Andrea Johnson empowers leaders, especially women, to embrace their authenticity and confidently navigate their personal and professional journeys. Drawing from her own experiences as an adoptive mother and a third culture kid, Andrea emphasizes the importance of understanding core values as a foundation for effective leadership. She shares insights on how emotional resilience is cultivated through intentional optimism and the necessity of challenging societal norms that often stifle women's voices. Throughout the conversation, Andrea highlights the role of mentorship in fostering growth and self-awareness, urging individuals to trust their ability to think critically and lead imaginatively. Her commitment to creating a culture of belonging and authenticity resonates deeply, encouraging listeners to explore their own values and impact the world around them.

In this inspiring episode, we sit down with Andrea Johnson, the visionary behind TheIntentionalOptimist.org. Andrea shares her journey of creating a platform dedicated to helping individuals cultivate a positive and intentional mindset. We delve into the principles of intentional optimism, exploring how it can transform lives and empower people to achieve their goals. Andrea discusses practical strategies for maintaining a positive outlook, even in challenging times, and offers insights into building a community centered around growth and positivity. Join us for an uplifting conversation that will leave you motivated to embrace intentional optimism in your own life.

Andrea Johnson joins the podcast to share her journey from a third culture kid to a leadership coach dedicated to empowering women and fostering authenticity in leadership. Growing up on a mission field in South Korea, Andrea navigated the complexities of cultural diversity and personal struggles with wellness, which shaped her understanding of emotional resilience. She emphasizes the importance of uncovering core values as a pathway to personal and professional growth, stating that her passion lies in equipping female leaders to trust their instincts and redefine their narratives. Through her signature tool, intentional optimism, Andrea provides a framework for individuals to align their actions with their values, ultimately leading to more impactful leadership.

The conversation delves into the significance of mentorship and the influential figures in Andrea’s life who encouraged her to embrace her true self and potential. She recounts how early mentorship experiences helped her overcome feelings of inadequacy and fostered a sense of belonging—an essential component in her approach to leadership. Andrea also discusses the dynamics of corporate culture, the importance of communication within teams, and the challenges faced by women in leadership roles, particularly in environments influenced by patriarchal structures.

As the discussion progresses, Andrea highlights her involvement with the John Maxwell team, where she learned to facilitate growth and development among leaders. She shares her vision for creating spaces where women feel empowered to express their leadership capabilities and discusses practical steps for individuals looking to define their core values. The episode concludes with a powerful reminder that true impact comes not from what one does, but from who one is, encouraging listeners to reflect on their own values and how they can lead with authenticity in their lives.

Andrea Johnson's insights serve as a beacon for those seeking to navigate their leadership journeys with confidence and clarity, reinforcing the idea that everyone has the potential to lead effectively, regardless of their background or circumstances.

Takeaways:

• Understanding your core values is crucial for personal and professional growth.
• Authenticity in leadership allows individuals to lead with confidence and conviction.
• Emotional resilience is a process that requires self-awareness and the courage to face challenges.
• Creating a welcoming atmosphere fosters open dialogue and encourages personal growth in others.
• Women in leadership can thrive when they trust their ability to lead effectively.
• The journey of self-discovery often involves deconstructing assumptions and beliefs from the past.

Links referenced in this episode:

• theintentionaloptimist.com

Want to be a guest on Becoming Bridge Builders? Send Keith Haney a message on PodMatch, here: https://www.podmatch.com/hostdetailpreview/keithhaney

My guest today is Andrea Johnson.

She empowers executives and founders to lead with authenticity, conviction, and confidence so they can make a positive impact on their lives, organizations, and communities.

As an adoptive parent who grew up internationally navigating mental and physical wellness, she learned that emotional resilience must be earned.

The process of uncovering and understanding the significance of her core values became the key to the process that allows her clients to do the same.

Andrea works with leaders who feel stifled, who have grown unsatisfied with their current level of influence.

She facilitates improved communication and corporate culture by working within teams.

Her passion is equipping female leaders to define a new culture of trusting their own ability to create imaginative and lead effectively.

Andrea was raised on a mission field in Seoul, South Korea.

As a third culture kid, she's familiar with navigating cultural diversity to find her own place of belonging.

A family history of obesity showed up early, along with bulimia and depression.

Her determination to become healthy, however, led to a gastritic bypass.

Surgery is a testament to her persevering spirit.

She experienced early menopause at 39 and became an adoptive mother through private adoption at age 42.

Her personal journey of deconstructing her own assumptions, beliefs.

That conditioning produced her signature tool, intentional optimism.

It provides a framework for how we do what we do.

It's the attitude and mindsets we employ and embody.

Live out our own values, goals, dreams with excellence.

Andrea is a certified Maxwell leadership speaker, trainer, coach, and disc behavior analysis consultant.

We welcome her to the podcast.

Well, Andrea, welcome to the podcast.

How you doing today?

I'm well, Keith.

Thank you so much.

I'm excited to be here.

It's good to have you on.

I'm going to ask you my favorite question for my guest and that is what's the best piece of advice you've ever received?

I had a wonderful mentor when I was in.

She was actually.

I grew up on the mission field.

She was another missionary and so we called them.

She was my Aunt Kathleen.

That's what we called our aunts and uncles in the missionary community.

And she just thought I was the greatest thing.

I don't know why.

And I think she could see the potential in me.

God's taking her home.

But she actually said to me, andrea, you are not too much.

You are enough and you need to show up as you.

And I didn't always heed that advice, but looking back now, that's kind of what I tell my clients.

That's so that's become a piece of advice that I now Try to live very intently.

But she, she saw something in me.

And that was the advice that she shared because she could also see that I was struggling with that confidence and being myself.

Yeah, I got labeled with too much confidence at seminary.

They said I was arrogant and I, I pushed back.

I'm like, no, I'm not really arrog arrogant.

I just understand that God can do anything and I'm very confident in his ability.

And you perceive that as arrogance?

