Stephanie: Hello, Meredith and Craig. Thank you so much for being here today with me.

Meredith: Oh, it's our pleasure. We're excited.

Stephanie: Oh, I am very excited because you guys are breaking a little ground here. You're my 1st dual interview. So, I hope you will, take good care of me today.

Both: You'll be gentle.

Stephanie: Okay. I am really, excited to get into your story because your midlife transition, your 40 story, really happens together and that is so wonderful because in so many of these stories, I find that this midlife transition takes people in a different direction than where they had been in sort of their mid to late thirties, right? That could be a different career, but a lot of times it could be a different partner. It could be that they married the wrong person and they're growing in different directions.

So I'm so excited to explore how this transition not only didn't break you, but brought you closer together.

Meredith: Yeah, we're really lucky and really grateful.

Stephanie: Yeah. So, let's start at the beginning. Will you tell me from both of your perspectives a little bit about your early years? What were the forces that shaped you? And who were you when you got to like, 35, 37?

Craig: I grew up in a, middle class, maybe even lower middle class family, humble upbringing. And the forces I would say that shaped me hugely were, I had great parents. they were there for me. They supported me. But one thing that they did instill in me was a sense of like perfectionism. Like I would come home with a test with a grade and my dad in particular would be like, that's great, but what happened to the other 5%? And that's coming home with like a 95 percent. And best of intentions. Just wanted me to know that I was capable of more. And so that was one of the things that really shaped me as I grew into my thirties was this, sense of, I have to be perfect. I have to show up as my best self at all times. I had this thing inside me where if I wasn't going to be perfect. I didn't want to run the risk of failing. So I had a fear of failure. And it kept me from pursuing certain opportunities, if I didn't think I'd nail it and hit it out of the park.

Stephanie: Right. The first time. Forget practice. There's no room for practice.

Craig: Exactly, exactly. Yeah. So I would say those are two big things that came out of my childhood. I had a great childhood and there's

Stephanie: of course.

Craig: but those are two things that came, with the limiting beliefs that I took with me into my thirties. And then maybe I'll let you start your childhood journey.

Meredith: It's interesting because we come from a very similar area of the world and had very similar values and childhood experiences. I also grew up with this perfectionist mentality. I did very well in school. And that became my identity. I'm smart. I achieve, I'm a people pleaser, you know, whatever it took and that,translated into my career too.

Like something needs to be done. Yeah, I can do it. Do you have capacity? Of course I have capacity. I would say no to no one ever because I needed that external validation that I've been getting my whole life for being smart. And so that, external validation, came at the cost of my own self worth and my own self confidence, which I didn't learn until later. I won't jump ahead. But the other force that shaped where I ended up in my thirties was this almost societal expectation of what we like to call the default life. You go to school, you get good grades, you go to university, you get more good grades, you get a good job, you save for retirement, and then you get to live a little bit and then you're done.

And so that was the life. And so I was going along checking all the boxes and I have to say, I didn't like checking the 30 box, because I hadn't quite hit all those, you know, I wasn't in a committed relationship. I didn't have my career totally nailed at 30. And so I did not like hitting 30. Like, it all fell into place in my 30s. And so I was checking all my default life boxes. I had the career, I had the partner, I had all the things. And yet, it wasn't the life for me. So that's, that's where I ended up in my mid 30s.

Stephanie: So how, when did you guys meet? When'd you get together? Tell me a little bit about your love story.

Craig: We met at work. We did meet at work. We met in our thirties, mid thirties and we worked for the same company for, I think, over 10 years. Yeah. And then eventually I moved into a different role. And I found myself on the same floor as her within a few doors or offices or whatever.

We met at a retirement party for a couple of colleagues that we separately knew. Three colleagues were retiring. We each knew them separately. And yeah, we, we hit it off at this little, little get together.

Meredith: And it's kind of interesting because he's not a big get together kind of guy. And we were among the last people at this party chatting.

Craig: And so it. It's very interesting that actually that party is like, I had no intention of going actually. And it's just weird that, you know, the Universe seems to just work in mysterious ways and something told me, you know, you should go and, pay your respects to the person that you knew that's retiring and give them a proper send off.

And so I did.

