Fear doesn't have to stop us from achieving our dreams. Sometimes, it can be the very thing that pushes us forward. My guest, Darlia Clark, knows this from personal experience. Growing up in Tennessee, she faced bullying, vision challenges, and struggles with confidence, yet she went on to build a successful career leading major corporate brand conversions. Darlia shares how she learned to manage fear, build self-confidence, and lead teams through difficult challenges without losing her authentic voice. We also explore the difference between being a boss and a true leader, the impact of family support, and how small steps can lead to personal growth. Darlia's journey inspired her new book, Bravely Leading: Where Fear Meets Flight, which draws on her experiences with leadership, motherhood, and overcoming breast cancer. I believe you'll enjoy her perspective on courage, resilience, and why moving forward matters more than having everything figured out. Highlights: 01:01 How childhood bullying shaped Darlia's confidence. 11:26 How a bold decision launched her leadership career. 16:59 Why overcoming fear starts with small steps. 28:24 How her father taught her to lead with confidence. 38:47 Why authentic leadership means staying true to yourself. 49:17 How life's challenges inspired her book on courage and resilience. About the Guest: Darlia Clark is a senior executive, speaker, and author whose career has been shaped by navigating uncertainty, fear, and moments that required courage before confidence ever arrived. Raised in small-town Tennessee, she made an early leap to Atlanta, learning firsthand what it means to leave comfort behind in pursuit of growth. That willingness to move forward before feeling ready became the foundation of a career defined by resilience and reinvention. Her professional journey began far from boardrooms, rooted in retail floors and hands-on work that taught her resilience, adaptability, and the importance of human connection. That foundation carried her into executive leadership, where she has overseen national and global initiatives valued in hundreds of millions of dollars. As Senior Vice President at Principle Global, Darlia led one of the largest brand conversions during the height of the global pandemic, guiding teams through labor shortages and supply-chain disruption while still delivering meaningful results. Life beyond work deeply influenced how Darlia leads. Motherhood, personal loss, surviving breast cancer, and long seasons of fear and anxiety forced her to slow down and reassess how she moved through the world. She learned that fear and anxiety are not signals to stop, but often indicators that something meaningful is unfolding. Growth, she discovered, lives on the other side of staying present and continuing forward, even when uncertainty feels overwhelming. Darlia is the author of Bravely Leading: Where Fear Meets Flight, a candid exploration of resilience, reinvention, and leading with authenticity when fear refuses to disappear. Through her work, she encourages leaders to keep moving, trusting that discomfort can be a doorway rather than a barrier. She lives in Atlanta with her husband, two daughters, and two dogs. Darlia believes that true impact is built through resilience, humility, and the courage to move forward—especially when fear is loud and the outcome is still unknown. Ways to connect with Darlia**:** www.bravelyleadingbook.com www.linkedin.com/in/darlia-clark About the Host: Michael Hingson is a New York Times best-selling author, international lecturer, and Chief Vision Officer for accessiBe. Michael, blind since birth, survived the 9/11 attacks with the help of his guide dog Roselle. This story is the subject of his best-selling book, Thunder Dog. Michael gives over 100 presentations around the world each year speaking to influential groups such as Exxon Mobile, AT\&T, Federal Express, Scripps College, Rutgers University, Children’s Hospital, and the American Red Cross just to name a few. He is Ambassador for the National Braille Literacy Campaign for the National Federation of the Blind and also serves as Ambassador for the American Humane Association’s 2012 Hero Dog Awards. https://michaelhingson.com https://www.facebook.com/michael.hingson.author.speaker/ https://twitter.com/mhingson https://www.youtube.com/user/mhingson https://www.linkedin.com/in/michaelhingson/ Thanks for listening! Thanks so much for listening to our podcast! If you enjoyed this episode and think that others could benefit from listening, please share it using the social media buttons on this page. Do you have some feedback or questions about this episode? Leave a comment in the section below! Subscribe to the podcast If you would like to get automatic updates of new podcast episodes, you can subscribe to the podcast on Apple Podcasts or Stitcher. You can subscribe in your favorite podcast app. You can also support our