Our new series, Thankful land Giving Back, begins today with Kathryn Mae Inman.  We just finished our conversation and I am basking in our natural connection.  Turns out Kathryn is a kindred spirit in that she is committed to living a life that is authentic, transparent and vulnerable.  She has done so by surviving, and now thriving, after her son’s heroin addiction.  Kathryn wants to share in the hopes it may help one other.  Or more.

She wrote Counting Spoons: A Memoir of Heroin, Heartache and Hope, her son Justin helped.  I’ve just ordered it.  I am drawn to her story, her ability to endure well.  It took some hard times to get her there and now she gets how critical it is to show up as the sum of her experiences plus all that she’s learned along the way.  As she can attest, it’s the hard times that make you who you are.  That and her faith.

Kathryn’s website: kathrynminman.com.

Thank you for being a part of the UY conversation.

The Unabashed You website has a page for each guest of photos, quotes and a blog with embedded audio at unabashedyou.com. You can find the show on other podcast platforms.  Want to lend your support and encouragement? We invite you to follow, rate, review and share.

Social media (direct links):

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If you have questions or comments email us at: [email protected].

We build upon on website visits, social media and word of mouth to share these episodes.  We appreciate growth knowing these conversations help you think, celebrate who you are, and move you in some way.

So be encouraged and continue to listen, read and be inspired. 🍐

I asked Shaun to come back to the show to have a conversation about a health challenge he has had for the past few years.  Chronic digestive issues along with brain fog has made Shaun’s life difficult to say the least.  And to watch from the sidelines knowing there is very little I can actually do, is a source of constant heartache.  They say ‘a mom is only as happy as her least happy kid’ and on some level I have to agree.

I’ve accepted my lot as cheerleader, head encourager, while asking questions to keep the brainstorming going.  (What is the latest?  What does that doctor say?  What does the other doctor say?  Is there a new plan?  What about the Mayo Clinic?)  He’s been to many doctors, tried many meds, supplements, etc.  It’s definitely a ‘wait and see’ kind of a thing and proving very hard to keep the hope alive.  Of course my despair pales in comparison to what Shaun actually lives day in and day out.  No restaurants, no enjoying family meals, eating four foods and four foods only: poultry, white rice, cooked carrots and peeled cucumber.  Oy vey.  Sometimes I wonder why the answer is ’no’ to the healing prayers I send up.  And yes, I’m aware some people have it worse.  I’m sad for them too.

Thank you for being a part of the UY conversation.

The Unabashed You website has a page for each guest of photos, quotes and a blog with embedded audio at unabashedyou.com. You can find the show on other podcast platforms.  Want to lend your support and encouragement? We invite you to follow, rate, review and share.

Social media (direct links):

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If you have questions or comments email us at: [email protected].

We build upon on website visits, social media and word of mouth to share these episodes.  We appreciate growth knowing these conversations help you think, celebrate who you are, and move you in some way.

So be encouraged and continue to listen, read and be inspired. 🍐

Sometimes you need to pivot.  Hillary and I planned two more assessments yet she came down with the same cold her kids did, and lost her voice.  No problem.  I figured we had covered quite a bit with the six tools we managed to explore: Myers-Briggs, 5 Love Languages, Enneagram, Spiritual Gifts, Emotional Intelligence and The Animal in You.  Learned a ton. Feel more expanded in who I understand myself to be.

A big thanks to Hillary for being the co-host these past six weeks.  Always entertaining, always the real deal.  Thanks for being you - someone I think the world of, and am all too delighted to do a slice of life with.

With a couple more weeks before we head into November and a new series, I called upon Shaun, the pinch-hitter man.  Of course he was game to help out.  We covered one of his passions, VoiceOver work (wait for his Alan Rickman, Christopher Walken, and Owen Wilson - priceless!) along with a round of rapid-fire questions from Elfster-blog.  We decided to skip one question in particular as we both found it a bit mean-spirited.  Again, we didn’t write the questions. 

It is deeply satisfying to know you have certain people in your corner and no matter what the need is, they will do their all to help you get there.  Thanks Shaun for sharing who you are with us, once again. 

Thank you for being a part of the UY conversation.

The Unabashed You website has a page for each guest of photos, quotes and a blog with embedded audio at unabashedyou.com. You can find the show on other podcast platforms.  Want to lend your support and encouragement? We invite you to follow, rate, review and share.

Social media (direct links):

Facebook

Instagram

If you have questions or comments email us at: [email protected].

We build upon on website visits, social media and word of mouth to share these episodes.  We appreciate growth knowing these conversations help you think, celebrate who you are, and move you in some way.

