Candice Van Dertholen did not arrive at her work in energy healing by reading about it. She lived through it.

In this episode of Fine is a 4-Letter Word, host Lori Saitz sits down with energy practitioner Candice Van Dertholen for an unflinching conversation about single parenthood at 22, a Texas maximum security prison career she stumbled into out of financial desperation, an abusive marriage that escalated into a violent car ride with her children in the backseat, and the night she nearly took her own life — waking up in a hospital bed furious that she was still alive.

From Joyce Meyer's Battlefield of the Mind on a hospital nightstand to affirmations she wrote thousands of times before she even knew what affirmations were, Candice traces the slow, unglamorous, piece-by-piece rebuilding that took two years before she felt like herself again. She also shares the complicated grief of finding out both ex-husbands had died within the same year, and why disenfranchised grief rarely gets the space it deserves.

Now a practitioner who holds space for others in those same pivotal moments, Candice talks about why self-sabotage is almost always a story, why money in alignment multiplies, and what happens when we finally stop running from the relationship with ourselves.

Listen on all platforms:

Search "Fine is a 4-Letter Word" on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your shows. Subscribe so you never miss an episode.

Timestamps:

• [00:00] Introductions — Candice and Lori on mutual friend Chris Schembra and life in Charlotte
• [01:45] The values she was raised with: personal integrity and the discipline of non-judgment
• [03:00] Growing up between two worlds — her mother's nursing work with terminally ill children
• [06:00] Her mother's unrecognized PTSD and the compassion Candice finally found, decades later
• [08:30] Becoming a single parent at 22 and the judgment she faced in Texas
• [09:45] The unexpected detour: corrections officer at a Texas Level 5 max security prison
• [13:00] The abusive marriage — how familiar energy patterns kept her from seeing the signs
• [15:30] The violent car incident that involved her children and set off a CPS investigation
• [18:30] The night she nearly took her life and the hospital room that changed everything
• [20:00] The books, therapy, affirmations, and two-year rebuild that followed
• [22:00] Finding unexpected permission to leave through a hospital chaplain's words
• [24:00] Complex grief: losing both ex-husbands within a year
• [28:00] Burnout, 75 Hard, and the yoga studio that led her to energy healing
• [30:00] What to do when you feel stuck and unworthy of the next level
• [33:00] The song that gets her going: Ready or Not by Britt Nicole

Guest Bio:

Candice Van Dertholen is an energy practitioner whose path to healing work was forged through personal experience. A single mother of three from a young age, she has navigated poverty, domestic abuse, correctional work, burnout, and near-fatal crisis to arrive at a practice centered on helping others break the self-sabotaging patterns that keep them from the next version of themselves. She works with clients in pivotal transition moments and offers pay-it-forward sessions for those who cannot afford standard rates. She found her work in energy healing through a yoga studio in Virginia, where she met her first practitioner after years of seeking the missing piece in her healing journey. She and her husband are military family who have relocated multiple times across the US.

Connect with Candice:

• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/candicevandertholen/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/candice_elizabeth.co/

Candice also offers pay-it-forward sessions for those who need support but are working with limited means.

About the Show:

Fine Is a 4-Letter Word is the show for leaders who are tired of pretending everything is okay. Host Lori Saitz brings on guests who get honest about what it really takes to lead with empathy, vulnerability, gratitude, and courage. New episodes every week. Subscribe so you never miss an episode, and if this conversation hit home, leave a review. It helps more leaders find the show.

Everte Farnell spent seventeen years married to a partner he now believes had borderline personality disorder, enduring verbal, emotional, and eventually physical abuse before everything came to a head in his own kitchen. In this conversation, he opens up about why men rarely report abuse, what changed the night his daughter stepped in, and how he rebuilt his health, his confidence, and his life from the ground up.

