Own Your Work
Are you ready to get unstuck in your career and take your career to the next level? Are you an ambitious professional that just can’t seem to get ahead? Are you tired of feeling like your next promotion, your next opportunity is in the hands of someone else. Well, then this podcast is for you. Every week, Sonja Holmes brings you the inspiration, tools, and strategies to help you take control of your career and build a work-life that you love.Through interviews with thought leaders in the professional development space, Sonja asks all the right questions to help you get the answers and strategies you need to get ahead. She covers everything from landing the job or promotion, improving performance and productivity, personal branding in the workplace, effective communication skills at work, and much more. If you are ready to win at work be sure to subscribe through your favorite podcast app of choice or head on over to sonjaholmes.com/ownyourwork.
Own Your Work
The Salary You Didn't Know You Needed: Soul Salary with Author, Jess Kaskov
Are you ready to redefine success on your own terms and live a joyful life? That's what we did in our recent life-transforming conversation with the dynamic Jessica Kascov. As a bestselling author, speaker, and life coach, Jessica shared her journey from a thriving engineering career to the inception of her company, Joyfulness with Jess. We delved into her personal life and discovered her deep-seated love for self-help books. You'll be inspired as we explore her transformation and learn how introspection led her to discover her true calling.
In a shifting world, we all yearn for something that brings us genuine joy and contentment. Jessica introduced us to an exciting concept - the Soul Salary. Dare to redefine your wealth by aligning your time and energy with what truly fulfills you. With Jessica, we discussed a remarkable four-step process to identify and amplify our Soul Salary while reducing things that drain our joy. We also touched on the importance of authenticity and taking risks to achieve high Soul Salary status; a conversation that will utterly change your perspective on success.
Lastly, we navigated the topics of self-care, self-trust, and the critical role of finding and utilizing our voice. We explored the concept of a 'Legacy Statement,' serving as a beacon to guide our actions and decisions in life. With Jessica's wisdom, we discussed ways to escape the autopilot mode and learn to listen to our inner voice, leading to a more fulfilling life. Get strapped, this episode is all about finding joy in the journey, and discovering your authentic self.
Connect with Jess: https://www.instagram.com/jkaskov/
Take the Soul Salary Quiz: https://soulsalary.scoreapp.com/
Get the book: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0C9SF6JVK/
https://www.sonjaholmes.com
Friends, I cannot wait for you to hear today's conversation. I recently had Jessica's call on the show and let me tell you, boy, this is the conversation. Things got deep and, I gotta be honest, I was a little hesitant about sharing this episode, at least the totality of it. I wanted to go back and edit it, edit some things out, friends, because I got a little vulnerable. I should open up and I shared a lot of myself. And anyways, the floodgates open, others started coming Once I started to talk about this, something that was really deep and personal for me. But anyways, your family here, I've already let you in, so I figured you know what. Let me just go ahead and release and share the whole thing. Okay, I think sometimes we filter how we want to show up and we get to choose and curate the parts of us that we want to show. But I'm going to just show this all. I'm going to share it all with you, the good, the bad, the ugly and this is a moment of, at least, my ugly tears y'all.
Speaker 1:Anyways, I'm so excited for you to hear what Jess has to say. So she is a number one bestselling author, she's a speaker, she's a life coach, thought leader and she inspires the world to profound joy and fulfillment. She left a successful 15 year engineering career at a Fortune 500 company to start her own business, which is Joyfulness, with Jess trading her heart hats for headbands. Today she does what she feels called to do motivating and supporting others. She lives in the suburbs of Chicago with her encouraging husband, her two active sons and two lazy cats. I cannot wait for you to hear this conversation. Friends, let's dive right in Right, jess. Well, welcome to the show. As I mentioned in the intro earlier, we have Jessica Cascov with us today. I'm so excited that you're here, jess. Welcome to the show. Welcome to the Own your Work podcast.
Speaker 2:Thank you so much, Sonya. I'm excited to talk more with you, yes, yes.
Speaker 1:So I can't wait to dig into your book a little bit more because, honestly, when I've been reading this man, let me tell you like, first of all, I feel like I'm like connecting with a friend. I feel like I got to know you a lot more, and I'm sure you're probably getting that from people as well too. You know, you really just show so much of yourself in this and I'm so grateful and I'm so excited about this conversation. But before we get into the book, right before we dive into the good stuff, I want to like just let the audience into your world and just introduce them to you. So can you tell us a little bit about who you are? Tell us about the joyfulness with Jess?
