Episode 81 - Jana
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Mel: [00:00:00] Welcome to Permission to be Human, the podcast. I'm your host Mel Findlater, mother, coach, and curator of Permission to be Human, the company and community. If you're a mom, know a mom, or want to be a mom, and you crave getting out in the world to make a difference, then you're in the right place. This is a space for moms like you to connect with yourself, your purpose, and your big audacious dreams.
Because when you feel your best, you can better you, your family, and the wider world. Let's do this.
Hello. Hello everyone. And welcome to this episode with Jana Hendrickson. I'm excited to share it with you. Jana is such a motivation and inspiration for me. And so many. She is. Uh, living this alternative life that we get to hear all about [00:01:00] where she is a very successful executive coach, as well as being a mom of her children.
And with them often. And world schooling them. So stick around to find out what that means. And we really dig into like, how on earth does that work? Like, what does your day look like to get all of this done? And she's also this. Beautiful human being who is able to not only get all these amazing goals and things done. But put herself first and really tap into the joy in her life. And is very good at helping others do the same.
Her big audacious dream is to live an adventurous life where her and her family can travel the world. World school and live outside the public school and corporate world systems. Whilst creating their own freedom and way of living spontaneously.
She [00:02:00] is incredible human beings. So listen up.
Mel: Okay. Hi. Hi, Jana hi Mel it's great to be here with you. Yeah, I'm really excited to have you here. We were just saying, or I was just saying to you that it's been a while we met. I don't even know how many years ago it would have been. No, we could do the math. So my daughter's nine and she was just born.
So almost nine years ago. Well, probably nine years ago. Yeah. At an amazing event that you ran in Berlin. Yeah. It
Jana: feels like a former lifetime of mine now, to be honest, a little bit. It was like the end of my middle chapter. And then I went on to another chapter after that, pretty much. It's kind of a strange, it was a very big transition time in my life.
But yeah, I, I basically had to host, uh, and create two conferences in 2014 and 15 in order to transform my life and a [00:03:00] couple of hundred other people's. That was nice. So it was really like, it was really kind of fitting how my endeavor of feeling alive and all areas of life was kind of in the process between 2013 and 15, 16, when this whole thing was going on was kind of just encouraging me to look at all the different areas and I was.
About to change or ready to change a couple of big things in my life. So when we met and I hosted that conference, I invited the speakers that I really wanted to help everybody, but also because I knew they would help me.
Mel: Yeah, it's so easy. I'm going to dive right in. And then we're going to go back to the question about who are you?
Because, uh, you're just leading into it so perfectly, but I think it's, It's really beautiful and often the case that we create these things that we, that we need the most, right? 100 percent So you created Alive in Berlin. It hugely helped me [00:04:00] in the same way, probably, that it helped you. I was in a massive transition.
So I went along to this conference. My daughter was two months old, I believe, and she was just strapped in and hanging out with me. I was really lucky. If anybody ever, like, thinks they can't do this, you totally can, by the way. I was very supported by my husband who also came along and was like, sometimes he would take her out for an hour or two and then bring her back to be like, nursed and stuff.
And and to be part of the conference as you do. So it was a huge transition in my life, like literally, probably the biggest one I've ever had when you have your first child. Right. But it sounds like it was also for you this time when you're going to move to, Move literally in many ways.
I think yeah,
Jana: I moved in many ways at that time In 2014, I think you intended 2015. Is that right? Is that your daughter's born in 2015? Yeah So 20 so I started planning [00:05:00] 2013 And I was at the world domination summit in portland, oregon and my friend chris gullible's conference up at the time it's not running anymore, but and I I remember the moment where I thought okay.
I'm gonna do this thing. I'm gonna build the thing that I wish we'd had in Europe. And that was a personal development conference with all the coolest people because I kept flying to the U. S. for these things. And I was like, we need this in Europe. And so I was going to build the thing that I wanted.
And then I said to myself, I'm going to ask Pam Slim and Chris Guillebeau, and if they both say yes to being a speaker, Unpaid just paying their, their flights and stuff, then I will do it. And then much to my dismay, they both said yes within the day. And then I was like, Oh crap, I better get planning.
And then I had about nine months, uh, pretty much exactly from there to building it in may the following year. So it felt like having a baby. In that way, but also at the same time, 2014 was the year that I left my first [00:06:00] husband after 12 years and five years of those married and I left England after 11 years of living in England and I became a nomad for four years.
And at that time, specifically, I was living between like when we met, would have met in May, 2020, 2015, I was living between Hawaii, Texas. LA, Berlin, I was like constantly flying back and forth between, so I was moving a lot is my point. So yeah. Yeah.
Mel: It's
Jana: a crazy
Mel: time. Yeah, for sure. And that phrase that you use at the beginning there is like.
