Evoke Greatness Podcast

Redefining Balance with Cherylanne Skolnicki

• Episode 144

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🎧 Episode 144:  Redefining Balance with Cherylanne Skolnicki

In this episode of Evoke Greatness, I welcome Cherylanne Skolnicki, founder of The Brilliant Balance Company and host of the top-rated Brilliant Balance podcast. From her 15-year corporate career at Procter & Gamble to becoming a successful entrepreneur, Cherylanne shares valuable insights about work-life balance, breaking free from perfectionism, and embracing our full potential.

We dive deep into:

  • The evolution from corporate executive to entrepreneur
  • Redefining what "having it all" really means
  • Breaking down the Supermom myth
  • Managing guilt while prioritizing self-care
  • Recognizing and preventing burnout
  • Building and maintaining meaningful relationships while pursuing ambitions
  • The future of women's leadership

🔑 Key takeaways:

  1. Balance isn't about perfect equilibrium - it's about having a big, full life with the freedom to enjoy it
  2. "Having it all" should be redefined as having whatever YOU want
  3. Guilt won't disappear - learn to feel it and take action anyway
  4. Early signs of burnout often manifest as apathy towards things that once excited you
  5. Choose connection over perfection in relationships
  6. The future of women's leadership requires letting go of doing everything ourselves

💡 Quotes to remember: 
"We have to feel the guilt and do it anyway." - Cherylanne Skolnicki on prioritizing self-care 
"The rigidity really is our enemy." - Cherylanne Skolnicki on maintaining balance

📚 Resources:

If you're seeking to redefine balance in your life, break free from perfectionism, or step into greater leadership, this episode offers practical wisdom and actionable insights from someone who's successfully navigated these challenges.

A rising tide raises all ships, and I invite you along on this journey to Evoke Greatness!

Check out my website: www.evokegreatness.com

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Speaker 1:

Welcome to Evoke Greatness. We are officially entering year three of this podcast and I am filled with so much gratitude for each and every one of you who've joined me on this incredible journey of growth and self-discovery. I'm Sunny, your host and fellow traveler on this path of personal evolution. This podcast is a sanctuary for the curious, the ambitious and the introspective. It's for those of you who, like me, are captivated by the champion mindset and driven by an insatiable hunger for growth and knowledge. Whether you're just beginning your journey or you're well along your path, you're going to find stories here that resonate with your experiences and aspirations. Over the last two years, we've shared countless stories of triumph and challenge, of resilience and transformation. We've laughed, we've reflected and we've grown together. And as we've evolved, so too has this podcast. Remember, no matter what chapter you're on in your own story, you belong here. This community we've built together is a place of support, inspiration and shared growth. Where intention goes, energy flows, and the energy you bring to this space elevates us all. So, whether you're listening while commuting, working out or enjoying your morning coffee, perhaps from one of those motivational mugs I'm so fond of, know that you're a part of something special. Thank you for being here. Thank you for your curiosity, your openness and your commitment to personal growth. As we embark on year three, I invite you to lean in, to listen deeply and to let these stories resonate with your soul. I believe that a rising tide raises all ships and I invite you along in this journey to evoke greatness.

Speaker 1:

Welcome back to another episode of Evoke Greatness. Today, we're joined by a true beacon of brilliance in the realm of personal and professional development. Please welcome Cheryl Ann Skolnicki, the founder of the Brilliant Balance Company and host of the top-rated Brilliant Balance podcast. Sherrilyn is a respected authority on well-being, work-life balance and unlocking human potential. With her Ivy League education and 15 years experience at Procter Gamble, she climbed the corporate ladder before forging her own path as a successful entrepreneur. As a trusted advisor to thousands of growth-oriented women and corporate leaders, sherilyn has become a voice of reason and a force for good in our often chaotic world. Her wisdom has reached millions through her podcast, social media channels, as well as features on major networks. Sherilynne's unique perspective on breaking the supermom myth, avoiding burnout and living lighter by shedding the weight of expectations has earned her numerous accolades, including being named one of Cincinnati's 100 Wise Women. Get ready to be inspired and empowered as we dive into a conversation with a woman who truly embodies what it means to evoke greatness Sherilyn welcome.