Stephanie: I love that. My husband and I have a very similar element to our story. I love to say we met the old fashioned way. We met at a bar, but neither of us were supposed to be there that night. I was at a sort of fancy restaurant next door with a girlfriend and a bunch of our friends showed up and there wasn't enough room for us all. So we said, ah, let's go next door to the dirty dive karaoke bar just, you know, for shucks. And so we were hanging out there. And he was similar, a friend was leaving his company so it was like a goodbye, you know, night out and they were supposed to be a mile down the road at another bar, listening to live music, but they wandered in. So, yes, total fate. Neither of us were supposed to be at that place that night, but the Universe certainly conspired to put us together.

Meredith: It's amazing, isn't it?

Stephanie: It is. It's so cool. And it's also I sometimes think of it as terrifying because like if one little thing had changed, like, if four friends instead of six had showed up, we could have stayed at the restaurant and I would have been next door. So like there, you know, there are moments like that are like, but

Meredith: That thinking can terrify me, actually, sometimes. It's scary to think how many things have to line up perfectly for an event to have occurred. And if they didn't all line up, where would we be?

Stephanie: Yeah. Well, those are the things to me that make me believe in magic because you know, when things do line up just that perfectly and something goes so right. It's like, that's the only explanation.

Craig: All right. So you guys are now in your late thirties, you're coming up on 40, you're working for the man in a big corporate job. Tell me a little bit about Craig. I think you hit 40 first, right? I did.

Stephanie: Okay. Tell me

Craig: Not like, not terribly much further. Like, just only a little bit sooner. Like, like, just.

Stephanie: Sure, you can keep saying that, but you're still first.

Craig: So yeah, I hit my 40s. And it was actually during the pandemic that I turned 40. The world was upside down at that point. So, in the process of the pandemic, companies were struggling to figure out what their next step was.

Nobody knew what was going on. they were deciding that they were going to close the office that we had just moved to. We had gotten together, we had moved across the country, we were settling into this new place. And they decided that, we don't know what's next, but we're moving everybody back. And if you want to move, you have a job. And if you don't want to move, you don't have a job. Yeah.

So we had a really big decision to make as I was turning 40 and we made the realization, we, you know, did some soul searching and realized that, you know, we haven't been particularly fulfilled in our roles in this corporate world.

This was the Universe again, working in our favor and offering us a flashing off ramp kind of sign saying, this is your opportunity to get out from under this, you know, unfulfilling career that you've chosen for yourself. And so basically that year we decided that we were going to leave our corporate job.

Stephanie: Oh my God.

Meredith: And it was

Craig: both of us at the same time.

Meredith: Yeah.

Stephanie: That's the terrifying part,

Meredith: It was very

Craig: terrifying. It

Meredith: was incredibly stressful. When we look back on it, you forget all the stress that was wrapped into it. Cause we had moved less than 12 months before. We were just settling in. We were very happy with where we were in the country. We were moving closer to friends and family, you know, everything was going well, and then the rug gets jerked out from under you and you're just, you have no idea what to do.

Do we keep our stable, safe corporate jobs? Cause both of us are, you know, high performers, high achievers based on all of our perfectionist, people pleasing tendencies. So we're, you know, we're on an upward trajectory and our careers are solid. So do we just bite the bullet and move back or not? And so it was incredibly stressful.

And then there was a wrinkle. My dad got cancer. Actually, my dad got two cancers and we were really feeling like it was going to be his last Christmas. That, that was the sense. So we drove 17 hours home for Christmas to a place that was really COVID locked down and had, we had to isolate for two, we did all the things at that time, right?

That really helped give us perspective that we actually want to be closer. Our parents aren't getting any younger. His grandmother is still around. Like, we want to be closer to friends and family, not further. So that perspective was really important because that really helped us make the decision.

Like, gut instinct. Let's go. And we're two really type A plan people, and we didn't have a plan, so that part was really stressful, but just, I can remember going for a walk around the neighbourhood and having a conversation about it, and it just felt like the right decision, even though it was really scary, because we had no plan, and we like plans.

We love a list, but we didn't have one, and we just trusted the plan was going to appear, and we made the decision to leave. And I don't even know how quickly it happened, but we were As soon as we made that decision, my dad started getting clean bills of health. Like he's, his treatments all started taking, like, it was again, when you look back on something and how it all works out, it's amazing how everything lines up.

And my dad is healthy as a horse today, like years later. Literally, it feels like his health scare was put in our path so that we could make this decision for us because we were really struggling with it.

Craig: Yeah, yeah, without that I don't know what decision we would have made. It really gave us the clarity to take the next step to jump out of the plane without the parachute.

