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In this episode of 'Fuck Fear' with Christine Spratley, Christine shares her personal journey of embracing the power of being Head Bitch In Charge (HBIC). She discusses the importance of not fitting into societal boxes, finding true happiness, and continuously asking and answering difficult questions about one's life and career. Christine reflects on her own experiences, including her transition from a corporate career to becoming a coach and public speaker. She emphasizes the significance of checking in with oneself, exploring personal beliefs, and surrounding oneself with supportive individuals. Join Christine as she provides insights, tools, and motivational advice for living a fulfilling life without limitations.
00:00 Introduction and Life Lessons
01:07 Welcome to the Show
01:29 Defining HBIC
01:38 The Garage Moment
03:33 Career Reflections
08:11 The Journey to Coaching
09:33 Survey Insights
12:27 Embracing Change
18:31 Generational Differences
20:18 The Power of Asking Questions
26:53 Finding Balance and Happiness
29:24 Economic Development and Youth Engagement
29:45 Maintaining Credibility in the Industry
30:39 Women as Leaders and Wingmen
30:54 Breaking Myths About Women
32:38 Emotional Intelligence and Logic
34:05 The Importance of Self-Accountability
34:37 Reevaluating Professional and Personal Beliefs
35:41 Intentional Participation and Sales
37:50 Starting HBIC Advisors
38:31 Balancing Personal, Professional, Spiritual, and Physical Aspects
46:12 The Concept of 'The Toss'
48:39 The Importance of Checking In
53:38 Redefining Professionalism
56:09 Homework and Final Thoughts
Creators and Guests
What is F*ck Fear with Christine Spratley: Living Like a Head Bitch In Charge ?
This podcast is for anyone who wants to live like an HBIC—or lives with, works with, marries, dates, or is raising one. Let’s be real: being a Head Bitch in Charge is messy, bold, and unapologetically badass. This is not a guidebook—it’s a pantry.
My guests and I will share the ingredients that we use—what’s worked and what’s failed—as we say “fuck fear” and take action to live a fulfilled life. We cover real-life hacks and deep philosophical pillars to navigate the chaos of everyday life—where some days, my only accomplishment is having a bra on and my teeth brushed.
We’re tackling the daily shit women navigate, from workplace politics to relationships, raising kids, and building careers, all with humor, audacity, and zero filters.
So, tune in—tell your friends, and even your enemies. This isn’t about aging with grace—it’s about aging with mischief, audacity, and a damn good story to tell.
Christine: [00:00:00] fuck. I mean, seriously, that's a pretty scary thing. I'm gonna start something, have no, I know where the destination maybe is gonna be, but I have no idea when I'm getting there.
But that was a very good life lesson and that's what this HBIC process was for [00:00:15] me. Was really about, I'm just gonna keep, I'm gonna keep starting and I'm gonna keep going. I don't know exactly where the de destination is or when it's gonna be there. Um, so there was no box to fit [00:00:30] into. [00:00:45] [00:01:00] Tubs. What's up bitches? Um, welcome back to the second episode of Fuck Fear, uh, with Christine [00:01:15] Spratley. That's me, uh, living like an HBIC and, uh, we're I, we, me, myself, and I often say we, and that's who I'm talking about. Although Joe's here in the studio with me, so Hello.
Um, he's here as well. [00:01:30] Last episode, we talked a little bit about kind of HBIC head bitch in charge.
Joe Woolworth: Hold
Christine: And we didn't dive into that. I gave you a little bit about the garage moment where we pulled into the garage. My husband looked at me after I'd been miserable, I think [00:01:45] for probably about a couple years, and said, you are not happy.
And, uh, what are you gonna do about that? And I can't just make, it can't be all me. So, um, I'm gonna talk a little bit about this, how I got there, how HBIC came [00:02:00] about, uh, what it means to be an HBIC, and why you may not think you are one or why you qualify for one. Um, and I'm the, the title of this actual episode is Ain't No [00:02:15] B Box Big enough.
And what I want to get very, very clear is you don't fit into a box. So anyway, I didn't, [00:02:30] maybe you do. But I didn't, and I didn't even realize that I was trying to fit into boxes. I, I was trying to fit into boxes I didn't even know existed. And every time I climb outta one, I thought I'd, I climbed into another one.
And I didn't know that [00:02:45] for a long time. And so this episode is about finding out what makes me happy. And part of that is understanding and owning, being an HBIC. So if you didn't listen [00:03:00] to the last episode, what, what that night was like is we came home, I couldn't remember where we came from, probably from eating out.
'cause we were eating out all the time. I don't know if you were, we were two adult working all the time. Kids in college. So it was like, work all [00:03:15] the time. Go eat, work all the time. Go eat, come home, me watch sports. Him upstairs watching documentaries, like that was our rhythm. And so we pull in the garage one night and he just was like, you're, you're really unhappy.
And I knew for [00:03:30] a long time that I was unhappy with my job. Now I had had an amazing career in, um, doing corporate negotiations for economic incentives, and I fell into it. Um, like I did most things. I [00:03:45] fell into it because, uh, I was a, I was getting ready to graduate college and I was needing to get a job and I was boxing at the boxing gym.
And, uh, I thought I was gonna go graduate, university of Texas and government [00:04:00] major, and I was gonna get a job in Paris or Britain or somewhere. Cool. And the only jobs that I could find were in Bogota, Columbia. And I don't know about people, but if you remember in the nineties and the early nineties, that was not the place for a little white girl from Iowa to be.
[00:04:15] And, um, and that scared the shit outta me. So, uh, I was working, one of the women that worked out there was Sarah Crocker and Crock. She ran Crocker Consulting, was a land development firm. said, Hey, you can be a runner. And that's how I started my career. So the reason why I bring that up is because I'm gonna [00:04:30] talk about, again, at 50 something.
I'm here looking at what makes me happy from a career perspective. But I had had an amazing career, and again, it just maneuvered and worked my way through into it. But [00:04:45] that night when I had to kind of look at myself, should be doing that all the time. Um, or I, I shouldn't say we, I should be doing that all the time.
And it's not a big deal when you do it all the time. It's like, you know, like when you go to the dentist, Joe, it, [00:05:00] and it takes 'em an hour to clean your teeth?
Joe Woolworth: Yeah.
