00:00:16
Good day, my listeners out there, welcome to is your way, in your way podcast. And I'm your host, Cassandra Crawley Mayo. And for my new listeners out there, let me tell you what this podcast is about. It's for those individuals who are ready to move forward in their lives, overcome obstacles, mitigate those self imposed barriers, even that negative self talk that will enable you to start living your best life on your terms. We talk about topics such as personal and business development, and even you have an opportunity to do some self reflection.
00:00:53
And today, our topic is called the shortest path is often the longest journey. And my special guest that we're going to talk about this, her name is, and I'm going to introduce you to her. Her name is Leslie Lindsey Davis. Welcome to the podcast, Leslie. Cassandra, thank you so much.
00:01:24
I'm so excited to be here. And I love it that you have three names, like.
00:01:38
Well, Leslie, you're going in and out, so my listeners didn't hear you, probably a lot of you. So let's try to repeat what you said for a minute. It sounds like we're having some technical difficulties in regards to the website. Not the website, but the Internet. Coming through.
00:02:06
My apologies. My apologies. I said, I'm so excited to be here with you, Cassandra. And I love it that you have three names like I do.
00:02:20
Yeah. So we already have something in common, right? Yes. Great. And as a.
00:02:29
Well, I don't know why you have three names. I have three names because our mother didn't have a middle name, and so she didn't give any of us girls middle names. And as a consequence, I tell people I got married just so I could have a middle name. That's cool. I could say that, but I'm not.
00:02:52
But actually, Crawley's my maiden name, and Mayo is my married name. And I kept that because more people know me by Cassandra Crawley because I got married in a later age. I'm still young, but just a little. I got married, and I'm not ashamed to say it, when I was, like, in my late fifties. So that's why I wanted to keep that Crawley in there and honor my family name.
00:03:18
Well, listeners, that was a little side chat.
00:03:25
Exactly. And you're ll. Wow. Yep. That's incredible.
00:03:30
So, my listeners let me read Leslie's bio just so you can get a little insight into what she's all about, and then we'll delve into some questions. Leslie Lindsey Davis, an inspirational speaker and the best selling author of you can eat love leaves. Audiences transformed by her powerful message of embracing emotions, cultivating self love, and building healthy relationships. With her warm authenticity and expertise, Leslie guides individuals on a journey of personal growth and self discovery.
00:04:10
She can connect with people struggling with loving themselves and setting personal boundaries. Leslie has sold over 8000 books, appeared on nearly 100 podcasts, and anticipated and participated in ten online summits and delivered empowering talks at conferences. She also has another book called journey to failing to healing. And she has a soon to be released book titled what color is my shirt? What a bio.
00:04:44
I love that. I'd already asked her, how in the world does she sell 8000 books? But anyway, that's not what this podcast is about. So, Leslie, let me ask you, and for my listeners to hear, too, tell us about your backstory.
00:04:58
Until you started working into the insurance industry, what was Leslie about back, back in the day? Well, before I started in the insurance industry, Leslie was somebody who was passionate about fashion and fabrics and colors and all of those things that a fabric store was like my playground. I tell people, you walk into the fabric store and the fabric starts talking to you and telling you what to become. And so I had great visions of myself working for pennies and living in New York and having this, you know, amazing apartment. And I would store my books in my oven because I hate to cook.
00:05:41
Right. I'd have, you know, these three tiny toy poodles. I'd have a red one, a white one, and a black one, and I'd have a dog walker. And I would just be living this incredible life where nothing, where I was immersed in fabrics and, and fashion and all of that all the time. But, you know, Cassandra, life happens, doesn't it?
00:06:03
Yes, it does. And when life happened to me, I realized I didn't want to keep working weekends. I was terrified when I would go out to my car at 10:00 at night. And so I switched into insurance. Now, I don't know about anybody else, but I've often asked people who are in, who are in the insurance industry, did you deliberately, purposefully, intentionally set out to go into insurance?
00:06:38
And the majority of people that I know did not deliberately, intentionally, or purposefully go into insurance, but that was where I spent the majority of my time. Until one day I walked away. Oh, my. You quit. Did you resign?
