Erica: Hey, girl. By now, you know I have Her Collective, my online community for ambitious women who are done doing it alone. Her Collective is for the women who are smart, capable, and driven, but they find themselves stuck on the sticky floors like self doubt, burnout, and waiting for permission that quite honestly never comes. Inside HER, you get more than motivation. You get real support, real strategies, and real momentum.

Erica: We work on things like clarifying what you want now and what's coming next, building confidence without burning yourself out, navigating hard conversations, career moves, and leadership moments with clarity, and surrounding yourself with women who actually get it. This isn't about hustling harder. It's about moving intentionally with the right tools and the right people in your corner. If you're ready to stop spinning, start choosing yourself, and build a career in life that actually feels aligned, I'd love to welcome you inside her collective. You can learn more and join us at www.joinhercollective.com.

Erica: Because honestly, girl, you were never meant to do this alone. Imagine waking up every night drenched in sweat, heart racing, and haunted by the same terrifying nightmare. A nightmare that shakes you to your core and leaves you questioning everything. Your career, your choices, your very identity. But what if that nightmare was your soul's way of screaming for attention?

Erica: What if it was the universe's way of giving you the ultimate wake up call? Today, we're diving into a story that begins with that exact nightmare. A story of a woman who seemingly had it all, climbing the corporate ladder to the top only to find herself disconnected from her true self and suffocating under the weight of expectations. This is the story of rebellion, not against the world, but for the self. It's a story about shedding the success script written by others and daring to write your own, even when the stakes are high and when the risks feel insurmountable.

Erica: What does it mean to be a rebel? How do you awaken the rebel within you? And how do you find the courage to trust yourself when everything around you is screaming to stay the course? These are the questions we're answering today as we unpack a journey of transformation, soul searching, and ultimately, finding true freedom. So get ready because this conversation is going to challenge you, inspire you, and maybe, just maybe, wake up that little voice inside of you that's been whispering, there has to be more than this.

Erica: You are listening to the Glass Steeling and Sticky Floor podcast. The podcast that will empower you to shatter limiting beliefs and toxic behaviors to uncover infinite possibilities so you can live your best life. I'm Erica Rooney, and I'm on a mission to bring more women into positions of power and keep them there. I'm obsessed with all things growth and abundance, and I'm here to talk you through the tried and true secrets to get you to level up your career and your life. We talk about the hard stuff here, imposter syndrome, perfectionism, fear, and burnout.

Erica: So pull up a seat, pop in an earbud, and let's dive in. Shelley, welcome to the Glass Ceiling Sticky Floor podcast. How are you today?

Shelley: Oh my god. I'm so good, and I'm so excited to finally be doing this with you. I feel like you're a soul sister.

Erica: Ugh, girl. I am because I have read your story. I know what's up, and I'm like, oh my gosh. It's my story, but just a little different. But let's kick it off.

Erica: You are a Harley Davidson executive turned chief sole officer. You're gonna have to tell me more. What is this come up story?

Shelley: Yeah. This is like a five hour story that I'm gonna give you the little snippets of, and then you can tell me where we wanna go a little deeper into this. So, the short version, and I wrote a whole book on this, but the short version is listen. I had the most incredible twenty six year corporate career. So let's start from a place of I feel incredibly fortunate.

Shelley: There is some privilege in my story for sure. And I rode this wave of, like, you know, I was really living my dad's success script. So that's kind of like, plant that seed because we come back to it. I was living my dad's success script. He was a marketing executive turned, you know, very, successful, you know, by traditional definitions of the word, you know, chief executive and a very successful, businessman.

Shelley: Let's put it that way. And so I was like, oh, well, that seems kind of interesting, and advertising and marketing is super sexy. And I got into it after college, and it just like, it was like a rocket ship. And I'm like, oh, this is a one way ticket around the world. I was living in really sexy places.

Shelley: I was I lived in Istanbul. I lived in Shanghai. I lived in New York City. I was on this incredible rocket ship ride, and I was eating it up. I was work working for literally some of the most iconic brands in the world.

Shelley: So before Harley, which I'll get to in two seconds, I served brands from McDonald's to Visa to a o AOL, which was sexy back in the day if we put a date stamp or time stamp on it, Intel. I mean, so many cool brands. And then Harley Davidson came calling. And it came calling at they came calling at a point in time in my life who had just gone through an epic divorce. I was redefining who I was in the world.

