Consequences of perfectionism
Are you constantly pushing yourself to the limit, even when your body wants a break? Are you stuck in a toxic work environment? Meet Kara Dennison - she's been there and done that! In addition to becoming a Forbes contributor by working her way up the corporate ladder, she speaks freely about boundaries and overcoming perfectionism. Success is much more than money; it comes down to mental health, emotional well-being, and physical condition.
Kara is the CEO of Optimized Career Solutions and an Executive Career and Leadership Coach. She is a Senior Professional in Human Resources (SPHR) who has worked as a Corporate Recruiting Leader, working closely with decision-makers, and has helped thousands of professionals land their dream jobs. She is passionate about empowering high-achievers and leaders to live impactful lives.
Kara is a high achiever, pushing herself to strive for success. But in the process, she also learned a hard lesson - taking care of her well-being was just as important. After hitting rock bottom with 16-hour workdays and medical issues from stress overload, this incredible woman had an opportunity to reinvent her vision: helping others understand their value despite achievement or accolades, nurturing healthier mindsets and habits on their journey towards achieving dream jobs, finding calming techniques such as visualizing our inner voice. Through it all, Kara serves as a reminder that we can only truly control our reactions - proving anything is possible when you take back your power!
Tune in to this episode and join Kara as she fires up an insightful conversation about vulnerability, honesty, time management, and psychological persuasion. Don't miss the chance to be inspired by a phenomenal Firestarter!
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Website- www.optimizedcareersolutions.com
Email- kara@optimizedcareersolutions.com
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[00:00:00] Melissa: So, hey, Mic how are you doing?
[00:00:02] Monica: Hey, I'm great. Thank you. What a week we've had. I've been thinking about you all night after going to that art show last night, and seeing Elisa's artwork. Incredible. You have to tell our fire starters all about this. It's so cool.
[00:00:16] Melissa: Yeah it's really something like when you're raising yourself, right and walk, I'm looking at this 18 year old and this art exhibit like well beyond her years, and I'm like, that was me. So I'm proud of her.
[00:00:31] Monica: She's really talented and obviously you are an artist at heart. That's everything you've ever wanted to do. Is that something that you just as soon as she was born, you were having her play with colors and paint?
[00:00:42] Melissa: I mean, I think as a parent I did sort of gravitate towards arts and crafts over sports. I mean, that's just how I am. I mean, having two kids now, I don't know how much influence you actually have because she fell right in line with Matt and I and like these two art-nerd parents. And now we have Sporto Jocko Miles, we go to nine basketball games a week and all we hear about is cutting and bulking and weightlifting and he has no interest in art. I don't know. I don't know if I'm gonna take credit for it, cuz if I take credit for the good stuff, I think I have to take responsibility for the bad.
[00:01:16] Monica: That is true, girl. I know. I feel the same way with my kids right now. we're in the miåddle of making some big decisions. My youngest, as you know, is trying to decide where he's gonna go to college. I know Elise decided, but he's still sort of contemplating between Ohio State and maybe even as far as Arizona, which is crazy. But it's time for them to fly.
[00:01:34] Melissa: It's time for them to fly. Elise has gone back and forth regular school, art school gap year, try to get a internship or an apprenticeship with a potter. I mean, she's kind of been all over the map. So she did register for Grand Valley State University here in Michigan, which is kind of small, mid-size liberal arts public university. It's beautiful, it's great, but I'm not really holding my breath. I mean, I wouldn't be surprised if August gets here and she's I think I am gonna take a gap year. I wanna go to New York. You know what I mean? I just, I'm leaving the possibilities open.
[00:02:06] Monica: Well, it's interesting because I think that younger generation, they're just really open to changing and being really fluid. I see their personal development transformation at a quicker pace than like our generation where it took us so freaking long to figure it out and we had to crash.
[00:02:24] Melissa: Are you kidding me? That's what the Kindling project is. It's all of us, 35 to 55 year old women, like figuring out, again!
[00:02:32] Monica: No, but I am excited to talk to today's guests because by all accounts, this girl is rocking it. And I love her vulnerability because she speaks her truth. It hasn't always been perfect, but man, where she's landing these days is like, you gotta give it up for this girl. So why don't you introduce her?
[00:02:49] Melissa: Oh, she's perfect. I mean, I've met her a few times. I've been at some events with her. I kinda have been aware of her for maybe five years. She pulls it out of you, like, she's made me cry over the internet. So today we have Kara. Kara is the c e O of Optimized Career Solutions. She's an executive career and leadership coach and a Forbes contributor. She's a senior professional in human resources who has worked as a corporate recruiting leader, working closely with decision makers throughout her career, Kara has personally reviewed over 500,000 resumes. Through her executive coaching program, she has helped thousands of professionals land their dream jobs and has been responsible for negotiating over 12 million in salary increases over the last few years. Can you come and give us some advice, kara?
[00:03:36] Kara: Absolutely. Thank you so much for having me here. Monica and Melissa, I'm so thrilled to be here, and thank you so much for all the kind things that you said. I am far from perfect, that's for sure. But I'm grateful and thankful for being here.
[00:03:50] Melissa: Yeah, you know what, I don't know if it was Obama or he just re-quoted it, but you know, perfect is the enemy of progress, right?
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[00:03:56] Melissa: Or perfect is the enemy of good. So don't worry about being perfect, like you're showing up, like we're all showing up like our beautiful, messy, imperfect selves here at the Kindling Project.
[00:04:06] Kara: That's right. Showing up is honestly half the battle. It really is.
[00:04:11] Melissa: Monica and I went to this international Women's Day event recently. One of the, I think the keynote speaker had a whole thing about what does it take to be successful. The whole point of was like, do the work. Do the work. you don't have to be perfect. You don't have to be the best. You don't have to be the first to market. You just have to show up and do the work, and it's like a fantastic message. Right?
[00:04:31] Kara: It really is. It's showing up and showing up every damn day. That's really it. That's really it.
[00:04:37] Monica: Kara, I mean, you're showing up every day, but you're showing in and sharing this space with your husband, right? He's your business partner. How does that work out for you?
[00:04:46] Kara: Yeah, we like to say that we're double married. It is, I'll say it's been quite the learning experience. It's not for everyone. I'm just really grateful that I have the best partner in the world. If I can brag a little bit, we started this business very quickly after we got married too. So it has been A very intense learning experience. I started the business and he was continuing his corporate job and supporting us. And then when we moved to literally the middle of nowhere, we live in a town in Tennessee that only has 500 people. So we moved here right before the pandemic and it really became, we have to rely on each other. And he quit his job when we moved here in order to help support me in the business. And it's been this back and forth of him trying to catch up to me, learn what I am, cross-training him. And right now we're at this really great unique place where we truly are partners in the business and in the home. And one of the keys to our success, a lot of people ask us that, like, how do you make it work? How does that happen? Is we treat really the business in the house as just things we need to get done right?