Speaker 2:Yeah. So I will say that I spent 15 years in food manufacturing as an engineer and I know you say that in the bio, but I want to emphasize that because I wasn't always a life coach, author speaker. You know, up until just a couple of years ago I wasn't, so I was a full-time engineer. So a little about me is I kind of made that transition through reflection. I paused and found out that my company was doing layoffs. They said in a month or two we will let you know if you have a job, which that's a little bit too much time to think about. Yes, oh my gosh. But I said, okay, this is probably a good time to do some self-reflection. I thought about what my favorite role was, and it was actually a cross-functional in human resources. It wasn't even like my operations or engineering.
Speaker 2:It was this one human resources role I did, and it was when our plant was closing.
Speaker 2:I was helping the whole plant deal with the closure and the in-between of running and the closure. It was so interesting because that role truly changed who I am as a person and a leader. But it was interesting to me that that was the role that I picked as my favorite versus the many years of other operations and engineering roles. So that was one hint that maybe I need to do something a little differently.
Speaker 2:And the second was I was thinking about what impact that I had the past 15 years, and it was actually not the process improvement I put in place or the equipment improvement. It was really just the impact I had on people that was left, because both manufacturing plants that I had worked at were now closed, so that equipment in a process improvement no longer exists. It's truly the impact I had on others and that really prompted me to think about where I'm at right now. I did end up having a job, so I still had a job, but I said, okay, I can't unsee the self-reflection I've done. So I really started this kind of dimmer switch off of engineering and on to joyfulness with Jess, my company, where I do life coaching, speaking and authorship, and I started trying that dimmer on towards joyfulness with Jess.
Speaker 2:So yeah, that's kind of the story of how it started. Yes, awesome.
Speaker 1:So tell us a little bit more about Jess as well, too. So what do you like to do when you're free time? Right? You're a mom of two two boys, right? I feel like I know you so well.
Speaker 2:I've been reading your books, but, yes, I do reveal a lot in there, don't I?
Speaker 1:I love it so much. Oh, my goodness, so good. Yeah, so yeah, tell me a little bit about your days, what you do, what you enjoy.
Speaker 2:I love that. So, as you mentioned, two boys, six and eight, my husband and I have been together almost 18 years, so amazing. Yeah, we are soulmates for sure. Yeah, at college, and it was wonderful as far as me. I love reading. So, that's kind of that makes sense with me writing a book, but I actually really enjoy self-help books. So it was kind of an easy decision to write a self-help book, because that's really what I love. I love being outdoors, the sun recharges me Water.
Speaker 1:I feel like I was a mermaid in the past life, probably.
Speaker 2:So our water Water is really freeing to me and going for walks and hikes and doing that kind of thing is really really important to me. Otherwise, I'm doing a lot of the kids stuff, so going to their courts and doing their activities, which I find very fun actually, yeah, I love it.
Speaker 1:I love it and I feel like reading your book and just getting to know you well. It feels like I'm catching up with a good friend. I want to say how's the boys? Do you still have that? The crown that says I'm a writer? Is that still in your? Oh, I have to do it.
Speaker 2:I have to do it. I am an offer crown that my son gave me.
Speaker 1:I absolutely do Awesome.
Speaker 2:Yeah, no, that is in my special mark. Yeah.
Speaker 1:That one I'm not letting go of. Oh, I love it, I love it. So, about how long have you been doing your life coaching and when did you take the leap? So talk to me a little bit about that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so two and a half years ago, wow, so we made the transition.
Speaker 1:I made the transition.
Speaker 2:I say because it's a family tradition. You know that's when I made the transition to starting, you know, really working on the joyfulness with just side of things, so motivating and supporting others.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, I love that so much and when I've been reading your book and I feel like so much of what you've been sharing about yourself and your journey, it resonates with me. I know it's going to resonate with you, know, my people, the listeners as well, with our community, but it just resonates with me so much. There's a lot of different themes that just really spoke to me. But before I kind of, like you know, share some of the things that like my key takeaways, first of all, let's talk a little bit about your book. If you want to share, you know you're the author of Soul Salaries, so tell us a little bit about your book. And I want to kind of go high overview of the four steps and I've been doing some of those exercises myself, so I want to share some of the things that I've been learning about myself through this journey. Oh, I would love to hear that.
