You picked a major at eighteen, and somehow that one decision still gets to decide what you are allowed to do with the rest of your life.

In this catch-up, Lorissa and Alex get into leaving corporate, translating those skills into something of your own, and why the systems that actually stick are the ones built around how your brain works instead of someone else's.

What We Cover

→ Why the major you picked at eighteen is not the lane you are stuck in, and how Lorissa and Alex each rebuilt a corporate skill set into something of their own

→ Lorissa on launching Lorissa's List before it was ready, and why a messy first version beats waiting for perfect

→ Why most task systems fall apart by Friday, and what makes one finally stick

Where to Start

If you need to finally close the 9,439 open tabs in your mind in just one afternoon so you don't have to try to remember everything anymore, this is for you. Build it here → go.alexpayetta.com/ceomode

Lorissa's List

Lorissa's curated list of the products, services, and providers actually worth your time, all vetted to a higher standard so you can skip the search.

→ lorissaviolet.com

Connect With Us

Lorissa Violet

lorissaviolet.com | @lorissaviolet

Alex Payetta

alexpayetta.com | @alexpayetta

Timestamps

0:00 Welcome back, and why this one is a catch-up

0:15 Lorissa's List, and the corporate job it traces back to

2:15 Taking your skills out of corporate without making the job your identity

4:16 Alex on turning Fortune 500 systems work into coaching women

4:50 You are not stuck in the lane you picked at eighteen

6:06 Getting fired, and why the next thing comes in phases

7:18 Launching Lorissa's List before it was ready

9:08 The brand-content year that did not work, and playing to your strengths

10:14 Phase two of Lorissa's List and learning by shipping

11:08 Life update: five days solo with the kids

12:37 Alex on building CEO Mode

13:36 Getting the mental load out of your head

15:22 Why Asana works for life at home too

18:28 Build around your brain, not someone else's

By the time you fall into bed at the end of the day, your body has nothing left. Not for affection, not for intimacy, not for the part of your relationship that used to be effortless. Nobody told you this was the trade.

Cindy Scharkey has been an OB/GYN nurse for almost 40 years, and what she kept hearing from women is that nobody is having this conversation. So she started having it.

What You'll Learn

→ The "one tank of energy" reality and why your sex life is the first thing it drains

→ Why scheduling sex doesn't work the way most couples do it (and what does)

→ What "responsive desire" is, and why most women have been measuring against the wrong thing their whole lives

Heard Yourself In This Episode?

Cindy points out there's only ONE tank of energy, and your marriage is pulling from the same one as your job and your kids. The Stress Loop quiz helps you figure out which of the four loops is draining it, and what to do differently starting tomorrow morning. Take the quiz here → go.alexpayetta.com/quiz

Lorissa's List

Lorissa's curated list of the products, services, and providers actually worth your time, all vetted to a higher standard so you can skip the search.

→ lorissaviolet.com

Connect With Us

Lorissa Violet

lorissaviolet.com | @lorissaviolet

Alex Payetta

alexpayetta.com | @alexpayetta

Cindy Scharkey, RN

cindyscharkey.com | @cindyscharkey

Mentioned in This Episode

→ Permission for Pleasure: Tending Your Sexual Garden cindyscharkey.com/permission-for-pleasure-book

→ Permission for Pleasure podcast cindyscharkey.com/podcast — short topical episodes good for couples to listen to together

→ Uberlube uberlube.com — Cindy's recommended lube. Code CINDY for 15% off

Timestamps

0:00 Why this conversation, why now

1:30 Cindy's background and why she started talking about this publicly

6:00 The "one tank of energy" — sex pulls from the same well as everything else

10:00 Responsive vs spontaneous desire (and why the movies lied)

15:00 Scheduling intimacy without it feeling like a chore

20:00 The 4% change that brings desire back

25:00 The fear-of-pregnancy "hand brake" nobody talks about

30:00 Decentering intercourse — what "sex" can actually mean

35:00 Where to start when you don't know where to start

40:00 Why painful sex isn't normal, and the lube conversation

Sometimes you're in the rhythm and everything feels good. Sometimes the rhythm breaks and you have to rebuild your week from the ground up. In this catch-up, one of us is in each season.

Alex and Lorissa catch up on where they each actually are right now.. one of them in the most grounded season she's had in a while, one of them hitting a wall and re-working how she runs her week. The conversation wanders into the Emma Grede "three-hour mom" debate, the judgment between working moms and stay-at-home moms, and why kids turn out how they turn out regardless of what we do.