Stephanie: Okay. But there's clarity. And I get that. And I get the flashing off ramps. Okay. And, and it's, I'm listening to your story and I'm thinking, you know, in so many instances, somebody wants to make a change, but the other person will stay in the steady stable. So, like, I got you, you know, we'll have some stability.

Where did you find the courage to make that jump? Can you remember? Can you think back like that? And I get that it was scary. It's so terrifying to me. And I'm a small business owner. So I have made that decision myself. Actually, it was made for me. But, but where did that, where did you find that courage?

Meredith: I mean, I would say we didn't even really consider dividing and conquering.

Craig: Honestly, to answer your question, I actually don't, I think back on that time and it was really, we went on that walk that she talked about earlier and we just, it just felt right. Like in our gut. It just felt like the right move and we just had faith that we would figure it out. I, I can't really answer it with like a tangible,

Stephanie: No, you answered it. You answered it. And let me, let me tell you why. One of the things that happens at this period in our lives is that people start tuning more into their gut. The thing that they have been ignoring for 10, 20, 30, 40, right?

Craig: Yeah. It was around that time that I really did start to tune into my intuition.

Stephanie: Yeah. So that's the answer. It's not that you found the courage. It's that you finally decided to listen to what your body, your intuition, you know, was telling you. so that actually is a really good answer and a really good, example of the transition.

Meredith: Yeah, and so like I said, we didn't have a plan, but we made plan after plan after plan. We even started a business. It seemed like everyone was doing real estate investing. So let's jump into that. So we did and it didn't take us long to realize that we were completely miserable and it was impacting our relationship.

Craig: And we were bad at it. There was so much wrong with that decision. It was like, yeah, this is just not it.

Meredith: It was a decision we made to replace our corporate income. How quickly can we replace the money? And it led us down a path of what are we doing? We don't know who we are. We don't know what we want. We don't know where we want to end up in our lives.

We hadn't done any of that work to decide what do we actually want our life to be like. And so you know, your last day of the corporate job was about a month after you turned 40. And mine was couple of months before I turned 40.

Craig: My identity was so closely tied to my corporate role, in my corporate life, that I had lost, throughout the years, I had lost who I actually truly was at my core and what I wanted in life because I had just been like, been kind of gliding down this default life path, the path that I just assumed was meant for me. And when, you make such a big decision to leave your corporate world, you're leaving behind that default life.

Now, everything rests on your shoulders. Now it's all up to you to decide what it is you want, who you're going to be. And I was like, lost a ship at sea, like just floating out there. And we had to do some real work to figure out who we were and what we wanted.

Stephanie: Wow. Yeah. And again, that is another just great example of the things that happen at, at this time, right? The i, the identity being all about our job. And for some people it's their kids or some external marker is where we pin our worth and we measure ourselves against something external.

And I love Craig that you said you lost your yourself or your sense of identity. I'm curious, and this is just a conjecture, I'm curious if you ever had it, because you followed the path so closely, not that you didn't know who you were, but like that, like true internal sense of identity and meaning and worth, like we're always on the path.

Craig: That's actually a really good distinction. You're right. I probably never ever, maybe a little bit when I was a kid, had a little sense of it and started to understand myself a little better. But no, I don't think ever I knew who I actually really was or what I actually truly ever want. I never did that work. I just took the default life as it came. Yeah,

Stephanie: As most of us do.

Craig: Yeah, totally.

Stephanie: Okay. So you find yourselves with no corporate jobs. You find yourselves flaming out of real estate pretty quickly,

Meredith: Yeah. Very quickly.

Stephanie: Very quickly. And then what?

Craig: So when we closed up shop on that business, because we realized that it was making us even more miserable without the paycheck

Stephanie: Right.

Craig: and, impacting our relationship, we decided that it's this above everything else, this relationship above everything else. So we're going to double down and we're going to figure out who we are and what we actually want out of this life.

We've made this huge decision. We can't just jump in willy nilly with no like understanding of who we are, what we want. If we don't have an end destination, how do we plan to get there? So we went on a journey of personal growth, self discovery. We read all the books, listened to all the podcasts. We went to personal growth seminars.

We uncovered all kinds of limiting beliefs about ourselves, which we've alluded to earlier. And we did all that inner work to understand who we are. And we did some really deep soul searching and dream making and understanding what it is we want out of this life. And so that was for like, I don't know, a good six months to a year where we really dug in on just that and not focusing on replacing income and all of that stuff. We knew that that would fall into place once we really understand who we are and what we want.

