Pivot with Jenny Blake

By Jenny BlakeBusiness Entrepreneurship Religion & Spirituality Spirituality Careers

Pivot with Jenny Blake episodes

December 17, 2023353: Pain, Purpose, and Portals—Pivoting from Massage Therapist to Coach with John O'Connor
“You have to condition your nervous system to feel free, to access and hold that state, no matter the context.”
In this conversation, we talk about leadership advisor John O’Connor’s pivot from masseuse to executive coach. He shares strategies for listening to your true calling, which often emerges from friction and frustration, and how those manifest physically in our bodies. John describes how we can tune into yearnings in different dimensions such as health, finances, relationships, community, and business; and how to create portals for new opportunities while noticing who is already orbiting around you.
More About John: John O’Connor is a leadership advisor to high performers looking to go deeper, find their calling, and align with their higher purpose. With over 10,000 hours under his belt coaching CEO’s, social impact entrepreneurs, athletes and post-exit founders, he is skilled at guiding people to uncover the things that are blocking them from creating a sense of freedom and fulfillment.

🌟 3 Key Takeaways
Calling often emerges out of friction and frustration, and can manifest physically. Reflect: what’s the desire under the frustration?
Swap out the word purpose with: What is meaningful? And what is most important? What are the most meaningful, important dimensions of life? What wants to emerge? What wants to come through my life in each dimension?
The Core Five: Health and wellness, finances, intimate relationships, community, business. In each of those, there is a calling—something that wants to come through, a yearning.

✅ Try This Next: When you find yourself complaining or irritated by something, honor how you’ve been, i.e. “The way this is happening doesn’t work for me.” That’s how it has been; then ask, “How would I like it to be different?” What are the three to five steps to make that happen? Write it down, and remember: you’re only a few simple moves away.

🔗 Resources Mentioned
John on the web, IG, Twitter, LinkedIn
The ManKind Project
📚 Books Mentioned
Healing Back Pain: The Mind-Body Connection by John Sarno
The War of Art: Break Through the Blocks and Win Your Inner Creative Battles by Steven Pressfield & Shawn Coyne
Free Time: Lose the Busywork, Love Your Business
Pivot: The Only Move That Matters Is Your Next One
Life After College
🎧 Related Episodes
Pivot: 325: 10+ Conference Networking Strategies with Alisa Cohn
328: Accessing Your True Self Through IFS with Adrian Klaphaak, 332: IFS Part(s) Two—Understanding Our “Not Enough” Exiles with Adrian Klaphaak
72: BREATHE. From Burned-Out Bodybuilder to Yin Strength Trainer with Anders Varner
Free Time: 196: 🍩 What Do Donuts, Coffee, Conversation, and Energy Cliffs Have in Common? (My Mini Daily Audio Diary from Attending TED 2023)

❤️ Enjoying the show? I'd be grateful for a rating and/or review! Even better? Share this episode with a friend :)
💌 Get my curated weekly(ish) PivotList newsletter
💻 Check out Jenny’s Pivot courses on LinkedIn Learning: Figuring Out Your Next Move, Holding 1:1 Career Conversations With Your Team, Managing Introverts, Coaching New Hires, and Coaching New Managers
💬 I’d love to hear what’s on your mind! Take the Pivot listener survey
☎️ Submit a question or comment for future episodes
🎧 Make sure you’re subscribed wherever you listen to ‘casts
📝 Check out full show notes at http://pivotmethod.com/353

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47 min
December 10, 2023352: “A Goal Should Not Be a Chore” — How to Set Aspirational Pull Goals with Ayelet Fishbach
It is a mistake to frame motivation as a muscle, according to today’s guest, Dr. Ayalet Fischbach. If you set your goals well, they will pull you like a magnet. In this conversation, we cover why numerical goals can backfire, the best practices for choosing a goal, how to monitor progress and cope with setbacks, and why social support is critical.
More About Ayelet: Ayelet Fishbach, PhD, is the Jeffrey Breakenridge Keller Professor of Behavioral Science and Marketing at the University of Chicago, Booth School of Business, and the author of GET IT DONE: Surprising Lessons from the Science of Motivation. She is the past president of the Society for the Science of Motivation and the International Social Cognition Network. She is an expert on motivation and decision making.