What We Cover

→ The moment Lorissa realized compounding Fridays was never going to catch her up

→ The Emma Grede "three-hour mom" take and the problem with judging other parents' choices

→ Why Lorissa's third baby year has felt completely different than her first two

Lacking Energy?

Alex attributes her energy to finally being back in her routines. Wake Up Different walks you through the 10-minute morning and evening routine she swears by, so you're more focused, energized, and grounded. Get started here → go.alexpayetta.com/wud

Lorissa's List

Lorissa's curated list of the products, services, and providers actually worth your time, all vetted to a higher standard so you can skip the search.

→ lorissaviolet.com

Connect With Us

Lorissa Violet

lorissaviolet.com | @lorissaviolet

Alex Payetta

alexpayetta.com | @alexpayetta

Timestamps

0:00 Alex's "I feel lucky all the time" season

2:15 Morning gratitude walks with a 4-year-old

3:48 Lorissa hits a wall, Lorissa's List takes off, and the one-day-a-week model breaks

6:30 Why being particular means being involved

8:10 Not blending work and kids, even when the baby is just chilling

11:22 Third-baby year: why time actually feels slower this time

14:05 The Emma Grede three-hour mom debate

17:40 Judgment between working moms and stay-at-home moms

You keep trying new supplements, new workouts, new morning routines, and something still feels off. The thing nobody is checking is usually the thing running underneath all of it.

Dr. Sam Riley is back for round two. This time we go deep on blood sugar.. why it sits at the root of hair loss, insomnia, weight that won't budge, hormone issues, fertility struggles, and the anxiety that seems to come out of nowhere.

What You'll Learn

→ The everyday symptom most women write off as "just hangry" that's actually a red flag for something much bigger

→ Why intermittent fasting is making a huge group of women feel worse, and how to know if you're in that group

→ The four foods Dr. Sam pulls first when someone says "I've tried everything and nothing is working"

→ What a continuous glucose monitor actually shows you in two weeks (and why the first week you shouldn't change a thing)

→ The protein number that makes women's jaws hit the floor, and the math that makes it doable

→ How food order at a single meal can completely change the way your body responds

Heard Yourself In This Episode?

Dr. Sam kept coming back to the same thing.. consistency with the basics. Wake Up Different is the 10-minute morning and evening routine that turns the basics from a daily fight into your DEFAULT. Get started here → go.alexpayetta.com/wud

Lorissa's List

Lorissa's curated list of the products, services, and providers actually worth your time, all vetted to a higher standard so you can skip the search.

→ lorissaviolet.com

Connect With Us

Lorissa Violet

lorissaviolet.com | @lorissaviolet

Alex Payetta

alexpayetta.com | @alexpayetta

Dr. Sam Riley

rileychiro.com | @dr.samriley

Mentioned in This Episode

→ Ashley Barrett Wellness barrettwellnesscenter.com — Virtual Nutritional Therapy Practitioner

→ Diabetes with Dani @diabeteswithdani — Creator of Conquer Your Diabetes, a Type 1 program for kids and women

→ Levels levelshealth.com — continuous glucose monitor

→ Cyrex Labs cyrexlabs.com — food sensitivity and autoimmune testing

Eight months of broken sleep and a head full of shoulds.

This is the mini where Alex talks about sleep-training Scarlett, and the hardest part of it actually being just undoing everything she'd told herself about what she was supposed to do. Lorissa, who's immune to the shoulds, has great advice on how to ignore the conflicting noise.

What We Cover

→ Why "what's best for the baby" isn't what you think

→ How anti-sleep-training messaging kept Alex questioning her own intuition for eight months straight before she called it

→ Why the shoulds in motherhood can sneak up on you, and what it means to "be your own camp"

Take the Stress Loop Quiz

If you don't feel like a version of yourself you love (like Alex felt for the past 8 months), the Stress Loop quiz helps you figure out which of the four loops is draining you, and what to do differently starting tomorrow morning. Take the quiz here → go.alexpayetta.com/quiz

Lorissa's List

Lorissa's curated list of the products, services, and providers actually worth your time, all vetted to a higher standard so you can skip the search.

→ lorissaviolet.com

Connect With Us

Lorissa Violet

lorissaviolet.com | @lorissaviolet

Alex Payetta

alexpayetta.com | @alexpayetta

Timestamps

0:00 Alex is finally sleeping

1:30 Eight months of broken sleep and the home birth community

4:00 Co-sleeping, home birth, and why they get tied together

7:00 Identity, camps, and the should spiral

10:00 Weaning Scarlett and letting the baby decide

13:00 "Be your own camp"

You've tried the charts, the timers, the consequences, the gentle approach, and your kid is still melting down every morning before anyone's out the door. What Randy Free teaches is the middle ground many parents are actually looking for, somewhere between gentle parenting and old-school discipline, and it works for all kids (even neurodivergent ones).