Stephanie: Okay. But let me just ask one question because there is a practical side of me that needs to understand. Were we waiting tables, where we folding clothes, like were there jobs during this months,

Meredith: There was severance. We each had severance, that eventually expired.

Craig: We had severance and we had some investments and savings that we had, accumulated over the corporate career.

Stephanie: Okay. So you did have a little bit of a cushion that you were able to

Meredith: fall back on, rely on while you were able to do this work.

Yeah, I would have loved to have had the foresight to start this work when I still had my paycheck. That would have been great. I didn't. So thankfully we had the severance for a few months after we left and then, you know, our savings that we started living off.

Stephanie: All right. and again, all these conversations I've had are people who have done the personal growth, who've gone to the seminars, read the books, listened to the podcasts, but they've done it as an individual person. And this was something you guys were doing very much in partnership.

Meredith: Yeah.

Stephanie: So tell me a little bit about how it is that you were growing as individuals, and as a couple.

Meredith: Yeah, it's interesting because the very first event we ever went to was a real estate event that we had planned to go to before we realized that we just were not digging real estate. But we went anyway, when we closed up shop on that business needed a break. So we, decided we were going to do a bit of a Southwestern United States road trip for 6 weeks to kind of get us out of that.

Stephanie: Yep.

Meredith: And so we went to this real estate conference and the person hosting it kept making these like offhand comments of like, oh, yeah, just your regular run of the mill real estate conference, nothing to see here.

And we were like, what? Anyway, so it ended up being a very strong personal growth, you know, foundation to this, event. And so that is the first place that we realize that we, you know, have these underlying limiting beliefs. For me of I'm not good enough. I'm not smart enough. I'm not strong enough. I don't make good enough decisions. Like, I don't fill in the blank. I'm not filling the blank enough was what was my biggest realization from that event. And so I had to, you know, share it out loud with him and it was scary and it was super duper uncomfortable. And he had to do the same with me.

And we both talked about it after that, had we gone to that event alone, individually, we would have gotten a lot from that event personally, from our own personal growth. We would have gotten a ton from it. But being able to go together and hear sort of firsthand in the high emotion environment where each other are at was mind blowing for our relationship. Like, to have that level of vulnerability and openness and sharing and being able to see how deep these limiting beliefs go, you know, it was a game changer for us.

And then every event subsequent to that, that put us on the same page and it's interesting because, you know, his limiting belief is, he says the words are different, but the sort of underlying belief of the enoughness, the self worth theme is there for both of us. And so that first event really sort of catalyzed the whole thing for us.

And I think just put us on the same page, enabled us to grow, both of us together. We went to all the same events. He read a book, then I'd read a book or we'd listen to a book together when we're drunk because we were on that road trip.

So we were listening to books while we were driving. And so we're absorbing the same material. We're, on the same journey or each going through our own. But we're talking it through, like we're listening to a book or a podcast when we're driving and we'll pause it. And then we'll have a conversation about what we just listened to. And so we stayed really connected. We're on our own journey, but we're in the car together.

Stephanie: Yeah. Well, and the other piece of that too is that when you're doing these things together, you have common language, right? We we're learning the same concepts, we're learning the same topics. We can talk about them and know that the language we're using means the same thing 'cause we just listen to the same speaker or you know, whatever, or podcast or

Meredith: Exactly. Yeah. And then we can hold each other accountable too, because as we're going through this journey, one of the things that we really had to both pay attention to was our self talk, which everyone does, right? And we made it, we made a commitment that we were going to speak to ourselves nicely, you know, get rid of that negative self talk.

And there was one day particular in the kitchen where like, you know, I cooked the fish before I actually cooked the vegetables, and the fish cooks quickly, so nothing was ready at the same time. And I was like, oh, idiot, why didn't you, and I didn't even know I said it out loud.

Stephanie: Oh,

Meredith: I hear from the other room, uh, uh, uh, like that's not how we talk to each other anymore.

And I was like, oh, right. So it's just, helpful that you're, when you're on this journey to have that added accountability to catch those things, wasn't even aware of it. Um,

Stephanie: Yeah. Wow. So. You're spending now a year going to these really great, really cool events. Tell me more about sort of what you're learning, you know, after you, so, right. Cause it's layers of an onion. So first it was limiting beliefs and talking to yourself. What other kinds of things are you learning? Um,

Craig: learned a lot about who we were and who we want to be. And who we want to be from a personal, but also who we want to be as far as in the world. And what we want to be known for and what we want to help people with. And so it was through these personal growth conferences that we, we'd bump into, you know, different people. And we were making friends along the way we're networking, we're making friends and one particular person, he talks to us about, you should be coaches. Like you guys have a really strong marriage, and the fact that you're doing this together, this journey you're on, this is one, not easy. And two, you can help a lot of people with what it is you're doing. And so as we were going, we were learning. what we were meant for in the world, like what we were meant to do and how we were meant to serve and give back to the world.

