We talk a lot about what men can lift. We don't talk nearly enough about what they carry.

Gabe Lemon built G6 Performance Training into one of Sacramento's most respected athletic development programs. He's trained thousands of athletes, sent players to the NFL, NBA, and MLB, and built a business that runs on one principle: movement is medicine.

But behind success is always a human being, and sometimes life demands that we redefine ourselves in ways we could not have imagined. This conversation is not about chasing perfection or motivational culture. It's about identity, vulnerability, and what happens when strength is called to evolve.

You'll Learn:

- Why protecting your energy isn't optional

- Why the injury is never really about the moment it happened, it's the pattern that led there

- What leadership actually looks like when you step back from the thing that defined you

- Why community — real, consistent, unglamorous community — is the infrastructure that holds everything else up

Perfect for: Leaders, athletes, and men who are pouring out more than they're taking in.

Sponsors:

⁠https://meropictures.com⁠

Learn more about the Jacquelyn social club:

⁠https://www.thejacquelyn.com/⁠

Get In Touch:

Instagram: ⁠https://www.instagram.com/thejacquelyn.official/⁠

LinkedIn: ⁠https://www.linkedin.com/company/the-jacquelyn/⁠

Email:

⁠[email protected]⁠

Most leaders try to fix culture by managing actions—new policies, new incentives, or more oversight. Dr. Jessica Kriegel says that's the wrong lever.

Jessica is a change strategist, Chief Strategy Officer at Culture Partners, and author of the bestselling Surrender to Lead. In this episode, Jessica and Mary Daffin talk about why most leaders get stuck in what she calls "the action trap," managing the action instead of the belief behind it. They talk about surrender: not giving up, but releasing the illusion of control you never had in the first place, and focusing only on how you show up. And they talk about accountability. Why it's become a dirty word, and the new definition Jessica uses with clients: a personal choice to focus on what you can control to drive results.

Jessica also walks through the four-step framework she uses to make accountability practical: See it, Own it, Solve it, Do it. It is a set of questions that works just as well on a direct report as on a boyfriend who won't walk the dog.

You'll learn: 

• Why culture starts with belief, not policy — and how to identify the belief that's actually getting in your way
• Why managing the action harder almost never works
• The four-step framework — See it, Own it, Solve it, Do it — for holding yourself or someone else accountable
• How storytelling moved one hospital's next-of-kin form completion rate from 42% to 97% in three weeks

Sponsors:

⁠https://meropictures.com⁠

Learn more about the Jacquelyn social club:

⁠https://www.thejacquelyn.com/⁠

Get In Touch:

Instagram: ⁠https://www.instagram.com/thejacquelyn.official/⁠

LinkedIn: ⁠https://www.linkedin.com/company/the-jacquelyn/⁠

Email:

⁠[email protected]⁠

Darcy Totten will tell you: we're only one grandmother removed from women not being able to open a bank account without a husband's signature.

Darcy leads the California Commission on the Status of Women and Girls, one of the state's most important advocacy bodies, representing 20 million women and girls. She writes economic blueprints. She convenes rooms. She tells stories that turn data into decisions.

In this episode, Darcy and host Mary Daffin talk about what it takes to change a room once you're in it, why representation requires more than just showing up, and what the UN's 33% threshold actually means in practice. They talk about the enormous wealth transfer currently underway to women and what it would mean if women used it the way men have. They talk about mentorship, solidarity, and the particular skill of building consensus among people who have nothing obvious in common.

And they talk about hope. The progress is real, and there is genuinely a lot to be hopeful about.

You'll Learn:

- How Darcy turns complex policy data into stories that move elected officials to act

- What the largest wealth transfer in history means for women and what it would look like if women used that power differently

- Why showing up in the room is the first step, not the whole project, and what comes next

- What a future of collaborative, solidarity-based leadership actually looks like

Sponsors:

⁠https://meropictures.com⁠

Stiver Financial Services https://www.stiverfinancialservices.com/Diamond Collective https://www.diamondcollective.org/gala-2026

Learn more about the Jacquelyn social club:

⁠https://www.thejacquelyn.com/⁠

Get In Touch:

Instagram: ⁠https://www.instagram.com/thejacquelyn.official/⁠

LinkedIn: ⁠https://www.linkedin.com/company/the-jacquelyn/⁠

Email:

⁠[email protected]⁠

There's a version of Lisa Wrightsman that almost didn't make it.

Division I athlete. Goal scorer. The kind of player who felt invincible on the field. And then, the day the structure stopped — no practice, no team, no room to belong to — it all unraveled fast. What pulled her back wasn't a program. It was a field.