I don't see it, so I'm going to build, I'm going to build it, right? And I think so many of our listeners who have these big audacious dreams it is about building, building what we need that we also think other people are going to need as well. I know that's been my journey, especially in the last, multiple times in my life, actually, but in the current kind of phase as well with building this, with building, [00:07:00] like I just, It's, it's ironic because you're like, I kept going over to the States for it.
I just went back to the UK for the do lectures because I was like, I don't have that community here. I need to go and find it. And now I'm like, Oh, I need to build that community here. Right. And that's kind of the way that that it so often works. Okay. So give us a little intro to who, who is, who are you?
Who's Yana?
Jana: Oh my God, that's a big question, isn't it? So I would say, I really am trying to resist the urge of defining myself by roles, okay, in terms of professional or home roles. So I think who I am at my heart is an adventurer, a connection seeker, a joyful person, a creator, somebody who appreciates wisdom.
and love studying, lifelong learner for [00:08:00] sure. In fact, I remember a time when I was coached the first time in order to figure out what the heck I wanted to do with my life, which was 2009. One of the things I said to my coaches, if I could just get paid to learn, like to go to conferences, study personal development, psychology, positive psychology and that kind of thing, that that would be my dream job.
So I kind of made it that, but it's yeah, definitely a lifelong learner. I've just extended that by, uh, doing a, uh, a master's PhD program and professional coaching and human development. And, uh I've been doing all the learning for the last 15 years, ever since becoming a coach. So yes, that is my profession, professional title is the just the coach as in life and business coaching in general.
But I do focus on self actualization meaning really, uh, creating a life and work that. fulfills us that [00:09:00] maximizes our potential really in the typical Maslow sense of the word self actualization with peak experiences and transcendence and a little bit of, a spice of spirituality thrown in there occasionally.
And so I really just am so interested in what makes people basically feel really happy. And so I've been studying that for 15 years plus. And, Other than that, I am also a wife to my lovely husband Chris, and a mom to two girls that are nearly four and six, and an unschooling mom at that. So we are gonna do life without school, uh, at least the system of the public school.
And, otherwise, yeah, I don't know, I'm sure I can think of a few more things, but Mostly that. Those are the key themes of my life, I would say.
Mel: That's brilliant. I love it. And you really are in [00:10:00] like the, the crux of it with the four and six year old unschooling and your coaching, uh, for those, most people won't know this.
I'm really privileged to, to be in your kind of first round of this group coaching program that you're running. Do you want to tell us what that is?
Jana: Yeah, sure. I can. It's a complete experiment, so I don't want to, I want to encourage people to just try something new and something different. It was born out of a couple of places really one, when I coach ordinarily, I tend to coach leaders, C suite executives, business owners.
And that's just kind of grown naturally over the time. I've always kind of worked more with people that were already self employed or running, running a business. And so. Fundamentally, my fees are now very high, especially after, uh, working with Tony Robbins for three years as a master results coach.
I just was like ramping up my fees. And at that time it was largely because I wanted to prove to myself that I could earn the same [00:11:00] money there, uh, that I made there with like one or two clients privately. Because my rates before that were not so high. So, the trouble of course, is that as an educated person, I have to recognize that I'm.
I'm white, privileged in many ways, even privileged enough to do unschooling with my kids and to charge those kinds of rates from equally privileged people. And it just kind of bugged me somewhere. And when I Went into more spirituality and in terms of my studies earlier this year, I was just kind of more listening in and doing some more practices around that.
And one of the things that kind of kept up, kept coming up was, to offer something like coaching was clearly needed. That was very clear when I was pursuing my PCC with the ICF. I had just asked for volunteers to come and be recorded on a coaching call with [00:12:00] me. And I had so many requests for coaching because it was free that I was like, Wow, this is so interesting.
These are not people that ever have contacted me to hire me to even find out what my rates are, but the moment it's free, it's like you want in. And so I thought I needed to produce something that was, uh, as basically as cheap as I possibly could make it. So it's basically not for the money, right? Where it's really just to give people an opportunity to have a coach support them in different ways at the same time.
different stages. My theme, obviously, is like big transition, self actualization, and loving what you do for work. But, yeah, I just thought, well, we can all ascend and rise together. It felt like the evolution of the Alive theme, where it was all about, becoming alive in all areas of life. And then for me, Ascend is all about, uh, reaching def your potential and whatever, wherever it is you're working on in your life.
And so I invited people to come and join that. And it's just a, it's [00:13:00] an open program. We're meeting every Thursday. And as it won't a couple of people will be on the hot seat. We'll receive dark coaching. We're going to do some more kind of Brainstorming together and there's going to be guest speakers as well.
