#156: OVERCOME Your Villains With Heather!
4 Nov 2025 · 39 min
Podcast episode (solo) featuring Heather Monahan sharing her personal story of being fired, how that event led her to start her own business, and excerpts from her forthcoming book Overcome Your Villains. Episode includes Heather reading Chapters 1–2 (A New Me; Create Confidence in Three Easy Steps) and introduces the BACK framework (Beliefs, Actions, Knowledge). Several sponsor ad reads and promotional calls-to-action (preorder, bonus bundle) are interleaved.
Chapters
Come on this journey with me each week. When you join me, we are going to chase down our goals, overcome adversity, and set you up for a better tomorrow. Fasten your seatbelts. I'm ready for my close up. Hi, and welcome back. I'm so glad you are here. Okay. This is going to be a little different. You know, I'm always trying to innovate and do something different. I need your feedback, as always. Let me know what you think. Okay. If you've been listening to the show for a while, you know that I auditioned. First of all, HarperCollins leadership made me audition to be Heather Monahan. Isn't that weird? I think it's weird. I feel that the author of a book should have to do the audible version. Right? You wrote it. Why can't you read it? Well, super interesting. I guess that's not the case when you go the traditional publisher route. You have to audition to be yourself. So bizarre. Okay, so backstory is, I got really nervous right before and I text Kendra hall, who she did the audible version of her book, Stories that Stick. I've had her on the show. She's amazing. And I said, what advice can you give me? I don't know what to do. They didn't give me any advice. And she said, just be yourself and don't go too fast. Right. So greatest advice ever. And I love that she gave that to me and that she helped me out when I needed it. And she was right. Just be you. So once I read that, I said, forget it. I'm just clicking record and I'm gonna just read. And so I just read a couple of chapters. I uploaded it, and a couple days later I heard back. I got to be. I'm Heather Monaghan. Okay, super exciting. But then be careful what you work so hard for. Cause then you might get it. And now I had to record the audible version, which I actually don't mind doing. It's not very different than recording a podcast, Right? You're talking into a mic and. And it is weird reading your own book because you worked so hard over such a long period of time to create it and now you're just going through it. It's sort of a surreal experience. But I'm super grateful I was given the opportunity. And I think. I don't wanna say, I think I know you're gonna love it. I believe it came out so good. And here's why. They allowed me, instead of going to the cookie cutter place, recording studio place that I didn't want to Go to. They let me record with one of my old producers from the radio business who I've known for years and who did my first audiobook for Confidence Creator with me. And so I feel safe with him. I trust him. He cares so much. He's just. He's a great person. Shout out to Scotty if you're listening. I'm so grateful for you. And it was just an amazing experience. I'm so grateful it came together the way it did. Okay. And I kept asking my point of contact@HarperCollins, hey, can I have some creative flexibility with the audiobook? I really liked how David Goggins did his. And, you know, at the end of each chapter, he gives behind the scenes and he takes it into real time, not just what the actual hard copy book is like. Right. It's different. There's more to it. And she said yes. So I just can't wait for you to hear it. I'm so proud of it. I can't wait to hear it. I'm super excited. I don't even know when I get to hear it. That's what's so weird about doing a book with a traditional publisher. You don't find out all that much information until after the fact. Okay, so here's what I'm going to do today. I'm going to read the first couple of chapters for you to one, give you a little insight and peek into Overcome your Villains. If you haven't pre ordered it yet, get it now because you can still get the $500 bonus bundle for free when you get it, go to overcomeyourvillains.com right now. Okay, so I'm gonna read you the first couple chapters. However, when I did the audiobook version, at the end of every chapter, I just riffed and I would just talk about what I thought about that chapter, what was really happening behind the scenes when I wrote that chapter, or what I meant. I don't even really know what I said, but just kind of whatever came to me. I just spoke my mind. I'm super excited to hear that part too. Okay, so here we go. We are going to. This is now. I'm completely done with the audiobook, by the way. Just finally finished. Super grateful it's done. And this is the first time I'm reading my book since I did the audible version. Okay. So weird that I'm even an author. Much less so weird. This is my second book. The whole thing's weird. Okay, just know this. Anything is possible. That's what I want you to know, right? Because I can't believe that not only did I write one book, but now I wrote two. And not only did I write them, I've done the audible versions and they're good. They're really good. And I'm super proud. So anything's possible for me. Anything is possible for you. Okay, here we go. Overcome your villains. Chapter one A New Me I Got fired. Three words I never imagined I would say. Three words I was too embarrassed to say to my family and friends. Three words that changed my life forever in ways I had no way of predicting. Some people describe being fired as a humbling experience. That's not how I would describe it. Maddening. Shocking. Psychotic. Those are all words that instantly come to mind when I look back on that awful moment. And what made it all that and more was how it all went down. It might be a little easier to understand if I give you some backstory first. I grew up poor. My childhood was not one I like to sit around and reminisce about. In some ways this has been a blessing because I learned to be driven like no other. But in other ways, this has been a holdback for me for much of my life. I was driven to chase a paycheck more than anything. All I knew was I didn't want to be poor. I didn't want to struggle. I didn't want the kids I dreamed I would have someday to grow up in a trailer like I did. That feeling of standing in the grocery checkout line and realizing you would have to put back half of the items on the belt because you didn't have enough money pained me.
