The Grit & Grace Leadership Podcast

Leading Authentically: Aligning Passion and Purpose with Jessica Joines

• Jen Kelly • Season 2 • Episode 11

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Join us on this enlightening episode as we dive deep with Jessica Joins, founder of the Women's Purpose Community and author of "Dare to Believe: 12 Lessons for Living your Soul Purpose." Jessica shares her transformative journey from a 20-year career in advertising to aligning with her true purpose.

We explore the power of reconnecting with your intuition, redefining success on your own terms, and finding genuine fulfillment in life. Whether you're facing the pressure of corporate life or seeking to reinvent from within, Jessica offers actionable insights to guide you towards courageous change.


Discover how to distinguish between fear-based and inspired actions, tune into your heart's voice, and navigate the challenges of balancing career and personal life.


If you're ready to challenge the status quo, listen in to uncover the tools and mindset shifts that can lead you towards a life where you get paid to be yourself.


Learn more about Jessica Joines 
Website: https://www.jessicajoines.com/

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Jen:

Today we're chatting with Jessica Joins, founder of the Women's Purpose Community and author of Dare to Believe 12 Lessons for Living your Soul Purpose.

Jessica:

We are not meant to trudge through life. We are not meant to like have lukewarm complacency about what we're dedicating our whole life to. If you're willing to be honest with yourself because for me, for a long time I was like, well, I'm happy. Sometimes I sort of like it and like that was good enough.

Jen:

In this episode, we'll offer actionable insights to help you reconnect with your intuition, redefine success on your own terms and find fulfillment in your life. Let's dive in. Welcome to the podcast everyone. Jessica, thank you so much for being here with us today. I have been deep in your book for the better part of a week and all of the concepts. So your book is Dare to Believe 12 Lessons for Living your Soul. Purpose. And for me this week, as I've been thinking about some new things on the horizon. For myself, I find that this book was extremely helpful as an inner compass on a lot of decision-making that I had to make for myself, so I'm excited to dive into some of the principles.

Jessica:

Well, I'm so glad to be with you. I've been so excited for this. You're doing such beautiful, incredible work, so it's really my honor to be with you today.

Jen:

Oh well, our treat as well, and I felt it important to start with your backstory. Would you mind just beginning to share a little bit of the major pivot points and lessons learned along that journey for yourself?

Jessica:

Yeah, well, the headline is I spent nearly 20 years in a career I didn't love and most days didn't even like, so like, if you can relate to that on any spectrum, you're listening to the right show. When I look back upon my story, like so many of us, I approached the decision of what you're going to do with your whole life. You know at least eight, 10 hours a day, a sacred decision with the energy of survival and scarcity consciousness. So I'm Gen X. You know that's the generation I am. I do see people talking about purpose in younger generations, which I think is incredible.

Jessica:

It was not a conversation when I was making the important decision of what I was going to study, what I was going to do with my life. You would hear like do what you love, but nobody really like did it. So when I started out, it was really what can I do that I can be good at and make money? And, like you know, it had to be something I enjoyed or liked. But it wasn't like what do I deeply love, what am I passionate about? So it was skill-based, and skill-based is very much scarcity, like it's a competition out there. I got to find something I'm good at to earn.

Jessica:

And so where that led me is, you know, roughly 20 years in the advertising and field of marketing. I did really well, I was really successful. I started working at traditional ad agencies, moved into media and at the end of my career I was the global CMO of a technology company, and a pretty big one. So that's where I ended and I always felt something was wrong from the very beginning, when I would go to work every day and kind of dread it, but I felt trapped in it and didn't know what else to do. But I didn't know what to do about it and that's what took me a long time to figure out.

Jen:

What did you do for yourself in those moments where you look back and you go yeah, thank God, I did. That was the catalyst towards where I am right now.

Jessica:

What worked for me and the way I approached it. I think there's some incredible learnings of it, but what I want to invite everyone is not get attached to the specifics of the how and my exact story, but the themes behind it and how I approach things. And so what I did for me eventually is basically like my heart, you know, you, you hear often like this, you know, like heart and head, like the conflict and the battle there. So my heart had been screaming at me for a long time but I just wasn't willing to listen to it because the voice of fear in my mind was so loud. And the stories of voice of fear in my mind told me was from the very beginning.

