Becoming Your Best Version

Christina Flach is CEO and founder of Pretty Girl Makeup.  She is a renowned celebrity makeup artist with experience working with celebrity clientele, magazines, and big name brands. She has been featured in Vogue, People, Time, and Elle, as well as campaigns for Gucci, Louis Vuitton, Nordstrom, Saks Fifth Avenue, Neiman Marcus, Macy’s, and Bloomingdales.  Christina also writes articles detailing the must know tips, tricks, and hacks of the makeup, wellness, and nutrition industries.  Christina has participated in numerous podcasts, TV, radio, and magazine interviews to raise awareness for the causes she holds close to her heart, and is the Beauty Expert on NBC in California.

Christina is a single mother of four, as well as a philanthropist.  She raises funds and awareness for anti-sepsis causes, having lost her husband to sepsis.  She also started the Beau Friedman Outdoor Classroom at the Edna McGuire School in Mill Valley, California, raising money for the Baby Beau and Ken Flach Educational Funds at the Northern Light School in Oakland, California.  She lost one of her sons sixteen years ago.  Education and nutrition are top interests for Christina.

Christina uses her platform to promote the importance of feeling beautiful from the inside out.  She inspires women to be the best version of themselves and how to overcome life's greatest obstacles.  She believes happiness and attitude are a choice, and wishes herself a good morning each day and sets her intentions.

To learn more:

www.prettygirlmakeup.com

www.christinaflach.com

Follow her on Instagram at @prettygirlmakeup and @christinaflachmakeup

Faigie Kobre (Faigie is Yiddish for bird) is an elementary school art teacher in Long Island, New York, who also works with women who love art but don't feel artistic. She helps them reignite their creativity through the medium of alcohol inks. She started her career as an early childhood educator (she got her masters in education in the 1980s) and then spent 25 years as a high-end portrait photographer. She conducted workshops on creativity and how to give kids are that feeds them.  While she loved helping children enhance their creativity, she switched careers in her 50s (after her children were grown) and loves teaching women how to tap into their untapped creativity.  Locally, she conducts art parties in her community, but her coaching and workshops are offered online as well.

Faigie constantly works on herself to become a better human being.  She works on her relationships.  She has six children, so she works on changing her way of dealing with each of her children, according to their needs and temperaments.  Any relationship requires you to give of one's self.  We are never finished, because there is so much to work on and to change.

Learn more about her work here:

www.creativityreignited.com

@creativealcoholinking

www.Facebook.com/creativealcoholinking

Roxanne McCarty-O’Kane is a ghostwriter and writing mentor who works closely with aspiring authors to empower them to become the changemakers they dream to be through authorship. Storytelling has been Roxanne’s bread and butter since 2007 with a long career as a journalist for newspapers, magazines, and online publications before transferring her skillsets into non-fiction book creation. Her emphasis on connection to her authors and honoring the uniqueness of their stories has seen her recognized in:

2022

2021

2020

2019

When she isn’t in her writing cave, leading Ignite & Write workshops, or mentoring aspiring authors, Roxanne enjoys asserting her dominance in family games of Bananagrams, playing her guitar, and curling up in the hammock on the back deck with a good book.

Roxanne McCarty-O'Kane joined us on the podcast from Australia. Roxanne says:  "My first contact with newspapers was as a ‘paper girl,’ jumping on my bike with a totally stylish yellow PVC satchel slung over my shoulder delivering copies of The Evening Post to subscribers in the small town of Wainuiomata in New Zealand. Rain, hail, or shine, they always received their papers and being in the land of the long white cloud, it often meant arriving home from deliveries soaked-through. Fast forward to today and I am a qualified journalist who has written for a number of newspapers, magazines and e-zines and am what you would call a jack of all trades. I have had to decipher incredible tech-speak, political jargon and complex government documents to draw out the things that really matter to people and have covered everything from everyday news happenings to court proceedings, business stories, profile and entertainment, features that cover hard-hitting topics that can impact the wider community and had the privilege to chat with a number of high profile Australian and international celebrities."

Her Phoenix Phenomenon project showcases inspiring people's stories. She now focuses on authors' stories. Get help with your book by contacting Roxanne at the links or email below. She also does service work helping victims heal from sexual abuse, as part of the No More Fake Smiles organization.

Roxanne follows the premises of the seminal book, The Four Agreements, by Toltec shaman, Don Miguel Ruiz. She is mindful about her words, and she strives not to take things personally or make assumptions and always to do her best in any situation.

