The Perfectly Imperfect Journey

Today I Noticed with Willow Older and Deborah Huber

What started as a mishap - trying to catch an exhibit at a local museum, only to find out it was closed that day -  turned into a mindfulness practice.  How does this happen?  Take two inspiring, creative women and set them loose in San Francisco with an unexpected few hours, and a whole new way of living their days was born.  An amazing Instagram page, a book and many workshops later, Willow and Deborah join the podcast to share what they’ve learned and engage Sherry and Anne in an impromptu “Today I Noticed” practice.  

 

Bio:

Willow Older and Deborah Huber are the founders of Today I Noticed, a creative mindfulness practice, and the authors of Today I Noticed: A Little Book of Mindfulness that Will Change the Way You See the World and the 2025 Today I Noticed: A Year of Inspiration and Mindfulness daily desk calendar. They lead mindfulness workshops for companies, teams, and conferences of all sizes.

 

Willow is an internationally published writer who runs her own editorial services business.

Deborah has spent her career in various creative and management roles in the tech industry designing and managing the development of digital products.

 

Perfection within the Imperfection with Sue Lambert

Sue Lambert survived her abusive childhood by numbing her pain with alcohol as she tried to live up to an idealized perfection standard.  Through pure guts and determination, Sue left home, did well at work, and started a family, but always felt that she was not “normal.”

After undergoing surgery, Sue became addicted to pain pills in addition to her alcohol addiction, spiraled downwards, and eventually landed in prison. One of the classes she signed up for while incarcerated was with the Enneagram Prison Project. In this unlikeliest of places, she found a doorway to examine her ingrained ways of operating in the world and ultimately found hope.  Sue now knows true perfection lies within the imperfect.  

 

Bio

Sue Lambert is an Enneagram Prison Project (EPP) Ambassador. She is also a retired EPP Faculty Member and Guide, a Life Coach, certified ACE (adverse childhood experiences) trainer, an IEA (International Enneagram Association) Accredited Professional, and Certified Narrative Enneagram Teacher. Sue identifies with Type 1 on the Enneagram and is passionate and driven to support others as they navigate their personal growth and development post-incarceration. She finds joy and fulfillment in nurturing others to reach their highest potential. Sue lives with her daughter, son-in-law, and grandkids and is “Nanny Granny” to them all. She feels a strong connection to her essential self when she is outside and enjoying nature and animals (horses/dogs/wildlife), where she knows in her heart that everything is “perfect” the way it is. Sue learned about the Enneagram and EPP behind bars and exemplifies the work, inspiring people worldwide to find inner freedom. Sue’s story includes what she describes as a dark time in her life, where she was also able to find light, and one of those light beams was the union she found with EPP, the Enneagram, and her true self, an impact she says saved her life.

Oprah Daily article on Sue: https://www.oprahdaily.com/life/health/a60583312/enneagram-test-prison-program/ 

Enneagram Prison Project: https://www.enneagramprisonproject.org/

Rebel With a Cause with Shelley Paxton

She was at the top of her game with one of the world’s most iconic brands, doing the work that had taken her across the world and back multiple times. From the outside looking in, things looked really good for Shelley Paxton.

But, she had a secret.  Shelley would be awoken every night by the same nightmare and walked through her days with anxiety, both of which she tried to numb with busyness and alcohol. She finally reached a point where she couldn’t tolerate the pain of playing to someone else’s version of success and went on a journey to find her lost soul. 

Shelley no longer believes in following the rules, and wants to lead a revolution for all of us to reclaim our rebel nature and fully dance to the beat of our own music.  

 

Bio

 

Think Brené Brown meets Biker Babe, with a dash of Liz Gilbert. As former Chief

Marketing Officer of Harley-Davidson, Shelley Paxton found herself at the top of the

proverbial mountain feeling success-EMPTY instead of success-FULL. That awakening led

her on a profound journey that became her mission, business, and Simon & Schuster-

published bestselling book, Soulbbatical: A Corporate Rebel's Guide to Finding Your Best Life. 

 

She’s leading a REBELution to rewrite the script of success.

 

Shelley’s inspiring work has been featured on NBC, CBS, Forbes, Thrive Global, Inc.,

Business Insider, Yahoo!, and a TEDx stage.

 

Her signature keynote – “Where Soul Meets Success” – is an essential roadmap for

leaders and organizations to redefine success in ways that celebrate humanity, well-

being, and fulfillment. It’s the post-pandemic antidote to burnout and seeking.

 

She’s based in Chicago (when not indulging her wanderlust) and is obsessed with mental

health advocacy and the color orange.

