Confidence Is Your Currency: Own the Room.

Every leader reaches a moment when looking successful and feeling successful are two very different things. 

In this episode, Dr. Ardeshir Mehran speaks with Tara LaFon Gooch, Forbes-featured CEO, TEDx speaker, bestselling author, brand strategist, and host of the globally ranked GRASP Confidence Podcast. Tara has built her work around one bold idea: confidence is not just a feeling. It is currency. It shapes how we enter rooms, tell our story, claim our voice, and create opportunities that match our deeper calling.

Tara’s story began in rural Maryland, as the youngest of five children raised by a single mother. Today, she helps entrepreneurs, speakers, authors, and thought leaders turn their expertise into influence, visibility, and legacy. 

Her message is clear: your story is not a liability. It is your greatest strategic asset. 

When you learn to lead with clarity, conviction, and purpose, your brand becomes more than polish. It becomes presence, power, and impact.

In this conversation, we explore the difference between performed confidence and owned confidence, why high achievers often hide a quiet confidence gap, and how personal branding becomes a path to self-ownership. 

Tara also shares the heart of her GRASP framework, the role of gratitude and faith in confidence, and what she would say to anyone who knows they are meant for more but cannot yet see the full path. 

This is a conversation about owning your brand, owning the room, and owning the life you were created to live.

Watch The Episode on YouTube

0:09:  You're not depressed, just unfinished: the show's premise

4:01:  Leaving corporate: depression, misalignment & the leap to entrepreneurship

8:59:  Looking successful vs. feeling successful 

12:40:  Happy home life as the ultimate wealth 

16:07:  The GRASP Model: five dimensions of confidence

23:27:  Grateful for visualizations as if they're already here 

27:31:  Your brand walks into the room before you do 

32:21:  AI cannot replace lived experience or original thought 

35:23:  The forgiveness book: 27 years of silence & a letter that arrived too late 

38:23:  Forgiveness is reclaiming the parts of yourself you abandoned to survive

CONTACT TARA LAFON GOOCH

Tara LaFon Gooch Website 

TEDx

LinkedIn

Instagram 

YouTube Channel 

GRASP Confidence Podcast


CONTACT DR. ARDESHIR MEHRAN

Dr. Mehran Studio

LinkedIn

Podcasts 

Blogs 

YouTube

Bestselling Book

Transcript

SPEAKER_02 0:00

You're not depressed. Just unfinished. This is the podcast for leaders, high achievers, and entrepreneurs who have built impressive lives on the outside. And yet sense something is dying on the inside. If you ever stared at everything you have accomplished and felt strangely empty, this show is for you. My guest today is Tara Lafonguch. She's an expert in the area of leadership, confidence, and branding. We will learn from Tara that confidence is your currency. Just like the way you use your wealth, you can actually apply your confidence. And that being confident, being successful, and feeling successful are two different things, and you can have them both. You will learn about branding that how your brand, your impression enters the room before you do. What taro will share with us is that confidence is not just experience, an attribute you have more or you have less. Actually, has an attribute, has a dimensionality to that. There are five dimensions to confidence. You will learn about them and how to use that. Tara has been featured in the Forbes magazine. She's a TEDx speaker, she's a keynote speaker, and she's a best-selling author. Two of her books that I've read them, love them, highly recommend them. How to grasp confidence and own your power and talk your way to the top. Let's welcome Tara. Hello and welcome. What else would you like to add?

SPEAKER_00 1:51

I'm also a podcast host, just like you. So I host Grasp Confidence Podcast. That's right.

SPEAKER_02 1:57

Great. So before we get started, orient us to about where you're joining us from. And if you go outside your residence, what are the areas you hang around? Some places say this is home. Is it a park? Is it a bookstore? Is it a coffee shop? Bring us to your neighborhood, to your place.

SPEAKER_00 2:22

Oh, yeah. So I live in North Carolina, central North Carolina, about an hour or so north of Charlotte, for anybody who's familiar. I have a husband, two dogs, and a 10-year-old daughter. And we like to go to the mountains on the weekends, go to different breweries. My husband and I we enjoy going to different breweries and trying different things and restaurants. I'm a foodie, so you can always catch me at a good restaurant eating some really good food or cooking and baking at home because I love that too.

