you're on vacation and they're calling you constantly because they can't function without you? Or do you have an autonomous team that thrives when you're there and when you're not there? That's what we want to build. We want to build other leaders. So when I think about the work that I do, I really do think about it as leadership community building. And it's so unique. And I don't hear people talk about that much, but I'm like, I never want to be the one-stop shop. I want to be able to help somebody find themselves and then go out and do that with other people. I want them to like disperse that into corporations because God knows they need it. I want business owners to take that and be like, I'm not scared to build a team because I now know how to build culture, you know?

SPEAKER_00 19:46

The corporate environment is something else. I came from corporate too. It's wild. And even now, women I work with also come from corporate environments. And it's like they give everything and they're so dependent on. And I'm like, they would have your chair filled in five minutes if something happened. They don't care. I love the whole idea of the community building, even in the corporate environment. Yeah. It's really cool because I think what strikes me most about the whole truth-telling experience is that it's not about excavating trauma for the sake of it. It's about really understanding how those experiences have literally shaped the way people lead and love and respond right now. I really like that. The person in corporate who believed in you, do they know what you're doing now?

SPEAKER_01 20:41

I don't know that he does. We did stay in touch for a while, actually, but I'm sure he takes a peek every now and then. But no, I've actually not stopped to be like, hey, this is all of the stuff that I'm doing. You know what? I'm actually gonna challenge myself to do that. I'm gonna reach out and just be like, you know what? Thank you. Thank you for back in 2012 when you gave me a shot. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 21:00

I feel like him knowing that would just delight him. I want to talk more about leadership because yes, you're working with the youth. You're also working with the women who are operating at a very high level, and you've walked a path of significant resilience. At what point did resilience stop being the goal for you and something else took over?

SPEAKER_01 21:27

I think it was when I realized that I can be the person in the room to hold all the balls. I can be the person to support other people. But it was the moment that I realized I can't allow myself to be held that struck a chord because I got to this point where I was so exhausted, but I had no idea how to ask for help or who to even turn to to ask for help. And I think it was in that moment that I was like, oh my gosh, I actually feel unsafe in the communities that I'm building. And why is that? And it was kind of like for me peeling back the layers. And actually, Jen, the one who introduced us, it was on a call. I had said that. And she was like, You and I don't know each other, and you're asking this question. And she's like, What if it's right now? This is the exact work that you feel safe to be held. And that's why you're asking this, and that's why you're so emotional around this. And I was like, wow, I had to like really take that in for a second. And so I was like, My word, she's right. So the more I talk to women, especially the strong ones, right? Like we're labeled this strong person. What does that even mean? I realized that I don't want to be the strong one because people are like, oh my gosh, like you've been through so much. You're so resilient, you're this and that. And I'm like, yeah, I am. But that comes at a cost that also comes with survival. Like that's one of the things I've only ever known. And I think resilience is important. And I feel like when we stay in the state of resilience, it's almost like you have to stay in the state of survival versus like. You can breathe. Take a moment. And so, one of the other things that I do, I just call it the shift. And this is like specific leadership, but it's like consciousness in yourself, like knowing who you are. That's why we do all the inner stuff first. And then communication. How do you communicate with people? How do you want to be communicated with? This is where the truth comes in. Like, can I actually ask for what I want? Can I tell people? Can I be candid? I think candid is the most real thing you can do in leadership. And I feel like too much we skirt around it and we're scared of like saying what we actually need or want, but that helps other people progress too. So, okay, so we have consciousness of self, we have communication, and then there's that commitment. So what are we committing to? You're committing to a team. Whenever you say, Hey, I volunteer to be a leader, you better be willing to be the role model, right? Like you can't work yourself to death and then tell your team not to do that because they're modeling what you're showing. And so then there's the connection piece. Do I actually know the people that I work with? Like in corporate, this for me was huge. When I walked down a hallway, my head was never down. I was never on my phone. And I made it a point, I would know your name. I would know, did you have a child? Did you have a dog? Did you have a bird? Did you just go on vacation? I wanted to know something personal about every single person. And the corporation I worked for, I was in charge of 156 people. That's a lot of people to learn. But every time, even still to this day, I don't work there. And I see people out on the street and they're like, Alexis, oh my God, how are you? And I get to reflect back to them, like, how's your daughter? She must be in college or she must be, you know, working here, or I saw this person here, or, you know, like, what are you doing? And I think that intimacy, that actual connection, again, we can't do with masks on. And we have to be willing to be seen, which is a whole nother thing in itself. But then receiving what other people have to say. So it's not just a connection of like, how can I connect with you, but how can I allow you to connect with me too? Right. And that comes back down to the root of truth. And then the next one is community, which we already talked about, that is integrated in everything. I really do think community is culture. And then the last one is confidence because we become confident when we can stand in our truth, right? Imposter syndrome is just because we're actually putting on the facade, right? Like you put on the masks and you're scared, somebody's going to see beyond that. It has nothing to do with your ability to do the job, to lead people. People already said yes to you for that component, right? It's mirroring that back to women. Or if I asked you whatever your biggest fear was, you're confident that you couldn't do that thing. You're confident that you're scared of spiders, or you're confident that I could never speak on stage. Like you would give me your conviction in that if that was your thing. So you understand that is confidence. And so the work that we do is literally just shifting it. Why do you feel you're not confident in this area? Let's work on that because you already have that. You're just focused on this other component over here. So it's a lot of reflection and like getting people outside their comfort zone and peeling the masks off. Cause when we do that, now you can actually see me. And once I'm accepted even a little bit, you're like, oh, okay, that wasn't so bad. Let me maybe peel one more off. So again, that's why it's curated in such an intimate space and creating community of women of high capacity that all feel that type of way. It's easier to feel seen with a room of people that actually understand who you are at your core.