Randy Free is a family counselor and retired international tax partner who spent 30 years in high-pressure corporate environments before building the PEACE-ful Parenting Process for neurodivergent kids and the high-achieving parents trying to figure out what actually works.

What You'll Learn

→ A simple framework for deciding which battles to fight and which ones to let go, so you stop trying to correct everything at once

→ What's actually happening in your child's brain during a meltdown, and why your calm matters more than your consequence

→ The story Randy tells about kicking his own son's door down in anger, and what his son remembered years later (it's not the lesson)

Take the Stress Loop Quiz

This episode all comes back to the mom's nervous system setting the tone for the entire house. If you've been moving at a pace that leaves no room for patience, that shows up in every interaction with your kids. The Stress Loop quiz helps you figure out where your capacity is actually breaking down so you can start building it back. Take the quiz here → go.alexpayetta.com/quiz

Lorissa's List

Lorissa's curated list of the products, services, and providers actually worth your time, all vetted to a higher standard so you can skip the search.

→ lorissaviolet.com

Connect With Us

Lorissa Violet

lorissaviolet.com | @lorissaviolet

Alex Payetta

alexpayetta.com | @alexpayetta

Randy Free

coachtoresilience.com

Take Randy's free PEACE-ful Parenting Self Assessment to see where your parenting lands → drive.google.com/file/d/1t5k06pPR-OeTqDBiMIJh_bE4j9phnhra/view

Timestamps

0:00 Meet Randy Free and his path from tax partner to parenting counselor

2:45 The PEACE acronym and how peaceful parenting differs from gentle parenting

6:30 The parenting quadrant, choosing your battles with red, blue, green, and yellow

12:15 Alex and Lorissa on the consistency struggle between partners

18:00 Nature vs. nurture and how neurodivergent brains process emotions differently

23:30 Mirror neurons and why your kids absorb your stress

29:00 The volcano exercise for teaching kids their own warning signs

35:00 Repairing after you lose your temper

40:45 When kids question authority and where to draw the line

48:00 Over-scheduling and what transitions do to a child's nervous system

55:00 Structure vs. flexibility for neurodivergent kids

1:00:00 Parenting a highly intelligent child who is emotionally behind

1:05:00 How to work with Randy and where to find him

Nobody warns you that getting dressed postpartum is going to make you cry before church.

Lorissa and Alex talk about body changes after kids, the identity shift that comes with them, and what actually helps.

What We Cover

→ The postpartum closet meltdown nobody warns you about and why it costs you more than time

→ How Lorissa went from always being "the smallest" to gaining 80 lbs and completely rebuilding her relationship with her body

→ The one closet move that stopped mornings from turning into a full emotional spiral

Take the Stress Loop Quiz

The reason getting dressed takes so long is the dread that comes with it, and dread costs energy you already didn't have. The Stress Loop quiz helps you figure out which of the four loops is draining that tank before you ever get to the closet. Take the quiz here → go.alexpayetta.com/quiz

Lorissa's List

Lorissa's curated list of the products, services, and providers actually worth your time, all vetted to a higher standard so you can skip the search.

→ lorissaviolet.com

Connect With Us

Lorissa Violet

lorissaviolet.com | @lorissaviolet

Alex Payetta

alexpayetta.com | @alexpayetta

Timestamps

0:00 Intro and the five-minute challenge

0:24 Why getting dressed is the biggest time suck

1:22 Lorissa's identity shift from always being "the smallest"

2:54 The emotional weight of postpartum body changes

4:47 Sobbing before church in leggings

5:54 Outfit wins, fails, and the maternity romper incident

6:22 The strapless gala dress disaster

7:21 Packing nursing outfits for Japan

8:09 Acceptance, button-ups, and the brief blip mindset

9:19 Body dysmorphia and panic-buying the wrong sizes

9:55 Husband gift fails (triple XS and XXL)

11:19 Why clearing out your closet actually feels like freedom

Two moms break down every system they use to run their households, businesses, and families without losing their minds.

If you've ever felt like you're doing a million things and none of it is running smoothly, this one's for you.

