In this personal‑development talk, the speaker recounts being abruptly fired after a 25‑year corporate career, describing the shock, mixed emotions of devastation and unexpected freedom, and the ensuing period of introspection. She emphasizes journaling—learned from her father—as a core tool for processing the experience, spending months reviewing her past entries to uncover patterns. Through this reflection she realizes she had become a toxic “corporate bitch,” driven by fear, insecurity, and a need for control. From this insight she formulates the “Shift to Riches” process, likened to a divorce or death ritual, which involves (1) discovering one’s true self and desires, (2) confronting and honoring both the good and the ugly aspects of one’s life, and (3) letting go of the unwanted while embracing one’s talents, confidence, and richness. She explains how this framework helps her and her clients overcome fear, doubt, and negativity to create a richer, more authentic life, and she ends by encouraging listeners to apply the formula to their own challenges.
Chapters
¡Hola! It was a rainy day, November 26, 2007, the Monday following the long Thanksgiving weekend. But I was pumped. I was excited to race into work. It was the holidays, my favorite time of the year. I was also excited about some work and projects that I had, even to close out the year. So I raced into work, my normal 5:30, 6:00 AM, long before anyone else was in the parking lot. I get into work, I sit down at my desk, my head is down, and by 8:05 that morning, I found myself standing in the middle of a parking lot with a pink slip in my hand, the words "You're fired" echoing in my ears, and one single box of my 25-year corporate career. I was devastated, while at the same time I was joyous. I thought I was actually having a nervous breakdown. Or suddenly schizophrenic, I couldn't figure out which. Which is schizophrenic. So one side of me was like, "What in the world? My mentor of 12 years just fired me out of my very glamorous executive career position identity." And yet another side of me was, "Woo-hoo! I'm free!" I'm liberated! And I really just thought I was having a nervous breakdown. The only thing I really knew in that moment was I needed to figure out how did I get here? How did I land up in the middle of a parking lot with a pink slip in my hand? So over the coming months, I kind of went on my own personal retreat. I didn't go to the Himalayas and hum with the monks. I didn't run off and, you know, hike the Appalachians in search of a greater whatever. I simply sat. I simply took the time to kind of go quiet. Have you ever done that? Have you ever really taken the time to just sit, take a deep breath, and go quiet? Now, I had one tool in my arsenal that I highly recommend to anyone who is searching for a really valuable tool that you can use on a regular basis. And it was what my father used to call his free therapist. He used to carry around this little spiral notebook. He'd stick it in his shirt pocket, he'd stick it in his pants. It wouldn't matter if he was out in the middle of a river fly fishing or if he was sitting at dinner with 12 children. Yes, I'm one of 12. Middle child. And yes, we're Catholic. Because that's typically the next question. But he had told me from a very early age, journaling is a great way to just purge the good, the bad, the ugly. If you have a decision to make, write about it. If you're dealing with a struggle, Write about it. If you are just experiencing something really amazing in your life and you want to capture it in that very moment, write about it. So I was probably 8 when I started writing about it. And 30 years later, I have about 150, 200 of these journals filled from front to back. I carry them everywhere. So I heard his voice in my head, As I was sitting there struggling to kind of determine and identify why was I sitting in the middle of that parking lot, and I heard him say, "Journal." So over the coming months, I started reading all of my journals. I never wrote my journals. I don't know if you don't use journaling and you haven't kind of sat down to purge your life. It's a great exercise, it's just a great way of just Pshew! At the same time, you may choose to read it or not. I always chose not to. So I put them aside the minute I wrote whatever I wrote. I didn't even edit. I didn't go back. And therefore, I went and just sat with my journals for probably a good 6, 7 months. At the same time, with myself, saying, "How did I get there? What happened? What—" Or who did I turn into that caused me to lose my 25-year career? Charlie and I, in a beautiful fall afternoon, we were jogging through the dog park. He hated jogging. He still does. He's now 10 and a half. And he's nipping at me, pleading for me to stop. Well, he didn't have to. Because as I was sitting there running— or I'm sorry, as I was running through that park and kind of playing out my life in my head, I suddenly found myself on the ground against a curb bawling my eyes out. All of a sudden it came to me exactly why I was left standing in the middle of a parking lot with one single box of my 25-year career. Career. And that was because I had become the ultimate corporate bitch. I was that woman, that boss, that bully who instead of using my talent, skill, expertise, gorgeousness, and real smarts, I chose to go about it in a very aggressive, it's all about me, selfish kind of way. How do you go about life? How do you go about being the person you are supposed to be? Do you ever really think about how you are going out into the world and presenting yourself to it? Well, I certainly had to take the time to do that, because that is not the person I wanted to be. That I definitely knew I shed it that day, standing in the middle of the parking lot. I didn't know what it was or who it was at the time. I just knew I wasn't that person anymore. So over those months and in the months to follow, I discovered a formula. I looked back at the process that I went through over those 6, 9, 12 months, even as I started penning my first book. I had to apologize, I had to take accountability, I had to take responsibility, and therefore I started penning it, sharing it with the world and all its glory. What I discovered was this: there is a process similar to divorce, similar to death, that you can go through and you can leverage in your life to face anything that comes up to you, but in a very rich, bold, and confident way, not the way I chose to take it. I call it my Shift to Riches Formula. You discover who you are, What you want, what you don't want. You acknowledge everything it is that you want out of this one lifetime that we get that goes really, really fast, and we want to be sure that we're optimizing it. And then you confront the good, the bad, and the ugly. You even honor your riches at the time. And those ugly things, that's why I call them bitches. I learned that the reason I was the woman that I was, that corporate tyrant, that witch, define it and call it whatever you want to call it, was because I was consumed with fear, insecurity, intimidation. I didn't show it. You would never have known it. But we do a good job masking, don't we? We do a good job putting on a face that we want the world to see, that we then remove when we get home. Sadly, I didn't remove it for a long time. At home or at work. It became me. So I learned to confront it. I also learned to honor my riches. I learned to honor those riches of my talents and my smarts and my beauty and my expertise and my confidence and my boldness. And that really kind of shed for me what it was that I didn't want in my life anymore. And then I was able to let go of the things I didn't want and accept the things that I did want. Which then, for me and for you, allows you to then create and accelerate anything you want out of life. I learned through that journey that I can have a really shitty day when I wake up in the morning, but all I have to do is keep in mind what it is I really want out of life and who I really want to be to you, to my family, to my friends, to my work, and then push through whatever might be holding me down what might be causing me to lash out on the world and shed it so I can create whatever it is that I want out of even that situation or that whole circumstance that I might be in. And today I use this as a tool with myself and with my clients because it is a way to be able to push through all of those bitches of fear, insecurity, doubt, negativity, intimidation, whatever it is that you struggle with, so you can put those aside and really pursue and achieve the riches in life that you want. Thank you very much.