SPEAKER_00 26:13

The other thing I wanted to ask, because faith is a thread that runs through your work. For women who haven't had the language or relationship in that way, how do you talk about it without losing them?

SPEAKER_01 26:28

Something that I found in my grief is God. And I grew up Catholic, never felt like I belonged. I always felt so ashamed. In my book, I talk about, and this is very controversial, but like I was in a domestic relationship. I had two abortions because of that. It wasn't because I wanted to. And it's also no excuse. I can't ever take that back, right? Like I have to live with that consequence. But when you're Catholic, that is not accepted at all, right? So I felt this deep shame and I always felt this disconnection with God in the moment of loss of everything. I felt an extension of him saying, Finally, I can reach you. You've allowed all of the armor to fall. And so now I can pick you up. And it was little things. It was literally conversations. It was being angry. It was screaming to like absolutely nothing. Like, you know what? Like, how can you say that you love me? And I got exposed to not church, not the Bible, not to any of those things at first. It was literally meeting God where I was, or him meeting me where I was. And it was little things from like, I lost my job, but then the book thing happened. And then I was about to be out of my mortgage. And I was like, all right, God, you know what? I do trust you. So, like, you got to take care of the mortgage because I don't have a job. I kid you not, my mom called two hours later and was like, Hey, how are your finances? And like, me and my mom don't have that relationship. We never talk about that. I was like, actually, they're really bad. And I think that was the first time I was allowing myself to speak a truth of something that seemed so vulnerable in the moment. That in itself was a test even received from my mom. So anyway, she sent me money. And then a couple hours before my unemployment kicked in, right before I needed to submit my mortgage. And then I had more than what I actually needed. The evidence for me was there. And something that I will never do to women is force that on them. I will always talk about my testimony because I want women to hear that. And I mean, I want men and children and everybody to hear that. But I think for me, something that I didn't do, that I was always met in every community, was like, hey, this is a Christian community. Here's what you should know. And if you don't know that, then there's almost the stigma of like you're behind. So I made a vow. I was like, I will never do that. I will always talk about my faith because I don't want somebody to come into my communities and be blindsided. But I've had women say, you know what? I used to believe in God, but I don't anymore. And here's what happened, and this is the reason why. And I'm like, you know what? I can respect that because I was there. Also, I believed in God. And then I felt like you let me down. Like I went through all of this stuff. How could you let me suffer this much? And it wasn't until I actually grew in intimacy, in actual relationship where I wasn't pretending to pray perfect. He had all the mess: the mascara, the blood, the sweat, the tears, the snot, the all of it. Like it was all there, you know? Just have a conversation or don't. You can listen to stories, you can hear people talk about it. I'm never going to force you to do that because I fully believe my only job, again, the Bible says, is to spread the gospel. The way that we do that is planting seeds. And we do that through testimony. And my job is not to make somebody or convert somebody into anything that they're not. So in the work that I do, it's not necessarily like you're coming in here, you have to do a Bible study, you have to do this. It's more like listen to my story. Allow me to share my testimony, and I want to hear yours. And what does that look like? And you don't have to tell me that you saw God in it. You can tell me that you felt like you lost your relationship with God because of that. I always say the curious Christians, right? Like the girls that are like, hey, I kind of want to learn. Where do I start? I'm like, listen, you can watch The Chosen, you can watch Jesus Revelation, you can read the Bible, you can listen to an app. There's so many different ways. We all learn different. And I am not a pastor. I am not a theologian. I am not that, but I do love Jesus. You know, I say that over and over and over, but I just think when we can allow ourselves to break fully the way that we get rebuilt again, right? We see the gold. I was able to see my flaws because I allowed him to fill them with gold. And it made me less scared to share who I am and share my testimony. I've had so many women say, I love the way that you talk about your relationship with God. And it makes me want to try again. And I'm like, that's absolutely beautiful. And if I can give you any tips, if you want something to read, I'm here for whatever you need, but I'm also not here to be like pushing stuff down your throat. I think it's been beautiful. It's been patient and I have no idea. Sometimes I'm so out of my comfort zone, like, oh my God, I have to talk about this. Like, what do I do? I don't have the right answers. I don't have it perfectly, but I will share my testimony over and over and over and over. And honestly, when I think about a testimony, it's just my story, and we all have got one.