 

Soulbbatical: A Corporate Rebel's Guide to Finding Your Best Life at Amazon 

For more info and booking: www.shelleypaxton.com
IG: @theshelleypaxton

The Serious Work of Play

As children, play was a fundamental part of how we lived our days - whether it was an impromptu game with neighborhood friends, recess at school, or creating secret worlds with dolls or army figurines.  There was no agenda, there was just fun for the sake of it. 
What we didn’t know then was how important play was to our development, creativity, and overall health.
As we get older, something shifts and we are increasingly asked to “act like a grown-up.”  We lose play as a regular part of our lives, and with it, a tool that can be so helpful in our continued growth, and happiness.  In this episode, Sherry and Anne explore the importance of play as adults and how to welcome more of it back into our lives. 

Mid Life Beginning with Suzanne Beaumont

When Suzanne Beaumont saw an advertisement for a marathon that invited readers to “change their life,” she was 49 and not much of a runner.  But something called to her and she started lacing up her trainers.  Several months later she finished that marathon and had the realization that doing hard things was not only possible, but could also propel her to move out of her comfort zone in other ways.  Suzanne feels like she has had a brand new beginning at midlife and now follows her passions wherever they take her - writing, traveling, and discovering herself.  Listen in to Suzanne’s perfectly imperfect journey.  

 

Life can only be understood backwards; but it must be lived forwards. Soren Kierkegaard

 

Bio

Suzanne Beaumont has lived in Wake Forest, NC for 25 years, raised three beautiful children there, and has been writing for the past eight years. She writes to simply know herself and explore the world around her. She studied writing with Natalie Goldberg and is currently studying haiku with Clark Strand.

As Suzanne reads or listens, phrases will often catch her attention and she'll discover a poem or essay that she didn’t know was inside her. And so it goes.

She began running in 2006, and stepped way out of her comfort zone when she signed up to run her first marathon with the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society’s team in training (TNT) program. She’s since run a half-dozen marathons, a handful of ultra marathons, and too many half-marathons to count, and served as a TNT volunteer coach for ten years.

Suzanne recently retired from her long-term career as a software architect, at organizations including Alcatel-Lucent, Research in Motion, Lenovo, and most recently, Blue Cross and Blue Shield of North Carolina.

She writes most days just like she runs most days; these are her practices that keep her grounded and moving forward.

The Power of Play with Shirin Etessam

Shirin Etessam was born in Iran and enjoyed a fairly happy and privileged childhood.  When her parents immigrated to the US, after some initial struggles, she found her place in high school and began to flourish.  She experienced success after college, working in film and television. Eventually she fell in love and adopted 2 children with her wife, with whom she initially had a nine-year friendship. While everything looked great from the outside, there was a problem bubbling below the surface: Shirin had started losing parts of her soul along her journey and had shrunk into a much smaller version of herself.  When her relationship eventually ended, Shirin began a multi-year, painful process of clawing her way back to her true self, through much self-reflection, spiritual teachings, and most importantly, the power of play.

 

Bio:

Shirin Etessam is a renowned play expert and storyteller, blending her background in film, TV, and branded content with a deep passion for the transformative power of play. Following a pivotal life event, Shirin embarked on a journey that shifted her focus from external achievements to the joys of internal fulfillment through play. With over a decade of dedicated research and exploration, she harnesses the principles of curiosity, creativity, and spontaneity to promote mental and spiritual health. Shirin advocates for integrating play into all facets of life, emphasizing its crucial role in today’s world for achieving true contentment and joy. Her work stands at the intersection of science and play, aiming to enlighten others on its essential benefits for our well-being.

 

Website: https://www.shirinetessam.com/ 

Free to Be: A Six Week Guide to Reclaiming Your Soul: https://www.shirinetessam.com/freetobe/ 

Resilience

Life can be messy. Unexpected things happen, we may encounter issues or struggles, and, at times, things just get hard. No one enjoys the struggle, but as Patrick Ness reminds us - it is not about how we fall - it’s how we get back up. This is the core of resilience. Given the fact that we will all have something that gets difficult, how can we not only survive it but also grow?  Resilience is like a muscle that can be built and strengthened with the right focus and attention.     Listen in to hear about some of our own challenges and the tools we use to get back up again.  

 

In this episode, Sherry references Amy Purdy’s book

https://amypurdy.com/amy-purdys-book-on-my-own-two-feet/

True connection with Shasta Nelson

Shasta Nelson’s brand is all about helping people connect authentically in real life.  For over 15 years Shasta has facilitated, taught, and modeled how to build healthy relationships, and has written a few books about friendships along the way.  Yet it was her own deep connection to the person who eventually became her husband that rocked Shasta’s world, and caused her to lose friends, her job, and the church she was serving.  Shasta’s journey was an incredibly painful one, but she emerged more deeply connected to herself, and as a thought leader in the human connection arena.  Listen in to hear Shasta’s perfectly imperfect journey.

