Andy and Ali talk about change and moving forward and ways to stay positive in a world full of challenges. Discover the importance of owning your awkwardness and not hiding your uniqueness, taking the emotion out of change, and getting excited about what other people value.

About the Guest:

Andy Vargo is no stranger to change! 

If you ever feel awkward about yourself, then you can understand how Andy Vargo lived the first forty years of his life. Coming out of the closet at forty doesn’t define him, pursuing his passion to help others does. Having changed everything about his life, Andy leads others as a motivational speaker and helps people live their fullest lives as a business and life-change coach. At night you can find him working stages around the northwest as a comedian making light of his journey with the gift of laughter.

Awkward is not only his brand, but his style as Andy encourages us all to ‘Own Your Awkward’ and be true to your genuine self. 

Andy hosts the podcast, Own Your Awkward, authored the Awkward Journal series and Own Your Awkward Life Changes, and shares his thoughts and ideas in his blog and video series available at https://www.awkwardcareer.com/

About the Host:

 Alison Perry-Davies (Ali) is intentional about Finding Joy in her life

 Sustaining a brain injury, diagnosed with PTSD and a raising a daughter with a variety of challenges, Ali decided there had to be more to life than what she was experiencing and began her journey to find more joy.

Ali’s belief is that wherever we come from, we have all known some level of pain, loss and trauma, these things do not need to define us. She doesn’t ignore that these things have happened; however, she decided this is not the way her story ends. Using integrated creative therapies along with sound and vibrational therapies she continues to explore and share complimentary healing modalities.

Ali hosts the podcast, Find Your Joy. She is also a co-author in 2 WOW (Woman Of Worth) Books as well as a Family Tree series book on Mother Son relationships. She went on to write her own book,  “The Art of Healing Trauma; Finding Joy through Creativity, Spirituality and Forgiveness” which went to number one best seller in seven categories on Amazon. 

A motivational speaker/singer, songwriter, poet, blogger and author, Ali also shares her thoughts and ideas through her blog and website at aliwayart.com

Ali continues to use humour and compassion to invite, inspire and encourage others to Find Their Joy.

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Hi, you're listening to Find Your Joy. If you're looking for ways to thrive rather than survive in a world that can seem rather chaotic, you're in the right place. We will be sharing stories of our own, as well as those from guests who have found ways to bring hope, healing and freedom into places where trauma has impacted them. I'm Ali, author of the art of healing trauma. And I'm here to remind you that life is sweet. Now, let's dive in and find ways to create our joy.

Hi, this is Ali with find your joy. And today I am so excited because we have part due to with Andy Vargo and own you're awkward, and I am so thrilled and excited. And thank you, Andy, for being back to date. How are you my friend?

I am excellent. Ali, every time I get to talk to you, it's just it's such a pleasure. And I I feel like I saw a greeting card wants and I'm going to go on a little tangent here. But side reading card ones that just said, Let's get together and talk and talk and talk and talk until all the errors out of the room. I feel that way with you like we could, in a good way. Take all the air out of the room.

Gosh, I love that. Dakka Dakka Dakka Oh, that is I know, I thought that I feel the same way about you. It's like, I can't believe that I haven't actually met you in person, that it just doesn't feel like that to me, right? Yeah, yeah. I love that. So, yesterday, I heard the other day or actually earlier today, we were talking. We were talking about, you know, distractions and finding ways to help people. And I wanted to ask you about that. So you have aside from all the other amazing things that you do writing books and public speaking and podcasting and stand up comedy, and my gosh, it's a long list, you also do coaching. So I am really curious, you How did you get into coaching? And what is there a specific client type that you work with? Or how does that all go?