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[00:05:51] Kara: We treat the house as a business. We treat the business as a business, and these are tasks and things that we as a team need to get done. And we remove ego from it. Most weeks, he's the one making dinner because I'm still in the office, right. Or he's the one throwing laundry in the machine because I'm still on with a client or vice versa. And it just is things that need to get done. No ego, no, you know, patriarchy, no social norms or anything like that. It's, we're a team and who's the best to handle this one task? Let's just get it done so that we can you know, end the day together and spend some time together. It's been fun and not easy, but really great.
[00:06:29] Melissa: Good for you. You know, I've been in and out of that situation in my life where there's been times where I was the breadwinner, where he was the breadwinner, where I was a stay-at-home mom. We started the business together. He worked in it for about five years and he went back to corporate life and he's been doing that for about five years. And now we're kind of looking at maybe he should take the business over again and maybe I can grow the kindling project at a different kind of clip. You know, if we divide and conquer here. But I have to say that those five years for us running a business together and raising little kids, and we moved from Michigan to Kansas, to California, to Michigan, and you know, just a lot of stuff going on in that decade, it was hard. I mean, it was hard and sometimes it's like you're going to bed with your boss or you're going to bed with your shitty coworker and you're like, wait, this is my husband!
[00:07:17] Kara: Yeah, it is. And one of the hardest things was taking like either resentments or frustrations from the business and carrying it into the bedroom, for instance. You know, something like that. The key, and it sounds so cheesy, the key is open communication, right? Being able to talk about that. And so the greatest thing that we implemented was at dinnertime it's, is there anything you wanna talk about? We ask that question every single day at dinner. Is there anything you wanna talk about from the day we open the space and we hold the space for each other to talk it out so that we don't bring any of that junk into the bedroom. Cause there was a big period where I'm like, I don't want to touch the coworker that pissed me off today. You know what I mean? But yeah it's difficult. It's a weird dynamic to play and then when, you know, you added a pandemic and you can't escape each other for a long time it's tough.
[00:08:04] Monica: Well, more power to you girls because I don't think that's in the carts for me. My husband and I have to actually, he travels so much and that is the key to our success. Is that we're so independent that we need time apart. So when we come together, it really does work, to Each's own right.
[00:08:20] Kara: I think it's self-awareness, you know, you know your relationship and that works for you. It happens to work for us. That's okay.
[00:08:27] Monica: Kara, when did you start your business?
[00:08:29] Kara: We started it at the end of 2018, so it's been just over four years now.
[00:08:36] Monica: Okay. And since then, I feel like for you, you're so much of everything. When you take the whole package, you are a, obviously a business coach, but you're also a life coach in many ways. I think you're also a therapist, you're an inspirational speaker, you're an entertainer. The way you do your socials, I mean, you've got a lot going on and that you're incredibly talented. have You always been connected and working and connecting with people?
[00:09:03] Kara: Yes and no? I think that I've always you know, I'll brag on myself. I think I've always had a little bit of this ability to genuinely connect with people. I used to say, I just had this knack, right? I had this knack of being able to have a conversation with someone one-on-one, being able to get them to just you know, connect with me. And I like that. I really genuinely love that part about myself and about my life and being able to connect with people. And I have this unique ability to be able to take a large amount of information. I like to say just let people word vomit on me. Just tell me what your problems are. Tell me what's going on in your career. You know, I love when women brag on themselves, so that's why I like to do it myself, right? So I can take all this and I have this intuition to really streamline it out, know exactly what the issue is, and be able to kind of mirror that back to them and say, here's what I'm hearing, and here's as an outside perspective a trajectory shifting way that we can maybe shift your mindset or your career or whatever. Right. And I think I always had that and I just never had the ability to hone it until I was in this situation that I'm in right now. I'll be honest when it comes to all the stuff that I have right? Forbes contributor and now I'm actually writing for the University of Phoenix and I have the leadership and the life coaching and the like, all of this stuff that I do. I'll be honest, a lot of it's a trauma response and I'm open about that.
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[00:10:27] Kara: I have spent most of my career striving for achievement. I am a high achiever. I am a people pleaser. I am a perfectionist. I am driven by an inner critic that needs to be in this high achieving mode, in this controlling mode. And unfortunately, that has led to a lot of burnout for me both in corporate and in my entrepreneurship business. And so where I'm focusing right now is recognizing that, and I think for a lot of women, high achievers, and that's why I like to work with high achievers. I'm able to, through my healing and through my self-awareness of recognizing, Hey, I am worth, right, I'm worth rest. I'm worth taking care of myself. I'm worth all of this stuff, all of the good things in my life without needing to constantly be on the hamster wheel. I get to now then tell that to other high achievers who feel that way, because there's so many people that I work with, men and women who are right, stuck in toxic workplaces, stuck on that hamster wheel, stuck in that need to achieve for many different reasons. Right? They either feel that the breadwinner or their family, they feel stuck. They feel like they have to deny themselves in order to provide or out of a sense of loyalty or out of their own sense of trauma or whatever, right? And so what I and my husband, Jack always say is, we will never, ever, ever not practice what we preach.
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[00:11:49] Kara: And so I am constantly putting myself through coaching, constantly in therapy and really learning the lessons for myself in order to help other high achievers because yeah, I have trophies behind me. I've got names, I've got accolades, I've got certifications, but it came at of cost and it came at a very big medical cost. And I wanna make sure that I'm teaching people that it doesn't always have to be that way.
[00:12:11] Monica: So was that your pivoting when you were from a corporate job to now doing your own business? Is it that sort of, that toxic workplace that you talk about? Did you just have a moment of okay, I can't do this anymore. Because you are an overachiever and you are a people pleaser, can you tell us about that?