Speaker 2:Oh my gosh, I can't wait to hear that. So the book is actually number one bestseller.
Speaker 1:Congratulations first of all.
Speaker 2:Amazing, I'm so excited so yes, very happy about that.
Speaker 2:But it is called Soul Salary S-O-U-L and it is the. It's four profoundly impactful steps to aligning your time and energy with what feels joyous and fulfilling. That's the long sometimes, but that gives you an idea of what you're talking about, sonya, with the four steps. But the Soul Salary kind of has the concept of salary, which we all understand what a salary is, what paychecks are, what bills are. So it uses that concept. But it's talking about what you pay your soul, not the financial salary you earn from your job. It's really what you're paying yourself and your soul and I define that as you know. Soul Salary is the value your soul receives when your time and energy are in alignment with what feels joyous and fulfilling. So that's the value of Soul Salary and the four steps really start, you know, with a precursor. So I start with. You know you need to demand minimum wage and I say it's the long.
Speaker 2:So, like the very first thing is, you are the CEO of your life. If you're not paying yourself minimum wage what I mean by that is if you're not meeting your basic needs I say you need to start here before you can move on to the next four steps and you know basic basic. You know sleep, food, you know just some basic needs that are emotional, physical, mental, and then you can move on to the four steps and we also start with a baseline what is your soul salary?
Speaker 2:So, we see like right now are you in minimum wage, Are you a middle class, Are you higher in soul salary? So I start with that quiz. I know you'll link it in the notes, but it is, you know, wwwjesuscascovcom. So easy, quick, frequent. If you don't want to buy the book and commit yet, you can start there.
Speaker 2:Four steps. The very first one is identify your paychecks, and this is soul, salary paychecks, right? So this is what brings you joy, what brings you fulfillment, and I found through my clients that a lot of people don't even know that right. They haven't done the reflection to see what is what fills me up, aka what's my paycheck. So you don't know what to ask for or to go towards if you haven't done the work on what is actually what actually fills me up.
Speaker 2:So that's the first step. The second step is to give yourself raises and promotions. So this is increase your paycheck A raise. For example, when I started my journey towards the dimmer swidge onto joyfulness with Jess, I pitched a part-time arranger with my company, and so that for me was a raise. And I joke in my book that in order to increase my soul salary, I decreased my financial salary, so that was a raise to me. It was actually doing less hours at my corporate job.
Speaker 2:A promotion is something bigger. It's not that low hanging fruit. It's something that scares the heck out of you. So for me, this was really like actually quitting the corporate job and going into 100% entrepreneurship. That was a promotion to myself. So step two is giving yourself raises and promotions to increase your paychecks. Step three is bills. We need to identify bills, and this is not as fun, right.
Speaker 2:It's really fun to say like oh, what are my paychecks? Not as fun, in step three, to say what is draining One of those bills taking away from my soul and my energy and my time. And I really lovingly named these joy killers and soul suckers Perfect.
Speaker 2:So the joy killers are what are keeping you from feeling joy, which are truly other people's expectations and your own, out of alignment expectations for yourself. So those are things that are not authentic to you, that you've taken on. And then soul suckers are really your limiting beliefs and fears. So those are what's keeping you from feeling fulfilled. So you're not doing that fulfilling work because you are fearful or you have a limiting belief about it yeah.
Speaker 2:The second step is budgeting and budget cuts. So this is reducing your bills, so budgeting are smaller steps than low hanging through. Just like raises are to paychecks, budgeting is to those, one of those smaller steps you could take to eliminate, delegate, add fun, to reduce some of those bills. And the second part is budget cuts, which again are the things that scare the hell out of you. They're big steps and then, basically, you keep going through these steps until you feel like you are at high earner stands.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's the goal right, right, it's the goal. But you also could say you know middle upper, middle classes right, yeah.
Speaker 1:Like you don't have to get all the way to higher earner right.