Yeah, that's, that's been an interesting journey. Because it's one of those things that, like so many things that I focused on in life lately. Friends, call them out. And we're like, you know, you're good at that, why aren't you doing that? And, for me, I, when I started, about five years ago, I had I was between jobs. And I had decided, You know what, I don't want to stay doing the same thing and making small changes and wondering why there aren't big results. So I don't want to make a change to a different company in the same industry. It's like it's now or never, I gotta get on this writing and speaking and pursuing things I want to do. So I started really focusing on motivational speaking and getting some of the books done that I had been working on over the years. And in that time, I had some friends that were going through different things, some similar to what I had gone through. And so I'm a little different, but they've just kind of naturally come to me for advice, and I would share ideas of one of those, like, why aren't you coaching this is you know, you could make money doing this, and especially knowing that I was getting my business going or like it's a natural fit a lot of speakers or coaches and this is something you're doing and I thought oh, I, I could be a coach, I could do that. So I went and I you know, took some certification and stuff but what I what I really realized looking back was that I had been coaching people my whole life. And I I hadn't identified that as a skill set that I was using, but I had always been in a leadership or management position when I was in grocery and retail and sales and I I was always coaching people around me at multiple different levels people above them below me. So I had developed that skill set over years and years and it was you know, one of those things that kind of was natural with with my personality, but I hadn't given myself credit for putting in all that time yet. So when it when the idea came to me or was presented to me to actually make a living as being a coach, it seemed like a new endeavor, but in reality, it was very natural and I had been doing it for a long time and what I had to learn was some specific tactics to work with clients on a professional level and the business of coaching so that was really the work that I had to do to do it but but that's really what got me into it. It was a nice complement to the the avenues I was going down with speaking and writing. And the other thing that when I'm when you're a motivational speaker at some point, you're not necessary. You're going to run out of stories. But the more you can bring other characters into your story, right? Okay, there is to share because I, I can only talk so much about my perspective and my experience. And that's only one. And I want people to learn from the whole community, I want to foster a community of people sharing their stories. And that's why I originally started my podcast was because I talked about owning your awkward, but I can only share my perspective, my story, how it's affected me. And my journey is not everyone's journey. So the more I can have other people in, and the more I'm coaching people, the more I'm learning from them. So I can help more people, because I've helped more people. Each time I learned something like, Oh, this is like, on our last show, I mentioned the guy who was the Explorer. And that was in the moment where I thought, oh, I need to apply this to myself, and he did, you know, Coach thyself situation here. And then I can take that later and use that with other people and say, you know, this, we had this moment, and this worked for this person, maybe this could work for you.

Right? Oh, I love that. So it is, so it is always bringing community to every client, or whatever it is. It's it's, it's, it's a team, it's the team that we all because we're it's like you said, it's the wells gonna run dry pretty quick, if we're only going with my ideas or my experiences,

right? And also, like, just to me, it's like, how boring is that, like, I and I'm not the kind of coach who is in your face about, this is the one way to do it. And you've got to get up at 5am and run five miles. And then you got to eat, you know, a homemade meal that you just harvested in the backyard or on your rooftop. And then you've got to do a Power Lunch and network with 15 people. Like that's not my style. My style of coaching is very much what is the life you're living now? What is the life that you want to live? The steps that we can take, because there are things that you are living right now that you hold dear and dear, that you don't want to flip upside down that you don't want to get rid of? Because those are your values? And what are important to you. So how do we incorporate that into the life you want and take steps to get there. And along the way, sometimes there is some evaluation of the things that are in your life now that maybe you have to realize, well, either I value these more than the life I say I want and I have to, I have to accept that maybe the life I want doesn't fit into the values I have right now. Or I may have to look at some things I have now and say, Well, if this really is the life I want, and that's as valuable, as I say it is. There may be some things I have to let go up. But I'm not that in your face kind of guy. Because and that's where that onyour awkward thing. It's like, let's, let's find the value and what what's at our core?

And right. What what it? Yes, I like that. And I love that what you're really talking about is a person coming to their own? It's not. It's not I'm not in a gym with a trainer who's screaming at me, it's, you know, it's it is the person that first says, What are your goals? What are you interested in? And if you don't know yet, let's play around with that till you find it out.

And my thing is, if if you don't want to give up after walking a quarter a mile is like, that's fine. It's it doesn't affect my life if you don't walk the full mile. But you have to accept that you're not going to get to the end of that journey. So I just bring it back to the person's like, this is on you. And I'm not saying that, throw it in your face. But if you really don't want it bad enough, then be okay with that and say, You know what, this is what I would rather have and stop looking at the oh, why? Why can't I have this? Why can I have that? Because it's all about the choices we're making. And you're the only one that has to live with those choices.

Right? And I love that you're saying that because in a way. And I don't know if this is the intent of what you're saying. But what I'm hearing is, sometimes maybe what we're thinking is what we want and what we think is so important to us, if we're not actually making any shifts to get there. Maybe that's not what we really want. Exactly,

yeah, actually better than words and even our own actions that we do for ourselves.

Right? It's so so that's interesting. So then maybe it's good to then explore again, I love that word that you use, explore what it is that we do really want. Because if I'm not willing to go that extra three quarters of a mile in this in this case, because of these domains started at the quarter mile, then maybe I don't want it that much and that's okay. If I don't want it that much. Maybe there's something else or maybe just the whole goal is just to learn to be okay with what's happening,

right? Yeah. And in our last episode, we talked about distractions. And I think that's one of the things that really hurts us is we see snippets of the best of everybody's life on social media and like world that's in front of us everywhere. So what we tend to do is say, Oh, I, I should have the boat, I should have the the perfect body, I should have the the the marathons, running medals. These are all the things people are doing. But we're seeing a little bit from each person's lives. And we're putting them all on the same plate that we have thinking that we can write all that on the same plate. It's like, well, the person who runs the marathons, doesn't have the Friday night party life, because they're giving that up in order to have the wherewithal and the athleticism for the marathon. So you can do all these things. You need to pick what fits for your plate, and be okay with that and go, You know what? That I'm, I'm proud of, and I'm not judging the fact that you have that. I think it's great. It's awesome. I would really be proud of myself if I did that. But what it takes to get that doesn't fit into what I already have, and what what I value more.