Oddly.
Some people would have no problem with that. For some reason, however, when it happened to me, it ripped my heart out. The shame I felt thinking others were looking down on me, realizing I couldn't buy what I wanted and had to operate differently was long lasting. Once you feel like that, there's a really good chance you will do anything in your power to never feel that way again. And that's exactly how I responded. Working my way up I started delivering newspapers at 10 years old, then bussing tables at a diner, then working the front counter and drive thru window at a fast food restaurant, then waiting tables and eventually bartending my way through college. My dream was to graduate and join a sales team. To be completely honest, I didn't just dream of joining a sales team. I desperately wanted to join a sales team. Not because I felt a passion or excitement to work for a business, but because I quickly learned that the owners of the Nicest cars in the parking lot where I slung drinks were always salespeople. They were the ones who left the biggest tips. They were the ones who had the nicest houses. They were the ones who had enough money to buy the most expensive suits, dresses and shoes. And they never had to put their groceries back. I joined a top winery sales team as soon as I graduated and I flat out worked everyone, even the old timers. It didn't take long before I became the top salesperson and I was promoted to brand manager. It also didn't take long after getting promoted that my new boss started sexually harassing me. I was too afraid to take on the company, too afraid to fight for what I knew was right. So I quit. I aggressively put myself out there looking for another sales job while bartending on the side at a networking event. A couple of weeks later, I met a man who stood out from the rest of the crowd and I decided to chat him up. He told me I should go to work for him and I told him he wouldn't be able to afford me. When he asked me how much I expected to be paid, I told him $75,000, never imagining he would pay anyone he just met at a networking event. That kind of salary you start in the morning, he told me. I was of course excited by this stroke of good fortune. I walked into the event a part time bartender and walked out newly employed with a 75k salary. What I didn't realize at the time was that I had left a lot of money on the table. I had undersold myself. This was something I would do again many times in my career. When you don't see your own worth, others won't see it either. People pay you what you believe you are worth. I later learned that this man was worth millions of dollars and he saw potential in me. I quickly became his top seller and he grew me to become his partner. In my early 20s, I moved myself across the country to take his $25 million property and turn it into a $55 million property. In just under three years, I finally had some money. I had established a reputation for generating revenue like few others in the industry. Still, I wasn't satisfied. Growing up poor had lit a fire in me that grew and grew until it consumed me. I needed more revenue, more room for growth, a higher ladder to climb, a bigger salary, more commission. I took my cash and my reputation and moved to Florida to go to work for a publicly traded radio company. It was a bigger company than the one that I had been working at with more revenue and far more upside. I pitched myself for a job that didn't exist and was awarded VP of Sales based on my performance. I was quickly promoted two more times and ultimately named Chief Revenue Officer. I was one of only two women on the executive team and I was as proud as I could be. I had finally arrived. There was just one problem. The other woman on the executive team seemed to despise me and she was the CEO's daughter. Instead of engaging this woman in battle, I decided to ignore the office politics and focus on growing revenues, which I did by leaps and bounds. When I started at the company, we were billing 100 million annually. Two and a half years later, after I was named Chief Revenue Officer, that number had doubled to more than 200 million annually. Much of this increase was the direct result of my own effort. I had the house, the car, the clothes, the cushion of cash in my bank account. I had made my dream come true. I had it all. And then I was fired. In an instant I went from being the hero who had more than doubled the company revenue, had won countless awards, had been promoted three times, and had just been named one of the most influential women in radio. Three weeks earlier. This was not a humbling experience. This was a horrific moment that left me under a weighted blanket with a bottle of Chardonnay attached to my wrist. This was the lowest of the lows of my life. A grown up version of getting your heart broken in high school. You thought you had it all figured out. You were so happy on top of the world, only to find out you were fooling yourself all along. That was exactly it. I had been fooling myself.
