Welcome to UnF*ck Your Brain. I’m your host, Kara Loewentheil, Master Certified Coach and founder of The School of New Feminist Thought. I’m here to help you turn down your anxiety, turn up your confidence, and create a life on your own terms, one that you’re truly excited to live. Let’s go.

Kara: Hi, everyone. I’m so excited to be here today with my friend, my soon-to-be friend, my acquaintance and colleague, Les Alfred. We’re in a podcasting group together, and she has an amazing podcast called She’s So Lucky. And I really wanted to have her on today for, it’s kind of a funny premise, but I just think it’s going to be really valuable. So Les has had so many conversations with so many amazing women and successful women about their lives, their journeys, their careers. So she’s agreed to come on and share with us the five best takeaways, lessons she’s learned from those conversations.

So it’s almost like – I was going to say Reader’s Digest, but that feels like a bad analogy. It’s like the good version, the CliffsNotes, the high-level takeaways. And then, of course, you’ll want to go listen to her podcast to get all the details. So welcome to Unf*ck Your Brain. Please tell us who you are and brag about yourself a little.

Les: Kara, thank you so much for having me. I’m so happy to be here. I’ve been a longtime listener of your pod, so it’s so exciting to get to be here. So yes, my name is Les Alfred. I host a podcast called She’s So Lucky. And if I were to brag about myself, what would I say? Probably that I’m really proud of what I’ve created from the ground up.

When I look around at the space, and I see so many people who are in it who are phenomenal, I see a lot of unfair advantages that they have, which I think more of us should be milking our unfair advantages, for sure. I didn’t really have a lot of those. A lot of it has just been pure grit and determination, and even though I still have a ways to go, I think getting as far as I have with what little I had to start is something that I’m really proud of.

Kara: I love that. Will you tell us a little bit about that? How did you get into podcasting? How did this all start?

Les: Yeah. Well, so from a very young age, I was obsessed with comms and media. So I always joke that I was a comms girl very early. When I was a kid, I actually used to make my own newspapers and magazines, and I would try to assign stories to my friends to get them to contribute.

Kara: Oh, man. I bet they were never as on it as you wanted them to be.

Les: They did not care. I did not get many submissions. But I was just very into telling stories and communications from a young age. And so I always thought that was going to be the route that I would go. Growing up, I was obsessed with talk shows. I was obsessed with Oprah and Barbara Walters and Diane Sawyer and that form of storytelling and being able to ask people questions and be kind of nosy, but nosy with a purpose.

Kara: Oh, yeah, professionally nosy. That’s part of being a coach, too.

Les: Exactly. Just get to get all up in people’s business.

Kara: No small talk. You’re like, “What’s your biggest trauma? Tell me right now.”

Les: Straight into it. And so I just always thought that I would go into journalism, that I would go into the comms field. And when I was in college, I was studying comms, and that was back when the ’08 recession happened to hit. And I took a look at the media industry, and I took a look at how many student loans I had just taken out to be in school, and I was like, “You know, I don’t know if this is going to work.” So I ended up switching my major and minor. I was a comm major, business minor. I ended up switching to be a business major, comms minor, because of my friends who were a couple years older than me. All the ones who had jobs were working in corporate, they were working in finance. And so I was like, “I’m going to do that, too, because I need a job, and I don’t really have time to play around.”

And so I ended up going more of the corporate route, started off in corporate finance, absolutely hated it, eventually made my way to corporate comms thinking that was going to be more of a kind of middle ground between where I was at and what felt safe and what I really wanted to do. And in some ways it was. And so most of my corporate career I spent in corporate comms. But on the side, I noticed these forms of new media that were popping up. That was back in the era of blogs, the very early days of influencing, where these women who I was following were almost editors of their own publications with what they were putting online. And I really admired that.

And so I started blogging way back when, and blogging led to social media, which led to podcasting. So I think a lot of my journey has been more so just trying to chase what it was I really wanted to do when I was younger but making it work for the world that we’re now in.