00:07:01
Did you give notice or you just walked away? I gave them two weeks notice, and they did everything they could to convince me to stay. And I got up that Monday morning after, you know, when my two week notice would have been effective. And I told myself no, you cannot keep doing this. And what I recognized a couple of years later is I had been sacrificing myself on the altar of everyone else, and the only person I had not been taking care of was me.
00:07:35
And I was, to put it into perspective, I was working 60 plus hours a week, and I was a mother and a wife. Mm hmm. Mm hmm.
00:07:50
You know, people talk about burning the candle at two ends, but I was burning it 45678 different ways. So the whole thing was on fire at one time. And that Monday morning, I woke up and I said, no, no, and I drove to the office, put my keys through the mail slot, and drove home. And it took. It took two years for me to be able to drive past that office.
00:08:18
Wow. Without feeling sick. Wow. Not guilty, but sick. Exactly.
00:08:26
So you know that it took me, which is one of the reasons I love the name of your podcast, is your way in your way. Yes. My way was in my way. I was the problem. I was in my way because I believed that it was my responsibility to take care of all these people and to take care of all this stuff and this business and everything, but none of it was giving back to me.
00:08:55
And that morning, when I put my keys through the slot, it was as if I finally stepped out of my own way. Hmm. Okay. And then, oh, my goodness, my life really started opening up to the point where here I am now. Now, this was ten years ago.
00:09:20
So over the course of the last ten years, my life does not look anything at all like it did the previous 60. Wow. So tell us, what. What happened? Like, it sounded like you started a journey to discover who you were.
00:09:40
And I kind of, like in my bio, you talk about personal growth and self discovery, and it kind of sounds like my book is your way. In your way. And the subtitle. The subtitle of my book is.
00:09:55
Is a self discovery guide for women on how to restore yourself, learn from your experiences, and be your true self again. So it sounds like perhaps you went through some self discovery yourself. Well, I did. Like so many people, there was 2 years after I walked away from the job where I had, you know, a crisis in the family, and I was so depressed. I was thrown into what I like to call them, the depths.
00:10:28
The depths. It was so deep. It was like being at the bottom of the Marianas trench. And I didn't know if I was going to be able to recover from it, but I recognized in that moment that I could either continue doing what I was doing and keep going on the path that I was going on. Because even though I had walked away from that job, I hadn't dealt with the things that got me into that situation in the first place.
00:10:53
I hadn't dealt with, you know, taking care of everybody else, prioritizing everybody else over myself, all of that stuff that got me there in the first place, I hadn't dealt with it. I hadn't dealt with a lot of grief. So on this particular day, when I hit this rock, I mean, I hate to say rock bottom, because I feel like that's tempting God or the fates to say, you think that was rock bottom? I'll show you. So, anyway, I hit this point, and I made the decision that I was going to get healthy, mentally, physically, and emotionally.
00:11:25
And I tell people that's when the journey really began. And in looking at myself at that moment in time, I thought that nobody loved me. And what I came to recognize fairly quickly was that the only person who didn't love me was me. Well, Leslie, let me ask you this, because a lot of my listeners, they've not. Some of them have not taken that deep dive internally.
00:11:56
So what made you. It sounded like maybe you were just sick and tired of being sick and tired. So you made a decision to go within yourself to discover what was it about you? Because I want my listeners to know, you know, being that this is your way, in your way, to be able to get out of their way like. Like you're talking about now, and then take a deep dive into your inner self.
00:12:22
So what. What. What propelled you to do that? Well, as I said, I'd made the decision that I wanted to be the best version of myself. I didn't want to continue living my life feeling frustrated, feeling overlooked, feeling as if my dreams, desires, et cetera, didn't matter anymore.
00:12:47
And what I came to understand is there. There's only one person I'm in control of, right? And that's me, and I'm not in control of anybody else. And this was really hammered home to me on Valentine's Day after I had this moment in the Marianas trench. I was in the grocery store, and I was looking at Valentine's stuff and getting Valentine cards for people in my family that I was going to send a card to.
00:13:15
And I saw this one card, and I said, you know, I wish somebody would send that card to me. Okay. And I walked away feeling very sad and dejected and everything else. And before I got to the cash register, this voice said, go get the card and send it to yourself. Hmm.