SPEAKER_02 3:00

That's beautiful. Food and brewery. You got my attention. I need to make a trip over there. I know this is fantastic. I read about your background that you had the successful and turbulent growing up, including corporate environment, and you made decisions a number of times to pivot. That give us a background in terms of some of the highlights of your career, your life that you think listeners would benefit from knowing your story.

SPEAKER_00 3:37

Absolutely. Growing up, I grew up the youngest of five in poverty, right? We didn't have that much. And I always thought I just wanted to be normal, whatever that meant. I just thought that the goal really was to have a corporate job. And that's what I really thought was meant success. So I after college got a couple of degrees, decided because again, that's what I thought smart, successful people did go to college, do all those things. And then I went into the corporate world. And I didn't, it just never suited me, right? I just never felt like I belonged, like a fit in, I was depressed, it was all of the things. And it just felt like I had been forcing something my entire life. And if anybody resonates with that, which I think a lot of people do, that they feel like they're just trying to force themselves in a place, in a hole that doesn't fit them. And that was me. That was what I went through. That was my journey. So in 2022, I officially left corporate and went into full-time entrepreneurship. And I haven't looked back since. And what I realized is that you cannot fit someone else's version of success and be happy and fulfilled. You and it's really about what values that you have and aligning with those values so that you can find something where you don't feel like it's forced, where it feels fulfilling, where it feels purposeful.

SPEAKER_02 5:32

Yes. This is so powerful that Tara, you mentioned that there's an element of you fitting in, and you realize it's not fitting in somebody else's environment, fitting in being you. Let me digress for a second. That I'm sure you've seen it year after year for the last 30 years. Gallup publishes a report in the spring and says 75% of American workforce is disengaged. This number has not changed. And they say we need more programs, we need more chatskis, we need more merchandise. But if you talk to people the way you describe it, they're saying that it's somebody else's game. It's just like a different environment. What is your take about so many people being disengaged and feel it's the job, it's not me? How do you see that?

SPEAKER_00 6:28

I relate to that tremendously. So I remember feeling disengaged and feeling what I was doing was not contributing to something bigger than myself.

SPEAKER_01 6:42

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 6:42

And I'm a very creative person. I I'm a natural teacher. I like enjoy educating people, I enjoy mentoring people, I enjoy teaching. I am very creative. And a lot of times with corporate structures, especially, it really is not geared for that type of person. It's not really geared for somebody who's creative and expressive like I am. And you are as well. You're very creative and expressive. And it you have to fit in a box.

SPEAKER_01 7:19

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 7:24

And if you tell me to get into a box, I feel like I'm trapped, right? So I think a lot of employees feel that way, that they feel like they can't do something. And just because it goes against the culture or the management or the leadership, so they feel like they have to hold themselves back. And when we feel like we have to hold ourselves back when we're an expressive, creative person, yeah, you're not getting the authentic version of us. And that's right, real person isn't showing up to work because we feel like we have to leave them home. And it's just a body and a seat at that point.

SPEAKER_02 8:03

That's right. And it's just feeling trapped. I remember my last job before finally I said, I'm done. And yeah, before I start this work, I was getting year after year good performance review. Here's your bonus. Here's all the things you go with your new assignment and so on. And I remember telling my manager and multiple managers, I am underemployed. They would say, What does that mean? I said that Jackie, you are giving me good money, but I can do so much more. Use me. They were frustrated with me, they didn't know what to do. They were saying, Oh, just stay focused. And I was thinking, I have so much to give, I can give multiple things, and I feel trapped. I feel that I'm just basically numbing myself. That's the domain of depression, that's the domain of anxiety. When we don't rise to our full potential, which Tara, you talk about the and I'm looking at my notes, I want to make sure I say this right. Looking good and no, looking successful and feeling successful are two different things. Yeah, and many people go through their life, they're trying to look successful, but feeling successful, how do you define feeling successful?