Christine: Versus 30 minutes or 20 minutes and they use the water gun instead of just scraping it a little bit and it hurts like hell. That's kind of what it's like if you [00:05:15] don't, if.
Look at what you're doing and check out where you're at in your happiness buckets and, and your fulfillment buckets is, then it becomes this big thing. So the more I do it, the more I encourage my listeners, you guys just do it. Check it out, look under the covers, see if you're [00:05:30] happy in this element of your life.
So
Joe Woolworth: why do you think so many people are afraid to ask themselves that question? 'cause I think, like, I would imagine a lot of people don't wanna even go down that road because maybe they think it's 'cause they kind of know the answer.
Christine: I'll tell you [00:05:45] what, I'll tell you what I think and I'll tell you what it was like for me.
I didn't wanna go down the road for two reasons. One, I, I knew it was change I had and I didn't want change. I didn't want a different [00:06:00] job. I was 29 years of career. Like I had built a reputation. It's funny how you don't realize, or I don't realize how attached I become to things until someone suggests they remove those [00:06:15] things.
Get a new job with a different title and a different industry, like sell your house and downsize like your ti. You know, you, I, I like to pretend that I'm am not attached to things until you start taking that shit [00:06:30] away. And then I become a 2-year-old and going, that's mine. Right. Right. And so I think part of it is we don't, we know that there's an opportunity there that the answer could mean I need to change some stuff that I may not be really willing to give [00:06:45] up.
was afraid, especially being the age that I was, I was afraid I wouldn't know. Like if I really stopped and asked myself what makes me happy, I wouldn't know. I remember, um, I was working at EY [00:07:00] and um, I was. Doing all the things, doing all the right things that I thought I should be doing.
And we had this innovation council or something came out. It was like when innovation, you know, that I don't, I can't remember how long ago it was, at least seven or eight years ago, [00:07:15] innovation was the thing. And um, and I remember you're supposed to, you know, figure out where you could be innovative and put it in a box.
And I thought, I am just not innovative. Now, what I didn't realize is I had chosen to [00:07:30] not be innovative because when I start being creative and start asking questions and why, and what makes me happy or, you know, looking at things from different avenues, then all of a sudden the creative monster comes out and I don't have control over where that idea goes.
Meaning [00:07:45] I could start looking at my home life. I could start looking at my relationships with my friends and my girlfriends, and then things could change. And so for me, I was concerned that I one didn't know what was gonna [00:08:00] change. And when you start asking why. You're left with a truth that you don't wanna deal with.
That's hard. Um, but two, I was afraid, maybe I wouldn't know. Um, so again, that's a little bit about where we're gonna go today, is how I found [00:08:15] out. Uh, one thing I did was, again, I thought it was just my job and the rest of my life was fine. Um, so that's where we started. And I, I was going through the pandemic and for some reason I got on head Hunter's [00:08:30] list and there was this, I don't even know what she was, but she put me on this.
She sent me this email and it said, Hey, if you're unhappy in your job, come find, come listen to this, this, uh, podcast. I don't even know if it was a podcast. It was a webinar. [00:08:45] And she was in Britain, so there was a bunch of us on, she was in Britain and it was a Zoom call and the presenter was in Denmark.
And I don't know what always said, but I walked away. There was [00:09:00] one thing that I walked away with and that's why I liked listening to things all the way through is 'cause I don't know what I'm gonna walk away with. Um, but it may be at the last three minutes of a podcast, so better listen, um, all the way through, [00:09:15] um, where I go, oh, yeah, that makes sense to me.
Anyway, he said, if you don't know what you're, you know, you have no clue what you wanna do. Um, a good thing to do is do this survey. And I, I [00:09:30] do it in my coaching. I've given this survey to people. I've asked them to fill it. I've asked them to do it, a survey that says if Christine wasn't doing what she was doing, if she was not in the industry and she didn't do this work, what would she be doing?
What would you, [00:09:45] and, and you had to list like five things. What would you hire her for? What does Christine think she's great at, that she sucks at? And you would fire her over or you wouldn't hire her for? Um, what does she love and what makes her [00:10:00] happy? Lemme see. What was the other question? The other questions were what?
Um, what, give me an example of when you've seen her succeed and be happy. And then the bomb question at the ends [00:10:15] at the end were, what really do you want Christine to do that she doesn't think she can do? And so the criteria though, for this survey was to give it to people that had known you for at least 10 years or so [00:10:30] and they could, they couldn't be your husband and it couldn't be like your bestie.
They had to be people that you had had that. And I was fortunate that I had enough, you know, I had a work husband and, uh, I had some, some friends from work and then I had also, I. [00:10:45] One of the things that I loved about my career is I, I've been blessed with meeting a lot of people, and those people are still in my life today from when I first started.
And so I sent it out to them. What it did was it showed me options and [00:11:00] all these things came back from, I'm a sports nut, go Steelers, anything, Pittsburgh is the way to go. So I had a ton of sports things. Then I had a ton of, I do negotiations and incentives and, and so there was a ton of public affairs and then there [00:11:15] was, you know, this and that.
And, but what came up consistently on, on a lot of the ones that I got a response was coaching and speaking, which was really interesting because I had always told myself stories that I suck at speaking in [00:11:30] public. And one of the things that I do in my coaching is when people tell me, uh, that they suck at something, I say, do you think or do you know?
Um, that's a Colin Paul saying, by the way, and I'll, that's another episode. But I asked 'em, do you think you're [00:11:45] no. And then they say, well, I think, and I said, well, how come do you think? And how much do you think that way? Or if you know, well, how do you know? Has someone told you if someone pulled you off stage?
Have you been booed? Have you, you know, or is this just a, a, you know, for me, [00:12:00] mine was, I could hear my voice crack when I talked. And so I just assumed everybody else could. And I assumed that everybody else could see my insides on my outsides and they can't. Um, sometimes they can, but they can't, nor most of the time.
So [00:12:15] again, I was really surprised. And that was one thing that was almost on every single one of my respondents, uh, that they sent back, was that I should coach and do public speaking. And again, this is how naive I [00:12:30] was I, and how arrogant I was. I literally was like, well, shit, I love talking. I love telling people what to do.
I'll go do that. That's coaching, right? [00:12:45] And again, I found out it wasn't, that's not what coaching is. Um, but again, my own ignorance led me down the path where I learned more. And so I started finding out, but I was in this group called Strong Women's Network. Shout out to Rose Fagler and [00:13:00] that group during that time of lockdown.