What You'll Learn

• Why a majority of domestic abuse incidents involve female aggression toward male partners, and why almost none of it gets reported
• How borderline personality traits can drive a partner to undermine the people closest to them out of fear of abandonment
• What it actually took for Everett to leave a marriage he had stayed in for years out of fear and outdated research about kids and divorce
• How losing over 100 pounds became part of Everett's recovery from years of stress eating and undiagnosed sleep apnea
• Why filing for a protective order as a man can come with its own uphill battle in the legal system
• How Everett went from believing the world was an emotional hellscape to seeing it as full of opportunity

Guest Bio

Everte Farnell grew up in the small town of Umatilla, Florida, and built a career as an entrepreneur, including scaling a roofing company to ten times its weekly sales in under sixteen months. After surviving a seventeen-year marriage marked by abuse, he rebuilt his life, lost over 100 pounds, and remarried into what he describes as the healthiest relationship of his life. He now shares his story to help others recognize and talk about abuse that often goes unreported.

TIMESTAMPS

00:00 — Introduction and Everett's background growing up in rural Florida

04:00 — The toxic beliefs about money Everett had to unlearn

06:00 — How Everett rewired disempowering beliefs over time

13:00 — Living with smiling depression and undiagnosed sleep apnea

14:00 — Seventeen years married to a partner with borderline traits

20:00 — Why Everett stayed longer than he should have

25:00 — The night everything changed in the kitchen

28:00 — The truth about domestic abuse against men

31:00 — How Everett became more empathetic and rebuilt his life

Connect with Everte Farnell:

Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/everte-farnell-aa77556/

Website: https://evertefarnell.com/

About the Show

Fine is a 4-Letter Word is a podcast about what happens when people stop pretending everything is fine and start telling the truth about what they are really going through. Host Lori Saitz brings on guests for honest conversations about the moments that changed everything.

Subscribe so you never miss a conversation that might change how you see your own story.

You're not failing because of lack of skill or effort. You're failing because of patterns you picked up before you were old enough to choose them. Dr. Kevin Mays, leadership coach and author of Lead Yourself First, built a career helping executives see that the behaviors driving their success are often the exact same ones quietly sabotaging what they're trying to build.

What You'll Learn

• Why childhood patterns like people-pleasing and humor as a deflection tool show up in the boardroom decades later
• How to shift from being run by unconscious programming to making intentional choices from a place of presence
• The difference between geographic disruption and internal disruption, and why the latter is the harder and more powerful path
• How to reprogram your subconscious using 'I am' statements rather than 'I would like' statements
• Why comfort is the true enemy of growth, and what to do about it when you're not at rock bottom
• What it really means to step into the void with no plan B and why that clarity can change everything

About the Guest:

Dr. Kevin Mays is a leadership coach, speaker, and author based in Grand Rapids, Michigan. Through his company, Upgrade Your Leadership, he works with executives and founders to uncover the unconscious patterns holding them back and develop the self-awareness needed to lead at a higher level. His book, Lead Yourself First, recently made the Amazon best-seller list.

TIMESTAMPS:

00:00 — Cold open and show introduction

01:25 — Welcome and breathing exercise before the call

03:36 — Kevin's upbringing in Michigan: the car company culture and what it programmed

05:22 — Birth order, family patterns, and the youngest child's drive for attention

08:11 — How Kevin began studying self-awareness and what opened that door

09:12 — The motorcycle trip: riding to the Pacific Coast until the bike broke down

12:50 — Aeronautical engineering, near-miss in the airplane, and choosing a different road

15:48 — Identity falling away piece by piece and the moment of real surrender

19:22 — How to strip away constraint without hitting bottom first

22:48 — Quitting his job, moving to Michigan, and committing with no plan B

27:06 — Overcoming early programming: affirmations, rewiring neural pathways, and the piano analogy

31:48 — Releasing constraint vs. replacing it: Kevin pushes back on 'brainwashing'

34:37 — Music, Rumi, and how Kevin finds presence and energy

35:18 — Lori's five key takeaways from the conversation

38:12 — Closing

Connect with Dr. Kevin Mays:

• Website: https://upgradeyourleadership.com/
• Book: Lead Yourself First (available on Amazon)
• Guest LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/dr-kevin-mays/
• Guest Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/maysleadership
• Kevin's hype song: Friday I'm In Love by The Cure

About the Show:

Fine Is a 4-Letter Word is the show for leaders who are tired of pretending everything is okay. Host Lori Saitz brings on guests who get honest about what it really takes to lead with empathy, vulnerability, gratitude, and courage. New episodes every week.

