School taught you that creativity, individuality and questioning authority were problems to be solved. But in today's world? Those are the exact skills that make you unstoppable.

Laura Canavan Hayes joins Amanda for a raw conversation about everything the education system got wrong - and how to reclaim what they tried to strip away.

In this deeply personal episode, Amanda and Laura unpack:

• What uniforms are actually about
• The rebellion that led Laura from banking to acting (via the dole queue)
• How Amanda's dad's "scrappiness" became her entrepreneurial superpower
• The moment Laura realised she could "be many things" instead of picking one lane

Laura's journey: From painting maintenance sheds in rebellion to walking away from a six-figure banking job to pursue acting and why a particularly demoralising "failure" was actually perfect preparation.

Amanda's realization: At almost 50, she's finally learning what it actually means to "apply herself"

The game-changer: What if everything you were told to suppress to "survive" in the world is exactly what you need to thrive?

The permission slip you've been waiting for: You can be many things. It's never too late to pivot, create, or claim your space in the world exactly as you are.

• Connect with Laura & claim her free e-book 'Six tips for a Healthy Home' HERE.
• LAURA'S INSTAGRAM
• BIOWEAVER INSTAGRAM

Mentions:

• The Artist's Way
• Marian Williamson Quote from her book 'A Return To Love'

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Subscribe on⁠⁠ ⁠SUBSTACK⁠ for BONUS tools & resources.

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Music Credit:⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠Holes⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ By Bradley James Grace

Today's guest didn't show up. So Amanda spills the tea on the ONE thing that's kept you stuck your entire life.

You think the problem is your partner. Your weight. Your boss. Your bank account.

Plot twist: You've been trying to solve the wrong problem.

Amanda lost 100lbs TWICE and was still miserable. She tried the geographic cure more times than she can count. Same drama, different zip code.

Here's what she learned from recovery programs that changed everything...

The secret isn't waiting for a miracle. It's using a method.

In this raw solo episode, Amanda reveals:

• The "miracle thinking" trap that's exhausting you (and why your brain loves it)
• Why Jim Carrey was depressed even after making millions
• The 3-step method that's helped millions find serenity (hint: you already know it)
• What's launching in 10 days that could change your life
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Plus: The one question that will show you exactly where you're bleeding energy.

Stop trying to control what you can't. Start changing what you can.

Your happiness isn't selfish—it's service.

Ready to stop waiting for everyone else to change? The Serenity Project launches mid-August.

Join the NEWSLETTER to be first in line.

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Music Credit:⁠⁠⁠ ⁠Holes⁠⁠⁠⁠ By Bradley James Grace.

This one's for everyone who's tired of feeling like they have to keep pulling rabbits from a hat to deserve a seat at the table.

In this unscripted solo episode, Amanda challenges herself to just talk. No outline, no plan, no trunk full of wisdom to unpack.

What emerges is a beautiful meditation on recovery, control and the radical act of being enough exactly as you are.

Fresh from re-entering the world after hermit mode, Amanda reflects on the insights that come from working a 12-step program while navigating business networks, social media and the simple act of house-training a new dog.

It's all connected: the way we try to control our environment, manage other people's experiences and reach outside ourselves to fix internal discomfort.

This episode captures the messy, real work of recovery. Not just from substances, but from the addiction to productivity, people-pleasing and the exhausting need to prove your worth through performance.

Amanda shares how she's learning to give her brain a break and trust that she's enough without constantly adding to herself.

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🎧 Listen now and subscribe on SUBSTACK for podcast companion articles, tools & resources.

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Music Credit:⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠Holes⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ By Bradley James Grace.

Ashleigh Tobin is a master storyteller who uses words as colours and her voice as a paintbrush.

As a hormone health coach, registered nurse with 35+ years experience and TEDx speaker, she helps women navigate the profound transformation of midlife not as decline, but as awakening.

In this conversation, we dive deep into the four stages of womanhood: maiden, creative, enchantress, and sage.

That third stage, enchantress or warrior woman, coincides with our forties and fifties, exactly when society tells us we're "over the hill."

But Ashleigh reveals this as the time when our greatest resources are waiting to emerge.

We explore how the stories we tell ourselves either open or close possibilities, why curiosity is the antidote to certainty and criticism and how to navigate the break in continuity when you start becoming someone new.

This conversation also touches on the profound moment when Amanda chose her creative calling over traditional motherhood, leading to an identity shift from "escape artist" to "creative wayfinder", proof that we can rewrite our stories at any stage of life.

Key Themes:

• Four stages of womanhood & midlife as a beginning
• How the stories we tell ourselves shape our reality
• Moving from certainty to curiosity as a way of living
• Why "someday" is the enemy of a life well-lived
• How small moments of noticing create profound change
• Creating space for your evolving self

Connect with Ashleigh:

• Website
• LinkedIn
• TEDx Talk: "How Menopause Will Change Your Life"
• Instagram

Photographer and yoga teacher Tara Morris sits down for one of the most honest conversations about what it actually means to be free; not when you're "perfect," but right now, exactly as you are.

