This Delicious Life™ - Self-Kindness, Less Servitude & Permission to Re-invent

Kim O'Hara
  • 5.0 (11)
  • PERSONAL JOURNALS

If you are driving kids or managing the launch of adult children, fielding calls about aging parents' health, running a business or working over 40 hours, and don't seem to be able to find moments to self-honor and relish in the beauty of life, you get to re-boot with the little delicious moments. So many women 30-60 in the "sandwich generation" have become inundated with tasks and forgotten to do random acts of self-kindness. In This Delicious Life™ podcast, female guests from all professions share how they find these small spaces to bask in their self-love. Host Kim O'Hara also shares about her delicious life and the development of her mindset that is the genesis of her upcoming book, Live Your Delicious Life.

  1. 3D AGO

    Why A Little Naive Optimism Can Go A Long Way

    How many of you are willing to walk away from a toxic job, pursue a passion project and be in naïve optimism while you do it? I know from my personal perspective, we tend with our careers or how we lead our kids to be in hard love, or face reality. Or we work ourselves to the perfectionist bone, having zero fun while we strive to "get it right." But with Dr. Vicki Johnson, she gives a solid sell on the idea of optimism, but also chipping away at projects with high effort. This in itself will lower the potential of being a perfectionist. She provided so many insightful takeaways in our interview, especially coming from a place where she juggled jobs, side hustles (built her platform ProFellow) and young kids, all crammed in a small apartment in San Francisco. Currently she lives in Bend, Oregon and has recently published her book, Pitch Your Potential: The Formula for Winning Dream Jobs, Awards, and Elite Opportunities.  Would you like to be a part of the Delicious Life community where we are building events and connections? Please join me at liveyourdeliciouslife.kit.com where you can download for free my PDF Seven Acts of Self-Kindness. If you enjoyed today's podcast, please rate and review. It helps us to get the message out that we don't have to be burned out exhausted women to achieve dreams and goals.

    35 min

  2. MAR 30

    We've been Fed So Many Lies: How We Can Learn as Women to Rejuvenate from the Hustle

    You would think with all the fancy initials after De Shell's name, we would be talking about female leadership, or coaching but that is not what this podcast is about. In fact, if you stay in the interview for at least 22 minutes, De Shell will mesmerize you like she did me. She will lull you into belief you deserve a gentle life and no longer need to feel like you are drowning inside. De Shell and I had a shared language of leaning deliciously into our expansion of self-knowledge in an area that is not necessarily to our professional advantage. Why not? Who told us that is not beneficial? The system, that is who, and its all a bunch of lies. How you feed your soul is how you show up everywhere in your life, including how you self-serve. For De Shell this was yoga. She learned after decades of practicing asanas  that the lifestyle is so much biggest than exercise. As a life long learner, she wanted to do something deeper that helped her calm down. What it meant for the mental and energetic and emotional space. She signed up for a teacher training which also  gave me permission to validate my desire to take a yoga teacher intensive one day because I too have been doing yoga my whole life thinking I want a better understanding of what's deeper. I have learned more than ever lately, if you just stay in child pose your whole time, it is okay. Why can't we do something just to learn? Why are we always in the hustle? Women always need an outcome, but what if the outcome is it feels good and you are curious. I share with De Shell I found out a lot of what I believed in, what I felt I had to prove, was a lie. She nailed in on the head when she said, it's the overfunctioning. The badges we think we need to win, and the conditioning to place more value on what we do versus who we are. Women who don't have self-trust use the real masculine language and think "if I could just…", but at the same time, it's magical thinking to say we don't need to make money. There is a happy medium. De Shell works with a lot of women on boards with high position, and she thinks of herself a decade ago. She would defend the lies based on how she defined herself. Self-care for example, relaxation versus rejuvenation. You don't rest when you die! You need to nap on a hammock! Stop trying to think looking good is self-care! De Shell takes off into the mountains, and travels alone. She doesn't want to be concerned with what you want to eat and what activity you want to engage in. She wants to rejuvenate! In the Fun Segment she suggests: 1.        Journal by candlelight, do yoga poses, sink into oracle witnessing and reflecting on becoming.  2.        Go on trips on your own and make discoveries. 3.        Eat at new places and savor what's local. What's the story behind the food? 4.        When you travel, see how the poor and impoverished live beyond your resort parameters. 5.        No schedule, no check in. 8 hour book days. If you loved our podcast, I would love to have you as part of our Delicious community by joining at liveyourdeliciouslife.kit.com If you want to learn more about the work De Shell is doing, check her out at https://leveragingtruth.com