Speaker 2:

Oh, that was a lovely introduction. Thank you so much, oh you are so very welcome.

Speaker 1:

I am excited to have you on, to be going through so many areas of your expertise and insight as we jump into it. I would love to just start out by diving into some of your backstory. You made this transition from corporate executive to entrepreneur. What was that journey like, and was there like a pivotal moment for you along the way where you realized you wanted to kind of go about forging your own path there?

Speaker 2:

Yeah. So I think that I always say I was like the surprising entry into the entrepreneurship pond I really was. The role I was born to play was probably corporate executive, and that is where my career started. I was dutifully climbing a corporate ladder and I was on it for 15 years before I really felt the nudge to do something quite different and I did not know that this is the business I was going to start. I just knew that it was time to start something.

Speaker 2:

So famously inside of our community I've shared the story that I at one point literally contemplated starting like an artisan bakery because I wanted this retraction from a life that had become so big and global and digital and I just wanted to do something that made people happy and digital. And I just wanted to do something that made people happy. And I discarded that idea fairly quickly and started my first business in the health and wellness space. It was like I refer to it as my starter business. I did it for about five years and kind of figured out what it meant to be an entrepreneur, to build a team, to put some systems in place. And then I had another pivot which led to what is now Brilliant Balance. So Brilliant Balance has now been in something close to its current incarnation for about 10 years.

Speaker 1:

So the concept of Brilliant Balance is really central to your work. Let's peel back a little bit and kind of go a little deeper on. How do you define that? How has your understanding of balance evolved over the years?

Speaker 2:

Yeah, tremendously. I mean, I think I came of age in the generation where, you know, we were presented with this image of work-life balance. That was a scale, you know, the sort of the old school scale, with two sides and your work was on one side and the rest of your life was on the other, and your goal was to keep them at exactly the same level. And that was never really going to work for anybody, and we all knew it, but it was the only model that the word balance really evoked. I think my first evolution in defining balance was to think of a much more dynamic metaphor, and I always thought about a ballerina, like a really powerful ballerina, like Misty Copeland, who, you know, when they dance across the stage, they have to stay in balance in order not to fall over, but there's this strength and grace that is necessary to be able to stay, to remain in balance, even while you're in motion, right, and that became a metaphor that, I think, carried me through the early days of Brilliant Balance. It made a lot of sense to me as a young mother with three children and a growing business, and these days I think it's evolved again.

Speaker 2:

Well, there's probably one more evolution along the way where I thought of it as the balance between what we have to do and what we want to do, and I think when we really ask women, maybe even men, what does a balanced life look like?

Speaker 2:

It's where there is a good mix of I'm able to do the things I have to do, but I have time to do the things I want to do as well, regardless of what bucket they fall into. And that has led to what I would say is my current definition of balance. I'm one of those people who I fully give myself permission for my thinking to evolve right, so it is no problem for me to have had this definition change a bunch over the years. These days I would say it's a big, full life with the freedom to enjoy it, and so a you know, a balanced life to me is just that it's not small, it's not tight, it's not stripped down, it's like it's big and full, but there's also freedom to be able to enjoy the things that we've added to that life with purpose, and that's kind of my current working definition.

Speaker 1:

I love the fact that you brought up giving yourself permission to allow those definitions to evolve. I think sometimes we think if we define it one time, we have to stick to that. We can't, you know, we can't go away from that. We can't evolve. But I think that is really as we grow and we learn more and we experience more. That's the whole idea. Right Is that we're in a constant evolution, and so I love that your definition has so beautifully evolved with you, because I think there are so many probably the listeners who have this idea that they want to have it all. Right. Do you think that's attainable? Right, We'll start there, and then how?