00:13:42
Okay. So I went back and I got the card. I got home from the store, put all my groceries away, took out a pen, sat down at the table, and started writing, essentially, a love letter to myself, telling myself, my past self, how amazing I was, how wonderful I was, and thanking my past self for enduring everything that I had been enduring, and encouraging myself for having not given up because, oh, my gosh, there were times when I wanted to give up. Yes. And then I put the card into the envelope, and I sealed it, and I put it with my calendar.
00:14:31
And on Valentine's day, I opened that card and I read it. And I've got tears in my eyes right now because I can still remember how I felt when I read those words that I wish that somebody would say to me, here's somebody was saying them to me. Now, logically, I knew I had written every word. That's not the point. Emotionally is where I was connecting with those words.
00:15:04
So I say to the people listening, if you are struggling and if you feel like your way is in your way, let's start small. Start with having written conversations. Yes, I did say written. Written conversations with yourself. Okay.
00:15:26
Start learning who you are. I call it talking to your very best friend in the whole wide world. And in my book, you can't eat love. I talked about that a lot because you were only in control of you. You're not in control of anyone else.
00:15:44
And I don't care if you gave somebody the perfect script, including facial expressions, tone, volume, et cetera, et cetera, you would feel disappointed when they delivered those words to you. Mm hmm. So let's stop expecting other people to give us what we are not giving ourselves. So I say, if you believe that you are, in your own way, let's start by having written conversations with ourselves. Get a notebook.
00:16:15
Nothing fancy. I can have six by nine notebooks, so I'm not overwhelmed by a big eight and a half, by eleven. Get a pen that's in a color that you love and set aside five to ten minutes each day. I do it in the morning. And start talking to yourself.
00:16:33
And, yes, I do have two sided conversations. Yes, you answer yourself. Right? I answer myself. But, you know, when I'm feeling something, whatever, you know, angry, happy, whatever.
00:16:47
Or I'm trying to work through a feeling or something, I will write. Of course you feel that way. Why wouldn't you? I'm simply acknowledging my feelings. Yes.
00:17:01
And isn't that what we want? Exactly. Exactly. Yeah. I was doing a podcast and talking to a psychotherapist.
00:17:12
And she was like, you know, people say, well, I started talking to myself, but when I. I didn't answer myself because people would think I'm crazy. And she said the same thing. You should answer yourself. You know, like, you know, you doing that negative self talk, you can even say, well, where did that come from?
00:17:29
Why are you thinking like that? And as you indicated, you can write it. And why is writing more powerful than just saying it from your perspective? To me, what it did for me is it got the hamsters off the wheels inside my head. Mm hmm.
00:17:47
It sends them back. Back to the pet market. And I could. I could put a period. When I put a period at the end of that conversation, it was gone.
00:17:59
It was gone. Because how many times do you hash and rehash and re re rehash something? And you let those conversations just start freewheeling in your head? And I wish I woulda and I shoulda and. And all those things.
00:18:12
What I discovered was, having that written conversation, I'm able to work it out much more quickly. I'm able to validate what I'm feeling. I'm able to acknowledge whatever the heck it is I'm able to work my way through, if not to a solution, but to a satisfaction that I'm heard. And so when I close that notebook, I'm not running off looking for something else to fill that space. Because what I discovered was I had what I call a myself sized hole in my heart.
00:18:53
And at that time, I had been filling that myself sized hole in my heart with food. That was my drug of choice instead of feeling. Okay. Okay, Leslie, what you're doing, do you call that journaling, or do you call it something different? I call it writing in a notebook.
00:19:12
And the reason I call it writing a notebook is I've had this aversion to the term journaling. Okay? Okay. I don't, like, you know, the have tos and all that kind of stuff. And to me, the word journaling implies rules and regulations and all this kind of stuff.
00:19:32
So I just call it writing in a notebook. I've had many people say, well, that's journaling. Okay? In your world, it's journaling. In my world, in order for me to do it, it's writing in a notebook.
00:19:44
Okay. Now, you've been on this journey for a while. Yes? Yeah. What is sustaining you?
00:19:54
Is it the consistency that you do, or what is it that you do maybe every other day, to sustain what I'm calling, in your good place. The number one thing that keeps me on the path and not going back to where I was is, first of all, I enjoy how I feel mentally, physically, and emotionally. And when I feel myself sliding back to where I used to be. Because here's the thing. Old habits, old behaviors, all of that stuff, they never go away right there, you know, shoved down the cellar stairs, and we put all these locks on the doors, and if you forget to lock one of them, they all come out.