Speaker 2:It could just be where, a place where you feel wonderful.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, definitely. And when I think about like just that high earner status for me when it comes to my soul salary, it really does feel like a place of true authenticity. It feels like a place of me, you know, having taken doing the scary things, the uncomfortable things, taking the leap and really just you know not saying that everything will be perfect, you know, when you're that high achieving soul earner, but it's just in the place where you're honoring, like that inner voice you are, you know. So it resonated with me. But I want to go back to like the precursor right, because I feel like this is the step that sometimes people miss. And demanding, demanding minimum wage, right.
Speaker 1:The basic needs, and you know, it's one of those things that I think, like you know, I don't know, maybe even some of the people that you've worked with as well or just in general, like it's, I feel, like it's, you know, we, we think about I want to get to a place where I feel good, you know, I want to get to a place of the all those things.
Speaker 1:But the basic needs, that's not the things. That is like shiny, it's not the things, these are the things that, like the sleep, you know, are you taking care of your body? Um, can you talk to us a little bit about you know, first of all, do you think that's common, that a lot of times we do try to like skip over that precursor of like just really demanding you know, those non-negotiable the, the, the basic needs, and what happens? What's the risk when you try to like skip that part and just go to the you know, to the other things and try to get to the top of the pyramid, like if we think about, you know, the mass of hierarchy of needs. I love that you, you know, illustrated that in the book. But talk to me a little bit about you know about that, what your thoughts are about that?
Speaker 2:Wow, I mean, I think the risk we'll start. There is extreme burnout, right, if you're in a it's not even just physical, like you're talking about sleep and it actually is, but it's also if you're in a mental crisis and emotional crisis, like that has to be addressed before trying to keep doing, doing, doing and adding and subtracting and um, it can be done in parallel but, I prefer, you know, start there and get the support you need.
Speaker 2:And I think one way to look at it, sonia, is if you can't recover from your day within your day, or at least recover from your week within your week, you are on the way to burnout, because you're you're losing momentum every week. If you can't recover from your week within the week, so you are on the path to burnout.
Speaker 1:If you can't do, that that's a perfect way.
Speaker 2:And I think with parents, thank you, and I think with parents especially um, that's where I see a lot of basic needs not being met is like oh, I have to take care of the household, the kids, the activities, the, the, the, you know, add whatever you want in here. Um, and I, I think my challenge is I take care of my family and myself. Yeah, Right, it's not, and then it's and myself.
Speaker 2:Yes, um, and what's really interesting in these quiz results is it's actually quite varied. I've done like multiple groups where I've like aggregated their quiz results and it's so interesting because it actually is pretty, um, even across the. So I in the quiz sorry, I'll leave it back up there are three subcategories. You also get ranked on basic needs, joy and fulfillment, and what's so interesting about it is it's about a third, a third, a third for people like like about a third are in minimum wage for basic needs. About a third, you know, our minimum or lower middle class in joy, and then same with fulfillment.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And it's actually quite interesting because, um, you know, you just don't expect it to be so varied, but it's not. It's definitely not everyone not meeting their basic needs. Um, yeah, it's really interesting and sometimes there people are minimum wage across the board Sometimes they're all three depending on the, the subcategory.
Speaker 1:So that really kind of helps people go to which chapter you know, that's so interesting and I love the way that you put it, where if you can't recover from your day within your day, you know, or within you know from your week within your week, and vice versa is kind of like you are, you know, you might be at the edge of of burnout right there.
Speaker 1:And I can definitely say like personally, from experience as well, too. I love how you phrase it that way. It's because sometimes we get through these really busy stints or these times or these periods, and I think one thing that I've been working to do is really disrupt this idea that have to, you know, serve everyone else first or I have to just push through right, don't even, um, meeting my needs, like I actually have needs that are emotional, physical, you know, sorry, I don't, didn't expect this, but getting a little, you know talking about it, because you can go past all of the things and not even if you have a bad habit of didn't expect to get emotional here, but, um, this is. But you know, I'm learning, I think honor, like you know, that voice and what's happening, um, go ahead.
Speaker 2:You were right. Such a beautiful thing that the tears like actually are a release to something needs to be released. I always think that, like, it's an energy release of like, oh, this is a realization and it's also like I've wanted to release it through tears. And I think it's interesting that you're like thank you for being horrible, first of all, and and I think you know one thing that you're kind of alluding to and maybe you know, maybe- I put words around, but you know, feel free to interrupt, but um is self-trust.
