Warrior Forward: The Podcast

The holidays hit your body weeks before they hit your calendar.

The decorations are still in the garage and somebody's already asking where Christmas is this year.

For the default parent, the holiday season doesn't start on a date. It starts with the first question. In this episode Kim talks about why the season shows up in your body weeks early, and shares the ten-second somatic reset she uses when the next holiday question lands.

When a journalist asked the internet to help him find out who Jane Doe was, women answered by all becoming her. Then they started telling their own stories.

Every time a case like the Cornell 7 breaks, the first question is "why didn't she say something?" I think it's the wrong question. This week I'm asking a different one: what's actually happening in the body of a woman who can't tell, and what happens to the ones who do?

Harassment is a blatant act of entitlement. And so is rape. The reasons don't matter, but the fact it's still happening does.

In this episode:

• Why I think the ketamine and frat house conversation lets everybody off the hook
• What #IAmJaneDoe actually built, and why women are suddenly telling stories they've held for decades
• Unwanted is unwanted: why extreme assault starts long before it happens
• The great American excuse machine, and the adults who keep it running
• Fight, flight, freeze and fawn, and why fawn is the one that gets women called liars
• Why the body stores trauma in pieces, and what shame does to a woman who wants to speak up
• The ranking system that files harassment under "not that bad"
• What it leaves behind, from the school hallway to the corner office
• Two sentences worth borrowing, one for the kid in your house and one for yourself

Content note: This episode discusses sexual harassment and sexual assault.

Referenced in this episode:

• Cornell 7 lawsuit and reopened investigation (PBS News)
• Cornell agrees to an independent probe (NPR)
• The #IAmJaneDoe movement (Katie Couric Media)
• Tonic immobility during sexual assault, Möller et al. 2017 (ScienceDaily)
• Reporting statistics (RAINN)

Warrior Forward Substack IG: https://www.instagram.com/warriorforward/?hl=en

You can be furious and still take the night off.

You scanned the news in the car line and then walked into the 9am like nothing happened. And on the nights you didn't check, you felt guilty for it.

According to Gallup's 2026 research, women are more burned out than men and more engaged at work at the same time. In this episode Kim calls out the exhaustion for what it is and makes the case for stepping back from the news without stepping away from what you care about. Gallup: Women Show Stronger Employee Engagement Amid Higher Burnout (Mar 2026) https://substack.com/@warriorforward https://www.instagram.com/warriorforward/

Grace-Miller Moody was 21 years old, standing in front of four turned chairs on The Voice, singing a song she didn't choose to sing there by accident. Her dad sent the tape in. All four coaches turned around, which almost never happens, and she picked Adam Levine because of a Maroon 5 concert her family went to after her brother came out of remission.

She won her Battle. She got cut at the Knockouts. And then the cameras packed up and went home, which is the part of the story nobody puts in the highlight reel.

This is a conversation about what happens after the dream does what dreams do, which is arrive, and then end, and leave you holding a Tuesday. Grace-Miller is at the very beginning of a road most of the women listening to this are twenty-five years down. She hasn't traded anything away yet. I wanted to know what she can already feel getting ready to go, and whether she can see it coming.

About Grace-Miller

Grace-Miller Moody is a singer and songwriter from Florence, South Carolina, and a psychology major at the College of Charleston. She competed on Season 27 of NBC's The Voice, earning a four-chair turn in her blind audition and choosing Adam Levine as her coach. She won her Battle round and was eliminated at the Knockouts. She's now writing and releasing her own music.

Website: https://www.gracemillermoodymusic.info/

IG: https://www.instagram.com/gracemillermoody.music/?hl=en

Upcoming Performances: https://www.gracemillermoodymusic.info/scheduling

Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/artist/4fGWdQQMwMIxHhtsxw6zci?si=H90Qn78cQX-DN22KqOClHg

This episode is the four words I've been fumbling for a decade-what do you do-and what happens when the thing you built doesn't fit a box anybody recognises on contact. If you've ever watched somebody's eyes glaze while you explained your own company to them, you already know the tax I'm talking about.

In this episode:

• Why nobody has ever asked my husband who's watching our kids
• What changed when "teacher" became "somatic coach" and the conversation started stopping dead
• The three extra sentences you pay every time you walk into a room
• Why the decisions that make you good at this are the ones nobody is there to witness
• What I stopped waiting for, and what I started calling it instead

Timestamps

00:00 The question 00:20 The holiday party 07:00 Four words 13:30 The map is old 20:00 The doctorate nobody hands out 28:00 The decisions nobody sees 34:00 The recognition wasn't coming 38:30 It's not just me 40:30 Say it anyway

Laura's approach to women's health weaves together her own experience overcoming a major spinal injury, her role as a working mom of three, and an impressive clinical career leading teams in pediatrics, home health, and women's health settings.

She founded AURĀE with the goal of helping women reclaim their sense of self and well-being, using her background as a doctorally prepared, board-certified family nurse practitioner to guide the work.

It's this blend of personal resilience and evidence-based wisdom that makes her story so compelling.

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Make sure you mention your favorite part of the episode! Join the community on Substack: https://kimwalsh1717.substack.com/

Being able to carry something doesn't make it yours to carry. This episode names the two-second window where competence quietly turns into obligation.

Tangible takeaway: Find one thing that landed on you this week without anybody actually asking. Just notice it.

"Just because you're capable of carrying it doesn't mean it's still yours to carry."

CTA: Check out more on this at Warrior Forward on SUBSTACK

Katie Southworth paints for a living, but that's not why she's in this chair. Eleven years ago she survived the suicide loss of someone she loved, and instead of going quiet, she picked up a paintbrush. This conversation is about what she built after the worst thing happened to her, and why she built it in color. She describes her work as learning to "reclaim your rainbow after rain." She creates original art and speaks openly about using color as part of staying in her own life.

Katie lives by one rule: be a buffalo. Buffalo run toward a storm because it gets them through it faster, instead of running from it and staying in it longer. This conversation is about what she built after the worst thing happened to her, and why she built it in color.

Connect with Katie: Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/katiesouthworth_art/ Linktree: https://linktr.ee/Katiesouthworth

Kim shares how success in life actually made her life more compicated and how to leverage having both success and extra responsibilites. Monday Mindset is a quick drop in to get your mind right for the week! Longer interviews are on Wednesday. Check out more on this podcast on Substack

We're back for season 4 with so much new!

Find me on Substack for longer writing, honest essays, and the deeper version of everything we talk about here: Warrior Forward: Substack

If this episode landed for you — share it with a woman who spent this summer becoming someone she didn't expect.