And so that we had a diverse group of women in there. Um, there were people that did all sorts of owned companies. Some were public, uh, relations owners and, and, and met, [00:13:15] um, marketing. And so all of these things, I had this plethora of women that I could go, Hey, and I basically tried on that job and I would interview them, Hey, what's, what, what's it really like?
Gimme the skinny and everybody should do that. I don't care what [00:13:30] age you are, what job you're looking for, you should always find people out there and tell 'em. And ask them, what's, tell me about this? What's the worst thing that you ever did in this job? And what do you love about it? And um, one thing I realized is, one, [00:13:45] people love to give advice.
So they usually take you up on that offer and they love to talk about themselves. So again, they'll, they'll give you this information, but these women were so wonderful. And so it just started to peel back that onion and I ended up doing it. I ended up [00:14:00] going to coaching, uh, I went to NC State to get my certificate at and um, and went, took classes there while I was working full-time.
And then I got my, my coaching hours at, um, at night and on [00:14:15] weekends and took my, uh, coaching certificate through ICF, um, international Coaching Federation. Passed my test and um, became a coach. Uh, and I couldn't go out and coach 'cause I was working in a big four. So, and [00:14:30] get paid, paid, so I just bartered and things like that.
But I did a ton of coaching, pro bono things like that. And then I did coaching in Deloitte. And again, this whole, I tell you this story because none of this I understood to be [00:14:45] what I was going to do. Like there was no divine inter eviction and clear path. This was a lot of, and it wasn't like, okay, this is what I'm just gonna do now too.
I was literally running projects and doing all of this other stuff and living [00:15:00] life over here. Like most of you probably are, you're probably juggling five or six things at once and not, and each of those things has a sub-bullet list of 10 or 15 other things. And so [00:15:15] I, I was doing all of this and again, this is why there's not a box that's big enough, you know, how do you.
How do you fit a coach into a corporate, into this, into that [00:15:30] all into one little box. You've just gotta be in multiple boxes, and that's okay. And so I just said, screw it. I'm not gonna be in a box. But the mindset that came out of that was really about, this is a journey for me to [00:15:45] find out. And so I really started going every time I thought I knew Joe.
Every time I thought I knew it would like, okay, we're gonna do this and this is what I'm gonna do. I would do it. And then I'd be like, Ooh, [00:16:00] I don't know. There's something over here and there's something over there. And so what I realized is it's okay not to have a definitive plan and just to keep moving and just to keep going and trust that you're in the right direction and bounce things off of very smart [00:16:15] people and have that group around you.
And that's what I did. But it was the mindset of I. This is something I need to figure out. Like no one else is gonna figure it out. There's not a five step process. And I learned a lot about, [00:16:30] again, there's a book called Break Your Own Rules. And uh, I think I mentioned it last time on my podcast. It's a really good book for women to read.
Um, I thought it was great. Mary Davis Holt is a wonderful person and it, [00:16:45] her and her colleagues, um, our co-authors I should say. It really talks about where we, what we think we can do and the box and the limitations of that. And what I started to read that book and I started to really start to explore [00:17:00] options.
It's, I ran a marathon and I'll never forget the night before, very first marathon I ever ran. And we go to the pasta dinner, the carb dinner the night before. Right. And this was in [00:17:15] Austin, Texas. It was the Motorola Marathon. And, um. I show up, I go by myself, I show up and I'm gonna eat dinner and I'm gonna, you know, I'm gonna do this marathon.
And I'll never forget the guy got up on stage and we're eating [00:17:30] and I'm sitting there and I'm just so up to marry this marathon. And he said, you know what I'm so amazed by is all the courageous first timers. And he, you know, we're all like, yeah, that's us. We're first timers, we dunno. And um, and he [00:17:45] said, because I know I'm gonna finish in two hours in some insane time.
And he said the most terrifying words, he said, and you have no idea when you're gonna finish. And I went immediately in my head, I [00:18:00] went, fuck. I mean, seriously, that's a pretty scary thing. I'm gonna start something, have no, I know where the destination maybe is gonna be, but I have no idea when I'm getting there.
But that was a very good life lesson and that's what this HBIC process was [00:18:15] for me. Was really about, I'm just gonna keep, I'm gonna keep starting and I'm gonna keep going. I don't know exactly where the de destination is or when it's gonna be there. Um, so there was no box to fit [00:18:30] into.
Joe Woolworth: it seems to me
I got kids that are in college and getting ready to go into college, that we do education.
Almost the opposite of what you're saying, where we try stuff, it's like, no, you need to pick what you think you're gonna like and study it for eight years, and then I really hope you like it. Mm-hmm. Uh, [00:18:45] which seems terrible. Like, it seems like we used to have a apprenticeships and stuff where it's like, go try 10 things and see which one you like before you commit to spending all of, in my case, dad's money on college.
But, [00:19:00] uh, you said in the last podcast, uh, you already have the power.
Christine: Mm-hmm.
Joe Woolworth: Was that. Was it fear that kept you from trying new stuff, or was it just not realizing that you had the power to try all those things? [00:19:15]
Christine: I think, I think I mentioned this before about asking yourself and stopping and checking. I didn't have any check-ins.
I, I had always been how I did my career. Go, go,
Joe Woolworth: go, busy, busy, busy.
Christine: Well then I had always [00:19:30] been asked to join a company to get a promotion and I had never saw, oh, is this what I want? It was, it was a better title, more responsibility, um, better company. You know, it was always the next thing, and I didn't, you know, now I [00:19:45] think the, the, I, I hate saying this because I, it's like, like I'm talking about those kids, but the generations now are going, Hey, what do I want?
I. Yeah. And, and do I wanna work 40 hours a week? Hell do I wanna, not even 40, do I wanna work 60 hours a [00:20:00] week? Let's be honest, it was more like 60 when, when I was coming up, if not more. Right. And if so, what am I getting in return? And I even coach on that now, but I didn't ask any of that. Yeah. I just assumed that this is what I wanted.
Joe Woolworth: Yeah. For all the flack that generation [00:20:15] gets, I think that's something they're doing right. Like,
Christine: and I'll tell you where I think this is, I think it scares the hell outta my generation and the older generation. 'cause you don't talk back.
Joe Woolworth: Right.