Fresh from losing her mother after 25 years of Parkinson's & navigating her own profound grief, Tara speaks with raw honesty about being "face down in the arena" while still somehow radiating the kind of energy that makes you want to lean into life harder.

As an Enneagram 7, she's learned that you can't just run from the hard feelings, sometimes you have to turn toward them.

We explore the difference between the stories we tell ourselves, particularly about our bodies and the actual experience of living in them.

Tara talks shares why she practices 'granular gratitude' for every single thing her body can do.

This is about more than body acceptance, it's about the courage to stop waiting for permission to live fully in the skin you're in.

Key Themes:

• What "being free in your body" actually means (and it's not what you think)
• Why we numb instead of feel and what's on the other side of that choice
• The different understandings of power
• How grief and gratitude can exist in the same moment
• Why your body stories are not the truth

If this conversation reminded you that you're already worthy of love exactly as you are, we'd love if you'd share it with someone who needs that reminder too.

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Connect with Tara:

The Love Offensive

Tara Morris Images

INSTAGRAM

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Subscribe to Amanda's ⁠⁠ ⁠SUBSTACK ⁠for companion articles, tools & resources.

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Music: Holes by Bradley James Grace

This one's for everyone who's ever felt like they had to choose between being authentic and being professional.

Jean Evans is a Networking Architect, but this conversation isn't about collecting business cards or LinkedIn strategies. It's about something much more essential: how authentic connection becomes life resourcing, especially for women rebuilding their worlds.

After being made redundant while breastfeeding one child with two toddlers around her feet, Jean discovered that learning to network wasn't just about business—it was about discovering who she was as a human being.

We dive deep into the wounds that keep us isolated—the fear of being seen as needy, the toxic self-reliance, imposter syndrome, perfectionism.

This conversation challenges everything we think we know about networking, success and the dangerous myth that we can, or should, do it all alone.

Key Themes:

• Networking as a learnable skill
• Vulnerability as permission
• Transactional networking or life resourcing?
• What's costing you connections & opportunities
• The mentality that leads to burnout, everytime
• The courage equation
• Your TRUE credentials

If this episode reminded you that none of us are supposed to do life alone, we'd love if you'd share it with someone who needs to hear that message.

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Connect with Jean:

Websites

Ignite Business Network

Jean's Newsletter, + free Top 20 Tips to Rock Your Week.

Jean's Networking Blog

Podcasts

Ignite Talks

NetworkMe

Socials

Linkedin

Instagram

Facebook

X.com

YouTube

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Subscribe to Amanda's ⁠ ⁠SUBSTACK for companion articles, tools & resources.

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Music Credit:⁠⁠⁠ ⁠Holes⁠⁠⁠⁠ By Bradley James Grace.

Amanda met Michelle at a professional speaking event, where she stood before a room & declared: "Every single person has something to offer. Everybody has value." Then she challenged everyone to prove it, right there, in real time.

In this conversation, Amanda unpacks with her, the inner panic that quickly ensued.

Michelle, aka THE PEOPLE READER, is an expert in human behaviour, president of the Professional Speaking Association and a woman who, on Dec 26th 2004, was caught in one of the deadliest natural disasters in history, the Indian Ocean earthquake and tsunami.

But what she witnessed in the aftermath wasn't devastation, it was revelation and it led to her life's work.

Tune in to hear:

• Why self-reliance doesn’t work & what the alternative is

• What happened when Amanda's ego "threw a tantrum" & quit on her recovery.

• Michelle's take on the key to our collective evolution.

• The results of Amanda's driving forces analysis (a tool developed by Michelle) & a powerful challenge to us all.

  
  

  Connect with Michelle:

  LINKEDIN

  FACEBOOK

  WEBSITE

  THE PEOPLE READER

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  Subscribe to Amanda's SUBSTACK for companion articles, tools & resources.

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  Music Credit:⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠Holes⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ By Bradley James Grace.

What happens when you stop being a "square peg trying to fit in a round hole"?

Interior architect Stephanie O'Sullivan spent over a decade in corporate creative roles, masking her neuro-divergent nature and slowly having "anything good about it sucked away."

Then came the breakthrough that changed everything and led to a complete reimagining of what it means to be creative, authentic and unapologetically yourself.

This Conversation Is Essential Because:

It's about reclaiming your creative intelligence in a world that profits from your conformity.

It shows how breakdown can become breakthrough when you stop fighting who you are.

It proves that your "difficult" nature might be exactly what the world needs.

And because sometimes the most radical act is simply being unapologetically yourself.

Stephanie's Links:

SOSCOUT

INSTAGRAM

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Subscribe to Amanda's⁠ ⁠SUBSTACK for companion article, tools & resources.

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Music Credit:⁠⁠⁠ ⁠Holes⁠⁠⁠⁠ By Bradley James Grace.