SPEAKER_00 31:10

That's the perfect lead-in to the book, actually, because you've written this memoir. It's called Changing the Reflection. And I know, listeners, you can all get the first 18 pages of the book when you join her wait list. And I'm gonna link that up in the show notes for you. I want to talk about what it takes to write a memoir. We've kind of touched on it a little bit, but writing a memoir isn't I'm gonna write a book as a business decision. It is a very particular kind of truth telling. So who were you when you started writing it versus who you are now? Oof.

SPEAKER_01 31:46

I was a scared little girl. Oh my word. I have gone back to the book and I'm like, oh my gosh, I can't believe I said that. I literally said that. When I wrote the book, I was broken. Like I talk about Jordan, you know, my son, and I'm just like, gosh, people won't know his story. And when I thought about writing the book, I kept hearing like it all starts with the book. And I was like, I have no idea what that means. Like, cool. And I thought it was going to be like, let me do a business book or let me write, you know, blah, blah, blah, like the things of my story that I thought people would like. But when I started writing it, it was actually like, oh, this story of when I was eight years old popped up into my head when I went to a salon and felt like out of place because I was a black girl. Or the foster care story. My brother had passed away in the process of writing this book in so much of my life. Like he was my best friend. Like he was my hero. We talk about some heroes don't wear capes. He didn't wear a cape, but he was one of the most absolutely beautiful people in this world. I started writing stories about, oh, I remember this. And I didn't want to forget. And I think for me, it was a way to like pull on things that made me who I am. Like we talk about resilience. And my brother, he was that person through and through. I mean, he was like five years old and he was cleaning me up and putting me to bed and singing me lullabies because my mom couldn't do that. My dad wasn't there. I was his responsibility. And I felt like, my word, what a strong kid to become an adult. And so the more that I would try to pull back and I didn't want to share, like, oh, well, maybe I won't fully go there. I was like, you know what? Who am I to not share the full story? My brother battled. He battled. I battled. Like, who am I not to share that? And who am I not to honor the little children like that? I was like all of the versions of me that had to live through that. I get to be an adult and be strong now, but they were surviving. Like they had no idea what tomorrow was going to look like. And so it was this beautiful, but very painful, very eye-opening experience of like, wow. This is why I talk about when you look at yourself in the mirror. Like, what do you actually see? Look beyond the mask. If you can look 10 layers deep, what does that look like? I used to call myself a little warrior and I saw her as strength and I saw me as weak. And I'm like, we can't even show up in our truth. And that little girl was fighting every day of her life. I felt like there was nothing but the truth to share. And it wasn't an Amazon number one bestseller. It wasn't anything, but at the end of the day, I'm like, people are going to know my story and they're going to know all of my truth and they're going to know who I was up until that point, right? Until I write the next book. I wanted people to stop seeing me as the facade. I wanted to stop that perfect image. And I wanted people to see me. And I was like, if I can even have one person say, I actually like this version of you better, or that helped me, then that's a win. I just felt like it was necessary. But gosh, I was so broken. I was in the midst of all of the grief right before I launched the book. Like it was ready on Amazon. It was going live on my brother's birthday, but my younger brother passed away literally two weeks before. That quickly turned into I didn't want to celebrate anymore. But it was still this sense of like, my gosh, I got to see all of these versions and I get to reference back when I'm like, oh, this is really hard to go on social media and post a video of like me talking about an opinion that I have. Girl, you wrote a book that you sent out to the world that literally exposed every dark moment in your life. Why can't you do this little thing anymore? Or what about the seven-year-old girl who was at school? Or the eight-year-old girl smoking cigarettes because peer pressure. Who am I not to share these stories? Because all of the kids that are looking now, you know, they're like, I need somebody to tell me that I'm not bad or that something can work out for me, even if I'm in this place right now. I felt like there wasn't another choice than what I wrote. And I think that if anybody wants to write their memoir, even if they don't ever publish it, I think it's something we should all go through. We should all experience. And I'm actually working on something for that.