Speaker 2:It's trusting that you will take care of your body, your mind and emotion, and your body doesn't trust that. And when you continue to not meet those, your body stops trusting you. And so there is a saying I have in the book, which is if you don't make time for your wellness, you'll be forced to make time for your illness. Happened to me, happened to me, happened to a lot of people. Not just burnout we're talking about, we're talking about mental illness, we're talking about physical ailments. You know, it's truly that important.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, so true, this has really been. It's been a good experience going through some of these practices and reflections and I love how you talk about for you one of the things that you do is like having that me time, you journal right and like just that reflection. I think part of you know when I think, and I know we'll talk about like legacy statement, but I think right now, even though I'm like going through my iterations in the book friends she has, she talks about a legacy statement where you are actually writing. I'll let you explain it. Tell us what the legacy statement is and I'm going to tell you kind of what the season that I'm in and like maybe my temporary. I know that I'm going through iterations of it, but I feel like I kind of got a legacy statement that I'm working on and working through. Hence the tears. But go ahead. What is a legacy statement?
Speaker 2:No, the legacy statement is the paychecks around. Fulfillment when you know what your purpose is in this, in this moment, doesn't have to be life purpose right. What do I feel? Authentic to me, of what I want to leave people around me feeling and myself feeling. That's a fulfillment. I call it a legacy statement because people understand legacy, but it truly is a fulfillment goal.
Speaker 2:Right, and so if your legacy statement sounds like too profound, it's truly just a fulfillment goal right or like something you want to do to feel fulfilled, and I also had multiple iterations on it and, like some of them, were very much like in my moments. One of my first ones was take care which was like take care of myself. I said self care, self love self trust. That was the first one. I needed to start my minimum wage right.
Speaker 1:Yes, yes, I love that I wrote down and like obviously this isn't perfect. I love the exercises because this is about progress and not perfection, right, because we start to go deep and get to know ourselves and the journey that we are on. It's just about taking steps right and even giving a shot and trying. So I'm going to share what I think in this season has been kind of like my legacy statement, and so it is to know my voice, to use my voice and to give voice to others. And that's not a perfect, I feel like give voice to others, not necessarily giving voice to others, allowing space and holding space for people to use their voice, to own their truth and to know and get in tune with their voice. But I think for me, 2023 has really been the year of the voice.
Speaker 1:I think, for a lot of times, the situations I found myself in where I kind of like silenced or there was things that held me back from just speaking not only my truth, but just speaking up, share my opinion, sharing my perspective perfect, imperfect or just whatever right and I really wanted to push out, but part of this process of me sharing my voice, using my voice, really takes me.
Speaker 1:It takes me getting to know my voice and like that is the thing. Like you, for me I don't know if maybe people can, you know, just use your voice without actually taking the time to reflect. But I found that in order for me to really use my voice, in order for me to own my voice, I actually have to take time to deeply reflect and know what my voice is saying, what my inner voice is telling me. You know what I actually want, right? Like what I actually think about it, right? And so I've been even questioning, like things like you know what I want to default to? No, what do you think or what do you want to do? Like I actually pause and instead of trying to access that to someone, I just try to get into it myself and say what do I want, right, or what do I think, and then I start voicing you know those things, but for me, that's so profound.
Speaker 2:That's so profound to be honest to say I want to, yeah, versus like I should say this no, I want to and I desire to say this and that's what I believe.
Speaker 1:And thank you so much. I think part of it is that for a long time, I haven't given space to my voice, which led to not having boundaries, you know, which led to me not asking for what I wanted. Also, too, as you mentioned earlier, I didn't ask for what I want because I didn't really take the time to get to know what it is that I truly wanted you know. So, like I think that step and when you were sharing that is so important to actually getting to know what you really want, a lot of times we just go through like the motions but don't actually pause and like say what do you want, what do I want?
Speaker 2:Right, and so anyways, the amount of us on autopilot, yes, the amount of us on autopilot. I mean, I was on autopilot.
Speaker 1:Mm-hmm.
Speaker 2:I love the I want and also it's I mean yes, right. So it's like I need to ask for what I want, but I also need to ask for what I need.