00:20:39
Right? But when I feel myself sliding down that familiar path, I say, wait a minute. Hold on, hold on. How are you feeling in this moment and what's going on that you're sliding back that way? Okay.
00:20:54
And then I will listen. You know, that's the other thing. I listen when I ask myself a question, such as, what is really going on right now? Okay. I listen.
00:21:08
Now. I will listen with pen in my hand and my notebook open, and I will write. Sometimes it's that we are approaching, you know, a date. Dates can have all kinds of weighty whatever. Sometimes it's that somebody said something.
00:21:26
Sometimes, it's something that happened. To be very, very honest, at this moment, it's: I'm in Texas. I woke up this morning; it was 71 degrees at 03:00 a.m., and I started feeling the angst of the summer coming on because this past summer was brutal. Okay?
00:21:48
And so I had to pause. I really had to pause and say, hold on. We haven't gotten to summer yet, so why are you getting wound up about something that hadn't gotten here yet? Right? It's not even spring.
00:22:02
No, it's not even spring. So I was simply, you know, honoring what I was feeling in the moment, and that's how I keep moving forward. Now, does that mean I don't go backwards? Oh, heck, yeah. Heck, yeah.
00:22:17
But, you know, forward progress is forward progress, right? We're not looking for perfection. Right? So you don't suppress it. You know, I was reading that at one time, and, I don't know, at one time in your life.
00:22:31
In your past, so to speak, you were running from emotions, a particular emotion. What. What were you running. What emotion were you running from? Grief.
00:22:44
Mmm. Okay, and was the grief. What's the grief a result of you leaving the job or where did the grief come from? What had you grieving? The grief came from the fact that this year, it's been 40 years since our mother died.
00:23:02
Okay. I was 26 when she died. My youngest sibling was 18. Our mother was 49. Two weeks after she died, I had a baby.
00:23:14
My first baby. Her first grandchildren. My family was so destroyed as a consequence of our mother dying that they were not able to do anything to help me with what I was feeling or with the baby or anything. My husband's family was ecstatic that they had a grandchild because it was their first grandchild. My husband was ecstatic that he had a son.
00:23:43
Yeah. Everybody was in their own stuff. And I talk about this. In the journey from failing to healing, I had nowhere to go with anything. I didn't know what to do.
00:23:56
I didn't know how to grieve. But you've got a small child. You're living your life, and so you keep moving forward. You keep putting 1ft in front of the other. And in January of 2016, this tsunami hit me, and I realized that either I was going to need to feel the grief or it was going to kill me.
00:24:26
And so at that point in time, I started really, honestly grieving my mother. Okay. Part of that journey ended up being related in the first three or four paragraphs of you can't eat love because I'm eating a chocolate meringue pie to honor her. I mean, I made a pie to honor our mother on Mother's day, and I'm eating it, and all these things started flowing out, and I'm writing them down. Okay.
00:24:58
And one of the sentences was that I realized you can't eat love. That the love is in the memories, the love is in, you know, the voices, the sounds, the things. It's not in. Not in the food. I mean, so now when people say, well, you know, so and so cooks and feeds me, because that's their way of showing love.
00:25:19
No, it's not their way of showing love. It's their way of showing control. They may think they're showing love, but they're not. They're showing control. Okay.
00:25:29
So it was really grief that I was running from, and in order to keep grief locked up. Yeah. I also locked up a whole lot of other stuff. I did shame and guilt really, really well. I did angry and sad really, really well.
00:25:49
Right.
00:25:52
Leslie, what does this title on this podcast mean? The shortest path is often the longest journey. What do you mean by that? What I discovered was, in order to get back or to discover who Leslie Lindsay took a lot of work. And I tell people, if I'd have known how hard the journey was going to be, I don't think I ever would have started.
00:26:23
But it was well worth it. Yes. So all I was doing was working my way back to who my original, authentic self was, which is Leslie Lindsay. The Davis is my married name, and I don't have a middle name.
00:26:39
Right. So it was. It was the longest journey because of all the work that I did to get back to me. And how close are you to you, Cassandra? Right.