Christine: I remember I was, um, an example of that is [00:20:30] I got on a call one day and um, my buddy Anthony, uh, called me and we were talking and he was like talking about how this, this young guy and the team had come up and he had told him, well, you know, I'm gonna go work for so and so for 50, you know, he like didn't wanna work [00:20:45] the weekend or something.
And he's like, well, you kind of need to. And he's like, well no, I kind of don't. And he couldn't, you know? And he was like, well, you're gonna go over there and work for like 50 cents more and not work the, and he was like, yeah. And that was such a [00:21:00] foreign concept to us, you know? Right. That you're gonna, what do you mean?
Yeah. And I think what I have learned from the generation that have come after me is ask a hell of a lot more [00:21:15] questions. Why are you not asking questions? And really you can do whatever the hell you want to when you want to.
Joe Woolworth: Yeah. I think the generation, like I grew up in the eighties, right? And so whenever my parents went out to eat or something like that, nobody asked me what I [00:21:30] wanted.
You know? I was just alone for the ride. And that has completely shifted. And um, and I think that's why this generation is smartly asking that question. Like, well, what do you want in areas where we never thought to, because it was like you were saying, like, I. I think [00:21:45] I said, you know, just being busy sometimes it's not about just being busy, you're just, you're doing somebody else's thing when you work for somebody else.
Mm-hmm. You're helping them fulfill their mission. Mm-hmm. And that's, you get, you get rewarded for being good at helping them do their thing.
Christine: Mm-hmm.
Joe Woolworth: And so [00:22:00] it's, it's almost, uh, counterintuitive to being like, well, what do you want? What kind of question is that? I, I got work to do.
Christine: Well, and, and also I think what's interesting about that is not only did we, did we, and, and as a, did we [00:22:15] not get asked what we wanted?
We, we were fucking grateful. Yeah. Right. That we got it. And you better check before you say you want seconds. And if you didn't eat, I'll never forget. I mean, how many of us grew up with, there are starving kids in Africa, you clean your plate, [00:22:30] young lady.
Joe Woolworth: Right.
Christine: And, um, now I'm not saying, and, and I think what's funny too, is again, we, we look at.
This generation, or I should say we, but I hear a lot of these generations that after her, and [00:22:45] they're just ungrateful and they expect everything. Well, have we ever sat there and thought, what, what would be different? Right. If I expected everything?
Joe Woolworth: Right? I think we really get down on the upcoming generation for the word entitled.
Yeah. But that's also an empowering [00:23:00] thing to think, oh, I'm entitled to happiness. I'm entitled to certain things as a human. I
Christine: coach. I coach people. This is literally what I coach. I remember my, my stepson Brady lived with us, um, I can't remember a couple [00:23:15] summers ago, well, last summer actually. And, um, we were talking and we were talking about internship, and I said, what kind of internship you want?
And dah, dah, dah, dah. And, and I coach people on this about, no, you wanna shoot for the sun, and then you don't get the sun. So then you get the star. Oh, [00:23:30] you don't get the star. Okay, then you hit a cloud. Okay? Then you climb down. Oh, then you hit a tree, and then you come down and then you land on the ground.
But we all know in corporate negotiation, you ask for what you want, add 50% because they're gonna negotiate your ass down. [00:23:45] So why are you starting on the ground level? Right? So I don't know that it's so much entitled and if it is entitled where you have this entitled means you owe it. Whereas there's a whole different mindset around, I am entitled [00:24:00] to happiness and I find my happiness this way, versus anybody owes it.
You still gotta work hard, but you might as well ask for it. And I think that's going back to the question about how I got into this mindset. I never asked those questions. So [00:24:15] that's when I started to be okay about asking the questions and getting comfortable that there might be answers that meant I needed to leave my years at Big Four, that I needed to take a different direction.
Okay. And [00:24:30] then leave that title behind. And leave all of that behind and, and go off like, I, like I've done. And that's kind of a scary thing. Um, but I will tell you when you're going through this and [00:24:45] if you're gonna start exploring, set things around you to help you do that. And what I mean by that, and I don't mean, yeah, you can have your therapy or whatever, but like, I, I like little speed bumps in the road, okay.
And I call 'em potholes [00:25:00] because they kind of jar me a little bit. But on your way to work, everybody's got a pothole that, that they forget about and they hit, you know, we know it's there. So I put in my playlist, in my routine playlist, I started putting in songs from Jen Wigmore, [00:25:15] H-B-I-C-L, king. My husband brought, was like, Hey, you know, L King, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.
I had never, again, I was just, I'm late to the party on a lot of things. I hadn't, I hadn't heard l I'd heard her, but I hadn't. I was busy, so I hadn't listened to her [00:25:30] and started listening to her American sweetheart, and I started getting this, this, yeah, like, wait a minute. These are rules that I don't need to live by.
And then the other part about being an HBIC is not only I'm not gonna live by your [00:25:45] rules, I'm gonna make my own. Well, then that means that my rules better be based on good foundation. And that means, and I'm gonna talk about it a little bit more in this episode, is, you know, the, my foundation is basically four areas of my [00:26:00] life, my personal, my professional, my spiritual, and my physical.
And that means what are my beliefs? What are these things that, that keep me grounded in this? Because again, it goes back, and I said this in the first part, and it's a, it's a very central part of [00:26:15] being accountable and self-accountable is that if I have a headache, you cannot take my aspirin. I have to do that.
I have to figure out what I need. You can help me, you can encourage me, but ultimately I have to do it. [00:26:30] And that's, so again, going back to that power, I have it. Maybe I need to learn, maybe I haven't heard of this before, but again, I put those things around me so that I was going through this time, I had those little bolts of energy and listening to [00:26:45] King and, uh, Jen Wigmore.
And you know, here I am, a 53-year-old woman, you know, throwing down on that.
Joe Woolworth: So when you started asking yourself the challenging questions like, what's gonna make you happy? Things like that. Did, was it [00:27:00] quick? Were you quick to identify one of those four corners, personal, professional, spiritual, or physical that you really struggled to balance?
Did one really pop out as like, oh, this could be a big problem.
Christine: Well this is, well that's a can of worms [00:27:15] and a half, but one, one. First of all, there's no such thing as balance for me. It's a rhythm to me.
Joe Woolworth: Balance implies that you would've to do everything perfectly, equally. Yeah. So if you've got four things, 25% of all your time must be spent on.