Speaker 1:Yes, yes, yeah. I have this episode where I share, you know, this really vulnerable time in my life where things weren't, where things were just really, really hard and like sometimes it was just one basic question. I didn't have a lot of time in the journal, I didn't have a lot of time with that, but what I did have I knew I was in a place and need to come out and I would ask myself this one basic question what do I need to be okay today? Like what do I simply need to just be okay, right, and like the thing is that you can go outside and everybody, no one can know that you, because I think, as a mom, we've been conditioned or just as not even just as a mom, but you know, sometimes we can just be conditioned to always be on.
Speaker 1:Look, I used to work for Disney, okay, and one of the saying saying was you know, you're always on stage. So I think like that was one of the things that like, no matter what, you don't bring your problems to the job, you don't bring it to the, you know you don't bring it to the stage, you know when you. Oh, there's a wonderful mask.
Speaker 2:Yes, a beautiful mask, everything's fine.
Speaker 1:I have this control, I'm all good.
Speaker 2:Yes, yes, because it feels weak or something. It just feels like like admitting that you can't do it all feels like a failure. For me at least that's what it felt like. So for years I went on that mantra of like work, like you don't parent like you don't want like what you're saying, you know, is basically like oh, I'm working my butt off and we'll just pretend like I don't have children.
Speaker 1:Right and. I'm lopping my.
Speaker 2:You know I'm lopping my butt off, but I'm just going to pretend like I don't have like work.
Speaker 1:Right Over here. You guys didn't want this and eventually it's not going to happen.
Speaker 2:I mean, you can't do that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, definitely not sustainable. Right, like that is not, yeah, and like I think the beauty is is like when you say that is embracing, you know I both at the same time, all at once. You know I am this, but I'm also this. I am this and there you go, that's it right. There I am. You know this and I am this. You know, fill in the blank, whatever those things are Right and it's just so powerful and I love your language is so important.
Speaker 2:I love how you just took that moment as well, too Right and just like it's the end, right, so uh well, you know, I wrote the book, I need it, so yeah, so, like I've been, through similar inversions as anyone is going to do it because I also went through this book and honestly helped me quit my job because I started doing the exercises you know, but it also helped me realize what do I need and doing that first and then where am I at and you know I, so I totally get the journey and the vernacular or something I've had to understand.
Speaker 1:Yeah, my growth. Yes, right, so good, so good. I love it. Write the book that you need it, that you need it. Um, I love that. I feel like in this book as well, too, we get to see that this was part of your journey. Is that is that, do you think? Would you? Is that um accurate um that I you know?
Speaker 2:I feel like I see a lot of examples of like real time. You know, like this was happening as I was writing. You know, and and there's even some in there that are pretty vulnerable, like I talk about my soul, my limiting beliefs and fears were too big for me to tackle by myself.
Speaker 1:I went to therapy. Yes.
Speaker 2:Went to therapy and that was something that was also a minimal wage thing for me. Mentally, I really needed the support, um, but also as far as a bill went, I was. I had so many things I needed to work through. And herbal working through is really what I do. I like to talk through it.
Speaker 2:Talk about using your voice right, sonya, like for me it's talking through it and for me a safe place was was my was a therapist, and so you know there's no shame in asking for that help and getting it, and that's one way I work through my bills.
Speaker 1:I love it. I love it Definitely like shout out to therapy. Okay, like I'm right there with you. Okay, look, close this door. We need to talk, right, I love that. I love that. Okay, can I share one of the?
Speaker 1:The exercise that it just brought me so much joy. It was like the first one, but I actually got down and I struggled in my being back and when we talk about the I am statements, right, and I actually went because I love that you share, when you know you're a sparkly like a rosé like, but, yes, I love that so much. That encouraged me. Like I always try to keep you know Cards and like I actually have a kudos like folder that I go to, but I don't often Revisit it, like to just you know, sometimes, when I need to, I go for encouraging work, but I actually with when you shared that about yourself and the activity of writing our I am Satan is actually went and it was so refreshing. You brought me so much joy. Like this was like a soul, you know, I felt like I was paying my soul right there and I actually wrote down like some of the things that like common threads and some of the things that I see, and so can I share some of those with you.
Speaker 2:I thought it was so fun.
