This Is Woman's Work with Nicole Kalil

If you grew up thinking adulthood meant “figure it out once and then coast,” this episode is your loving wake-up call. Reinvention isn’t a plot twist anymore — it is the plot. Careers shift, relationships change, industries get AI’d, and your dreams evolve faster than your LinkedIn headline. In this conversation, I sit down with Ilana Golan — F-16 flight instructor turned tech exec turned founder & CEO of Leap Academy, a career reinvention platform that helps driven professionals leap into leadership, entrepreneurship, and portfolio careers.  We talk about what it actually takes to reinvent yourself (again and again), build a portfolio career that doesn’t burn you out, and turn your hardest seasons into rocket fuel instead of reasons to shrink. Because staying stuck isn’t a personality trait. It’s a habit. And you’re allowed to outgrow it. In This Episode, We Cover: Reinvention as a life skill, not a crisis – why you’ll need to reinvent every 1–2 years in today’s world, and how to stop making that mean you did something wrong. IQ, EQ, and now AQ (Adaptability Quotient) – the new metric that matters Breadcrumbs & clues – how to spot your zone of genius in the patterns, feedback, and “random” skills you’ve picked up along the way. From failure to fuel – how Ilana rebuilt after being kicked out of her own company, and how to move from spiral to experiment when life blows up.  The 5 days / 5 weeks / 5 months framework – a simple, non-scary way to test new directions without burning your life to the ground. Portfolio careers 101 – what they are, why one job won’t meet all your needs, and how to add new income/impact streams without looking like a confused hot mess.  Stability and possibility – how to choose a “baseline” role or revenue stream so you feel safe enough to play, experiment, and leap. Reinvention after rejection, grief, or trauma – why you can’t tell your story from the open wound, and how to move from bleeding to scar to superpower. Because the moment you stop chasing the life you think you should want, you finally make space for the one that was meant for you all along. Thank you to our sponsors! Get 20% off your first order at curehydration.com/WOMANSWORK with code WOMANSWORK — and if you get a post-purchase survey, mention you heard about Cure here to help support the show!  Sex is a skill. Beducated is where you learn it. Visit https://beducate.me/pd2550-womanswork and use code womanswork for 50% off the annual pass. Connect with Ilana: Website: https://www.ilanagolan.com Leap Academy: https://www.leapacademy.com IG: https://www.instagram.com/ilanagolanleap LI: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ilanagolan/ Youtube: https://youtube.com/@ilanagolan-leap-academy LeapCon (free gift and discount code): http://leapacademy.com/tiww (Code: TIWW) Related Podcast Episodes: Your Value Doesn’t Expire: Career Reinvention Over 40 with Loren Greiff | 344 Confidence Isn’t Born, It’s Built — Lessons from the Cockpit to Real Life with Michelle “MACE” Curran | 343 7 Keys To Unlock Your Dynamic Drive with Molly Fletcher | 229 Share the Love: If you found this episode insightful, please share it with a friend, tag us on social media, and leave a review on your favorite podcast platform! 🔗 Subscribe & Review:Apple Podcasts | Spotify | Amazon Music | YouTube Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Join journalist and TEDx speaker Julia Hotz, author of The Connection Cure, as she challenges the narrow view of health. She introduces the concept of social prescribing, revealing that up to 80% of health is shaped by social factors. Julia outlines five key categories for enhancing well-being—Movement, Nature, Art, Service, and Belonging. She shares inspiring case studies, offers fun ways to make movement joyful, and emphasizes the importance of reconnecting with what truly matters in life for better mental health.

Michelle Grosser, a nervous system strategist and former trial attorney, joins the discussion on regulating your nervous system to combat burnout. She reveals how the body sends four times more messages to the brain than vice versa, emphasizing the need for safety over success. Michelle discusses the importance of daily movement, stillness, and play, cautioning against high-intensity workouts when overwhelmed. They also explore how emotional suppression and weak boundaries can lead to burnout, urging high-achieving women to stop settling for 'just fine' and prioritize their well-being.

In this engaging talk, Dr. Emily Anhalt, a clinical psychologist and emotional fitness expert, delves into the seven traits that build emotional resilience: mindfulness, curiosity, boundaries, empathy, communication, and playfulness. She emphasizes the importance of balancing empathy with boundaries to prevent burnout and shares practical strategies like emotional push-ups to confront discomfort and foster growth. Dr. Anhalt also discusses the power of trusting your future self to manage life's challenges and offers insights on how feedback can be a tool for personal development.

Karen Freeman, Chief Product Officer at DCM Insights and co-author of The Activator Advantage, shares insights on transforming business development. She highlights why client loyalty is dwindling and the shift in buyer behavior away from trust. Karen outlines the importance of actively building pipelines, treating networks as assets, and consistently creating value. She introduces the Activator profile—commit, connect, and create—as essential for success, emphasizing that doing good work alone is no longer sufficient in today's landscape.