I perceive it as confidence in God.

So we had a disagreement on that.

I wasn't.

I don't know that I was seen as confident in seminary because I have 2/3 of my Masters of Divinity.

I didn't finish.

But I look back at myself and I think that.

I think the difference between what you described and what I would have called arrogance and what I looked back at now and see is what I think was arrogance in myself was.

I felt like I had it figured out.

I felt like I had the answers.

And I think as soon as we think we have the answers, that is a recipe for disaster.

So knowing that God is in charge, I don't think is arrogance.

I think that is confidence.

I think that's good stuff.

We disagreed on that.

And so I responded back kind of in a snarky way of people who are humble are humble for a reason, which they didn't like that either.

Oh, where did you go to seminary?

St.

Louis.

Concordia Seminary, St.

Louis.

Oh, sure.

Okay, cool.

Anyway, I'm gonna.

Sorry, like, go into question mode.

No, no problem.

I love to ask my guests this question too.

I'm curious who you mentioned.

Kind of some.

Just someone just recently.

But who else were.

Who are some people in your life who are mentors for you along your journey?

Tell us what about them, made them special.

And if you want to kind of give them a shout out, here's a chance to do that.

I am one of those people who unfortunately has mentors who are already gone home to be with the Lord.

Most of them.

And I mentioned Kathleen, Kathleen Autry.

She was amazing.

And I can look back on my young adult years when I think it's super important to have mentors.

And I had some ladies in my life that really made a difference.

One was a two year mission that just thought I was amazing as well.

And even back then, and to this day, I still think it's amazing when people think I'm amazing.

I don't know what that is, but.

And her name was Dawn.

And then I ran into her again in college.

Like I was.

It was Interesting how God put her back in my life and she managed to encourage me and kind of push me out of the nest in certain ways.

Then I had another mentor who spoke into my life.

Her name was Gladys Hughes.

And she spoke into my life in a way that others, that only one other one really has.

And it was very much in the scriptural sense.

Like she nurtured me and taught me and discipled me in when I was in college.

And so.

And she was a very, I'm very high energy and she was very calm and I needed that.

And so she mentored me in that area.

And I had another one then when I was a young pastor's wife who just met me where I was and also, you know, challenged me consistently.

Carolyn Ruzak is, she's still with us, but I don't keep in touch with her as much.

But I remember my husband and I had finally gotten to.

Because as poor young pastor and pastor's wife, it was okay.

We made it to the 10% giving.

We're giving our tithe.

Woohoo.

And she said, oh, that's great.

I'm going to pray that God convicts you to do 15%.

I'm like, what?

So looking back, most of my mentors kind of challenged me.

Like I shared Kathleen said, please be yourself.

And dawn pushed me out of the nest.

And Gladys was really good about encouraging me to memorize Scripture, which still sticks with me today.

And, and then Carolyn was like challenging me to like allow God to be the provider.

I have a mentor now that I've known since I was 15.

I think I shared with you before we started recording that one of my dear friends was Air Force and her, her dad was Air Force, he was at Osan.

And she and her mom and my mom are like best friends.

And so I've known her since I was 15, but she has now been more of a mentor in my business.

And as I grow, she's the one who introduced me to John Maxwell.

She's even just this morning we were Marco Poloing back and forth about you could do this with your conference and you could do that.

And it's like that's too many thoughts.

But so I think the overarching.

I've never really shared that in a way that puts all my mentors together but or the people that I feel like have been mentors.

They all, there's this theme of they challenge me and they all have different energies and they all have different reasons, but they all challenge me to be more, to do more.

And I think that's a really good.

That's a really good way to describe a mentor.

Yeah, I like that.

And those people that God puts in our life are there for a particular reason, to help us sometimes get to that next level or to see something in ourselves that we don't always recognize.

And it's so powerful when people see that in you.

I had someone.

Yes.

In my life early on.

Tell me you're going to, you're going to do great things.

You're going to.

You're going to break through race in your church body and help people to understand.

I'm like, get out of here.

Oh, could you tell me something that's a little less scary and daunting?

Right.

And it actually went kind of viral in our church body, especially during the pandemic when the George Floyd thing happened.

So I end up being that.

And I just had one of our.

In a publication, we had the reporter where our Sanaka president mentioned I was one of the leaders in that field for our church body.

And I'm like.

And I, I thought back to someone saying that, going, oh, I guess he was right.

So, yeah, you never know.

Yeah.

Oh, that's lovely.

I love that.

So, Ken, talk, talk to us about your journey.

You mentioned John Maxwell.

I.

I love that you're part of John Maxwell speaking because he was one of the unknown mentors for me when I was a young pastor, because I walked into a church and realized I have no idea how to lead this thing.

And first thing I did was looked out for someone in.

In the religious field who was leader, who was a leader.

And I went to everything.

John Maxwell, every conference I could get to, bought every book.

He had, used all of his videos to teach my.

My churches how to lead.

So it was like he became this probably no more than I do, unknown mentor for me.

But talk about your journey.

Becoming a certified Maxwell speaker, trainer, coach.

I love the disc profile thing, too.

So I'm kind of curious about your whole journey into all of these different areas of leadership.

Yeah, my career actually is in university medicine.

I was an administrator and operations manager in two different really good Atlantic kind of Ivy League schools at Johns Hopkins and University of Virginia.

And I did well and I was managing people, but I realized I just wasn't.

That wasn't where I needed to be.

I learned and noticed that people would show up in my office to get wisdom, to get to just have a space that they could talk.

I had a, a former staff member literally show up my office in the middle of a panic attack saying, you're the only safe place I knew to come.

Wow.

And when the chief of the department would come in and shut the door and just kind of like, I just need to talk to somebody or my new.

Because I was on the academic side.

So we did a lot of grants, management and a lot of budgeting.

It's like people don't understand things.

And I learned how to explain.

Well, just having young doctors and researchers show up and say when I was leaving, if you leave, who's going to help me with my career?

