Have you ever reached a point where everything made sense on paper but stopped making sense in your body? The title was right. The career was respected. The money made sense. And underneath all of it, something kept whispering, this ain't it.

Yolessa Lawrinnce was a track athlete who competed for Canada, a dancer on Broadway, and a law school graduate with a respectable path in front of her. Three months after graduating, she walked into a qigong center she had passed every day for years and never entered. In that first class she felt energy move through her body for the first time, walked back out onto the street, and found the world had changed.

What followed was not a clean transition. It was resistance, an injury she is certain a spirit gave her to make her sit still, and a ten-day retreat in Sedona that turned into seven months. When she came back to New York, everything she had spent her life building felt small. She sold her belongings on the street in a single evening, bought a one-way ticket, and never looked back.

This episode is about what happens when the irrational thing turns out to be the most truthful thing, and what it costs to follow a calling your old life cannot explain.

IN THIS EPISODE

- Growing up Jamaican-Canadian and being called a little different by her own family, and what they actually meant by it
- Why she never stopped asking why, even when it cost her relationships
- What it means to feel energy in your body for the first time
- The injury that forced her to stop, and the premonition that arrived while she was immobilized and alone
- Ten days in Sedona that became seven months, and the evening she sold everything she owned
- Why the intuitive voice works in reverse to logic, including why it bypasses the neocortex and limbic system entirely
- Why self-trust is a physical capacity, not a mindset
- The four things your body needs before any of the spiritual work is available to you
- Why she says vibrate instead of exercise, and what that does to your inner organs
- Her daily rhythm, and her honest caveat about the overhaul that came before the small disciplines
- The one thing she does every night before bed that changed her self-concept
- Why you cannot manifest what you are not already, and what Usain Bolt has to do with it
- Her forthcoming book, The Awakening Intuitive, and why she calls it an initiation

If you are standing at the edge of something that does not make sense yet, this one is for you.

GUEST

Yolessa Lawrinnce. Psychic medium, healer, Dahn master, licensed lawyer, and the director and trainer at Sedona Healing Arts, a center for spiritual awakening. She has guided more than 10,000 people on their healing journeys, helping them access their intuitive gifts, free themselves from limiting patterns, and move toward the life their spirit has been leading them into. Her book, The Awakening Intuitive, releases later this year.
https://yolessalawrinnce.com
https://www.sedonahealingarts.com

THE GROUNDED LOUNGE

The Grounded Lounge is a weekly virtual space where Black entrepreneurs and leaders grow, heal, and rise in community. Grounded coaching, honest conversation, and practical tools. Your next level needs more than strategy. It needs a more grounded you. Join us inside the Grounded Lounge.

ABOUT THE SHOW

The Grounded CEO is a Zerlo Network original for entrepreneurs, leaders, and visionaries who are building success without losing themselves in the process. Life and business do not happen in separate rooms. The way we lead, the way we love, the way we make decisions, the way we carry pressure, and the way we recover. All of it comes with us into the business. Because success should not cost you your body, your peace, your relationships, or your truth.

DISCLAIMER

The conversations on The Grounded CEO are here to educate, inspire, and open up meaningful reflection. We talk about healing, leadership, mental health, relationships, and growth, but this show is not therapy and should not replace care from a licensed mental health professional.

I'm an executive leadership coach, not a licensed therapist. This podcast is not intended as a substitute for the advice of a physician, professional coach, psychotherapist, or other qualified professional. So please take what supports you, honor what comes up, and reach out for professional care if you need it.

Watch The Grounded CEO and every Zerlo Network favorite on demand, anytime. Download the free Zerlo Network TV app on Roku or Amazon Fire TV. Zerlo Network is streaming 24/7, ready to help you make it possible.

What do you do when the life you built is a life you now have to grieve? Not because it was wrong. Not because you didn't want it, pray for it, work for it, or try to make it last. But because somewhere along the way, the thing you were holding together started pulling you away from yourself.

Myoshia Boykin-Anderson has been an entrepreneur since 1998. She taught herself technology at 16, never went to college because she was raising her siblings, and started her first tech company at 26 as a single mother after the office she'd been moved across the country to run was shut down. She built that one to multiple six figures, closed it, took a gap year, and came back to build AndTech Solutions into a multi-million dollar firm and an Inc. 5000 company.

And privately, she was empty.

This episode is about the grief nobody prepares you for: grieving a life that looked beautiful, was successful, and was genuinely what you prayed for, but that cost more than you could keep paying. It's about a 14-year marriage she describes as thirteen years too long. It's about what happens when a woman of deep faith realizes she has been trying to help God fix the thing God is asking her to release. And it's about the long walk back to your own worth.