Kara: I love that. The journey from, you’re eight years old trying to make your friends publish a newspaper to, “Well, now I got a podcast, and people do want to show up and have that conversation.” So let’s just jump into it. You’ve interviewed so many amazing women. Tell us your first kind of favorite takeaway or story that you want to share with us.

Les: My first favorite takeaway. Okay, whenever people ask me what my number one favorite episode is, the first one that I point them to is an episode that I did with a woman named Kennedy Ryan, who is a romance author who has had just this really amazing arc. But over the past few years has really popped off. And she’s not new to this, she’s true to this. She has been writing for many, many years. Her books have really popped off and gained popularity in the last handful of years. But there were so many elements of her story that I really, really loved.

One, her background was also in journalism, and she probably about 20 years ago got into writing fiction because she was somebody who had always loved reading fiction. She had ideas for different stories that she wanted to tell, and so it was something that she kind of did on the side for fun. And she spent many years self-publishing over a dozen books, over a dozen romance novels that ended up leading to her getting her first major publishing deal a few years ago when she started publishing books under her major publishing deal. That was when things really started taking off for her.

And she then had some of her self-published books get acquired by her publishing deal. She is now having her books turned into series. She’s getting executive producer credit. She’s writing in Hollywood. But to hear that story and that trajectory from a woman who from the outside looking in, it looks like she’s just now popping off in her 50s, mind you. So she’s had many lives and many careers before this. But to see somebody be able to bet on themselves in different ways and to work at something for a very long time, I think we have so many examples of instant success where people expect instant virality. And if they haven’t achieved the pinnacle of what they want to achieve by 25, they’re freaking out and calling themselves a failure.

And so I think one, to see somebody who is doing that later and has found alternate routes to get to where she’s going was really inspiring. But two, she also pushes back on a lot of just like really shitty systems through her writing of things like misogyny, misogynoir. She really writes her romance novels with romance at its core as an act of resistance and these stories of women, often marginalized women, being loved really, really well and wanting to normalize that for people. And so that’s been like one of my favorite episodes with so many inspiring takeaways.

Kara: I love that so much because first of all, that willingness to be like, “I’m going to self-publish 12,” and so many people have it’s exactly that overnight success. But also that’s sort of, I think, one of the ways that women and marginalized people are socialized is like, well, the authorities have to accept you and validate you and grant you access, right? And so I can think of so many people I’ve coached where it’s like, “Well, but if I can’t get a book deal, then I’m not a real author, right? Or then that means if I send out one book I wrote and people don’t want it, then I shouldn’t be doing this. I’m bad at it. I’m not good enough, right?” And that she was just like, “Nope, I’m going to put out 12 of these.”

Les: At least. I don’t even remember the actual number, but it was at least a dozen. She’s written so many books.

Kara: And that she was like, “And great, it’s awesome that did parlay into mainstream success later,” but I just like, for those of you listening who have a thing you’re not doing or that you stopped doing because you didn’t get immediately validated by an authority figure or a tastemaker or whatever, are you willing to put 12 out? Are you – like, how often are you willing to try?

And I love that she’s a romance author, too. I’m supposed – like, I would have expected you to pick like your most famous interviewer or something, but I will say I’m guilty of having originally looked down on romance fiction. I have to say because I was raised in a very like – my father’s a rare book dealer. And just a very – focus on the classics. So like, he was sort of like we had to pick someone. Growing up, it was like all of our birthday presents or whatever were going to be, you know, books from that person to collect. And it was like a scandal that I wanted Virginia Woolf, right? It was like, it was supposed to be like pre-1800.

And then, whatever, I went to Ivy League schools where people are snobby. Okay. But the thing that, like, not to be a kid online, but that changed my brain chemistry about this was seeing a meme or a quote, whatever, something that was basically like, “Yeah, romance novels are novels where nice things happen to women. And so, of course, they’re like not intellectually serious,” right?

Les: Women are often writing them. Women are enjoying them. God forbid women enjoy something, then it’s automatically just shit on.