Roxanne has penned her own book, Ignite & Write, a resource for fellow authors.  Learn more and follow her work: https://www.roxannewriter.com.au/

Email: [email protected]

Instagram: @roxannewriter

Facebook: facebook.com/roxannewriter

LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/roxannemccartyokane/

Robin started her professional life as a biomedical scientist in the field of molecular physiology. Her work over nearly three decades contributed in major ways to our understanding of the control of the circulation in health and disease, relevant to disorders as varied as high blood pressure, heart failure and obesity. She was honored with many major national and international awards by her scientific peers and was an endowed professor at Cornell University. She is currently Professor Emerita at Cornell and Adjunct Professor of Medicine at Georgetown University.

Throughout this award-winning career, Robin’s passionate avocation was textile art, including spinning, natural dyeing, knitting and weaving. Eventually, the pull of art was irresistible, and she decided to close her research laboratories to devote her efforts completely to abstract painting. She is an alumna of multiple programs at The Penland School as well as numerous other online and in-person art courses.

Robin’s lyrical, process-driven work is rooted in eclectic curiosity and the material surprises she discovers working with her finely-developed visual vocabulary. Her debut exhibition opened at Calloway Fine Art in Georgetown, Washington, DC in Spring of 2021, where she continues to show. Robin is currently one of three finalists for the 2022 DC Mayor’s Arts Awards in the Emerging Creative category. This spring Davisson opened a unique new creative hub in Georgetown called StudioLab RD.

Visitors to StudioLab can browse available art, flip through her art library and enjoy a cup of coffee or tea on the studio’s sun-filled street level. Upstairs, guests can watch Davisson at work, from testing ideas in her sketchbook and prepping canvases, to mixing and applying paints and discerning the final touches on completed pieces. Davisson is accessible and available to chat with visitors and exchange ideas.  She often gives observers a chance to explore their creativity.  Her intention is to explore the creative process together. Salons, a creative-in-residence program and other offerings are also currently in the works.

Today, Robin follows her intuition.  She describes it as a combination of her history, her emotions and her intellect.  She recognizes that, for her, it took a lifetime to develop and follow her intuition.

You can learn more about her work here:

www.robindavissonart.com

@robindavissonart

@studiolab_rd

Wendy Posillico, who joined us from Jupiter, Florida, by way of New York and Lake Tahoe, is an athlete, a coach, a single mother, an explorer, and the founder of WP Elite Mindset Coaching and Live Your June. After becoming a professional golfer in her 30s and a single mother through IVF in her 40s, Wendy’s life went in a completely new direction, and she came to understand the importance of a flexible mindset, targeted goals, and clarity of self. Drawing upon her background in special education (she worked as a special ed teacher in Harlem) and human development, a lifetime of experience in competitive sports, and the most up to date research on high performance, Wendy created her Elite Mindset coaching program. She learned to embrace transition and trust her intuition in order to transform her life, and she wants to help others to do the same.

She encourages people to "live their June," explaining that "June is who you really are.  It is an energy inside each one of us that is as unique as a fingerprint.... Live Your June offers self-assessments, online courses and private coaching to help instigate the connection with who you are and who you were born to be." Wendy describes "June" as the best in us, passed on from generations before we came into the world. She notes that, as children, we tend to live our uniqueness and are not hampered by societal judgments. She helps adults come back to who they really are before the world told them who they were supposed to be.

Wendy runs groups in which she provides safe spaces for participants to be vulnerable. "We all need space to speak the stuff that's scary," Wendy says. She continually challenges her clients to think bigger, and marvels at the "something in people's eyes when they believe in themselves." Her personal philosophy is that we should aim to "instigate our souls."  She coined the term "soulstigate," which is "about listening to your inner being and trusting when something does not make sense."

Wendy also raises money for pediatric cancer research, in honor of her late niece, and funds for clean water efforts in Zambia, Africa.  Check out https://whitsway.org/ and https://golfforeafrica.org/ to learn more about these organizations.

Learn more about Wendy's work at liveyourjune.com and follow Wendy on Instagram and Facebook: @liveyourjune.

Emma Payne, who joins us from Vancouver, is the founder and CEO of Grief Coach, a text messaging service that delivers ongoing, expert grief support globally. Grief Coach, which was borne out of her personal loss, combines Emma's passion for mobile technology and engagement, with her deep commitment to providing affordable, accessible, and personal grief support. An MIT graduate and best-selling author who started building online communities before Netscape was born, Emma knows that, while grief is hard, it’s a little easier when we have people by our side.

(source: grief.coach) 

Stark numbers exist regarding grieving.  The U.S. Census recently reported the biggest jump in mortality rates in 100 years.  Death spiked almost 19% in 2019-2020 (Covid, suicides and overdoses account for some of this).  So that feeling that we have that so many are grieving is not just a feeling.  It is real.  Before the pandemic, it was hard to find a grief counselor.  When we are grieving, there is vast data that indicates that we are at risk of negative health outcomes.  This is especially true of vulnerable communities.  But the health care system needs to acknowledge this, and has not.  Yet.  Grief Coach has filled a huge gap.