[00:12:28] Kara: I had two major burnouts in my life. The first was in corporate. In 2018, very first day of 2018, I got engaged on January 1st in 2018 I was studying for my S B H R. I got that within five months, I planned a wedding within eight months, was in a job search to try and get out of my company and did it all wrong. I did it all the things that I don't teach my clients right now. I got denied for my dream job on my honeymoon, and I ended up in the hospital at the end of the year, and it was because I had a six week long migraine from all of the stress that I was under and from, you know, my team got cut in half. I was taking on all of these roles. I went to a neurologist and got all the scans. And he basically said, there's nothing wrong with you. There's nothing wrong with you this is caused by stress. And if you do not do something to change your life, this will continue to happen. And it's you know, your friends, your family, they can all tell you like you're working yourself to death, but until someone with that white jacket says something, you know, that's the moment where it kind of hit me. And I was married to my husband for four months. I was the breadwinner. And I turned to him and I said, I think I wanna quit my job. before I married him, I said, I am on the path to C H R O. I will never leave corporate like I am climbing that ladder, all this other stuff. And then four months after I'm like, Hey, you remember that? I think I wanna quit my job. And he like took a big gulp, okay, well what do you wanna do? And I had been writing resumes on the side and things like that just as a side hustle cuz who didn't have a side hustle at that point. And I said, I really wanna do this. I want people to not feel like I felt in the job search. I want to help do these resumes and I wanna work for myself. I can't do this anymore. And so we did. I ended up quitting at the beginning of 2019 and grew this business, partnered with another career coach, sort of apprenticed under him. Ended up helping 730 people in the year of 2020 in this one business, in this one program, which was wild and also very taxing. And in 2021, I split off from that coach. My husband and I created the program that we have now. The thing that I didn't do is I didn't learn the lessons of the inner lessons. That inner healing journey of why did I burn out? What was my part of the burnout in the corporate, right? Because yes, I was working for a toxic environment. Yes, the leadership did things that corporate America does, right? But what was my part in it? Why did I not set boundaries? Why was I working on my sick days, right? My P T O days. Why was I working every weekend, right? What was my part of it? And I ended up in the hospital at the beginning of 2022 again.
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[00:15:01] Kara: With more medical issues, and this all from many doctors, was because of sustained levels of anxiety and stress and working 16 hour days. And this time I couldn't quit my business because now I'm finally doing something that I love and I'm passionate about. I'm helping people. I'm finally aligned with what I really feel like I'm supposed to be on earth to do.
[00:15:21] I can't just quit and run. That was my old thing, right? So it was hiring people to help delegate for a year to just try and get me out of the business as much as possible so I can figure it out. Hiring coaches to help me heal. Hiring therapists, hiring a burnout coach. And I ended up shifting my program to really focus not on just helping people get their dream job and leave toxic environments, but also heal burnout. The burnout coach that I hired to help myself, I ended up hiring and placing in my program to help our high achievers. So now we not only help them find jobs, but we also help them heal some of their trauma and starting their next chapter a little better. And I'm a completely different person. I've transformed. I have a morning routine. I don't work on weekends, like all this other stuff, and I'm way more aligned and there's still lessons, I'm still learning.
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[00:16:10] Kara: But that was the big pivot for me was, you can leave areas, but if you don't change your own reactions and that healing that you need to go through, that will still follow you.
[00:16:22] Melissa: Yeah, you still show up as yourself wherever you go. I just wanna say I'm so proud of you and so inspired by you, and I feel like I completely relate to almost every aspect of your story. I think I suffer from some perfectionism, which is also childhood trauma response of you know, not really knowing what was gonna happen next and having, even though I had very high achieving and caring parents in some ways, you know, just like all families and all kids we didn't always get our needs met. And I just showed up as that kind of kid that wanted everything to be right and wanted everyone to be happy and just put myself on a hamster wheel at a super young age of what does mom need? What does dad need? What does the house need? You know and it just it has continued for 50 years. It's a constant reevaluation. It's a constant, oh damn, I am in this situation again for the 800th time. What is my role in this? And it's so much an element of what drives me for the Kindling project, what you're saying is, I wanna give back, I wanna share what I've learned. I wanna save someone else 10 years. Right. I wanna reach out to other women who like yourself and like myself, and also Monica's very much this way too, you know, always headed towards burnout. Even when we rest and recover, we start over. We almost just can't help ourselves, right? We just get in the harness and we start pulling like maniacs. And so It's work. It's work that you have to do that never ends. I think.
[00:17:46] Kara: Yeah, I think the cycles will continue to repeat until we learn the lessons in them. That's what I found. Right. And the first step is always that awareness piece, right? Because it's just gonna keep coming until we're aware of it. And then I tend to find that as the loops happen and the lessons come, we're able to be a little bit more prepared for them, learn the lessons a little bit better, and eventually we'll break the cycle. I feel you, right.
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[00:18:10] Kara: And that's why it's so important to learn what our roles are in there, because literally cannot change anything else in the universe except for the way that we react. Right. And so, my husband and I just went through this huge course about positive intelligence.
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[00:18:24] Kara: And positive intelligence is not eliminating negative thoughts cuz they're always going to happen. It's shortening the time in which we bounce back from them. Because for me, old Kara, right, negative thought would come and it's woo. Spiral all the way down. Let me just pull that thread, woo. Until I am just sitting in the depths Right. And it's not healthy for me. It's distracting, right? And it just, it stops me from moving forward to help other people.
[00:18:52] Melissa: It's like this balance between, we need introspection and awareness about ourselves, but we also need to get out of our heads and out of ourselves to really like, be of any kind of service. And so it's like healthy introspection, not like crazy monkey monster brain, and then healthy out in the world, healthy, you know, knowing yourself, knowing others. I kind of been going down this big path the last few weeks, few months maybe, you know, not that I haven't done them all my life, but really looking at all the personality assessments, right? In studying them and looking at the personality types and, you know, doing some little workshops around. Right now I'm working with true colors, but you know, it really actually doesn't matter if it's disk or anagram or any of these, like that whole psychological study of knowing yourself and knowing what type of mindset and approach you have to the world, but also really actually understanding how others perceive it, you know, may or may not be good for you. they might be users or they might misinterpret you and just really kind of getting clear, right? Because if you don't understand those things, you really can't be clear about what's going on. I feel like a lot of my adult life I've been in a bit of a fog, like, why is this happening? So there's some kind of clarity required, I think, for this growth that we're talking about.
[00:20:07] Monica: Yeah, and I think what I love what you said, Kara, is sort of when that narrative or that negative chatter, I always say I've learned to flip it. And I'm like, oh, that's my friend. That's just my internal clock trying to protect me cuz if I play small, I can't get hurt. So that's what's happening. So, no, it's okay. We're gonna push through it anyway. And that fear, so that's one way that I've sort of dealt with the imposter syndrome or anything that pops up that says, what are you doing? you can't do that. But I also think the biggest takeaway from what I'm hearing from you is this, is that our body always betrays us because it's the first to tell on us and keep score saying, okay, you're not listening to me. I'm gonna shut this down really quick. Right. It flatlines us in many ways. We're like, no, I've been trying to tell you that you need to slow down. Take it easy and you're not listening. So I'm gonna start creating things in your body to make you feel like you are in so much pain.
