Speaker: 00:00:02

Hi, Laurel.

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Welcome to the show.

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I am so honored to be with you on your very first podcast.

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It's so exciting.

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Thank you for having me.

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It's my honor.

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You've been a huge influence in my life and the wisdom and support that you bring to me

and to everyone that you interact with is a blessing.

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thank you.

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All right.

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So let's dive in.

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When you think about your life and work and the inflection points that changed your

trajectory,

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What feels like the right moment to enter into your story?

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Well, what's on my mind and heart today is I'm going to be 34 years sober next month, this

month, this month on September 20th.

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So I think actually stepping into my first AA meeting was an inflection point for my life

and my career.

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Huge inflection point.

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Say why it was a huge, AA and getting sober is a huge inflection point for life.

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Absolutely.

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Tell me how it connected with your career.

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Well, up until that point, and while I was getting sober, I was living out my

14-year-old's dream, which was being a hospitality executive.

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So I pretty much started when I was in junior high thinking about how I could run the

Waldorf Astoria someday.

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And uh at that point in my career, I was part of an international group.

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as the VP of Human Resources, I was doing well professionally.

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And at the same time, dealing with my eating disorder and alcoholism was not really a

great match for hospitality and running around the world and being in airports and

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drinking free and first class and all those things.

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So um I really...

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had to figure out a way away from hospitality and figure out a way to make a living um in

a way that was honoring of my spirit and my talents.

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Yeah.

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So sobriety.

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So that's interesting.

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The realization you had was, hey, this career is incompatible with me living a sober life

and with me living a healthy life.

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especially in early sobriety, because you really, it's a little more intense.

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uh You know, after 34 years, I can be in lots of situations and know that I'm not gonna

drink, but when you're really trying to get sober, it's tougher when you're around alcohol

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all the time.

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Yeah, it is.

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I'm almost five years sober now and uh the holidays are still tough.

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They're still tough.

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Most of the rest of the year is OK, but the holidays, there's a there's a you feel the

impulse come up.

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Well, I do not you.

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I do.

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uh OK, yeah.

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I do.

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It's not completely gone.

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It's really not.

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It's, you know, I feel like it's embedded in me through generations of drinkers and

drinking and holidays and it doesn't really go away entirely.

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No, it's embedded through generations and then society just supports it, reinforces it,

makes it makes it a double challenge.

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Okay, so you had this realization, can't do this career anymore, so what happened then?

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Well, I focused on getting sober despite that.

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I mean, I remember I was newly sober and I was about to go on my first long...

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business trip and I went to an AA meeting and I was thinking this AA thing's not going to

work for me because I have to get on an airplane and go to parties.

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uh And the speaker in the meeting was an airline attendant who had been sober for 20

years, you know, and had been passing out drinks.

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So that was also like a god shot as we might call it um to, yeah, you could do this.

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So I did

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complete working at that company well.

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And I remained sober, but I was able to be part of a sale of a company and make some money

and figure out what to do next.

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So it all coincided with my spiritual journey and my professional journey and then making

a huge pivot, you know, a couple of years into my sobriety after we sold the company that

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I was part of.

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Okay, pause for a moment.

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What's a God shot?

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A shot is for me, it's like a God wink.

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It's like, it's like if you're paying attention, there's clues or direction, good orderly

direction, sometimes we call it.

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um So yeah, it was sort of, yeah, this lay, if this wonderful woman can be sober for 20

years and pass out drinks every day, you can get on a plane and not drink.

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Yeah, it's sometimes the power of actually meeting a living example is huge.

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makes the possibility real.

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I love that good orderly direction.

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God, God shot.

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Okay.

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so you had a little bit of money from the sale.

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You were, you're getting your legs under you with your sobriety.

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You were figuring out what's next.

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Now you have said that you went on a Lakota vision quest and from that came the seed and

the vision for what was next.

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Tell us first of all, what is a Lakota Vision Quest?

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What's that like?

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Well, in my in my experience and story the AA experience was connected to the Lakota

Vision Quest because I actually met someone who's become one of my very best friends in AA

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and she was going to do this thing called Vision Quest and I didn't really know what I was

getting myself into but I just kind of I wanted to be her friend I felt like I was in high

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school in early AA I was like I want that girl to be my friend so I was like

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vision quest with you, but I didn't know what I was doing.

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uh I ended up arriving at a ceremony with a hundred people.

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Some of them were full-blood Lakota people from South Dakota.

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There was lots of people from all over the country and all over the world, and they were

practicing traditional Lakota ceremonies.