So be encouraged and continue to listen, read and be inspired. 🍐

After some more serious exploration, we thought it would be fun to look at a popular  personality test called The Animal in You https://animalinyou.com.  Playful, whimsical and with just 10 questions,  it is an easy assessment to do.  The results yield the selection of an animal, the animal in you.  Get it?  There are 50 possibilities and of course they all have particular characteristics.  Over 22 million people have taken it.

As you can tell we enjoyed our conversation.  While I don’t see myself as an eagle, with all the daring, risky outdoor activities, I did like being described as having “an infectious joie de vivre.”  I do see Hillary as an otter stated as small, fun-loving and communicative.  And finicky?  Nope, I’d say discerning.  There’s a difference.

Which animal are you?

Thank you for being a part of the UY conversation.

The Unabashed You website has a page for each guest of photos, quotes and a blog with embedded audio at unabashedyou.com. You can find the show on other podcast platforms.  Want to lend your support and encouragement? We invite you to follow, rate, review and share.

Social media (direct links):

Facebook

Instagram

If you have questions or comments email us at: [email protected].

We build upon on website visits, social media and word of mouth to share these episodes.  We appreciate growth knowing these conversations help you think, celebrate who you are, and move you in some way.

So be encouraged and continue to listen, read and be inspired. 🍐

I’d always wondered about “emotional intelligence” as in what exactly does that mean.  In recent years we started hearing that phrase - a lot.  Turns out it was coined in 1990 by two psychology professors who wrote a book about it.  The concept took off.  Hillary and I decided to take a deeper look to see how we rated on this scale.  The one we used is https://www.mindtools.com/pages/article/ei-quiz.ht.

We appreciate how this tool was broken down and organized.  Easy to use, easy to go back and refer to.  (Remember we both score high in administration.)  The five characteristics of self-awareness, self-regulation, motivation, empathy, and social skills supported what Hillary and I knew, giving it words, making it clearer.  It also pointed out areas we want to grow in, definitely.  All this as a way to better understand ourselves.  It matters who you are because you need to show up as exactly that.  For you.  For me.  For us.

Thank you for being a part of the UY conversation.

The Unabashed You website has a page for each guest of photos, quotes and a blog with embedded audio at unabashedyou.com. You can find the show on other podcast platforms.  Want to lend your support and encouragement? We invite you to follow, rate, review and share.

Social media (direct links):

Facebook

Instagram

If you have questions or comments email us at: [email protected].

We build upon on website visits, social media and word of mouth to share these episodes.  We appreciate growth knowing these conversations help you think, celebrate who you are, and move you in some way.

So be encouraged and continue to listen, read and be inspired. 🍐

Here we go with another assessment tool to help us figure ourselves out.  We’re looking at spiritual gifts in this episode.  You may not know what these are.  They are thought to be helpful in determining how you have been crafted as a human being.  The ‘gifts’  cover categories like leadership, administration, wisdom, and also more faith-based ones like faith, serving, and mercy.  I believe anyone would benefit from taking a look at this assessment although clearly it is designed for those of the Christian faith.

We are committed to encouraging all people regardless of how they identify spiritually, and if they don’t.  No matter what, we want you to show up in your life fully you.  And not feel apologetic about it!  You’re here to do the thing only you can do so let’s be sure we know ourselves well enough to do exactly that.

Thank you for being a part of the UY conversation.

The Unabashed You website has a page for each guest of photos, quotes and a blog with embedded audio at unabashedyou.com. You can find the show on other podcast platforms.  Want to lend your support and encouragement? We invite you to follow, rate, review and share.

Social media (direct links):

Facebook

Instagram

If you have questions or comments email us at: [email protected].

We build upon on website visits, social media and word of mouth to share these episodes.  We appreciate growth knowing these conversations help you think, celebrate who you are, and move you in some way.

So be encouraged and continue to listen, read and be inspired. 🍐

Today we are looking at the assessment tool the enneagram. It is a system that includes 9 different personality types.  Through a series of questions, patterns emerge so you can see yourself more clearly, how you navigate the world and how you feel about it.  The one we like is https://www.yourenneagramcoach.com. It can be a useful tool to help you understand the why of who you are. What I like about theirs was it breaks down the nine types by percentages according to how you answered.  We have all nine types within us, some are simply more dominant than others.

Finding out your predominant number, or numbers in some cases, leaves a blend of intrigue, affirmation, wondering, and “uh-oh” along with a thirst for further info.  I get it.  You find out about your strengths but also your weaknesses too.  That’s where the “uh-oh” comes in. Don’t you want to be empowered when it comes to showing up in your own life? It takes information to do that well.