Yeah. [00:27:30] So unrealistic. And
Christine: that's, that's so not, and, and again, it goes back to can we, can we have it all? And it's like, well, what's all you know, what's all for you may not, I don't want that. Like I, no, I don't want that. I don't want an 80 hour work week or a 60 hour work during busy [00:27:45] season. So again, but what I think the question that you're asking is, is there one that I really struggled with that was really glaring and it was work and I had ignored it for a long time.
And funny thing is, if I'm [00:28:00] really honest, I had been looking to leave my industry and what I'd done for quite some time, quite some time. And I just couldn't, I mean, I had, I was almost hired so many times [00:28:15] and it just never, it always fell through. And thank God for unanswered prayers. I think that's a Garth Brooks song.
Um, but. Because this, I, I kept getting the door slammed in my face because that door was not supposed to be opened. You know, there's a reason why some doors are [00:28:30] locked. And so it was work and going back again to what I had tied up in my work, which was my ego, which was, I had done all this, I had built all this, and oh my gosh, I'm gonna go have to build something [00:28:45] new.
But there's also this lightness when you, when you release everything that weighs you down, there's this lightness and then you can go build what you wanna go build. And, and I can always go back. It's not like I left the industry [00:29:00] and left my brain behind. I mean, I still listened to Bloomberg and I still, I was at last Friday talking about the, the younger generation last Friday was on this, um, N-C-E-D-A, that's North Carolina Economic Development [00:29:15] Associations.
Career Trek round table. And um, shout out to Liz Dobbins and everybody over there, they did a great job. Um, secretary Lily came in and actually spoke so down to earth about [00:29:30] economic development, and tons of the kids were there. I said, kids, I gotta quit doing that. Young adults, it's just so wrong. I'm sorry.
And, um, oh, I'm not sorry. Thank you for being, um, flexible with my wording, I should say, instead of, I'm sorry. [00:29:45] So they were all there and we got to talk about what it's like to be in the industry. So it's not like I left that industry and I just lost all my marbles and I don't have any cred. I've earned that cred.
And that's one thing I think I didn't realize until I had let [00:30:00] go is that I still had my cred. Like, you don't leave it and then just go, I mean, you gotta stay up on it. And I don't necessarily, I mean, I've only been gone for six months or whatever, but in five years maybe I don't have the same cred, but. I still [00:30:15] have that, I have those war wounds, I have those lessons.
And I think that really is about letting that go, being able to build something up and building that self-accountability and giving yourself that, that openness to do that. So again, that's [00:30:30] kind of how I found the mindset. And then I, I took the action so much about being an HBIC is taking action. Take an action when uncertain.
And I'm gonna say this to any men out there listening and any woman out there [00:30:45] listening that has a man, you're gonna sit there and shake your head. Women make great leaders, but they also make badass wingmen. And, and what's really interesting is, um, I told you there's gonna some myths about that I'm gonna [00:31:00] break in here that I broke kind of in my head, um, during this timeframe to get this mindset was one very much was that we are one dimensional.
Women are emotional creatures, and we just have so many feelings [00:31:15] and, and we just, you know, we're just difficult and, and all of that. And there's a beauty to women and I, I'll never forget this. My husband would always go, [00:31:30] he would get, he'd be like, this is the logical answer. You're not being logical. And I remember one night we were sitting there and he was, he was wrong.
He was wrong. He had a logical process, but he was wrong. And I couldn't [00:31:45] articulate it. And I looped back around, so just hang there with me. I know I'm kind of off, but I, I looped back around. So I sat there and I, and, and I couldn't figure it out what it was. So the next morning I was still pissed off and I knew he was wrong.
And [00:32:00] so how many women have, have sat there in that position? And I'm a processor, so it takes me a while to processing. So, so that morning, um. Google 'cause, 'cause it, we had Google in our house. I asked, I had this conversation. I was [00:32:15] like, can you have, can you reach a incorrect answer using a logical process?
'cause I didn't know how to come back at him, you know? And 'cause he kept saying, well, you know, you're just emotional and blah, blah, blah. And it said, yeah, if you're hypothesis is wrong, if your assumptions [00:32:30] are wrong, you can reach a con, a logical conclusion that is incorrect. And I was like, gotcha. So I told him about it later.
But I, I bring that up because I love logic. I love business strategy, I [00:32:45] love all of that. And I happen to be emotional. [00:33:00] [00:33:15] They, they talk about emotional intelligence. Seriously. Women have [00:33:30] had emotional intelligence. Ladies, you, we've had this since we've had our first period. W we, we were figuring out how to regulate our emotions since like 10 years old, where we went, holy shit.
[00:33:45] Huh, I'm leaking. How the fuck do I get outta this room? Oh my God. And we did, we, we found the back of the wall and we called it the back wall scoot, where you just kind of keep your back to the wall and you scoot out. We were regulating that stuff like seriously. [00:34:00] So, so I that, that, that myth that women are one dimensional.
That we don't like logic. I believe, for me anyway, I love logic. I love coming to a logical conclusion, but I use emotions to give me [00:34:15] context around and now they call it emotional intelligence. And if you understand emotional intelligence, I coach on it all the time. It's being able to read the room, read people's emotions, flex and ebb, regulate your own.
We've been [00:34:30] doing that. Any woman that has gone through puberty in high school with other women. We have gone through that. We have regulated that. And part of that owning that for me [00:34:45] was understanding, oh, I'm not just a one dimensional person. I'm not a one dimensional entity. I have all these entities and this is how they fit together.
So when you ask about the mindset and this process and that pillar, you know, was there [00:35:00] one outta whack? It was my job, but it was also the perspectives and the beliefs that I had about the box that I needed to fit into that job. To be really honest, that I got
Joe Woolworth: you. Your hypothesis of why your job was so important was wrong.
Is that what you're getting at?
Christine: [00:35:15] Yes, it was that, but it was also, for instance, I remember the last part of my job, they came at me and they said, 'cause in Big four it's all about revenue. I don't care what anybody tells you, it's all about revenue. And most jobs, it is about revenue and it should be [00:35:30] because they need revenue to stay in business.
Okay. But, and I hated sales. I always told myself I hated sales. Well, I've been selling. My whole life. First date I was, you know, I mean, we're always positioning ourselves. Don't women if [00:35:45] listen, if you've taught a toddler to eat broccoli, you can freaking do corporate politics. Seriously. Seriously. Think about it.