Speaker 1:

do you help women refrain this concept to something that's more achievable and fulfilling?

Speaker 2:

Yes, it's such an important question because I think if we're really being honest, you can tell me, I mean, do you still want to have it all? I do, I mean. That's still a very appealing concept to me. I was sold that concept as a young woman and told I could in fact, have it all, and that sounded great to me. What I think it really means, and where we need a bit of a redefinition of having it all, is it's having whatever you want. Yes, right.

Speaker 2:

So our collection of what we want is still often pretty standard. I mean, if I surveyed a thousand women, the answers to what they want are still going to have a lot of overlap. That we're not hiding right the collection of kind of goodies that we want to have, but the nuance of them is really different from person to person. So lots of us may say, well, I want to have a career and I want to have a family and I want to take great care of myself and I want to travel and I want to have money. Okay, great.

Speaker 2:

But the specifics of that are really unique to each of us and the way, the amount of time we want to invest in each of those things, the activities that are important to us, inherent in each of those roles, are very different, and so I think being able to define having it all for us in a way that protects for the nuance within each of those roles is that's really the answer. And it's hard work because we're so prone to compare ourselves to the way other people do it, and when we see that, we pick it up as an expectation right, and so we kind of go through our life picking up expectations and adding them to what becomes a pretty long list of rules we're following for how we're going to go about managing all this. You know, stuff that we've acquired, so that has to shift if we want to have the freedom that I was talking about earlier.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, it makes me think back to the beginning of my career very ambitious, very driven, had this great opportunity to jump into a big role and fortunately, my husband was supportive of that and was like go get it, go after it.

Speaker 1:

That led me to. I refer to balance, as I don't know if you remember those toys that are like it's the oil and water and they kind of move and they slosh around. That's what balance to me has really seemed like, because sometimes, oftentimes early in my career, I was leaning so heavily towards my career I'm touching my nose to the ground, leaning so heavily, but I also wasn't really cognizant or taking care of that other side because I was so focused on this. Now, today, my balance looks very, very different because I too, my definition of balance has drastically changed. I think, paired with getting crystal clear on your non-negotiables of what you're willing to do and what you're unwilling to do, I think that changes along our career, along our life as women, and I feel like taking those things and kind of molding them together, that's really how we get our own personal definition of balance and what that means to us, and it's going to change based on seasons and times in our life and I think that's okay.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, I think what I love about your oil and water toy example is it inherently implies fluidity. And when you were saying, like what is important to you now has changed Sometimes, I think it changes week to week and month to month. That's non-negotiable, so we don't even have to set those pins so tightly. The rigidity really is our enemy and our ability to recognize this will be a fairly fluid process and we will have to pay attention to when things have shifted so we don't miss that inflection point and then we can make the adjustment right. Kind of back to the ballerina staying in balance idea. They work together.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, absolutely. You talk a lot about this super mom myth. Let's talk a little bit. Let's dive deeper into that. Let's talk about that. And what does that myth entail, and why is it so detrimental to women's wellbeing?

Speaker 2:

Yeah, I think you know whether being yeah, I think you know whether we call it super mom or even super woman. I think the mythology around women is that perfection is the expectation that we have picked up for ourselves, and nothing has embodied this better in the last decade than the monologue in the Barbie movie. I mean, I think it's why it went viral. It deserved to go viral. It so beautifully articulated this razor-thin line of expectations that we are all trying to walk, and the collective pain that was experienced when we heard that reflected back to us in those theaters, I think was not accidental, right, it was designed to kind of give us that collective moment of reflection. And until we hit that moment of saying this, these expectations of being great but not too great, right Across all of the factors is is just fundamentally exhausting. So the mythology around that, of course, is that it's possible, that it is, that it is possible to be like, perfectly honed in every aspect of our lives.