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It was the vision of a group of Lakota chiefs that they would teach their ceremonies to

lots of people in lots of different races and it would heal the races.

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um So I fell into this path and I was a visitor, a respectful visitor and participant for

many years um in Lakota traditional ceremonies sanctioned by Lakota people.

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And a vision quest is one of their ceremonies where you find your place in the tribe.

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In my case, it was not uh a traditional Lakota tribe, but my place in the world, really.

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And in that process, yes, I had this vision for something at the time that was called

Career Camp that's evolved into Compassionate Leaders Circle.

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I attribute my business and the creation of my business to that ceremony

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So if you could describe in a line a sentence or two what your place in the world is as a

result of that experience, what is it?

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What came to you?

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em Translating ancient wisdom into modern practical practices that connect people beyond

jobs into calling or what we call soul work.

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Now I've had the honor uh of being a participant in your work as well as being a guide for

others.

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uh And you talk about soul work.

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Tell us a little bit about what is soul work?

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How does that show up?

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What's the work that Compassionate Leaders Circle is doing in that realm?

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you for the question and thank you for being uh my partner in this process for so many

years.

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It's been, I actually flashed on you going to graduate school and me talking to you from a

vision quest on my cell phone, which I wasn't supposed to be on.

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So you and I have had a long, interesting journey, but soul work, the way that I define

soul work is the absolute best use of your passions and purpose.

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And that can be volunteer pursuits, family pursuits, vocational pursuits.

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Soul work is different for everyone.

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But it's sort of that thing that you're meant to do, you can't help doing.

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I mean, I really think of being on the journey with you through motherhood, like

motherhood for you was a calling and uh for me not, but aunthood is my family calling.

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So it's honoring these pursuits and these paths and these relationships in a deeper way.

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Yeah, we love Auntie Laurel here.

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I love your son Cormac.

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Aww.

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okay, so.

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So you've had you got sober, you went on the vision quest, your place in the world became

clear, and you built a business around it.

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And so this business has had many iterations, and you as a person and as a shepherd and

midwife of it, a leader of it, a guide for it.

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As you think about the iterations over the years and the versions of Laurel over the

years, where, what's a, what's a, uh a point in time where you were really stretched as a

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result because of the business?

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Tell us about that.

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I'm reminded of a time when I was living in my sister-in-law and brother's apartment in

Austin, Texas.

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This business and these learning models took me a lot longer and cost me a lot more in

time and money than I thought they would.

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It involved graduate school and iterations and writing and research and traveling.

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And um so I decided to step away from my business and look for a job.

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And I help

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people every day get jobs.

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I'm a career coach.

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I'm really good at resumes and interviewing and teaching other people how to interview.

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And I applied for 400 jobs and I got to a very cool job at the time I thought it was a

cool job, but I'm so grateful I didn't get it.

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I was uh one of two candidates for a director of training.

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for Facebook and the job was in Austin and Ireland and I love Ireland.

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um And I convinced myself that it was my dream job and I didn't get it.

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After a long time of doing everything I thought I could do to get a job, I realized that I

already had a job and it was my company and I had to re-choose my company.

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um I think there's also something real about after being an entrepreneur for so many

years, I think um it's really hard to go back to the structure.

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Long term, it was such a blessing I didn't get that job because since then I've learned a

lot about Facebook and part of my mission personally and professionally is to support

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children and support teens and uh what Facebook has done with their algorithms is

appalling and not really aligned with my...

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my principles so I'm very glad I work for myself and not for Facebook but um this is a

common story with entrepreneurs.

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There's many times where you risk so much of time and money and ah sometimes you do have

to do other things for money while you're building your business and I have done that but

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in this case it was I think another god shot.

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You know, the universe was saying, have something else to do and it's not this.

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m Yeah, it reminds me of that phrase, know, when uh it's like, or the image that's coming

to mind is there's a brick wall and you we keep it's when we're beating against the brick

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wall trying to make something happen or get to the other side of that.

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And if we just looked over towards our right, we would see a window.

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that had an opening and all we had to do is maybe lift the window a bit and then there's a

there's a path for us.

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Yeah.

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Um, well, okay.

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So you've worked with many people over the years when a client has that experience of, and

you're highly intuitive.

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I know this about you.

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And when a client is.

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when a client is committed to a path that is not that they're continually getting the

feedback, no this isn't it, this isn't it, this isn't it, ah how do you help them?

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How do you support someone in that way?

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Well, our work really reflects and mirrors a vision quest.

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It's not a traditional vision quest, but it is a process about tapping into spirit and

tapping into imagination and tapping into creativity and tapping into humanness.