 

Bio 

A pioneer in belongingness, Shasta Nelson is an in-demand keynote speaker, popular media resource and contributor to the Harvard Business Review, and author of three books in which she teaches how to build healthy relationships, including The Business of Friendship: Making the Most of the Relationships Where We Spend Most of Our Time. For over 15 years, Shasta has been translating the science of human connection into actionable practices that lead to greater belonging in our communities and workplaces. Her expertise has activated organizations such as Google and LinkedIn to intentionally create and accelerate the high-trust and resilient relationships that lead to higher employee retention, engagement, and collaboration.

​

Shasta has been featured in hundreds of publications such as the New York Times, Los Angeles Times, and TIME magazine, and has appeared as a guest on the Harvard Business Review podcast, Today Show, and Steve Harvey Show. Shasta is a two-time featured TEDx speaker, with her first TED talk receiving over 800,000 views, and she has delivered 500+ keynotes for over 20 different industries, including tech, healthcare, nonprofits, education, and more.

 

Website: https://www.shastanelson.com/

TedX Talk: Relationally Fit: The Social Secret to a Longer, Happier Life https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=irRtftdsW8E

What Lights You Up with Libby DeLana

One day, when she was a teenager spending the summer in Ireland, Libby DeLana took the bus into Dublin and was awed by the Book of Kells. Little did she know that moment would change her professional trajectory. Fast forward to several years later, with an undergraduate degree in hand, Libby went to culinary school with a friend and discovered that as much as she enjoyed creating delicious food, she was far more enthralled with the layout of a beautiful menu. She listened to these whispers of what really lit her up and had a very successful career in advertising. Fast forward a bit more, and while everything seemed great on the surface, Libby realized something felt off in her life.  Once again, she listened to the whispers, laced up her shoes and went for a walk.  And she has kept walking, every day, for the past 12 years.  Libby has turned this walking practice into more than just being in nature.  She has a whole new chapter in her life, has written a book and hosts a great podcast. Listen in to hear Libby’s perfectly imperfect journey.  

Bio

Libby DeLana is an Executive Creative Director, founder of This Morning Walk™ (thismorningwalk.com / @thismorningwalk / #thismorningwalk) and is co-host of the podcast This Morning Walk with Alex Elle. She spoke at The Do Lectures 2022 with Cheryl Strayed about the transformative power of a walk.

Libby spent her career in advertising and was the Design Director at MullenLowe for 15 years, then went on to co-found Mechanica, a small boutique agency in Massachusetts. Libby’s work has won many industry awards, has been featured in publications like PRINT Design Annual, Graphis Design & Logo, Fast Company, Communication Arts, and has been profiled by the BBC for the series called The Chain in which, “leading figures name the woman who’s inspired their success for the next interview in this audio chain.”  

Please feel free to join this walking community by following @thismorningwalk @parkhere on Instagram or for more info and resources thismorningwalk.com

Find Your People with Maggie Kane

As a young person, Maggie Kane had big plans to leave her hometown of Raleigh, NC, and find adventure in Italy.  While she was lucky to get to Europe during college, it was a volunteer gig with a day shelter for people experiencing homelessness that planted the seeds for her true adventure of a lifetime.  That volunteer gig turned into a paid job and it was through relationships with the people from the shelter that Maggie found her true calling: starting the first “pay what you can” restaurant in her hometown.  Through many twists and turns, and unexpected stops and starts, A Place at the Table was born, and with it, Maggie has truly found her community.  Listen in to hear Maggie's #perfectlyimperfect journey. 

 

Bio:

Maggie is the Founder and Executive Director of A Place at the Table, Raleigh’s first pay-what-you-can nonprofit cafe. She graduated from NC State University in 2013 and began working for a nonprofit with people experiencing homelessness. By befriending many people living on the margins, she saw the challenges of food insecurity as well as providing dignity to those in need. In February 2015, A Place at the Table was born and Maggie never looked back. Opening in January of 2018, Table has served thousands of people in Raleigh with a dignified and an affordable meal, together. Maggie has a heart to serve, a desire to always be inclusive, and a passion for loving people.

She lives in Raleigh, loves to jump rope, and eats a large amount of peanut butter. She loves hiking in the mountains, and all things sunflowers. You’ll find her watching movies at the theaters in those big comfy chairs, skydiving, or breaking away for a quick 2-day weekend trip.

A Place at the Table: https://tableraleigh.org/