Shelley: I was reclaiming my mojo. I wanted my badassery back. And so when you get the call from Harley Davidson to say, hey. We want you to help us build our global marketing organization. You say, hell yes, and you learn to ride a motorcycle.

Shelley: So that So hold on.

Erica: You didn't even know how to ride a motorcycle before that? I had

Shelley: no idea how to it's it's usually the first question I get from people, so I had to drop it in because it's also a story of, like, we get to do whatever the fuck we wanna do, and we can reinvent ourselves. We can learn how to ride a motorcycle. I was 40 years old when I learned how to ride a motorcycle. So this was Shelly Paxton, like, you know, reclaiming her mojo, you know, revving on the throttle of a big ass Harley Davidson, stepping into a really unbelievable role. I ended up staying at Harley for six and a half years.

Shelley: So my final six and a half years of my twenty six years in the corporate world was at Harley. It was I literally zero regrets in my entire career, zero regrets going to Harley. It was unbelievable, the the honor and the privilege of getting to represent an iconic, sexy global brand like Harley that is truly a legacy brand. And especially as a marketer, I have a lot of reverence for being a part of that history and putting my fingerprints on, you know, you know, 100 of history and and all of that. And that makes my story all the more interesting because with that as the backdrop, like, I'm now feeling like a badass.

Shelley: I've learned how to ride a motorcycle. Ultimately, I become chief marketing officer of Harley Davidson. I take the global reigns. I do not take this lightly. And in the final year of my time at Harley, I'm honestly I'm feeling exhausted.

Shelley: I'm feeling empty, unfulfilled. I felt super alone because nobody around me was talking about feeling this way, so I assumed I was the only one feeling this way, which I know we'll dive into because this is a really important topic. And so here I am, and then I kinda wasn't listening. So I started drinking heavily. I was pushing it down.

Shelley: I was totally numbing. And I get to this point where clearly the universe and my soul were like, uh-sister. We're gonna wake you the fuck up. You are going to pay attention. You are going to listen to what's going on.

Shelley: So a nightmare started ripping at me out of my sleep in the middle of the night, always 2AM, and always seeing the exact same nightmare. And that was the entire final year that I was at Harley. And for context, I'm, like, 45 and 46 years old. Right? So this isn't like I'm a little kid having a nightmare.

Shelley: I'm a full grown, like, full grown ass woman who is every day trying to pretend she has it together. And finally, I asked for help, and I asked for support. And I went to find a doctor, and I went to a therapist, and I started to understand what this nightmare was telling me. And I woke up, and we can go into the nightmare. I'll pause in a second, but I woke up to this idea that I was completely disconnected from myself, my soul, my truth, my own desires, and frankly, my own definition of success.

Shelley: I had I had, you know, been ticking all the boxes of this traditional success script that my dad handed me, and it served me really, really, really well until it didn't. And so that was the beginning of me understanding that it was up to me to reclaim my own agency, to reconnect with myself, and to make different choices going forward. And that led to christening myself chief sole officer and going on this journey that I called my sabbatical. And I know there's a lot in there, so I'm gonna stop talking.

Erica: It's crazy because there's a lot to unpack there, but, Shelley, I can't tell you how closely that mirrors my experience as well. Like, that's what's wild. It's like I climbed the corporate ladder. I got all the way to the c suite, and I just felt like I had to do everything to perfection. I was in this role.

Erica: Like you said, a bit of privilege here and there. So it's like, okay. Well, I need to live this role and be happy about it. And I've got these kids and this job and this lifestyle that on the outside looks Instagram picture perfect. You know, we're going to The Maldives.

Erica: I've got these two beautiful kids, but inside I was dying. And the only thing at the time that I felt I could do was drink more wine because no one understood me. I couldn't talk to anybody about it, and I just felt so alone. So instead of actually dealing with what was going on inside of me, I was numbing it all down and shutting it all away. But as you know, that only takes you so far, and it works until it doesn't.

Erica: And when it doesn't work, it's not good. Yeah. I would love when you

Shelley: get the cosmic kick in the ass. Right? And it comes for all of us. If we don't listen, it whispers and then it shouts, and then it hits you with a two by four, whatever that looks like for you. And so you're right.