[00:21:01] Kara: Body always keeps a score, even though we wish we didn't. I love that you said that because it's so interesting. Like I just mentioned, we went through that positive intelligence training. That's literally what it teaches is it teaches you how to visualize and personify your inner voice because that inner critic, it calls it in this training your inner judge and it has you visualize it. And so mine looks eerily similar to me and my mother, surprise. Ah, right. Oh, the girl with mommy issues. Right. So, I mean, most of us do. It always comes from our parents, either daddy or mommy issues usually. And what they tell you is that it's when we're little, we look up at our parents as almost kinda like a God figure because you're tiny, you can't take care of yourself. And so these figures are the ones that are taking care of you. And when they don't and your needs are not met, you can't cognitively understand that, okay, your parents have failed you for some reason, whether big or small. So you take it on as yourself, I must have done something wrong. I must be bad. And so this inner judged voice starts, you know, trying to protect you. It's there to try and protect you back to the old days where it's like the amygdala. And so it tries to protect you and it creates this narrative like, oh, I must be bad if I were to achieve. If I were to be perfect, if I were to be quiet, if I were to be this, if I were to be skinnier or better at sports or better at whatever, then maybe my parents will love me more and I'll be taken care of, right? And so now we're old enough and we realize okay, that's not true. It was something else or whatever. But when we're triggered in some sort of situation, that version of us and that inner judge comes back up and says, oh, see remember if you just achieved more, if you were more perfect, da, people would love you. People would like you, da. So what was really interesting is being able to like visualize and create this persona for that inner voice. It allows you to separate who you are as a person. All three of us, right? We are great people. We do good things for people. We wanna help. We are great women who are just struggling in this human experience and we make mistakes every once in a while, that's okay. But our inner voice, our inner judge says, Up, look at you. Look at you. You made a mistake. You must be a failure. Right? That's your inner judge trying to keep you safe, to keep you small so that you don't take risks, but it's okay. And it's even more helpful to almost personify them and say, ah, there's that picture of this person, this other thing that isn't me just trying to keep me safe. I recognize you. And to Melissa's point and Monica's point, that's coming up for a reason, why is it coming up? Let's explore that. Okay? But let's not dwell on it, right? Maybe it's coming up because I'm feeling some sort of way. Maybe I'm not aligned with this. Maybe I just, whatever. Let's explore it and then let's move past it, right? It doesn't have to consume me. Which a lot of people tend to let their emotions consume them and we're 90% emotion, right? And so it just becomes this rollercoaster. So being able to kind of become in control of that instead becomes a little bit more powerful.
[00:24:05] Melissa: And that separation from that inner critic or, you know, I just call it like my monkey mind, that separation from it is so liberating when you do have that aha moment. That's not even me. Or, also that's not even true. I have another dialogue, I don't know if this was addressed in your program going on in my head it's like what is everybody else saying? And it really almost becomes my reality. And it probably most of the time isn't true. You know, I'm making up what you're thinking or how you're judging me or how you're perceiving me. And then I will later find out that's not at all what that other person was thinking, but it became my reality. And then I'm responding to something that didn't even happen. And all these things I guess they just go back to doing this work, doing this inner work. And I really think that's kind of maybe where all three of us intersect is that we recognize this, I think as women especially, we've put the inner self down, right? It hasn't been the priority. Everything else outside of us is more important than us. But really what's more important than you in your own life? And if you're not important to you in your own life, you're just not important. Cuz you're not gonna rise to that level for anybody else.
[00:25:16] Kara: I'm really glad that you said that Melissa, because it was a good reminder of me. Aren't our brains just fascinating? One, we are so freaking smart. And two, I am the same way.
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[00:25:27] Kara: I can have entire conversations with people in my head, like I can create entire stories, full on conversations. Just this week alone, and it's, we're recording this on Wednesday, just this week alone, I've had a couple of meetings that I've created entire conversations for in my head that I've worried about, created anxiety about, I've talked to friends, my husband about all this other stuff. And then I get on the meeting and it's like none of that existed. Why was I worried? This was a great meeting. I showed up as myself, it was fine. All of this stuff. And I'm like, I could have spent that time not worrying, doing something so much more powerful. And what I've come to learn, and this was a good reminder and I hear it all the time. But honestly, people don't give a shit about me. Like people don't care. People are caring about them and they think about them. No one is thinking about us.
[00:26:19] Melissa: Of course, you can only take care of yourself, right? But how is it that some of us little sensitive eggs show up really concerned about everyone else more than ourselves? Yeah, that probably is something that happens in childhood, but it could also be something that just, you show up that way, you know, there's like a crack in your shell.
[00:26:37] Kara: I think it's great when there are people that can care for, and look out for other people. I think we need people like us, but I think those people also have to realize I have, you know, these notes all around, we have to take care of ourselves first, right?
[00:26:50] Monica: Yeah, it's crazy. The scenarios that play out in our heads that full on dialogue back and forth. I said, she says it's it, and then to your point, it never happened. It's all a waste of time. So when you speak a lot about alignment, Kara, is this something when in particular when women come to you for your services at Optimized Career Solutions you help them with their careers and resumes and the job search, is this something well, Mel and I, you should know in the Kindling project, we've talked a lot about this is are you aligned? Are you planted in the right soil as like Melissa likes to say to make sure what you're doing mirrors the life you wanna live? Is this a part of your process? And tell us a little bit about that, how you help women really align.
[00:27:32] Kara: It's an unlimited coaching program and it focuses on the authentic job search. And the reason why we do this is because what we have found a lot is the most critical part of a job search for a lot of people now is when they find themselves in a toxic workplace and things like that, it's because they're no longer aligned. Right? For me, when I first got my job at my last corporate one, I was super aligned. I loved my boss, I loved the work I was doing. Leadership changed, my boss changed and all this other stuff, and I stayed for two years too long because I was no longer aligned, but I wanted to be loyal. I wanted to prove myself like all of this other stuff, right? And I wish I had someone like me that said, Hey, you're no longer aligned. It's not your fault. Like God, how great would it have felt to hear? It's not your fault? Oh my God. Right? It's not your fault. This situation just is no longer serving you. Right? And so when it comes to a job search, a lot of times what is so frustrating in a job search is one, the traditional job search, the process is broken, right? Applying to those jobs online is broken. The best way to get in front of someone and to get hired is to talk to the person who can actually hire you, right? Who's gonna be your boss? Because if you're talking to a recruiter, they've got a checklist, right? And they're gonna say, do you fit this box? Do you not fit this box? And then you're not really learning anything about the job, about the culture, et cetera. And when you are trying to be in the right position and in alignment with your career, why that's so important to me and why
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[00:28:58] Kara: My mission literally is we exist to empower high achievers and leaders to live impactful lives, starting with their careers is because I strongly believe when you are aligned in your careers, you're fulfilled in your careers. That starts affecting the rest of your life, right? You start to be financially fulfilled, your relationships are better, your marriage is better, you can start showing up to be the parent that you wanna be because you've just come home with this great energy, right? You love the work that you're doing. But when you are not aligned, if you're in a toxic workplace, if your boss is micromanaging you, if you feel like your job is sucking the life outta you, your relationships start getting suffer, or suffering, right? You're not the parent that you wanna be, plus your mental and physical health, it starts suffering too, right? And so that's why alignment is so important. And it starts with being authentic in your job search. Because so far too often in that job search, people feel this pressure to start twisting themselves and changing themselves to fit some sort of job description or some narrative that they feel like this recruiter or this decision maker wants 'em to be. And then by the time they get into the job, they're like, oh shit. Who did I say I was gonna be? Right? And now they're in this position and they're like having to mask all day long, or people please all day long. And then they're right back where they were, jumping from the pan into the fire, feeling stressed, feeling that, you know, tension and all that other stuff. And so what we really focus on specifically in our coaching program is healing some of that burnout. Right? And really getting, the very first session we have is, what do you want out of life? Sometimes people are like, this is a career. This is a job searching thing, right? And I said, yeah, I know that, but you're a high achiever and most likely you've probably changed your whole life, maybe even relocated for a job before. And I wanna reverse engineer that. I said, what do you want outta life? What experiences do you want? What contributions do you wanna give? What type of, you know, growth experiences do you want out of life? And then let's find a job with a culture that can give you that type of life, because then you can be empowered in order to go after that.