Kara: Automatically. I don’t have a full romance novel habit yet, but I did read a basically a romance novel recently that was about a plus-size woman, right? And as somebody who’s been in a fat body my whole life, I think if I had read those growing up, it probably would have helped a lot, right? I had to do so much body image work on the idea that I could be loved, desired, you know, attract, like, all of that stuff. And I think that was the first area I used thought work and coaching on, and it was like such a grind because there was so little in the world to validate that approach. And so I feel like that’s such a beautiful, like, writing those stories about people who are different kinds of marginalized feels like such a powerful thing.

Les: For sure. It’s one of my favorite forms of self-care, forms of resistance.

Kara: So who’s your second? I don’t mean these as rankings, just…

Les: No, that’s okay. I know. I know, just of – these are all in like no particular order of amazing, amazing lessons. So I actually had an amazing guest who’s been on my show twice now who I love dearly. She’s also local here to New York like us. Her name is Tricia Lee, and she is a real estate broker, a very accomplished real estate broker, but also serial entrepreneur.

And she is just such a badass. And the two times that I had her on my show were some of our top episodes that we’ve had. So our first episode with her was about two years ago. That was one of the top episodes that year, despite the fact the episode came out at the end of the year. And then the most recent episode we put out at the top of this year that so far has been our highest-performing episode of the year and almost to date because she is such a powerhouse.

But she is somebody who is such an amazing example of what radical self-belief looks like, and not from a place of cockiness or whatever, but from a place of, she knows how excellent, how competent, how capable she is, and she leads with that. And she owns it, and she makes no apologies for it. And so being able to sit down and be in conversation with her multiple times on the show now has just been such a treat.

I will say the two episodes we did together were really great, but I think the second one I loved even more. And I think it’s because we’d podcasted together. We now had known each other for a couple of years, so we were really comfortable. And we just jumped straight into it. But she is somebody who is just all about playing to win. And not win in the sense of, “Somebody else has to lose,” or, “You have to gain something over somebody,” but taking the hand that you’re dealt and making the best play you can for you.

One of the things that she said in that table was that you can be consumed obsessing over the hand you’re dealt and what you weren’t dealt. And she literally said verbatim, “Girl, you’re at the table, and you better play, and play to win, regardless of whatever it is that you’re dealt.” And she’s just somebody who is so freaking inspiring. And every time I hear her speak and several times when I feel sorry for myself, I hear her voice in my head that’s like, “Girl, you’re at the table, you better play, and you better play to win,” multiple times. I hear her say that to me multiple times a day, honestly. But just all of the takeaways that I got from her were so incredible. That was my favorite one from her.

Kara: I don’t know if she talked about this or just from you from observing her, like what do you attribute her ability to kind of be so confident without apology to? Because I think one of the things I often hear from women who are maybe more confident or more assertive, right, is this sort of like, “Well, okay, but then there’s like negative consequences,” right? Like if a woman shows up too assertive, especially if she’s a woman of color or if she’s marginalized in some other way, it’s like, then there’s pushback, right? And so I think so many women feel caught in this double bind, right, of like, “Well, if I’m passive and don’t do anything, it’s my fault. But if I’m too assertive, then I get pushed back.” I’m just curious whether she talked about this or you’re just observing it. What do you think helps her show up in that way and succeed?

Les: Yeah. I mean, I think a lot of it is the receipts that she has. I mean, in the first episode that we did together, it was more so laying the foundation of her background, her professional background, her personal background, kind of how she got to where she is. And we talked about the many years that she spent working in corporate, corporate beauty, actually, was where she got her start in her career. She spent many years working at companies like MAC, kind of building a career in corporate beauty.

She then went on to own a chain of nail salons actually around Brooklyn. And through owning her shops in Brooklyn, that was how she got introduced to real estate. But it was because she felt so strong in her ability because she really cut her teeth in corporate and then she had these successful nail salons, it was like, you can’t speak doubt onto her because she knows what she’s capable of and she has the receipts to prove it. And she’s also willing to learn and is not afraid to be seen learning. And I think when you have that perspective, then it’s like, there’s nothing to apologize for.

Kara: Yeah, I think there is something about that combination. It’s like, if somebody is both confident and willing to learn, it’s like there’s something very grounded about that kind of confidence because it’s not confidence from like, “I’m perfect, and I know everything, and I can manage everything.” You know, it’s that sort of like, “Yeah, I know what I know, and I know what I don’t know, and I have nothing to apologize for.”