🌟 3 Key Takeaways
A powerful goal defines an aspirational state, not the means to get there.
It’s a mistake to frame motivation as a muscle: If you set the goal right, it will pull you; it shouldn’t feel like a chore.
There are three traps to watch out for: framing it as a means to another goal instead of the end goal itself; setting a goal that is too specific or concrete instead of an abstract goal; and setting a goal in terms of something to avoid rather than something you wish to approach.

✅ Try This Next
Set one aspirational goal for the year ahead, emphasizing your ideal state (rather than the outcome, or what you’re trying to avoid).

🔗 Resources Mentioned
Ayelet on the web, IG, Twitter, LinkedIn
Articles: Ayelet’s OpEds
Video: TED—4 Proven Ways to Kick Your Procrastination Habit
📚 Books Mentioned
Get it Done by Ayelet Fishbach
How to Change by Katy Milkman
Ruff Love by Susan Garrett
The Messy Middle by Scott Belsky
Free Time: Lose the Busywork, Love Your Business
Pivot: The Only Move That Matters Is Your Next One
Life After College
🎧 Related Episodes
Ten Percent Happier: The Science of Motivation | Ayelet Fishbach
The Tim Ferriss Show: Susan Garrett -- Master Dog (and Human) Trainer
Pivot: 320: Sustainable Ambition with Kathy Oneto
327: 🐺The Wolf You Feed — On Addiction, Recovery & Codependency — and What We Get Wrong About All Three with Eric Zimmer
154: Two-Month Report from the Puppy (and People!) Training Trenches
60: How Emotionally Agile Are You? Strategies for Setbacks with Susan David
Free Time: 181: Be Irreplaceable with My Creative Coach Jay Acunzo
190: 🐍 How the Cobra Effect Creates Perverse Incentives and Metrics Tyranny

❤️ Enjoying the show? I'd be grateful for a rating and/or review! Even better? Share this episode with a friend :)
💌 Get my curated weekly(ish) PivotList newsletter
💻 Check out Jenny’s Pivot courses on LinkedIn Learning: Figuring Out Your Next Move, Holding 1:1 Career Conversations With Your Team, Managing Introverts, Coaching New Hires, and Coaching New Managers
💬 I’d love to hear what’s on your mind! Take the Pivot listener survey
☎️ Submit a question or comment for future episodes
🎧 Make sure you’re subscribed wherever you listen to ‘casts
📝 Check out full show notes at http://pivotmethod.com/352

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41 min
December 03, 2023351: The Ultimate Guide to Great Mentorship with Scott Jeffrey Miller
Are you falling into “accidental jerk” mode while mentoring others without realizing it? Today’s guest, Scott Jeffrey Miller, is sharing nuances of mentoring that you have likely never considered. What it means to truly validate someone (with an example that made me blush!), how to set boundaries with your time and expectations, the thirteen different roles mentors can play, and his delightful six-step process for closing out with mentees.
More About Scott: Scott Jeffrey Miller is a sought-after speaker, WSJ-bestselling author, and podcast host. He currently serves as FranklinCovey’s senior advisor on thought leadership. Prior to his advisory role, Scott was a twenty-five-year FranklinCovey associate, serving as the Chief Marketing Officer and Executive Vice President. He is host of On Leadership With Scott Miller, and today we’re talking about his latest book, The Ultimate Guide to Great Mentorship: 13 Roles to Making a True Impact.

🌟 3 Key Takeaways
The 13 roles mentors can play (not mutually exclusive) are: The Revealer, The Boundary Setter, The Absorber, The Questioner, The Challenger, The Validator, The Navigator, The Visionary, The Flagger, The Distiller, The Activator, The Connector, and The Closer.
Don’t be an accidental jerk: The session and mentoring relationship are not about you! You are not your mentee. Don’t dominate the sessions by talking too much, or lean too heavily on advice-giving.
Scott’s 6-Step Close-Out Process: Revisit where your mentee started, share funny/tender learnings about their growth, re-identify and communicate go-forward commitments, resurface worthy concepts that were closed or tabled, celebrate the wins and learn from the losses, recap your confidence in them and outline any areas of potential support.
There are important differences between coaches, mentors, managers, allies, champions, and sponsors: Coaching is a profession; you have a process and a pedagogy. Mentors are usually in a leadership position; marshaling their wisdom for the benefit of someone else; it’s mission-centric and pro-bono, a little more informal. Allies and champions know how trustworthy you are, can recommend you for roles.