Jessica:

Even when I first started having these feelings of I need to do something else, I was in my twenties. Still like this went on for quite a long time. But it was God, you've invested so much at an undergraduate degree, a master's degree, like what are you going to do? Start over all these kinds of limiting stories? Um, but that voice in my heart just got louder and louder to where it was so unbearable. So for me, what I started doing is listening to where my heart was guiding me and you know not necessarily where the voice of fear in my mind was guided me. So for me, my, my heart voice guided me eventually to taking a pretty like drastic leap. That doesn't work for everyone and that might not be where your heart voice is guiding you, and so that's like. What I want to really hit home is mine might be different, but I'd been at this for a really long time. I had been trying to make it work in corporate via different companies, different avenues within my industry, for a really long time.

Jen:

Strengthening the heart voice, and I think there's so many ways to describe what that is your intuition. It's subtle, it feels different. For me it was how often do I trust it? And we'll talk about, like, the small ways and the big ways as we get into it, but as we kind of fast forward to where you are today and how much time has gone by since that early day story that you just gave us, to where you are today, I made the leap in 2015.

Jen:

So yeah, Okay and part of what you've done which is just so beautiful. In 2021, you've launched the Women's Purpose Community, which services C-suite women who crave a safe space to do courageous work. I am sure a lot of these women have a lot of pressure. The stakes are high in their life. If we can just kind of zoom out and think about, what are some of the macro themes that you see emerging right now for women in the C-suite.

Jessica:

I have a lot of women that come in that are like, hey, I've been miserable in this career forever. I've been, you know, living for a paycheck. I don't want to do that anymore. I want to do something that I'm excited to do every day. I want to get paid to do what I love. I want to get paid to be me.

Jessica:

Call it a collective shift in consciousness, but the old ways are just feeling a little too heavy. So I do have a lot of that. In a more general sense, a lot of women that come in struggle with what women in some ways uniquely face still, even in this day and age, is, you know, being a caretaker but also having a career and just not having time for themselves and that lack of life balance and I went through it too when I was in corporate leading to things like burnout, leading to things where they're just pulling at both ends and feeling so disconnected from themselves. And, look, I would say some women too are really trying to reinvent the paradigm from within, which is a really challenging thing to do. A lot of companies are really good about talking the talk, but they're not necessarily walking the walk when it comes to, you know, greater flexibility, really placing an emphasis on well-being and purpose and things of that nature.

Jen:

For the women who are trying to reinvent from within the system. What are some critical things that they're talking about and how they're going to accomplish this? And the reason I'm saying this is that in the last week or two, I've just been noticing a lot of articles about how difficult it is to keep senior level women in roles right now because of all the things that you just mentioned. Roles right now because of all the things that you just mentioned and the bottom line is it's a culture problem, and so, as much as we can think about skills for ourselves in these moments, I think there's two parts. It's what do we do for ourselves, but how do we enable the cultures or anything that you're actually seeing in terms of tangible shifts?

Jessica:

There is a lot of data. Korn Ferry, for example, has done a lot of research on a variety of these topics and shown that, you know, elevating women in leadership is not like about giving them more training. It's about honoring life balance, honoring these types of things, honoring a sense of purpose, and that's how women grow. So what I would say is, yeah, you know, continuing to stay and be a voice, continuing to have conversations with the right people and bringing in a blend of you know, data backed solutions and being patient. That change is often not sweeping, but small. Yeah, well said.

Jen:

For those folks. I'm just kind of going back to some of the key indicators that, when people are at the doorstep of that major change that you've walked yourself through and you're kind of leading the way for so many, what are some indicators that someone's there?

Jessica:

If you're being truly honest with yourself, like do you love what? We are not meant to trudge through life, we are not meant to like have lukewarm complacency about what we're dedicating our whole life to. So, and for me and I say if you're willing to be honest with yourself, because for me, for a long time, my definition like I say, if you're willing to be honest with yourself because for me, for a long time, my definition, like I settled, I was like well, I'm happy, sometimes I sort of like it and like that was good enough. And so, redefining what's possible for you, I'd say do you really love what you do and do you love it most days? Love, not like If you're dreading it, if you're feeling anxious, you know all these kinds of things.