Oh, I love that. I love that. Because like when I think of all the people that and it doesn't even matter, you know, it doesn't matter if it's weight, or relationship or money or a boat, or all of those things. It can be easy. And like you said, especially nowadays with social media, we don't tend to, you know, I just thought of this. My husband and I on a trip. Let's just say this window. Yes. Our selfie, right? Our selfie is not going to be of us arguing over which way we're supposed to go to get there the quickest, right? Yeah, but no, it's always good to take this great idea I have I'm gonna start doing selfies all the time. This is our trip. Both of you pointing different directions. Because it's true, right? I mean, I will for one thing is I am. i It's not to be. It's not a thing about being fake. But I know that sometimes for me, when I read people's posts, and they're being honest. But if every day you're honest, is really, you know, sad, bad, horrible things, then, you know, maybe it's time to shift that a little bit. And so and especially on my alleyway, art page, I basically I don't really share a lot of really personal things. It's mostly art, writing music and other people's things. I promote other people's things a lot on there. And so I just like thought of that, yeah, what might our next vacation I'm gonna have to start doing selfies, I

cannot wait to see those. It can be the it can be the be real, right like that. Here's our here's our regular pay post. And then here's the behind the scenes.

Exactly. That's what I want to do. I told me what to do that one because it would be so. So here's the thing. So I'm like, okay, my husband's in the military, right, like 35 years. So if you can just imagine, and someone you know, it's really funny. Someone gave us some a prophecy, a revelation about what our future would be like, a week before we were married. And this person had never before Matt came to us didn't know who we were. We weren't talking. We were in a crowded room of a lot of people. And this was a person upfront speaking, and we weren't even sitting together. And that guy pointed us out. True story. This guy pointed us out. I was at one table. Dave was at another table. And this guy says, you know, I just see you and you together somehow. How are you related? Everyone giggled. He, because we were getting married the next week, right? And he said, Okay, you can you guys just stand together for a minute. And then still, we're not talking we've said nothing, right? And this guy says, You're a builder to Dave. And you're a kite. Oh, and he said, This is not meant in any way to make better of one or the other. But you are going to be flying high and soaring and flooding all around. And he's going to be the boulder that holds on tight to your your string of your kite so you don't fly away and throughout our life. Now we've you know, that's, you know, almost three decades ago now, you know, day one, something will be happening and Dave will always look at me and say boulder kite

left. Yeah, it's a similar as soon as you mentioned that he knowing you. And as soon as you mentioned he was in the military, I just had this image of very prepared, we have a plan, we're going this route and you go zipping around the room, what's next?

It's so true. Like it's, and, and what's really awesome, and it take took us, I can't speak for everyone, it took us, oh, 15 or 20 years, you know, like everything that you really love about a person when you're in a relationship and the early days, that just makes you Google crazy for them. I guarantee you that give it 10 years, that's gonna be the same thing that drives you nuts.

I have heard that many times. And it's true, because even with friends and co workers in any type of relationship, it's very similar where you're like, Okay, it's losing its charm. Yes, that's

right. And so here's what I say that go beyond that into 15 or 20 years with that person. And it becomes something that you really honor and respect in that person again. So at a much deeper level. So what's awesome is that, you know, I'm likely going to see things in a very different way. And Dave is going to prepare us for it.

Yeah, that's beautiful. You know, and I see that a lot in work culture, where, you know, we get annoyed with the people in other departments because of their, they don't approach things the same way we do. But I always think, well, we have a sales rep, we have a customer service, we have operations, and we have accounting, well, you don't want an accountant who's so focused on relationships and all this stuff that he's not paying attention to the books. Exactly, you know, typically, you know, they might have a more dry personality, they might be a little more rigid on things, but but that's part of bringing their skill set to the table is part of that the whole package. So we can't, we have to stop looking at people and saying, oh, we need to make you more mediocre, we need to make you fit into everything else like no part of you being very good at this job is that this is the personality trait that comes with it. Part of being in customer service is that you are a lot more nurturing a lot more attention to what someone else's needs are. And so you know, that may drive someone else crazy, because you're like, No, just tell them this is all they get, well, you want them answering the phone with that demeanor. You don't want them cutting everybody off. Right? We have to learn to play those roles and appreciate what comes with other people's strengths.