Speaker 2:

And the truth is we do have shining moments where we hit that in all of those facets right. There's days where I walk out of the house like I look great today, and there's days where I look at what I did with my kids, and I want to high five my husband and be like, look at us killing the game. But there are also days where I'm not proud of a parenting moment or where, you know, I don't have it pulled together to leave the house. So, finding the self-compassion, maybe to acknowledge that, yes, we should strive for those moments when we hit it out of the park and celebrate them and not hide them right. We don't want to be apologetic about when we're successful, but also having some compassion when we're not. That that is part of the human experience. I think moms and women deserve really to be human and sometimes that's what we don't give ourselves permission to be.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, and have grace around that. I think it was yesterday had a text exchange with another mom and her kiddo had come and stayed with us for the night and they had had a bit of a disagreement, and so it's one of those things that immediately my heart went to. Number one I want to know she knows where he is and that he's safe. Number two I don't want her to feel like we're judging this situation, because I've been there many times myself and so I just shot a little message and was like hey, just want you to know safe or good, just want to make sure you knew. And she said, yep, I did. And a day later she sent me a message and she just said I want you to know how much I appreciate you just being willing to care for others' kids.

Speaker 1:

You know, in a way that, like I just don't experience a lot of moms that aren't non-judgy and I thought, oh gosh, that is sometimes the society that we have created.

Speaker 1:

And I think back to when I first started my career and I was on the road a lot and my husband was doing it all, but I still wanted to kind of appear as that great mom Nowadays and I shared this with the person I was exchanging text messages with.

Speaker 1:

I said what I want you to know is number one this is a judgment-free zone, sister, because I have been there and done that I said. But second of all, there are many days when I feel like I'm absolutely failing at this mom thing and maybe that's maybe I don't share that enough, because we're all there and oftentimes when we're in that space, it feels so lonely, it feels like we're the only one experiencing it and that's very isolating. And so, as much as we want to kind of put our best foot forward, I also think it's important to share some of those flubs that we have because we're human and thankfully God's grace reminds have because we're human and thankfully God's grace reminds us that you're human, you're going to make the mistakes. But as much as I have grace with you, have grace with others. And it was like this perfect moment to just remind her and to remind myself that like hey look, we've all been there, we've all done that, and like let's walk arms and have grace with each other.

Speaker 2:

Yes, yeah, and I think I do think that this is happening more in this generation of women, maybe. Thank you, brene Brown, right, I think there was. I think her work has infiltrated, right just the culture where women of this generation are saying, listen, shame cannot survive the light, right? So if I know somebody else has been in that situation, then I just feel better about my own humanity. I'm not sure our mothers had that benefit.

Speaker 2:

You know, when I look at the level of performance that was required and how quietly people were holding in anything that was less than perfect in their own home, right, this doesn't ever have to leave these walls. We don't need anyone else to know that this happened. That culture of like secrecy really did just perpetuate the mythology of perfection, and then we stepped into that as like oh well, apparently we're all supposed to be able to appear perfect. So I like that. I'm starting to see those walls get broken down. I think it's very important to have trusted circles where you can share those stories and give people the opportunity to know that they're not alone, right, that everyone is trying to figure it out, right as we go.

Speaker 1:

Right, yeah, nobody has it totally figured out, and that's the beauty of it, and I think oftentimes that's why we have to go through the teenage years with our kids. It's a humbling reminder that you don't have it all figured out, indeed, yes, well, as we think about just the busyness of the world. Right, we have a world that glorifies busyness, and how do we go about giving ourselves permission to prioritize that self-care and pouring in to make sure our cups are full, without the guilt of feeling like we're taking attention off everyone else and putting it on ourselves?