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All the while that woman was hating me and nursing her apparent desire to eradicate me from the company. You see, when her father became ill and needed to step down as CEO, he elevated his only daughter to the position of interim CEO and she tortured me. I can't lie, the way this villain treated me made me feel miserable. But I refused to buckle I wouldn't let her get the best of me. I refused to show any weakness. Here's just one example. I would be sitting in the conference room, usually the only other woman in the room, surrounded by male colleagues. As the villain would walk in, she would go up to each person at the table, one by one, saying hello and even hugging some. Then she would walk right by me as if I didn't exist. Those days were tough. They were tough because by ignoring me, she was signaling to everyone else that I didn't matter. I was invisible. This feeling of being ignored really got to me. And it became worse over time. And every time I allowed this to occur, I could feel her getting stronger as I got weaker. I was like Alice in Wonderland, shrinking away to nothing after taking a swig from a bottle labeled Drink Me. I hated that feeling that I didn't exist. Things had gotten so bad that the night before I knew she was going to be in a big meeting with me. I would start to panic. What would I do when she would ignore me again? I desperately needed my paycheck. So I couldn't do what I most wanted to do. Tell her off. What could I do? What I hadn't realized was that allowing her to continue to ignore me was not only chipping away at my self confidence, it was building hers and all the other executives and managers could see it. The rest of the team looked at me differently. Everyone had always seen me as a tremendously confident high performer. But I was starting to shrink in front of their very eyes. I was becoming nothing. I finally had enough of this game. I decided that while I couldn't tell her off, I could make sure she and everyone else in the meeting knew I was there to get ready for this moment. I practiced exactly what I was going to say in the mirror at home the morning of the meeting. I picked a red outfit. A power color that allows me to feel my best. Did my hair took some extra time to look good because I knew it would turn my self confidence up just a notch. I wanted to stand tall and exude confidence. And with all my preparations complete, I. I knew I would. I had reached a point where nothing was worth allowing me to feel like a B rate version of myself. I wasn't nothing. I had delivered millions of dollars worth of business to the company for years. I deserved to be seen and heard. To put the icing on my confidence cake. I played my fire me up playlist as I drove to the office. I showed up to the meeting and chatted everyone up. Many people complimenting me on my dress. I smiled, thanked them. It was game on. Then in came the interim CEO, my new boss, the villain. She walked from person to person, as she always did, and passed by me as she always did. She sat at the head of the table, where she always sat. That's when I made my move. I raised my hand and said, good morning. You must have missed me. I'm down here, excited to be here. I gave her a big smile and a wave. I wasn't being mean or disrespectful, but in that moment, I was building my confidence. And I could see that hers was being chipped away. The reality is that in any moment you are either building your confidence or chipping away at it by the actions you take or don't take. If my new boss had wanted to build her confidence back, she could have said something like, Good morning, Heather. Thank you for understanding that wasn't intentional. Glad you're here. Thank you. Now, let's begin the meeting. But she didn't say anything. She hadn't seen that one coming. I saw a few of the men at the table shoot glances to one another and I even saw one of them trying to hold back his laugh. I had let it be known loud and clear I would no longer be ignored. That was it. The game ended right then and there. Or so I thought. Looking back, I believe this was the moment when the villain decided to get rid of me for good. Within a few months, I was gone. I'm sure you know the saying, when one door closes, another door opens. That's not how I saw it. I was in a total panic. My source of income had been suddenly and irrevocably cut off. Not only that, I had signed a non compete agreement when I became Chief Revenue Officer, which prohibited me from taking a position with a competitor for one year after leaving the company. This meant that I couldn't leverage my vast network of connections in the industry for the next year. I would have to find some other way to generate income. And I needed income. There's another part of the story I neglected to tell you. When I was fired, I was a single mom with a 10 year