See past episode 17: ‘Rachel, Ross, Monica, Chandler, Phoebe and Joey’ to hear Erin Sur, Life and Enneagram Coach.  To make it fun she used the cast of Friends to go through the numbers and added a few other notable people to make up the nine different personality types.

Thank you for being a part of the UY conversation.

The Unabashed You website has a page for each guest of photos, quotes and a blog with embedded audio at unabashedyou.com. You can find the show on other podcast platforms.  Want to lend your support and encouragement? We invite you to follow, rate, review and share.

Social media (direct links):

Facebook

Instagram

If you have questions or comments email us at: [email protected].

We build upon on website visits, social media and word of mouth to share these episodes.  We appreciate growth knowing these conversations help you think, celebrate who you are, and move you in some way.

So be encouraged and continue to listen, read and be inspired. 🍐

Today we are looking at the assessment tool the 5 Love Languages at https://5lovelanguages.com. The site has subcategories of Romantic, Friendships, Family and Workplace so you don’t have to be in a romantic relationship to find it helpful.  This info is for you, about you.

While this assessment started as a tool for romantic relationships, it is clear it can be used across the board.  The Five Love Languages is a 1992 book by Gary Chapman. It outlines five general ways that romantic partners express and experience love:

Words of affirmation

Quality time

Physical touch

Acts of service

Receiving gifts

Hillary and I both agreed the 5 love languages has value.  Once again it’s a way to understand what makes you, you.  The better you know yourself, the more likely you are to have a healthy self-concept, and have meaningful relationships with those who are in your life.  And if you want to share your own findings let me know.  I would find it fascinating to hear how this was for you.  I love connecting!

Thank you for being a part of the UY conversation.

The Unabashed You website has a page for each guest of photos, quotes and a blog with embedded audio at unabashedyou.com. You can find the show on other podcast platforms.  Want to lend your support and encouragement? We invite you to follow, rate, review and share.

Social media (direct links):

Facebook

Instagram

If you have questions or comments email us at: [email protected].

We build upon on website visits, social media and word of mouth to share these episodes.  We appreciate growth knowing these conversations help you think, celebrate who you are, and move you in some way.

So be encouraged and continue to listen, read and be inspired. 🍐

Learning more about myself, or ‘becoming who I already am’ has given me increased understanding, compassion and confidence.  I am more patient with myself.  I am way less apologetic and more prone to embrace the parts of me I like, and even the parts I don’t. It all makes me, me.  I want to share and encourage you to do the same.

“Explore More of You” Is the new series that starts today.  We are going to look at some assessment tools to help us understand ourselves better.   We may even discover some things we didn’t already know ,or some things we’ve long wondered about.

We know there are fellow executives and protagonists out there who can relate to each of our results along with the other types found through this tool.  The idea is to get to know yourself better.  It will help you, your relationships, and how you move through life.  Isn’t that a good thing?

Thank you for being a part of the UY conversation.

The Unabashed You website has a page for each guest of photos, quotes and a blog with embedded audio at unabashedyou.com. You can find the show on other podcast platforms.  Want to lend your support and encouragement? We invite you to follow, rate, review and share.

Social media (direct links):

Facebook

Instagram

If you have questions or comments email us at: [email protected].

We build upon on website visits, social media and word of mouth to share these episodes.  We appreciate growth knowing these conversations help you think, celebrate who you are, and move you in some way.

So be encouraged and continue to listen, read and be inspired. 🍐

Melissa Bollea Rowe is our final Insta Summer 2 partner for this series.  Melissa is about many things and wants to share them out of a place of goodwill.  She is first and foremost a songwriter.  Next she went through some tough times that brought her to three words that she “practices” every day.  It changed her life.

I think it’s fascinating Melissa continues to parlay her passions into many different avenues like writing a book, with a second project coming soon, and writing the score for a movie that will hopefully help a lot of kids learn.  Plus she understands the value of time, how precious it is, and how sharing it with someone else really is the ultimate gift.  Who will you give to today?

Thank you for being a part of the UY conversation.

The Unabashed You website has a page for each guest of photos, quotes and a blog with embedded audio at unabashedyou.com. You can find the show on other podcast platforms.  Want to lend your support and encouragement? We invite you to follow, rate, review and share.

Social media (direct links):

Facebook

Instagram

If you have questions or comments email us at: [email protected].

We build upon on website visits, social media and word of mouth to share these episodes.  We appreciate growth knowing these conversations help you think, celebrate who you are, and move you in some way.

So be encouraged and continue to listen, read and be inspired. 🍐