Yeah, I love that. It's true, because we would not expect that. In fact, like you said, it would be I don't know, business, suicide or whatever to, to expect everyone to be the same in all those different roles. And yet, sometimes in relationships, whether that's a life partner, or friendship or something, we, I love how you are and now I'm going to mold you into what I want you to be, you know,

what I, you know, I got divorced, six years ago, started dating guys came out of the closet. And when I first started dating people, first of all, I hadn't been in the dating world for like, 25 years. So it's like, right, there's just a lot. And you don't just go into the cafeteria anymore, and try and find a boyfriend. Not as an adult. So I'm just like, okay, so you got to, like, have some tact and get to know people. But I kept meeting people and thinking, Oh, this guy is great. If only he would this, this, this and this, then he'd be the perfect guy, right? Or I would, you know, oh, you know what, we really got along if only this, this, this and this, and why can't you do X, Y and Z? And I finally started to change that conversation might have to be able to say, You know what, this person is awesome. Yes, it's too bad that we weren't a fit because of, you know, whatever else didn't line up. And that's okay. Like, if those things lined up, then we would be, but they're great for who they are, but not a fit for me. And that doesn't blame thing or anything else. Just know, you know, all the boxes didn't line up.

It didn't line up and who knows. And yeah, well, that's kind of how it how it went for us. Thankfully, we had have enough lust that it carried. carried us through those really tough days.

But that's a form of connection, right? I mean, that is part of the thing. It's like, that's part of a relationship is that and that sometimes when you can't verbalize things in words or you don't know how to solve a problem, you know, you can see it as a distraction, but it's coming together and staying with action. I still care about you and I want to make this work. Yeah, not gonna solve it over dinner trying to you know, Have a conversation. But at least we know we still care.

Yeah, yeah. And just finding ways to anyway to the Connect, like you said, you know, whether all in all the ways that intimacy live, and they and they live in very many ways. And so yeah, it's good. So I wanted to ask you to kind of shifting here, but maybe not. What did you come up with on your awkward?

Oh, that is that that was another thing where it's like, kind of a journey. When I was writing books, before I started changing my career, I have been working on a book for a couple years, a couple of different books, one, about different types of bosses and what life is like, at work with a good boss or a bad boss, and how, as, as leaders, we can learn to be, you know, lean towards being the better boss than the than the bad boss, but also as employees or, you know, people who are being managed, how can we take control those situations no matter which boss you have, so you can say, well, if I'm in this situation, then this woman do still haven't finished that book. It's still partway done. But I was also working on another book that I was a little more excited about, which still is also not done, but called. And that one was going to be called the awkward interview. And so I was going to, and it's all about facing the things that you don't want to face in an interview. For example, like the tough questions, the the long pauses of, maybe you've been fired, you have a gap in your resume, you don't have a college degree. You know, there's several things like that, that create these awkward situations and how to how do you converse around those. And so, so I had that book, I was working on that book, and that was going to be the first one I got done, which didn't happen, I've gotten other books done, but that one got put on pause. So when I first was going through my divorce, it was Father's Day, two months after I moved out of the house, and I was just depressed, knowing like, this is just not my idea of a Father's Day. Sure, where my relationship with my kids is, you know, that was very dark time. And I just remember thinking, I'm gonna buy myself my own gift this year, and I went online, and I bought myself, the website name awkward career.com. And I, I decided to lean into that awkward because I at the time, I wasn't writing anything personal. I wasn't talking publicly about coming out, everything I did was more career focused. It was that that type of writing all of my blogging was about how to grow your LinkedIn network, how to have a good profile, all that kind of stuff is very safe. And then I thought if I if I had the website, awkward career, it could cover more than just the one I didn't want to have it be awkward interview, I wanted it to be about be able to cover all of that stuff that I thought I would be talking about. Well, I started developing the website and putting stuff out there. But as I went, I started actually opening up and sharing and doing these awkward thoughts and being very open about my life. I really stuck with the awkward name. And at one point, someone said, I was doing these little YouTube videos called awkward thoughts like, Hey, this is a thought for the day. Someone said, I can't tell if you're trying to be serious or awkward, I think you just need to kind of like step into it or own it. And when I started to do a podcast, I had a friend who just like we talked about on the last episode kind of copying and idea. The one of the first podcast I was on was my friend Jim Keller has a show called Exploring awesome. And so I wanted to do something around that but I didn't want to say exploding exploring awkward or you know, I didn't want to be too much the same. But somehow that connection of just own your awkward popped in So originally it was the name of the podcast because the whole point is have someone on NASSCOM how they've owned their awkward to live their best life and that to me, like the idea of the name that just resonates with everybody. So that became my mantra for speaking and coaching. And when people ask, you know, what is it you do is or what is this only or awkward thing? And like well, it's it's all about taking that thing that we may be insecure about that we don't feel quite comfortable with sometimes, and instead of having it hold us back. It's our superpower.