Speaker 2:

Well, my answer to this is unpopular, which is that I don't think we're going to get rid of the guilt. I think we have to feel the guilt and do it anyway. We're so wired to experience some of these core emotions, and guilt is one of them. We talked about judgment five minutes ago. We are going to experience these emotions. If we allow them to paralyze us and we don't take the actions that we really want to take because of them, we won't get what's on the other side right. So I think that just take your example of if we want to resist the culture of being busy in service to others at the expense of doing some things that we genuinely want to do, that we like that make us feel healthy and whole and human, we're going to have to learn to tolerate the little side dish of guilt that comes with it until our brain gets the memo that there's actually no one being inconvenienced by us taking that time for ourselves right. Exercise is the classic example here. I mean this. I have the data on.

Speaker 2:

When you ask women if you had more time, what would you do? The number one thing they will tell you is I would exercise in some way, shape or form. Why? Well, partly because they think they're supposed to say that and partly because they know they feel better and they do right. They can look back to a time in their life when they were more consistent about some kind of exercise routine and they know they feel great. So when we can give ourselves the permission to say I'm going to hardwire this habit into my life and just acknowledge that, not only will I benefit, but so will everyone around me.

Speaker 2:

When I am more emotionally regulated, I am happier, I am more engaged with them because I've had some time for me, then it's easier, becomes easier over time to allocate time to those activities. And it's not always exercise. It's a great gateway drug because we can justify it, as I should be doing it anyhow but it opens up the pathway to reading, it opens up the pathway to gardening, it opens up the pathway to cooking and all the other things that we've forgotten, that we love, right? So you know, find something maybe, and then let it be a path to other things.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, I like what you said about and you're right, it probably is the unpopular opinion, but I like what you said about feeling it, sitting with that feeling right and still moving forward, but sit with that feeling. So I think so many times again, brene Brown, honor those feelings that you're having and sit with them. Honor them even if they're not. You know, even sometimes the shame, the guilt, like, sit with that. Is that serving you? Is it honoring you to proceed through that and then keep going right? But I think sometimes we just want to skip over it or push it down and that doesn't serve us very well either.

Speaker 2:

Quite the opposite, right yeah, then we have all kinds of bad behaviors that we'll engage in just to try not to feel those feelings.

Speaker 1:

Right. Well, I think, going from the kind of fast-paced busyness I think sometimes that is a one-way route to burnout. Because we have such a fast-paced society, what are some of those early warning signs of burnout that people often overlook? What should they pause on when they're starting to see some of these things come to the surface?

Speaker 2:

Yeah, Burnout is such an epidemic. I think we're using the term maybe to describe the early stages, which is the only thing helpful about it is we'll start to notice them sooner. The word I hone in on for early stage burnout is apathy, right, when you are just feeling disinterested about things that used to excite you. It could be projects at work, it could be things to do at home. If you're just looking at everything on your list and you're like I don't want to do any of this, Like there's nothing here that is grabbing at me, that is the sign that you are headed toward burnout. It's different than overwhelm, right.

Speaker 2:

Overwhelm is typically I don't know where to start. I could do any of these things. There are so very many of them but the energy is kind of has like an agitation in overwhelm, where we can spend a lot of time rearranging our to-do list and not doing it. But we could do any one of those things right. Burnout is like you could line this up for me perfectly, give me the space to do it, and I still don't want to do it because I'm literally. My body and brain are like shutting down out of exhaustion, and so that's usually the key signal for me that I'm looking for.

Speaker 1:

And as you think about progressing through all those things, I think so much is encompassed in this side of human potential, and potential can be a very fleeting thing, I guess. I mean. So someone can grab a hold of potential and they can really do something phenomenal with it, and someone can identify potential but maybe never do anything with it. Becoming a successful entrepreneur and thought leader how has that changed your perspective on human potential and what people actually grab a hold of?

Speaker 2:

You know, potential is one of those words that just I'm such a words girl Like I am a total word nerd know. Potential is one of those words that just I'm such a words girl Like I am a total word nerd. Potential is one of those words that I just adore. I also love the word possibilities. I think they're related.