It's like I see you as a mentor and I'm like, wait, no.

But looking back at that and then seeing where I got kind of disenchanted with academic medicine, trying to rise up in the FIELD without being 6 foot 3, blonde haired, blue eyed male and with an MBA, you know, it's like I don't have any of those things.

And I was disillusioned with that.

But I also realized that I don't like to manage people.

I don't like to manage teams.

I don't like to manage.

I mean, I don't mind managing a circumstance because managing means to like keep the status quo.

Managing means to like keep it smooth and to remove the bumps.

And I realized that what I was.

And I had conflicts with my boss and with the chief of the department because I would hire people and I would tell them in an administrative position, you know, like an administrative assistant or something, which there's no shade on that kind of work.

But it's really kind of the low end of the totem pole.

Right.

So I would say this is a launching pad for you.

It is not a landing pad.

And I expect you to grow and I will help you grow in this position.

And within three years I think you should be someplace else.

Several people took me up on that.

A couple were already there when I got there and were like, no, I'm just here counting out my days to retirement.

Like, yeah, I'm not in, I'm not, I'm not down with that.

But I even had, But I then I had one staff member who just couldn't see it.

They were just like, are you trying to get rid of me?

Are, you know, helping you grow?

I told you when you started or when I interviewed you.

Like I tell them that in the interview so that they know well, all that to Say, I got very kind of discouraged trying to keep the status quo, because when someone would move on, the division chief would come and say, what'd you do wrong?

Like, I did my job.

I did what I'm supposed to do.

I helped them grow.

And he's like, no, you're supposed to keep people here.

And I realized I just didn't want to do that anymore.

And as I was sharing my frustration with my friend that I mentioned, I knew she had done something, but I wasn't really paying attention.

And, you know, I just really didn't know.

And she said, you really should look at the Maxwell team.

You should look at.

This is speaker trainer, coach training.

And so I said, okay, fine.

You know, and I really didn't think about it.

I kind of looked at other ways that I could be a consultant or coach or whatever.

And then I.

Because I just really didn't see myself as qualified.

And then when I really looked at it, I went back to her, and I was like, okay, I think I really want to do this.

So I still.

I walked into it really not knowing anything about John Maxwell.

My husband knew who John Maxwell was because as a pastor, he had read some John Maxwell books, and in pastoral circles, John Maxwell's leadership books are very popular.

So.

Because he comes at it from.

If any of the listeners don't know, he was a pastor.

And so he comes at things with that perspective.

And even in our big meetings twice a year for the coaching and the team kind of certification meetings where we do kind of a conference, he does a worship service every year.

He preaches, and he speaks in those terms.

But as I started learning what it meant to be a speaker trainer and coach, all of those things about just be yourself.

Andrea started coming up, and I got certified, and I just found that I struggled being able to share someone else's information.

So it's been a journey for me, and I've learned a lot about myself.

But what I found was a really great environment where I could learn and learn at my own pace.

A great environment with full of mentors.

There's not a soul in the Maxwell team of the.

I think it's 50,000 people worldwide now that are certified.

I've not found a soul that wasn't willing to help.

Oh, I take it back.

I found one here in Charlottesville.

But most of them are like, can I help you grow?

Because that's what we're here for, right?

It's the people who are attracted to the certification of being a Maxwell speaker, trainer and coach, meaning you get access to his books to teach them and to do masterminds.

You can use them in your job.

You can use them as a business.

You know, the people who want to do that are kind of interested in helping everybody around them grow, not just themselves.

And so the environment has been so helpful and productive.

And so it has.

It has made me a better mom, it has made me a better pastor's wife.

It has made me a better entrepreneur.

I went out on my own 3 years ago this month.

And so, you know, having that access to all of that.

And I'm kind of next week I'll be kind of going up to the next level to the executive leadership program, but which will give me access to even more.

But even just being a disc consultant, because there is the certification availability to do that.

I'm learning how to help people learn how to communicate.

It's one of the things that I recognize immediately now.

And I, I see other people's ways of communicating and can communicate with them when I couldn't before.

And, you know, it's, it's exciting to do that.

But what's available inside there is youth consultants.

I mean, youth.

If you're a youth person, man, amazing youth certification in there.

There's team.

If you just want to be a consultant and build corporate teams and work in the corporate training area, it's just, there's a corporate training one.

So there's a lot of opportunity in there for anybody who's interested leadership training and development, especially your own.

So I love that.

And I remember taking the disc profile when I was a pastor and it was, it was interesting because I, I came across as a high D.

I was not as high D.

Of course, for those who don't know, disc profile is, is kind of a dominant type.

A type thing.

But in my new role, my disc profile changed.

I'm.

I'm a lot less D, but more I more influence because that's what my role is now.

It's not.

I can't go in and tell someone how to do this with this command presence, as much as I can only influence people to make.

To help them make better choices or use a certain tool or take a certain direction.

So I've had to adapt my natural dominant personality into something else.

I was fascinating to figure out.

How do you utilize your, your strengths in a way that you help people to become their better self?

I love how that person pour.

Those people pour to you and say, there's more there.

How do you draw that out of people?

And as a person who's coached people myself, my goal is always never to tell them what to do, but always to help figure out what God has placed on their heart, what abilities they have, and help them tap into that.

So I'm.

I'm glad that someone.

There's a program out there to help people be better leaders and better.

Yeah.

And I love how John Maxwell said.

I think his last thing I heard from him when I saw him recently was leaders always go before.

And so it's like, in order to be a leader, you have to kind of at least be out in front a little bit.

Can be.

Oh, yeah.

I'm like, there's even the geese, like, rotate off, right?

It's like everybody's a leader, and the geese rotate off who's in front.

And you have to lead the person in the mirror first.

And so, you know, I do most of my work.

My passion is working with women in leadership.

And so a lot of women think they're not leaders.

And so a lot of my work includes reminding women that you lead yourself first, therefore you're a leader.