Oh, I love that. Oh, I love that. Because that is it. Isn't it? Really? Right. It's, it's the thing that we hide from so much. is usually really such a beautiful, wonderful, powerful thing inside of us. You know? Yeah, I love that. It's true. I like that a lot. I think of like, I have no idea because then again, brain injury I don't know what I would have said before, but you know what I am thinking of somebody like I'm gonna say a Jim Carrey. Mm hmm. You know, I'm I'm guessing that Jim Carrey, the thing that you know, when you think of Jim Carrey, other than I mean, he's an incredible artist. He's a gifted speaker, he, you know, he does some serious roles really well. But man, I mean, talk about a guy that can make himself look like a cartoon. Right? Yeah. I mean, like, like, how do you and just be completely right out there? I mean, he didn't just do that one day on on film, right? I mean, I guess. And he was doing that getting whatever kind of punishment in school was being dealt out. Back in the day, right, I'm guessing that he was a guy that got it got a lot of crap for a long time. And people told him to stop acting like a goof. But he owned his awkward at some point.

That's a great example. And, and, you know, I like to remind people that that thing that we're that we don't feel comfortable with. It's what makes us more unique than anything else. And typically, that's what people fall in love with us for, like, Jim Carrey examples, like, oh, my gosh, look at all these amazing faces he can do, right? Didn't step into that initially, you know, and push past that time where he may have gotten in trouble or where maybe kids looked at him like he's just a goofball. And not maybe not a cool kid or whatever, whatever could have happened? Yes. Then, you know, that actually turns out to be the thing would be like, Oh, my gosh, look at all these amazing faces you can make. Who else can you know who

can do that? And, I mean, you know, now I'm just gonna go off on that a little bit more. And then, and through all the things that he's gone through, and I'm sure that he's, you know, has success as far beyond anything that I'll remember or have watched and, but I've watched a lot of them because I just, I like him. I like I'm serious. I like him. Goofy I like is I remember being in Maui one time and walking through this thing and seeing this whole art display. And finding out it was Jim Karis, and I was like, what he paints, I was, you know, there's just all these things. And now I love watching the really serious stuff that he he brings out, and I'm thinking if he didn't, if he wasn't that guy, who would be a complete, you know, goofy guy for our interior entertainment, all these other things. I don't know if they were always in him or if he's been developing. And it's been processing all these years. But I think if I, if I think of somebody who's made a career out of owning his awkward, yeah, that's a great, he. He's somebody that's

calling me invite him on my show. You should.

That's what I was just thinking. I was thinking, well, first of all, because it's all about me, I thought, oh, my gosh, I wonder if he would be on my show,

too, so he agreed to tag team him.

That's right. Well take two home there's enough Jim Carrey to go around, right. Like, like he's because he's a guy, you know, if you're, oh, my gosh, no, going on a tangent about Jim Carrey. But he I remember he I've seen some kind of a, I don't remember what it was, it was a clip from something. And he talked about selfies. And he's talked about people wanting, you know, as a celebrity, you know, people, everybody wants a selfie with him. And he's talked about how useless that is. He said, I would so much rather, they would say to me, you know, anything. Talk to me about anything, but a selfie all his selfie does is capture one second in time. And then you get to feel important. I don't know if he was, he was

good. Next thing is I stood next to him.

I stood next to this guy, right. And I've taught him that before of the people that that I know, that I know of not that I know, celebrities, that means something to me. I kind of don't want to meet them even because here's the deal. I sure I probably would take the selfie. But what I really want is something else. I want a connection with the person who's made me feel alive at times that I felt like I was going to die, right? That's what I want to do. I want to connect with that person I want to talk to you about I don't know, anything I mostly want to listen.

Well. It's like, yeah, that thought of if you if you knew you only had 30 seconds with somebody? Yeah. What would you do with that? Or if you could only ask one question, what would you ask and it makes you think, Okay, well, how am I most going to use that interaction and through the just to capture it to tell people and that comes back to that distraction of, you know, what gets put on on social media where it's all out there. But a lot of it isn't meaningful, and you have to learn to see it for what it is and like one of the things that I Do constantly is I unfollow a lot of people, if, you know, I don't disconnect from them, but I just I can choose when to go see their stuff that we're still connected, right? I don't need it constantly put in front of my face, I can choose the meaningful people, the close people, and that's who I can follow. And I still have interactions with a lot of people that I don't regularly follow. But it's all about curating what I want to put in my head. So that when I am in that space, I constantly something will pop up, like, why is that here? And so if it is, you know, you mentioned earlier that that negative that people are putting out this, like, sure we have those bad spaces, you're going to put them out. But one of the things I tried to be very conscious about when I'm posting them online that I, I can get in a negative mindspace, just like anybody, but I tried to think about, okay, if my ultimate goal is to help people, whether that's professionally or just friends, or be seen as someone who can be a resource and help people through things, then if I'm in this dark space, someone else probably is. So instead of just saying, Hey, I feel like crap right now. I always will change that and say, well, here's how I feel right now. But it's okay, because of this is where it can go or like I, I try and always post in a way that is taking you to a different place. It's helping you change your perspective. And that's one of my whole goals. Or sometimes I'll even post like, if I feel really lonely, I'm more likely to post something like saying, Hey, friends, don't feel lonely. Don't forget, I'm here, if you ever need to chat, the opposite of what I'm feeling, because I know someone else's out there. And I don't want to just put that, oh, the world's a dark place and everyone's hurting. It's no, you know, there's other people who feel the same way you do. Or, you know, if, if no one's called me today, I can have a pity party about it. Or I can ask myself, well, how many people have I call today?