Speaker 2:

The notion of what could be right I think that there are. Virtually everyone can have a vision of what could be, but I think the people who are really stretching to fulfill their potential are, like, frustrated by the gap between what is and what could be. So they're always going to push that line out further and sort of attempt to close it. And every attempt to close it brings us closer to realizing our own potential, like what we actually could do. By the way, I think there are people on the other side of that who are content, and contentment is a great word.

Speaker 2:

It's just often at odds with fulfilling our potential. Right, if we can be content. So I like to look at it ultimately as something that we sort of cycle through periods of contentment followed by periods of like divine discontent where we're you know, we're sort of reaching for what's next. So you asked the question specifically about what's the difference that kind of gets people to take the action or not take the action. And I wonder if it's something about being willing to be imperfect, like we can get paralyzed in not taking action because we're just not sure we're gonna get it right or there's so much fear of failure or fear of judgment right or guilt associated with it. But if we can really connect to imperfect action and that's that pathway that allows us to keep moving forward ultimately toward our potential, so we stand a much greater chance of I'm not sure we'll ever truly fulfill our potential. I think it is the definition of like the infinite game, but that we'll step a lot closer.

Speaker 1:

Ed Milet has a term that I have very first time I heard it, I've really held on to it, and that is he is all about being blissfully dissatisfied. I'm like, oh, I like that. It's just this unwillingness to stop at satisfaction or contentment, and again, which contentment isn't a bad thing and some people, to be content can be a good space. But for those who, to your point, get wrapped up in the I can't take this next step if it's not right, those are the ones that get that, that paralyzation, yeah From and their inability to be able to progress forward versus I'm going to take this next messy action, messy step and I'm going to do it anyway, and then there will be lessons along the way and people being able to really embrace that piece to propel themselves forward. Yes, many of our listeners try to balance that sense of career ambition and that sense of personal life right. What's your advice for maintaining healthy relationships while pursuing professional goals?

Speaker 2:

Well, this is just everything, isn't it? I think we are so made to be in community with other people and in very close relationship with a tight circle of people, and it is so often the collateral damage in the life of the high achiever right. Our relationships are often the collateral damage, like our pursuit of more can cause us to ignore or damage those relationships. There's a phrase that is so simple, it rhymes right. It's a little cheesy even, but the idea of connection over perfection has been really helpful for me personally, the idea that those relationships have to be the driver. And whenever I notice my desire for things to be just right or to be more getting in the way of my ability to have connection, that's where I really want to check myself. So I'll give you an example, if I'm you know, I was.

Speaker 2:

My mom turned 80 last year and we had people over to celebrate who traveled in for it. And my son, who's a teenager and is a really great cook, was there helping me with stuff, and he's really talented in the kitchen and absolutely could have pulled this off on his own, but of course I'm micromanaging the size of that. He should cut this pepper so that it can go on this plate at the right way. And at some point he just looked at me like as teenage boys do, like you got to be kidding me, right? Do you want me in on this or not? And it was such a reminder of like.

Speaker 2:

It's a small example, but I have a thousand of those every day where my intentions are pure right. I want a better outcome. I'm going to just give you this little piece of advice that's going to go so much better, but really what I wanted was that connected moment with him where he was a part of his grandmother's celebration and people could celebrate his talent and what he could bring to the party, right. So I had to really step back and be like it doesn't matter how you do it, do it your way and it'll be great. And I really try to. I am not perfect at this, but it's something that I really try to look at, because that relationship matters more to me than the outcome of that particular instance. And you know, for anyone who's prone to perfectionism, I think you'll you'll just see thousands of examples of this as you move through your day.

Speaker 1:

Right. But I think, being able to have the discernment in maybe not in that very moment, right to where you Ideally in the moment yeah, yeah, ideally in the moment but even having the discernment to say, oh, in my next engagement where I'm conscious that I'm trying to kind of manage the situation, I too I refer to myself as a control enthusiast. My husband refers to it as something different, but I'm like I really like to, I'm enthusiastic about that control, which can get very much in the way as well, but I think the discernment of okay, recognizing it in the moment and then like I need to be conscious of this in the next engagement, where I value the relationship over needing to outcome.