Lisa Wrightsman leads Street Soccer USA in Sacramento, helping individuals experiencing homelessness rediscover structure, dignity, and belonging through the game. She also brought the Homeless World Cup to the United States. This is the kind of influence that changes the trajectory of a life.

In this episode, Lisa and host Mary Daffin talk about what it means to be in the right room — and what it costs when you're not. They talk about the rooms that define us, the rooms that close on us, and the rooms we have to build ourselves when no one else will.

The mission of Street Soccer USA is simple: soccer is the mechanism. Belonging is the point.

You'll Learn:

- Why belonging is the real mission

- What it takes to rebuild identity after losing the structure that defined you

- How a single room can change the trajectory of a life

Sponsors:

⁠https://meropictures.com⁠

Learn more about the Jacquelyn social club:

⁠https://www.thejacquelyn.com/⁠

Get In Touch:

Instagram: ⁠https://www.instagram.com/thejacquelyn.official/⁠

LinkedIn: ⁠https://www.linkedin.com/company/the-jacquelyn/⁠

Email:

⁠[email protected]⁠

Influence isn't loud. It doesn't announce itself. It works in rooms most people don't know exist — through relationships, presence, and unspoken rules.

Cassandra Pye has been working those rooms for over 40 years. As president of Lucas Public Affairs and one of Sacramento's most trusted voices in communications and public affairs, she's advised governors, senators, and electeds from both sides of the aisle. She was raised by seven women in Baltimore who handed her a blueprint most people spend a career trying to find.

Cassandra shares what she was taught, what she had to figure out on her own, and what she now passes on — about power, presence, discipline, and the unspoken rules of influence.

What they share in these conversations doesn't usually leave the room. Now it does.

You'll Learn:

- Why presence is a strategy and how to build it deliberately

- The unspoken rules that govern who gets heard and remembered in high-stakes rooms

- How to make a genuine connection before you say a word

- What it actually means to build a brand and why consistency is the whole thing

Perfect for: Leaders who want to build influence through relationships

Sponsors:

⁠https://meropictures.com⁠

Learn more about the Jacquelyn social club:

⁠https://www.thejacquelyn.com/⁠

Get In Touch:

Instagram: ⁠https://www.instagram.com/thejacquelyn.official/⁠

LinkedIn: ⁠https://www.linkedin.com/company/the-jacquelyn/⁠

Email:

⁠[email protected]⁠

If theater goes away, what does Sacramento lose? A lot more than the show.

Lyndsay Burch, CEO of The Sofia and B Street Theatre, makes the case that the arts aren't just culture — they're infrastructure. They connect businesses, draw people to a city, and give a community a reason to be together when everything else is trying to pull it apart. In this episode, Lyndsay sits down with Mary to talk about the extraordinary balancing act of running a job that's 100% creative and 100% operational, why B Street's children's theater is the future of the performing arts, and what live theater means in the age of AI.

You'll Learn:

- Why the arts are foundational to a city

- How theater is becoming more valuable, not less.

- How to activate a theater to it's full potential.

- The evolution of leadership across Sacramento's art organizations.

Perfect For: Anyone who cares about what makes a city worth living in and anyone who's ever walked out of a theater feeling more connected and joyful than when they walked in.

Sponsors:

⁠https://meropictures.com⁠

Learn more about the Jacquelyn social club:

⁠https://www.thejacquelyn.com/⁠

Get In Touch:

Instagram: ⁠https://www.instagram.com/thejacquelyn.official/⁠

LinkedIn: ⁠https://www.linkedin.com/company/the-jacquelyn/⁠

Email:

⁠[email protected]⁠

Kiera Anderson, Ed.D. is in the early days of leading one of Sacramento's oldest cultural institutions — the Sacramento Ballet. In that time, she's already navigated hiring new artistic leadership and making the call to scale the school.

In this conversation with Mary Daffin, Kiera talks about how ballet's demand for discipline and real-time problem-solving shaped her as a leader, and why the rehearsal room — not the stage — is where trust is really built. They also have a candid exchange about women in leadership. Kiera's dissertation examined teenage girls who were still being called 'bossy' in 2019. The progress is real, but the distance left is too.

And at the heart of it all is Kiera's vision for access — changing the perception that ballet is "not for me" and building a company of artists who live here, work here, and are our neighbors.

You'll Learn:

How the discipline of ballet translates directly to leadership

The difference between technique (the dancer) and mentorship (the whole person)

Why trust is built in rehearsal, not on stage

What Kiera envisions for the Sacramento Ballet's next five years — touring, scaling, and expanding access

Perfect For: Anyone who cares about leadership, the arts, or what it looks like to step into something bigger than yourself.