00:26:54
That's right. That's right. And it is. It's a process. And I always say my journey will continue until that's the end for me.
00:27:02
Exactly right. It is. It is a process. And I concur with you that it's worth it when you look back on it, because we would not be who we are today. You wouldn't have written the books.
00:27:14
You know, I wouldn't have written my book. So, yeah, it's. Well, it's. It's well worth it, as I. As I look at it, because we will always have trials and tribulations, always, 1000%.
00:27:27
And one of the things that I discovered after publishing, you can't eat love. And I'm discovering more and more with the journey from failing to healing. There are more Leslie's out there than I ever imagined, and I'm quite certain that you are discovering that there are lots of Cassandras out there, and you probably never even imagined there were that many Cassandras out there. Exactly. Exactly.
00:27:55
So they. They need, you know, that. That one Cassandra, that one Leslie out there. They need to hear our words because they are their words, and they need to know that their words are valid and that they are valid as a person. And yes, if one person did it, if one other Cassandra, one other Leslie did it, well, that's some hope for them.
00:28:22
Exactly. If for nothing else, to get. To start getting out of their own way. That's right. To start taking a couple of steps on that journey to discovering or rediscovering that amazing person that they really are.
00:28:38
Exactly. Exactly. And, you know, and. And many of them are still waiting. Waiting for the Leslie and the Cassandra.
00:28:48
And that's too, while I was in my own way, because it took me forever to write this book that's been in my spirit for so long, you know? But yet, you're right. As people read the book, there are certain things, and then the reviews, the comments. I've even had people to read the book to email me to say, I saw myself in you, and I just want to thank you. So you're exactly right on that part, for sure.
00:29:12
Now, what methodology do you use to guide individuals through the journey of personal growth and self discovery? Well, the first thing I usually do is find out.
00:29:29
I ask them when they're doing something, you know, who are these negative voices that they hear? Because that's what a lot of people hear. You know, they'll talk about the negative voices that start up, or they will start throwing out, limiting beliefs, as, you know, just, it's gospel. And I will get them to pause and I will ask them, think for a moment, whose voice are you really hearing? Because if we can start identifying the voices and attaching them to the people that are in our past, they're not just random voices that we picked up off the street.
00:30:09
They are voices from people in our past, in our lives that have taken up residence in our heads. So I get people to start there. Let's start naming and identifying those voices, and let's start asking ourselves, are their comments true? How true are they? How valid are they?
00:30:33
And then I ask, what is something you would like to say to that person, knowing what you know today? Right. And that's usually how we start on the path, because, as you know, in order to get out of your own way, you need to figure out what the heck is this garbage is in front of you? What are these roadblocks? What is all of this stuff that's sitting in front of you?
00:30:58
And you start sorting it out. Either give it to goodwill, put it in the trash, something. Right? Right. But until you identify what it is, you're just going to be spinning and you're going to be looking for somebody to tell you what to do.
00:31:14
I'm not going to tell anyone what to do, but I will help you discover the noise that's in your head so you can start doing something. Right. So what you're finding with your clients, the same, the commonalities or the common theme has a lot. Sounds like it has a lot to do with their past. Exactly.
00:31:37
That are in their head and that is keeping them stuck. So it sounds like you help them get unstuck. They help themselves get unstuck, and. And then they start going on a journey, so to speak. Right.
00:31:53
Okay. And I. I don't fill in the blanks for anybody. I get them to discover it. As you said, they've got to discover it for themselves.
00:32:04
But one thing that I do that's a little bit different from a lot of people, oftentimes when we go into therapy, and I've got plenty of hours of therapy, trust me. Oftentimes when we go into therapy, we keep hoeing the road over and over and over again and we don't move forward. What I believe is just like in your car, you've got a very large windshield, and you've got a small rear view mirror. The rear view mirror is for information to help you make decisions about moving forward. Right.
00:32:36
So that's. That's what I help people do. Check the information in the rear view mirror so that you can make a decision in the present. We're not going to live back there. It happened.
00:32:48
It is. We're simply going to examine it and say, okay, this is who always said these things to me. And so now, when this situation arises, this is the voice that I hear. All right, well, now I can tell that voice, go sit down over there. I've got this, and I can move forward.