Speaker 1:

Yeah.

Speaker 2:

That's the thing is people who I say I like, control a whole bunch, so we all find these cute ways to use our behavior. I think anyone who's over-controlled, who knows that that's kind of the cluster that they live in, knows that what we care about are outcomes. We've been rewarded for delivering great outcomes, right, we're excellence oriented, and it's really learning to ride that balance between does it need to be that excellent or do I want to have an experience with this person? Do I want to be in relationship with this person? And that's what your question really struck a chord with me about. What do we do about these relationships along the way? Because when we're dealing particularly with ambitious women, it does tend to correlate with this kind of over-controlled person, because that's what's gotten us those results often early in our lives. And yet learning to release some of that control is kind of the thing that catapults us even further, kind of in the back half, and so it's an evolution, right. It's a new skill set that we have to develop.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, and even just talking through this, it almost reminds me of the other end of the spectrum, which is oftentimes when you are starting to do something different and you're having career growth. There may be relationships that no longer serve you, that sometimes we fear letting go of, and I think a lot of people hold on to those relationships. That it's okay and people need to learn to give themselves permission to outgrow people. It doesn't mean that friendship, that relationship, the whatever has to end badly. It just needs to be the decision around the fact that sometimes people are in your life for a season and you actually outgrow them and that's okay.

Speaker 2:

I agree completely, and those are painful when they happen and sometimes hard to identify. Sometimes they're right in front of your face and we're just afraid to let go. But creating space like none of us can maintain relationships with hundreds of people, right, despite what social media would tell us we just can't right we can have close relationships with a small handful of people, and really being protective of who is in that circle is important, right, because the environment we put ourselves in, who we surround ourselves with, does start to dictate what expectations we have of ourselves, what we think is possible, right, what we normalize, and so that kind of inner ring is tight. The next ring out where you're kind of in the dozens of people that you're doing life with, equally important, right, because they're influencing your beliefs around what's possible and what is normalized.

Speaker 1:

Right, right. Well, I'm a big proponent of women thinking, forecasting futuristically for themselves. I think so often we want to think about everybody else and sometimes we don't put ourselves behind that lens to say what does the future look like for me? So what do you think is the biggest challenge facing women in the next handful of years, in the next decade, and how can they prepare for that?

Speaker 2:

This is such a good question. I think this is the evolution to leadership in every sense of the word. I think we, you know, go back to our conversation about having it all. It's almost like this generation of women is are still trying to prove that we deserve it by outworking it, like there's this high hustle of doing everything ourselves to prove that like we can handle it. And I think if we really reframe this as a call to leadership leadership at work, leadership at home, leadership in our communities it really is the invitation to get results through others right, by building movements behind us, organizations behind us, by learning how to let go the conversation we were having about control, by learning how to modulate our relationship with guilt, the way we were talking about earlier in the interview all of those things are going to be pulling at us back toward doing every single thing ourselves and we won't have the impact that we can have unless we are able to learn to really be true leaders right.

Speaker 2:

So the practices of leadership are, we can recite them Some of us studied them in school but to give ourselves permission to actually execute them in all aspects of our lives, I think that's the inflection point I see us standing at and when we get that, I think we really start to amplify our impact. So that's the direction that I'm excited to be a part of and that I see people doing so when I say leadership at home, if you think about all the movements you see around lightening the motherlode, fair play, the kind of division of labor at home, they're all nestled under that. They are calls to leadership to say this should not all be our work. How can we execute small organizations whether they're like the family members living under our own roof or people that we hire or community organizations that can support us, like there's an elevation to leadership that I think is really happening.

