20 Minutes with Bronwyn

I think it’s safe to say that the politics of the past several years has made us cynical. That’s definitely been my experience. But recently, I attended a fundraiser for an organization called the Service First Women’s Victory Fund. They are on “campaign to elevate the collective voice of elected women leaders who have dedicated their lives to serving our country and who know what it means to put service and country over partisan politics. Together, we are building a new normal where service leaders and women lead the way in Congress.” ​​https://www.servicefirstwomensvictoryfund.com/ Friends, they renewed my faith. And today, I have two incredible congresswomen who represent the fund to talk to us. You are about to meet Representative Chrissy Houlahan, who serves Pennsylvania’s 6th district and Representative Abigail Spanberger, who serves Virginia’s 7th district. Get ready for a dose of inspiration, and a VERY renewed sense of urgency to get involved in our very fragile democracy.

One of my FAVORITE songs of the last few years is a little ditty called My Type by a band called Saint Motel. My daughter Stella turned me onto it, and it has been on heavy, heavy rotation in my house (and car) ever since.   So imagine my delight when lead singer A/J Jackson’s team reached out to see if I’d be open to having him on my show to talk about his new project.   You will be able to hear my barely concealed fan-girling in this episode, but I did manage to ask him several questions I had to know the answer to.   A/J and his band Saint Motel have performed on some pretty big stages. Think Coachella, Bottle Rocket, Madison Square Garden (opening for Panic! at the Disco), and about a badrillion other venues.    I wanted to ask him what it’s like to perform at that level.   As a singer myself (wink wink), I wanted to know about his vocal warm-up routine (it’s hilarious) and any weird pre-game rituals (rhythmic slapping anyone?).   And I REALLY wanted to understand the thinking behind his recent move beyond music to create something altogether new … by founding an eye wear company!  AVIEW is A/J’s new project,  an eye wear brand that taps into the psychology of color therapy.  I’m fascinated by people who resisted the temptation to just sit around and binge-watch all that streaming had to offer during the pandemic-2020, they actually made something.  The conversation did NOT disappoint, and I can’t wait for you to meet A/J. Check it out ... links to resources below! AVIEW: https://www.aview.com/ My Type: https://spoti.fi/3cg80bJ

In Russian, the word for procrastination is: “provolochka“ In Arabic, they say, “taswif an” In Spanish, it’s aplazar.  In other words, procrastination transcends culture, race, gender, and even transcends time. Seneca was talking about procrastination during the ROMAN Imperial Period, and famously said:  “The fool, with all his other faults, has this also, he is always getting ready to live.” The tendency to procrastinate seems to be baked into our behavioral DNA as homo sapiens. Which seems like some kind of cosmic joke, given how SHORT our lives truly are.  This episode is dedicated to sharing the ONE technique that has changed the procrastination game for me. I’ve never shared it publicly before because it is so laughably simple, but what the heck, I might as well come clean!  This episode is packed with practical strategies for getting around your very human case of procrastination, and I mention a few resources, which I’ve listed here for your viewing/reading/listening pleasure: https://mailchi.mp/bronwyncommunications/procrastination  My Focus + Shine Worksheet Dopamine Nation: Finding Balance in the Age of Indulgence by Dr. Anna Lembke Deep Work: Rules for Focused Success in a Distracted World by Cal Newport “To Stop Procrastinating Start by Understanding the Emotions Involved”, by Shirley S. Wang, Wall Street Journal, 2015 Gwyneth Paltrow x Brené Brown on the Roots of Shame and Vulnerability, Goop Podcast

I have historically had a VERY fraught relationship with eating.    I grew up in Orange County, California, where eating disorders were a rite of passage. And I don’t say that flippantly—almost everyone I knew growing up had a disordered relationship to eating, myself included.   I remember pulling into the student parking lot at my high school and seeing some kid’s Volkswagen decorated with a bumper sticker that read, “No Fat Chicks, my Bug will Scrape.” I remember feeling a sense of alarm … like, I had just been schooled on one of the fundamental rules of adolescence in my community: DO NOT be fat. Whatever else you may do.   I know this tortured dynamic isn’t unique to me. Most women I know have a difficult relationship with food.    It’s VERY confusing to have a tortured relationship to something you literally cannot  live without.Food is a fact of our humanity. But for so many of us, it is a fact shrouded in myth and morality and twisted by culture.    It’s a mess.   My guest today is someone who I think has the potential to break through the misinformation (and frankly, the misogyny) associated with food. Her name is Vanessa Rissetto, and I fell madly in love with her during this conversation. I know you will too.   Vanessa is a registered dietician who Essence named “one of the top 5 black nutritionists that will make you change the way you think about nutrition”.  

A few weeks ago, I was giving one of my favorite talks to a team of professionals at one of my favorite clients. The talk is all about how to build a powerful morning ritual. Something that sets you up for excellence, all day long. At one point, a woman in the session asked me a question … as a mother, how do you get over the feeling of guilt that comes with taking all that time for yourself? I nearly tore my skin off when she asked this.  Why? For about a million different reasons … Because I too have felt this gut-twisting guilt. Because I know that women feel it far more often and more acutely than men feel it. Because I know that question is tied to a much deeper truth about working mothers that we struggle to articulate. That guilt that we feel anytime we take time for ourselves is tied to something poisonous in our culture. This episode is my attempt to shine a light on my journey as a working mother, and how I’ve developed a working rapport with that guilt.  This episode is my attempt to reclaim and redefine what it means to be a “good mother”.  But most of all, this episode is my love letter to every single working mother out there. Ravenmothers*: We ride at dawn.  