SPEAKER_00 9:28

I think success is very individualized. And honestly, as I get older and it I love aging. I know you don't probably hear that from a lot of people, maybe especially women, which is sad. But I actually love aging. Bring it on. And one of the reasons is because I feel so much wiser. I feel like I'm really aligning with my values in a powerful way that I've never aligned before. And to me, the success on the outside, I don't even care. I have no, I actually don't care at all what people think about me anymore. And that is such freedom. Yeah, I don't care what people think of me. I don't have to drive a flashy car. I don't have to have some tremendous mansion. Yeah, it's not things I value. But as a society, we're told that is the standard of what success should look like.

SPEAKER_02 10:33

That's right.

SPEAKER_00 10:34

But it's not to me. To me, it's having my a healthy family, having a healthy me being healthy, yeah, mentally and physically, that's success. Success is also having a happy home life.

SPEAKER_01 10:52

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 10:53

And this is something that I talk about with clients quite frequently, actually, because a lot of times when I start working with somebody, they will say to me during a meeting, I just don't feel successful. I feel like an imposter. And I ask them, so what are you successful at? And it's hard for them to understand that at first. Oh, I don't feel successful at anything. You're healthy, you're breathing. That's a success, right? You had meals today, another success.

SPEAKER_01 11:26

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 11:26

You're in a safe neighborhood, success. Your marriage is together and flourishing success, relationships are great, your child is healthy. Find the ways you're successful. And as you age, as you get older, you'll start to understand that those flashy things, those instant gratification things, don't add to your life.

SPEAKER_02 11:53

That's right.

SPEAKER_00 11:54

And in a lot of ways, they can take away because they make you feel like you're outsourcing your worth on somebody else's opinion, most likely a stranger. You don't even know to increase somebody else's opinion and perception of you. How diminishing is that? So to me, success, and we're all successful in some way, but it's really through alignment of your values.

SPEAKER_02 12:22

Through alignment of your values. Yeah. Yes. That's beautiful. Two things I wrote down. I love aging. And I love the way you mentioned in our society, aging is positioned as like a decline. Yeah. Like the way car gets old, certain point goes to junkyard versus your thing. New actually you're rising, you're becoming wisdom, you're becoming whole, that your values change instead of gathering, check this out, this car, that house, etc. You become fuller, you, and also you talked about something very few people talk about. Having a happy home life is the ultimate wealth, yes.

SPEAKER_00 13:05

And you can ask anybody, in you can ask anybody that has a huge house and uh and all fancy cars and eight figures in their bank account, yeah. And if they are having an unhappy home life, they would trade it all. That's right, they would trade it all. So, yes, that is the ultimate form of wealth. 100% agree with you.

SPEAKER_02 13:25

Beautiful. So, Tara, the journey of you arriving to become an expert in brand and confidence. How did that start? That brings you that this is my passion, brand and confidence.

SPEAKER_00 13:44

I love that. I know that your brand is your is a first impression somebody has of you, your business, before they dig in any further, right? It's the first impression. And I knew this was going to be something that was important for me as I started entrepreneurship. Before entrepreneurship started, when I was in corporate, I worked in sales and marketing. So I worked with the marketing department, with the CMO to close deals and do various things for a hundred plus million dollar company. So I knew that if I could do that for a hundred plus million dollar company, surely I could do this for myself, right?

SPEAKER_01 14:35

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 14:35

And that took confidence. Now, in the beginning, I didn't have a lot of confidence because it was something that I was new at. I had never started a company before. I didn't come from a family of entrepreneurs, and I had just got knocked down, right? I had just realized that I was really depressed in corporate, I was anxious, and I didn't feel on the surface like I could, I didn't know if I could do this, right? And of course, the statistics say that most startups fail.

SPEAKER_01 15:10

That's right.

SPEAKER_00 15:11

So I had a lot of uncertainty. And again, at that time, I had just completed my MBA, and my daughter was just a couple years old, four or five, something like that, years old at the time. So I had a lot of risk riding on this. And I knew I needed confidence. And I realized that the two went hand in hand, that it's really hard for you to show up and not care about other people's opinions of you, and to show up messy and not knowing all the answers if you don't have confidence in yourself, if you don't have that belief.

SPEAKER_01 15:48

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 15:49

And I spent the last several years growing that confidence muscle, growing my brand at the same time, and showing up regardless of people's opinions, but showing up because I mattered, had something to say, and had value to add in the marketplace.