✅ Try This Next
Help your mentee clarify their goals of what they are really trying to accomplish. Be hyper-aware of what it’s like to be mentored by you. Bonus: Create a hand-crafted certificate of completion, from the heart, for the next mentee who closes out with you. As Scott writes, “I’m totally serious. Don’t download a certificate from some site. Draw one. With markers and crayons and illustrate what you’re certifying them in—what specifically you’re awarding them with.”

🔗 Resources Mentioned
Scott on the web, IG, Twitter, LinkedIn
Articles: Scott’s Inc.com column
📚 Books Mentioned
The Ultimate Guide to Great Mentorship by Scott Jeffrey Miller
The Road Less Stupid by Keith Cunningham
Your Next Five Moves by Patrick Bet-David
The Advice Trap by Michael Bungay Stanier
Free Time: Lose the Busywork, Love Your Business
Pivot: The Only Move That Matters Is Your Next One
Life After College
🎧 Related Episodes
On Leadership with Scott Miller: Your Next Five Moves with Patrick Bet-David
Pivot: 026: Tame the Advice Monster with Michael Bungay Stanier
Free Time: 057: You+ vs. You 2.0 with MBS

❤️ Enjoying the show? I'd be grateful for a rating and/or review! Even better? Share this episode with a friend :)
💌 Get my curated weekly(ish) PivotList newsletter
💻 Check out Jenny’s Pivot courses on LinkedIn Learning: Figuring Out Your Next Move, Holding 1:1 Career Conversations With Your Team, Managing Introverts, Coaching New Hires, and Coaching New Managers
💬 I’d love to hear what’s on your mind! Take the Pivot listener survey
☎️ Submit a question or comment for future episodes
🎧 Make sure you’re subscribed wherever you listen to ‘casts
📝 Check out full show notes at http://pivotmethod.com/351

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40 min
November 26, 2023350: The Simple Yet Powerful Three-Word Phrase that Shifts My Day
A short-and-sweet solo episode for you today on the three little words that instantly shift my mood from heavy obligation toward light, joyful action. Every time I remember to say this phrase, it’s like opening a window in a stuffy room—suddenly, there's space, air, and light.

🌟 3 Key Takeaways
See tasks as opportunities, not burdens: What within them are you grateful for? What are your reasons for doing them in the first place?
This phrase helps with three things: stress reduction—viewing tasks as opportunities lowers anxiety; increased motivation—hen we feel fortunate to do something, we're more energized to do it; and a happiness boost, as gratitude is a direct path to joy.
**If there is no possible way to shift, maybe it is time to stop doing that thing altogether. If certain activities are draining you, dragging you down, say no. If you can’t yet say no—at least not now—find the reasons you are sticking with them, and keep those top of mind.

✅ Try This Next
What’s one thing you’re dreading, procrastinating on, or avoiding this week? What happens when you shift your mindset from “I have to” toward “I get to”? Does anything feel lighter or freer?

🔗 Resources Mentioned
Articles: ✍️ Connect with me on Substack
📚 Books Mentioned
Free Time: Lose the Busywork, Love Your Business
Pivot: The Only Move That Matters Is Your Next One
Life After College
🎧 Related Episodes
Pivot: 348: How to Experience More Everyday Awe with Dacher Keltner
312: Are You Future-Tripping?
316: “Don’t Suffer Twice”
154: Two-Month Report from the Puppy (and People!) Training Trenches
Free Time: 029: Funded By Source with Ksenia Avdulova
154: The Hard No
174: What Book Marketing has to do with Glass Blowing: Reflecting on Free Time’s 1-Year Bookiversary 🥂
120: Transform Your To-Do List into a Results List — Leanne’s Favorite Time-Saving System
090: Paying for Consistency and Accountability