Think about what it takes. So anyway, getting off. Sorry, I'll slow down. [00:36:00] But getting back to your point, just about the hypothesis and about understanding the process, and that helped me realize I'm not one dimensional. I had always told myself I [00:36:15] couldn't sell. And I remember this. 2024 was the year I said I'm gonna intentionally participate in my, my life.
Intentional participation. I used words not re resolutions. Intentional participation was my resolution for that year. I. And [00:36:30] I sat there and they were giving me slack about, ah, you know, you're great and the clients love you and they'd do anything for you, and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. But you need more revenue and you need to go get new revenue.
And so I was like, all right, you're gonna intentionally participate. You're gonna find out how to sell. [00:36:45] And I had all these, you know, take action, take action, take action. And I remember sitting with, got this call with, um, with a buddy of mine, Brandon, and he said, Christine, I don't know who told you [00:37:00] that you couldn't sell, but somewhere along the line you bought that bullshit.
So you don't, and going back to your thing was, my assumption was the way that I looked at my job wrong was all of that. Part of it was, I, so I [00:37:15] was selling, like you sell, I was selling like accountants sell. And I don't know if you noticed, but I'm not an accountant. I, I was told once that, you know, an accounting firm is like black, black and white.
Christine, you're a color tv. And so I had to learn how to do that. So [00:37:30] for a while I thought it was just my job and I thought, well, I just need to learn how to sell. So I learned how to sell, like I sell. And then I said, well, coach and I'll coach within the framework of my company. And I tried to fill all these buckets [00:37:45] and then it became I needed more.
And a lot of times we hear you're too much or your bucket's too big. You know, spread too
Joe Woolworth: thin. Yeah, what? Spread too [00:38:00] thin.
Christine: Spread too thin. But then you're too much, you're too loud, you're too this, too that. And, um, my response to that is maybe they need to go find less. Maybe you need a bigger room. Maybe you need a bigger [00:38:15] stage.
And for me, I needed a muzzle that came off. I needed to be able to say and do things the way that I wanted to do. Then once I found, and that meant my job changed. That meant I needed to step out on my own [00:38:30] and literally start HBIC advisors. And the mission behind that of doing that was I don't want other women to wait as long as I do to go get their teeth cleaned [00:38:45] about their life of fulfillment and what makes them happy.
I want them to do it as soon as possible. As often as possible, and keep checking in with themselves and take that on and take that mantle and go, oh wow, did what I did [00:39:00] yesterday. Is it still fulfilling to me? And if it's not, maybe there's something I can do that's different. And I think for me, going back again to the four areas in my life that's touched on all, all the [00:39:15] areas, my job, my personal relationships, being responsible for me means I may have to leave certain friendships.
I may have to leave certain personal relationships. Personal relationships [00:39:30] mean to change because I'm a very giving person, but I may give too much. Well, it's not too much. I'm just not getting anything back. So I'll give just the same amount just to someone who'll give something back. So [00:39:45] then you might ask, well, the other two, we've talked about professional, we've talked about personal, spiritual.
That's a huge part of people's life that, that that centerness that fulfillment. Some, some people get in [00:40:00] religion, some people get it elsewhere. But again, if you're not checking in and all of these ebb and flow, but if you don't understand how they intersect with each other, then one's gonna rule at the detriment of the of another one.[00:40:15]
'cause they're not all in alignment. And I think that, going back to a question we asked earlier, Joe, was about, you know, why people don't look underneath the covers? Then it's like that, you pull that sweater, that [00:40:30] thread, and then things start to unravel. But at the end of it unraveling, you have a ball of yarn, you can just REIT a fricking new sweater.
And so you just put it all back together and that, and that takes time and that takes [00:40:45] vulnerability. And that means you're out there without a wire sometimes or a net. I'm sorry. And so I think that is why we don't do it. But again, all of those are the four parts, and that's why [00:41:00] you don't get into a box because they don't all fit in the same box at the same time.
I wanna, I'm gonna throw ey under the bus a little bit here. I'm not throwing ey EY under the bus. What I'm doing is just repeating something that [00:41:15] was in the newspaper, and it was, they did, after I had left, they had did a, a training session for up and coming leaders, women, female leaders. And it was, there's a famous quote in the session about men's [00:41:30] minds are like waffles.
They compartmentalize. Women's are like pancakes and they just run all over. And first of all, we all know that's fence. I don't even need to deal with that. [00:41:45] But I started thinking about that and to me, it's there. It's not that women's minds aren't like waffles, it's just that we have more compartments. We have compartments on compartments, on compartments [00:42:00] because we are connecting all of these contexts around the situation.
I guarantee you, you walk out of a business meeting and you'll have your facts. Men will go, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom. And then next time, guys, why [00:42:15] don't you go ask the women? Okay. Tell me about the, tell me about the interaction, the conversation that everybody had in their body language and all that stuff that.
Nobody picked up on because they were doing the facts. See, for me, I had to look at all of that, take [00:42:30] all of that in and get the facts. That's how I sat in the meetings. And so again, I'm, I'm hitting home this myth that we don't, we don't have a box. We've got lots of boxes, and then we come [00:42:45] in and we put them all together.
And that's the beauty of being a woman and how we grow and how we function. And that's why we can do so much, so many times. [00:43:00] Now, granted, it gets confusing and if we don't, our pillars aren't on good foundation, we can get kind, I can get kind of nuts. I mean, I'm not gonna lie, it took me till I was like 54 to figure out what I was fulfilled with.
Now [00:43:15] granted, I was fulfilled along the way, but when I wasn't, for a long time I didn't look at that. So learn from me. Don't wait, ask, but don't be, try not to be dismissive of all your [00:43:30] boxes. A friend Mary Beth went to lunch with me one day and she said, Christine, it's like a spider web. And she said they all connect and when you network with people or when you, you know, your personal, your, and it all connects some and you see this big, [00:43:45] huge spider web, but you just build it and people build their own little lines to connect.
And that's really what it's like for me as an HBIC. And that's the beauty of it is there's all these new things that it can be, 'cause it [00:44:00] isn't just a waffle with four boxes. So on that note, I'm going to, I think I've pretty much busted some myths, don't you Joe?
Joe Woolworth: Yeah, I think so.