Sponsors:

⁠https://meropictures.com⁠

Learn more about the Jacquelyn social club:

⁠https://www.thejacquelyn.com/⁠

Get In Touch:

Instagram: ⁠https://www.instagram.com/thejacquelyn.official/⁠

LinkedIn: ⁠https://www.linkedin.com/company/the-jacquelyn/⁠

Email:

⁠[email protected]⁠

The music is 300 years old. The CEO is 31. Giuliano Kornberg leads the Sacramento Philharmonic and Opera as one of the youngest heads of a major U.S. orchestra-opera hybrid — and his job is to honor tradition while making sure classical music stays relevant to a generation that didn't grow up with it.

In this conversation with Mary Daffin, Giuliano gets into the real tension of leading a legacy art form as a young CEO: how do you keep the masters at the core, the Beethovens and the Puccinis, while also putting Harry Potter on stage, and designing a Saturday night concert experience that a 30-year-old actually wants to attend?

The answer isn't choosing between tradition and trends. It's proving they need each other. And behind all of it is the balancing act that every arts leader faces: between creativity and survival, between what the art deserves and what the business demands.

You'll Learn:

- How a young CEO balances tradition and trends in one of the oldest art forms still performed live

- Why "keeping the core the core" is Giuliano's programming philosophy — and what plays well alongside it

- Why live classical music has a real, measurable impact on wellness

- What Sacramento's growing arts ecosystem says about the city's identity

Perfect For: Anyone who thinks classical music isn't for them. Anyone navigating the tension between legacy and relevance.

Guest: Giuliano Kornberg, CEO of the Sacramento Philharmonic and Opera

Sponsors:

⁠https://meropictures.com⁠

Learn more about the Jacquelyn social club:

⁠https://www.thejacquelyn.com/⁠

Get In Touch:

Instagram: ⁠https://www.instagram.com/thejacquelyn.official/⁠

LinkedIn: ⁠https://www.linkedin.com/company/the-jacquelyn/⁠

Email:

⁠[email protected]⁠

How does a sleepy government town become a destination city? Ask Mike Testa. As President and CEO of Visit Sacramento, Mike has spent the last decade reshaping how the world sees Sacramento — from birthing the Farm to Fork Festival and Aftershock to landing Terra Madre on a ten-year deal.

In this conversation with Mary Daffin, Mike gets into the real mechanics of city-building: how you convince elected officials to turn a family park into a concert venue, why art is what truly sets a city apart, and what calculated risk looks like when there's no precedent and no guarantee.

What you'll learn:

- How Sacramento went from government town to Farm-to-Fork Capital and why not everyone liked it

- The stories behind creating Aftershock, Farm to Fork, and Terra Madre

- Why art and performing arts are what truly set a city apart

- What calculated risk looks like when there's no precedent and no proof

Perfect For: Anyone who loves Sacramento and wants to know the stories behind the city's biggest moments and anyone who's ever had to lead without a guarantee.

Guest: Mike Testa, President and CEO of Visit Sacramento

Sponsors:

⁠https://meropictures.com⁠

Learn more about the Jacquelyn social club:

⁠https://www.thejacquelyn.com/⁠

Get In Touch:

Instagram: ⁠https://www.instagram.com/thejacquelyn.official/⁠

LinkedIn: ⁠https://www.linkedin.com/company/the-jacquelyn/⁠

Email:

⁠[email protected]⁠

At the turn of the 20th century, there were hundreds of third places in every city. Those slowly disappeared. And now they're coming back.

Drew Wahl has spent over a decade inside some of the world's most interesting clubs, and he sees a deeper shift happening. Third places are coming back. People want real rooms with real people where the phones go away and the conversations actually matter. As Chief Partnership Officer of the Sonato Alliance — a network of nearly 90 independent private social clubs worldwide — Drew sits down with Mary to talk about why clubs are resurging, what members really want, how culture defines a club's identity, and why a club is a living, breathing thing you come back to, not just a place you visit. If you've ever wondered what happens behind the door with no sign on it, start here.

You'll Learn:

- Why social clubs are the "tip of the spear" in the return of third places

- What makes clubs one of the last AI-free, tech-limited spaces and why that matters

- Why a club is a living place and what it means that conversations stay there

- What members actually want (hint: it's not the food)

Perfect For: Anyone who's felt the pull of wanting a real place to go — not a bar, not a networking event, just a room full of interesting people who showed up on purpose.

Guest: Drew Wahl, Chief Partnership Officer of the Sonato Alliance

Sponsors:

⁠https://meropictures.com⁠

Learn more about the Jacquelyn social club:

⁠https://www.thejacquelyn.com/⁠

Get In Touch:

Instagram: ⁠https://www.instagram.com/thejacquelyn.official/⁠

LinkedIn: ⁠https://www.linkedin.com/company/the-jacquelyn/⁠

Email:

⁠[email protected]⁠