00:33:05
Right? Right. So let's see why you. Even though you're still on your journey, but thinking back on your journey, what was the most difficult part of your journey? When other people started figuring out that I was doing something.
00:33:22
Cause I didn't share with anyone. And the reason I didn't share with anyone is I didn't want anyone telling me what I should have, woulda or coulda done. But when people started figuring out that something was changing in me. I started getting some pushback and having the conversation with myself that if they were pushing back, that was on them. Yeah.
00:33:50
That I was on the journey that I knew I needed to go on in order to live the life that I wanted to live. I'd had enough of living somebody else's life. Yeah. I wanted to live my life with my choices, with my excitement, with loving me. And if I chose to let their uncomfortableness with this change interfere in that, then I would be going back to where I was right now.
00:34:26
Can you describe for the listeners, as well, what was it about you that changed, that people saw something was different? What. What was that? What did that look like? Well, first of all, I started losing weight because my drug of choice was losing its power.
00:34:44
I ended up losing almost 100 pounds. Oh, my gosh. It's incredible.
00:34:52
Wow. And then the other thing was, when I would make a statement to my husband and he would start trying to fix whatever it was I was saying, I was able to tell him, I don't need you to fix it. I just need you to listen. Mm hmm. Mm hmm.
00:35:08
And when he would get angry with me about me not wanting him to fix it, I would simply let him babble on about his anger. And again, who can I control? When it came to my kids, part of the tsunami that I was hit with was that my oldest child and his wife decided they didn't want to have a relationship with me. I recognized that I couldn't control them. And there was nothing I could do other than keep working on me being the best version of me and believe, you know, that eventually we would be reconciled.
00:35:46
And I'm happy to say two years ago we were reconciled. So. But I also believe that if I hadn't have gone on the journey, if I hadn't have prioritized myself, if I hadn't, as you like to say, gotten out of my own way, we would not have been able to come back together because the person that I was was part of what caused us to, you know, be separated. That's amazing. That is amazing.
00:36:22
One of the things you said is discovering your very best friend, and you are the friend. How can you become your own best friend? A lot of us have friends, and many of us have best friends, but it's something to say, why don't you let yourself be your best friend? Because you think about, how do you treat your best friend? Do you treat yourself the same way as you do your best friend?
00:36:47
So how does that dynamic change? Because that's different. So how would a person begin or figure out, how can I be my best friend? What are some resources? What are some things that I can do to help me be my best friend?
00:37:05
Well, if you think about a best friend, you know, the ideal best friend is somebody that you can call up at 02:00 in the morning and go on and on and on about the same thing that you went on and on and on about all day long. Right? And you would know because they are your best friend. They're not going to be too tired to listen. They're not going to be tired of hearing the same story for the thousand millionth time over and over and over again.
00:37:30
Right. But honestly, our physical best friends, they do have limitations. They will also make comments to us that aren't quite the comment that we are looking for at that moment. And heaven forbid they even have lives where they may not answer our phone call at 02:00 in the morning, or they might get really annoyed because you woke them up at 02:00 so what I discovered when I went on the journey was I was desperate to be heard, regardless of what time of day it was or how many times it was, that I was talking about the same thing over and over and over again. And what I started doing was having these written conversations.
00:38:18
So that's where part of that written conversation is. I'm talking to myself. I'm building a relationship with myself so that I am giving myself everything almost everything that I wish that someone else would give me. And when we start prioritizing ourselves and giving ourselves everything we wish other people would give us within our yearning, our neediness, to use the word I don't like, starts subsiding because we are satisfying our own needs. We are feeling heard.
00:38:56
We are feeling loved. We are feeling cared for. So, developing that relationship with yourself does two things. Number one, we teach other people how to treat us. And the way that we do it is they observe how we treat ourselves.
00:39:15
Right? When we start strengthening that relationship with ourself, becoming our very best friend in the whole wide world, people start observing, well, my goodness, they take really good care of themselves. They prioritize themselves. They speak to themselves in this fashion. This is what they do for themselves.
00:39:34
And that boundary with ourself gets strengthened. So then when we set a boundary with somebody else and say, I'm not going to accept this behavior, or this is the behavior that I expect, they're going to be able to look at how you treat yourself, and they're going to understand that boundary. While it may flex a tiny bit, it's a pretty solid boundary. Yeah. So establishing that boundary solidly with yourself through the help of your very best friend in the whole wide world, helps you establish that boundary with everybody else.