Speaker 1:

Well, and a lot of this leads to something that you're doing, that you have put on through your business, which is the bold experience. Talk a little bit about that and kind of that sense of coaching and connection and community that you've built, and how can people take advantage of that? What do you want them to know about it?

Speaker 2:

So, the bold experience is really the culmination of my professional work so far. So again, 15 years ago, when I started this chapter as an entrepreneur, I don't know that I could have foreseen that it would have led here, and yet when you stand here and look backwards, it all makes sense, right. So what I'm leading today is a collective of women who come into a renewable year-long experience. The experience has five modalities in it. So we are doing coaching, we have them in community with each other. We take them on retreats, right. They're involved in a mastermind experience where they're peer coaching one another. I mean, there's a level of content available to them to support the transformations that they're trying to make.

Speaker 2:

So it's you know it's more than a membership, but it really is a comprehensive experience that they have that unfolds over the you know again sometimes a multi-year experience, and it's designed for women who have reached a level of complexity in their lives, through the work that they're asked to do and the lives that they've built at home, that it really has become lonely. It's kind of the it's lonely at the top idea. They're looking around in their neighborhood, they're looking around in their workplace and they're like there's not a lot of people like me doing what I'm doing and so it's hard to get the relatability to some of the problems they're trying to solve and I do think that word complexity is important. It's like it's ratcheted up to a level where the tools and the behaviors and the practices that got them to this point in their life just aren't going to get them to the next place.

Speaker 2:

So they have like a low-grade awareness of that but they're not sure what to do about it typically when we meet them. Low-grade awareness of that but they're not sure what to do about it typically when we meet them. And getting into this experience where they're able to really put me as an advisor in their corner and bring my team in to support them and then be with other women who are at a similar life stage, really unlocks something where they're able to make bold moves right To do something that's going to put an imprint on the world that they just didn't think was possible because their time was so eaten up doing every single little thing themselves until we crossed paths. So I'm super delighted by the work I get to do with them. I actually just got off a call with that group before this interview and it's so deeply energizing to be around women who are really committed to figuring out how they're going to have the impact they mean to have.

Speaker 1:

What a beautiful experience and the opportunity to be a part of something like that and create that sense of community. That's really, really important. As we wrap up, I would love for you to share number one where can people find you, find your content, and then where can they go and we'll put all this in the show notes, but where can they go to find out more about this bold experience?

Speaker 2:

Okay, Well, it's super easy because if they go to the website, which is brilliant-balancecom got to have the dash in there or you just Google Sherrilyn Brilliant Balance, you'll find this. It's pretty easy from there. There is a page, of course, unique to the Bold Experience. The website itself can get you to the podcast, to free content, and downloads all the archives of my podcast, which I think we're like 370 episodes in or something. So there's lots of that to dig through and, yeah, like a playground of resources there, awesome Well, I highly encourage everyone to take advantage of it.

Speaker 1:

Sherilyn, thank you so much for your time coming on, just sharing your insights and your experience and putting on something so needed within the world amongst women, and oftentimes it can feel alone, and so creating that community really drives something for women to continue going on to become their best selves.

Speaker 2:

Well, thank you for having me and for so generously sharing my work with your listeners. I really just you have had great questions and it's been so fun to have this conversation with you.

Speaker 1:

Thank you so much for listening and for being here on this journey with me. I hope you'll stick around If you liked this episode. It would mean the world for me if you would rate and review the podcast or share it with someone you know. Many need to hear this message. I love to hear from you all and want you to know that you can leave me a voicemail directly. If you go to my website, evokegreatnesscom, and go to the contact me tab, you'll just hit the big old orange button and record your message. I love the feedback and comments that I've been getting, so please keep them coming. I'll leave you with the wise words of author Robin Sharma Greatness comes by doing a few small and smart things each and every day. It comes from taking little steps consistently. It comes from making a few small chips against everything in your professional and personal life that is ordinary, so that a day eventually arrives when all that's left is the extraordinary.

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Sonnie Linebarger

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