[00:30:56] Monica: That's fantastic. you're really putting words to their story to be their authentic selves. And I think that is so helpful because to your point, most people don't know how to do that. So when you ask them what they want we do that all the time with our community and we get so many blank stares from these women. They're like, what do you mean? Yeah, you!
[00:31:14] Melissa: The other thing I wanna say about this is it's not our society or culture, right? I feel like one of my big lessons of being an employer and running a business for 12 years is actually it's my responsibility to plant these people in the right soil. I'm not really getting the best results out of you if you're really bad at math, and I'm asking you to manage a budget, right? And if you're really good at design and I plant you in that soil where you're designing things, there is sort of a synergy that happens. And the leadership actually has to learn this. This is like on a leadership level. Quit trying to make people do things they don't wanna do. But we have this American sort of pioneer attitude of you know, pull yourself up by the bootstraps and do the hard things. And that means you're a good worker. Actually, to me, I feel like that doesn't mean you're a good worker. That just means you have a high threshold for pain, right? A good worker is somebody who shows up happy and positive and contributes and learns and is interested in learning more about what they're already doing so they can get better and better at it. And I feel like it's almost a whole cultural shift that we need to have. And now that I have teenagers going through high school and looking at college, I realize, oh wait. Of course it's like this in our workplaces, we raised these kids like this. You know, if your kid is bad at math in our society, you get them a math tutor. But what if they were fantastic at photography? Maybe a photography tutor is where you should have spent your money investing in their alignment as little people. But it's the exact opposite mindset that we have in this culture of well, you know, you gotta do the hard things.
[00:32:55] Kara: It's interesting because right now current state, we have five generations in the workforce. Now the traditionalists, we only have 2%. Right. But they're still in here. And then we've got the boomers, right? Then we got the boomers, the Gen X, the millennials, and the Gen Z, and the cultures are so vastly different and I'm thrilled because like eventually, you know, the traditionalists will get out of there. The boomers will start, you know, getting older. But we're seeing this shift so much because I actually just wrote an article about this. It was that was the mentality of the traditionalists and the boomers and the traditionalists were the ones who really set up corporate America after the Great Depression. Like this was that thing. You sit down, they valued loyalty and dedication. You sit down at a desk, you go every single day, and you get a watch at the end of your career and a pension and that's it. But that no longer exists
[00:33:48] Melissa: and you were rewarded for suffering. Do the hard thing. The company man, even if he lost his soul along the way, was the hero. And I just caught bullshit on that. I don't think a life well spent is suffering.
[00:34:04] Kara: Yeah, I don't think so either. And what the younger generations really value is they value being apart. Gen X came in with an entrepreneurial mindset, and that's when the gig economy sort of started up exploding. And Gen Z wants to be valued and they want flexibility and they want to be valued for their skills that they bring to the table. And so what's interesting, I'm actually writing an article for University of Phoenix on skills-based degrees. They're literally teaching different skills. It's fascinating. And so what's rising up now that I'm seeing is this new leadership style called the coaching leadership style.
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[00:34:39] Kara: leveraging strengths of people on their team, leveraging that coaching model where it's, Hey, I'm not telling you what to do. I'm asking you what should we do? Right? And it's really driving that innovation and I'm thrilled for it because that old method of just sitting at a desk and grinding away, sure there's things that at every job that you're not gonna love to do, but putting people with passion, when people are passionate, the motivation is there and the innovation and the productivity is there too.
[00:35:04] Monica: So true now, but you also help a lot of women get a seat at the table, negotiate like these are important things that, why do you suppose women has have such a difficult time asking for the money?
[00:35:17] Kara: One of the things that I think personally, just on a personal note, is I think back to when I was raised, right? Like I was raised by, in a very strict Christian household and I was told, be humble. Don't brag, be grateful for what you have. You know, like all of those types of things that come in this strict religious households, I'll be honest, women weren't as, I don't know how best to say this, but women weren't as valued. Right? And so when it comes to your career, a lot of that has done women a disservice, right? So when it comes to interviewing, it feels uncomfortable to brag, right? Even at the beginning of this podcast, when I was like, I'm really good at this. I'm like, Ooh. Like it's still so hard for me to say that. I do it even though it's uncomfortable because I wanna set an example for other women to brag on themselves. I think it's incredible to be able to do that. No one else is going to be able to advocate for yourself in an interview except for you. And even still, I talk to bonkers smart people, like incredibly smart people, and they're like, well, it was really just my team. It was me and my team. I said, listen, who was driving that team? Who's doing all this? Right? And so I do believe that as. The generations grow up as our societies grow and things like that. And as women get more power in the marketplace and more seats at the table, I think that will shift. Also, I wrote another article in forms about how businesses that have women in leadership actually are more productive. They have better results. They are more in touch with their customers. I think that to be honest, if we think about, our grandmothers were not able to have checking accounts. They were not able to own businesses. They were not able to own houses.
[00:36:56] Melissa: My mom even, couldn't sign a mortgage. Right.
[00:36:58] Kara: Which is insane. Right? That was your mother, your mom,
[00:37:03] Melissa: I dunno if you're aware of this big IBM study. I looked at that last year about women in corporate America and even though there's all these initiatives to attract women, To put more women on boards, to train more women for leadership, the participation of women is going down and so they're investing more and they're prioritizing it more across corporate America and the actual women raising their hands is less and less. And I really think that has to do with the corporate structure isn't designed for women and their needs and their priorities, even their health, even our cycles. I mean, not to be like all woo, we like woo, we have bodies that have cycles and we have high performing weeks and we have low weeks, and like we could craft our work around our biological needs and our emotional needs and it just hasn't actually been considered on any kinda large scale way. If you even have the conversation in a public place, people start getting squirmy. It's a reality that we're different. We're different biologically and physically and chemically.