SPEAKER_02 16:07

So let's stay with that one. You this is the first time I've seen somebody to talk about confidence and talk about there's a structure to it, your grasp model. Because before that, people say confidence, come on, stop out of it. Yeah, following like puff up your chest, you know, lean back. And there are many wonderful experts. They teach you body language, have to walk in the room. You talk about actually it's deeper. There's a structure to that. That's what you talk about during your TED talk. Walk us through your grasp model that when you work with somebody, what are you seeing as you think about your model? What do you advise them about?

SPEAKER_00 16:53

Yes, thank you. So while my company, what we do is branding, it's very much personal development at the same time. And there's a lot of reasoning to that. All of this is it's identity and belief based, right? So unless we understand the our identity and have a belief system that it's positive, it's going to be really hard to move the needle in business, regardless of what strategy, trick, or tool you implement. And this is something that, again, I've realized over the six years I've been in business total, 100 plus founders that I've worked with is this, right? So grasp, I developed it for myself, but since then I am, you know, have implemented it in my coaching practice as well when I work with other people. GRASP stands for gratitude, responsibility, action, sight, and purpose. Gratitude, responsibility, action, sight, and purpose. And I'll just give a quick synapsis of each. Gratitude anchors us in the present, where our superpower actually is. Gratitude, I always tell people, is the law of increase.

SPEAKER_01 18:15

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 18:15

It can rewire our brains. It's very powerful. Responsibility means personal responsibility. And I think that is so important because if we don't have personal responsibility, if we get knocked down, we might not get back up. You have to have that personal responsibility to keep getting up in the face of any obstacle, adversity, or challenge.

SPEAKER_01 18:37

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 18:37

And then we also have action. Action is very important. No amount of thought replaces action. And as high performers, sometimes people tend to get perfect, be perfectionists. It's not about being perfect, it's about taking action even when you don't want to, even when your emotions tell you you don't they don't want you to. Even when somebody else is telling you you're not ready, it's taking action regardless of the environment, the circumstances, or your emotions.

SPEAKER_01 19:13

Yep.

SPEAKER_00 19:14

Sight, very important. I always use this quote by Marian Wright Edelman.

SPEAKER_02 19:19

You to be what you can see.

SPEAKER_00 19:22

You can't be what you can't see. And you know the interesting thing about our human brains, they it doesn't know the difference between an imagined reality and a real reality. So you can spend your reality, your time imagining the worst case scenario, catastrophizing, imagining all of the worst things that could happen, or you could reframe it and imagine the best case scenario. If you want to step into the most confident, successful person imaginable, you first have to see them so that you believe it and you step into it. It's an embodiment. What I teach is not fake a team make it, it's not quick fix. This is an embodiment identity shift type of level of practice. So that's sight. And then finally, it's purpose. Purpose is our north star. I believe we all have a purpose, a calling, something that we're naturally good at, something that makes us different from anybody else. And that's why I don't believe in this premise of competition.

SPEAKER_01 20:37

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 20:38

How could you be have competition if you're aligned with your God-given purpose possible?

SPEAKER_02 20:45

This is beautiful. First of all, I'm taking copious note. Um becoming the coaching and therapy session for thank you. Thank you. A reminder. You talked about gratitude and the law of abundance. Having come from consulting firm, being a partner in various corporation and consulting firm. We were competing with each other as if there was a zero-sum mentality, whose project it is, whose bonus is this, how do you divide a bonus? What you talk about, which is so true, it arouses the heart that there's enough for all of us, plenty of that. We don't need to compete with each other. It's about is the race against yourself to raise yourself up. This is so beautiful and it's so strong and so scary. Then that just the whole notion of gratitude, which that was the title of your of your TED Talk, Gratitude, the Foundation of Confidence, which had so many millions of viewers. In fact, I invite the listeners. To go to uh taros uh tedx and uh to watch that the as you think about the people you work with so far gratitude, responsibility, action, sight, and purpose. Do people struggle with one of those five? Do people work with all of them, men, women? How do you see that as you work with your client?