    31 min

  3. MAR 16

    (Start Here) I Was Last on My Own List - This Is That Story

    New here? Start with this one. This is my story — and probably a little bit of yours too. At 44, I was a single mom with two kids, no savings, and everything to prove. So I did what so many of us do - I worked harder, gave more, pushed further. I overworked. I overpleased. I said yes when I meant no and kept producing results to prove I was worthy, capable, enough. And then my body said: not so fast. The panic attacks started. Not as a breakdown - as a message. My nervous system was waving a white flag, telling me I had been last on my own list for so long I had forgotten I was even on it. So I started small. I looked at trees in the sunshine. I danced in my apartment. I laughed with friends. I started stealing tiny moments back for myself - what I now call Delicious Moments. This is that story. And if you're in the messy middle right now, running on empty, holding everyone else together - this one is for you. Start here. 🌻 Loved this episode? Join Live Your Delicious Life — my free weekly newsletter for women in the messy middle. One story. One act of self-kindness. Every Tuesday. → Sign up here: liveyourdeliciouslife.kit.com.

    15 min

  4. MAR 11

    What If We Created Fun with Money?

    Over the last decade of coaching women, speaking to women, and my own personal experiences, our most fraught constructs are time and money. So many of us have these old money stories we have brought into adulthood and we are almost paralyzed by conversations and transparency with money, nevermind having fun with it to de-stress and be expansive. Meghan Dwyer, a certified Financial Planner, and podcast host of Money Isn't Scary, joined me to talk about money. Why can't we love money and be proud of money, and also be intentional with it at the same time? What would it feel like if we were in our joy with money and created fun with money? What if you created a fund to do something guilt free for yourself?  Whether you are a mom of little kids navigating Disneyland, or a solopreneur looking at your bottom line for Q2, the money we have can be a representative of our inner worth. Instead, how about we have inner worth and self-trust and let the money follow suit! I find that money becomes a barrier for women, and we have a hard time being transparent with money because we think we are bragging or making someone else uncomfortable. When instead, we could be helping another woman be less alone with her money stress and instead see abundance! We give some Delicious Fun Money Tips on the show! Listen in to learn how to: Save up $20 a week for a fun account.  Check your bank balances each week instead of being ruled by fear Take the emotion out of communication with money using AI. If you enjoyed this episode, please share it, rate and review.  I would also love if you could come join my Delicious Life community through my newsletter at https://liveyourdeliciouslife.kit.com where I will be sharing weekly tips on how to have more random acts of self-kindness in your life.

    32 min

  5. MAR 3

    Lean Into Crafting That Book (with Less Exhaustion)