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So one thing my clients have the advantage of that I did not at the time is they have a

partner in thinking and guiding, right?

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So I remember even thinking at that low point, like, I need a career coach like me to

guide me through.

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I did have some really wonderful therapists and um spiritual guides.

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um But when I can't point out to a client that they're having trouble, you know, or that

is the wrong path, I have to help them through a process where they

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more than anything understand where the windows are.

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Right?

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So part of our process is just opening up to possibilities that we may not have been able

to see on our own and exploring lots and lots of options.

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You know, in my case, one of the options, which I was for a while not willing to look at

was you can make your own business work.

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Right?

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So for my clients and for the people like yourself who is a practitioner of our method, we

may have some very clear ideas or intuitions about what our clients should do, but we have

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to lead from behind and we have to help them get there without us getting too far ahead of

them.

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Right.

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Well, and, and your pro, so your methodology, um, it has three phases, uh, past, present,

and future.

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And what I've come to really wholeheartedly trust is in the process.

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So, you know, as a coach, if when I'm guiding someone through the methodology, what I love

about it is when I have those moments.

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And I, every coach has these moments of like,

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I want them to go faster.

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I want them to see this or is this gonna work?

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Right?

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There's a there's a niggle of a doubt.

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my god.

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Is this gonna work for them?

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I really want this to work for them.

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And then I remember, okay, the methodology has wisdom in it.

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It has been crafted and refined over decades.

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And I have seen it work over and over and over again.

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And when I say work, it's

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It could be that someone re- falls in love with their work the work that they have and so

there doesn't need to be a transition or it could be that they're gonna meet the moment

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and find the courage to jump into being an entrepreneur or or it's stepping into a bigger

vision for themselves as a leader whatever it looks like.

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yeah.

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I think one of my favorite cases is someone who had their own business and realized they

wanted a corporate job.

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Right?

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Like, there's lots of ways to find soul work and it may be surprising.

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But yeah, even as the author of the process, it is wiser than I am.

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It's more patient than I am.

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It's and it is really truly connected to ancient wisdom that is beyond

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It may not make sense, but it works.

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Mm Well, I think it makes sense and it works.

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Okay, so, as you think about what's what's stretching you now in your business, in your

career.

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Well, in my life and in my business and in my country, what's challenging me now is what's

going on with the world and what's going on with my country.

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And entrepreneurs always face changes that are beyond their control.

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You know, it could be COVID.

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It could be shifts in the market.

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So what is challenging me now is looking at the reality of the American economy right now

and uh pivoting the business into a place that we can do service and we can be profitable.

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So we had our best year in 2024 and we're having a very challenging year this year and

some of that is completely related to economic forces.

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education changes.

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One of our biggest plot pipelines um that we developed last year was in uh K through 12

schools.

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um so I actually get excited about resetting and redoing.

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So uh we're kind of pivoting back to consumers and helping people with their personal

purpose.

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not that we're going to stop doing uh bigger enterprise programs, but they seem to be slow

in coming.

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we're focusing on doing service for people who may be out of work or thinking about

whether they're going to have a job because of AI or all those questions that really

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impact a person's mental health and their family's financial health.

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Yeah, so we're challenged with how we're gonna make money for the rest of the year and

beyond.

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I'm kind of, you know, it took me a minute to figure out a new strategy, but now that we

have one, I'm kind of excited about it.

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love that.

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Now, you said you said a few things there that um

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that caught my, well, you said a lot that caught my attention, I'm curious as you're

pivoting, knowing that there is spirit and wisdom embedded in the methodology, what are

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some of your personal practices that help you stay aligned to spirit and ultimately helped

you make this decision to pivot?

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back to consumers.

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One of my big practices is traveling.

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um last year I was in London and Bath and I did some meditation and reflection and writing

about what the future of my company would be.

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And I made a decision to play in three different sandboxes at once and see what spirit

would throw back at me.

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So um

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My sandboxes and the company's structure right now is consumers, professionals, and

leaders who want to invest their own money in their development, organizations and

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universities that want to impact their students or staff or alumni, and K through 12,

which is really about not-for-profits and schools.

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And because I made that decision more than a year ago, we've been able to play out those

three scenarios and land with, okay, we're going to focus on consumers.

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So sometimes I think it's important not to choose, but to experiment and see, you know,

and that takes faith.

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You know, business consultants will say, you have to have your niche, you have to have

your focus, you have to have your plan.

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But

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in turbulent times, it doesn't really serve you.

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um And fortunately for me, I can hold a lot of things in my head and my heart at the same

time.