SPEAKER_00 22:28

Such a great question. Oh my gosh. This is why I put gratitude first and why it's the first level in this method. It's really hard, even if you I think people want to skip past it first of all. Yeah, because they think I'm already grateful, I'm grateful, I've got it. I do a little gratitude checklist or whatever every day. And I always challenge people, just start there anyway, right? And the reason is surprising. If you don't have gratitude as that foundation, is anything else going to stick? Yeah, see, if you have the site and you visualize yourself, but you're not already grateful for it, will it come to you? I'm grateful for the things that I imagine in my mind as if they are here right now.

SPEAKER_02 23:27

Say that again. This is powerful.

SPEAKER_00 23:29

Yes, I am grateful for the positive sight, the visualizations that I have in my mind as if they are here right now.

SPEAKER_01 23:41

Beautiful.

SPEAKER_00 23:42

This is why gratitude is the first, and it can't be compromised, you can't skip the step. Now, there's gonna be some days I need a little bit more work on responsibility. Yeah, but I have found that it's really just start with gratitude and then go to that next step. I feel like a lot of people try to skip that.

SPEAKER_01 24:05

That's right.

SPEAKER_00 24:06

Think, yeah, they think it's a woo, or they think it's not scientific, or they think that they don't need it. Again, I always challenge people, start with gratitude because it's not in a checkbox, it's nothing that you can complete. And this is something that I really try to instill with the folks that I work with. There is no bottom to gratitude. Technically, you could touch the bottom of the ocean. Yeah, there's no bottom to gratitude, there's always a deeper layer. And I had this revelation as somebody who continually practices gratitude in my own personal life that I am even grateful for breathing. Yeah, there's no shortage, and again, this is why I say gratitude is the law of increase and why others say that it's the parent of all values. Yeah, I even have gratitude for the air I breathe because it is so abundant. I don't have to work for it, it's already here. I need to do is receive it, and that is a reminder to me of everything else the success in life, the money, the clients, the outcomes, all of that is already mine. I just need to receive.

SPEAKER_02 25:28

Yeah, this is beautiful. When you look at social media about personal development, there's such a focus on checklists. Give me a grid, give me a 10-step program action. What you talk about starts with the essential mindfulness of the person, gratitude, responsibility, action is the brain, awaken the person first. Yeah, before we talk about 10-step of the action. Yeah, people ask me, so Ardish here, you're a psychologist who works with depression, anxiety, the trauma with leaders. So, how do you take care of yourself? Expecting something, I don't know, maybe fascinating. And I tell you, I'm a pretty simple guy. To my left outside, is a beautiful garden. There's a wonderful apricot tree. There are trees, flowers, branches, and I go there, sit there, and I watch the birds, I watch this roll, I watch the hummingbird. I think I have a hummingbird body that comes and hover around me. And it's a state of bliss. I surrender, I say my prayers, it's a state of gratitude. I'm thinking, I'm a rich man. Just having this space, this peace, that happy home life. Just being that state, that's wealth. Yeah, we don't need very complicated checklists and sub-bullet points. It's just being present and doing your work.

SPEAKER_00 27:04

Yeah, I I love that.

SPEAKER_02 27:09

And then that notion your brand walks into the room before you do what does it look like for somebody enters the room, boardroom, community, school? What does it look like your brand walks into the room before the person?

SPEAKER_00 27:31

So this is barring from a quote from Jeff Bezos, and I it's my personal spin on it. And what does that mean your brand walks into the room before you do? It didn't necessarily used to be that way, but now with of course the internet, social media, podcasts, different things. We look somebody up online before we decide to do business with them, before we decide to trust them, before we decide we like them or know them. Yeah, we look them up online, and it's that again, that first impression. And this is why thought leadership is so important. And it's important because it's showing up as an authentic person. Yeah, it's only going to get more challenging as AI evolves to be able to tell what's real and what's not. And it's going to be more difficult to discern reality, quite frankly. So you building this brand starting as soon as possible, that is thought-leading, that is inquisitive, that asks good questions, that shows up authentically, that's what people are going to be even more attracted to going into the future. Because even though we're more technologically connected than we've ever been before in human history, we're also more disconnected than we have ever been before. And it's we're going to see an increase in loneliness. We're going to see an increase in isolation. And it's an epidemic of sorts that I feel like a lot of people don't realize. And it's an increase in comparison and thinking that other people's lives are perfect. And that leads to depression and anxiety on your part because again, you continually feel like you have to keep working and striving for something.