Speaker 1:One of the things that I saw is that you know and these were the words, like I took the words as was You're a safe place.
Speaker 1:So you know I'm a safe place. You know, and I've actually saw that from multiple, multiple some it was co-workers and some it was friends, but I've seen this theme and it was you are a safe person or you are a safe place, you know, and like that just meant so much. Like you know, when I was reading through these things, I started to like tear up and then I another one that I saw was you are the calm, and I started going back through all of these like different emails and things that I keep in. You know, and I'm seeing that like that is a thing, like that is the theme. So it was you know, I'm a safe place, I'm the calm. I had this one where someone put you are the Empress of empathy. I was like whoa, I never until I did that exercise, like I hadn't really even took that in and like let that soak in, but I was like the Empress of that needs to be on the wall.
Speaker 1:Yes, I got it right up here on my wall. I wrote down these things and you know, not only did I write it on my list, but I wrote it on my like whiteboard in my wall, just for those reminders that I need right. And so Someone said you are the definition of composure. Someone said you're like the. I put sure of wisdom because it was like you. They kept saying like you share wisdom, I'm like the share of wisdom. So I put like the share of there on, but mentor, coach, coach, true leader. Then there was the empathetic like you're like empathy. I kept seeing that empathetic, relatable.
Speaker 1:And then this was another one, like the light in in Blair my eyes. So that's it. It was you're the rising tide that raises the rise in tide that raises Other boats around you. And like I'm like, oh my goodness, first of all, shout out to the person who wrote that you know who you are. Like I think it's just you're very generous with your words. And like wrote that so eloquently, but like I love what that was saying about me. And so, anyways, I took some of those things and it felt good to read those words that others had wrote to me, what others delete, like my superpower was and just different things that you know cards. I started to open up cards, like, went to the box, bringing it and getting up the car. So that was just like a fun Exercise for me and I encourage everyone to do that, like when you do this exercise, like pull open the cars, the letters, the Emails and all the different things it was. So it was fun. Well, and it's, it's interesting to.
Speaker 2:You know you're giving credit to these people, which is wonderful. They wrote it and you wrote it down, so you believe it about. Yes, yes, right, so it helps you believe it about yourself and maybe those tears were also remembering.
Speaker 1:That is yeah, right.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and I'm not. Yes, actually might be the better word yeah acknowledging that is yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, because if you wrote it down, you know it was applicable. Right, yeah, this, and prison and empathy. Yes, look, I'm gonna t-shirt who's that I'm the imprecise, I'm the Empress of empathy and most Get it, get a crown yeah. I Am.
Speaker 2:You know, and it's, it's, it's so cool that you have those yeah, no look at the children. Oh, and I was insane is your I am list. I would say 75% of those align with your legacy statement. Have you noticed that I can know?
Speaker 1:what I did not I.
Speaker 2:I didn't make that connection empathy yet, wow, yeah, safe place, empathy, calm, you know, there are so many things in there that were actually aligned with your legacy.
Speaker 1:Oh, thanks for seeing that connection, because I definitely Didn't see it. So I appreciate you making that connection for me. Oh, this is just been such a good conversation. Oh, my goodness, I'm like you know, I know I really really appreciate you coming on here and, like, I just really Want and I know that a lot of the listeners, like we're also on this journey too.
Speaker 1:You know we call it creating our best work life. Yet, right, it's actually a work life that actually works for you and part of that is, like you know, being authentic, finding the things, like you say, that lights, you know, your soul on fire, like doing the things. That feels Fulfilling, and it's a journey. It's, you know, a process to get there. And I'm so grateful that you answered the call, that you took the leap right, and I really believe that your, your, your book and your message is going to continue to impact a Lot of people to know that, like there's a way, like there's a life that you can create, and it doesn't always have to be this.
Speaker 1:You know, like, because you talk about you know, I feel like some of it is like the steps and then some of it is like the leaps right, and I think you know. So, when I was like going through, I started to think about what are the little, the steps that I can take. Now, you know, like raises and promotions, like I look at the raises as, like you know, these steps, what are the things that I can do to start taking steps to? You know this place? And then the promotion is like, okay, this big this, this leaps that I want to take and you know there's a lot of leaps that's on my heart that I want to take but you know, thinking about what are the raises, that's really yeah, I think.