And so I would say that that was a huge game changing insight that pulled from, from those events.

Meredith: Yeah. Building on that. I think that my biggest learning through this is similar, is, it's identity. I get to decide who I am. I'm not just randomly a person that's just walking and talking and doing things randomly.

Like I literally get to choose the identity I want to have. That's evolved for me. I journal that stuff every day, the attributes of the person I want to be, the identities, the attributes, the truths for that. Like I journal that stuff every day to remind myself of who I'm becoming. Cause I literally get to decide who I am. And I, it sounds weird, but I didn't realize that before. I was just going through life.

Stephanie: No, it doesn't sound weird at all because most of us are on autopilot, right? And we're following the, plan, the path, the societal expectation. So Meredith, tell me something about yourself, identity wise, that you chose that was different than who you were before January 1,

Meredith: I've made a list of 12 truths about me. And it was something someone suggested at one of these retreats, and I really struggled. They said come up with 10 truths about you. And I came up with two or three based on the feedback I used to get in my corporate performance reviews.

Like, okay, these things are true about me. Like, I do build strong relationships. Okay, that's true. And I really struggled to get past, like, two. How was it so hard for me to say ten things that I think are true about me? That's how disconnected I had become from who I was. And then I just had this flash of, what if I got a little aspirational?

But when I write my 12 every day, it keeps them front of mind for me so that, you know, every day we're faced with so many decisions and actions I get on constant all day. That when I am reminded of who I want to be every morning, that I'm more likely to act in accordance with that version of me that I want to be.

And every time I make a decision or I take an action where I act in accordance with that. It's like a check mark in the proof column. Like, yes, I do make good decisions. You know, I start to see those things showing up in my life because I'm reminded of them and I focus on them. And when I put those check marks in the proof column, I actually believe that I am this person now. It's not an aspirational thing. It's like, I am a person who makes good decisions. I still do build strong relationships. And you know, all those things are still true and they've become more true every day.

Stephanie: Yeah. Well, and the lovely thing about that is if you're writing that list, that's that list of 12 things every day, you're retraining your brain, you're retraining, even your subconscious like, right. Cause you're seeing that thing that is, that may have begun as aspirational, but is becoming truer and truer every day.

So there's definitely a retraining element there.

Meredith: There's almost a learning, an unlearning, a relearning, like all of that's happening.

Stephanie: Yeah. How about you, Craig? What about your identity? What things did you choose to be after your, personal growth, you know, investment year that were different than who you were as a corporate dude?

Craig: I would say the biggest one is before all of this, I was pretty stoic and, suppressed my emotions because I thought that that's what men do. Like, we just, we don't cry. We don't express our emotions. Yeah, exactly. So I would say this journey has taught me that, I'm a lot more in tune with my emotions than I probably would have allowed myself to believe I was back then. And I own it. I am, who I am. I more sensitive, I think, more empathetic, And, yeah, I think those were things that I thought were weak. I would have definitely suppressed in the past, that I've owned, I own now. So, would say that's the biggest one.

Stephanie: Wow. Okay. So you said 6, 12, 18 months, you were really fully invested in this. What does it look like as you're coming out of that period? What is the new life? How does the new life start to take shape?

Meredith: We still do all those things. Like we still go to events. We still read the books and listen to the podcast. We're still all over that, but we just now have a more of a sense of who we are and what we want to give to the world. So now we own a business that fills us up, that we give back to the world and help them with their relationships.

Craig: So our time now, a lot of it is spent helping clients to find themselves and love themselves and understand their relationship with themselves and with each other and build the marriage that they've always wanted.

Meredith: And it's funny, you know, we ended up there because, you know, going to these events, like Craig said, we met friends and people that we would see over and over and a lot of them started asking for help, you know. Some of them, it was to your point, one, not, both are doing it on this journey together. So how do we have these conversations?

Some of them, they're both there and they're both talking to us. Like, how do we navigate this? How do we navigate that? How do we overcome this obstacle? And so we were getting a lot of requests for help, which we enjoyed, right? We enjoyed just helping the people that had become friends of ours.