One does not have to have a smart phone to access this service.  It is a one way service, in that clients receive customized support through Grief Coach via text.  Fourteen percent of Grief Coach's clients are seniors (read "not necessarily tech savvy").  Many of their clients come via hospices.  Clients can invite people to join their service who want to help but do not know how to help a grieving person.  Grief Coach's feedback is an almost constant stream of gratitude for their help.  "Thanks for telling me what to do," many support clients remark.

"We take the beautiful knowledge that exists and make it accessible," Emma says.  Many of Grief Coach's experts worked in hospices or with patients with terminal illnesses for decades.  Grief Coach is developing additional resources for people with terminal illnesses and for health care workers who work in high trauma/high death roles.

"No one teaches us how to grieve.  We are in a grief and death illiterate society.  It is scary to sit with someone in the depths of grief and depression. Grief must be relieved," Emma explains.  We are all fortunate that Grief Coach is helping us process and move through our grief.

Learn more about Emma's work here:

www.grief.coach

Check out the Grief Coach blog for helpful tips:  https://grief.coach/blog/

https://www.instagram.com/grief.coach/

https://twitter.com/mygriefcoach

https://www.facebook.com/mygriefcoach

https://www.linkedin.com/company/griefcoach

https://vimeo.com/griefcoach

https://www.tiktok.com/@grief.coach

https://www.pinterest.com/mygriefcoach

Vailes ("Joye") Shepperd is a captivating author.  There are few historical novels about the successful Black experience before, during and after slavery.  Because of a lack of documentation about the African American experience and culture during the early part of U.S. history, A Good Ending for Bad Memories (Bold Story Press, 2021), while fiction, is a true account of Black reality and culture in the U.S.  It is full of compelling characters and rich settings, and adds to an important narrative.  "Our history was not compiled and kept like others, but we all know stories that are important to know," Vailes relates.  Her book's characters bring to life multiple aspects of the American Black experience, and her readers, like me, are the beneficiaries of her shared work.

A Good Ending for Bad Memories is a richly sensual novel about a prosperous African American family before, during, and after slavery. It threads truth, folklore, legend and fact, in a captivating exploration of a family’s complex legacy. The plot frames their experiences and events in the United States, as well as in Mexico and Egypt.  Vailes brings her characters to life in a way I have not experienced, in recent memories.  She shares that her brother is a poet but, I believe, Vailes's work sometimes reads like poetry.

Vailes is one of the founding/member editors of the Washington Independent Review of Books (www.wirobooks.com), which began when The Washington Post ceased publishing Book World. She interviewed authors and wrote regular articles about writing for the Washington Independent Review. She designed a writing program for high school students while teaching in a Saturday program under the auspices of Substance Abuse Prevention Education. Vailes was editor of The African Safari by P.J. Fetner (St. Martin’s Press) and Take Me with You by Scott Jackson, President and CEO of Global Impact. Her short story, "Monroe" was published in an anthology of women writing about men, Brothers and Others. She lives in Washington, DC with her husband and, sometimes, two sons. A Good Ending for Bad Memories is the first of four upcoming books.

When asked what she does to become her best version, Vailes explains that "sometimes you just have to make a decision, like 'This is a good day. I am thankful to have this day and I'm going to make it the best I can. I'm going to smile at this. I'm going to look at something beautiful and smile.'" Vailes reminds us to be intentional about what we ingest with our minds. We all have the ability to control, more or less, what we allow into our orbit.

Learn more (and check out her blog) here:  https://linktr.ee/vailesshepperd

https://www.vailesshepperdbooks.com/

Amal Ghandour is a Lebanese-Jordanian author and blogger (Thinking Fits), with a career that spans more than three decades in the fields of research, communication and community development. Her book, About This Man Called Ali (2009), was named the first biography of a modern Arab artist by the renowned Historian, Philip Mansel.

"It is very frightening to excavate, but the process is very rewarding," Amal reflects. Amal also discusses her take on the two-state solution that has dominated the discourse about Palestine and Israel, which she notes is "Israeli occupancy of a people who do not want to be occupied." As a person who lives in an area experiencing serious hardship, she fiercely resists optimism where it is not justified.

Website - https://amalghandour.com/

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/amalghandour/

Twitter - https://twitter.com/ghandour_ag

Goodreads - https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/61908393-this-arab-life

Amazon - https://www.amazon.com/This-Arab-Life-Generations-Journey-ebook/dp/B0B6DGWW5Q

Raquel Benavidez joined us from San Diego to talk about how she employs the teachings of Toltec shaman, Don Miguel Ruiz, in her daily life and work. Don Miguel Ruiz is the author of the bestselling The Four Agreements and The Mastery of Love. Raquel maintains that The Mastery of Love is about the compassion that nurtures the four simple, logical argreements in Don Miguel's seminal work, The Four Agreements, which changed my life.  "We are here to create ourselves only," Raquel says. "We can disagree, but we do not have to judge. As long as others are not hurting me...people have the right to think however they'd like. What gives me the right to think I know the only truth? We must stop our righteous indignation because being righteously indignant puts us in the same trap."