Christine: Okay. I would like to
Joe Woolworth: hear though, you [00:44:15] kept saying over and over again, you need to check in.
What are some good questions that you can ask yourself to check in?
Christine: Check-ins for me are, again, I talked about this earlier, about your beliefs and when I go, Ooh, wanna [00:44:30] react? Wanna react? And just, and just spending time with that and just going, okay, well what's that mean? What do I believe? Does this work for me? Do I still like this?
Do I still, and this could be anything from a job to this team, [00:44:45] to this project. It could be anything from this marriage, this relationship, the, the way we have, the way we do things in our house. This could mean anything from my weight, the way I look. [00:45:00] Again, all these facets because this could be my relationship with my God or my higher power, but when I check in, it's literally how many, uh, you know, and too often I hear this a lot when I [00:45:15] coach is I'll do that as soon as I get done with, and then the list starts.
I'll catch up on the weekend and I read this quote, [00:45:30] um, about, and I'm gonna get it wrong 'cause I don't have it in front of me. But it's basically, um, everybody has time. It's about priorities. And one of the biggest things about checking in is do I [00:45:45] have either a system around me to check in with that helps me?
On a regular basis. Regular could mean once a month, could be once a week. For me, what that looks like in a healthy manner is it means that I have [00:46:00] what I call my OG mugshot crew, the women that have known me, the women that know my shit, the women that know when I'm off kilter and I can't see it. It means that I do have, I do do counseling.
I, I think everybody, I think, why would you not, [00:46:15] I mean, we go to a doctor to get fit or to go get our health checked. We go to a, a gym guy to get us fit. We, you know, do all this. Why would we not go get our, make sure that we're aligning our lives in, in a, in a psychological [00:46:30] way, you know? So those are the things that I do to check in.
And when I start becoming, I'll do it later. Great thing about I'll do it tomorrow, is, tomorrow never really comes. And then you, for me, I end up [00:46:45] down the road and then it becomes an emergency or. Um, in my case, I had some medical issues, but I tell on myself and I give people, I'm gonna introduce a concept, and this is, this is one thing that has helped me.[00:47:00]
A lot of times I think that I'm checking in and I call it the asleep dreaming. You're awake kind of theory where, oh yeah, I'm, I'm good, we're good. I'm check in, checking in. All right, good. But I have this [00:47:15] deal that I do with my girlfriends, and it's called the toss. And it is when someone sees something in my life, they go, Hey, can I toss?
Or when I see something in someone else's life, and it may be just [00:47:30] something they said or whatever, and I'm just like, I don't know about that. And it, I don't know if it's right, wrong, indifferent, but they'll go, yeah, toss, and they receive it, or I receive the toss as information. It's information. Hey, I don't [00:47:45] know if you saw this, Christine, but you just said this, this and this.
You've said, I'm sorry, like 50 times this week about shit that you never apologized for what's going on or, you know, when I, when I was wanting really hard to stay at [00:48:00] my job, my friends were like, a couple of my friends were like, listen, you say you're filling your buckets, but you don't seem happy. You say you're coaching enough, but you, you know, at, at your job, but you just don't seem happy.
Um, I actually had a, [00:48:15] a team member tell me, Christine, you don't seem as engaged. And, and it was on at a toss. And this was somebody that I oversaw and he said, Hey, you know, can I toss? And I said, sure. And he was like, all right, well I don't see you engaged and this is the type of project where you would [00:48:30] be all over what's going on.
And so sometimes the check-in is literally about the people that you put around you that go, here's a toss. Now I have to tell you the other rules of the toss. The other rules [00:48:45] are, for me anyway, is my girlfriends and I. If I say, Hey, can I toss? And they say, yeah, I don't feel like it. You, okay, I'll pack that up for later.
You have that right? Or I can say, yeah, you can toss, but I'm not gonna, I don't wanna talk [00:49:00] about it. Just toss it. Or you can toss and talk. So it's a good way to kind of just go. And I don't, I don't judge them for what they say. I mean, it's just a toss. I'm just gonna throw this out there. Fit, nah, doesn't work.
Maybe. I don't know. [00:49:15] And I think that's really important because sometimes I can't see my blind spots, but if I'm not checking in, if I'm waiting till next month to get with my girlfriends, or I'm check or I'm waiting or I'm putting it off until, [00:49:30] you know, maybe I need it today. And it could just be a real little shift.
How I think, or it could be a little shift in how I work with the kids or my approach. It could just [00:49:45] be one little thing to check in. But when I get out of the habit of doing something, I don't, I don't like to start. I'm not a starter. I'm a continuer starting iss hard for me. [00:50:00] But once I get going and once I have that in my life and other things to help me around the way I talked about the potholes, you know, putting them with stuff, you know, I, I like to say that it's like, and I don't play video games, um, but from what I [00:50:15] gather, you can get these, you can choose something and get more stuff.
You can get better weapons or you can get more energy or something like that. And to me it's like that you put these things in your life that give you feedback, give you energy, give you [00:50:30] joy, give you information to help you check in with yourself. And if you're not. May wanna take a look. When I wasn't doing that, I was really exhausted all the time and I was really unhappy.[00:50:45]
And I did it for a while, but after a while, a while leads into years sometimes. And that's really a part of being an HPIC where I've just put this, I've quit being [00:51:00] accountable to myself. I've quit growing. Um, I remember I was in, uh, Austin, Texas. I was broke and I was a, I was a runner and, um, land development, [00:51:15] worked as land development person and, and running plans, building plans and um, site plans.
And I was sitting out and it was when I smoked, um, and I was sitting out at the front stoop of my little place and I didn't have any money. So I had Nova. I don't [00:51:30] even know if people know what the Nova Channel is. I know not very many people nowadays know, but. It's, it's basically a, a public service channel.
And, um, I don't know why it was on, but I didn't have a channel changer. And it went [00:51:45] off and I was reading the paper, smoking a cigarette, drinking my coffee, and the TV was in the other room. And this, this preacher lady came on and I was too lazy to get up and turn it. And she said, you know, [00:52:00] and she was, she was southern preacher, so you know, black southern preacher.
Ah. And she was like, you know, she's like, they got through all their hallelujah and stuff. 'cause I was, I was raised, Catholics wouldn't do that. We didn't talk during church. And um, they were up [00:52:15] dance and stuff. And she would say, now, you know, and she says, when you're hooked up to the machine and it goes like this and like this, and you'd boom, and then it goes like this and it goes, you know, and she'd be like, she goes, but the last thing you want is it to go like this.