[00:38:09] Kara: Yeah. I think it's a mix of things. One, it has not been very long that women have even had any rights, and now they're trying to take 'em away. And then the other thing is the structures were not created to support us. You're absolutely right. I know I can get done in a week, the week after my period, I can get done so much. But the week of my period, I'm like, I'd rather just stay in bed, you know, like whatever. And third, you know, the same structures of the society, but we're so much lower to return to work after the pandemic because of the absolute pressure to take care of the mental load at home too. So what I talked about at the very beginning with Jack and I, we attacked the home. Eliminating ego as a business, who's the best to attack this task, right? Just to get it done as a team. And so far too often women are still stuck in that patriarchal mindset of, I gotta take care of that home. But honestly, this is no longer sustainable in this society. Homes need to have two incomes. And so if you are both bringing in an income, you both need to attack the home, right? And so there are a lot of things that play into this, but I do think it is to start with women needing to be okay and letting go of some of that stuff from either their childhood or society of bragging on themselves. Listen,
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[00:39:26] Kara: you have to advocate for yourself. You just absolutely have to, no one else is going to. So learning how to do that, and I think also as society as we grow, I think we're gonna start seeing a little bit more supporting for women. I'm hoping.
[00:39:39] Melissa: Bragging is also like a very gendered word, women advocating for themselves or sharing their accomplishments is almost always bragging, and the reverse is not true. Like, when a man shows up and tells you about his successes, people cheer. I mean, people wanna follow him. And so I think there's a lot of things that are very gendered, right? And so we feel like it's bragging cause we were told as little girls not to brag and not to be bratty and not, you know, not to be self-indulgent, but.
[00:40:08] Monica: For sure. But I'm wondering if we were just fed a bunch of bullshit too, because can we really do it all as women? And is it okay not to do it all? But also that conversation of yes, why are we asking for equal rights? shouldn't that just come with the territory? But then we have these real conversations. Let's look at it from the other angle. Okay, you want equal rights, you wanna do all this, but now you're telling me you want a week off for your period. I mean okay, well that I understand the argument against sometimes when women, is it a disservice? Cuz the more we propel forward then we're having these honest conversations. Like you said, Mel, this is a reality. This is our bodies. We didn't make this shit up. This is happening.
[00:40:48] Melissa: Well, and I don't even know if a week off is the answer, but just an acknowledgement. Right. And also maybe I think about this in my own life and like in my relationships and running a business, there's certain things like when I, you know, let's say on a hormonal level, there's certain times where you know, this is a good time for feeling or for openness, or for organizing or for discarding. And then there's other times, you know, emotions and hormones are cyclical, right? And depending on where you are, you might be suited to one task this week and another task two weeks from now. I'm not saying we have to build it into every job description or every corporate structure, but even just the bare acknowledgement of you know, what's going on with her today? like making some kind of allowance for a lot is going on with her today and maybe like she could work from home this week. And I think that Covid and the Pandemic has made men and women like ask for more. Wait a minute, I did a lot of fucking work this year. I got a lot done from home. Why can't I do this more often or 50% of the time?
[00:41:55] Kara: I think to both of your points, I think what I have found as a business owner being able to be in charge of my own schedule, right? And working with my own body and my own energy levels, I find that I can be different levels of productivity based on my cycle, right? And I think when we work in a rigid structure that was set up to function with men's bodies and things like that, it doesn't allow us to tap into the power that we have when we are able to work with the energy levels that we have on our cycle, right? Because I can still work in a men's schedule on the week of my period, and I do it every single week, right? And every single month. But I also know that if you gave me the space and you weren't micromanaging me on a week where I can soar, then I could get done multiple projects, right? So I think to both of your points, having that structure where, you know, Every woman is able to kind of manage their own project schedule and all that other stuff. Probably is not realistic at this point, but what is realistic is fricking equal pay. You know, can we just get there at this point right now? Because the fact of the matter is to Monica's point, we are doing so much more and I think it's almost insulting at some points when I really think about it. The amount that women do, the amount that women do in their day jobs in their home life just in general, the way that our brains work and just go so much further at times and strategically and analytic, like all of this stuff. And it's just not ever recognized. It's never you know, appreciated or paid or whatever. Let's just get to equal footing. That's what I would love. You know?
[00:43:40] Melissa: I would like to see that too. I mean, I think I'm just dreaming big about just acknowledging also feminine energy and feminine work cycles and yeah. How about, let's start with equal pay?
[00:43:51] Monica: And girls we're lucky, honestly, because we have a skin color that passes too. So we, we don't even have it half as bad as our, you know, our counterparts,
[00:44:00] Melissa: white women make, I don't know, whatever it is, 70% on the dollar. And then black women it's much less than that, right? 54 or 60, or, I don't remember the numbers, but I've seen those studies over and over again.
[00:44:11] Monica: When we talk about time and time management and trying to create it all, what is your trick to figure it all out with time management?
[00:44:18] Kara: So here is what I'm currently doing and I'm trying it out and it's going fairly decently. I have blocked every Wednesday of my week off so that I don't meet with clients every Wednesday. The reason why I've done this is because a lot of my work and a lot of my life is content creation, right? It's getting on TikTok, creating value driven videos for people for free. I'm writing a lot of articles. Like I said, I write for Forbes and the University of Phoenix, and then I also write the resumes for our company. So there's just a lot of content heavy writing, and when I'm trying to fit all of that in, in between calls with clients, that takes a different part of my brain. So what I've decided is if I can have two days of high impact client meetings and then a break a weekend and Wednesday, Let's try that. So I've been trying that and it's been really exciting for me. So that's what I do. Also with time management, I really have a strict morning routine. Just something I've also learned about myself as I'm A D H D. So I always used to beat myself up. why do I always procrastinate? Why can't I start tasks and why do when I do start tasks it's so focused that I lose track of time, all this other stuff. So now what I do is I really make sure that before I even sit down at my desk, cause I used to just get up out of bed, go to my desk, and then be there for 14 hours. I really make sure that I do my Pilates, that I meditate, that I sit down and talk to my friends or my husband before I even sit at my desk, do my makeup. And that's like my little ritual before I even sit down at my office. And that's when I visualize it, that's me filling my cup out first so that I can then go and pour from the overflow. Because if I continually sit down with an empty cup, I'm just gonna burn myself out again. And I also really try not to work on the weekends anymore which is important.
[00:46:06] Melissa: You're like decades ahead of me, girl.
[00:46:09] Monica: So good. So balanced. I mean, really balanced. I love that.
[00:46:13] Melissa: I like that idea. I might try to adopt that of like just addressing specific buckets in time blocks, because I also tend to be, I'm doing phone calls and I'm making a deck and I'm talking to a client and I'm managing a kid and I'm driving a dog to a grooming appointment. And it's like my whole day feels like this constant juggling.