Shelley: I cannot believe how many similarities. I know a little bit about your story, but I didn't know all of that. Oh my god. Okay. So you were about to ask a question.

Shelley: I just had to say that.

Erica: To go off what you're saying, like, what is hilarious is the universe gives you these signs and these nudges along the way. Right? And hindsight is a gift that we will all have one day, but today is not that day. And all of those signs were coming in left and right, but because I was so damn stubborn, right, I wasn't going to give into any of that because that meant I failed. And like you said, like, I had all these check boxes.

Erica: I could never admit that I was struggling, that I wasn't keeping it all together, that I wasn't sleeping, that I was waking up at, you know, 4AM, like, sweating, heart palpitations, totally stressed out. I could not admit that to anyone because that meant I was a failure. And so all of your story just, like, strikes a chord, but what what makes me, I guess, happy and sad about it is happy number one that we're here talking about it because that's the whole thing. What makes me sad about it is, like, there if there are us two women in the world that have found each other feeling this exact way having this story, how many other women are out there not speaking about it, suffering in silence, numbing out, unhappy, staying in terrible relationships, and wasting their life away?

Shelley: Yeah. And, Erica, I mean, you're hitting on exactly why, one, we're soul sisters, one of the million reasons, and why we're having this conversation, why I wrote my book. I mean, I can't tell you one of the I I keep this quote all the time, so I'm holding up a little orange sticky, which you'll come to orange is my color, and these are permission slips I typically write myself. But what's on this one is a quote from Brene Brown that guides me every single day, and it is exactly what we're talking about. I would love to read it.

Shelley: It says, one day you will tell your story of how you've overcome what you're going through now, and it will become someone else's survival guide.

Erica: Oh, I love that. Brene Brown is just like the queen of all things.

Shelley: Yeah. I mean, without a doubt without a doubt, like, I feel like one of my personal I say she's on my personal board of directors. She doesn't know it yet.

Erica: Nope. That's okay. Be able to yeah.

Shelley: And I hope to be able to tell her one day. And that is so important to me because I put my heart and my soul in my book, and I very intentionally seek out these kinds of raw, vulnerable conversations so we can normalize it. Exactly what you just said. Like, I think about how much the conversation has shifted from when I was having this nightmare. I left Harley almost eight years ago.

Shelley: So just to put another kinda timeline around it, I left Harley almost eight years ago. It was 2016, late in the year. And when I think about then, what the narrative was, no one was having these conversations. We weren't talking about mental health. We were not openly saying, I need help.

Shelley: I want support. I'm in therapy. I'm, you know, finding our people and talking about how can success be something that feels more full and less empty. And that was like this whole that what hit me like a lightning bolt is this idea when I was on sabbatical and in the journey that I've taken since, is we can get all the way to the top and we can feel really guilty, like you said. Because we're I was like, I'm a privileged white woman.

Shelley: Like, this is ridiculous that I'm even having these feelings of is this all there is. And I was guilting myself exactly like you said. And the reality is that isn't that isn't the question. Right? That's the question is, are we being true to ourselves?

Shelley: Success is a feeling, not a checklist. And when I finally got that and I understood that when you are continuing to tick the boxes and live someone else's success script, whatever that looks like, you can have successful in the corporate world. I'm not saying you have to leave your job. What I'm saying is we get to do this very differently, and we get to do this on our terms. And it takes more of us as individuals stepping into our badass truth and talking about it, and then it takes us collectively to start to shift culture within companies and within our communities and within the world, frankly.

Erica: So powerful. I do wanna go back to that nightmare, though. What what was that nightmare? How How long did it go on? You know, you said that you you woke up.

Erica: You finally asked for help. What was that turning point that led you to finally ask for help?

Shelley: Yeah. You're gonna relate to this based on the little bit that you've shared and that I know. So the nightmare was I'd still even every time I even start to tell it, I will get tears in my eyes, and I have goosebumps. And I tell this often on stage, and you probably know this feeling. It never gets old, and it is I am always fully present in the terror of what it was because it truly was, you might not make it to 50 years old if this keeps happening.