It's only just started at the end of September, but it's been really wonderful because. The power of community, which became very clear already at Alive 10 years ago is just profound people do learn a lot from being in a community and they are just differently accountable and such like, so I think it's a, it's a great project and it's really just an experiment to see if anybody even wanted it and people did.
So that's good.
Mel: Yeah, brilliant. And that's a success already. Like you won, you won that game, right? And I would have done it.
Jana: I would have done it. If there was one person whom I had discussed this with after a PCC recording call, and I said, Look, how would you want this to be built? Tell me what you kind of need, etc.
[00:14:00] And they weren't entirely sure. But I was basically just building it for that one person. And I was like, if it's just for you, and it's only you're going to be showing up, that's fine by me. And so it really is, yes. Yeah, it was, it's a win, I guess, no matter what, even if there's one person showing up. And I want it to be something where people are actively choosing into it.
So either they choose in by a monthly subscription or six months if they kind of feel solid about wanting to stay and stick around for a while. But yeah, I think it's a, it's a great middle ground between taking some sort of online course where you're basically studying by yourself and that can.
has difficult kind of conversion rates and people like really following through and stuff like that versus a, so just single one to one coaching agreement that some people may not at this point in life, want to, uh, invest money in. So.
Mel: Brilliant. [00:15:00] Yeah. I am totally on board with the group coaching concept.
I think as you say community is a big part. We are designed to be together. We're designed to do things. I have a sign somewhere back there. We're designed, as humans, we're designed to do something bigger than ourself together with others. And, while we're not necessarily, uh, there to collaborate on some project, humorously, I think that will happen anyways on the side based on who's in the group.
But what we are doing is being able to listen in and hear someone else be coached on a topic that I've either been there before I am now, or I can see that myself being having similar challenges in the future is just so beneficial. And, you
Jana: know, I think it's highlighting the humanity of it all, right?
Like, because I need to hear the things that are being raised just like the next person. I can relate every single time, and as you mentioned, we tend to create the things that we need ourselves. I think there's an element of, [00:16:00] how can I describe it? So, Usually what I find and have found in my history of coaching is that clients will come up with topics that are just very relevant to something that I'm working on or something that I'm going through.
So you kind of attract that a little bit, I guess, or you have just your your activating system is just very, very much wanting to spot those things, but I think it's helpful for everybody. So I don't really put myself above it. Okay. Anybody in the group. I'm setting my own goals.
I'm working on my own purpose and all of these kinds of things that we've talked about so far, because, yeah, it's it's really about rising together, like you said.
Mel: Yeah, brilliant. I have two questions in my mind and they may well like merge together or we can separate them. One is for those who really aren't in this field of coaching or really understand what it is, I wonder if you could [00:17:00] share what that is and then I think if we can lead into what your, your big audacious dream is, which may well include goal coaching within that then, So what coaching is?
Coaching? So what coaching, what coaching
Jana: is, oh, what is coaching? Okay. What is it and like why Mm-Hmm. . Like why coaching for you? Yeah. That's a, that's a different question really. So for me that's, that's, uh, distinguish first. So with coaching, I've actually done quite a lot of in depth work as part of my degrees with regards to the difference between coaching and counseling and psychotherapy and, the different, I guess, the different areas that are there to help professionals that are helping people.
And I think the main difference, uh, with the coaching realm is that we are dealing with fundamentally healthy people. And that what I mean by that is that they are not, they don't have any pathology. They don't have any [00:18:00] diagnoses per se. Now this may still include somebody like, because there are coaches for say ADHD people or whatever, right?
But Like different kinds of people that have maybe maybe are just neurodivergent or have a specific interest in that sort of thing. But fundamentally, we are working with healthy people a bit like a fitness coach, where we are seeking to enhance, improve, and just accelerate their personal development.
And for me, the, the reason why I think everybody should choose into coaching is because there is so much. So much gold in having somebody even just listen without an agenda and judgment and to have the space and the regularity of making space for your own thoughts, for your own goals and what is important to you and to really just get a different perspective.
That's sort of the minimum [00:19:00] and at best it usually leads to Bigger changes, more accelerated action taking more clarity. I think that's what most people are seeking from coaching on what they even really want, but it's always coming with the deep dive of why they want the thing, what they're actually seeking to accomplish underneath.
And the kinds of feelings they would like to have on a daily basis. And so my approach to coaching has always been more of an ontological one, which is about the way of being rather than the way of doing, because I feel like, especially after seeing the Tony Robbins world, there was a lot about stop doing this, start doing that.
These are the action plans. And what are your goals? And that to me was, Over the longer term, not really producing the identity shifts that I think people need to experience in order to fundamentally change their ways and their pursuit of goals. And so it really had me deep, [00:20:00] deep dive into transformational NLP, which neuro linguistic programming.