old son. Dylan. While you may be expendable, you are never replaceable. There's no one else in the universe like you. I didn't realize this at the time, but today as I write these words, it is crystal clear. You have the ability and opportunity to take your unique skills and attributes wherever you want. Just because you have been successful in one lane doesn't mean that you can't succeed in another. Getting fired was painful and heartbreaking. That day, I truly felt like I had lost everything. What I didn't realize was that while they could take away my paycheck, everything else stayed with me. No one can take your reputation, your experiences, your network, and your talents. No one is replaceable. The scariest thing I did was deciding not to go back to corporate America and work for another company. Instead, I decided to go to work for myself. I would take all the success I had earned for others and use that success instead to ensure the future of my son and me. Sitting here right now, I still can't believe I did it. While I loved the security my steady paycheck provided, I hated the way it made me feel. I wasn't living up to my potential, and I certainly wasn't happy. I was simply surviving, hoping my boss would finally recognize my worth and leave me alone to do what I did best. But that's no way to live. To find your true calling in life, you need to be willing to take risks and put yourself on the line. This may mean escaping your box by jumping out the window and realizing you've got wings and that they will open when you need them most. I think we all intuitively know this is the case, but sometimes we have to be pushed out the window to discover our wings have been there all all along. Making the decision to sit alone instead of sitting at a table where you are not supported is not easy, but it will be worth it. There's a little more to the story about that day. When my new boss fired me, she slid two different papers in front of me. One memo simply read, heather Monahan has been terminated. The other memo was much longer, and it said something to the effect of Heather Monahan had a wonderful career. The company sadly decided to resign and pursue other interests. The company is so supportive and happy for her. We wish her well, blah, blah, blah. She also had a stack of papers behind the two memos. She explained that I could pick whichever memo I wanted to sign, but if I signed the long memo and the stack of papers behind it, she would be handing me a check as a parting gift. If I instead decided to sign the One Line memoir and leave that stack of papers unsigned, I would get nothing. After years of countless flights, work trips, leaving my son behind with babysitters, and now being treated terribly by this woman, I knew that she was getting a tremendous amount of pleasure from this final opportunity to twist the knife she'd already stabbed deep in my back. I'm Certain she was convinced I would sign the long memo and take the big check. Not today, villain. I pushed both pieces of paper back across the desk at her and I said, I didn't write these memos, so I won't be signing either one of them. I'm not sure what you're trying to pull here, but if that is all you've got, I'm leaving. In that moment, the entire dynamic in the room changed. What the villain didn't know was that I was finally more driven to respect myself and than I was to take the money. At that moment, I was no longer the little girl who had grown up poor without the things the other children in my school had. I was no longer the young girl who had to put back groceries on the shelf because she didn't have enough money to pay for them. I was no longer the career woman who always put my company's needs before the needs of myself and my family. That was a pivotal moment for me, the turning point in my life that sent me down an entirely new path. As I stood up from that table, I watched as my boss's face turned beet red. She may have won the battle, but she had lost the war. When I stood up for myself that fateful day, I set myself up for finding success and happiness on my own terms, not on someone else's. But that success would not come overnight. There was much work to be done, and there was that little thing about not having a paycheck. As I drove home from the office that last time, I didn't know how I was going to pay the mortgage for my condo, make the payments for my son's school, or take care of my other bills. But I knew that I had what I needed to figure it out. That day. That woman thought she had fired me, but I had actually just fired my villain. When you fire your villain, you set yourself up to take off. That's what this book is all about. In the pages that follow, I'll reveal to you the lessons I learned after I was fired and how I used what I learned to rebuild my confidence and find the kind of success that we all dream of having in our lives.