IN THIS EPISODE

- Why Myoshia says her entry into entrepreneurship was involuntary, and the bathroom floor moment that started it
- What she realized much later about why technology pulled her in so hard as a kid: it was the one thing she could control
- Turning down scholarships and an electrical engineering path because she couldn't leave her family
- Building the life she always wanted, on the lake, boat and all, and still finding it painful to get out of bed
- The difference between being obedient and trying to speed God up, and how she learned to tell them apart
- The dance analogy that reframed her whole understanding of following versus leading
- Why she says the grief started while she was still inside the life she was grieving
- Mastering the art of no, and why knowing what she doesn't want turned out to matter more than knowing what she wants
- Money as the elephant in the room when you're dating and you've built more than the person across from you
- Priest, provider, protector: what she's actually looking for, and why she won't trade one for another
- Why she stopped calling it gym time and started calling it fitness time, and what that small language change unlocked
- Dimming her light to make other people comfortable, and what changed when she stopped
- The mosaic: why being broken and being a piece of art are not opposites

If you are grieving something you once prayed for, this one is for you.

GUEST

Myoshia Boykin-Anderson. Co-founder and Chief Strategy Officer of AndTech Solutions, where she leads strategic vision, innovation, growth, partnerships, and market expansion. She is also sole owner of AndTech Global, the commercial side of the firm, focused on strategic advisory, data intelligence, process automation, and digital transformation.
https://andtechllc.com
Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn: Myoshia Boykin
AndTech Solutions on LinkedIn

THE GROUNDED LOUNGE

The Grounded Lounge is a weekly virtual space where Black entrepreneurs and leaders grow, heal, and rise in community. Grounded coaching, honest conversation, and practical tools. Your next level needs more than strategy. It needs a more grounded you. Join us inside the Grounded Lounge.

Website: https://www.indigounbound.com/the-grounded-lounge
ABOUT THE SHOW

The Grounded CEO is a Zerlo Network original for entrepreneurs, leaders, and visionaries who are building success without losing themselves in the process. Life and business do not happen in separate rooms. The way we lead, the way we love, the way we make decisions, the way we carry pressure, and the way we recover. All of it comes with us into the business. Because success should not cost you your body, your peace, your relationships, or your truth.

DISCLAIMER

Before we close, a gentle note: the conversations on The Grounded CEO are here to educate, inspire, and open up meaningful reflection. We talk about healing, leadership, mental health, relationships, and growth, but this show is not therapy and should not replace care from a licensed mental health professional.

I'm an executive leadership coach, not a licensed therapist. This podcast is not intended as a substitute for the advice of a physician, professional coach, psychotherapist, or other qualified professional. So please take what supports you, honor what comes up, and reach out for professional care if you need it.

I'll see you in the next episode. Thank you for being part of this conversation.

Watch The Grounded CEO and every Zerlo Network favorite on demand, anytime. Download the free Zerlo Network TV app on Roku or Amazon Fire TV. Zerlo Network is streaming 24/7, ready to help you make it possible.

What do you do when the thing you built starts falling apart? Not the idea. The actual thing — the clients, the contracts, the calendar that used to be full, the revenue you could count on, and the identity you built around being able to make it work.

Risha Grant spent 27 years building a multi-million dollar firm doing culture, equity, and belonging work. In 2025, the market for that work collapsed. In this episode she talks about the moment at her kitchen table when she realized it wasn't coming back, the denial that came before acceptance, the shame that came after, and what it's like to still be in the middle of it.

She's joined by Milford Carter, financial planner, president of Carter Financial Group, and — not incidentally — Risha's own financial planner for years before this season arrived. What you get is rare: the emotional reality and the financial plan, discussed by the two people who actually lived it together.

This is a conversation about money, grief, denial, faith, and the kind of grace it takes to begin again.

You'll hear:

- The exact moment Risha knew it was over, and why being a former athlete made her push through the warning signs longer than she should have
- Why she couldn't just pivot away. When your digital footprint goes back 30 years, you can't quietly become someone else
- Milford on why every vision gets tested, and the two-houses story he tells clients about foundations nobody wants to look at
- The financial plan Risha put in place years earlier that let her survive the worst year of her adult life, and what it was like to call her planner in a panic and be reminded of her own decisions
- Why shame was the heaviest part, and how "did you make the wrong decisions" is a question people ask when they don't understand what actually happened
- Healing that doesn't look like healing: no business books, no spiritual books, just fiction, movies, and permission to feel pleasure again
- Milford on perfectionism, and what happens when you make a mistake that contradicts the person you told everyone you are
- Why healing isn't the same at every stage of life, and the baking analogy for accepting the parts of yourself that aren't sweet
- Risha on walking as a lifeline, and what her mother put in her that still gets her out of bed
- The honest answer to "is it time to go get a job," and why for some entrepreneurs starting a new business is genuinely easier than filling out an application
- Milford on protecting your morning like a maniac, and the night in 2020 that changed how he lives

If you are sitting inside an ending right now, this one is for you.