Subscribe so you never miss an episode, and if this conversation hit home, leave a review. It helps more leaders find the show.

Scott Lackey grew up as a free-range kid roaming the woods and building forts, convinced he had all the time in the world. Then three questions from three people in the span of two weeks turned everything upside down. What followed was a winding path through the military, a failed invention, a Ponzi scheme, and a long list of promises he kept breaking to himself — until one sleepless night during Covid changed the trajectory of his life.

In this episode of Fine Is a 4-Letter Word, host Lori Saitz sits down with Scott to unpack the stories behind his upcoming book, including why crossing the finish line is never the actual victory, how military service wired him differently than the civilian world could handle, and why the Ironman he completed wasn't really about endurance at all.

Scott shares the moment he realized broken promises to himself were the root of his unrest, and why learning to listen to your inner voice, whether you call it God, instinct, or something else entirely, changes how you move through every challenge.

Key Topics Covered:

1. How Scott's free-range upbringing shaped his sense of adventure and created the blind spots that nearly derailed his early adult life
2. The two-week period where three questions from a coach, a teacher, and his father forced him to think about the future for the first time
3. How an Army commercial became the clearest sense of direction he had ever felt
4. Serving with the 1st Infantry Division in Iraq, Saudi Arabia, and Kuwait, and why four years of military service were irreplaceable
5. The Wire Dog invention he built in the desert, the $10,000 Ponzi scheme that ended the dream, and what those failures actually taught him
6. Why Scott believes the gifts are always in the pain, and how that principle shaped his leadership philosophy
7. The danger of taking advice from people who have nothing at stake in your decision
8. How broken promises to yourself erode self-trust, and the internal wake-up call that led him to register for the Ironman
9. The practices Scott uses to stay connected to his inner voice, including journaling, fasting, long workouts, and meditation
10. What the Ironman's question 'What are you willing to sacrifice?' ultimately revealed to him If you've ever felt stuck at 'fine' and couldn't put your finger on why, this conversation will hit close to home.

GUEST BIO: Scott Lackey Scott Lackey is a US Army veteran, entrepreneur, Ironman athlete, and author whose life story reads like a series of pivot points, each one forced by failure, chance, or a voice he couldn't quite ignore. He grew up in rural America, joined the Army after seeing a TV commercial that spoke to something he couldn't articulate, and served with the 1st Infantry Division across Iraq, Saudi Arabia, and Kuwait.

After leaving active duty, Scott pursued an entrepreneurial dream built around an invention he'd prototyped in the desert, only to have it derailed by a Ponzi scheme. What followed was years of building, failing, learning, and ultimately creating something worth sustaining. His upcoming book draws on all of it, examining why failure and pain carry more lasting value than the victories people celebrate, and why the hardest promises to keep are often the ones made in private, to yourself.

Scott completed a full Ironman (140.6 miles) after a period of quiet internal reckoning during Covid, a decision he kept to himself for six weeks because he didn't yet trust himself to follow through. He's a husband, father, and dedicated student of what it means to live with integrity to your own inner compass.

Connect With Scott:

• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/scottlackey1/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thescottlackey/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/people/Thescottlackey/
• X: https://x.com/thescottlackey

You may find some of the topics in his top 10 most requested keynotes of topical interest. Link on his website: https://scottlackey.com/speaking/

Another area of possible interest is his published short stories: https://scottlackey.com/published-work/

Subscribe to Fine Is a 4-Letter Word wherever you listen to podcasts.

Invitation from Lori:

This episode is sponsored by Zen Rabbit.

Smart business leaders know trust is the foundation of every great workplace. And in today’s hybrid and fast-moving work culture, trust isn’t built in quarterly town halls or the occasional Slack message. It’s built through consistent, clear, and HUMAN communication.