And then one of the guys who hosts the event asked us to speak on stage at the next event about marriage and relationships and that was sort of a aha moment for us. Like, huh, maybe we actually do have more to offer here. Like we know our relationship is our superpower. And other people are seeing it too because they're asking.

And so how do we lean into this more? And that's how we ended up being marriage coaches because there's such a demand and we just love doing it. When I think back to my corporate life I enjoyed my job, I felt good when I, delivered something and got a pat in the back, got my gold star, but it doesn't compare to the level of fulfillment and contribution to the world that I feel when you can help someone sort of lock into place the level of happiness and fulfillment that they get from having a marriage that is working.

There's just nothing like that feeling.

Stephanie: That's awesome. So tell me, in your experience of working with, do you mostly work with couples or do you also work with individuals who are like, I'm the leader and not the leader, but like, I'm, I'm the one going down this path. I'm going to drag the other person with me. Like, is it more that or is it more couples?

Craig: It's both, but I would say more couples.

Stephanie: Okay. So, are the couples mostly your age, like say within five or seven or eight years. Like, are these people like the, like 35 to 45, 32 to 48 kind of people, or is it all over the map?

Craig: I would say many of them tend to be a little bit older.

Stephanie: Oh, interesting.

Craig: Yeah. I would say in the 50 plus age range. And I think that's because we're seeing the statistics support that, in the United States, divorce rates are actually coming down a little bit in every age demographic, except for kind of that empty nest group where, you know, the focus has been on kids for, you know, 18, 20 years. And now the focus changes back to, Oh, it's just the two of us now. And who are you, we've kind of lost who we are and what this is. And we've disconnected a little bit. So that's actually a demographic where the rates are going up a little bit.

Meredith: Yeah. Usually when we work with people closer to our age, it's entrepreneurship, usually. Like those are kind of the two groups that we seem to work the most with, the empty nest groups, which is actually super interesting because we really enjoy working with that empty nest demographic. And what we've come to realize is both sets of our parents divorced as we were leaving the home, like we were going away to college.

Both: And

Meredith: so I think that part of the reason we really enjoy working with the empty nest is because we've, you know, lived through it through our parents, and seen the implications of a divorce at that stage of life and how that's impacted them over the last 20 plus years and how, in some ways they're still recovering emotionally and financially. And then also entrepreneurs, like we have a strong network of entrepreneurs.

It's also a demographic where the marriage is tough for entrepreneurship, right? Like there's a, there's high stress, high stress, like layers of complexity that exists there that are a little different. And so, that's, those are the two groups we primarily work with, which is why the ages kind of fluctuate a bit.

Stephanie: Okay. The reason I asked, I was wondering how many people were sort of like you and kind of like waking up and going through that transition. But it sounds like it's, it's a little different and the empty nest makes complete sense to me. Again, based on all my conversations, you know, around this midlife transition, because a lot of times in your forties, you could be finishing your career as, a parent of young people. Right. So, yeah, that makes a lot of sense.

Craig: And our parents actually would have been going through this transition that you're talking about the, the 40 year old transition, back in the nineties when they split up and we were, and I'm. I just think about it now is like, it's exactly what they were doing. My dad had just recently retired from the military and they split up and he wanted, yeah, it's just, it started a new, new career. And yeah, so. Very interesting, actually. I never really put a lot of thought into that until we're having this discussion about, you know,

Stephanie: Yeah, yeah, so now you can take the filter and kind of like, you know, look at it in reverse and see that your parents are probably going through a lot of the same things that you're going through right now.

Craig: Totally. It's crazy to think they were my age at one

Stephanie: I know. Isn't it? It is. It is. My parents were super young. So, my parents were 20 when they had me, so we were always, you know, not that far apart, but even still, it's weird to think, you know, at my 25th birthday party, we had this crazy party. I was living in Boston at the time. We had this crazy party at a nightclub. It was fabulous. And my parents were there and they were, you know, dressed to the nines and having, I remember seeing pictures of like my mom, like having a stogie in the corner with like one of my friends. I was like, what is going on? But my parents were 45, like they were young. This was still a blast for them. So yeah, it's crazy. Okay. so you guys are in your early forties now. Tell me about where are you headed and what is the next layer of growth and or transition for you?

Meredith: Well, a big undertaking of growth and transition for us is we're just starting to write a book right now. So, I know that that is going to add new layers to uncover on this onion as we work through that. And so I'm excited to see, you know, sort of how that adds to our evolution in this, which is kind of exciting.