The past 18 months have brought a LOT of change and adaptation.   Some of the ways we adapted during the pandemic have been incredibly useful. We took a long, hard look at what we say yes to. What we say no to. If we weren’t already great at washing our hands, we sure as hell are now.   But there is one adaptation that makes me nervous.    That my friends … is our increased consumption of alcohol.    And when I say “our” I really mean MY relationship to alcohol, and perhaps you can relate. It went from a weekend funtime activity to a daily unwind ritual. That’s a major jump in consumption.   Apparently, I’m not alone in this. This specific adaptation—leaning on alcohol to get through the past year and a half—has disproportionately affected women.   According to a RAND Corporation survey on alcohol consumption,  during the Covid-19 pandemic, women have upped their “heavy drinking days” (that’s defined by 4 or more glasses a day) by 41% compared to pre-pandemic.    Here’s the thing : Not all of us are “alcoholics,” but a LOT of us are drinking alcoholically.    I’m worried about us. And I wanted to talk to someone about their journey dealing with alcohol and addiction, and what a life of sobriety could look like.   And I could think of no better guide, no better teacher than my dear friend Maryann Minck. Maryann Minck is a treasure. She’s on Instagram (if you don’t already follow her, you really should), and she is a private chef to some VERY fancy people in Laguna Beach california. Think big wigs. Think celebs. If you follow me on Instagram, you’ll know Maryann because during the pandemic 1.0, she and I did an IG live most Sundays called Cooking with Coco. (She and I have known each other since we were 6 years old, and have called each other Coco for decades, hence the name of the IG lives.)   Here are quick links to the resources she mentioned during the conversation:   The Promises Poem The AA “Big Book” How to find a chapter near you.   So sit back, pour yourself a “decompression Perrier” as Maryann says, and enjoy my dear friend Maryann Minck.   Shine on … we need your light.   B

Welcome to Season 4! To kick things off, I wanted to focus on the toxic communication pattern of martyrdom. Why? Because as communication patterns go, few are as unnerving and damaging to our relationships as martyrdom, AND as communication patterns go, few are as EFFECTIVE in a twisted sense as playing the role of martyr. As they say, we repeat behaviors because on some level, they WORK. Which is why it is so difficult to STOP. So why is martyrdom so powerful? And what can we do about it when it surfaces inside of ourselves, or in others? That's what we're talking about this week. 

As you may already know, authenticity is kind of a big deal to me. It’s the cornerstone of my work in the world. As a communication coach, I’m NEVER interested in “polishing” someone as a communicator. I’m interested in revealing someone in their truest most beautiful form. And I’ve been doing this for a LONG time. The good thing about being devoted to a practice, to a craft, is that you feel quite confident, and quite sure of yourself. The bad thing about being devoted to a craft is that sometimes you think "What could this person possibly teach me? I do this for a living." But that’s exactly what my guest today did, she taught me to see a blind spot in my own pursuit of authenticity. My friends, I’d like to you meet Jessica Zweig, most of the SimplyBe podcast, author of Be. - A No Bullsh*t Guide to Increasing Your Self Worth and Net Worth By Simply Being Yourself She is an award-winning entrepreneur, personal branding expert, the founder and CEO of SimplyBe. Agency where she works with entrepreneurs, creatives CEOs and the companies they lead to help them grow on and offline by leveraging the most powerful marketing tool on the planet: authenticity.

This episode is dedicated 100% to pulling back the curtain of my journaling practice, not because I think it’s unique or special, but because it is probably the single most important ritual I have. My journaling practice is more important to me than therapy. Exercise. Diet. Even church. Truly, if you asked me to sacrifice any of my rituals, you would have to pry journaling from my cold dead hands. Why? Because my journaling practice is the “room of one’s own” that Virginia Wolf talked about … a place out beyond the voices of my family of origin, friends, children, husband, clients, partners, neighbors, and anyone else I come into contact with. It is the engine of my productivity, creativity, and frankly spirituality and I'm here to tell you how to get this engine fired up in your own life.

June of 2014, for the first time in its history, a trans woman—the luminous Laverne Cox— was featured on the cover of Time Magazine, with the headline: The Transgender Tipping Point. Just this April, Elliot Page became the first trans man to grace the cover of the magazine. Whether 2014 marked the “tipping point” for popular culture’s reckoning with the transgender community is debatable … because here we are 7 years later, still trying to tip. Still trying to understand. In 2014, I would say that the experience of knowing someone trans was still fairly unusual. But in 2021? It seems like all of us are 1 degree separated from someone going through the experience of reconciling identity and gender. My guest today is the incredible Sean Garcia, Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist, working in private practice in San Jose. Sean is passionate about serving the needs of transgender/gender variant persons and their families as well as the neurodiverse population. He is currently the only transgender-identified licensed therapist in Silicon Valley who facilitates a monthly transgender group for adolescents and teens. Sean's story, insights and wisdom *changed* the way I see the world. My hope is that he will do the same for you.