Companies and leaders TALK about the importance of connection and community. And it’s easy to believe your organization is doing a great job of maintaining an awesome corporate culture. Because you’ve got annual all-hands and open door policies, and “fun" team-building events.

But let's be real. Leaders who are serious about building real trust are finding better ways to strengthen culture, create connection, and foster community.

That's where I come in. Forward thinking companies are hiring me to produce internal/private podcasts. To bring leadership and employees together through authentic stories, real conversations, and meaningful connections. Think of it as your old-school printed company newsletter - reinvented for the modern workforce. I KNOW, what a cool idea, right?!

If you run, work for, or know of a company that wants to upgrade communication, facilitate connections, build community, and maintain culture, let's chat. Message me at [email protected].

Because when people feel heard, they engage.

Raised in a household steeped in integrity, respect, and love, Dr. Andrena Phillips credits her upbringing and the strong leadership modeled by her Marine father and telephone company manager mother for shaping her approach to life. Those early foundations became the fuel for a lifetime of showing up authentically, keeping her word, and encouraging others to live by values that go farther than any resumé line or professional accolade.

And Dr. Andrena carried all of that — through a nursing career, through raising three kids as a single mom, through earning her doctorate, through building a business that certifies coaches and develops leaders — into every chapter of her life.

She met her late husband in Walmart when she walked up to a tall, bald, hazel-eyed stranger and told him his wife was a lucky woman. He followed her to the hair gel aisle and told her he wasn't married. They were together from that moment on.

When he got sick, they had what she calls the "hard truth conversations." He was a military man — practical, prepared, purposeful. He told her two things to hold onto: never question the man above, because He knows our beginning and our ending. And run your race, Andrena, whether I'm here or not, because you had purpose from the very beginning.

And so she did. She kept showing up. She kept building her business. She kept dancing — because she and Mr. Phillips used to dance together on social media and people loved it, and dancing still brings him close. From the outside, people saw her and thought, she's fine. But what they didn't see was the therapist, the long walks, the internal work happening behind the scenes. She wasn't fine. She was just getting through and those two things are not the same.

Three years later, Dr. Andrena is still doing the deep work and letting it show up in how she leads, how she loves, and how she lives. She's still grieving — she'll tell you straight up that grief has no timeline and no rulebook — and she's also still growing, still coaching, still owning her greatness.

Hype Song:

Affirmations by Flippa T Affirmations (Radio Edit)

Resources:

Dr. Andrena’s website: https://KeepMovinWithAndrena.com

LinkedIn: https://linkedin.com/andrenaphillips

Facebook: https://facebook.com/KeepMovinWithAndrena

Instagram: https://instagram.com/Keep_MovinWithAndrena

Twitter: https://twitter.com/AndrenaKMovin

Dr. Andrena’s book: https://keepmovinwithandrena.com/walkingagain/

Invitation from Lori:

This episode is sponsored by Zen Rabbit.

Smart business leaders know trust is the foundation of every great workplace. And in today’s hybrid and fast-moving work culture, trust isn’t built in quarterly town halls or the occasional Slack message. It’s built through consistent, clear, and HUMAN communication.

Companies and leaders TALK about the importance of connection and community. And it’s easy to believe your organization is doing a great job of maintaining an awesome corporate culture. Because you’ve got annual all-hands and open door policies, and “fun" team-building events.

But let's be real. Leaders who are serious about building real trust are finding better ways to strengthen culture, create connection, and foster community.

That's where I come in. Forward thinking companies are hiring me to produce internal/private podcasts. To bring leadership and employees together through authentic stories, real conversations, and meaningful connections. Think of it as your old-school printed company newsletter - reinvented for the modern workforce. I KNOW, what a cool idea, right?!

If you run, work for, or know of a company that wants to upgrade communication, facilitate connections, build community, and maintain culture, let's chat. Message me at [email protected].

Because when people feel heard, they engage.

From a childhood shaped by the loss of her father and the blending of deeply religious family values, Kym Coco developed an early appreciation for spirituality as a lived sense of connection and empowerment. Her journey began with the awareness that we are spiritual beings within physical bodies, a notion both comforting and inspiring when navigating life’s difficult moments. As Kym grew older, especially after her father’s passing, she felt compelled to internalize and reinterpret her spiritual upbringing, seeking an authentic alignment with her own experiences and needs.

This was the foundation she leaned on when her husband Steve became ill. Their rich conversations about meaning and connection to something greater became the foundation of Kym adult life. Before he passed, Steve told her plainly: "Kym, you're gonna need structure when I'm gone." So she bought a van. (He wasn't thrilled about it.) But that van became a beacon of hope and the centerpiece of a solo golf adventure across the western U.S. where Kym played courses from the Oregon coast to Montana to Wyoming. She met wonderful people, played in the rain, dodged lightning, and caught a double rainbow.

Meditation, learned in her twenties, became a lifeline, a practice to quiet the chaos, cultivate presence, and forge mind-body-spirit alignment. For Kym, meditation was about learning to witness and gently release the tension, angst, and old energy patterns of childhood and young adulthood. Her willingness to try different modalities, whether a 10-day silent retreat or simply stepping away from her phone, reflects a growth mindset and playful curiosity that infuse her journey.

Kym’s not someone who pretends the hard stuff isn't hard. She recognizes that the stubborn patterns of worry or fear don’t dissolve overnight; instead, it starts with small acts of awareness, self-compassion, and the willingness to let go of static definitions of self. She highlights the importance of sampling different “flavors” of transformation, just as one might experiment with various styles of yoga or tea. Because who you are today isn’t fixed, and your resources for change evolve alongside you.

Hype Songs:

Real Good Feeling by Oh the Larceny

Andy Grammer - Damn It Feels Good To Be Me (Official Video)

Resources:

• Kym’s website: https://swagtail.com/
• LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/in/swagtailyoga
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/swagtailyoga
• Attention is our greatest resource, and we can train it to focus on what matters most. I'm sharing a free 20minute class to start boosting it now. https://swagtail.com/podcastbonus/

Invitation from Lori:

This episode is sponsored by Zen Rabbit.

Smart business leaders know trust is the foundation of every great workplace. And in today’s hybrid and fast-moving work culture, trust isn’t built in quarterly town halls or the occasional Slack message. It’s built through consistent, clear, and HUMAN communication.

Companies and leaders TALK about the importance of connection and community. And it’s easy to believe your organization is doing a great job of maintaining an awesome corporate culture. Because you’ve got annual all-hands and open door policies, and “fun" team-building events.

But let's be real. Leaders who are serious about building real trust are finding better ways to strengthen culture, create connection, and foster community.

That's where I come in. Forward thinking companies are hiring me to produce internal/private podcasts. To bring leadership and employees together through authentic stories, real conversations, and meaningful connections. Think of it as your old-school printed company newsletter - reinvented for the modern workforce. I KNOW, what a cool idea, right?!

If you run, work for, or know of a company that wants to upgrade communication, facilitate connections, build community, and maintain culture, let's chat. Message me at Lori@ZenRabbit dot com.

Because when people feel heard, they engage.

What if everything you’ve gone through in life — the chaos, the loss, the addiction, the grief — was the exact preparation you needed to save someone else's life?

Dan Flanagan grew up surrounded by strong values of integrity, hard work, and loyalty, anchored in the rhythm of small-town Ohio life and Catholic faith. His childhood had a kind of Norman Rockwell quality to it — a baseball field in the backyard, dirt bikes, snowmobiles, his mom ringing a bell to call the kids in for dinner. But underneath that idyllic surface, something harder was brewing.

Dan's dad, his hero, his best coach, was secretly battling severe clinical depression. When Dan was 15, his dad went away to a psychiatric unit an hour from home to undergo treatment and was gone for over a year. His mom held down the fort working 12-hour days.

The sudden loss of his parental anchor left Dan and his siblings with too much freedom, few role models, and an onslaught of confusion and pain. He went off the rails. Started drinking, making bad choices, falling in with the wrong crowd.