Jessica:

Your body is always speaking to you. I'll give you one example, and it's a pretty significant one. In one of my jobs within advertising, when I was reached a real apex one of many apexes I had several it took me a while to listen with this is I literally started having panic attacks and, of course, what I got diagnosed with was like anxiety disorder. No, as soon as I made a switch, no more anxiety, no more panic attacks. But it was really like I say, the way I talk, my soul was screaming out to me through my body, saying this isn't working for you. Make a different choice, make a change.

Jen:

Yeah, and I think sometimes we allow ourselves to be in the conditions and we either get so used to the discomfort or the fear of taking the leap and the risk and you know we'll have everything to lose. Because I've built this big life for myself. That feels more painful than the sitting and suffering.

Jessica:

I'd love everyone to learn the acronym for fear, which is false evidence appearing real. So fear is always a liar and when you're connected to your lower consciousness, your higher consciousness is entirely possible for you. You are going to see limitation where there truly isn't. You're going to make up stories of limitation, like up here, that truly don't exist. So I'd actually say, like, actually get quiet witness and look at the stories that you're basing these decisions on. You know, coming from the fear-based mind, and just from a playful, curious standpoint, ask yourself like are these actuallybased mind? And just from a playful, curious standpoint, ask yourself, like are these actually true? You get to write the story of your life, so you don't have to choose this.

Jen:

What are some real practical exercises that people can do?

Jessica:

One is. This one helps me the most it's it's looking at it from the higher perspective, at it from the higher perspective. And, for you to remember, I am in alignment if I don't take actions based on where that voice of fear is guiding me. So if that voice of fear for me in my first few years of the sole purpose journey, it was this is never going to work, go get a damn job. There's three levels of embodiment there's actions and then there's feeling and thinking. Feeling and thinking going together. So we're talking about actions right now.

Jessica:

So I did this for years. My voice of fear, everything was saying. I totally believed it. I believed every false story. Fine, I didn't try to not believe it. I didn't play that game. My only job was I'm not going to take the actions based on whatever it's saying to do. So that's step one. When you feel like you're in a groove with that, then I say work on your thinking and feeling and they go together.

Jessica:

So whenever you're feeling stress, ask yourself what am I thinking right now? Pause and ask. Then ask is this true? Yeah, thoughts are not facts, they're just thoughts. They're just thoughts that you're choosing and even though it doesn't feel that way you get to choose everything you're thinking. In every moment you get to choose your perceptions. That is your empowerment to remember. You have a choice. So pause and say, even if I don't even believe it, don't even get in that what's something, a different story I could choose to perceive right now. What could I choose to think differently? So pause and redirect, and that's a practice and a great way to do it is set yourself like little calendar invites throughout the day, a little 15 minute calendar invites where you get you to say what am I thinking right now?

Jen:

Yeah, or where have I been in the last hour? You know just yes, uh, I love that, and I find if I do that maintenance through the day, then it, it's, it's a little, it feels a little less heavy every single day. And so then what's the next step?

Jessica:

There's two paths to healing. There are two simultaneous paths in one, and this is the one we're talking about now. So the one we're talking about was like take contrary action. You know, create new neuropathways, right, and you do that in your healing stuff. You are, you're healing the you know, the reptilian brain that's always in the fear spiral, right. So that works. But the simultaneous path is well, what's the iceberg, what's below, what's below the surface, what's really going on here? And here's the beautiful thing as you start to bring that iceberg up, or those roots up, and then I say, into the light, so into your awareness, they start to dissolve.

Jessica:

What remains hidden keeps its power over you, and why sometimes you're spiraling on the same fears and same stories over and over, and you don't know why. You know because there's something beneath the surface going on. And so there's two ways to look at this. One is just understand what you're really afraid of.

Jessica:

In my book I talk about it as like the what if fear game, where you go, if this happens, you know then, what am I really afraid of? And you keep going down down to you, just feel I've gotten to the root fear. You know I'm, I'm going down down to you just feel I've gotten to the root fear. You know I'm, I'm, I'm afraid I'm going to end up homeless on the street. So that might be what's going on. What also might be below the surface is, you know and we all have trauma, right, some worse than others that you learned something, you know via any trauma, or not just via your own parents, unconsciousness, growing up. That is just this hardcore, limiting belief or pain that's unhealed, that's actually driving it and then, depending on what it is, there's different ways to approach that a lot of times we want to avoid it, we want to just, you know, push through like, not deal with it.