So a way of speaking to yourself in a way of uncovering patterns that are basically running your system and changing those. And then also the ontological world, which is really about how. Essentially, who do we need to become in order to accomplish the thing. So that's kind of how I see coaching. And then why this for me, I mean, it was kind of it came to me, as I think it comes to a lot of people that had decided to work in this field, but it was, I think it combined my interest for human psychology for this desire of improving oneself.
And I just always had a lot of curiosity. My first work was as a journalist, so I'm. I've asked questions for a living for a really long time. And so I just really love the art and science of it and the [00:21:00] evidence based research that backs up what coaching does and can accomplish. But I also am really smitten by the more spiritual aspect of what coaching can bring to a person in terms of meaning and purpose.
That's why I'm studying self actualization. Yeah.
Mel: Brilliant. That's such a good description of coaching, but also of what draws you to it. And it totally makes sense based on what you've already told us before this with if, if you could get paid to learn, right? Mm hmm. And in some ways you are, right?
Because we're clients and we we have to learn things in order to, do the work for sure. So that, that's brilliant. So that leads me to the question, which may or may not be related because that's the how, but what's the, what's the big audacious dream?
Jana: I think the dream that I have been pursuing probably the most in the past few years [00:22:00] is to.
Essentially live a life with my family that has my husband outside of a normal working contract as an employee, that allows us to create our own income from probably different streams as well as earns us the flexibility to be where we want to be. Whenever we want to be. So after four years as a digital nomad in the years of 2014 to 2018 we had met part of Chris was part of this for two years.
We had met some unschooling families or some traveling or world schooling families. And I think, although we have. But our forever home in Michigan. We always wanted this as a base and meaning we wouldn't want to be completely nomadic again, but we definitely foresee for us to be several months in one place or another.
And obviously maintain our [00:23:00] home in the meantime. So, for example, here in Michigan today. Actually, my friend posted the first snow. What is it? October 15. It didn't last very long, a few seconds, but we have a long winter usually, meaning that's about from November, December, all the way through last year, we had a snowstorm on May 2nd and so.
It's usually a good five months. And in the winter months, it's really lovely when there's like a big amount of snow like that's usually case. I'm saying usually because last winter was a big disappointment because it was an El Nino year and it was very warm. But usually there's several feet of snow in this area.
And That's nice for a time, but I think we always like the idea of going, which we tend to spend some time in the spring in Florida when it gets kind of mushy and you're just over it with winter that sort of thing. And so currently we're planning a trip to Japan. And we want to be in a [00:24:00] situation where we can just do that.
Yeah. More often, or however often we want really, but when the four of us travel, that's across the pond for anywhere, we looked up flights to Thailand because we love Thailand a lot. And for the four of us to go, it'd be like 13, 000 just to go fly there, not even live there. So it requires a certain amount of income, I think, and, and lifestyle.
in order to have the completely independent life. But really, I just want a life with my family and especially for the girls that exposes them to a lot of amazing things that allows us to say yes to spontaneous adventure and gives us opportunities to grow. Both my husband and I invest a lot of money in personal development.
He's doing a big program this year. I spontaneously decided to pursue my degree. So this is all, these are all really big investments. And so we are always, keen to continue that [00:25:00] type of growth. And there's an endless list of things that I would want to do. So. Yeah,
Mel: brilliant.
I love that. I love that. So yeah, my audacious goal
Jana: is not about other people. Sorry. It's just about my family. Yeah.
Mel: Yeah, and how you get there is, is often is clearly the other people, right? But I love that the goal is, and the dream is to live this family life. Life where you're all exposed to learning, uh, of cultures, uh everything in the world, and have that flexibility to languages.
Jana: Yeah, and because I'm German and my kids aren't very German at all. I kind of failed that first at the very first hurdle. So I didn't raise my girls speaking German. I didn't last very long. And now they don't like it. So, but one of the things is if. We can be in Europe for two or three or four months.
There's a different emergent in Spanish [00:26:00] and French and German, right? So those types of things are important, I feel like. And certain places you kind of don't want to go just for a week or two. So. That's a good, good reason why. But yeah, we all have traveled. We all well, me and my husband have traveled and, and lived in different places around the world.
And there's just so much more to see.
Mel: Yeah. Brilliant. And I can't help but ask, and I feel like this is what the people listening are going to be thinking like, but how, like, what does that practically look like day to day to be able to create this, uh, life of flexibility to earn enough income to still have your kids, like.
How does that, pan out?
Jana: I mean, so I think for starters, I think it's, uh, I'm, I could go two ways. Let's just talk about the money first. Let's just talk about the elephant in the room. [00:27:00] So my estimation for that kind of really like for, in order for my husband to come out of work, because that's a big, Deal, right?