Craig: Yeah. And more speaking. So I think for us, I think it's going to be continuing this personal growth journey that never ends. And, that's something that I didn't realize going into entrepreneurship that it was going to be such, a requirement, I guess, if you will, because your business can only go to the level that you're at, it will not exceed you.

So it's really just continuing that journey of self discovery. And there's always more to learn about yourself and to optimize you. And I think really right now we're in a season of really digging in on getting better at business and understanding entrepreneurship and really focusing on that.

Meredith: Because the coaching part is the fun, easy part, almost. It's the business part that requires the steeper learning curve for us, for sure.

Stephanie: Yeah, yeah. And I've always found that these things, both in personal growth and in entrepreneurship to be really cyclical, right? Like you work on something and you're working hard on it. So for me, you grab an issue that's, that's holding you back, you've identified it, you've become aware of it. So you work on it and you know, just like you guys, maybe it's a year, maybe it's, 18 months that you're like actively focused on outgrowing this part of yourself. And then you get to a place where you can just enjoy that growth and kind of let it integrate and figure out where the new normal is. And there's a period of smooth sailing for me, usually before the next issue kind of like bubbles up. I'm like, oh, okay. I want to go do that now. And I also, I've got a success under my belt where I know that I've, I've made this shift. And now things are, you know, objectively better than they were previously.

And also in my business, I feel the same way. It's been, you do that investment in learning things and getting better at it. And then you have a period of putting them into use and then, you know, seeing what those results are and the testing. And then you reach again, that smooth sailing and then you go again. Have you guys found that for yourselves as well?

Craig: Totally, and I think one of the biggest things for me is there's always an underlying kind of worthiness and just battling those fears that have always been there. Fear of rejection, fear of failure. And so like, it feels like sometimes you get over it, like you do the hard thing, but somehow there's always still he's back there somewhere. He doesn't rear his ugly head as often. He doesn't come up as often, but still every now and then he shows himself. That voice in the back of your head that tells you you're not good enough or that you shouldn't be doing this. And so I think there's always just that underlying battle with that voice that tries to keep you small.

Meredith: And to your point, Stephanie, I think that voice tends to come out when you're on that next, you started that next cycle. Whatever the fear was from before, when you've pushed through that and you're kind of, Oh, I did it.

You're kind of riding that high and you're feeling really good. And it's like, everything's to your point, objectively good right now. And then it's like, okay, now it's the next challenge. Ooh. That voice is back. Well, what if that was as good as it's gonna get? What if I don't know how to do this next part? What if I fail at this next part? What if, all those things. The fear kind of perks back up when you hit the next challenge, the next unknown piece. And then just like the last one, you push through, but you do the work, you're brave. You know, you find the courage to get through it and then, huh, okay, I did that, and the more often you do that, you know, the quieter the voice gets, but to your point, it never, ever goes away.

Stephanie: Yeah. Craig. I'm very curious. How do you handle that voice now, that's different from it probably hung you up several years ago, right? It held you back. It hung you up. how are you handling it now? When it does rear, it's ugly little head.

Craig: I name it, for one. . I name it. And it's, I know that it's separate. It's not me. It's separate from me. It's like a different person that's just trying to hold me back. So I think my mindset before was, it was self defeating. would let it consume me. It was me and I wasn't good enough.

Whereas now I know that, that,voice isn't me. It's just a thought and we all have thoughts and we aren't our thoughts. And so it's just been a lot of work on that. And a really cool tip that I learned along the way was name that voice and separate it from yourself. It's a different identity, different person. And so naming it has really, really helped and understanding that it's not me.

Stephanie: What's his name?

Craig: Jack.

Stephanie: Nice. I love it. All right.

Meredith: I think the other thing is that you're willing to fail now, right? You're not so afraid when that voice comes up. You're willing to try.

Craig: Yeah. Yeah. I think this entrepreneurial journey has forced my hand on the fact that failure is not, like, it's not an option.

It's going to happen. Like it's not something that's optional. Like it happens and you just have to get comfortable with it. And learn from it and move on. And it doesn't end you. And so I think going through that a little bit, having a couple of failures and understanding that it didn't end me helps a tremendous amount.

Stephanie: Yeah. And also looking at it, especially from an entrepreneurial point of view as, instead of failures as more like iteration. And testing. And right, we're going to test this hypothesis. Oh, that didn't work. So which variables are we going to change before we test it again? And just sort of shifting the, the narrative on the word failure, right? Because the word itself is so heavy and awful, and it leaves a trail and yet most of the things that we encounter on a day to day basis are not failures.