GUESTS

Risha Grant — Founder, author, speaker, culture strategist, and CEO. She spent more than 27 years shaping global conversations about leadership, culture, equity, and belonging, and is now building again.
Websites: rishagrant.com and zerlonetwork.com
LinkedIn, Instagram, Facebook: Risha Grant

Milford Carter — Financial planner and president of Carter Financial Group. For more than a decade he has helped business owners, executives, women, families, and professionals think about wealth preservation, planning, and recovery.
Facebook and LinkedIn: Milford Carter
Instagram: Mr. MJC II

THE GROUNDED LOUNGE

The Grounded Lounge is a weekly virtual space where Black entrepreneurs and leaders grow, heal, and rise in community — grounded coaching, honest conversation, and practical tools. Your next level needs more than strategy. It needs a more grounded you. Join us inside the Grounded Lounge.
Website:https://www.indigounbound.com/the-grounded-lounge

ABOUT THE SHOW

The Grounded CEO is a Zerlo Network original for entrepreneurs, leaders, visionaries, and anyone building success without losing themselves in the process. Life and business do not happen in separate rooms. The way we lead, the way we love, the way we make decisions, the way we carry pressure, and the way we recover — all of it comes with us into the business. Because success should not cost you your body, your peace, your relationships, or your truth

Welcome to the very first episode of The Grounded CEO.

Most leadership advice starts with strategy. This show starts somewhere else — with the mind, the body, and the spirit of the person running the business.

In this premiere, host Shayna Renee sits down with three women who each carry one piece of that foundation. Cantiese Burrell brings the mind. Kelly Johnson brings the body. Ticki Favaroth brings the spirit. Together they answer the question the whole season is built on: what does it actually mean to be grounded as a CEO?

The conversation moves through all four parts of RISE — reveal the truth, intend to heal, sync with rhythm, and embody love.

You'll hear:

• Why grounding isn't a one-time achievement, and why every new level of growth requires a new pot, new soil, and a willingness to let some things fall away
• The four practices Ticki has used for a decade to tell the difference between her own strategy and what God is actually saying, including her annual three-day planning retreat and her yearly month-long sabbatical
• Kelly's story of entering somatic work to save her marriage, and what she found instead
• Why high-achieving leaders so often carry unprocessed trauma, and how the nervous system quietly runs your decisions before strategy ever gets a vote
• How to do a body scan, why the hips hold grief, and what to do when your body speaks and you don't yet know the language
• Cantiese on why you don't have to excavate your entire past to heal — you just have to clean up the wreckage, starting with your triggers
• The difference between boundaries as a wall and boundaries as a front door
• Where love and accountability collide in leadership, and what it cost Ticki to lead with love without protecting the whole ecosystem
• Why three minutes of putting yourself first is a legitimate place to begin

If you've built something that looks good on paper but doesn't feel good in your body, this one is for you.

GUESTS

Cantiese Burrell — Licensed clinical social worker, empowerment leader, and founder of Living My Worth. For more than 20 years she has helped Black women tell the truth, heal, and reclaim their worth. Ask her about the Me Moment book.
 https://livingmyworth.com
Instagram / Facebook / LinkedIn: Cantiese Burrell | Living My Worth

Kelly Johnson — Senior HR professional and trauma-informed somatic coach. Her work helps leaders understand what the body has been holding, what the nervous system has been carrying, and what it means to lead in an embodied way.
 https://kellynicolecoaching.com
LinkedIn: Kelly Johnson

Ticki Favaroth — Faith-driven CEO, strategist, founder, and legacy builder whose work sits at the intersection of business, purpose, excellence, and spiritual discernment.
 https://www.hrandco.com (human capital practice)
https://www.tickifavaroth.com (wisdom table practice)

ABOUT THE SHOW

The Grounded CEO is a Zerlo Network original. Being a grounded CEO isn't a title — it's a practice. The practice of telling the truth sooner, healing with intention, honoring your rhythm, listening to your body, trusting your spirit, and embodying love in the way you lead, build, decide, rest, repair, and rise.

This season sits inside the real tensions entrepreneurs face: the endings, the pivots, the grief, the pressure, the relationships, the family decisions, the empathy, the faith, and the success that looks good on paper but doesn't always feel good in your body.

DISCLAIMER

Before we close, a gentle note: the conversations on The Grounded CEO are here to educate, inspire, and open up meaningful reflection. We talk about healing, leadership, mental health, relationships, and growth, but this show is not therapy and should not replace care from a licensed mental health professional.

I'm an executive leadership coach, not a licensed therapist. This podcast is not intended as a substitute for the advice of a physician, professional coach, psychotherapist, or other qualified professional. So please take what supports you, honor what comes up, and reach out for professional care if you need it.

I'll see you in the next episode. Thank you for being part of this conversation.

Watch The Grounded CEO and every Zerlo Network favorite on demand, anytime. Download the free Zerlo Network TV app on Roku or Amazon Fire TV. Zerlo Network is streaming 24/7, ready to help you make it possible.