And even if you think you're just a wife and a mother, you know, like scare quotes, then you're leading your kids, you're leading your household, you're leading your husband, believe it or not.

Or if you're a single person, you're a leader, somebody's looking at you always.

And the way you lead yourself is the way you lead others.

And so I think that's very important.

People think, well, I don't necessarily need that information.

Yes, you do.

Exactly.

I'm always, as I talk to leaders, I always realize that their leadership is developed over time.

So as you think about your experience as a third culture kid, how has that shaped your approach to leadership and empowerment?

You know, when you're in that third.

So for anybody who doesn't know what third culture kid is, I will give a little definition to that.

It's people who grow up in a culture that is not necessarily the one that they are from.

So for me, as a Southeast Texas kid, or my dad was in Wyoming, so an American kid growing up, or white, even growing up in Korea, that meant that I was in an environment that was not what my demographic normally was.

And I wasn't Korean and I wasn't American.

I had a huge expatriate community.

But it means that you develop a culture that's kind of your own.

So it's half Korean or part Korean, part American, part military, part Missionary part, ecumenical part, you know, and it's unique.

And third culture people tend to sometimes have a hard time fitting in when they settle somewhere.

And I was one of those people.

I struggled a lot.

But one of the things that we don't recognize when we're in the middle of that third culture piece is the beauty of the diversity that you see and that you are exposed to when you're there.

Just being in the Korean culture and the Eastern culture, looking back now, what I didn't recognize was it taught me so much about being a good participant in the whole, in the community.

It taught me much about respecting my elders.

And I don't mean that in a weird way.

I mean like they do, the multi generational families and you know, they, they automatically think of how can we do this better as a team?

I am an I for my disc.

I'm an icd.

So I literally have three letters above the line and the S is below the line.

So for anybody who doesn't know, S is the steady and S is the team player.

And I am a definition of a non team player.

So being in that Eastern mindset helped me, helps me see the greater picture, the bigger picture, the connectedness of it all and how when we do one thing, it affects a lot of other things.

But it wasn't until I hit like 50 that I looked back on that and started seeing the value of it.

And it has very profoundly affected the way I lead.

I am a belonging person.

I am a welcoming person.

And I want to belong and I want to be welcomed.

And therefore I want you to belong and for you to be welcomed.

And I think having that third culture experience is what kind of bred that in me.

Because I was a Southern Baptist missionary kid.

But when we went to our vacation or and I went to school, we were with kids from.

I was with kids from 65 different countries in my school.

And when we were on vacation down at our missionary beach, every Sunday a different missionary spoke from a different denomination.

So, you know, one Sunday I'm going to get Southern Baptist.

The next Sunday I'm going to get Lutheran.

The next Sunday I'm going to get Presbyterian, Nazarene, you know, Methodist.

And so it helped me see things from a more broad view.

Which means that when I'm in a leadership position now, I think when I was kind of coordinating myself off from all of that for a long time I didn't.

And now I can see that I do have it back.

But now I have a broader view.

I'm more inclusive in the way I lead.

And so I think that I would love for that to have affected me for about 30 years.

But I kind of.

That is, that is my story and it is my struggle that I turned my back on all of it and kind of abdicated those things and pretended that I wasn't that person.

And so, you know, God has a way of bringing us back and it's a beautiful thing to see where he brings us full circle.

I love that.

Tell me about your core values and how those core values impact the way you live your life.

Excuse me.

Yeah, core values are one of the things that I work on with my clients.

It's one of the biggest topics we talk about because As I mentioned, 50.

A while ago when I turned 50, that was quite a year for me.

I live in Charlottesville, Virginia.

I just personally don't see how you're not changed by a situation like that.

My husband and I were very much changed and I think we were.

God had us on the road to being changed.

And then it was like a very stark, okay, this is, this is it.

But when I started my work, really doing my work at like 50, because sometimes grief will put us in a learning opportunity.

It'll put us in like a crucible where we're willing to, if we're willing to just.

Look, I realized I had, If I had 50 years left.

I don't, I don't want her to be like the last 50.

I want to be different.

I want to, I want to leave an impact.

I want my son to see something different.

I, I don't want to be carried along by somebody else's principles, somebody else's priorities.

I want to know, I mean, what has God really placed on my heart?

And some of that journey was hard.

Some of it was deconstruction of a lot of things.

And I was willing for it to be deconstruction of my faith, but it turned out not to be.

It turned out to be deconstruction of religion rather than.

And other people's principles and priorities rather than my faith.

It is deeper and stronger, but.

Than it ever was before.

But in that process, I started.

And we do this a lot, Keith.

Right.

We start from the, we start with behavior.

So we start from the Outside and work in.

And I started with intentional optimism and then Maxwell stuff and learning because that was part of my process and learning the disc and learning how to coach and learning how to be a leader.

And then I realized that one of the things that I wonder if I still have it in my desk.

One of the things.

Yeah, I do.

That we have to.

We don't have to.

We.

It's really beneficial for us to understand about ourselves is what our non negotiables are.

And a lot of people think that values, things that we value are non negotiables.

But I say the things that we're born with that God places in our personalities and in our hearts are our core values and our non negotiables.

I started long before I went to seminary, but I started with Stephen Covey, Franklin Covey Planners.

And I did my governing values.

And I still have this right.

I'm dating myself.

It's laminated with packing tape, but.

But it's, it's lasted right.

That packing tape is really good stuff.

But these were my governing values.

And when I started as a coach looking at core values, I realized that these, some of these actually really tapped into who I was as a person and who I was created to be.

But I realized some of them were outside of me.

And so I went on that journey and realized how important it was for me to understand who I was and to know my core values means that I understand where my boundaries are.

It means I'm less defensive about my boundaries.

It means I understand the authority with which I present things.

It means that I understand how to communicate better.

I give people more benefit of the doubt.

So working on my core values really kind of opened.