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yeah, and I think part of what we do in our business is go to where the pain is.

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you know, as compassionate people, we want to alleviate suffering.

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So I think in this world of AI and online,

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and all these things, people are sort of craving community, craving connection, and they

need more help than they think they need.

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So uh yeah, we're excited about continuing our other things, but focusing on how can we

serve the folks that are worried.

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One of the things I like to think about is, and even for myself personally, is turning

worry into wonder.

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So kind of to circle back, like, what are my practices?

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uh I recently wrote an article about the four steps to reset your professional purpose and

career direction.

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And I did that process for myself.

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And my purpose for the rest of the year is to make more money and have more fun.

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And that's it.

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And maybe have more fun comes first, because there's lots of ways to make money, uh

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but my team and I need to have more fun.

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More fun it is you've got four months make it happen you said You've mentioned AI a couple

of time and uh You know AI is one of those for me it's a worry it's also a tool and it's

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really interesting living.

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With the question the worry the wonder.

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In the moments where it doesn't feel like worry of okay how is this going to impact.

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Me and my family as well as the world uh but you know as a as a human I worry about my own

safety and my own thriving and my family's safety right so of course I'm gonna worry about

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okay is it gonna replace me.

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There could be no more coaching opportunities and I don't believe that's actually going to

happen at least not anytime like super soon.

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uh And it is it's just an interesting experience both living with the question of how is

this going to impact me and I'm not really gonna know if it's going to impact me in a very

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extremely negative way for a while now and.

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I'm also using it I'm learning about it and I'm using it every day.

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help me.

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What have you seen come up around AI with the work that you all are doing with clients.

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So many things, but a year ago I did a executive retreat and there was 20 people in the

room and I asked them how many, well first of all, gave them, I asked in the morning of

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that retreat day and I think I led two days, um I asked ChatGPT to write a paragraph about

the CEO of the company.

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And then in that morning I said, a friend of mine wrote this about your CEO.

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And I read it and I asked everyone, who do you think wrote that?

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And no one could guess.

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And then I told them.

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And even the director of marketing said, wow, that's really good.

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And then I asked them all, how many of you have ChatGPT on your phone?

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And one of them raised their hand and it happened to be the oldest person in the room,

which I thought was awesome.

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I doubt that if I did that same exercise with them that I'd have the same answer today,

right?

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And that's just in a year.

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So I think all of us in the world have a responsibility to

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learn about AI because it's here, it's beyond its coming, it's here.

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There's lots of implications.

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I think a lot of them are good and a lot of them are dangerous, but they're already

affecting, you know, I think there's been 25 million layoffs in this country this year

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already.

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And it's affecting everything.

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And the people that are resistant to it, I tell them,

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You know, not learning about AI and not using it and not learning the options is kind of

like me 30 years ago saying, I'm never going to use an ATM machine.

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I'm always going to cash my checks with a human.

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Right.

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We can see how that went.

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But I do think knowledge is power and there are gonna be a lot of jobs that are gonna be

eliminated by robots and AI.

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They're just are.

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um I'm not worried about myself because I think a lot of what I do is not really

replicable by a human.

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I mean, there's lots of people in our field and coaching and...

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leadership development that do believe that.

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But I'm choosing not to believe that.

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I'm choosing to believe that human conversations are healing and there's going to be an

element of folks that just want human connection and real people.

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um But I'm fascinated with it and my journey is just beginning.

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learning about it.

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Mm-hmm.

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Mm-hmm.

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Okay, more to come on AI.

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The conversation will continue, right?

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Yeah, I am actually interviewing someone who is a leader of a coding school and he has

this argument that we still need to teach coding.

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m So I'm excited about having that conversation with him and learning more.

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But I think embracing it and making the learning process as fun as possible is going to be

important for everyone who wants to survive

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this.

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Mm-hmm.

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Mm-hmm.

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Okay, so it's time to wrap up, reflect on the conversation that we've had today.

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And if there is one takeaway or line, phrase that our listener, that you want our listener

to take, what is that?

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I think returning to this idea of purpose is going to be only helpful.

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um So I would ask listeners to ask the question, why am I working?

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Because if you can answer that, then you have your purpose.

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And that can be different.

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For some people, it's to put my kids through college.

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For other people, it's creative expression.

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But ask yourself that question, and if you don't like the answer, change the answer.

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I love it.

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On that note, I think we should wrap.

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Laurel, thank you for your time.

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I've enjoyed this conversation and I can't wait until the next time we reconnect.

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Well, your listeners are very, very lucky.

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I'm excited about your podcast.