Right? Oh, I love that. Yeah, it's it's so true. And I like I love what you're saying, too. There's, I tend to, I don't know, again, my exploring, I don't tend to know a lot about any one thing. But I do a whole bunch of things about a whole bunch of things. And so I studied actually, when I got a diploma in holistic art therapy, right, so creative using therapies to do it. And part of what I studied was sound therapy, this is going to make sense in a minute. And then from that, now, I'm going for a diploma in sound therapy, because it just captured my heart, the science behind it, and my personal experiences. And why any of that matters is because I also studied many years ago, lots of things around prophetic or psychic or seeing things, what we see in our with our maybe invisible lie, and how we speak that into being in the visible realm. I'll put it that way, make it sound really spooky. But anyways, like what you're saying. So when I so when I see something in a person or in myself, what I do is, if I if I like what you're saying is, so if a person if you're depressed, right now you're actually speaking into giving energy to, and here's, I'm going off into this whole other thing, maybe. But it's, it's being intentional with my energy, because I actually believe that the energy that I pour into anything is going to make a difference, I'm only going to be as good at my piano playing as I pour into it. And I'm only going to be as good at my being depressed and totally screwed up and anxious, as I'm willing to pour my energy into it. And so if like you're saying, you're having this day where you're feeling a certain way, if you pour your inner if we You, me, any of us pour our energy into what we would hope for, rather than what we're experiencing at that moment. And that's not to be living a lie, or to be covering up something but rather, this is where I want to put my intention and my energy.

Right. And to be able to say, you know, this is how I feel in this moment right now. But this is not my life forever. This is not, I think that we have a tendency to, you know, you see people saying or making comments like this, like I just didn't think that's how my life would be or like, oh, is this all there is? It's like, well, this is where you're at today. You know, just because it's raining today doesn't mean it's gonna rain every day of your life. Or be able to say, You know what, I'm so glad it's raining because that's what's going to water the flowers and give us food to eat. And so I have to put up with this today because that's going to fuel other things. What's going to make the sun don't seem that much brighter when it does shine. And that was one of the things like I've had, since I, you know, restarted my life a lot, you know, the last five years, that's one of these you asked, like what I coach on. And it really is, I caught my market myself as a life change coach, most of my clients are really making the change that they're doing, you know, because I can work with people on relationship changes, or relocation, any type of major change. But usually, I end up with people who are wanting to step out of, you know, the corporate world and start their own business. And so it's a lot of small. But one of the things as I've gone through that the last few years is I've had a lot of side jobs where I'm, you know, working a lot of hours just to put time in to pay the bills while I get my business off the ground. And there's been days where it's like, is this going to be the rest of my life? Am I going to be mopping the floor at midnight to like, this is not what I'm supposed to be doing. But if I stay in that mindset, then that is what I'm going to keep doing. And if I can say, You know what, this is what I'm doing right now. And it might be six months, it might be longer, it might be shorter, who knows? But this is just a point in time.

Yes. I love that. It's just a point in time. It's like, you know, what it makes me think of when, you know, mostly it would when you when you say when I when I've said something or done something that I've just give anything to take it back. And I have to remember, this is like a point in time, or just something that I did or something I said it's not who I am. It's not who I was created to be. It's not who I'm going to be forever. And I can learn to not do or say that thing again. And also, if I'm in a position in my life, where I'm thinking, How did I get here and well, I don't want this to be my life. You can shift it, we can change it while there's breath in us.

And and unfortunately, I think what most of us do to come back to that Jim Carrey moment, that's the point where we take the selfie, and we write, we take a selfie in the worst point, and then that's what we focus on instead of saying, You know what, I don't have to take a selfie right now, I don't have to dwell on that. I don't have to put it out there. Because if I if that's what I put out into the universe, whether it's Facebook or conversations, now all of the follow up conversations I have with everybody, like it continually puts it back in my face, like, Oh, I hope you're doing okay, oh, this, you know, like that, and you just dwelling in that space versus, you know, versus saying, God, you know what, today, it was a tricky one, but I'm looking forward to tomorrow, or I'm gonna, you know, tomorrow, I'm gonna do something different. And that was the first book that I wrote, it's called life gets better. And it's just a guided journal, where you pick three things you're going to do every day to make the next day better. And it's because when I was at rock bottom, I kept saying, when's it gonna get better? When's it gonna get better? God, this isn't what I wanted for life, is it ever going to be any better? And one day I finally said, You didn't do anything yesterday to make today different? So what do you expect, right? Art of journaling. Today, I'm going to do these three things. And at the end of the day, that would write down what I did. And then I'd say tomorrow, I'm going to do these three things. And then I would reflect on that. So when I started speaking, in coaching, I realized that people can't necessarily work from a blank slate. So I put those in a format where they can just copy and paste, but like, we have the choice. And that's my big thing is that you have more power than you give yourself credit for.