Even in coaching, it really opened up a lot of things for me to be able to do this with other people.

So my personal core values.

And again I said principles and priorities.

These are.

I define them as the principles and priorities that guide your.

Like they're your inner compass.

We all have them.

I think there are some that are common to different disc types.

So as a D, you might have more, more results oriented kind of core values.

But for me I'm a very high I.

So most of them are very relational oriented.

And I, as an inspirational person and my very top one, which when I don't know that this will move.

It started out as freedom.

And it's funny, it's like this was my top one.

Even then it was freedom.

And as a 27 year old, I thought that freedom meant freedom from a job, freedom, money, that kind of stuff.

But as I matured and really looked, I realized it was freedom of thought.

And I realized that part of my frustration in communication with people, and even with my mother, was that I don't like conflict, and nobody really loves conflict.

And to be true to who I am, I need to think about things myself.

And I had kind of abdicated that for a really long time because I was told, and a lot of us are told this in evangelical culture, that what's going on in here is always bad, and what's going on in my head is always bad, and I can't trust it.

Therefore, I have to trust these other people out here who are.

Nope, better.

And I'm the good little evangelical girl.

And I tried to do that, and it just didn't work.

And I got myself into some trouble that I now lament, you know?

But all that to say freedom of thought is my top one.

And when we have a.

When we recognize a core value, it's usually something that we reciprocate.

So when you say you don't tell your client, your coaching clients what to do or the people that you work with what to do, it's the same thing.

It's like, I.

I don't tell other people what to think.

Now, I want you to agree with me because I don't like conflict, but truthfully, I really want you to think for yourself.

So core values are something that are reciprocal.

So first for me is freedom of thought.

The second one I mentioned a minute ago was belonging.

I thought it was community, but it really is belonging.

And it allows me the permission to create the safe space for a former staff member who didn't work for me anymore to show up in my office and say, you're the only safe place I need to come.

Right?

So it's like, when you can see those kinds of things, it helps you see that.

And then the third one, I'm still kind of the.

I like to work with primary core values and secondary.

So I have other ones that are things like celebrating beauty and that kind of thing.

But the third one that I am still working on defining is authenticity, because I think it's a little nebulous, but I think that's part of the struggle.

When my mother would say things like, don't you like this picture?

If I didn't like the picture, I couldn't be authentic and say, I don't like the picture, because then I would hurt her feelings.

And so.

But if I.

If I hadn't seen the picture before.

If it wasn't an automatic.

I like that picture.

I would struggle, and my sister would always be, just tell her you like the picture.

And I'm like, but that's not being true to me.

But when I realized that I needed that freedom of thought and the authenticity, that's how it shows up.

So now I've learned to give people the benefit of the doubt, to listen to.

Like, okay, I don't.

I get to override some of these things.

I get to look at myself and.

And know myself better and say, it's important to this person for me to enjoy this painting with them, you know, and it's just like, there, it's.

It's done.

But my husband has learned to not say things like, wouldn't you agree that?

Because then you're really encroaching on the territory.

So he has learned to say, what do you think about this?

And that gives me the ability to share who I am and what I think.

So that was a very long answer to how do core values show up?

And kind of.

How do I use them in leadership?

I love those, and I see how they inter.

They kind of intertwine, too, because the freedom and authenticity are kind of connected because the freedom to not have to necessarily agree with what the.

Maybe the establishment is, but kind of think for yourself and be who you are.

Authenticity is really important to me, too.

I even have it as some of the words on a lot of my websites, because for me, authenticity is.

I grew up in Southern Baptist, part of town.

Fundamentalist.

Yeah.

And the thing that was always unnerving for me, I guess I would say, was when I would hear pastors say on Sunday morning, you shouldn't drink, you shouldn't smoke, you shouldn't dance.

But then I'd go to the.

To the clubs, and a lot of the members were drinking, smoking, and dancing.

And I'm like, well, see, this isn't really being out there.

Either you shouldn't do it or you shouldn't be here.

And sometimes the pastor would be in the club.

I'm like, I see.

This really isn't working out for me.

But to be who you are.

And that was my preaching, was that way, too.

The guy you met in the office the day, during the week and we had a talk with is the same guy who preached on Sunday morning.

Same sense of humor.

I didn't change my voice.

I didn't have a dear.

My preaching voice, you know, kind of a thing.

And he's like, so I Wanted people.

When they walked in and saw me, it's like, yes.

The same guy just sat down in the office with.

For the last hour and a half or two hours.

So, yeah.

Yeah.

To me, it's really important not to be phony.

Yeah.

In your authenticity.

Well, and, you know, some of the things that I struggled with.

We're still Southern Baptist, and there have been a lot of discussions in my house.

But part of it is, the beauty about Southern Baptist is that there isn't autonomy of a local body.

And there is a very wide variety of Southern Baptists.

But I've always been that person.

It's like, if you.

You know, I joked with Presbyterian kids growing up, yeah, Southern Baptists are the closet drinkers.

Y'all are the ones that are drinking at dinner.

But, you know, it just.

It's unfortunate that there are places where we worship and congregations and families of God that.

That do not represent and that do not represent a good, honest.

What it means to honestly follow Christ.

And so, you know, to be the same person everywhere is the most important thing.

And I think that's a great definition of authenticity.

It used to really bother me.

It's like, if you're a Buddhist, just believe what Buddha says and do your thing.

If you're a Baptist or if you're a Christian, believe what Jesus says and do what Jesus says.

It's like, I don't see why this is so hard.

And I'm even farther into that now.

Right.

It's like, I.

Now, I don't apologize for it now.

I'm like, do you not see the inconsistencies here?

Do you not feel the cognitive dissonance?

Do you not.

Do you not understand that, you know, if you want to go sit in the pew and listen and then go do your thing at the clubs, that's your business.

But you're not the one up there telling everybody not to be at the clubs.

But don't.

Don't be upset with everybody that asks the clubs, because, you know, it's like, who.