    You know that dream you have to write a book? The one that shows up uninvited while you're in the shower or staring out the window on a Tuesday?  Once it hits, it won't go away. I got to talk about that dream recently, and why the women who have the most to say are so often the ones who keep waiting to feel ready. Samantha Hawley invited me onto her Beyond Awareness podcast, and honestly, it became one of those conversations I didn't want to end. We talked about what's actually in the way of your book.  It's trust. Trust in yourself, your story, and the version of you that already knows what she wants to say. But in order to have that trust, you need to give yourself those little delicious moments in other areas every day or you are going to continue giving your energy away to everyone else, and not have any left for your creative freedom. We also got into identity shifts, why perfectionism is just fear wearing a blazer, and why writing the book you have right now is what shapes you into the writer you'll be in five years. The woman you want to be with a voice, a passion and purpose... not minimized by all the areas of your life pulling at you (that can make a false sense of importance.) I felt this podcast episode with Samanta was so delicious that I built a whole This Delicious Life™ episode around our conversation. In this honest and frank interview, you will learn: How to know if you have a book versus just a complaint dump. How a book can help you put voice to your feelings. You'll receive guidance on how to stop clinging so tightly to your book ideas. I wrote one book on permission and then at the guidance of a book professional, evolved it to something more akin to this brand. I tossed that book and wrote a new one, and then found a book agent because the newest book was more aligned to the joy and purpose that was bubbling out of me. We can wear our book journey lightly, not like some mission we can never get done. We can let expand and flow, and how you do time in your life is going to dictate how you find time to be in the book process. Listen to, Subcribe and rate Samantha's Beyond Awareness podcast. And of course, do the same for This Delicious Life™ so we can grow! I would also love if you could come join my Delicious Life community through my newsletter at https://liveyourdeliciouslife.kit.com where I will be sharing weekly tips on how to have more random acts of self-kindness in your life.

    35 min

  6. FEB 24

    What If You No Longer Cried Yourself To Sleep?

    On today's episode, I chat with Lauren Young Durbin, a Career Strategist for Midcareer Women. She is dishing out the goods for all of us who are thinking about our next career move. While a lot of advice is floating out there in this category, what I found unique about our talk is what a straight-shooter Lauren is. Some of the takeaways right at the top of the talk include gems like: -       Your vision might not be your vision. It might be someone else's you adopted. -        We are the biggest wardens of our careers. -       Start by thinking bigger and then think bigger than that. Lauren lived the advice she coaches. She was struggling in a job working 60 hours a week with two neurodivergent twins, while also building her own business. She straddled as long as she could, and finally left her job to focus on her business. The end product? She was no longer upset or crying herself to sleep. When we get the hit to make a career shift, it can be scary to make the move and the leap but the benefits are vast when we listen to what our soul is telling us. Then how about when we think we want to do something that is more out of the box than what we have been doing? We get to make that gradual shift and it's  not a complete toss it over. We can lean into both and observe what we are trying to make work and ignoring the signs. We think since we are already doing everything for everyone, the idea of doing seven companies seems implausible and we limit our expansion. Lauren says we need to think out of the box – we can demolish the box or expand it since we created it in the first place. And wouldn't it be nice if we could vision board all the time with all the crafts and glue? With four-year-old twin boys Lauren doesn't have time to do the visualization she wants to do and pepper the walls with vision boards, so she takes time during the day to visualize and think about what she wants. Ask yourself if something is important, and if you discover it isn't, let it go. Just make room for what your vision truly is. And the truth is, many women just need to re-configure how they are showing up for themselves at their job, and want to stay. They stay at the company and get promoted, perhaps, because they don't know what that transition is yet. Lauren's Delicious Advice?  Light one of the 50 candles you have from Ross, and do the small things for and only yourself. Who is Lauren? Lauren Young Durbin, Esq. is a career strategist and founder of Tyche Career Coaching, where she helps midcareer professional women stop spinning and start moving. Her specialty? Helping high-achieving women figure out what's actually wrong, how to fix it, and what they want to do next—without burning everything down in the process. A licensed attorney (JD, New York Law School) and proud Wellesley alum, Lauren has made four career pivots herself, from legal publishing to litigation support to contract management to coaching. She's been the woman in the wrong job, the toxic environment, and the "this looks great on paper but I'm dying inside" situation. Multiple times. She figured it out. Now she helps other women do the same. Lauren is known for her direct approach, sharp questions, and zero tolerance for the corporate lies that keep smart women stuck.