podcast through our tip jar https://tips.pinecast.com/jar/unstoppable-mindset . Leave us an Apple Podcasts review Ratings and reviews from our listeners are extremely valuable to us and greatly appreciated. They help our podcast rank higher on Apple Podcasts, which exposes our show to more awesome listeners like you. If you have a minute, please leave an honest review on Apple Podcasts. Transcription Notes: Michael Hingson 00:04 What if the biggest thing holding you back isn't what's in front of you, but rather what you believe? Welcome to Unstoppable Mindset, where inclusion, diversity, and the unexpected meet. I'm your host, Michael Hingson, speaker, author, and advocate for inclusion and possibilities. This podcast explores how the beliefs we carry shape the way we live, lead, and connect with others. Each week, I talk with people who challenge assumptions, face adversity head-on, and show what's possible when we choose curiosity over fear. Together, we focus on mindset, resilience, and the small shifts that lead to meaningful change. Let's get started. Hello, everyone. Wherever you happen to be. I am your host, Michael Hingson, and this is the Unstoppable Mindset podcast. Today we get to chat with Darlia Clark, who is from Tennessee but now lives in Atlanta and has been involved with leadership and and dealing with fear and a variety of things, working with various companies, and we'll get to all that as we go through roughly the next hour or so. So I'm just going to say, Darlia, I'm really glad that you're here. I want to thank you for being here with us and for being on Unstoppable Mindset. Darlia Clark 01:35 Well, I'm really excited to be here, and thank you for having me on the show. Michael Hingson 01:40 Well, why don't you start by telling us kind of about maybe the early Darlia growing up? Darlia Clark 01:46 Oh, sure, yeah. That's always fun. It's a good way to start. I love starting with that. So, as you mentioned, I'm from a small town in Tennessee, right outside of Chattanooga, and the early me started out with have an extreme lazy eye, so I got to wear the patch to kindergarten, which you know kids love to make fun of that, and I had a little speech impediment where anytime I would say an R, it would come out as a W. So in kindergarten, they they thought that I needed to be in special learning classes just because they they didn't know what they didn't know back then. But luckily, I had a mother who was a school teacher, so she helped wrangle in and get me in some speech therapy and the right eye doctor and patches, so I was able to stay in regular classes. Michael Hingson 02:49 So the lazy eyes became good working eyes and weren't lazy anymore. Darlia Clark 02:57 Yeah, it still turns in when I'm when I'm tired, but as far as vision with glasses and everything, I can see pretty well. Speaker 1 03:06 Okay, Darlia Clark 03:07 throws off depth perception slightly, but that's about it. Michael Hingson 03:11 Well, but you're able to to deal with it, and that's kind of the the big issue. And I I'm not hearing you use W's instead of R's where R's belong. So that must be working right. Darlia Clark 03:26 Yep, that's working right. Lots of speech therapy for that one, and yeah. So I, as a kid, I would always put out my stuffed animals and my dolls, and I would just put them in the driveway, and I would read to them and write songs and just perform for them constantly. So had a lot of fun with that, and that's you know kind of stuff that, as we grow up and get into our careers, when you think back as a kid, what's so fun? What would you do now if you could do it for free? Those were always the kind of things that were a lot of fun for me. Michael Hingson 04:06 Roughly, how long ago was all this that had happened? Darlia Clark 04:10 Well, I am 56, almost 57. So this is 50-plus years ago. So Michael Hingson 04:17 in the 1975, 7476, era. Darlia Clark 04:23 Yes, yeah, I was born in 69. So, and I got my first pair of glasses when I was two and a half. Michael Hingson 04:30 Did you get a lot of bullying about wearing glasses? Darlia Clark 04:36 I I did, but it was the glasses as well as the fact that the eye was turning in, so kids would always say they couldn't tell where I was looking, or you know, so a lot of a lot of bullying for that for sure. Michael Hingson 04:54 Do you think that was something that affected you in in any way? How did. How did you cope with all that, especially as you were growing up? Darlia Clark 05:04 Yeah, I think that bullying has always been a part of my life from a young age, and quite honestly, I feel that it's made me tougher along the way. When I when I think back, it's you know, especially as a kid, I can always think about the dreams I had at the moment, and really they kind of ebbed and flowed with the confidence confidence level that I had at the time. So it's not that oh, I used to have small dreams, and then they got