Who's to say?

Right?

So, yeah, I feel you.

I do what you say, say what you do.

Yeah.

And it's.

And it's not just Southern Baptists.

No, it's just.

It's just in general, the idea.

Yeah.

Just in general.

And even society is driving me insane right now with this offense, because I.

I woke up this morning with this thought that this is just in general, but I hear, like, a certain movement saying, we need to protect the life of a certain group in the Middle East.

But Then we don't need to protect the life of the unborn.

And I don't, I don't understand how you, how you kind of put those two.

Or vice versa, or vice versa.

And it's like it, either life is important or life is not important.

You can't have it both ways.

And so this, this inauthentic passion for one and not the other doesn't sit well with me.

And I just, it, I struggle with, this is not authentic.

This is fake.

I don't know how you do both of those and support that at the same time.

And so it just drives me insane because it's like, I think all life is precious.

And if all life is precious, it doesn't matter.

From the cradle to the grave, it's life.

It's a gift of God, and it's precious.

And how do we not understand that all life is precious?

And I have thoughts and opinions.

So yeah, I was gonna tread lightly there.

I was gonna put it on social media.

Like, yeah, I'm not going to, but it's like it's on my heart and it's like, like it's not worth it, but it needs to be said.

So I'm saying it on here.

You know, as an adoptive, as an adoptive mother, let me tell you, and as a woman and as a believer, I'm, this is, I struggle with this a lot because I am not beholden to any political party.

And that's one of the things I lament is that for a while I was.

And because I thought that was the right thing to do, and I no longer do that.

But as an adoptive mother who has known other women who were birth mothers and know the beauty of that process, but also know the struggle of that process, there is too much involved in all of it to make a blanket.

I mean, there's a rightness and a wrongness to certain things, but there's more.

It's never just one aspect.

It's so new.

There's so many aspects to it.

And you know, yes, protect the life of the unborn, but what about the kids in foster care?

What about the people in our prisons that are in out of proportionally of one demographic or two demographics?

And what about the immigrants and what about the homeless people?

And what about when start doing that?

I, I, I'm with you.

I'm just like, I don't understand how we can only be in one area and Well, I understand it now because I have kind of come out of that and I've read some really good books that have been very helpful, if you're interested, because I think here's.

As humans, we want to identify with the group.

As humans, we want to be part of the group.

And as Christians in America, like, this is what I noticed when I came home at 17, that the American church said the Korean church is not.

It wasn't like this at the time.

And the missionary community was most assuredly not like this, because if you're a missionary, there's a reason you're a missionary.

But I came home to Houston, Texas, and felt like every church I went into was a social club.

And I, at 17, and really struggled with that.

Of course, I've just shared that I abdicated all of my ability to think and decided, well, but this is who I am.

I'm a Southern Baptist, and I must fit in and I must do so.

I kind of assimilated and kind of.

I must be wrong.

Right?

And because, you know, you're being judgmental, Andrea.

And so what do you know?

You're only 17 and you, you haven't even lived here.

You've lived overseas most of your life.

So I, I recognized that from the beginning.

But as a pastor's wife, I've always struggled.

We've been in small churches, and it's to see that as a culture.

The history of this nation has basically said up until recently, like the last 20 to 30 years, the good people go to church.

And so if you want to be a good people, or if you want a job interview or if you want, then that's what you do.

And so I had a very skewed understanding, and I think most, most Americans do have a skewed understanding, unfortunately, of what it means to actually be a Christian and what it means to go to church.

And so I think we have become, we have conflated a lot of political ideology with theology.

And I think that's a very sad state of affairs, especially when a lot of our leaders are doing this, actually doing the conflating, they're doing the actual switching.

And I think voices like ours are never quite loud enough.

And we know that we're going to be strung up or we're going to be crucified or whatever, if we say anything on social media.

And so maybe just for us to be here as encouragers for each other and for the listeners to say, you know, I mean, this is, this is called bridge builders, right?

You can do that.

You can, you can build a bridge even with your neighbor, you can do.

You can build a bridge even inside your family, because not everybody in my family agrees with me or thinks like me.

And that can be a real challenge.

But it is God honoring.

And I was reading Psalm 102 this morning, and it's a lament.

It's a.

It's like I'm in anguish.

Why is this happening to me?

And I don't feel that way right now myself.

But I've been there and just being reminded that worship is all about being in God's presence and bringing.

And us being in the world is about bringing God's presence to the world.

And I think that circling all the way back to understanding ourselves and how God shows up with us and what the fruit of the Spirit looks like is how we do that.

And that's how we lead and that's how we affect change.

And it's going to have to be on a one on one basis, because we can't.

We're so big as a country, we cannot expect something to happen from the top down.

We have to do it right here.

It's all local.

And that's why I love what you do, because I think it's.

What I see as a issue in our society today is people are not quite sure what their core values are.

And if you don't know what your core values are, you are swayed very easily by whatever win comes your way.

And so I'm curious, how do you in your work, help your clients figure out what is their core value?

Because it goes back, I think, to your core values of creating a sense of belonging, showing up as your authentic self.

So how do you help your clients to do that?

Well, one other concept we have to address here is what I call my ABCs, which are my assumptions, beliefs and conditioning.

Because a lot of times what people think of as their values are actually their beliefs, beliefs.

And I don't know about you, but beliefs are.

I think beliefs are very changeable.

And because, like, you and I have both changed our beliefs about even our upbringing in the church.

And we've changed.

I've very much changed political party affiliations, and I don't really have one, but, like, ideas about it.

And anybody who's changed political parties, their beliefs have totally changed.

When we have new information, when we have, you know, we also, we as a society, we used to think the world was flat until we had new information that said the world was round.

So our beliefs are based on information, they're based on our core values, and they're based on the conditioning.

So what I was talking about earlier with some of the things that I did was a lot of my conditioning is that that was the water I was swimming in.

That was the way I was taught, and that was the community that I placed myself in.