    29 min

  7. FEB 7

    When One Career Ends, Another Has Been Growing Under the Soil

    I spent the last eleven years happily thriving as a book coach. I built that career through networking near and far, and I did all the stuff - the webinars, and the funnels and the 30 day challenges, lives, you name it, I tried it to find the people who needed me and my style of coaching. What I also was doing in all that time was meeting so many incredible women from all walks of life who were passionate about businesses, or ideas, brands and concepts, but we also talked about their kids and their parents. I spent a lot of small circle conversations chatting about the way we live our lives, and the desire to have more. To lighten the load of responsibility but still be connected to love. What I found with most of the women I met was they didn't know how to find their self-esteem without controlling, managing, knowing and understanding where their life was headed, so they felt safe. To be in the middle of a transition created a lot of fear and self-judgment. "I should've known better." "I should've seen this coming." What about looking at the fact that what has been growing has happened right in the middle of what you were accomplishing and is now being called to attention... especially if you gave yourself the bandwidth and ten minutes to stop and recognize the new calling. We look as women to the problems, and not the potentials. We are built to solve problems for everyone we love, and in our companies and professions. So it is natural to believe when we are calling to pivot that this is a problem. What if it is a calling to be bigger than you even dreamed you could be? I had to share with you my season I am in today. Realizing the career that brought me the stuff was also part of the new beginning. It's a wave of growth and opportunity not cut and dry. Be in the open spaces and look at what you launched and did as part of the bigger picture of your delicious life.

    17 min

  8. FEB 4

    The "infinite pie" for Women: We Don't Have to Fight Over Crumbs

    We don't need to be fighting over pies as women. We can just make more pie. Younger women get this, banding together with their small group of women who can be their confidants and friends, and those who have achieved top leadership roles often credit this small group of confidantes, friends, or business partners for their success. The smart money is not fighting anyone, but being yourself and being good at what you do.  Co Founder of Take the Lead Gloria Feldt shares with This Delicious Life that there is an "infinite pie" for us as women. This mindset comes from her from her book, Intentioning: Sex, Power, Pandemics, and How Women Will Take the Lead for Everyone's Good, which emphasizes limitless resources and the need for women to redefine power positively as the energy to improve life for themselves and their community. To me this sounds like a very succinct definition of the "divine feminine." Alongside stepping into a leadership role at Planned Parenthood at 54, Gloria has won many accolades -Forbes 50 over 50, Glamour Magazine's Woman of the Year, Vanity Fair's Top 200 Women Legends, Leaders, and Trailblazers. So I got right into asking what changed in her career after winning awards. How did they increase her own personal worth and what did it mean to women who were not winning awards? She said for her "basically nothing changes" professionally as a result. The value of these accolades lies in their ability to help her advance her mission of achieving equality for women, particularly in leadership, power, and pay. It's not a place for women to be more competitive but add more places at the table for every other woman. No one has the golden ticket! Which goes back to the infinite pie! There are not scarce resources! We don't have to fight over crumbs although we have been socialized to believe this narrative. Gloria suggested that many women are choosing entrepreneurship over the corporate world to create their own culture and flexibility, despite having to work harder. She noted that the number of people starting businesses is now almost equal between men and women. She also emphasized the importance of encouraging women to "think bigger" about their business ventures to shift the culture surrounding money and power. Gloria concluded by stressing the necessity of having more women in AI leadership to prevent the technology from programming existing cultural biases. Gloria's Delicious Takeaways: Have authority and agency over your own body. Earn your own money (and at least have a baseline to support you and your children if you need to.) And get involved in AI!

    41 min
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About

If you are driving kids or managing the launch of adult children, fielding calls about aging parents' health, running a business or working over 40 hours, and don't seem to be able to find moments to self-honor and relish in the beauty of life, you get to re-boot with the little delicious moments. So many women 30-60 in the "sandwich generation" have become inundated with tasks and forgotten to do random acts of self-kindness. In This Delicious Life™ podcast, female guests from all professions share how they find these small spaces to bask in their self-love. Host Kim O'Hara also shares about her delicious life and the development of her mindset that is the genesis of her upcoming book, Live Your Delicious Life.

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