Finding joy when a difficult relationship ends is possible. This week, Liza Harper, a life redesigner, joins me to talk about finding joy and clarity through relationships and life’s transitions. She’s a life and divorce coach who seeks to empower women to unleash their desires. 

We discuss some ways you can infuse joy into your life. Liza opens up about the personal development work she did for herself and how it led her to do the work she does today.  Plus, we explored fear, shame, and stigma surrounding failing relationships.

In this episode you’ll hear:

• How Liza helps her clients find joy in the next chapter of their lives. (5:02)
• Why it always works out when you bet on yourself. (14:42)
• Ignoring your intuition during a difficult past relationship. (26:02)
• Fear and shame women may experience following a relationship with a narcissist. (35:04)

http://yourkickasslife.com/360

It’s no secret that this year has been challenging and many have been put into situations where they need to have tough conversations. In fact, many problems can be solved when two people can have a thoughtful, mature, and healthy conversation. Yet, having tough conversations or simple communication was never taught to most of us in school; we don’t know how to do it. This week, Alexandra Jamieson returns to the podcast to discuss how to have game-changing conversations. 

Alexandra is the co-author of Radical Alignment, a book about how to have tough conversations at work and at home. In this episode, Alex helps us learn the steps needed to show up as your best self, regardless of how the conversation turns out. 

• How a communication workshop for couples inspired Alex and her husband, Bob, to write their book, Radical Alignment. (22:00)
• How we fall into traps of bad communication. (10:00)
• Why the common culprit in miscommunication is the missing conversation. (18:16)
• You can create team psychological safety with equal speaking time. (25:00)
• The 4 steps in the All-In Method, including declaring the topic of conversation. (24:27)
• How to invite someone to an emotional or high-stakes conversation. (40:00)

http://yourkickasslife.com/359

“Narcissism” seems to be a buzzword these days and I wanted to have an expert on who can give us the low-down. According to trauma therapist, Britt Frank, everyone has shades of narcissism. She goes on to say that high-level narcissism is an addiction to self-protection by any means necessary. And for those who have experienced a relationship with a narcissist, it is a traumatic experience. 

In this week’s episode, Britt joins me to discuss how to heal from traumatic relationships, including those in which narcissistic abuse is present. Britt is also a teacher and speaker who specializes in the "Science of Stuck." 

In this episode you’ll hear: 

• What is a narcissist and how does someone know they may be in a relationship with someone who is a narcissist? (6:33)
• Britt’s goal is “dismantling the mental health myths that keep us feeling STUCK and SICK”. She shares what she means by that. (13:34)
• Dealing with trauma: Some signs or patterns which signal someone should deal with their trauma. (16:07)
• Why someone may get physically addicted to their narcissist and experience withdrawals. (22:27)
• How someone can begin to heal from a narcissistic relationship. (27:03)
• Mother wounds and grieving our childhoods (the things we didn’t get) or other parts of our lives. (31:04)
• How COVID has affected Britt’s work, including the collective processing of COVID trauma. (38:13)

http://yourkickasslife.com/358

I am doing something I have never done in any podcast episode. For the first time, I am bringing you an interview I did on another podcast, where someone interviewed me. My dear friend Rebecca Ching has a podcast called The Unburdened Leader. It was such a fantastic conversation and I am so grateful that she said, “Yes,” when I asked her if I could air it for my listeners.

We talked about a lot of hard things, including grief and addiction.  On 9/27, I celebrated nine years of sobriety and recovery from alcoholism. It is something we talked about in this particular episode. I share how commitment to my values helped me maintain my continued healing and sobriety and how grief nearly brought me out of recovery. 

In this episode you’ll hear: 

• My addiction to alcohol and what it symbolized.
• Why I needed to understand and heal my traumas in order to fully unburden the last of my addictions.
• Perfection, control, and overachieving worked until it didn’t. Drinking worked for a while until it didn’t. 
• The role community plays in my sobriety.