The darkness in his family didn't stop with his dad. His brother Sean also developed mental illness in college and attempted suicide more than once.

Dan managed to earn a degree and build a sales career out of sheer determination and grit, the unresolved trauma and anger simmered beneath the surface. He masked his struggles with alcohol and bravado, insisting that everything was “fine,” when he was far from it.

The turning point came on May 6th, 2019, when he finally said enough. He enrolled himself in an intensive outpatient program at the Cleveland Clinic, started showing up at the gym at 4:45 AM, and began listening obsessively to Eric Thomas, Tony Robbins, Jocko Willink, and David Goggins — anyone who had built something from nothing and come out the other side.

About a year into his sobriety, he was listening to a Jocko podcast and heard about Dr. Daniel Amen, a world-renowned psychiatrist who developed brain SPECT imaging, a tool that shows what's happening in a living brain rather than just guessing. Dan ordered the book “The End of Mental Illness” before he even got home. And sitting on his couch that Saturday, something cracked open. He describes it as a spiritual moment, followed by a question that felt like it came from somewhere bigger than him: what if all of this was the preparation?

Motivated to make a difference, Dan leveraged his story and his sister’s expertise to launch the Brain Enrichment Initiative, a peer-to-peer mentoring and mental wellness program for students. Rooted in authenticity and vulnerability, the program aims to help young people break the silence around emotions, teaching them proactive brain health strategies and creating space for real connection.

The urgency behind BEI is very real to Dan. He is out there doing the work every single day — for his family, for those kids, and for every version of himself that didn't have someone showing up to say: your brain can get better, and so can you.

Hype Song:

Dan’s hype song is Zach William’s “Survivor”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8R4tdF2s42w

Resources:

• Dan Flanagan’s website www.bei-neo.org
• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/dan-flanagan-a4934850/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/dqflanagan
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/dqflan/

Invitation from Lori:

This episode is sponsored by Zen Rabbit.

Smart business leaders know trust is the foundation of every great workplace. And in today’s hybrid and fast-moving work culture, trust isn’t built in quarterly town halls or the occasional Slack message. It’s built through consistent, clear, and HUMAN communication.

Companies and leaders TALK about the importance of connection and community. And it’s easy to believe your organization is doing a great job of maintaining an awesome corporate culture. Because you’ve got annual all-hands and open door policies, and “fun" team-building events.

But let's be real. Leaders who are serious about building real trust are finding better ways to strengthen culture, create connection, and foster community.

That's where I come in. Forward thinking companies are hiring me to produce internal/private podcasts. To bring leadership and employees together through authentic stories, real conversations, and meaningful connections. Think of it as your old-school printed company newsletter - reinvented for the modern workforce. I KNOW, what a cool idea, right?!

If you run, work for, or know of a company that wants to upgrade communication, facilitate connections, build community, and maintain culture, let's chat. Message me at Lori@ZenRabbit dot com.

Because when people feel heard, they engage.

Welcome to the celebration of five years of fine is a four letter word. I'm your host, Lori Saitz, and man, what a ride it has been. Five years. I don't know that I could have said five years ago that I would expect to be still doing this show five years later. mean, man, that's like another lifetime ago.

Think of everything that's happened in your life in the past five years. I mean, I had different cats, I lived in a different state. I've had so many adventures in the past five years and met so many amazing, incredible people and been through so many experiences. Someone asked me the other day, I was a guest on someone else's show, and they asked me what I was grateful for, and I said, all the incredible experiences I have gotten to experience, all the incredible adventures I've gotten to experience in my life. So grateful.

You know what else I'm grateful for? Every single guest, more than 200 of them who have been on this show, and especially the first 20 who trusted me enough to give me their time and say yes to being on a brand new show. Because stats show 80 to 90 % of shows never make it past the first 20 episodes. 44 % don't even get past the first three episodes. And here we are at episode 227, five years of weekly publishing. Wow. Sure, there have been some vacation weeks like last year when I was in Tanzania and that year, Panther and I were on our month long road trip sabbatical, but average it out and we've published 45 episodes a year.