Shelley: And that was one of that was one of my wake that was one of my sort of holy shit moments. So to take you back to the nightmare, I was, again, two 2AM. I woke up in sweat and tears at 2AM on the dot every single night. This happened the entire final year. So this isn't like, hey.

Shelley: For a couple of weeks, I was kinda waking up and losing some sleep. This was I was not sleeping, and I was starting to lose my grip on reality, especially because I was drinking myself to sleep to try to incapacitate the nightmare. All the things you were saying, like, I was like, well, I'm not gonna deal with the real thing or actually try to understand what's at the core of this. I'm gonna try to make it go away. I'm gonna try to numb it away, and enough bottles of wine will incapacitate that thing for sure.

Shelley: Right? Well, of course, the answer is no. So here's so I was it was crazy, and part of the reason why it makes me so emotional is because I was every night, I was being guided through this, like, maze of hallways that I didn't I didn't recognize. It was like, I first start out, and I think I'm in the apartment I was living in when I was at Harley, and then it's this unfamiliar maze of hallways. I'm being pulled by this invisible force.

Shelley: I ultimately end up in this dark, like, pitch black, cold, lifeless room. And I'm, like, forced to walk into this room. And you know when you walk in a room and you're like, oh, some real bad shit has happened in this room. Right? Like, your hair is on end, and there is no sign of life, and it has, like, a bit of a damp chill in the air.

Shelley: And all I can see is on the other side is this dim flickering outline of what looks like a small utility closet. And, of course, that same invisible force is, like, pulling me toward it. I'm resisting. I don't wanna know what the hell it is. I don't wanna be there.

Shelley: I'm trying to bolt in the other direction, and I find myself standing in front of the door, putting my my door my hand on the door handle, pulling the door open. And as I do, I hear this whimpering. And spoiler alert sort of trigger warning for dog lovers. I look down, and on the floor is my precious pug. So I had this fat, cute, roly poly blind pug named Mocha.

Shelley: He had died before I went to Harley. But when I open this closet, he is alive and skeletal, malnourished, neglected, longing for attention. So what I am believing in this moment, in this nightmare, is I'm a monster who has left her dog to, like, die in this little utility closet, and I didn't even know he was still alive. And so I scoop him up and I cradle him, and I promise to never leave him again. And I'm telling him how much I love him, and boom, I wake up.

Shelley: That exact point at 2AM every night, I kid you not. So, you know, you you kinda know what's coming, and it's terrifying. And so I got to the point, and I'm curious if this was, you know, a different set of circumstances, but it sounds like you were trying to drink it away and all the things. I got to a point where I was just on the cusp of not even being able to function in my job. I was so high functioning, it was scary.

Shelley: When I look back at it now, and I was like, oh, just, you know, put on all the cool jewelry and put it, like literally, I was armoring myself up as Brene says, and I was stepping in trying to pretend everything was okay, but I was exhausted. I was continuing to repeat the cycle. I was just not myself, and I'm like, this can't go on. And so about three or four months in, I was like, I need help. I wasn't publicly ready to, so I went to a doctor who had done, like, some of my executive stuff for Harley, and he had a very, holistic view of medicine and an approach to health and very Eastern meets Western medicine.

Shelley: And so for me, I was like, that felt like a safe space for me to have an initial conversation. And so his name was doctor Bob. I mentioned him in the book. I doctor Bob, I think, was the beginning of the me, you know, turning a corner because he was like he he initiated me to slowing down, to a little taste of meditation, to this idea that we can have monkey brain. Right?

Shelley: This is sort of like our demons trying to wake us up and keep us up. But, honestly, it was through slowing down and an initial meditation practice, and I'm talking, like, five or ten minutes at a time, and I'm still kinda that person. I I started to understand that what I was seeing, mocha, was a proxy for my soul, and my soul was dying in a closet, longing to be loved and fed and nourished and longing for my attention and for me to reconnect with it and own my truth. And that was the moment when I got that lightning bolt. I was like, I need to pause.

Shelley: I need to go take some time to myself. And I've spent the next probably six months making sure that I could pave my way out of Harley in a way that felt really respectful to the brand and my team and all the things. And that's what I did. And I was, like, terrified because my peep the people closest to me, my parents included, were like, you do this. Nobody does this.

Shelley: This is ridiculous, Shelly. Look at this job that you have. And I was like, I know. I understand. It looks ludicrous from the outside, but all I know is I can't wake up and feel this way every single day.