And so she said basically [00:52:30] that's how life is. Should check in, should go like this. It should go like this, but the last thing you want is to go like this. And sometimes when I'm not really engaged in owning my stuff as a, as an HBIC and I'm not checking in, my life is on [00:52:45] autopilot and I just think, I'll just keep, I'll just keep, just like this and I'll we'll catch up then.
And that's when I'm not, I mean my life is like this, but me checking in is like this. I'm not doing it. And I can't [00:53:00] think of a better place to be than checking in and being what's under this. Um, and for me now being on a lot of the other side of it, there's not a door I [00:53:15] don't wanna open. And part of it I think has to do with, I was talking with someone the other day.
Part of it has to do with my age. I'm 54 and I. I don't, I'm closer to that end than I am to that end. And so [00:53:30] time is of the essence. So I do wanna be the head bitch in charge. I do want to do that. And I wanna do it as much as I can, as often as I can. And I don't lean in. I know we've talked about leaning in.
Sometimes [00:53:45] I jump the fuck in and then I can get in, figure it out, and if I don't like it, I get the hell out. And I, like I said before, I don't empower anybody. I mean, you've got that power. We just gotta find people around it to check in and make sure it's still the pilot lights on. And sometimes [00:54:00] they blow it up into this huge raging bonfire that's so beautiful and magnificent.
We've seen those women that do that. So look at all those four sides of your life and really check in. I wanna address something I'm gonna shift here, if you [00:54:15] don't mind, Joe. I wanna address something I said, personal, professional, spiritual, and physical, and. I know some people talk about professional, and some of my listeners will be, well, I, I don't have a [00:54:30] job.
I stay at home, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And I'm just gonna call, I'm just gonna call this out Professional in that sense of, the word is you have a profession. A profession is, you [00:54:45] are a stay-at-home mom or you are a caretaker. You are may not get paid for that in dollar bills, although you should. And that is an episode that will come up because I have a whole thought process on that.
But also being a professional is doing [00:55:00] something at an elite level, at a skilled, full level. And you can't tell me that moms aren't skillful. You can't tell me. You can't project manage. You can't tell me you weren't in crisis management, change management implementation. You'd be implementing all [00:55:15] damn day long and improvisation.
We have seen the pivot and the reinvention all day long. So anybody who is thinking that professional is just, I need a briefcase and I need to work at a big [00:55:30] four accounting firm. No, no. A professional is how you show up with the skill that you have. And I know that there's some, there's some hot, there's some teams in the, in the corporate environment right now that could use a few moms.[00:55:45]
There's a few CEOs that I wish could have a conversation with their moms or with our moms. Um, I'd love to get them, you know, set straight. Um, and the last thing is, is a professional is someone who [00:56:00] doesn't do it as a, just a pastime. And the last time I checked, most of us that were living as a mom, and for me it was being a stepmom.
I didn't do it as pastime. I was fully invested. [00:56:15] So don't dismiss that element. Because someday you may wanna go into the working world as far as a corporate working environment, and you have all those skills. You just need to [00:56:30] repackage them and put a nice little label on it. And you've got chat GPT to help you do that nowadays.
So it's fine. But again, don't be dismissive of what you provide and the skill level that you have. [00:56:45] I think we've covered the four and um, I think I wanna talk about, actually I do wanna talk about some of the homework 'cause we're gonna wind up now [00:57:00] and some of the homework that came out of this episode, um, that we're just gonna, you know, again, homework is take it or leave it, um, or do like my kids do and use chat GPT to, to do it.
Um, but as a coach, [00:57:15] I, I can't not do homework. So the homework for this session really is. What boxes are you in? And if you don't know, ask, ask your girlfriends and, and, and what [00:57:30] boxes, where are the edges and what doesn't feel comfortable? Where are you too much? And just, you don't even, I [00:57:45] know some of you won't wanna ask that question because you, you've heard me say, well, maybe if I'm too much, maybe they need to go find less, or I need to go find a bigger stage.
I'm gonna offer you this for today. And going forward, and I tell this to people [00:58:00] I coach, you can stop at any point in the journey you want to. You can change your mind and you can always turn around and go back. So ask the question. You don't have to go any farther [00:58:15] than ask the question and answer it and just see what comes up.
That's the other thing is give yourself that grace to just explore without knowing when you're gonna end the marathon and just see where it takes you. [00:58:30] Give yourself that gift of really going, Hmm. What if I wasn't in this box, Joe, did you see the movie Barbie? Yeah. Do you remember when she didn't even know she was, [00:58:45] they were trying to get her in that box and she was running around and, and they were trying to put her in the box and, and then she'd run out and, and, and that's what it's like sometimes I think it's like, I don't even know that I'm in the box and that I should [00:59:00] stay there, and so I run out.
But there are times when I've put myself in the box, I've put other women in a box, or I'm in an environment that has me in a box and I, that's why I'm uncomfortable. Women have a great thing we do. It's called intuition, and I [00:59:15] never understood that. And the best way I can do it, this is not a technical term 'cause someone will fact check me, I'm sure.
Um, good for you. But for me, it's that, [00:59:30] uh, we talked about it before about the beliefs or whatever, but it's that, it's that, huh? You know, like when your dog looks at you, you go, huh? You go, huh? Like Scooby Doo used to go, huh? Mm-hmm. That's what it's like. I I really do. I I could sit there and go, I [00:59:45] what? And it makes you just, Hmm.
And it's just, you can't explain it. But then it just makes sense. So just sit with that. When you answer these questions, what are my boxes? Do I have enough of them? [01:00:00] Do I wanna be in all of them? You know? Who gets more, who gets less? How do they align? Just right or wrong, this is just a podcast. Just have fun with it and explore it [01:00:15] because.
You deserve to know what fulfills you, but only you can do the work to find that out and to ask those questions. So I [01:00:30] think that closes us out. You've got your homework, you, and, um, these are good questions to ask for your friends, your girlfriends, get a glass of wine, do that. Um, my friends, I'd be doing it over a football game, [01:00:45] so, you know, but literally anywhere.
And, um, until next time, ladies tubs have a great weekend. [01:01:00] [01:01:15]