Les: ”If I’ve been able to figure everything else out, why is this any different?”

Kara: Yeah. And that the saying you described, the sort of like, “You’re at the table, so you better play with what you’ve got.” I think that the confidence that comes from being like, “Okay, well, I’m not paying attention to all the things I don’t have or all the whatever, right? What do I have? What’s in this hand?” Right? It’s not useful to be like, “Well, I should have gotten dealt a queen and an ace, and I didn’t, and so now there’s nothing I can do,” right? It’s like, “Okay, I got three threes. What am I going to do with this? How can I leverage that?” I think is such an important takeaway, especially because I just think we’re so bombarded now, especially on social media, with like people who are trying to curate this perfect image of this perfect life where everything’s going perfectly.

And so it becomes even easier to feel like, “Well, I don’t have that, or I don’t have this, or I can’t.” You know, I feel like if I could like imprint one sentence into every woman’s brain, it would be like, “There’s multiple paths to success and the life you want. It’s like you just have to figure out what is the right one for you.”

Just like you going from like, “I think I’m going to be in communications, and then maybe I’m going to be in corporate,” to, “Oh, no, I’m actually going to host a podcast,” or me being like, “I didn’t go to law school thinking I’m going to be a life coach.” Like, to take a left turn there, but being open to and willing to be like, “Okay, what have I been dealt? What are the skills are that allow me to make this transition? Double down in those as opposed to fixating on what I don’t have.” So what’s your third gem for us?

Les: So my third gem was earlier this year, I had a woman on my podcast named KK Hart, who is incredible. And she’s a really wonderful friend and mentor of mine who I connected with last year. And she’s not somebody who I think a lot of people know in the sense of, like, usually she’s not at the forefront. She’s actually a really amazing operator and investor, acquirer behind the scenes. So she has invested in and consulted so many of our favorite brands, supported so many of our favorite kind of high-profile girl boss founders behind the scenes. You know, she’s not necessarily that person who people immediately stamp the “girl boss” stamp on, but she is often the person behind the scenes like cutting the checks and mentoring all of those people that we look to.

And so I had her on my podcast earlier this year, and our conversation, we talked a lot about different kind of finance things about what does it look like to invest and to acquire different businesses, but we also looked at, what does it look like to take that approach to your whole life? And one of the things that she said in our episode that was like such a big takeaway for me was having kind of an ROI approach to everything that you do. So yes, when it comes to our work, when it comes to our money, when it comes to our business, we’re always looking for the ROI.

But also, are you investing in yourself, in your relationships, in being the person who you want to be? And so she had this phrase that she put of DIY your ROI. DIY your ROI, you get out what you put in. And what does that look like? And how can you take that same approach to your personal growth, to your relationships, to showing up as the person that you want to be? And not from an overly self-help-y way. I think that’s something that even as a perpetuator of it, I’ve said lately it’s kind of giving me the ick of all of the…

Kara: If self-help gives people the ick. I’m in trouble.

Les: No, no, no. It’s not the ways that you talk about, but in the overly glow up, shiny, best version of yourself, constant optimization, which is very different than the work that you do. But just that constant over-self-optimization version that I think everybody’s fatigued of. It wasn’t necessarily that, but it was, how do you put as much emphasis and focus on getting to know yourself and who you are in the world and being who you want to be in the world and focusing on that as much as you focus on the external things and on the shiny things and basically, being the shiny thing isn’t worth having beneath the surface? Like, you’re not okay with yourself and just hearing her whole approach to that and the DIY your ROI was really helpful.

Kara: So if you’re willing to share, is there an area after talking to her where you feel like you’ve DIYed your ROI or a place that you’ve looked at the ROI differently of something you were investing in?

Les: Yeah. I mean, I think I’ve definitely been investing in my life outside of work a lot more since that conversation. Just in my friendships and even as a former kind of toxic self-help person, even when I would do things like exercise or read or whatever, it was just always for growth constantly. And I had to kind of take a look at myself and be like, “Who are you outside of just being obsessed with growth? Are you good with you? How about you just be for a bit? And do you like who you’re being without constantly trying to fix everything?” So that’s been quite the focus. So I’ve actually focused a lot less on work over the last – I don’t know how many, six months probably since we recorded that episode and more on everything else.

Kara: I love that because I do think so many of the listeners to this podcast, for sure, are that constant optimizer, constantly trying to grow. And that instinct for growth and evolution can be a beautiful thing, obviously. We’ve all met people in our lives who are just stagnant and stuck because they won’t try anything or get moving.

But you can hustle for your worth in self-help just as much as anywhere else, right? If you’re like, it’s one thing to be like, “I’m excited and interested to grow in this way.” It’s another thing to be like, “Well, if I’m not trying to grow, then I’m doing something wrong, and I should be, and I’m not good enough now.” You know?

Les: Or if you have to change everything about yourself to get whatever it is you’re going for, does it even feel good once you have it?

Kara: Right. It’s like pretending to be somebody else when you’re dating. You’re like, “Great, you just won a relationship with somebody who’s dating a fake version of you. Now you got to be that person forever.” But I think that ROI thing is so – it’s so important, especially in our work-obsessed society. I mean, even just thinking of my – I try to keep Fridays separate. I try to not work on Fridays. My work week is like Sunday through Thursday, and then I spend Fridays with my husband before we get our stepkids.

But the default ease with which I will let something flow into Friday, or I will, “Okay,” you know, like I had to like, we’re filming here on a Friday because I had to reschedule when I was sick, which is fine, but and yeah, working for myself, part of that flexibility. But I did, even as I – when I schedule things on Friday, I do feel like I try to stop and think and be like, “Well, okay, but if my relationship were my highest priority, or, you know, one of equal priority, whatever it is.” I think it is so easy to take because we’re just so fixated on work, and work feels so urgent, right? It’s like I’m like, “Okay, but if I don’t film the podcast, it won’t go out,” whereas my husband’s not just disappearing if we don’t spend one Friday together.

And that’s true, but also, if I never protect that time, right, and I don’t invest in that relationship, then that relationship is potentially going to go away or not be what I want from it. And I think it is, especially those of us, we both live in New York, live in a work-obsessed world. That’s such a good reminder of, like, at the end of my life, my work is very meaningful to me, so it doesn’t feel like, as yours is to you, it doesn’t feel like I’m going to get to the end of my life and be like, “Well, I spent all that time at Halliburton, and I neglected my relationships.” Like, you know, we feel like we’re helping people. But I’m still sure that if I, you know, give everything else short shrift, at the end, I’m going to regret that. All right, what’s your – are we on three or four?

Les: I think that was the third. So we are moving into four. We’re flying by.

Kara: So much good advice.

Les: And this is four as in I’m thinking of it as the fourth, but not to say that it’s the fourth of importance because I actually think this next one is really important for women. And it is from the conversation that I had with Emma Grede. Many of us know Emma Grede. She’s had a huge year and has had so many amazing accomplishments.

Kara: The nicest house I’ll ever be in.

Les: Yeah. Oh, yeah, that’s right. Yeah. Yeah. Oh my God, stunning. Stunning home, stunning everything. But there was a snippet of our conversation that I’m constantly replaying in my head, particularly when I ask for things, which is she kind of pushed back on this idea of constantly asking for favors or presenting things as a favor.

Not to say that we can’t ask for help, but I do think often times as women, when we are making an ask, when we are making a request or when we are talking to someone about some sort of exchange, we frame everything that we’re doing almost as a favor. Like, even when I…

Kara: ”Can you do me a favor and review that report?”

Les: ”Yeah, can you do me a favor and be a guest on my podcast?” When actually, I have a very dedicated audience who you would be very lucky, no pun intended, to get in front of. And if you have a book to sell, I have an audience who’s willing to buy it. So if you come on my podcast, you’re not doing me a favor. You’re getting a really valuable experience in front of a dedicated audience.

So being really clear about what it is that you have to offer. And when you’re making a request or when you’re offering something, not framing everything as a favor. And even this year, I’ve started getting into angel investing, which has been a really interesting experience. But so many of the conversations that I even have with founders, particularly women because I invest in women-owned businesses, who are raising money is it’s almost like they’re asking for a donation.

“If you do me this solid and give me this money,” it’s not a donation. It’s an investment into this amazing thing that you’re building. It’s not a donation. It’s an investment that will have a return. Do you believe in it? You know what I mean? When you’re making that ask, are you asking in hopes that someone can give you a favor, or are you asking from a place of power because you know that what you’ve got is an asset, so you’re making an ask that’s going to be beneficial to both people? And I think sometimes as women, we get so stuck in framing everything as a favor because we don’t necessarily ask from that place of power. And that conversation with Emma really taught me how to ask from a place of power.

Kara: Yeah, that’s really interesting. I think I do that even with my employees. Like, if it’s anything that doesn’t feel like it is exactly in the exact wheelhouse during – I don’t know. There’s like anything extra or different, I think I do that. That’s so interesting.

And I definitely see that so much. I never had this problem with charging, but I also train coaches, and, you know, I have this new business as an accredited coaching academy. And the drama around charging for coaching that new coaches, especially socialized, people socialized as women, have and this sort of like, “Other people are doing me a favor by letting me coach them,” right? This kind of like, “If I ask for money, first of all, I’m asking for it, right? And I’m like putting” – it’s sort of like I’m begging. It’s like I’m asking for money, and that’s uncomfortable. And they’re doing me a favor by letting me coach them because I need the practice. It’s just all of the thoughts are sort of, everything other than, “This is an exchange of value for value. We are both free autonomous agents who can make this exchange, and there’s benefit in it for both of us.” Right.

That kind of like both a weird, “I’m a supplicant, but also you’re doing me the favor, but also I don’t want to take your money. Like, I’m going to harm you.” It’s like there’s such a swirling…

Les: It is. It’s a difficult dynamic. And I think a lot of women – I know I struggle with that, too. A lot of women struggle with that. Okay, number five. We touched on this a little bit in the first example that I gave with Kennedy Ryan, but I do think the fifth example displays this a bit more explicitly, which is around this idea of creating your own opportunities and not necessarily waiting for institutional forms of approval.

So another guest that I had on my show is a woman named Recho Omondi, who is also a podcaster. She hosts a podcast called The Cutting Room Floor, which is a very successful fashion and culture podcast. But the way that she podcasts is more unconventional. So her entire podcast is behind a paywall, and she is building a fully independent media company. So she has built her entire community and her entire podcast on Patreon. She does not have free-flowing episodes that are available on every platform. People need to invest to get the content. But when they do invest, they get very nuanced, well-researched, in-depth pieces of content.

And the way that she works is so opposite of what you hear from the podcasting industry and the media industry that is very much a numbers game, where it’s all about volume, and it’s every single week, put out as much content as possible and be signed to this network and have these host-read ads, and that is the only way to be successful.

She started off her podcast kind of setting out to do that. And the first couple of years of her show, she was putting the episodes out for free for everybody. And just found that it wasn’t sustainable. And so in order to keep sustaining the show and keep production going, she decided to put it behind a paywall and ask her community to invest in it. And through that, she has built a really, really strong community around this really thoughtful, nuanced content. But it does really go against the traditional models of what often works when it comes to media, when it comes to content, when it comes to those traditional stamps of approval.

And so I really think that the lesson that I really learned from her that I think is incredibly valuable is to not be so stuck on only one way of doing things, particularly if you’re not presented with the types of opportunities that you would like to have, that there are ways that you can do things differently to make them work for you, to not wait for those institutional stamps of approval, and to figure out how to build and create in a way that feels fruitful and sustainable outside of merely feeling like you have to feed the machine.

Kara: So interesting. This is making me realize that I think so many wannabe entrepreneurs or especially because I speak to coaches, but entrepreneurs of all kinds who are socialized as women have themselves in this double bind where they’re like, “If somebody else is already doing it, then I’m too late, and I can’t do it. But if I don’t see somebody else doing it, then it’s not a thing, and I can’t do it.” Can’t be done. It’s like, “If there is proof of concept, then I’m too late. If there isn’t proof of concept, then that must mean it’s a bad idea, and it won’t work,” right?