That's he's a very well paid software engineer. I think we would want to hit about 300, 000. Dollars annual income consistently. And the keyword is consistently, cause that's the tricky part, because if we don't have systems, if we don't have a products or services that are continually making money that are recurring revenue, I think you might do that for a little while.
And then you're like struggling again, cause that's kind of how the business world might work sometimes feast and famine and all that. Uh, otherwise the, I guess the lucky. Development for me was that there that I am mostly working with clients that pay five figures, several five figures for [00:28:00] coaching together for a year.
And so I don't actually have to work, work many hours in the week to move, to make more than six figures. So that's good. But it's also work to generate new clients and all of the usual stuff that people do. Right. So that there's that. The other train of thought that I, that was kind of coming up for me is just like the next person.
I am already struggling to fit everything into one day that I need to do. So whilst my husband has a fairly simple schedule of getting up Going upstairs. He works remotely for a company in the U S and basically sitting in his office most of the day between nine and five, at least. And he's somewhat available throughout the day.
Like right now he's covering our time while we're talking here on the podcast. It's pretty simple. And then at the end of the day, he's kind of done with his day and he has his own little chores and works out and [00:29:00] whatever. But for me, I'm trying to combine. The PhD work, my Ascend work with the Xen community, my coaching work, and I'm doing the ICF PCC quantification right now.
And I also have my kids around 24, seven, literally. So, the, I guess the other aspect is that I spend a lot of time reading and I'm currently dedicated to reading the Bible. So that takes up a lot of my morning time. Plus I'm obviously reading for my PhD. So I think the, The truth is that that can get very frustrating when my kids want to be entertained or when I'm like, Oh, we got to go here.
Like we have a homeschooling group on Mondays. We have another homeschool group tomorrow that takes several, several hours out of the day. We're going to visit another homeschool group on Friday this week to see if we want to try it out because it's a bit more schoolish [00:30:00] then, then what we are used to.
And so I am trying to use my time widely. So sometimes that means I listen to books instead of reading them. Or I most of the days tend to get up somewhere between 4. 30 and 5. 30 and I have usually at least an hour or two before they wake up to myself. That's kind of my holy time. And I go to bed really, really early, ridiculously early apparently.
And, so for me, my work time is usually between 4 a. m. or 4. seven probably, then everybody wants to wake up and snuggle and have breakfast and all those types of things. And, uh, and then there's like kids activities we do a lot of arts and crafts and we do, we don't really do the learning, learning, like we're not working with a home curriculum at all.
The idea of homeschool, I should say the idea of unschooling for those who don't know that concept at [00:31:00] all. Isn't that you're basically don't not, you're not doing anything. The idea is that you are allowing your children to lead their own learning and to be self directed in their way of getting an education.
So say for example, my older daughter seems to be quite schoolish, which is much, much to my surprise, as in she's very, very systematic. She likes to be told what to do. She wants to play school. She doesn't really like the idea of actually going to school for eight. It's about an eight hour day here, Monday through Friday for kids.
But she likes the idea of like playing teacher and student and that sort of thing. And she likes to do her math. So the way that looks in unschooling is that the parent usually is one key parent that sort of takes care of the kids. Most of the time will, really just like spot what they're interested in at the time [00:32:00] and facilitate more learning and experiences in that area.
So that means I'm procuring worksheets and workbooks kind of, uh, manipulative toys. I've just ordered like a math thing, which tells her about place value or like those types of things. So we're always investing in school. Schoolish things not an educational toys per se, but more in like experiences.
That may mean So for example recently I took them to a supermarket where I needed to grab a few things and then my daughter was like she was kind of like spotting me doing the checking out I did a self check out and i'm like, how about you do it? And so she did all of the moving things across the scanner and all that.
And then I asked her, like, how much did it come to? How are we going to pay? So it's like, you're learning in the moment along with in life, basically and it's a commitment to lifelong learning. And I, that's one of the reasons why I want them to see me study in the mornings, [00:33:00] which is that they see that this is a lifelong thing.
Mom is self directed in her learning. And, yeah, I think the practicality of that. And some in summary can be that it just feels either overwhelming or like you never get enough done. But at the same time, I think when it comes to this big lifelong dream, or this this overarching dream of we have, we honestly have what we would love in many, many ways, we can travel, we are living in a gorgeous large house and all of those things in a beautiful environment at that.
But I think there's like this, the piece that's probably missing at this point is my husband's time that we're winning that back. So that would be replacing his income and that's what we're kind of working on. Yeah. That was a very long way to answer your question. Sorry.
Mel: That's okay. I don't even remember what the question was, but I love the answer.
Nonetheless [00:34:00] I think Because my next question was going to be what is unschooling for those who who don't know. Because it's it's a very different style of education and it is an education. Yeah, as you say, it's that like, it's intense.