❤️ Enjoying the show? I'd be grateful for a rating and/or review! Even better? Share this episode with a friend :)
💌 Get my curated twice monthly PivotList newsletter
💻 Check out Pivot courses on LinkedIn Learning: Figuring Out Your Next Move, Holding 1:1 Career Conversations, Managing Introverts, Coaching New Hires, and Coaching New Managers
💬 I’d love to hear what’s on your mind! Take the Pivot listener survey
☎️ Submit a question or comment for future episodes
🎧 Make sure you’re subscribed wherever you listen to ‘casts
📝 Check out full show notes at http://pivotmethod.com/350

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15 min
November 19, 2023349: Embracing Doubt and Going for “Good-Enough” Work with Simone Stolzoff
As relationship expert Ester Perel says, “Too many people bring the best of themselves to work, and bring the leftovers home.” This is one of several notions that sparked today’s guest, Simone Stolzoff, to reconsider his relationship to work. We’re talking about his unique approach to researching his new book, The Good Enough Job, interviewing over 100 primarily white-collar workers, but only featuring nine stories in depth. His goal is that you’ll treat this book—and our conversations—less like a textbook and more like a mirror. “I hope [it] prompts you, as writing it did for me, to examine your own relationship to your job.”
More About Simone: Simone Stolzoff is an independent journalist and consultant from San Francisco. A former design lead at the global innovation firm IDEO, he regularly works with leaders—from the Surgeon General of the United States to the Chief Talent Officer at Google—on how to make the workplace more human-centered. His feature writing on the intersection of labor and Silicon Valley has appeared in The Atlantic, WIRED, The San Francisco Chronicle, and numerous other publications. Today we’re talking about his new book, The Good Enough Job: Reclaiming Life from Work.

🌟 3 Key Takeaways
If all your needs were met, what would you do with your life? How might that inform the work you do to get paid versus the activities that nourish your spirit?
Michael Norton at HBR asks millionaires two questions: How happy are you on a scale of 1 to 10? And how much more money would you need to get to a 10 out of 10? Regardless of whether people had $1 or $2 or $5 million, respondents all answered the same way: that they’ll be happier when they have two to three times more money than they have now.
You may still experience grief even if you’re making a decision that can be a better path for you in the future.

✅ Try This Next
Consider how your identity is shaped by the people you are surrounded by. Find communities that can reinforce an identity of yours beyond the commercial value you contribute to the world, beyond your professional life. What group/s can you join where what you do for work doesn’t matter to them at all? (Think intramural sports or even time outside with pets :)

🔗 Resources Mentioned
Simone on the web, IG, Twitter, LinkedIn
Simone’s Substack: Simone Stolzoff
Articles: NYT—Please Don’t Call My Job a Calling
📚 Books Mentioned
The Good Enough Job: Reclaiming Life from Work by Simone Stolzoff
The Pathless Path: Imagining a New Story for Work and Life by Paul Millerd
Free Time: Lose the Busywork, Love Your Business
Pivot: The Only Move That Matters Is Your Next One
Life After College
🎧 Related Episodes
Pivot x RadReads: Conversations with Khe Hy (Spotify Playlist)
Pivot: 341: Pivoting From Prestigious Consulting Jobs To The Pathless Path With Paul Millerd
321: ChatGPT as Universal Intern and Excellent Advice for Living with Kevin Kelly
Free Time: 203: 🎢 Riding the Emotional Rollercoaster of Launching with Natalie Lue
205: Why Paul Millerd Turned Down a $200K Two-Book Traditional Publishing Deal

❤️ Enjoying the show? I'd be grateful for a rating and/or review! Even better? Share this episode with a friend :)
💌 Get my curated weekly(ish) PivotList newsletter
💻 Check out Jenny’s Pivot courses on LinkedIn Learning: Figuring Out Your Next Move, Holding 1:1 Career Conversations With Your Team, Managing Introverts, Coaching New Hires, and Coaching New Managers
💬 I’d love to hear what’s on your mind! Take the Pivot listener survey
☎️ Submit a question or comment for future episodes
🎧 Make sure you’re subscribed wherever you listen to ‘casts
📝 Check out full show notes at http://pivotmethod.com/349