SPEAKER_01 29:39

That's right.

SPEAKER_00 29:40

It's just alignment. So I personally, for me, when I'm thinking of showing up online, creating content, my podcasts, speeches, what have you, I show up from a place not of perfection, but of a place of genuinely just adding value to others and helping people think differently, helping people understand something that's complex and bring it to a place that's very easy and digestible. And that's what I would do with the grasp method. That's what I do in my coaching practice and business is to take complex ideas, make them digestible and actionable, but it's always coming from a place of authenticity. It's not about copying anyone else, it's about showing up as the best version of who you are.

SPEAKER_02 30:35

Yeah, and adding value. If you would please, you and I are active on LinkedIn. So I look at LinkedIn two, three times a day, and I see there's so many wonderful infographics, they all look alike.

SPEAKER_00 30:53

Yes, they are.

SPEAKER_02 30:54

Text has started to look alike, and to the point, some of the individuals, and many of the injures actually, I know, and I know what they're capable of, and I see their contribution, and I'm thinking, and AI created this. You lost being different in that value. Yeah. What is your advice to individuals and their digital signature with respect to brand and be you be unique?

SPEAKER_00 31:34

AI cannot outsource thought leadership, it cannot create original thought leading content. That's your job. And I think that we have so many things backwards in how we approach things in society. We're in this hamster wheel mentality where more and more churn it up, burn it up, quantity, and it's very little quality, and it's very little authenticity. So it's not about creating more and being on a hamster wheel and again competing with something else or with an algorithm or anything like that. It's about what is something that you learned in your life that could help someone else.

SPEAKER_01 32:27

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 32:28

That is something AI cannot produce because AI doesn't have lived experience. AI doesn't have a story, an origin story. AI doesn't hasn't survived trauma or learned a life lesson. So I think we tend to overcomplicate things and want to use something like AI to replace all thought that we have. And what's concerning for me is that we're going to stop being able to think for ourselves.

SPEAKER_01 32:59

Yeah, and everybody starts to look alike. That's right.

SPEAKER_00 33:02

Everything starts to look alike, and we're gonna, yes, and you're getting just lost in the sea of sameness. That is not branding, that is not showing up as the best version of yourself. That's not personal development.

SPEAKER_01 33:16

Yeah, that's right.

SPEAKER_00 33:17

So I would encourage anybody listening to this to it's better to show up messy, yeah, than to show up the same. And I had an actually interesting experiment with this. I put out an email maybe a week or two ago to my email list, and it had a typo in it. And at first I was, and I didn't, of course, you know how it is. You read it a hundred times, right? You miss it, and you miss it, and as soon as you hit send though, you see it.

SPEAKER_01 33:51

That's right.

SPEAKER_00 33:53

Why is that I don't know, but it happened, and I was actually really glad that it went out with a little error because they knew I wrote it.

SPEAKER_02 34:06

That's right.

SPEAKER_00 34:08

So, isn't that interesting now that AI has made everything too perfect, and that's why you recognize it as AI?

SPEAKER_02 34:16

That's right. This is so interesting. In fact, that I would invite for listeners to reach out to Taro and to myself. The whole urgency that how many likes do you get? And I'm starting to see, I don't trust that likes anymore. Doesn't matter how many hundreds or you the thousands you get. Um it's almost this what is it, the usual suspect. I follow the people who have origin story that something is unique, something is their story that we are all hungry for. I support those individuals and I'm trying to write like that. And Tara, you write like that. I follow you. Your stories, they are always I learned something, it's unique. Your stories, they are edgy, and they bring something fresh. Ah, of course. Now I know. Thank you. So this is so important. I know you're working on your next book. First of all, my compliment to you. I'm a first, I have one book, and you're going to your third book. I know it takes a lot of energy. Your next book, tell us about it. I know you're very excited. You're working on it. What is it about?

SPEAKER_00 35:37

It's about forgiveness. And I will be sharing the story of how I forgave my father after 27 years of distance and silence, after not seeing him since I was 14 years old, and thinking and believing that time equated distance and healing, that because 27 years had passed, that I have forgiven him, that I must be healed. And it takes you through that journey of thinking that I was over it and finding out I wasn't, and what that looked like in my life, but more importantly, how someone can use the framework that I have in the book to forgive someone for something they don't think they can forget and forgive.