Jana: I think I think people might think of it initially as kind of neglectful.
Parenting when you first see it because it seems kind of hands off and there's no structures and all of that but the truth is it's a huge commitment from the parents because You are constantly You're the one who is responsible for your child's education Along with the kid and not some teacher it would be so much easier if I just dropped my kids off at free daycare As in free public school is really what it is, right?
They're keeping them busy for eight hours and I can just do what I need to do. And I don't, I'm not dismissing for a second that it's needed for many people who just want to go to work. But really what it means is we're outsourcing the education to a teacher person that we may often not know. And [00:35:00] so I think.
The way we see it, we take it very seriously, is that we are buying apps, buying looking at innovative ways for them to get different skills. We're investing our own time and sitting with them. I'm not teaching per se, I don't want to be, it really would drive me up the wall to do that.
But there is an element of, my daughter talks about, Lightning and thunder at nine p. m. We start to look it up on YouTube and learn about lighting, lightning and thunder, right? And whatever it is. So, so it's, it's taking the opportunities that arise there and then in the moment and learning together.
Mel: Brilliant description. And what's it like to, to have this big audacious dream that you've described, it's, it's an alternative lifestyle. Right. And an alternative ways to raise your kids and to educate and, [00:36:00] and generally just not necessarily the mainstream that everybody is going to grab hold of and understand right away.
I'm curious of what's what's that like, how does that impact anything, if at all?
Jana: Well, let's see, what is it like? I think in some ways it can be isolating because, we are pushing against a lot of mainstream, uh, with unschooling, with our high focus on personal development and spirituality and spiritual growth or personal growth, I'm a carnivore, so I, I have a very restricted, strange diet for health reasons that I think, uh there's a lot of great research that support it.
So we're doing a lot of things differently, and that can sometimes mean people are like, huh? Right? Like, what? Why are you doing that? [00:37:00] And it does, it's not met with curiosity. I am very, I'm not often met with curiosity. If I like right now told anybody I'm reading the Bible, there's nobody that has yet asked me why, why'd you do that?
Or how, or how does one do that? Or what made you even, I mean, you're East German. Why are you even baptized? Like, so, so nobody asks those kinds of questions or why unschooling people don't tend to ask. They just kind of go straight into. A box. Oh, I see. So she's this or she is that or she is carnivore and I'm vegan and that doesn't fit or she does curriculum or not like we are just so quick to basically judge and categorize because that's kind of what our brain needs sometimes but that can feel isolating.
And, it's kind of interesting. Somebody fairly recently said to me, [00:38:00] yeah, I've been following your your journey from Germany and England to around the world in those four years and then to the U S and that's also inspiring. And you, you're so brave. I'm like, I don't, I don't know that I would think of myself as brave, or adventurous per se.
Because for me, I just did what felt most aligned to me for my entire life. And so the reason why I coach a lot on big transitions is because I've moved country several times and cultures and languages, and I have changed from journalism and marketing into finance roles and became a chartered accountant in the UK and then decided to do coaching and became self employed and had a lot of transitions, smaller ones in there together with a live So for me, that's just always been like, I've got my compass and I'm adjusting.
I got my compass and I'm [00:39:00] adjusting and some felt more like a premonition or like a a stroke of fate, if you will, like moving to the U. S. And some were more pragmatic, like leaving a marriage that wasn't working anymore.
Mel: Yeah. Yeah. Brilliant. And I would argue back that whether you want to call it brave or not, there, these, every single one of those choices you made along the way in order to stay aligned with your goals and your, your way of wanting to live is, is an act of courage.
And I'm sure that fear kind of hung out and came along with you during each of those, right? And
Jana: still does. Yeah. I
Mel: mean,
Jana: I don't think
Mel: that goes away. Yeah. For sure. And that is courage. And, and related to that, I think with your the challenges that you just described in terms of how people might interpret what you're doing, I'm curious what, like, [00:40:00] what keeps you going?
when met with, a world that might not quite always understand?
Jana: Well, first of all, I think it needs to be said that it always makes me question things a little bit. So when I get challenged in that way, or just not accepted, or I'm noticing I'm not making the friend that I thought I was going to make, or that the person can't quite relate or something like that, when anything like that happens, it.
Makes me like, pause, and Invariably, create some self doubt too, because then I'm not necessarily about certain things that I'm really convicted about. Somebody said, Oh, that's so gross. You just eat a lot of meat, or eggs or bacon or butter. Then I'm like, yeah, but I have so much conviction about that because I've read so [00:41:00] much research about it.