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40 min
November 12, 2023348: How to Experience More Everyday Awe with Dacher Keltner
“The evolution of our species built into our brains and bodies an emotion, our species-defining passion, that enables us to wonder together about the great questions of living.”
That’s just one of many illuminating conclusions that researcher Dr. Dacher Keltner discovered in his scientific studies of awe. In this conversation, you’ll learn about the eight wonders of life, how to experience more everyday awe (and take yourself on awe walks), and what’s behind our current crisis of meaning.
As Dacher writes, “Our experiences of awe hint at faint answers to these perennial questions and move us to wander toward the mysteries and wonders of life.”
More About Dacher: Dr. Dacher Keltner is a professor of psychology at the University of California, Berkeley and the faculty director of the UC Berkeley Greater Good Science Center. A renowned expert in the biological and evolutionary origins of human emotion, Dr. Keltner studies the science of compassion, awe, love, and beauty, and how emotions shape our moral intuition. His research interests also span issues of power, status, inequality, and social class.
He is the author of the best-selling book Born to Be Good: The Science of a Meaningful Life and of The Compassionate Instinct, and today we are talking about his most recent book, AWE: The New Science of Everyday Wonder and How It Can Transform Your Life. Dacher is also the host of the award-winning podcast, The Science of Happiness.

🌟 3 Key Takeaways
8 wonders of life: moral beauty (the strength, courage, overcoming, and kindness of others); collective effervescence; nature; music; visual design; mysticism (spiritual and religious); stories of life and death; and epiphanies.
Everyday awe: In our daily lives, we most frequently feel awe in encounters with moral beauty, and secondarily in nature and in experiences with music, art, and film.
The big idea of awe: We are part of systems larger than the self. “Awe is about knowing, sensing, seeing and understanding fundamental truths, and leads to epiphanies across the eight wonders of life—transforming how we see the essential nature of the world.”
✅ Try This Next—Go on an Awe Walk:
Tap into your childlike sense of wonder. Try to approach what you see with fresh eyes, imagining that you're seeing it for the first time. Take a moment in each walk to take in the vastness of things, for example in looking at a panoramic view or up close at the detail of a leaf or flower.
Go somewhere new. Each week, try to choose a new location. You're more likely to feel awe in a novel environment where the sights and sounds are unexpected and unfamiliar to you. That said, some places never seem to get old, so there's nothing wrong with revisiting your favorite spots if you find that they consistently fill you with awe. The key is to recognize new features of the same old place.
What’s mysterious around me? What’s the deeper story of what I’m perceiving?

🔗 Resources Mentioned
Dacher on the web and LinkedIn (No Twitter and IG accounts)
Video: The Diary of a CEO—The “Happy Life” Scientist (YouTube Video)
Articles: NYT—How a Bit of Awe Can Improve Your Health
📚 Books Mentioned
AWE: The New Science of Everyday Wonder and How It Can Transform Your Life
The Varieties of Religious Experience by William James
Red-Tails in Love by Marie Winn
Free Time: Lose the Busywork, Love Your Business
Pivot: The Only Move That Matters Is Your Next One
Life After College
🎧 Related Episodes
Dacher’s podcast: The Science of Happiness
On Being with Krista Tippett: Dacher Keltner on the Thrilling New Science of Awe
Pivot: 292: Fun as the Ultimate Flow State with Catherine Price
Free Time: 170: 🌈 “Imagine a World of Abundance” ✨

📝 Check out full show notes at http://pivotmethod.com/348

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40 min
November 05, 2023347: Claim Your Bragging Rights—From Hidden Gems to Halo Effects with Lisa Bragg
“By trying to appeal to everyone, you appeal to no one,” writes Lisa Bragg. “Instead of broadcasting, think of narrowcasting.” The clue to today’s conversation is in her name, an idea she grew up grappling with: to brag (or not).
“Hidden gems” are often told to work in the background or “be so great they can’t ignore you.” But the world is just too noisy for that now. Lisa is sharing how we can “shimmer with pride” gracefully, without veering into obnoxious braggadociousness (yes, I just made that word up).
More About Lisa: Living with the name Bragg, Lisa has had to master the art and science of self promotion. She’s seen when being too humble has cost international deals and when bragging right has unlocked opportunities leading to untold fortunes. Lisa helps high-achievers of all sorts to be seen, heard and share their value with the world. Her book, Bragging Rights: How to Talk about Your Work Using Purposeful Self Promotion, launched in May.