And you have to think about all the people in society who saw something that hadn’t been done and were like, “Well, I’m going to try it. I think maybe it could be.” Right? Who is the first person to do anything? Like, somebody has to be the first one, and why shouldn’t it be you?

I’m curious how, from picking up from the themes you’ve been talking about, I suspect that the name of your podcast is not meant to actually be like, “Yeah, they were just really lucky.” So I’d love to hear how you kind of came up with that name and what it kind of means to you in your life.

Les: Yeah, definitely. I mean, I, as I kind of mentioned earlier, when I said as a child, I was very obsessed with like the Oprahs, the Barbara Walters, whatever. I’ve always been very fascinated by successful women. And the older I got, the more I realized that people often use the word lucky to undermine the success of women in many other ways, where there was some sort of external factor, often some sort of man who made their success possible, whether it’s like, “They have this husband or this father or this boss who put them in a position to do XYZ.”

Kara: Somehow not true of men who have wives or fathers

Les: Who have wives who manage their entire lives so that the only thing they have to think about is whatever works.

Kara: Like every productivity guru who’s like, “Yeah, you just work for 90 minutes a day.”

Les: And it really irritated me when I was hearing people describe these women or even describe me as lucky for different opportunities that I got. And there are absolutely elements of luck of fortunate things that happen, but I also think you put yourself in the position to receive it, to be ready to jump on it when it comes. And I thought about this idea of if we were to talk to these quote-unquote lucky women and heard the stories behind their luck, it was actually a lot of really hard work and it was a lot of preparing themselves to receive that luck and putting themselves in a position to receive that luck and being ready to do the next thing when it came. And so, yeah, this idea of she’s so lucky is kind of a more tongue in cheek, you know, when we look at the word luck, it’s like, how do they create their own luck and how do they position themselves for that luck? Not, “Oh, this thing magically fell in their lap.”

Kara: And what do you do with your luck, right? I feel like I’m coaching so often on women get really tied up around their privilege and feeling bad about their privilege and feeling ashamed of their privilege, which is so unhelpful, right? Like, go do something with it.

And then simultaneously have other clients who are much more in their like, “I’m so lacking or so wanting, or I don’t have this, I don’t have that, I don’t have that,” right? Other people have this advantage and that advantage. And I think for me, the thing that’s been most helpful has been to be like, “I am undeservedly lucky in some ways. I’m unlucky in some ways in our society, and I’m lucky in some ways.” And then, but how do I play that hand, right? Like, what am I going to do with my luck? Luck by itself isn’t enough. We know that just hard work isn’t enough. There’s systemic barriers, there is luck and privilege.

Les: Because you can also be lucky and have opportunities fall in your lap and fumble them and not be ready.

Kara: Exactly. And this is why I coach women all the time who are like, “Yeah, yeah, I’ve succeeded, but I had this privilege.” And I’m like, “Okay, yeah, I’m not saying we should disclaim that. And there are people who had that privilege and didn’t do what you’ve done,” right? They didn’t pick it up. They didn’t do anything with it. They didn’t give back with it. They didn’t, right?

So yeah, it’s like, how can you both acknowledge your luck? Like, we’re undeservedly lucky to be in a place with running water and not be getting the West Nile virus or whatever else is going on for us right now. We have electricity. We’re in a stable, somewhat stable society. And at the same time, okay, what are we going to do with that? How do we play that hand, right? And how do we focus on that as a positive that we can parlay into something, not as a reason to feel guilty and not do anything or a reason to undermine ourselves or whatever else. I love that so much. Thank you so much for coming on. Where can everybody find you? Obviously, they can find your podcast wherever they listen to podcasts.

Les: Yes, you can find She’s So Lucky wherever you listen to your podcast. New episodes come out every Tuesday, and then you can find me on Instagram @LesAlfred.

Kara: All right, everybody, go listen because these are obviously amazing interviews and follow Les on Instagram. And thank you for coming on the pod.

Les: Thank you for having me.