[00:46:32] Monica: Can we talk a little bit about social media? So here are some things. I'm gonna read a few things. Okay? Hashtag A D H D, hashtag workaholic, therapy tikTok, go after your future. Know your worth. Toxic workplace. These are the messages, the themes that you're sending out to your people. And it's so cool you say things like motivation, don't wait to feel motivated. Reclaim your sanity and your time. Learning to work with my brain instead of my brain working against me. The only people who do not have imposter syndrome are imposters. The importance of celebrating wins. I love that you're really connecting with your audience with real messages that really inspire some action and some positivity. And you also have this thing where you work with a lot of threes. I don't know if you've noticed that, but it's three small steps, three small things.
[00:47:24] Kara: Just easy for me to think of three I guess I had no idea I did that. No, I think I use a lot of psychological persuasion techniques in my coaching and my courses that I teach people. And it's not to be manipulative, it's just I happen to be, again, here I am with advocating, not bragging, but I tend to Be pretty good with knowing people and how they work. And one of the ways is and I use this in my resume, is people don't like reading paragraphs. People don't, you know, we're in the Twitter generation, they like lists, listicles, you know, I love reading a listical too. So when it comes to social media, having threes or in my articles, five ways to blah, blah, blah, those tend to be the best ones.
[00:48:06] Monica: But what about the entertainment part? Because you do some funny shit, honestly with your boys and the music. Where do you come up with these ideas?
[00:48:14] Kara: It's just trends on TikTok. I'll be honest with you, TikTok was a tough thing for me. And when I burnt out last year, I dropped it like it's hot. Because TikTok triggered a lot of those things for me. People pleasing perfectionism, like having to respond to every comment, like all of this stuff. And so when I burn out, I was like, that's the first thing to go. But I'm trying to get back on it because I really love it. And TikTok is creative and so I have some hobbies that I really like. I love makeup. I love doing my hair. I love, you know, it's just fun and creative things. And so being able to do some of the trends and the transitions on TikTok, it feeds that creative aspect for me, while also still having the work aspect to it too.
[00:48:53] Melissa: You know, you're doing a lot of things that I admire and also. That I'm not comfortable with. I know you're younger than us, like maybe it's a Gen X thing of at least myself, and I think maybe Monica and Amy, at least here in the kindling project, we're not super comfortable with social media the way that maybe somebody 10 or 15 years younger than us is. But I admire it. I admire the guts and the courage and the openness and the willingness to share. And I feel like I do show up. I mean, Monica can argue she knows me well. I think I do show up one-on-one openly and honestly, but I just sort of freeze like a deer in the headlights if there's a camera or, and I just, I would like to get more comfortable because if my next phase in life is more about sharing or more about giving, or more about educating rather than producing, the mediums are here and they're not going away. And so do you have advice for people that need to get a little more comfortable with social media?
[00:49:48] Kara: Yeah, I'll tell you my hottest tip. First of all, when I first started TikTok, when I first started sharing on social media, and I still feel this way, sometimes it's not comfortable for me. I am an introvert at heart. I used to talk about personality tests. I literally just redid my Enneagram as well as my Myers Briggs last week. Last week, I n fj. Okay? Okay. So I am an introvert at heart getting on social media, even like putting a Facebook post out there. It's uncomfortable for me. I don't like it. What I have come to realize, and this is through a lot of coaching and therapy, is that people connect with me, which sometimes really is weird cause I'm like, I'm just a goober in sweatpants in my house. Like I don't understand why, but if I can just help one person that's gonna change something. Right? And then the one thing when it comes to video is I'm on Marco Polo and I've been on Marco Polo for, man, I wish Marco Polo would sponsor me the amount of time I talk about Marco Polo. But Marco Polo is this app and it's sort of like a FaceTime walkie-talkie. And I've been on Marco Polo for probably seven years now. Ever since one of my best friends left our corporate job, I got her on this so that we could talk. And when you're talking, you literally have to stare at yourself to talk. And it was super uncomfortable for me to do it. I was 85 pounds heavier than I am right now. I hated looking at myself on it, but it did me a huge favor because I started getting used to looking at myself in camera. And then also the work that I do became on Zoom, and so I started getting used to looking at myself on camera. So then when I transitioned over to TikTok, as much as it was uncomfortable, filming myself on camera wasn't that uncomfortable because I started getting used to it. And so what I would recommend for anyone who's looking to get on TikTok and doesn't wanna just dive right in, I honestly would start FaceTiming people or get on Marco Polo with your best friend and start doing it. So that the most important thing is getting used to seeing yourself on camera. The other thing, if you are in a job interview or whatever, record yourself answering interview questions and watch it back. It is going to be, I promise you, the most uncomfortable thing you have ever seen in your entire life.
[00:52:01] Melissa: I feel like Zoom was such a brutal awakening for me. I felt like pretty comfortable and pretty confident going into a conference room, and all of a sudden I had to look at myself. And I also credit Zoom with some weight loss over Covid. You know I think over Covid it was like, you lost weight or you gained weight. But I was like, oh my God I didn't know I looked like that, or I didn't know I did that weird thing. Or, gosh, I really fidget a lot. Like it was just a, almost like a rude awakening.
[00:52:27] Kara: The more you can observe yourself on camera, you'll be so shocked in the clients that actually watch the replays back. The transformation is shocking. And it goes back to self-awareness. And so that's what I would highly recommend is do that. The other thing that I would recommend is a big tip from my friend Samantha, write out your post. If it's a written post, read it once and hit post, cuz I am guilty of writing posts and then just copy and pasting it and throwing it at my notes app and never posting it. I have hundreds of posts on my note app that I never post and she just posts and she gained this huge following over a year just by, you know, taking a big breath and hitting post and just saying whatever will be. And honestly, the biggest piece of advice is get used to yourself seeing yourself on camera. And then the second thing is just do the damn thing and don't put so much pressure on yourself with it because it has such a short shelf life like, People will engage with it and people are gonna forget about it the next day.
[00:53:21] Monica: So true. So true. So, I mean, we've kept you for so long, but I do just have a few more questions. a lot of our listeners are women who have maybe put their career on hold to be moms and now are thinking, I'm gonna get back into it. What career advice do you have as far as, you know, there's a huge gap in there, resume. What's your advice to women like that?
[00:53:43] Kara: So a lot of times when it comes to those types of things, that's an objection, right? That's an objection that someone's gonna have in an interview and is an objection or a limiting belief that you have as to why you're not gonna get that job, right? And so the first thing that I would say is, one, realize that it's just this thing that's holding you back, right? And then two, have something prepared for you to say, to come overcome that in the interview. So, I always like to address it, head on, keep it short, and then, this is my tip for interviewing, address the objection, head on, keep it short, and then turn it back around as to why you're excited to be there. So what it might be is for someone who is a stay-at-home mom and maybe has some work history in the past, right? Hey, you know, I completely understand why you might be worried that there's a gap on my resume. I've been, you know, a stay-at-home mom taking care of my kids for the last X amount of years. And why I'm really excited about that is I actually got to learn this, and this about me and increase my leadership skills by managing probably the most unruly team members I've ever had, right? You can add a little humor in there, but I'm actually really excited because I was able to take this break and really focus on what I really want next in my career, which is this, and this. And from what I read about your company, that's something that you guys value as well. And I'm really excited to learn about how my skills and experience can really help you drive your company forward.