00:40:12
And the boundary you establish with everybody else doesn't have any holes in it. It may flow, flex a little bit because you allow it to flex a little bit. Right. But for the most part, it's pretty steadfast, pretty rigid, kind of like a castle with a giant moat around it. And the world knows this is the behavior that Cassandra will accept.
00:40:33
This. These are the words she will accept. This is what she will accept, and there is no question about it. Right. Okay.
00:40:43
So that self discovery journey is so valuable. Although, like you indicated, if you knew you have to go through this journey, you wouldn't have gone through it. It's like the shortest path is often the longest journey, but look what you got out of it.
00:41:02
Anybody inspire you? Have you been. Who's your inspiration? Who is my inspiration? That's a good question.
00:41:12
I would have to say that even though I did not have a good relationship with my mother. It's my mother. Mm hmm. She had a sticker on the cabinet door that said, life begins after 50, and she died at 49. Right.
00:41:32
Okay. So I often think my. Well, first, my family doesn't believe in anything that I do. They just roll their eyes, and because I can't control them, I just. You know, ignore them.
00:41:44
But I believe, you know, if she were to see me, she would be very proud. Yeah, I'm sure. So she. She is my inspiration because she didn't get to live her life. She had six kids before she was 30 years old, and she died at 49, so.
00:42:04
Wow. Anyway, that's amazing. Yeah. I'm not living her life. I'm living my life.
00:42:09
Your own, right. But yet, you know, she'd be proud of you. Yes. Yes. Oh, absolutely.
00:42:14
And I think that's interesting. Ironic how that the grief is the emotion you were running from as a result of your mom, and now look. Look how far you've come with that. That's amazing. So, Leslie, as we wrap up today, what.
00:42:30
What do you. What are your next steps? You believe? What's next for Leslie in the next maybe three to five years? Well, my dream, since you asked, my dream is to be on a stage talking to 10,000 people and telling them, letting them know that your feelings are your feelings and nobody else gets a boat.
00:42:57
And helping those 10,000 people to understand that your emotions are valid and helping people to sit in their emotions, because I believe that if we can help people become emotionally healthier, that we can reduce a whole lot of issues, depression, suicides, all of these things, because people will know how to feel and how to experience their emotions in a safe way. Right. And not feel so alone. So that's. That's where I see myself in.
00:43:39
In three to five years. But in the meantime, to get there, I will continue, you know, doing what I am doing, speaking on smaller stages, doing workshops, doing presentations, talking to amazing people like you, and. And getting my next book. What color is my shirt? Which is not testing your emotions, getting that out into the world, but the work that you're doing is incredible.
00:44:07
Absolutely incredible. And I'm going to go order your book from Amazon. So anybody listening, you can do it right now, as long as it doesn't kick you out of the podcast and order the book is your way. In your way. Thank you.
00:44:25
Thank you, thank you. And listeners, I didn't pay her to say that, just so you know. I know you think, you know, all my guests make sure you say that at the end, right? Well, Leslie, it's been a pleasure. I have learned, and I think instead of my journaling, which I'll still journal, because I've been journaling forever, but start writing out letters to myself and.
00:44:48
Which is so ironic because, you know, we talked about in the beginning how we have a lot of commonalities. In my book, these are love letters. They're love letters to women. It's dear women who compare themselves. Dear women, it all started with your backstory.
00:45:04
So. And they're love letters, just as you, as you mentioned. So I just think that there's some type of connection that we have because of the similarities that we have. And I just, you know, I want to thank you again for your time, your energy, your, what I call your gold nuggets. And I know my listeners out there.
00:45:29
If there's something that was said, please relisten to this. We can, you can replay this on YouTube, on all the social, my media platform, but you can also listen to all the podcast platforms as well. Well, and many of you are aware that I go live every Wednesday at 01:00 p.m. Eastern standard time. And you also know that I never say goodbye.
00:45:56
I always say bye for now. And God bless all of you. And again, Leslie, thank you so much. Cassandra, thank you so much. This has been an absolute pleasure.
00:46:08
Thank you.