Jen:

But there's a great gift on the other side of that iceberg when you do go down and you can take it all in very differently and see your options and see what's around you in a different way.

Jessica:

It's hard sometimes to look down and bring that stuff up. I get that, but the easy part is is when you do just like you described, it starts you unravel. It's just because it's hidden in your lack of self-awareness that has kept it having this power over you.

Jen:

Jessica, when you see people battling this dynamic, like what are the blockers, like what's in the way from people really trusting their gut or their intuition?

Jessica:

The whole process of it is once you can start to not be so identified with the voice of fear in your mind and you're identified if you're believing in most things that you say there are true. So when I say identified, it means you're, you're having a thought, you're believing it's true, you're identified. So as soon as you start having that little pause that we talked about earlier and just witnessing it and just witness is objective and detached and just going Hmm, that's a thought, I don't know if it's true or not, I don't know if I believe it or not, and you're creating that space. What happens is, all of a sudden, that voice of your heart, your soul, your gut. You start to feel more connected to it. You start to hear it, but you don't hear it in the same way. It's a feeling. So your intuition, your gut, your soul voice, it's not talking at you all day long. That's a feeling. So your, your intuition, your, your gut, your soul voice, it's not talking at you all day long. That's your ego.

Jen:

Quite honestly. Having the courage to make these decisions and lead from this way is really what I'm hoping becomes of this conversation. And that brings me to the next topic, which is action, and in your book I love that you talk about inspired action versus ego based action. And for those of us who are in action all day, making decisions and moving through a busy workday, hey, how do we tell the difference? And let's let's define the terms and get clear with what they are.

Jessica:

Ego action is the voice of fear, and where that's guiding you and when your actions in alignment with that inspired action and it's more in rather than soul action I guess you could call it that too or intuitive action is because that's, that's the language of that resonance, right? It's not usually like this linear story. It's like you have a feeling and you act upon it. The other thing, too, that's really important with it, and and look, I applied this when I was building my sole purpose, business is the way that I do has shifted in two ways. One, like, yes, I can have a business plan, but I'm not going to necessarily stick to my plan. If the resonance, if my intuition is calling me to pivot in some way, I'm going to listen to that. When it comes in over the plan, yeah, okay. So it doesn't mean like you get rid of planning and, you know, don't have your tasks and all of that.

Jessica:

However, I honor the resonance, I honor the inspired action my intuition is guiding me to take, even if it's unexpected, you know. So that's like the inspired. It happens, you know, within the day. The other thing, too, in terms of you know how I approach doing now. It's an energetic shift for me. So if I am, you know, doing whatever tasks and everything, and I feel like I'm in this fear-based energy of striving trying to make something happen, push, pull, you know this kind of energy, I know that's not serving the expansion of my sole purpose business and in fact it's probably hurting it Okay. So I pause and take a break. If I cannot be in action or in doing from a place of at least neutrality but hopefully excitement, then I know I'm doing more harm than good as I'm talking with you.

Jen:

I'm just thinking about people who are in environments where everybody else is not completely operating this way, and what I would say to everyone is just find the small ways that you can implement some of these ideas that we're talking about. If you don't have the full flexibility like entrepreneurship, like, yes, it comes with a lot of risk, but this is the other flip side is that you get to operate the way you want to operate, um, but for those who potentially don't, I think there's a lot that we can influence every single day, regardless of the environment and the dynamics that our colleagues or coworkers might be in. And you'd be surprised, right, like you'd be surprised what shifts when you shift, when we bring that forward, when we bring our authentic selves to our team, to our colleagues. I've enjoyed your book so much and I can't thank you enough for all the work you do for these women who are, you know, profound leaders in their own right and making fantastic change in the world. So thank you for being here with us today.

Jessica:

Thank you so much for having me. It's been such a pleasure.

Jen:

Thank you for joining us. Don't forget to follow us on Instagram and LinkedIn, where we transform the wisdom from our podcast into practical tips, tools and takeaways for your leadership journey. Find us at gritgracepodcast. See you next week.