When I say we, I'm referencing that this show isn't a solo effort from the people who've helped me with strategy before it even launched, specifically Donnie and Mark, to my editors Greg and Chad and Adam and team and Jennifer, who put it all together after it's recorded. I thought for this episode, we do a little review of some especially memorable moments and shows.

This episode is sponsored by Zen Rabbit. Listen, we all know that no one's reading emails and those all hands meetings and Slack messages can feel a little impersonal. How do you make work feel more human? Leaders who are serious about building real trust with their teams are finding more modern and effective ways to strengthen culture, create connection and foster community. That's where I come in.

Forward-thinking companies, and specifically those with new CEOs, are hiring me to produce internal podcasts, to bring leadership and employees together through insightful stories and personalized conversations, and to share information that actually helps you move your career and company forward. Think of it as your old school printed company newsletter, reinvented. I know, what a cool idea, right? If you run, work for, or know of a company that wants to upgrade communication, facilitate connections, build community, and maintain culture, let's chat. Message me at lori at zenrabbit.com.

As I look ahead, I can’t necessarily promise another five years, but I can promise I’ll keep doing this for as long as it brings me joy. And right now, it brings me SO MUCH JOY to meet all these fantastically interesting people and hold space in my studio for them to be seen and heard and to tell their stories.

Thanks for listening to Fine is a 4-Letter Word. If you enjoyed the show, please follow and share it with a friend. Leave a review on Apple Podcasts or your favorite platform to help others discover it too.

Remember, you do not have to settle for FINE. You have the power to become a leader people respect and want to follow AND create a life you love. Now let’s f-ing go!

What would you do if your business partner, the woman who recruited you, trained you, and believed in you before you believed in yourself, didn't come home from vacation? That's exactly what happened to Nicole Milone, wealth advisor and founder of Solaris Strategic Wealth.

Raised as the oldest of three in an entrepreneurial family, Nicole Milone internalized the values of compassion, curiosity, and resilience from an early age. Helping run her family’s shoe store, she learned firsthand the value of hard work, adaptability, and the complexities of money.

After studying finance and spending years in the banking industry, Nicole was invited by her mentor and financial advisor to move into the world of financial planning. What began as helping with processes and paperwork grew into a deep calling to empower others around money. She recognized from her own experience how few people truly understand or feel confident in their financial lives.

Nicole’s world was turned upside down when her business partner and mentor, Debbie, passed away unexpectedly, suddenly leaving her in charge. There was a succession plan — on paper. But the real knowledge, the day-to-day operations, the payroll, the bank accounts — all of it lived in Debbie's head. Overnight, Nicole became the owner of a business she didn't fully know how to run. She was forced to hold it all together for her team and clients, without ever really stopping to grieve.

She was waking up at 3am, making massive decisions with a brain that grief had essentially rewired. She still can't fully recall that entire first year. She thought she had to do it all. That was the only model of business ownership she'd ever seen. But she finally realized she couldn't — and more importantly, she didn't have to.

With her husband by her side, and professionals she learned to trust and delegate to, Nicole rebuilt both the business and herself. She did the deeper work around her own complicated relationship with money, the fear of losing it, the silence around it she grew up with, and how all of that quietly drives our financial decisions without us realizing it.

Now she's on a mission to make sure no one else gets caught as unprepared as she was.

Hype Song:

Fireball (feat. John Ryan) - song and lyrics by Pitbull, John Ryan | Spotify

Resources:

• Nicole Milone’s website: Strategic Wealth Management Services | Solaris Strategic Wealth
• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/nicole-milone/
• Facebook: Https://www.facebook.com/solarisstrategicwealth
• Instagram: @thenicolemilone
• Twitter (X) @Solaris_SW

Episode with Kristi Straw

Invitation from Lori:

This episode is sponsored by Zen Rabbit.

Smart business leaders know trust is the foundation of every great workplace. And in today’s hybrid and fast-moving work culture, trust isn’t built in quarterly town halls or the occasional Slack message. It’s built through consistent, clear, and HUMAN communication.