Shelley: All the money in my bank account, all the privilege and good fortune of riding motorcycles around the world, all of it. I'm gonna die. And so I just I finally paved my way out. Like I said, I left in September 2016, so I'm coming up on the, the eight year anniversary. And I woke up one morning.

Shelley: And it was like a love letter on the side of my bed, and it was like, you are going on a sabbatical. This is how you are gonna talk about it to people. You are not going on holiday. You are not going on a traditional sabbatical, but you are going on a much deeper journey of self and reconnection with soul, and you'll figure it out. And that's where sabbatical, which became the title of my book.

Shelley: So later on, I started to realize, oh, this is a journey other people are interested in. This is a conversation more people wanna have just like you and I are. And so that started to lead me into this becoming my mission, my book, my business. But I have to say in this especially for anyone listening to this right now, most importantly, this became a way of being and an understanding of intentional choices I get to make every day to show up in my truth, to show up more bold and more brave and more badass in in my way. And you get to choose that in your way.

Shelley: And for some people, that's absolutely in the corporate world, and you get to decide to do it differently. I actually have a keynote right now that I call I quit so you don't have to. So it's about me leaving so I can pay it forward. I wanna share what I wish I would have known if you're sitting in a mid level manager seat, if you're sitting in a c suite c suite seat like you and I were, all of that. So I'll pause there.

Shelley: That's a a lot, but that was the journey.

Erica: Hey there, listeners. If you have ever felt like you're stuck in a place, held back by self doubt, perfectionism, or that pesky inner critic, you're not alone. We all face those sticky floors that keep us from reaching the heights we dream of. But guess what? It's time to shatter those limiting beliefs and toxic behaviors to uncover infinite possibilities.

Erica: My book, Glassy Loops and Sticky Floors, is your ultimate guide to smashing through barriers, overcoming limiting beliefs, and stepping motivational powerhouse. It's also been featured in Success Magazine, so you know it's packed with insights that work. Inside, you'll find real life sticky floor stories, practical strategies to help you navigate your own sticky floor moments, and a whole lot of inspiration to keep you climbing. This isn't just a book. It's your road map to success, confidence, and freedom.

Erica: Grab your copy of Glass Ceilings and Sticky Floors today at www.ericaandersonrooney.com. Whether you're in the boardroom, the classroom, or just starting out, this book is for you because no one, and I mean no one, deserves to stay stuck, no one deserves to feel small, and you have glass ceilings to shatter. Let's do this. I mean, it's so powerful, and I love just the entire story of it. And thank you so much for sharing it because those are the pieces that I feel like we don't talk about out loud as much.

Erica: And I'm a big believer that when you do voice your fears or you voice your struggles, they become smaller. They become less of a thing. Right? When we keep them closed up in this closet, it's like that big scary monster that we can't talk about. When when we shed light, when we open that door, we are finally allowing that light to come in.

Erica: And you look in there and you see it's not this big scary thing.

Shelley: Yeah.

Erica: But my question for you, you talk about a way of being. You talk about this whole transformation and, you know, exiting Harley Davidson. I know one of the areas that I really struggled is what I call FOPO, the fear of other people's opinion. And that has you know, we got YOLO. We got all these other things.

Erica: I've got FOPO. Right? Fear of other people's opinions. Oh, that's so good. For so long.

Erica: How did you let go of the FOPO?

Shelley: Oh my gosh. It is something I still practice to this day. So I think what's really important to say, and I say this in daily life, and I know you do too, I don't have it all figured out. This is literally I preach what I need to practice. I practice what I preach.

Shelley: And and preach is a strong word, but you know what I'm saying. Like, I'm I'm in this work because I'm still in this work. And so I think it's important to say that, you know, it was I always say every badass accomplishment is a series of tiny steps. I'm still taking those tiny steps every single day, so I see this way of being as a practice. I have more tools.

Shelley: I have more concepts. I have more of an understanding and a self awareness, and I'm still practicing this every single day. So I talk a lot about the choices that I make, and one of them gets exactly I love FOPO, by the way. Brilliant. One of the choices that I make and that I I love to share with the world is I choose or we choose because I'm inviting all of you to choose for yourselves as well, values over validation.