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Remember I'll show you how to identify the villains in your life and leapfrog right over them, leaving them in your rear view. My goal is to help you wake up, excited about the day to come and everything else ahead of you. Now let's get started. Chapter 2 Create Confidence in Three Easy Steps this book is built on the solid foundation of my powerful Back process which takes us back to a time in our lives when we were full of happiness, believed in ourselves without question, and were willing to take risks without fear of failure. You don't think that's true for you? I promise you it is. As children we didn't second guess ourselves before attempting to crawl or walk, we just did it. And if at first we didn't succeed, we picked ourselves back up again and again and again until we achieved our goal. We embrace the challenge in a fearless and joyful way, full of self confidence and always optimistic for the future. Take a look at babies learning to crawl or walk. They aren't nervous about what other people are thinking, they aren't waiting for someone to give them permission. They have an urge to move and they go all in. That is where we are going to get you back to. There are three parts to the back framework. Beliefs, the self talk and other internal messages we have accepted as truth. Actions the actions we are currently taking and plan to take in the future to find success and happiness. Knowledge the information and skills we need to be more effective people in every aspect of our work and personal lives. Together, BACK will provide you with a powerful and easy to implement framework for creating the confidence you need to leapfrog the villains at work in your career and in your life. This book has been designed around the back framework, enabling you to quickly and easily identify and read the chapters that focus specifically specifically on whatever it is you need most. Working on your self beliefs, taking action or expanding your knowledge. I want to give you a sense of what that means in this chapter and then I need you to jump to the part of the book that resonates most with you. For example, I am an action person. I feel most comfortable with the idea of taking action. So that's the part of the book I would start with. I know plenty of people however, who are more drawn to self reflection and would rather start with the belief part. You decide what is right for you. There are no wrong answers. When you start with part one, you are jumping right into examining your own self talk and inner beliefs. What I have discovered is that for years I had been telling myself a story that was not true. I have a feeling that you too have been telling yourself a self limiting and inaccurate story. Can you think of what that story could be? The one in your head that holds you back from achieving your goals and dreams time after time? Let's decide today that this story is inaccurate. It's just not true. What would that mean to your life? Here's an example from my own life. I grew up being called the social one while my sister was called the smart one. She had perfect grades, flawless SAT scores, graduated at the top of her class and became an accomplished lawyer. I, on the other hand, had always assumed I wasn't smart. Not because anyone called me dumb, but because I saw her as a smart one, which I thought meant I wasn't. Throughout my life I told myself the story that I was not smart. That meant that I sat out of meetings if the person coming in had gone to Harvard or some prestigious university. It meant that I opted out of opportunities in which I could have advanced because I was holding onto a story that I was not intelligent. Fast forward to last Christmas when my son Dylan and I met my sister and her kids at Walt Disney World. We were sitting, talking when my sister shared that she had just taken her kids in for an IQ test. I laughed. Who does that but my sister? Of course she had done that and they're probably geniuses just like her. She asked me if I had taken Dylan in for an IQ test. I told her no and laughed again. She told me she didn't understand why I didn't get him tested. Then she asked if I remembered taking the test as a child and I did not. She told me that the school had directed my mother to bring my sister in for an IQ test. There was no babysitter available, so I joined them. Since I was there, they offered the test to me too and we were only a year and a half apart in age. My sister told me that her scores came back off the charts in the top 1%. A genius for sure. Then she also told me that while my score was not as high as hers, I also rated in the genius range mic drop. This was news to me. I had never heard this story before. I couldn't believe I had spent the previous 45 years believing I wasn't smart and then behaving in ways that reflected and reinforced this false belief. Make the decision today to stop telling yourself the story that is holding you back. It just isn't true. What story are you telling yourself that is currently holding you back? If this resonates with you, then jump right to the belief part of this book and let's get to work on changing those false beliefs. Of course action is my jam. I would always rather be doing something than self reflecting or evaluating and accessing knowledge. Maybe because I've loved sports my whole life and working out, or maybe because I understand the power of momentum. If you're like me, you will want to start with part two. Owning your own voice and speaking up takes practice, but with time becomes second nature. Let me give you an example. 