I can't blame other people, right?

I mean, only till I was, like, 17.

And then it's like, nope, that's my choice.

So once I started associating with specific groups of people, that's my conditioning.

And you're right.

That's how.

When we don't have.

If you want to call it a compass or an anchor, and I don't mean, like.

I don't mean to make this like, Jesus should be your compass and Jesus should be your anchor.

Yes, I know, but I actually had a counselor because I went through clinical depression and all kinds of stuff, trying to come out of this or in the middle of it and then coming out of it, realizing, well, that's why.

Right.

I believe in depression.

I mean, all kinds of stuff.

But I had a counselor look at me and say, andrea.

And a Christian counselor, he said, it's like you have no anchor.

It's like you just are tossed to and fro by all the winds and all the waves.

And it's like, are you quoting James to me?

And he was, but having that compass or an anchor does.

It gives us roots to put down.

It means that we have a solidity to who we are, and it makes a difference.

So when I start with people and they say, well, how do I know what my core values are?

One of the easiest places to start is what I would call the opposites.

When we work with kids, and a lot of times, really good parenting, we had to learn with an adopted son who has ADHD to do positive opposites.

So if we wanted him to stop doing something, we would tell him what to do.

And so a lot of times what we need to look at is the things that we don't like.

We need to look at that and then kind of flip it.

So what in the last week or two weeks made you really angry?

Or what consistently makes you really angry?

And I don't mean the guy who cuts you off in traffic.

I mean the person who doesn't let you finish your sentence or the.

Like, I had the.

I need to agree on everything about, like, this picture hanging on my wall or things that.

Or the disrespect or the way you.

You find you're the only one who seems to pull your weight at work or those kinds of things are indicators of what I would say, core values or being dishonored.

Maybe in Your life.

And so when, when people start looking at that, I think those helps just shine a light on the things that are important to us.

And so I have like a little free exercise or a course or all kinds of things.

And I do coaching on this.

But in the exercise, no matter how you work with me and the mat, no matter how I actually tell people to do it, it's always starting with a perspective of other people looking at me.

What would five people closest to me say about me as far as like my traits?

And when I start doing that and people start doing that, they come up with like a brain dump.

They come up with all these words.

And being able to kind of put yourself in someone else's shoes looking at you is amazing because a lot of times we are either too high or have too high of a view of ourselves or too low view of ourselves.

So when we put ourselves in someone else's shoes to look in, it kind of helps us see.

Yeah, Andrea really is a free thinker.

And Andrea really likes to be herself.

And Andrea really, or Andrea really chafes when I tell her what to think or my mother said, you're the strong willed child definition.

It's like I would say, don't tell me what to do.

And you know, I look back, I'm like, well, that's kind of wise because that's how I was created.

But so that's the first aspect to it.

And then we walk through kind of defining them and walk, kind of narrowing them down and looking how they show up in our lives.

It can be a six month process.

Sometimes to do this, it's not like a little test you take because it's really looking inside to see who you are.

But then the final step is integration and implementation.

How do they need to show up in my work?

How do they need to show up in my family?

How can I set boundaries that are internal rather than external?

Because I don't need external boundaries.

I mean there, I mean, for this kind of work, I don't necessarily need external boundaries.

There are plenty of situations where we need external boundaries.

I'm not a psychologist and I'm so I'm not debunking any of that.

But for core values, a lot of times we just need an internal boundary.

Kind of like our front door.

People know that they can walk through my yard, but they don't walk through my door without knocking and me opening it for them.

And that's an except universally accepted thing.

Like I don't even have kids in the neighborhood that Knock that.

Don't knock on my door.

Right.

It's like they know.

Even little kids know to knock on my door.

So helping people.

See, a lot of times, it's the things that are bothering me, that there's something underlying that's.

That's being dishonored.

Um, I also.

That's how I talk about core values, is that they're being dishonored, and then realizing that a lot of times we dishonor them, we allow them to be dishonored.

Um, and kind of owning that and then figuring out what they are and then learning how to integrate them.

That's how I help people, kind of even just start the process.

I love that you focus mostly your work with female clients, I take it.

I.

It's my passion because it's my lived experience.

Right.

And, you know, I work in corporate situations, and I do work with men.

And I believe I'm doing the John Maxwell Live to Lead conference here in Charlottesville, and that's usually attended by 40% men.

But.

But my passion is women in leadership.

And part of that is my experience in my background and my conditioning of.

Women are not supposed to be.

Women are supposed to be seen and not heard.

Women are, you know, it's performative.

Women are not strong.

And I come from a background of, like, women do not speak up in church, women do not teach women, you know, none of that.

And so I want women to understand they have a place at the table.

I want women to understand they are loved and valued and are just as important as anyone else in the room.

And because I.

The word I've been avoiding, I'm just gonna say it.

It's like, I think patriarchy hurts all of us.

And so I also have a son, so I want him to understand that women are leaders and that.

That we're all kind of in this together and that God placed us that way for a reason.

So it is my passion to work with women, but I do work with men, but I prefer working with women.

I find that interesting because I'm curious how you help them do what mentors did for you, which is trust your ability to critically think, create imaginatively, and lead effectively.

So how do you help women do that?

Well, somebody asked me on a podcast episode, so if you were coaching me, how would you push back?

And it's like, I do push back, but I create a welcoming atmosphere.

I thought, Keith, I thought I would start out working with women my age.

I'm going to be 58 next week, and I thought I would be working with women like me in a second career who were, like, breaking free from the men and doing all that stuff, you know, and shaking their fist at the patriarchy, I thought that's who I'd work with.

With.

But God has placed in my life millennials and Gen Z and these younger women who see me as a little bit of a wiser mentor figure.

And so they're number one.

People don't work with me if they're not interested in growing.

I've had one or two clients that I had to do corporate that were not interested in growing.

Was very difficult for me because, like I said, I don't like to do that.

So depending on the relationship, I.