🌟 3 Key Takeaways
Self-Promotion Myths: Your work speaks for yourself; cream rises to the top; and if you wait for it, you will be chosen.
Bragging Rights Strategy: How are you? Who are you? Who do you serve? What do you know? Who do you know? Who knows you? What’s next?
Own your knowledgeable authority: You can be influential by having a point of view and articulating it, either as a: knowledge broker (curating ideas with a central theme), expert (developing your own thought-leadership), and/or visionary (seeing around corners or into the future and communicating a distinct vision).

✅ Try This Next: Journal on the following prompts—When do you wish you had been bolder? Reflect on a time you were bold. What happened? Bonus: Start your brag book—capture kudos that you didn’t get, compliments you want, “keeper” emails people have sent you (a smile file).

🔗 Resources Mentioned
Lisa on the web, IG, Twitter, LinkedIn
📚 Books Mentioned
Bragging Rights: How to Talk about Your Work Using Purposeful Self Promotion
Invisibles: The Power of Anonymous Work in an Age of Relentless Self-Promotion
Find Your Red Thread by Tamsen Webster
Free Time: Lose the Busywork, Love Your Business
Pivot: The Only Move That Matters Is Your Next One
Life After College
🎧 Related Episodes
Lisa’s podcast: Bold(h)er: Stories of and for Women Who Stand Out, for BMO for Women.
Pivot: 293: Are You Saying Yes to Spaghetti-Throwers? and 013: Upside of Being Invisible with David Zweig
Free Time: 196: 🍩 What Do Donuts, Coffee, Conversation, and Energy Cliffs Have in Common? (My Mini Daily Audio Diary from Attending TED 2023)

❤️ Enjoying the show? I'd be grateful for a rating and/or review! Even better? Share this episode with a friend :)
💌 Get my curated weekly(ish) PivotList newsletter
💻 Check out Jenny’s Pivot courses on LinkedIn Learning: Figuring Out Your Next Move, Holding 1:1 Career Conversations With Your Team, Managing Introverts, Coaching New Hires, and Coaching New Managers
💬 I’d love to hear what’s on your mind! Take the Pivot listener survey
☎️ Submit a question or comment for future episodes
🎧 Make sure you’re subscribed wherever you listen to ‘casts
📝 Check out full show notes at http://pivotmethod.com/347

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
47 min
October 29, 2023346: Finding Clarity While Navigating Change with Marc Lesser
“If it’s not a paradox, it’s not true.” So says today’s guest Marc Lesser, long-time mindfulness teacher and business leader. In his latest book, he considers what would happen if Homer Simpson, the Buddha, and Alice in Wonderland walked into a proverbial bar. How would each react to tricky situations? What would be the integrated way forward? We also talk about being asked to leave his previous company, Brush Dance, after fifteen years and how he navigated a new phase of his career as a result.
More About Marc: Marc Lesser is a speaker, facilitator, workshop leader, and executive coach. He is the author of five books, including the Zen of Business Administration, and his latest, Finding Clarity: How Compassionate Accountability Builds Vibrant Relationships, Thriving Workplaces, and Meaningful Lives. Marc’s podcast Zen Bones: Ancient Wisdom for Modern Times features interviews, supportive tools for creating more meaningful work, and potent mindfulness practices to develop yourself, influence your organization, and change the world.

🌟 3 Key Takeaways
Humans have evolved to be anxious and dissatisfied (two distinct purposes of evolution to stay alive and to pass on our genes). During meditation practice, or throughout your day, ask yourself: What does it feel like, in my body, to be satisfied? To not need or want anything?
“There are even gaps in our efforts to close all these gaps between what we want and what is. Very little goes exactly as we might want it to, and if it ever does, that doesn’t last long.”
Wholeheartedness as the cure for exhaustion. As David Whyte says, “The antidote to exhaustion isn’t rest. The antidote to exhaustion is wholeheartedness.”