Companies and leaders TALK about the importance of connection and community. And it’s easy to believe your organization is doing a great job of maintaining an awesome corporate culture. Because you’ve got annual all-hands and open door policies, and “fun" team-building events.

But let's be real. Leaders who are serious about building real trust are finding better ways to strengthen culture, create connection, and foster community.

That's where I come in. Forward thinking companies are hiring me to produce internal/private podcasts. To bring leadership and employees together through authentic stories, real conversations, and meaningful connections. Think of it as your old-school printed company newsletter - reinvented for the modern workforce. I KNOW, what a cool idea, right?!

If you run, work for, or know of a company that wants to upgrade communication, facilitate connections, build community, and maintain culture, let's chat. Message me at Lori@ZenRabbit dot com.

Because when people feel heard, they engage.

What would you do if you woke up one day to find the California Attorney General was suing you for $60 million — and you hadn't done anything wrong? That's exactly what happened to Shane Barker, digital marketing expert and founder of TraceFuse.ai, and the way he navigated it says everything about who he is.

Shane was shaped by the loving, free-spirited energy of his family in Sacramento, California. It was a household with hippie leanings where kindness and connection were valued above all. Though he acknowledges that no childhood is perfect, Shane credits his upbringing with teaching him resilience and the ability to view life’s challenges through a lens of growth and learning. He’s a big believer that every experience, even the tough ones, is an opportunity to evolve.

This mindset was severely tested when Shane found himself at the center of a high-profile, $60 million lawsuit from the California Attorney General. He was the owner and marketing leader of a real estate company created to fight predatory lending and help vulnerable homeowners after the 2008 housing crash. The company grew rapidly, making waves by standing up to big banks and brokers who had exploited countless families. But the very system he sought to challenge turned its sights on him, launching a very public PR battle, freezing his bank accounts, and painting him as a villain in the court of public opinion.

The experience was a brutal, wild ride. He was working 18-20 hours a day, 40 pounds heavier, running on energy drinks and determination, endlessly battling negative narratives online and in the media, trying to protect his family from the chaos while simultaneously fighting for his reputation and his business. He was showing up and arguing with strangers online who weren't even customers and confronting the reality that truth isn’t always what gets broadcast or believed.

He thought he was winning. But he finally realized he was losing. Losing his health, his time, his energy, and his opportunity to be at his son's baseball games.

Throughout it all, Shane remained steadfast, refusing to flee or hide. He eventually realized that other people were living rent-free in his head, and he was handing them the keys. He stopped fighting every battle on the internet, started walking 10 miles a day, and began asking a very different question: what can I learn from this?

When we spoke, Shane and his family were beginning a 45-day vacation in a small little beach town in Oregon. He’s come a long way from what he called Shane 1.0 who was in a room with coffee, going to war every day. Now he’s looking at animals and enjoying life and continuing to grow.

Hype Song:

Shane’s hype song is "Ain't No Sunshine" by Bill Withers

Resources:

• Shane Barker’s website: https://shanebarker.com/
• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/shanebarker/

Invitation from Lori:

This episode is sponsored by Zen Rabbit.

Smart business leaders know trust is the foundation of every great workplace. And in today’s hybrid and fast-moving work culture, trust isn’t built in quarterly town halls or the occasional Slack message. It’s built through consistent, clear, and HUMAN communication.

Companies and leaders TALK about the importance of connection and community. And it’s easy to believe your organization is doing a great job of maintaining an awesome corporate culture. Because you’ve got annual all-hands and open door policies, and “fun" team-building events.

But let's be real. Leaders who are serious about building real trust are finding better ways to strengthen culture, create connection, and foster community.

That's where I come in. Forward thinking companies are hiring me to produce internal/private podcasts. To bring leadership and employees together through authentic stories, real conversations, and meaningful connections. Think of it as your old-school printed company newsletter - reinvented for the modern workforce. I KNOW, what a cool idea, right?!

If you run, work for, or know of a company that wants to upgrade communication, facilitate connections, build community, and maintain culture, let's chat. Message me at Lori@ZenRabbit dot com.

Because when people feel heard, they engage.