[00:55:08] Monica: Oh, that's solid. That's good.
[00:55:09] Melissa: Perfect.
[00:55:10] Monica: I'll have to try that. I've been a stay-at-home mom, so maybe I'll try it.
[00:55:13] Melissa: Yeah, you always say that and I think first of all, stay-at-home Mom is like the hardest job there is. I mean, the reason I have a company is, you know, I was like two in the morning nursing a baby lonely and bored and scared and is this my coworker is really ungrateful.
[00:55:31] Kara: I know, right? They're tough.
[00:55:33] Monica: They're tough.
[00:55:34] Melissa: But also in your case, Monica, you're a blogger, you're a writer, you're a community organizer. Like you're involved in all this philanthropy. Like you have a hundred jobs, you're managing a tennis team, like you have a hundred jobs. And I think that it's just because it's not a traditional corporate job, it doesn't, you know, so many women don't show up and brag on themselves or advocate, you know what, I have a lot of wisdom. It was hard earned. And it doesn't matter if, you know, you don't have to earn it in the trenches.
[00:56:04] Kara: Actually, that is the trenches, that's the real trenches. But yeah, that's two Melissa's point, you have not been unemployed. You have been working. And that's a lot of what I would tell people too is, Hey, when you've been quote unquote a stay-at-home mom, what else have you been doing? Have you been volunteering at the school? Have you been working at a church? Have you done any hobby? What else have you been doing that we can leverage? Even if it's, you know, just telling that story.
[00:56:36] Monica: Yeah. No, that's excellent advice and thank you ladies. Thank you for validating me. You're right. I have been working my ass off. Actually.
[00:56:41] Kara: You have.
[00:56:41] Monica: I need a vacation.
[00:56:43] Melissa: Youre a super duper, highly productive person. And then when I hear you say things like that, I'm like, wait, she gets more done in a day sometimes than I get done in a week. I'm running two companies.
[00:56:54] Monica: Okay. Okay. I'll take it. I'll take the love. Okay, so Kara, really, here you go. What advice would you tell your young self? And my second question, you can tie it up is I'm gonna pull this back on you. What does transformation mean to you?
[00:57:09] Kara: Okay. Good.
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[00:57:10] Kara: One I would say to my very young self is you are smart. You are smart, you have a gift and you will help a lot of people and you're worth everything that life gives you and you're worth taking a break and you are worth not working yourself into the ground. All of those things, right? Cuz that was something. For me, hyper independence and things like that was really tough for me. So that's something that I would really focus on and really I would tell everyone and all of their younger selves is that you have a gift, you all have gifts, you all are smart, and you all will go on to do great things. Because I think sometimes the school system, like Melissa said, we get caught up in these things that don't really focus on our gifts, you know?
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[00:57:54] Kara: And for transformation, what transformation means for me is, transformation means being willing to go through the breakdown in order to get to the breakthrough. Because I think a lot of times people want the transformation because they see what's on the other side, but they don't wanna go through all the crap in between. What I have found with transformation over and over again, it is the hardest thing to do ever. And it requires self-awareness. It requires the deep, dark lessons and it requires getting to know yourself and having that awareness and learning those lessons and accepting help. Right. Accepting help and looking at your situation from a different part point. And what I think transformation is, is it's inevitable. People are going to change and you are going to transform whether you like it or not. And so being ready to accept it and die full in is something I'm really excited that I'm able to do cuz I wasn't always able to do that.
[00:58:55] Monica: That's awesome. Thank you for sharing that. Yeah. So how can people work with you, Kara?
[00:59:00] Kara: Absolutely. So we have a couple of different options. Right now we are doing resume and LinkedIn's. We will optimize your resume and LinkedIn for you and give you access to our training course that was just updated at the beginning of this year. So all best practices for this job market. And then we also have an unlimited coaching program. Like I said, it focuses on the authentic job search so that we can help you get aligned and you can set up a free consultation either with myself or my husband Jack, in order to see if you're a good fit to work with us. And that is going to be at get started dot optimized career solutions.com.
[00:59:32] Melissa: Go there ladies. I know there's a lot of women here that are looking for a job change and I think that Kara would be the perfect place to start with that.
[00:59:41] Kara: We would love to talk to you, love to help you out.
[00:59:43] Melissa: Thank you so much my friend.
[00:59:45] Kara: Thank you for having me. That was great.
[00:59:47] Melissa: It was great inspiring conversation. Is there anyone you wanna give a shout out to? This is a little something we've been doing this season is having everyone do a little round table thanking someone.
[00:59:58] Kara: I know it's not a woman, but I would like to thank my husband. He has gone into 1000% support mode. Supporting a partner, a business partner, and a wife who has gone through burnout is a really tough job. And he does it with a smile and is grateful for it every single day. And I wanna thank you both of you two for having me on. I really appreciate it. This was a fantastic conversation and it brought up lessons that I even needed to be reminded of this week. So honestly, thank you so much for having me on. I'm really grateful.
[01:00:33] Monica: Glad you're here. I think I'm gonna shout out to like the Youngs, the seniors impending graduation, the senior class of 23. They are really a group of talented young people, my son being one of them. And Lisa, your daughter Mel, being another. I'm just really excited for them. They're the future fire starters and I can't wait to see what they do because I feel like they've just ahead of the curve. They just know more than we ever did, and I love that about them.
[01:01:02] Melissa: You know, I mean, not that you stole my shout out, but I was, I think it was cause we both spent last night at the senior art exhibit, like at our local art house and looking at the work and also reading the artist statements. It gives me like so much hope and optimism about this world because I am a person who had to like, turn off media not too long ago that I had to withdraw from some people that were toxic. And I really genuinely had a couple years there where I just felt like the world is going to hell. When I see these little bright, 18 year old brilliant artists, these super deep, sophisticated artists statements, I'm like, we're all gonna be just fine. We're gonna be just fine. We're gonna be better than fine. They're gonna solve some of these problems that we're handing them so yay, yay teenagers. It's not every day I say that. Alright ladies, I hope you have a great rest of your week.
[01:02:01] Kara: Thank you. Thank you for having me.
[01:02:03] Melissa: Yeah.
[01:02:03] Monica: Thank you so much everyone. Thanks for listening and remember fire starters, it only takes one spark. Bye!
[01:02:10] Melissa: Bye!