20 years ago when my confidence was low, I never felt sure if my ideas were good ones. That meant that if I was in a meeting, I avoided raising my hand for fear someone else would say mine was a terrible idea. It takes practice, but speaking up can be learned. Speaking up is an action step. Challenging yourself to speak up one time a day and starting off small will work baby steps. I also realize now that people are invited to a meeting or to be on a team because of their potential contribution. By not contributing, you're actually not holding up your end of the bargain and not warranting your seat at the table. That is a problem. I've also seen countless times when more experienced people don't speak up or contribute their great ideas because they are afraid those ideas will be seen as antiquated. Conversely, junior people won't share their great ideas for fear that others will say that they don't understand the business or that they missed the mark completely. Both have the potential to add value, but in order to do so, they need to take action and raise their hands. Do your job, speak up and contribute. What's the worst that can happen? Warrant the seat at the table you have been given. While some people gravitate to beliefs and some to actions, you may be pulled more towards knowledge. If you are most comfortable listening to podcasts like this one, or reading books or relying on mentors to learn, then you're going to want to jump forward to part three. I have learned so much from my time in corporate America, my time in the C suite, and my time in therapy and studying psychology in college. I'm Excited to share with you what I have learned. Here's an example. Fear is a liar. This is one of the most powerful statements I have learned in my entire life. Accepting that fear is a liar, nothing but false ideas I have made up in my own mind, has changed everything for me in my life. Some say it's an acronym for False Evidence Appearing Real. Whether it's fear that something could happen to my son or fear fear of what could happen to screw up my next presentation, or fear of what someone might say, the story created in my mind is always worse than the reality. When I was a kid, I learned that if I felt fear, I should run home and hide. Somehow I hung onto this concept throughout my whole life. What that did was cripple me in my personal life and in my career. I've since learned that when I feel fear, I should not run away and hide. Instead, I should run toward it and embrace it. Fear is a green light. That means go and go faster. I own the power to dissolve the fear I feel by accepting that it is not real. These days when I feel fear, I go running right into it. That is the only way to prove it is a liar. And it always pays off for me. It will pay off for you too. Don't overthink this. Just go to the part of the book that you feel is right for you. Can't decide? Then just turn the page. Meet a different guest each week. Okay, so that was the first two chapters. I hope that you loved it.
Oh my gosh.
I wanna read the whole book to you right now. But I had to give you an idea what Overcome youe Villains is about. It's my powerful three step process that's going to rock. If you rock the process, you are gonna leapfrog adversity, overcome challenges and overcome your villains left and right. So let's giddy up and get it going. Head over to overcomeyourvillains.com and you can pre order the book. Get the $500 Bonus Bundle for free. Take action. Buy it for a gift. Buy it for you. And just know this. I appreciate you immensely. The target number HarperCollins leadership gave me to sell on launch date is massive. Anything you can do to help will be greatly appreciated. All right, if you are loving the show, subscribe, rate, review, share it on social. It means the world to me and always tag me. I want to hear your questions. I want to thank you when you share on Social and I want to keep showing up to keep helping, creating confidence in you because you are are worth it until next week. I decided to change that dynamic. I couldn't be more excited for what you're gonna hear. Start learning and growing. Inevitably something will happen. No one succeeds alone. You don't stop and look around once in a while. You could miss it. Come on this journey with me.
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