Speaker 2:And then the promotions chapter is really fun because we ask questions that are. I ask questions that are very. Yeah, and that's where you get the crazy, yeah and I put crazy parentheses, because our quotation, because you know it's. It might feel crazy to write it down but truly it is underlying a thing you want to do.
Speaker 1:Yes, oh, so good, so good. I'm still, you know, like I've read the whole book and I'm still going through and like letting the activities, like doing and like really sink in, because I think there's just so much you know in this and I know, like this was like the call, this is the you know, the thing that you're doing, you are, this is the joyfulness with Jess, right, this is how you know. I believe that you know, taking the steps in this book is going to help us, is going to help people actually get closer to creating that joy. And that goes with your legacy statement, like you know, the legacy statement that you you may have made a lot of iterations to get to, but it was like the impactful, like I'll, you can say your own, but you know, but it's in the book. Go ahead, say it. If you know it. If you know it, yeah Well.
Speaker 2:I know it. My goal is to be a profound I thought leader that inspires the world to profound joys of it. So that I make a profound impact on the world by um like, give everyone a path to join.
Speaker 1:Yes, yes, and that's it right there. That's it right there the path to joy. And I really, really believe that, like this book is going to do that and part of just like what we do in the podcast and your style is so you know it just really resonates with me because I just, you know it's about, you know, inspiration, but then there's also the actionable steps and, like in this book, you lay it out. I feel like you're very vulnerable in this book. I feel like I got to know you, but I also feel like there's the coach in there as well too. That's walking you through step by step, like how to get there, the right kind of prompts, the right kind of open, you know questions, so that it can get our thinking in the right way, right To get the most out.
Speaker 1:So, like I want to encourage y'all friends like I don't always say this, you know, get this book, okay, and I'm not just saying that because you're here, like honestly, like I feel like this is a book and I think it needs to know to. You know, create a life that's actually in line with what their soul desires, right, because there's so much you talk about intentions versus expectations. We can be on here all day and I'm not going to do that because I feel like everything that you need is in this book, friends, like the intention versus expectations, right, and in order for us to really get to that place and creating, like you know, that joy and that online life, like there's just some great exercise and activities. That's, I believe, will help us to get there. So, thank you for saying yes to the work, thank you for saying yes to being a guest. Okay, this is so profound.
Speaker 1:No, we only gave a high overview of the steps, but I know that everybody can get and like go into this book and go into the activities and actually do the work Like this. Really, I hope this conversation inspires people to do the work. Tell us, first you know where we can find you, where we can find the book, friends, yeah, yeah and where we can find the quiz. Remind us I'm going to put it all in the link in the show notes, but go ahead, I want you to use this floor. How can someone work with you? How can they find you? Floor is yours friend.
Speaker 2:No, thank you so much. Yeah, thank you so much and honestly, like you know, you talked about coaching. I feel like I'm making a mass coaching through the book, so that really you know that's been really cool for me is because I said I wanted to make a profound impact on the world. One-to-one coaching is great, but I really wanted to use the book to coach others without necessarily having to be there right, it's the book.
Speaker 2:So thank you for saying that. That really warms my heart. But you can find the book on Amazon and that you know it's under SoulSallery and under Jess Cascov. The biggest thing I would say is start with the quiz, like I mentioned earlier, because that will help give you like a baseline. So you'll see like, hey, where do I need to support myself? And then, when you get the book, if you can't do every chapter right away, go to the chapters that align with your quiz results, right. So it's a basic need, it's a choice of fulfillment and start there. So the quiz again is wwwJessCascovcom slash SoulSallery. That's a free quiz, it takes about two minutes, awesome, awesome.
Speaker 1:Well, thank you so much. I'll make sure, friends, to put that in the show notes. Take the quiz, get the book, read it, do the exercises. I really believe that this will change your life. It definitely has impacted mine and I'm so, so grateful for you, jess, thanks again.
Speaker 2:I loved this conversation. I loved the vulnerability. It was very magical.
Speaker 1:So thank you so much. You're so welcome. Thank you Well, all right, friends, we are going to wrap this up, and you already know how I end this show right. Until next time, friends, remember there's so much more to you than the work that you do. Own your work. Don't network on you. All right, friends.