✅ Try This Next
The next time you feel anxious or stressed, try flipping your thoughts with these two prompts: “The story I’m telling myself is…” followed by “The story I want to live by…”

🔗 Resources Mentioned
Marc on the web, IG: @marclesser, Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook
Articles: Stop Giving Away Your Power, Cutting Through Frustration, Surprise Yourself, “The World is Its Own Magic” (a quote by Shunryu Suzuki in Zen Mind, Beginner’s Mind)
TEDxPresidio: Leadership, Attention, Focus
📚 Books Mentioned
Marc’s books: Finding Clarity, Know Yourself, Forget Yourself and Z.B.A: Zen of Business Administration
Zen Mind, Beginner’s Mind by Shunryu Suzuki
Search Inside Yourself: The Unexpected Path to Achieving Success, Happiness (and World Peace) by Chaede-Meng Tan
Free Time: Lose the Busywork, Love Your Business
Pivot: The Only Move That Matters Is Your Next One
Life After College
🎧 Related Episodes
Marc’s podcast: Zen Bones: Ancient Wisdom for Modern Times
Pivot: 327: 🐺The Wolf You Feed — On Addiction, Recovery & Codependency — and What We Get Wrong About All Three with Eric Zimmer
309: Wayfinding and Developing Identity Agency with Ciela Hartanov
307: Pivoting from Google to Starting People Playbook with Tony McGaharan
Free Time: 001: All-in on Heart-Based Business

❤️ Enjoying the show? I'd be grateful for a rating and/or review! Even better? Share this episode with a friend :)
💌 Get my curated weekly(ish) PivotList newsletter
💻 Check out Jenny’s Pivot courses on LinkedIn Learning: Figuring Out Your Next Move, Holding 1:1 Career Conversations With Your Team, Managing Introverts, Coaching New Hires, and Coaching New Managers
💬 I’d love to hear what’s on your mind! Take the Pivot listener survey
☎️ Submit a question or comment for future episodes
🎧 Make sure you’re subscribed wherever you listen to ‘casts
📝 Check out full show notes at http://pivotmethod.com/346

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36 min
October 22, 2023345: How Are We Holding Ourselves Back? with Adrian Klaphaak of Career Pathfinder
How are you holding yourself back? From the whispers of your soul, your deepest power and purpose, from your highest calling? That’s what we’re diving into in today’s tenth (!) Pivot x Career Pathfinder series podcast episodes with Adrian Klaphaak.
You’re invited! Join us live for the next recording session on November 7 at 1:30 p.m. ET — ask questions in the chat or if you’re feeling brave, come off of mute to be in the coaching hot seat :) Register to join us here »
Are you looking for a little support and guidance on finding your purpose, or best next step? Check out Adrian’s Career Pathfinder Program and apply promo code PIVOT for a special offer on his group training.
More about Adrian: Adrian Klaphaak is a coach, purpose guide, entrepreneur, and founder of A Path That Fits Career and Life Coaching. His coaching approach is holistic—a constant balance between getting results and a quest for meaning and fulfillment. He describes himself as “a deep seeker with a constant itch to make things happen.”

🌟 7+ Ways We Hold Ourselves Back from our Calling
Obligation, doing what we should
Being overly practical
Looking for perfection
Fear of failure
Doubting our abilities or undervaluing them
Not having enough time
Staying in our comfort zone
What would you add?

✅ Try This Next
Ask yourself: How am I holding myself back from finding my calling? Write about it, be honest about it. Next: What will you do differently as a result of this awareness?