SPEAKER_00 35:59

Love. Was there like a particular version of yourself that you had to grieve in order to be able to tell all of those stories, honestly, in that way?

SPEAKER_01 36:10

Mm-hmm. I actually loved that the lady I worked with, she was like, write the first draft for yourself. I think it was self-forgiveness. I think it was through all of the phases. You know, first was the little girl who didn't stick up for herself because she was too scared. And every time she opened her mouth, something went bad, or somebody told her how terrible she was. And so it was better to be quiet than to say something. I had to grieve that version. I had to grieve the sense of not being courageous or feeling resilient. But like I look at it now and I'm like, no, you were. You were strong, you were surviving, and you were making sure that you were protecting yourself. And then I think about the 13-year-old girl that her brother became incarcerated and she lost her best friend. And then her whole life became this place of like, what do I do without the person who always guided me? Then at 16 and 17, and in the relationships that I got in and the shame that I felt and how I couldn't forgive myself, or like, how could you ever let that happen? Or the version of me that was assaulted. I always said I'd be the strong girl who was like, I would fight my way, but what did I do? I froze. You know, I think there's so much shame that we carry and we don't talk about it because there's so much stigma. But I had to forgive those versions. And I also had to be like, and you did what we needed to do. I couldn't imagine going back to that and thinking, like, oh, let's fight. Like, you could have died if that was the case. There are times when there were so many odds stacked up that one wrong move could have changed everything. It could have been that book never came out because I wasn't living. I don't know that I ever really grieved the version or the person, but I think it was the choices and experiences that I grieved and that I had to forgive and say that I have compassion now because I can actually see something different than the judgment I had before.

SPEAKER_00 38:05

I always say forgiveness is the F-word that sets you free. Sure is. And I think too, there's something so powerful about making your story public that also changes your relationship to it and to yourself. You can't unwrite that. And there's such power behind that. That's beautiful. So I have some questions that I like to ask a version of because I feel like they really are the heart of what the show is about. So when you think about legacy, like your legacy work, not your reach, not your numbers, not that stuff, but what you want to be known for. What do you want to have actually accomplished?

SPEAKER_01 38:53

I think the only thing that I ever want is for people, all people. It doesn't matter who you are, young, old, male, female, whatever. I just want people to be seen. I want to be the example of allowing myself to be seen fully for me, showing up in truth, no matter what that means, and having other people be that example and seeing my kids, they are my legacy. And to see the work that I do now and to hear the conversations that they have, because I am an advocate and I do show them this, like I'm their role model. I get to see them do it. I think for me, that's the biggest reward. And, you know, it doesn't matter money-wise, but I want people to know that there is a difference no matter what the circumstances, our today does not define our tomorrow. That right there just feels like the legacy. It seems so simple, but that in itself is such a powerful statement for a world that feels like they have to be everything for everybody all the time.

SPEAKER_00 39:52

And what's one thing that you want women to hear today? Like if she's somewhere in the middle of rebuilding herself and she's not sure she's gonna make it, what do you want her to know?

SPEAKER_01 40:03

You've already gotten through all of the hardest moments that you've ever gone through right now. And all you have to do is get through today. We don't have to look at tomorrow. We don't have to look at a year from now. We don't have to look at where our career is, what our bank account looks like. We just have to get through today. And sometimes that's literally just kind of shutting down, shutting everything off, and just being. And that's enough.

SPEAKER_00 40:28

Yes. And last but not least, what does living a limitless life mean to you?

SPEAKER_01 40:35

I think limitless is just all of the things. Like, again, I all go back to the being seen, the being truthful, the being you, the showing up, the, you know, not locking yourself down. Nothing has to be forever. When I think of that, that makes me feel like, okay, this is limitless. Where I can be in the world, who I can impact, my children, the school they're at, finances, all of that can be limitless. I think the expansive mind, let the creativity flow, dream as big as you can. That's limitless. Like we don't need parameters for life. We're here to do it together and experience as much as we can.

SPEAKER_00 41:15

Yes. I'm gonna have all of your links in the show notes for people, but where's the best place for them to hang out with you?

SPEAKER_01 41:23

I'm getting ready to build on Substack. So I'm gonna have y'all come over there because I love Substack. I really do. And as a writer, I'm like, come on.

SPEAKER_00 41:32

There's something about the energy over there. It's completely different. You can go back to long form content. I love it too. I'm with you. Thank you so much for taking time out of your day to have this conversation with me. I really appreciate it. I know so many people are gonna get so much value from this and probably have a lot of honest moments with themselves. So thank you for being you and being seen.

SPEAKER_01 42:02

Thank you for having me. This was such a pleasure to chat with you today.

SPEAKER_00 42:06

Thank you. And until next time, here's to creating your limitless life.