Shelley: And so you'll you'll come to know that I absolutely love good alliteration, so I almost always will make everything alliterative because I also find it easier to remember for myself as well. But, you know, the idea and what really landed with me when this hit me on solbatical and it's really crystallized over time is that it's this radical mindset shift from believing that what matters is out there somewhere outside of you, which lives in the land of validation and what everybody else thinks, to knowing what matters most is all in here, inside of you. Knowing what matters most is your values, your truth, your desires. And that shift has I I talk about this as the very first choice I always make in every talk, in every conversation, on every stage. That is the first one I cover because to me, it's so foundational.

Shelley: And so when I say values, I actually mean both value and values. So I'll talk about both of those. So value is really us inherently believing in our own worth. Right? In our like, the value we have.

Shelley: Like, we don't have to prove ourselves. We are worthy. Right? So we're starting from that place of just belief in what we have to bring to the world. So anchor in your own value and your own self worth and get clear on your values.

Shelley: So I'll say that one of the most, I guess, life changing, game changing things for me, I use speaking of Brene Brown, I use her dare to lead list of values. And if you don't have that, I'll send you the link. Put it in the show notes. I went through a training with her back in, oh my god, 2018 or 2019 around dare to lead. And what one of the things that really stuck with me is that we kinda went from understanding, like, all the things that you that resonate with you on the value sheet.

Shelley: So let's call it 15. And then you have to get down to 10, and then you get down to five. And then you get really clear on what are your top three values. And it's something that I use now. It is my lens and my filter.

Shelley: My top three are freedom, authenticity, and courage. And it I just went, oh my god. Of course, they are. But I had never seen it that clearly before. I had never understood it to be like, oh, that's a way I can start to make decisions.

Shelley: That's a way I can live a life that feels more aligned, and so much so that I actually authenticity, you can see this and anybody watching the video. I it's authenticity is the truest form of rebellion is one of the lines in my book, and authenticity is one of my values, and I tattooed it on my forearm. And I look at it every single day as a reminder to be true to me, and then it, of course, reminds me of my other values as well. So that's what I practice. And you know what?

Shelley: Some days, I get totally caught up in the FOPO. Of course, I do. I'm human as are you and everybody else listening. So it's a matter of waking up and reminding myself and regrounding in that choice of values over validation.

Erica: Oh, my gosh. Well, I'm dying over here, but I have to tell you and anyone listening, you've gotta go check out my girl, Nicole Kaleel's book called Validation is for Parking because that really helped you with the FOPO and also what an awesome name for a book. Yay. But So good. I know.

Erica: I was like, okay, I gotta find out what this girl's values are and then you just spilled them to me. But my values are growth, health and wellness, and courage. And courage has been the one that has always really been the driving one. Right? Like, growth comes naturally to me.

Erica: I'm so growth minded. I'm, you know, hustling and busting here and there. Health and wellness, it's been ingrained for me for forever. But courage is one that I really leaned on because I wanted it, but I needed it. And I needed the courage to say, is this what a courageous person would do?

Erica: And I used that mainly when I was really struggling with FOPO. And I've told this story before, but even when it came to starting this podcast, I sat on the idea of starting a podcast for over a year because I was like, oh my god. Everybody's gonna say, what is she doing? She doesn't know what she's talking about. And now it's been going for over two and a half years.

Erica: You know, it's a globally top rated podcast. Like, holy shit. What if I had just sat in that FOPO and just believed in number one, nobody was even saying those things. So I wasn't even believing something that I had heard. I was just making up this bullshit in my head.

Erica: But the thing about values is so many people don't sit down and do that exercise that you talked about because it's too woo woo. And if I'm honest with you, that was me too. I was like, of course, I have values. Who doesn't have values? But then if you were to be like, hey, Erica.

Erica: What are your values? I would have been like, I don't know. What are they?

Shelley: Yeah. Or you would have listed off, like, 10 or 15 things, which is totally me too. I I mean, listen. I get it, and I get why people say that. I also think that what you just said is tied to this kind of fear we have of sitting with ourselves quietly because the scary part and what takes courage to your point is I'm gonna allow whatever's gonna come up to come up.