And even if they are, they're really, you know, little F failures. They're not capital F failures. Right.

Craig: Yeah. Great point.

Stephanie: I want to go back just a little bit.

I haven't talked about this in a while, but I, love this. And so I just, I love saying it, when it makes sense, but, when I was in my probably late twenties, early thirties, I had started my journey down the personal growth, path. And there was, a man that I used to work with for a while. And he had this, he gave me this exercise that absolutely changed my life.

So. I had two voices in my head. I never really gave them names, but they were, the nice girl and the mean girl. And the mean girl was very, very loud. And you could barely ever hear the nice girl. And so his homework to me was, at night when you get in bed, grab a journal and I want you to write down all the things that pleased you that day. Not they went well, not you succeeded, not, you know, doesn't have to mean anything. But what pleased you?what did you like about the day? And it could be anything from like, Oh, I was walking down the street. I actually smelled the flowers as I was walking by, right? Like little things into big things, like I won a new client. And then once you've got your list, you turn the page over and then you goline by line and you write down what talents, skills, qualities or abilities you brought to the table that made that thing go well. And so the thing about walking down the street and actually smelling some fresh flowers on the breeze. It's like, I noticed I pay attention. It's simple little things like that. But I did that exercise for about a year and a half, almost every night and it completely shifted the voices in my head. The mean girl came way, way, way, way down and the nice girl went way, way, way, way up. And now there was much more balance.

In, in fact, the nice girl was a little louder than the mean girl now. And it, really brought about quite a shift in my life because you end up just being nicer to yourself. Yeah. And acknowledging that you are responsible for the things that go well in your life. And that brings a lot of, agency. It brings a lot of power. It gives you a lot of backbone.

Craig: That's a great point because journaling, like I journal every day, it's been a game changer. And that, you know, that journaling and just gratitude, like finding the things that have gone well in your life that you're grateful for has really actually changed a lot of that negativity in my head.

I default now to more positive thoughts, to more the things that are going well. I see the positive, whereas growing up and into my thirties, I couldn't say, I couldn't always say that I would have been more focused on the negative, the things that weren't going well.

Stephanie: Yeah. And all the ways that you were letting yourself down.

Craig: hundred percent.

Meredith: I think We tend to assign more accountability to the stuff that goes wrong, like that it's more our fault, and the stuff that goes well, it was lucky, or, you know, we don't take as much ownership of what goes well. So it's like almost putting on a pair of sunglasses, and looking at the world through different lenses, and seeing that, I contributed to that thing that is good, and so when you start to look for that, you see more of that.

Stephanie: Yeah.

Craig: Another really cool thing that we learned along this journey is something called a brag book. It's similar to what you're talking about, like of just writing down all the cool things you've done in life, like all of the amazing accomplishments that you think

Meredith: Everything you're proud of.

Craig: Everything you're proud of, everything that you like, you walk down the street and you smile at a stranger who looked like they were having a bad day. Like the something is, random as that to when

Meredith: you stood up to a bully in grade two on someone else's behalf, like your whole life

Craig: When you won the spelling bee. Like Mm-Hmm. All of the achievements in your life, and you just get this history of your greatness inside of a, a book of some sort.

Mm-Hmm. . So I thought that was really cool. So we, we started, we started doing that.

Stephanie: a little bit of a twist on that I keep in a digital notebook because, as you guys know, when you're an entrepreneur, there is nobody who's patting you on your back, right? Your clients aren't. Your team isn't. And so I keep a little note called kudos. And so anytime somebody sends something my way that was a kudos, I make sure I put it in that note. So like on a low day I can go and be like, Oh, I can't do anything right. And like, Oh no, let me go look at my kudos. Actually. Some people have said some really nice things. It was just the things that come by in passing that, that reflected well on me. I like to keep those in a little, in a little note so I can refer back.

Meredith: Yeah, I think that's incredibly helpful. I do, I do something similar too. I used to do that at my corporate job too. Like some days you just need it.

Stephanie: Oh, you guys, I am so grateful to have you here with me today. Thank you so much for sharing your story and, for taking such good care of me with both of you on the other end. I feel like this went really well, so I'm really happy.

Meredith: Oh, it was our pleasure.

Craig: It was absolutely an honor to be here and be your first double guest, I guess we'll call it, but yeah, it was awesome. It was such a good conversation. Loved it.

Stephanie: Great. All right. Thanks you guys.