Today's episode was recorded on April 27, which is Iryna and her husband's 11th wedding anniversary. This is a short solo episode where Iryna talks about her life as a mom, wife, friend and gives unsolicited life advice to anyone out there who needs it on marriage and relationships. She tells the story of how her and her husband met, why its ok to not like your partner sometimes, and how important it is to marry someone who love and support you no matter what. This episode is light and funny so enjoy it.

#whatsyourdefiningmoment #marriageadvice #relationships #sharingourstoriesishealing

In today's episode Iryna is joined by an amazing woman, author, film and culture critic Jonita Davis. In this episode we only scratched the surface of the amazing life this creative woman has lived. We talked about her writing process and should you stay in "one lane " as a creative, why it is important to speak up against injustice, especially in the state of world today.

Jo was diagnosed with ADHD and she opened up about how getting diagnosed helped her navigate creativity, writing and her life better. Jo newest project is coloring books called Starseed Panic Pages. These coloring books offer structured coloring activities that soothe the mind and engage neurodivergent thinking. These unique pages and journal prompts are designed to help manage panic, anxiety, and overthinking. To lean more about these coloring books and purchase some for yourself, friends and family, head to https://panicpagescomdomainonly.wordpress.com/.

To lean more about Jonita Davis, her books, projects and publications go to https://jonitadavis.com/

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In today episode Iryna is joined by the founder of GraceFull Home, a Denver based furniture bank, EmilyJane Zahreddine. EmilyJane is a powerhouse, who saw a problem in her community and decided to create a solution. She launched her non profit in 2024 and already helped over 200 people in Denver metro area who are exiting homeless and need help furnishing their new home. EmilyJane spoke about how the idea of creating GraceFull Home came to her and why helping our community members is so important. To learn more about GraceFull Home , go to https://gracefullhome.org/

EmilyJane was graceful enough to let the listeners in to her personal life, like motherhood, being a business owner and she even gave her thoughts on today's political climate as she has 13 years of experience working in federal government.

As always, it is powerful conversation when a powerful woman speaks! #whatsyourdefiningmoment

In today's episode Iryna is joined by Emily Mara, who is a personal trainer, accountability coach and the founder and owner of EMpower by Emily Mara https://www.empowerbyem.com/. This conversation is extra special for many reasons. One of the reasons is in this episode Emily and Iryna talked about the beauty and challenges of motherhood. Emily lost her mom over 10 years and she spoke about lessons she learned from her mom, her grieving process and her approach to her journey as a mother of two girls.

Emily started dancing at a very young age and the love for dance provide her with great opportunities of travelling around the world and performing in front of amazing audience. As Emily said, "movement has always been medicinal to me". Today, Emily owns her own business EMpower by EM, she is empowering women to look and feel their best though her coaching and personal training. This episode is good for the soul and the heart!

You can learn more about Emily and her business at https://www.empowerbyem.com/ and follow her on social media @emilychristinemara #whatsyourdefiningmoment #sharingourstoriesishealing #thebeststorytellingpodcast #empowerbyem

Michael Sykes is the founder of the organization called Equitable Solutions and the director of culture, equity and leadership for Denver Public Schools. This conversation was deep, meaningful, vulnerable and we talked about variety of topics. Michael was open enough to talk about his life in a very profound way, things he had to learn and overcome to become a person he is today. Michael wrote a book "Easy Equity" and he dedicated this book to some of the strong , powerful and important women in his life and he talked about them with such love, gratitude and respect and how they helped shaped him into the person he is today and how instrument their love has been for me. Because both Iryna and Michael are parents they talked about how parenthood changes us forever and make us want to be a better person for ourselves and our children.

We also discussed topics around racism, black lives matter movement and why self love is so important when it comes to these and other issues .

To learn more about Michael Sykes, the work he does and to purchase his book visit https://equitablesolutions.net/. You can also follow Michael on Instagram @equitablesolutionscolorado

I had a pleasure of having a wonderful conversation with Karen Olson, the founder of national non profit organization call Family Promise. Karen joined me on the podcast to talk about her book "Mean For More" . In her book Karen captured her incredible journey from a single act of kindness to a lifetime of service. Karen wrote a beautiful story about her childhood and tragedy she experienced at a young age and how helping others helped her heal herself alone the way. To learn more about Family Promise, go to https://familypromise.org/ . You can find local affiliate in your state to volunteer and donate.

To learn more about Karen Olson and to purchase her book, head to https://www.karenolsonauthor.com/

#momentsthatdefineuspodcast #whatsyourdefiningmoment #sharingourstoriesishealing #meantformore #author

In today's episode Iryna is joined by an incredible fashion designer Michael Sullivan. Michael went all the way back to his childhood and talked about little Michael, his hopes and dreams for the future and how he is living that dream right now. Michael's grandfather was a big inspiration for him because of his impeccable style and his wisdom. Michael has been honoring his grandfather in his recent clothing collection. Not only Michael is a great fashion designer, he is builds his community for people to feel seen and loved and most importantly be themselves. Michael is a founder of fashion house HAUS. HAUS is a black - queer owned design-haus that creates urban contemporary, gender & size inclusive, clothing with an eco-friendly, gender-affirming, and cruelty-free focus. To learn more about HAUS go to https://www.hausclothing.com/. You can also follow Michael on IG at michaelcsully #momentsthatdefineuspodcast #whatsyourdefiningmoment #nyfw #fashiondesigner #sharingourstoriesishealing

Bella and Iryna were invited to be part of the discussion panel on the Outlier's Edge Podcast. We discussed what it means to be an entrepreneur, obstacles we had to overcome to get to the place we are today and why failure is necessary and perfection is the killer of all joy.

Visit https://niiamahashong.com/oepodcast/ to learn more about the ultimate Outlier behind the podcast and the outliers community Niiamah Ashong.

#whatsyourdefiningmoment #outlierscommunity #entrepreneur #lifelessons

Welcome to Season #4!!!!!! In the first episode of season 4, Iryna and Bella sat down for a beautiful conversation. They talked about why Bella has been MIA from the podcast, the loss she experienced last year that give her clarity on how to move forward and what's in store for the podcast this year. You don't want to miss this episode because there is big announcement on expansion within the podcast!!!!! #momentsthatdefineuspodcast #whatsyourdefiningmoment #bigannouncement #newyearnewopportunities

In today's episode Iryna is joined by Denise Izso, the founder and host of Blacadian podcast. Through social media , Iryna and Denise became listeners of each other's podcast and finally decided to sit down for a conversation on Moments That Define Us Podcast. Denise was born and raised in Canada but both of her parents are from Barbados. She spoke about growing up in Canada , in a predominantly white neighborhood and how she navigated her childhood, friendships and the world around her mixing her two cultures.

Denise talked about Canada and answered the question we all want to know - "Are Canadians really that nice". She also spoke about racism in Canada and the comparison to the United States.

Denise has had to navigate life as a woman of color her whole life so she decided to share her experiences through storytelling and that's when Blacadian podcast was born (she is black and canadian so blacadian, get it?

Check out Denise podcast here https://open.spotify.com/show/2yLBboXfmlaVRZjxPlYTmo

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