Shelley: When we're doing a values exercise, it's gonna call a lot of stuff up that you sit with to really say, what matters most to me? And it takes a lot of courage to even sit with yourself and with that exercise. So bravo to anyone who does it because it's not easy work, and I'm not trying to even pretend that it's easy work, but it will change your life.

Erica: A 100%. And it always makes me laugh because you're going through those list of words and the list of values. And the way I describe it to everyone is, like, sometimes it feels really icky to cross off those words. And one of the words I cross off every single time is generosity. It doesn't mean I'm not a generous person, you know, but it's not one of my core values.

Erica: And so you really have to get comfortable saying that's not a core value of mine and owning that.

Shelley: It's so true. Well and it's funny. Okay. Real time, when you were listing out your values and health and wellness was one of them, I've been debating with myself. I felt something get kicked up there because I've been debating I've been on this.

Shelley: I got really sick in 2022. And so the past two years have been me saying that my my well-being in all physical, mental, emotional, spiritual, all of it comes above and beyond everything else in my life. And it's really started to get me thinking, like, maybe, actually, that is my highest value. You know? Or was it my highest value for a season?

Shelley: And those things we get to play in and out. And so I've been playing around with that because I have shifted my entire life to be in service of my own health and well-being, and now I'm, like, back and badass, and my energy is better than ever. My health is better than it's been. I'm 54, and I feel like when I was 40. It's amazing.

Shelley: And so, like, we still get to play with it. I guess it's to reiterate your point that it doesn't mean that you don't believe in these other things or that there aren't gonna be seasons where some of these things are gonna take precedent because you decide and you get to decide. But I find that having three that generally help you navigate and I use mine to set boundaries too, which is another choice I make. I say, we choose boundaries over burnout. And to me, the question I ask around boundaries also ties back to value.

Shelley: So I I found a way to start pulling the thread through as well, which has felt very meaningful in in my life and in my work.

Erica: Well, I'm so glad you brought that up because so many people think that your values can't change throughout your life. And I'm here to say that's absolute bullshit because if you go way back in time to when you're, you know, fresh out of high school, you're entering the real world, maybe you're not married, maybe you don't have kids, maybe you don't even have a real job. Your values are gonna be very different than if you jump forward twenty five years and you have a family and kids and a dog and all that shit. Right?

Shelley: Totally. So it's

Erica: okay to own that. Right? Certain ones like authenticity, encourage, those usually run deep and are ingrained forever, but there are those few that kind of float around like health and wellness. But one thing I wanna ask you about, Shelley, that I'm so, so interested in is you talk about awakening the rebel within, and I just love this idea. But talk to me about what does it mean to be a rebel and how do we awake this rebel within?

Shelley: Oh my god. Well, here's this is what I love, and I'm still playing around with this in my work, but the the subtitle to my book is a corporate rebel's guide to finding your best life. So that says a lot about who I am, because it's not just, being a rebel for the sake of being a rebel. What I'm actually doing is I am redefining what it means to be a rebel, because I think the word rebel got a very bad rap. And usually when I say it, and I often make this joke on stage, it's like you picture, like, arms crossed, leather jacket, you know, outsider with kind of the glaring stare, like any character played by James Dean back in the day.

Shelley: Like, that's what it is. It's like the outcast, the outsider, the the person who's rebelling against. And so what I have been on a mission to do is say, what if rebel is actually those of us who are rebelling for, not rebelling against? And we're rebelling for who we are and what we want and the impact we wanna have in the world. So when I think about a rebel I mean, a rebel to me is a badass who's courageously rewriting their success script in service of their soul story, all the things you and I just spoke about.

Shelley: And so what I will often do is share, here's who I see as a rebel, and I'll show a picture of Brene Brown. I'll show a picture of Michelle Obama, of Simone Biles, and how timely that we're having this conversation because I've been talking about her since 2021 with the whole original Tokyo, Summer Olympics and her taking a beat, and I say she shed the shackles of should. Right? Like, the world was like, well, you should compete because you're the team captain. You should compete because blah blah blah blah.

Shelley: But, you know, you're the veteran. There's always the Greek chorus to your point. There's always the people shouting at us, telling us what we should, in quotes, be doing, and it's really up to us. So I encourage people to, you know, shed the shackles of should, and I talk about Simone. So I say that these new rebels like Brene and Michelle and Simone and even Arianna Huffington, they are reclaiming.