🔗 Resources Mentioned
Adrian on the web, Yelp, Facebook, LinkedIn
Course: Career Pathfinder, promo code PIVOT
Video: Finding Your Calling
Articles: Pulling the Thread—How’s the Wanting Going?, The Free Press—You Can Be Addicted to Weed. I Was When I Was Twelve.
JB’s Rolling in D🤦🏻‍♀️h: The Business Yips & 51/49, Ignore the Odds
Tools: Substack app
📚 Books Mentioned
Write for Life by Julia Cameron
Free Time: Lose the Busywork, Love Your Business
Pivot: The Only Move That Matters Is Your Next One
Life After College
🎧 Related Episodes
Pivot: Pivot x Career Pathfinder podcast episodes with Adrian (Spotify playlist)
Free Time: 223: The Confidence Trap: Why You Don’t Need It to Do Big Things (SPARKED Crossover)

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42 min
October 15, 2023344: Navigating Workquakes in a Post-Career World with Bruce Feiler
Two-thirds of Americans say they’re unhappy with their work (70%), and three-quarters say they plan to look for new work over the next year—that’s 100 million Americans. Today’s guest breaks down what’s behind these workquakes; why they are happening more frequently; how he navigated a major “pile-up” in his 40s of death, disease, and financial disaster; ghost jobs; and the most powerful question you can ask yourself about what’s next.
More About Bruce: Bruce Feiler is the author of seven New York Times bestsellers, including Life Is in the Transitions, The Secrets of Happy Families, and The Council of Dads, and his newest book, The Search: Finding Meaningful Work in a Post-Career World. His three TED talks have been viewed more than four million times, and he teaches the TED course How to Master Life Transitions. A native of Savannah, Georgia, Bruce lives in Brooklyn with his wife, Linda Rottenberg, and their twin daughters.

🌟 3 Key Takeaways
Workquakes happen every 2.5 years; 55% begin outside of the workplace; the average person goes through 20 in the course of their lives
One of his favorite questions to ask work story subjects is, “Did you get a piece of advice from someone?” Three-fourths of people were given a variation of: listen to yourself. Do what you’re already thinking about doing, the answer is already within you. Give yourself permission to follow that.
Conduct a personal archeology: “The happiest people don’t just climb, they dig.” Look at lessons you learned about work from your family (upsides and downsides), what you loved as a child, role models you had growing up, what your parents and grandparents did for work and the values they held around family, work, and money.

✅ Try This Next
Write the rough draft of of the next chapter of your work story with Bruce’s template:
In this transition, I’ve realized that I want to be the kind of person who _________.
I want to do work that _________.
I’m at a moment in my life when _________.
I want to be in a place that _________.
My purpose right now is _________.
The best advice I have for myself right now is _________.

🔗 Resources Mentioned
Bruce on the web, IG, Twitter, Facebook
Newsletter: The Nonlinear Life
Articles: ‘The Search’ Review: Rethinking the Rules of Success, The Stories That Bind Us, Narrative Psychology, New York Magazine—Gail Sheehy (from the archives)
TED talks: The Council of Dads, Agile Programming — for Your Family, The Secret to Mastering Life’s Biggest Transitions
Service: Our Story Bridge
📚 Books Mentioned
The Search: Finding Meaningful Work in a Post-Career World
Life Is in the Transitions: Mastering Change at Any Age
Passages: Predictable Crises of Adult Life by Gail Sheehy
Free Time: Lose the Busywork, Love Your Business
Pivot: The Only Move That Matters Is Your Next One
Life After College
🎧 Related Episodes
goop: Gwyneth Paltrow x Bruce Feiler: Are You in a Workquake?
Pivot: 168: Penney on Pandemic Opening Our Collective Pandora's Box (Part 1), 169: Penney on Pandemic Opening Our Collective Pandora's Box (Part 2), Penney & Jenny 8: Embracing Liminal Space (check out the full Penney & Jenny Show on Spotify)
Free Time: 138: ⛵️Stop Sailing the Sea of Shiny Shoulds

❤️ Enjoying the show? I'd be grateful for a rating and/or review! Even better? Share this episode with a friend :)
💌 Get my curated weekly(ish) PivotList newsletter
💻 Check out Jenny’s Pivot courses on LinkedIn Learning: Figuring Out Your Next Move, Holding 1:1 Career Conversations With Your Team, Managing Introverts, Coaching New Hires, and Coaching New Managers
💬 I’d love to hear what’s on your mind! Take the Pivot listener survey
☎️ Submit a question or comment for future episodes
🎧 Make sure you’re subscribed wherever you listen to ‘casts
📝 Check out full show notes at http://pivotmethod.com/344

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38 min

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