And, then I'm just like, Well, that's okay. You do you and I do me there are certain points like that, but sometimes it's not as simple as that. Sometimes it, it is more of a, yeah, check in for me as to what I'm doing, but usually, I don't know. I feel like most, if I'm looking back sort of the majority of decisions that I've made, I have had a lot of conviction, even if it took me a really long time to get to it.
Like, for example, couple of examples I can tell because when I decided to leave my marriage in 2014, that had been such a long time coming. And it took me years to get to clarity and certainty about doing that. And the second time I'm thinking of is like, Just when my husband and I were traveling globally and we knew we wanted to have children and we kind of needed to get on with it because I was I was [00:42:00] getting to be that age where that becomes more and more difficult.
We took over a year to figure out where in the world we wanted to live and have children. So it doesn't necessarily, I think this is partly what people are not seeing as much in social media, right? So you might be like, Oh, Yana's doing the whole immigration process through the S or she's now living in the U S.
They don't see that it took 11, 000 for just lawyers and fees and so much paperwork and so much patience and tears and this visa and that visa and driving there and here and there, like all those small steps aren't being portrayed, right. Or equally about a divorce, like talk about anybody going through a divorce and how long that takes.
And in England, you have to live separately for two years before you can even apply for a divorce all that kind of stuff. So. It looks like a moment of courage, but actually it's a lot of small steps. And so that's really how we do life now is just [00:43:00] take a long line of small steps every single day.
But my husband and I are pretty system driven or routine driven. And so, there's there's there are mechanisms that we've put in place to make sure that we are staying on track like we always talk every week about our finances. We talk about our marriage every week. We talk about our kids every week.
Like we have certain things mapped out in the calendar. And, yeah, every, yeah, it just takes kind of time to make big changes happen sometimes. Sometimes it's a second, like a couple of seconds and 20 seconds of courage, as you say, in terms of the courage, but a lot of the times I think it's a lot longer than that.
Mel: Definitely, I describe courage as a muscle and you need to do the teeny tiny ones to get to the big one, right? But I love that you just shared, I don't, I would almost sum that up as like [00:44:00] this, this life of flexibility that you're craving and, and, and living and building doesn't mean a life without challenge, right?
No, it's still life and it's full of challenges and every decision we make will have something that will come along with it that will be, that will be hard. So thank you for sharing that and being real and human about it. Because it's very easy to listen to the big dream and be like, Oh, well, you're making X amount already.
And I couldn't do that. And you're doing this and you're doing that and, and, uh not see the bits that come to get to that point. Yeah, absolutely.
Jana: And this is ultimately what brings us back to coaching because for it is choices, right? Coaching is creating choice for someone ultimately, and, uh making them aware of choice.
choices that they have. And so in this way, I feel like the way that we create any goal is by [00:45:00] making choices. And it doesn't mean that certain problems go away. It's just, we are choosing the way that we want to do life and the way that we're choosing our heart. So we're choosing this heart. Like I often say doing unschooling, for example, is really doing life on hard mode.
Cause I would get a lot more done if I had the kids out of the house. And I totally get like, sometimes parents are just honest and they say, Oh my God, I couldn't have my kids around me all day. I'm like, yeah, I get it. It's really, really hard. And it takes so much patience to endure the whining and the gazillion requests every day, every hour there's always mom, mom, mom, mom.
And most parents have that for what, three hours between school and bedtime. And I have that. For 12 hours or 14 hours a day. And not in trying to get anything done in between that can be really frustrating and challenging. And so it's that [00:46:00] is our heart. But then someone else who chooses, rightfully to send a kid to school has a different kind of heart.
Between either making their own living and being a single mom or dealing with the kid being challenged at school and they don't see an opportunity of taking the kid out of school, even though the kid is not thriving and all those kinds of challenges. So we are just choosing our level of hard.
And so. Yeah, definitely those, those don't go away no matter what we choose. And I don't believe that more money will make us more happy. I think there's just a different, or happier I should say, but I think there's a difference in what can be created with that. And so while we earn what we earn now, we're doing the things and sort of creating the experiences at the level that we can afford for everyone in our family.
And when there is more available yet still, then we might just choose some bigger adventures. It [00:47:00] would just be fun, I think, mostly, to spend 20, 30, 40 grand on a safari in Africa for like two weeks or something, you know what I mean? So I think there are certain things, experiences in life that are justifiably more expensive and that they would be fun to do.
Mel: Excellent. I love it. Okay. We do have to start winding down. So the last kind of, I guess, broader question that I have is, uh, we always finished with a tip that you would give. So we have moms with big audacious dreams, uh, listening in. And you know what? Someone let's go down this path with you. Maybe they're big audacious dreams that are like, not the mainstream, that maybe it.
their mom wouldn't get, or their neighbor wouldn't understand, or they don't think they would, at least at this stage in time. What tip would you give them, uh, in order to pursue that?[00:48:00]
Jana: I'm pretty bad at giving tips. I'm usually good at asking questions. But I think it's because there is no one truth, I think that fits all for some people, it is really valuable to share their audacious dream with somebody to create some momentum and, and accountability, but for other people. I sometimes think it's best they just carry out what they want and they don't talk about it so they don't meet so much pushback, right?