Shelley: They're decide they're realizing that the success script that exists now and has been in in in most cases is kind of very patriarchy driven, it's not serving them or the greater good. So they're reclaiming their agency. Michelle Obama does everything with more humanity and soul. Brene, you know, is rebelling for vulnerability and courage and so many things. Ariana's rebelling for, you know, well-being in all the ways through Thrive Global and her own story.

Shelley: Symone is reclaiming her own agency, and we just saw that payoff in spades at the Paris Olympics. I mean, all these things. So I'm like, wow. When you start to shift what a rebel even looks like, and you start from that point and then this new definition that I've created around rebelling and rebelling for, which feels more empowering and more energizing and more expansive, it all starts with what we were just talking about, like reclaiming your own truth. Right?

Shelley: And what are you rebelling for? That's my kind of famous question that I love to ask people. So I'm curious how that lands with you.

Erica: I love it because I think it's about damn time we actually start to rewrite the script on a lot of these terms that we have been using. Right? What does it mean to be successful? What does it mean to be a good mom? What does it mean to be a woman who has it all?

Erica: Like, all of those things, we need to rewrite, including what does it mean to be a rebel. And I love your definition, so that is amazing. But, Shelley, I've got one last question for you, and that is if you could go back to the Shelley who is waking up in the middle of the night, 2AM, with this horrific dream. What piece of advice would you give her today?

Shelley: Oh, I you know what? I would I would tell her it's okay to trust yourself Because I think the thing that I struggled with the most was this like, everything was so loud, this validation and my parents' voices and the voices of my community. Everybody only knew one way to, quote, unquote, be successful. And, like, I didn't trust myself. It took me so long to trust that little voice and that instinct, and I knew something was wrong.

Shelley: I was falling apart mentally, physically, soulfully, spiritually, all of it. And so I think that kinda trust and surrender, I feel like that's one of my forever lessons, but, like, trust and surrender. Like, it will guide you, like, nurture that relationship with yourself and it will inevitably guide you in a direction that feels like success. Right?

Erica: I love that. I love that. Shelley, where can people get in touch with you? How can they find you?

Shelley: Oh my gosh. My website is shellypaxton.com, so feel free to check me out. Shelley's with an e y. I play my playgrounds are LinkedIn, so please connect with me on LinkedIn, Shelly Paxton. And on Instagram, I'm at the Shelly Paxton, so that's a fun place.

Shelley: You'll see me popping up there. And you can buy my book, Solbatical, a corporate rebel's guide to finding your best life anywhere where you buy your books, Amazon, your local bookstore, anywhere else. So, those are those are the biggies. And, hey, if you are listening to this and you're a corporate executive and you can see a need for a badass to come on your stage and share this, you know, way of being and, you know, all the nuggets that I've learned over these past eight years, I would love to share. So more of that on my website as well.

Erica: Oh my gosh. I love it. Thank you, Shelley. This was so fun.

Shelley: Thank you.

Erica: As we wrap up this powerful conversation, I want to take a moment and let everything that we discussed today sink in. Shelley's journey is a profound reminder that no matter how far we've climbed, no matter how many boxes we've ticked off on that success script handed to us by others, there's always room. No. There is a necessity for us to pause, to listen to our inner voice, and to ask ourselves, is this really what I want? Is this truly my story?

Erica: We've talked about what it means to be a rebel, Not the kind that fights against everything, but the kind that fights for something deeper, something more authentic. The rebel who is brave enough to rewrite the script, to define success on her own terms, and to trust herself even when the world is shouting otherwise. So as you go back to your day, I want you to remember this. It's okay to trust yourself. It's okay to rewrite your story, to embrace your values over validation, and to be the rebel for your own soul.

Erica: Because at the end of the day, that's what success truly looks like. Living a life that feels full, authentic, and completely yours. So thank you for listening. Thank you for sharing in this conversation and for daring to explore what it means to be your own chief sole officer. Until next time, keep rebelling for what truly matters to you.

Erica: And remember, you've got this. Now if you haven't rate, reviewed, and subscribed, please do so. It truly helps the podcast land in the hands of the woman that needs to hear it most. And remember, until next time, the only ceilings that exist are the ones we place over ourselves. Let's smash through them together.