SPEAKER_02 36:36

This is very powerful. First of all, I can't wait to see your book coming out. I definitely will buy it. In the US, this Sunday is Father's Day. So I'm going through my own emotions about my dad, and we separated. I'm an immigrant, and I didn't get a chance to do the physical forgiveness because of different countries. Do you have any messages or anything you want to share with the audience as the Father's Day approaches this Sunday?

SPEAKER_00 37:14

Yes, I have a lot to say about this. So it was last May, right before my 41st birthday, when I decided to write him a letter. And again, keep in mind I hadn't seen him for 27 years. It wasn't until nine months later I had learned he had already died. Oh, I never got the chance to properly forgive him. He never got the chance to read that letter. I wish someone would have told me a couple of years ago. Now, again, it was for a reason, and we all have our journey and it's divine timing. I don't question that. But if someone were to have shared their story bravely, like I'm trying to do now with me, maybe I could have forgiven him in this lifetime.

SPEAKER_01 38:10

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 38:11

Maybe his physical, humanly hands could have actually read that letter and received it. I don't know. I'll never know because he died before the letter came to him. And my lesson for everybody is forgive quickly.

SPEAKER_01 38:29

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 38:30

Because tomorrow's not promised. And a lot of times there's people, it's usually our parents. We have trouble forgiving. That's generally number one with a lot of folks, right? I can't forgive my parents, my mom or dad for XYZ or something, something like that. I would encourage anybody listening to this just to forgive quickly. If your mom or dad, the best thing you can do is do it today. And remember, and this is a line out of my book forgiveness is not about the other person. Yeah, it's about reclaiming the parts of yourself you abandoned to survive them.

SPEAKER_02 39:14

That's right. That's right. This is so powerful. Thank you for sharing this vulnerable story. That in my therapy work, there's a journey, there's a passage that forgiveness, anger, and grieving they go hand in hand.

SPEAKER_01 39:34

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 39:35

And people get to the point they just can't let go. It's that person. This happened. This happened to me. I wish I said that.

SPEAKER_00 39:43

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 39:44

It's about realizing that the way you wrote your letter is about when that happened, there's a voice you didn't get to say it. There's a cry you didn't get to express. There was anger that you didn't get to project. You can do it now. You're doing it for your own dignity. Dignity is a matter to me. It's a very powerful personal value. Do it for your own dignity. That you couldn't say that that time, but you can say it now to free yourself. Because as Tara, you mentioned, this is your life. This is your show. Everybody else, including your parents, they come do their work, then they move on. But this is your show. You free yourself to be you and move on to your next life. Wow, my dear friend. As we wrap up, I want to ask you to complete this sentence. Your brand is not just what you do, it is filling the gap.

SPEAKER_00 40:55

Who you are. There's only one of you. Your brand is who you are. Own it.

SPEAKER_02 41:04

Own it. Beautiful. I have a lot of notes from our call. You say that I love aging. I want to try and think about that. I love that because I'm actually thinking about myself. Your ultimate wealth is your happy home life. Add value, sense of connection. Don't join the loneliness club and your grasp model. Grow, respond, action, sight, and purpose. Taro, uh, where do people find you?

SPEAKER_00 41:43

Absolutely. I'm on every social media platform, LinkedIn, Facebook, and Instagram. You can research my podcast, Grasp Confidence Podcast, on any podcasting platform.

SPEAKER_02 41:56

Wonderful. And if people want to follow up with you and work with you, what is the best way for them to do that?

SPEAKER_00 42:04

Absolutely. You can email me, Tara at best B-E-S-T branding, br-d-in-g dot solutions.

SPEAKER_02 42:13

Beautiful. Thank you so much. And all of this information will be in the body of the text for the podcast. So from San Francisco to North Carolina, we wish you a healthy, happy weekend. It's coming up very soon and a wonderful Father's Day for those in the US. Please listen to this podcast and share it with your loved one, with your colleagues, that they need to hear these messages and to know more about our friend Tara. Besides everything, we see you in the next episode. Take care. Bye.