And so giving a tip to me is a, is a tricky thing. I think when somebody has a, a dream, again, a tip isn't, you can do it or just do it and go for it. And I want you to make it happen. I think it's more that find the things that you need. the resources, the support, the the kinds of people that you want to be challenged by or that will support [00:49:00] your mission so that you can succeed and so that you can still take the small actions every day.
And I do think it, whether it's a friend or a coach or anybody, really a parent, but the moment you start breaking that down, And you're a little bit more like you're working your way backwards a little bit. It doesn't have to be exact, right? Like if it's a year away, like a conference would be or a creation of a group.
But I literally sat with a client earlier today because she was like, well, where do I start with a business plan? And I had her drop chat GPT and I said, here's what you're going to say. And I said, this is what I do. This is what I plan to do. These are the things that I feel like I need to figure out for a business plan.
Write me a business plan. Two seconds later, there's a business plan like, I feel like we need to use the resources that we have. And actually, if even if you don't want to hire a coach, using chat to PT as a coach is probably a really good tip. And starting there, and really having them [00:50:00] ask you the questions, ask me 20 questions that I need to figure out in order to accomplish my goal.
Here's my goal. Make a plan with chat2BT. That's my tip. There you go.
Mel: Excellent. That was a great one. Yeah, I love it. Okay. Thank you so much for joining us today. There's always, I have about 60 more questions I could ask, but we will stop now. But tell people if people are entering with curiosity and going, Oh, that sounds so interesting.
Like who you are and what you're doing. And I want to follow what you're doing or get in touch. Where would they go?
Jana: Yes, thank you. Well, thank you very much for hosting and for all your beautiful questions. I, I would send people probably to my LinkedIn and my Instagram profiles you can find me there at Jana Hendrickson.
And, uh, on Instagram, it's I am Jana Hendrickson, Jana spelled with a J A N A. So that might be important to note. Because I don't, I'm not [00:51:00] very, I'm not very keen on visibility. I like to sort of be the person in the background a little bit, but I do share myself authentically on Instagram with all the aspects of my life so that you'll find carnivore diet things, you'll find ascent community things, you'll find things about my marriage and about my children and unschooling daily life.
You'll find in my stories today that I spend most of the day, decluttering and rearranging our art supplies. So it's a very real account. I feel most at home there. And if it's more more in the professional realm and B2B type stuff, then I'm more on LinkedIn. But those are the two places I would send you to.
And otherwise, of course, you can find me on jannahendrickson. com. Excellent. Thank you so much, Jana
Mel: If you live on Vancouver Island, then listen up. This is for you. [00:52:00] And if you don't, still listen up because it may well eventually be for you. I have started The Courage Club. It is up and running right now with our founding members and it will be launching for real in January of 2025. And it is a space for women to meet new people local in their area you And try new things, build up that courage muscle, take fear along for the ride, and have some fun together.
And if that seems like something that you are craving, that space to get out and do things that you might not otherwise do on your own, but that you do want to do, then You can do it with the Courage Club. Now, courage shows up in many forms. Sure, there's the physical ones that we all think of, but there's also social and there's emotional courage, and there's so many ways that we can show it.
So you will have an opportunity to [00:53:00] decide how you going to do your acts of courage. Head on over to Permission to Be human.ca/the Courage Club and get your name on the waiting list so that you can hear all about it as and when it comes up.
That is it, folks. This has been Mel Findlater on Permission to Be Human, the podcast, and I am so glad that you have joined us here today and hope that you have taken away some tidbits that will help you go away, connect with your big audacious dream, and make that massive impact in the world that you are dying to make.
If you liked today's episode, please, please, please like it, share it. Think of one person. Think of one person that you think would also like it and send it on over to them. Let's get this out there and more moms feeling like themselves. Inspired, dreaming big, and out there [00:54:00] being them. Please do head on over to find me on Facebook with permission to be human or Instagram or you can even Off me an email and say hello.
Have permission to be human, always, at gmail. com. Say hello and let me know that you listened. What did you like about it? I would love to hear. If you didn't like it, I don't really want to know. Ha ha, just kidding, you can share that if you want. I would love to know, however, who you are. Let's connect.
Let's find out what you want more of. I want to hear from you and I want to make it what would be useful to you. As always, remember that you have permission to dream big, permission to feel big, and permission to be you. You have complete and full permission to be human.
For real, you [00:55:00] do.