In this engaging discussion, Tonya Lester, a Brooklyn-based psychotherapist and author specializing in women's emotional health, challenges the stereotype of 'being difficult' as a negative. She delves into the common habit of women suppressing their needs, highlighting the damaging 'do-nothing-do-nothing-freak-out' cycle. Tonya offers practical phrases for expressing hard truths calmly and stresses the importance of healthy anger in relationships. Listeners will learn the value of setting boundaries and the necessity of speaking up to foster genuine connections.

We’re getting unapologetically muscular today. Former Wall Street Journal reporter turned professional bodybuilder Anne-Marie Chaker joins us to talk about why women’s strength training is not a vanity play—it’s a longevity strategy, a confidence accelerator, and a rebellion against “shrink yourself” culture. In this episode, we dig into: 🏋️‍♀️ Why strength training is self-care that actually works—and how lifting transforms more than your body 🧠 The mental health perks of moving heavy things (spoiler: it’s better than a bubble bath) 🚫 Breaking up with “skinny culture” and redefining beauty, power, and health on our own terms 💪 Motivation vs. discipline—how showing up matters more than feeling ready 👩‍👧 Raising the next generation to value strength over smallness and confidence over comparison 📚 Insights from Anne-Marie’s book Lift: How Women Can Reclaim Their Physical Power and Transform Their Lives—a call to take up more space, in every sense of the word. This conversation is funny, real, and a powerful reminder that stronger is better than smaller—because it’s for you, not for them. Thank you to our sponsors! Get 20% off your first order at curehydration.com/WOMANSWORK with code WOMANSWORK — and if you get a post-purchase survey, mention you heard about Cure here to help support the show!  Sex is a skill. Beducated is where you learn it. Visit https://beducate.me/pd2550-womanswork and use code womanswork for 50% off the annual pass. Connect with Anne: Website: https://annemariechaker.com/   Book: https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/authors/2268426/anne-marie-chaker/ Substack: https://annemariechaker.substack.com/  Related Podcast Episodes The Stress Paradox: Why We Need Stress (and How to Make It Work for Us) with Dr. Sharon Horesh Bergquist | 294  How To Breathe: Breathwork, Intuition and Flow State with Francesca Sipma | 267 Apple Podcasts Don’t Let Your Doctor Kill You: The New Hormone Solution with Dr. Erika Schwartz | 305 Share the Love: If you found this episode insightful, please share it with a friend, tag us on social media, and leave a review on your favorite podcast platform! 🔗 Subscribe & Review:Apple Podcasts | Spotify | Amazon Music | YouTube Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

If you’ve ever thought, “I’m not a leader, I just have 47 people depending on me and zero time to pee” — this one’s for you. In this episode, we’re pulling back the curtain on what really gets in the way of women leading at work, at home, and in our own lives. Spoiler: it’s not your title, your org chart, or your calendar. It’s the invisible beliefs, the perfectionism, the “I’ll just do it myself,” and the “if I say no everything will fall apart” stories running in the background. Executive coach, author, and Harvard Business Review podcast host Muriel Wilkins joins Nicole to unpack the seven hidden leadership blockers that quietly cap our potential — especially for women who’ve been praised their whole lives for doing it all, doing it perfectly, and never dropping a ball. Together, they dig into how to actually lead yourself first, rewrite old scripts like “I can’t make a mistake” and “I don’t belong here,” and create a version of leadership that doesn’t require burnout, over-functioning, or pretending to be someone you’re not. Because leadership isn’t just about managing people. It’s about managing you — your beliefs, your boundaries, and your response when things go sideways. We explore: Why leadership isn’t a title, it’s how you show up in every area of your life The 7 hidden leadership blockers that keep high-achieving women stuck and exhausted How “I need to be involved” and “I can’t say no” destroy your capacity and your team’s growth The quiet cost of perfectionism and the belief “I can’t make a mistake” The difference between being a leader and actually leading (yes, there’s a big one) Why real confidence isn’t knowing you’ll get it right — it’s trusting you can handle whatever happens Because at the end of the day, leadership isn’t about having all the answers — it’s about having the inner steadiness to face whatever comes next without abandoning yourself in the process. Thank you to our sponsors! Get 20% off your first order at curehydration.com/WOMANSWORK with code WOMANSWORK — and if you get a post-purchase survey, mention you heard about Cure here to help support the show!  Sex is a skill. Beducated is where you learn it. Visit https://beducate.me/pd2550-womanswork and use code womanswork for 50% off the annual pass. Connect with Muriel: Website: https://murielwilkins.com/ Book: https://www.murielwilkins.com/books Podcast: https://www.murielwilkins.com/podcast-coaching-real-leaders   Related Podcast Episodes: From Small Business to Big Impact: Leadership, Confidence, & Community at the Goldman Sachs 10K What Good Leaders Can Learn from Bad Bosses with Mita Mallick | 351 How To Build An Emotionally Intelligent Team with Dr. Vanessa Druskat | 328 Share the Love: If you found this episode insightful, please share it with a friend, tag us on social media, and leave a review on your favorite podcast platform! 🔗 Subscribe & Review:Apple Podcasts | Spotify | Amazon Music | YouTube Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