Right. So where do I get that book?

So everything's available on my website at awkward career.com. They're also on Amazon or some other bookstores like Barnes and Noble or even I've seen them even at Walmart online, but you can you can order them. If you can order them through my website, that I shipped those directly from here or through Amazon, whatever is easiest for people, depending on where they're shopping. Okay, well, we'll

make sure that that's all posted where they can get all of these things. That's great. I don't know that. I knew that you had that particular book. But that's awesome. Now you did write a book on on your awkward.

Yes. And that one I have right here. Yes. Let me see it. Perfect. Awkward life changes, and awkward life

changes. What's that? What's the subject down at the bottom there?

Oh, it's the complete handbook to mastering change.

Oh my gosh. So that's awesome.

So this has a lot of kind of reflection and stories in it about getting through change a lot of philosophy behind how our mind works with change. And then there are exercises to fill out to kind of walk you through see if I can show it the right way that walk you through there some things you fill out, okay, arms to help guide you through change. You know, one of them. You know, for example, one of the beginning is about dealing with the emotions of change the tracking how you feel In a moment, and realizing that if I feel like if my negative feelings about this change are really intense on day one, you know what, when we get day 30, day 60, day 90, those feelings get a lot more minimalized because we're not reacting emotionally at the same time. So the whole design of this book is to take the emotion out of change, so that you can make it go in the direction you want.

Take the emotion out of change. I love that I take the emotion out of change. Can you unpack that for me a bit? Definitely. I know what I think immediately. But can you attack that one a

bit? Well, and here's the thing like I, I used to really not like when people got really emotional and reacted. And I thought, oh, that's they don't have they don't have their stuff under control, because they're the person who's going off the handle stuff. Right, does have a place, they spark energy, they help us react. But we need to make sure that they're not steering the ship, we need to keep the emotions down in the engine room, creating some fuel and some spark. But that when we choose which directions we're going, we're not making those emotional reactions.

Perfect. Oh, I love that. Because that's really the thing that makes change difficult for any of us. Right? It's the it's the emotion that spews off the what ifs the endless what ifs. But what ifs on their own are great. They're just ways to preemptively figure out what we need to do differently. Those are things to consider. Those are things to consider while we're exploring. Yeah. But if my emotions are running the show when my emotions are running the show, and I'm going to say, for me, a lot of it, the emotion is usually anything that hooks it's it looks it's card up to anxiety. Sure. That's the one right? That's the one that makes it a challenge, because emotion could be I'm excited for the change. I guess even though if that was running the show, then you tell me you're the expert in this feel even excitement, I'm guessing even a good emotion might be to the detriment if Yeah, if it's not able to be something that does like a bit of a recon mission on the chain.

And that's exactly the point I talked about that in the book where if we're too excited about something, think about when we meet somebody, and we decided to go all in, go all in, we've met this person, we're getting married, and we just met on Tuesday, and now it's Thursday, and all of our friends are like, whoa, whoa. So we feel really good about and we haven't, we haven't, we don't even know like, what religion they are. So I don't even know, celebrate the same holiday, there's nothing you have to be in the same religion, but like you just don't know enough because you haven't gone through all the seasons with this person. But when we get excited about things, it can happen with a new job where we overlook. That might not make sense, or that might not be the best for us, because maybe we're gonna get a little more paid. But we overlook that. And we have to work an extra 30 hours a week or that maybe it's a toxic work environment. But we're just excited about this one piece of it. Right. And with with anything like that. So so we have to manage that good excitement as well, as you know, sometimes that pushes us forward. And we use it as a justification because we feel good. And on the flip side, as much as we use the good emotions to jump into things. We use the negative emotions to either jump out of things, or to not jump not to move because we're afraid.

Right? Oh my gosh, that's. I like that. Where were you a few? Well see, you know what? I've been in this relationship long enough that, that people kind of forget all the failed ones I had before. But it's true, right? It's like anything, we get so excited. And we just, I had a very wise friend say to me once you have to spend four seasons and anything before you can make a really big decision about it. And that's a relationship, a job, a new home, a garden, it doesn't matter. You need four seasons. Yeah,

I love that. I say a very similar thing. I always have told my kids and I joke about it with people. I'm like, you have to go through the whole year. And you go through all the seasons. And sometimes I say that, you know, you don't want to start dating someone in January and then get to Christmas and find out they're Jewish. And that's nothing against anybody being Jewish. I've dated some Jewish people, I love them. But you have to know what gift to show up with and what thing to celebrate and is an issue for you. You don't want to find out because you haven't spent enough time together. And I apply that to any holiday because even I have people, I have friends where Halloween is the biggest holiday of the year for them, and they can't use that you wouldn't be excited about it. And if you dated them from January to October, and all sudden they're planning Halloween parties and dressing up and you have a fear of dressing up, but you're not into it. And you haven't known them long enough to have that conversation. Then all sudden, it's this surprise. Whereas when you go through all those seasons, then you've experienced enough of a snap shot, snap shot of what could be happening in life

snap ship could be the reason.

Good work is well. No, it's It's true, though. When trying to figure out some things. I mean, you know, this that comes with age and experience, right, but it's, it really is true, just spending some time and sorting some things out. And that was never my strong suit. I get very excited very quickly about a lot of stuff.

Well, it's good, right.

And it can be exciting. And, and but like you said, you know, just just, it's a good reference point, the holidays, just even of what someone else values. And that's another, you know, sometimes it can be wonderful, because we get excited about what they value. Right? That's like, oh, I never even thought of it that way, you know, what my brother used to send me, like videos of all of his stuff. He was really into Halloween, I didn't even know he was really into Halloween. I mean, I didn't really you know, other than, you know, getting dressed up and not going and getting candy. As a kid. I never really Halloween wasn't my thing. And then there was a time in my life that I spent a whole religious phase where I was, you know, Halloween, like whatever. I mean, I've done in been and done almost everything at this point in my life. So but my brother, I didn't know how much he was into Halloween, when he started sending me all of these videos for that he passed away, quite suddenly a few years ago. But in, in the last years of his life, he was sending me all of these Halloween things. And I was like, Where did this come from that you read to it. But then I started looking forward to them. And I tried to really embrace like, he is so excited about this. I mean, this is, this is like a guy that had spent most of his life as a biker. But, you know, now he's using this whole new world, but he's doing this thing about Halloween and getting excited about how he was gonna freak the kids out. And they were gonna do this stuff. So you're saying that and it was like I actually I'm, you know, I'm kind of for a person who gets excited about a lot. I'm not excited about pretty much any holiday items. I don't know why. I'm just

I don't get as excited about some of the manufactured stuff. Right? With the holidays, I don't get caught up in. I mean, I will get a Halloween costume if I'm going to a thing and it's fun. But I if I wasn't invited one or there wasn't one going on, I'd be like, I'm excited to hang out with people. So I get excited about the event. Yes, it doesn't matter what holiday it is. And it doesn't matter what it's celebrating. That's why, like, you know, when I when I talk about like, like when sometimes I talk about like religions in school and stuff down here, and I think I think religion should be in school, but I think it should be if it is it's celebrating everything. And so the kids go through learning, every tradition that and and not that you can learn everything, but it's like, you know what, this time we're learning about a Hindu celebration, this time operation, and it and you're studying it from a more secular standpoint of this is what these different cultures around the world that I love that, you know, it doesn't have to be that it's dominated. You know, traditionally in America, a lot of the holidays that are celebrated are Christian. And that doesn't have to be the case. It doesn't mean they don't have to be celebrated. But why can't instead of stopping some why can't it just be doing all?

Yes. And the week start to learn about different things that people celebrate. I it was funny I watched the show now let me say the name of it right? Because it bride and prejudice. Oh, a play on the Pride and Prejudice but Pride and Prejudice. And it's in it's a Bollywood it's a Bollywood production I believe it's it's centered around more than Indian customs and the colors are great and you get to go inside this family I understand that it's it's made up but it's you know I'm my guess is that it's there are some things that are a little bit true to form for for some of it. But I love things like that because again, every time that we get to have a little bit of a glimpse Just to get a peek into another culture, we get to actually just understand a little bit more. And I think the more that we understand each other, the less likely, you know, whatever prejudice and racism and bigotry and wars and all that crap that we give space to that because some, you know, sometimes because someone's not like us, right and and it's easier to have a conflict or whatever it is with the person when I don't understand you. And the more you understand them anyways, so that's that's kind of, you know, that's it's a little bit of, that's a little bit of my take on it, which has just spun me into a whole other thing. So I think for for day today, we're gonna wait here because now we're going to go on to our third episode. And this is very exciting for me because I think I just thought of something brilliant. Oh, if only I can remember it in a minute. So Annie, thank you so much. Thank you so much for being with us today. And for everybody listening, we are going to have yet another episode with Andy. And it's going to be really exciting because I think I've come up with good questions, if only I can remember them when we get there. So it's ally find your joy. Thanks for being here and we'll see you next time.