Raquel has launched The Truth Foundation, which is dedicated to educating and expanding the perceptions of identity and race both in the workplace and one’s personal life. The program works in partnership with her corporate clients to bring empowerment and hope to local underserved communities through guidance programs that broaden the opportunity to achieve real success and happiness among their constituencies.

"The Truth Foundation was born out of a necessity to help and share the opportunities given to us. As women, we want to nourish and be able to provide to those in need. We get inspired by Mother Nature, and in current times, we feel more than ever that we need a collective need for change. We are ready to let go of the old paradigms and bring light into this new era, with transcendental love-universal love and compassion. Seeding fortitude and resilience in young women to embrace and nurture their inner truth, cultivating a community of rising luminaries to trust and harness the experiences of life through power of choice, respect, and faith in oneself. The Truth Foundation is a registered 501(c)3 in the US, that endeavors to help people identify and pursue their passions and live in their truth. We empower and support a more mindful approach to business & life.  Goals:  Professional Development. Education. Spiritual Journeys. Activism."

"Angels at Work exists to support the success and wellbeing of all individuals working in the corporate business world, the education sector, and small businesses alike. Our work focuses on complementing institutions’ existing strategies, aiming to assist them in building a more dynamic workplace. We also offer a range of services to build and maintain mindfulness within the workplace."

See TheTruthFoundation.org and AngelsAtWork.org for more information.

In 2018, Catherine Hand was one of two producers for Walt Disney’s adaptation of Madeleine L’Engle’s beloved children’s classic A Wrinkle in Time. Catherine’s career in the entertainment business was launched working for the legendary writer/producer Norman Lear. She was the Associate Producer on Lear’s Emmy Nominated ABC TV special, I Love Liberty, and helped to create the national nonprofit, People for the American Way. Later, she served as a development executive at Zoetrope, Francis Coppola’s company where she worked on several projects, including Godfather III. Catherine has also worked for years in the public service sector. After having produced several large-scale events for national organizations, garnering a Gracie Award for best public affairs programming in 2009, Catherine was recruited by the Obama Administration where she was part of the core leadership team involved in communicating policy and political decisions impacting the federal workforce.

Catherine shares some beautiful life lessons in this episode. "Faith is for when things are going wrong," she shares. Her lifelong dream did not come to fruition until after she turned 60. But she did not give up. "We can't changes things...but we can stop fearing them," she counsels. "Thoughts are temporary," she says of her 3:00 am musings. "They are not permanent," and we can talk back to them. One of her takeaways from writing her book, Becoming a Warrior, is that "Have something worth fighting for...that is greater than yourself." And others can benefit from what you have learned. Catherine encourages us to become warriors in the universe to illuminate others.

She continues to develop new projects and enjoys coaching others to become warriors in their own lives. Her memoir, Becoming a Warrior is scheduled to be published by Bold Story Press on October 25, 2022.  It will be available everywhere.

"I read Madeleine L'Engle's award winning novel, A Wrinkle in Time, when I was ten years old and dreamt of one day making it into a movie. It would take five decades for my childhood dream to come true. My journey would include working alongside the television luminary Norman Lear in the creation of the nonprofit People For the American Way, and a 25 year-long conversation with author Madeleine L’Engle about her book. My memoir, Becoming a Warrior: My Journey to Bring A Wrinkle in Time to the Screen due to be released in October 2022 illustrates one woman’s persistence—through a demanding career in the entertainment industry, the sudden and unexpected death of my beloved husband, raising three young children on my own—and eventual success. In 2018, over fifty years after I first read A Wrinkle in Time, Walt Disney Studios released a major motion picture based on this beloved novel directed by Ava DuVernay, written by Jennifer Lee and starred Oprah Winfrey, Reese Witherspoon, Mindy Kaling, Chris Pine, Gugu Mbatha Raw and Storm Reid." -- Catherine Hand

“Catherine’s journey of over 50 years to have A Wrinkle In Time brought to the Silver Screen is simply extraordinary.  And the book’s impact upon her life is both compelling and inspirational.”

-- Alan Horn, Former Chairman of Walt Disney Studios - Motion Pictures

“No one I’ve known ever loved a book more than Catherine Hand loved A Wrinkle in Time. Her perseverance and journey to make the film is nothing short of inspiring.”

-- Norman Lear, award winning writer/producer

To learn more, see catherinehand.com

https://www.instagram.com/catherinehand5555/

twitter: @madebyhand