I always ask questions, and I make you come up with the answer.

And every once in a while, I'll share some experience or I'll share.

We might even walk through a leadership book.

And I let.

I let the leadership book challenge them, you know, and then.

But I am.

I'm also a gardener.

I love plants and mostly flowers, that vegetables are too hard and they're not pretty.

So I like planting seeds.

So I will.

And I take a lot of that from.

That's my spiritual background.

Right.

So I will plant a seed.

What about this?

Or.

And I ask a lot of whys and what ifs, and there are times when I look at.

I did this yesterday with a client.

I said, I understand why you think this.

Do.

Can I share my opinion?

You know, I always ask that permission, you know, but I always get a yes.

But I said, I wonder if this is not an area where you just feel like you would prefer to have control rather than, you know, because it was figuring out how to delegate and that kind of stuff.

And.

And she was like, oh, you know, oh, let me think about that.

And what's interesting is that just pushing back a little bit, a little bit is like a lot of my mentors did with me.

Challenging, saying, I think you can do bigger.

I think I've had two clients just recently.

One of them.

Both of them use me as job references.

But one of them, I had been telling her she was not happy where she was, and she was looking at a place where she had left.

And they were talking to her about coming back, but she wanted a bigger role.

And I'm like, just propose it.

Just do it right?

Just, why aren't you doing this?

You need to do this.

You need it.

And with the disc, you can go through and tell people, these are my strengths.

They, like, give you wording.

It's like, here's all the stuff you put on your resume.

And she had started working on the proposal, and then she got just terminated really quickly, and she said, I'm glad I started working on that proposal.

And then literally, she put that proposal through the next week, and she got the bigger job.

They hired her, and because they already loved her.

So helping people figure out how to let go of this is what I think I'm qualified to do, or, you know, how can I do that?

But the other one actually just reached out to me.

She's a former coaching client.

She reached out to me, and she said, I need an hour of your time.

What's your hourly rate?

I will Venmo you now, now.

Because I need it.

And what I needed to do for her was push back.

And she said, I need you to challenge me.

We had a lady in our church.

I'd never been asked to do this before.

She asked me to participate in her baptism, which for me, as a Southern Baptist girl, I'm like, only ordained ministers do that.

Right?

So.

And so she really challenged me.

But even the day before the baptism, she said, can we meet?

And of course, I was like, oh, no.

And that always scares an eye, you know?

And she said, I just want you to challenge me.

So going back full circle to what my mentors did for me, that is what I do in coaching, is that I challenge you to think, because I want you to think for yourself, and I want you to walk through it all.

So even I give assignments.

If this is what we talked about today, these are your next steps, and I need to know when you come back what you've done about them.

But they, of course, agree to them, you know, so it is a challenging atmosphere, and it is a growth atmosphere.

There's a purposefully.

It's a purposeful growth atmosphere to be in a relationship like that with me.

I love that I could talk to you all day.

This has been fascinating conversation, and we didn't get to half the question I wanted to ask.

But I do like to ask my guests this question.

As you think about the impact you're having right now, what do you want your legacy to be?

I.

I'm still working on getting there, but I want my legacy to be the people that I actually helped become who they needed to be.

If it's my son, if it's my coaching clients, if it's my friends, if it's the women who listen to my.

And men who listen to my podcast or attend some of my events, I want my impact to be that they changed because of what I did for them.

And it's a sort of service oriented.

And I think that makes me come across sounding very altruistic.

I find I struggle with being selfish.

Like, what can you do for me?

But that's what if you.

You're not the first person to ask that.

It made me really think that I do.

I want at the end of my life, I want.

I would love for people, even if they didn't show up at my memorial service or whatever, I would love for people to say she impacted my life this way.

She helped me become X.

You know, it's the becoming part.

It's like to be.

And knowing that I want people to be who like Ephesians 2:10.

It's like here's masterpiece.

You were created for special things that he designed for you long ago to do.

And that's my verse and that's what I want for other people.

So the people that I've left behind and helped do those things, I think that's there.

I couldn't have something better.

That's amazing.

Where can people find you on social media and connect with you?

If they want you to be their coach and push them to that next level, where can they connect with you?

Well, I am the intentional optimist.

So you can find me@theintentionaloptimist.com and everything is on there.

All of my social media contact is on there.

I have a YouTube.

My.

My podcast is called Stand Tall and Own it and it is from a female leadership perspective and you can find that on YouTube or wherever you do your podcasting.

And I didn't know this, but Apple Podcast is now available on the web, which I think is great because I have so many clients who are like, can I listen to it on Spotify?

Well, yes, you can, but I also am pretty present on LinkedIn and Instagram and if you, if you prefer those platforms and you want to DM me through there, just let me know that you heard me on bridge building or bridge builders and I will know that you're not spamming and they're not trying to sell me anything and I will respond.

I just got one of those the other day, Keith.

It was really cool.

This woman we're going to meet next Friday so it's.

You can reach out to me all those ways and just, you know, let me know how I can help you be, become Andrea.

Thanks so much for what you do and the spirit you bring to this space, especially the way you pour into people's lives.

It's so critical in this day and this time, as we wrap this up, can you are there some key takeaways or action items you want to leave with the audience as we close this out for today?

Well, I want everybody to know that it's not what you do that makes you impactful or valuable.

It's who you are.

And you have the ability especially to think and to make your own choices and to trust themselves to do that.

But if there's one thing that you could do, it's to figure out what your core values are.

And I have a free downloadable on my website.

It's like a button used to be right above my head but I think that's for my Live to Lead conference.

So it's right up there and it's just a free download.

It walks you through the exercise and if you need more help, just let me know.

But when you know your core values, you have like the authority to lead, the confidence to lead, and you can set boundaries and in a non defensive way.

So I think those are some pretty important actions.

Well, thanks again so much for taking the time to be a guest on the podcast and providing such amazing content.

My pleasure.

Thank you so much.