What You'll Learn

→ The weekly rhythm that replaced seven nightly "what's for dinner" spirals with one 30-minute decision

→ How a $75/week hire fits into a system that runs your entire household without you holding every piece

→ The thing Alex does every single day that most people don't even know exists, and it's saving her hours

House Rules

If you know you're ready for more systems in your house, House Rules is every single system Alex runs at her home to keep everything running smoothly... the meals, the laundry, the mail, the mess, all of it running without you holding every piece. Get started here → go.alexpayetta.com/houserules

Lorissa's List

Lorissa's curated list of the products, services, and providers actually worth your time, all vetted to a higher standard so you can skip the search.

→ lorissaviolet.com

Connect With Us

Lorissa Violet

lorissaviolet.com | @lorissaviolet

Alex Payetta

alexpayetta.com | @alexpayetta

Mentioned in This Episode

→ Butcher Box butcherbox.com

→ Thrive Market thrivemarket.com/lorissa

→ Mixbook mixbook.com

→ Wispr Flow ref.wisprflow.ai/alex-payetta

→ Resonant resonant.app

→ The Short Years theshortyears.com

Timestamps

0:00 Life updates (Japan, South by Southwest, sleep struggles)

12:00 Meal systems and why we eat the same thing every day

19:24 Why Lorissa picks sleep over the 5:30 AM workout

23:31 Buying back your time before anything else

26:45 Revenge bedtime procrastination

37:03 What happened when a client got a task management system

44:00 The $75/week part-time assistant breakdown

57:00 Car bins, mudroom staging, diaper bag systems

1:02:00 Kids artwork system that keeps memories without clutter

1:08:42 Why Lorissa starts every day praying for discernment

1:16:36 How AI is changing the way Alex runs her business

We have our first guest ever on the pod, Dr. Sam Riley. He's a chiropractor who practices frequency medicine, which means he looks at the whole person.. structural, emotional, and biochemical.

We get into why "fixing your nervous system" might be missing the point, what's actually behind high cortisol and that tired-but-wired feeling, and why emotions show up in the body more than most people realize.

What We Cover

→ Dr. Sam's origin story (and the moment he walked out of his allergist's office at 14)

→ What frequency medicine actually is and how it differs from Western medicine

→ Why your nervous system might be doing exactly what it's supposed to do

→ The connection between emotions and physical symptoms

→ Alex's fertility journey and what shifted when she addressed a subconscious block

→ High cortisol, fight or flight, and the tired-but-wired cycle

→ Blood sugar, hydration, and minerals.. the foundations most people skip

→ Why the emotional work matters just as much as the physical adjustment

→ Practical takeaways for high-achieving women who can't overhaul their lives overnight

Wake Up Different

Dr. Sam reinforces the importance of handling the BASICS. Wake Up Different walks you through the 10-minute morning and evening routine that gets you rebuilding your foundation, without a crazy influencer routine you'll never stick to. Get started here → go.alexpayetta.com/wud

Lorissa's List

Lorissa's curated list of the products, services, and providers actually worth your time, all vetted to a higher standard so you can skip the search.

→ lorissaviolet.com

Connect With Us

Lorissa Violet

lorissaviolet.com | @lorissaviolet

Alex Payetta

alexpayetta.com | @alexpayetta

Dr. Sam Riley

rileychiro.com | @dr.samriley

We're back for Episode 2, and today we're getting into delegation.. why it's so hard for high achievers, where perfectionism sneaks in, and how to figure out what to hold close versus what to let go.

We also go off on some tangents (as we do) about childhood, how our pasts shape our parenting, what it means to keep growing instead of chasing "perfect," and why nothing has to be permanent.

What We Cover

→ Why the most successful people struggle the most with delegating

→ The two buckets for deciding what to outsource

→ How we approach childcare completely differently (and why both work)

→ The real reason perfectionism keeps you stuck

→ The myth of "balance" and why gray area is the goal

Where to Start

The very first step to delegating is looking at how you're spending your time, and deciding EXACTLY what needs to be delegated. Alex created a free PDF that walks you through exactly that. Grab the PDF here → go.alexpayetta.com/timeback

If you already know you want the full system that includes exactly how to delegate, the best way to do it is CEO Mode. Build it here → go.alexpayetta.com/ceomode

Lorissa's List

Lorissa's curated list of the products, services, and providers actually worth your time, all vetted to a higher standard so you can skip the search.

→ lorissaviolet.com

Connect With Us

Lorissa Violet

lorissaviolet.com | @lorissaviolet

Alex Payetta

alexpayetta.com | @alexpayetta