We love to talk about authenticity at work… right up until someone actually shows up as their full, messy, human self and makes everyone clutch their pearls. In this episode, we unpack what it really means to be yourself at work with Claude Silver — the world’s first Chief Heart Officer at VaynerX and author of Be Yourself at Work: The Groundbreaking Power of Showing Up, Standing Out, and Leading from the Heart. We get into the difference between authentic presence vs. executive presence, why “that’s just who I am” is usually “fear” in a cute outfit, and how to stop armoring up at work without turning every meeting into group therapy. We talk about perfectionism, people-pleasing, power dynamics, calling people in (instead of just calling them out), and what it actually costs you and your company when you leave the real you at home. If you’ve ever wondered how to bring your heart into a workplace that’s still obsessed with your hustle, or how to belong without shrinking or pretending, this conversation is your permission slip to stop faking it and start leading from the heart. We Explore: What authenticity at work really means (and why it’s not “I say whatever I want, whenever I want”) The difference between confidence and authenticity – and why you need both How Claude defines authentic presence and why “executive presence” is starting to feel outdated Perfectionism as a confidence derailer and how it quietly kills trust, connection, and creativity How to share your real life (kids, chaos, hard mornings) at work without oversharing or dumping Navigating power dynamics when a client, boss, or leader says something that goes against your values How to find “your people” at work Gen Z and Gen Alpha aren’t being “difficult” — they’re just done with workplaces that value performance over personhood. They expect companies to evolve, not the other way around. If leaders want to keep and motivate this generation, they need to ditch command-and-control and lead with humanity. Authenticity isn’t a bonus anymore — it’s the baseline. Thank you to our sponsors! Get 20% off your first order at curehydration.com/WOMANSWORK with code WOMANSWORK — and if you get a post-purchase survey, mention you heard about Cure here to help support the show!  Sex is a skill. Beducated is where you learn it. Visit https://beducate.me/pd2550-womanswork and use code womanswork for 50% off the annual pass. Connect with Claude: Book Website: https://www.beyourselfbook.com/  LI: https://www.linkedin.com/in/casilver/ IG: https://www.instagram.com/claudesilver/?hl=en  Related Podcast Episodes Work Shouldn’t Suck: How to Make It Good with Moe Carrick | 356 15 Lies Women Are Told At Work with Bonnie Hammer | 330 The Hard Truths Of Entrepreneurship with Dr. Darnyelle Jervey Harmon | 313 Share the Love: If you found this episode insightful, please share it with a friend, tag us on social media, and leave a review on your favorite podcast platform! 🔗 Subscribe & Review:Apple Podcasts | Spotify | Amazon Music | YouTube Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hope isn’t just a feeling. It’s a practice—especially when life feels like a dumpster fire. In this episode, we get real about how to build hope (not wait for it) with psychologist, speaker, and author Dr. Julia Garcia—the mind behind The 5 Habits of Hope. She’s a psychologist and keynote speaker who’s built crisis hotlines, coached schools and leaders worldwide, and blends lived experience with research to turn The 5 Habits of Hope into practical, everyday tools.  We unpack why hope is missing from our work, relationships, and world… and how to bring it back with five repeatable, no-BS habits: Reflect, Risk, Release, Receive, Repurpose. You’ll hear practical prompts, what “emotional risk” actually looks like, and how to rally your people when you’d rather white-knuckle it alone. Bonus: Julia lovingly drags our community (in the best way) to go hit “Subscribe” on our new YouTube. Because support is a verb. We cover: The difference between reflecting vs. ruminating—plus the prompt: “I’m struggling because…” Why emotional risk (not skydiving) is the real courage builder—and how to do it safely A body-based “release” exercise to let go of performance, perfection, and pressure Receiving support without spiraling into “I should handle this myself” Repurposing tough feelings into fuel using the reframe: “I’m hopeful for…” How to set up “tap-in” systems with your people so you’re never doing the hard alone Why hope isn’t naive—it's a discipline that accelerates healing, connection, and action Because when we choose to practice hope—even on the days it feels impossible—we don’t just change our outlook, we change what’s possible for ourselves and everyone around us. Thank you to our sponsors! Get 20% off your first order at curehydration.com/WOMANSWORK with code WOMANSWORK — and if you get a post-purchase survey, mention you heard about Cure here to help support the show!  Visit beducate.me/womanswork69 and use code womanswork69 for 65% off the annual pass.  Black Friday has come early at Cozy Earth! Right now, you can stack my code WOMANSWORK on top of their sitewide sale — giving you up to 40% off in savings. Connect with Julia: Website: drjuliagarcia.com Book:The 5 Habits of Hope Youtube: @DrJuliaGarcia IG: https://www.instagram.com/drjuliagarcia/  LI: https://www.linkedin.com/in/drjuliagarcia/ Podcast: Journey with Dr. J on Spotify / Audible Related Podcast Episodes: 7 Questions For Living A Meaningful Life with Marni Battista | 322 How To Live A Fulfilling Life with Dr. Edith Eger | 251 Burnout 2.0: BurnBOLD with Cait Donovan | 331  Share the Love: If you found this episode insightful, please share it with a friend, tag us on social media, and leave a review on your favorite podcast platform!🔗 Subscribe & Review:Apple Podcasts | Spotify | Amazon Music | YouTube Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices