The Pivot Effect - How burnout, a pandemic, and a song about self-doubt led to a second career in leadership coaching.

[00:00:00] And you go into a room thinking, when somebody hires you to do something, you think, okay, they expect me to be the expert. And the first thing you're thinking about is, what if they know more than me? I look like an idiot. Like, my God. Yeah, there's so many fears.

[00:00:15] Yeah, there definitely are. I'm grateful that I've done some good communication trainings too, that now I know that if someone does know more than me, there's a way you can kind of not, and I embrace it. I'm the type of person that you know more than me. Great. Let me learn. Tell me all about it. Tell me all about it. Exactly. Tell me more. It's one of my favorite questions. That right there is a great way to spin it as opposed to, oh, oh my gosh, I didn't know that. It's like, oh, that's really interesting. Tell me more about that. You know, like there's communication.

[00:00:45] Communication ways that you can, you can shift it to not feel dumb in that moment, you know. Welcome to the HR Huddle Podcast presented by Sapient Insights Group, the ultimate resource for all things HR. It's time to get in the huddle.

[00:01:11] Hey, everyone. Welcome back to Sapient Insights Group's HR Huddle. I'm your host, Terri Zipper, alongside my co-host, Susan Richards, and we're back with another episode of The Pivot Effect. This is the show where we talk about you as an employee, a leader, a mentor, a coach, what's possible and how to get there.

[00:01:32] If you're feeling stuck in your following rather than leading, you want to lead, or you just feel like you've outgrown what you're doing and you want more, we got you. We focus on the skills and capabilities you need to thrive in the future of work, regardless of the work that you're doing, because there's always going to be a future. Sometimes we just have to make it. Our guest today is Amy Gearhart.

[00:01:54] Amy is an accomplished singer-songwriter, speaker, and coach whose journey spans years in the music industry and a powerful evolution into leadership coaching. Today, we're going to explore what happens when passion, purpose, and personal growth collide. Oh, this sounds exciting. And why sometimes the most important pivot isn't changing careers, but changing how we see ourselves. Welcome, Amy, to The Pivot Effect.

[00:02:22] Thank you so much. I'm so excited to be here. Yeah. I'm totally fangirling out right now. I'm totally fangirling. It's been a while since anyone asked me to be on a podcast. I was like, absolutely. Yeah. Yeah. Well, you are one of our early, early guests on The Pivot Effect. This is a new show we just started a couple months ago, and we're really having fun doing it and just excited about the things that we're talking about,

[00:02:47] because it really is about the people, the passion, the decisions we're making along the way to just sort of figure out who we are and what we want to do. And it's not always linear, right? So for those who don't know you, which I am one of them, I looked at your website, and I'm like Susan, totally fangirling. Tell us about music, Amy. Like what, you know, and I'm assuming that's kind of where you started was music, Amy, but maybe not. Maybe there's something before that. Tell us what that looked like.

[00:03:15] Yeah. Well, you know, I feel like I was just telling someone the other day that I feel like I've lived a lot of lives within this life that I'm living right now. I, my music was the foundation really of everything that I do now. I have been a performer or been in performance in some aspect ever since I was a kid. So maybe around, I don't know, seven or eight was when I did my first musical theater, like community theater performance. And then I just fell in love with singing and acting.

[00:03:45] I don't do hardly any acting now, although who knows what'll happen in my sixties and seventies, you know, but I went to school for music, went to Florida State University, got a degree, started off as a vocal performance major, then switched to, not that this matters too much to the listeners, but I switched to a BA in music so I could do a little bit more expansive music education.

[00:04:07] And so I, I got a certificate in ethnomusicology, which is really the like anthropology of music where the origins of music, how it started, how it developed. And then after school or while I was in college, I, I knew that I didn't want to sing classical music, which was sort of the track in school of learning how to perform arias and opera. Although I did very little in opera and vocally, I could probably still do some of it, but not nowhere close now, but I realized that wasn't my passion.

[00:04:36] I had started songwriting. I wanted to write music. I wanted to travel and perform more popular secular music. And so I started, picked up a guitar. I bought a guitar when I was 21 years old or 20 years old. And I started learning how to play guitar and then started putting my songs to music. And the rest is really history. Although there was a many, many years in between where I started playing cover shows and coffee shops and restaurants and bars.

[00:05:04] And I moved to New York for a little while. Well, moved to Virginia, worked for a commercial realist, or sorry, Virginia. I worked for a production company. New York, I moved to and worked in a commercial real estate company. And then after that, I quit my job because I just was miserable working in an office from 7 a.m., 8 a.m. in Manhattan to, you know, 5 every day. And so I decided to pursue music full time. And that was back in 2007. And so I moved to Atlanta.

[00:05:32] I played cover shows in Atlanta for about 8 years. And then I started playing a couple little local festivals. Met some really amazing guys at a festival. A band you might know called Sister Hazel. And the Sister Hazel guys do this music festival every year called The Rock Boat. And I had gone on The Rock Boat as a passenger in 2008. And then fast forward to 2013, I was an official artist on that boat. It's really a music festival that happens on a cruise ship.

[00:06:01] Just like one on land, you've got 30 or so bands. And then from there, I was able to start touring independently with music. And I did that pretty much up until the pandemic. So music really has been the full foundation. I've done a lot of hobbies and side projects and things along the way. Had a short stint with Mary Kay. Had my own little business doing that. I became a director in that. And then when I was able to tour with music, I stopped that business. And then started really just touring for many, many years.

[00:06:30] Was fortunate to do some vocal work for Lifetime and E. Some commercial projects in Atlanta. And I was nominated for some awards, which was really cool too. And then from there, just really built a fan base. And was touring with music for a long time until I started my coaching business during the pandemic. That was a long answer to your question. I have one other question about that. What was your favorite cover to do? Well, that's a tough question. All right. We'll come back to that.

[00:07:00] That depends on the day. We'll let you think about that one. I will say anything that a woman sings. I usually love doing that. So still to this day, probably Angel from Montgomery is a great song that Bonnie Raitt covered. Written by John Prine. I still love doing Fleetwood Mac as well. It's just fun stuff to sing. And then of course, one of my all-time favorite bands was the Cranberries when I was growing up. Yes. So yeah, all of that really, really works well for me.

[00:07:29] We're liable to break out in song before we finish this podcast. Oh my God. That's okay, Terry. We're going to sign you up for the rock boat next year. I think there's still a few cabins available. Well, so when did you first realize you wanted to do something different? Like, was it an event? Was it just sort of gradual? You know, what happened? Yeah, that's a great question. It was, in hindsight, I believe it was a gradual thing that started happening.

[00:07:56] So when I started touring originally with my music, it was in 2014. And for the listeners, you know, I'm an independent artist. I don't have a manager. I don't have a booking agent. I do everything on my own. And when I tour, I usually will go into people's homes and perform what's called a house concert. So someone will set up, you know, 30, 40, 50 chairs. They'll invite all their friends and family over.

[00:08:20] And I will perform a concert either in their backyard or in their home that's like a listening room event. So it's not really a party, but it's a concert with some socializing. And those are incredible. And I do play a couple smaller venues, but I'm the one driving all the miles. I'm the one managing my taxes. I'm the one, you know, selling the merchandise and ordering it and designing it. I'm the one updating the website.

[00:08:46] And I think there was a time that probably towards 2018-ish, it was, you know, let me do the math here. 14, so 14, 15, 16, 17. So about five years into touring, I started getting really burned out. I think, you know, anything you do, even if you love it, even if it's a part of your soul, if you do it too much without having boundaries and breaks, which I know now because I'm a coach and I teach this to other people, but if you do anything for too long without taking care of yourself

[00:09:16] in the process, you will burn out. And I had a moment where I was in my car in 2018 and I just started feeling exhausted because the best part of my days as a touring musician is playing the shows and meeting people and having dinner with people and getting to know them and sharing stories. The hardest part of my days is the isolation of being in your car for 8, 9, 10 hours at a time, staying in a random hotel, you know, just the road noise. Now, luckily, I'm a big fan of audiobooks, so that helps.

[00:09:46] But I just was getting to a place where I was like, man, do I really want to keep doing this? And if I do, how much longer am I going to keep doing this for? So I had started brainstorming a transition into something different or adding in something different right before the pandemic, pretty much. So 2019, I started playing around with maybe I want to go into real estate. Maybe I want to, you know, start a different career. Also, I don't know if you've heard, musicians don't make a ton of money.

[00:10:12] So it wasn't, there was that moment of, I'm getting a little older and I should probably consider a retirement at some point. So it was probably a gradual thing that happened over the course of a year or two. And then the pandemic really solidified that transition when the entire music industry pretty much got wiped out. Yeah. Kind of slowly, slowly. And then all of a sudden, all of a sudden it was like, God was like, here's your sign. Here you go. If you're going to start something new, it's the time to do it now.

[00:10:40] So, and Amy, what, what drew you to coaching when I, and, and knowing that change is hard and it's scary and it's difficult. What made you like leave that life that you had led and jump with both feet into coaching? That's a great question too. I, I have a song that I wrote back in 2017 or 2016 with two friends of mine, and it's called Love and Myself.

[00:11:06] And that song is about my own personal journey with self-doubt and insecurities and really learning how to love who I am as an individual outside of all the things that I do, learning how to build a healthy relationship with myself. And so when I started playing shows and sharing that story and telling people about how the song was written and all of the ups and downs that I've been through in my own personal relationship with who I am, I started getting people coming up to me asking questions afterwards

[00:11:36] or saying, Hey, thank you for sharing that. I've been through that too. How did you do that? And what did you, you know, did you hire a therapist? Did you get it? You know, did you have a coach? What did you do? And so I started almost coaching and mentoring before I knew what that actually was. And so there was this kind of pull to want to help people. And I think I've always intrinsically had that pull or inherently had it. And, but I, I think early on in my career, a lot of it was about me and, and,

[00:12:06] you know, can I, can I win a Grammy and can I be famous and all of these things. And then as I got older, I'm like, Oh, maybe this isn't really about me anymore. Maybe it's about connecting with other people and helping other people. And so during the pandemic, you know, the government did something really amazing for people who were self-employed. There was the pandemic unemployment assistance and which was the first time ever that anyone who was self-employed could apply for unemployment, which helped tremendously.

[00:12:32] In order to have some sort of income coming in. And so I applied that income along with some additional funds I had saved to start getting coaching certifications and to start, you know, leaning into this, these programs. I did a lot of different programs in neuro-linguistic programming, hypnosis, hypnotherapy. Originally thought I was going to be a hypnotherapist and realized, Oh my gosh, this is many long hours working with people.

[00:12:59] And, and then I went through a lot of leadership trainings and it just was something that just like, you know, the decision to pivot the decision to build the career evolved as well. So it wasn't like I snapped my fingers and knew exactly what I was going to do or how I was going to do it. You know, when I first started coaching, my brain thought, Oh, I'll work with entertainers because I know what that's like to be an entertainer. But then I realized, remember they don't have any money, no money. All of us were completely broke during the pandemic.

[00:13:27] And I did some pro bono stuff. I did free coaching. I did a lot of stuff as I was getting experience, but, um, and then that worked into, you know, I still had women reaching out to me when they found out I was a coach and a lot of men too, but the majority of my clients are women and women who struggle with their confidence. Women who struggle with speaking up. I have a lot of corporate women are female clients that have to lead teams and meetings. And there's still that imposter syndrome that creeps in from time to time.

[00:13:57] So I don't know if I answered your question. Yeah. How did it? Yeah. How did I choose it? Yeah. Yeah. And it brings up another question for me. I mean, my first experience with you was on the rock boat in 2020. That was my first rock boat life-changing event. And what I loved about you was that you always had this just air of confidence and competence

[00:14:25] and joy when you were on stage. And, and I still see that when I get to see you on stage yet, you talk about that imposter syndrome and being afraid. What kind of fear showed up for you as you were transitioning from like leaving the stage to joining a whole new stage in coaching? You know, that is another great question. Honestly, I think a lot of the fears that came up at that time was the diving into the unknown.

[00:14:53] I had been doing music for so long. Like I, I still, you know, I'm about, I'm getting ready now for the listener and, and I might've mentioned this, you Susan, you know, and Terry, you're learning. We're, we're getting to know each other and I'm excited about our, our friendship as well. But I, after I played, I played the rock boat again this January and now, you know, within a month or two, I have three months worth of touring completely booked up music and doing,

[00:15:20] running a music business, running an independent business was something I knew how to do. I developed those skills over 20 years. And so there was a big fear of, my gosh, I don't really know what I'm doing and, or how to build a different type of business or how to get clients because I could sing a couple notes and get hired for something. I could send somebody one of my songs and get hired for something. Whereas a coach or a trainer or a speaker, you know, a lot of that is, it's not just about,

[00:15:49] can you be on stage and perform or can you help someone? It's, can you get results? You know? And so there, that's not something you can really explain to someone, you know, when you're first start working with them. And so there was a lot of fear of, oh my gosh, what? Like, and I, I've never had to do marketing before really. I've never had to run a CRM. I've never had to build web pages and to create programs. So there was a lot of learning that came into that.

[00:16:18] And I did hire coaches as well. When I first started, I hired business coaches. I hired, I got together with other, other life coaches and leadership coaches and, you know, learned as much as I could. I became a sponge. I know probably more about digital marketing now than I ever knew before. Not that I, you know, you're only one person. You can't do it all by yourself. But, but there are things that I, I never really knew before when I was running my music business.

[00:16:48] So I think a lot of those were, were fears of like, how do I do this and how do I do it and not fall flat on my face? Or if I do fall flat on my face doing it, how can I do it in style? How do I get back up? Yeah. You're totally right. There's, and you know, a lot of this stuff is, is not really that, it's not really that hard. Yeah. You have to take some time and you have to want to try to learn it. Right. You can hire somebody to do all of this stuff if you have the money, but at the

[00:17:17] same time, if you kind of know how to do it, you don't have to be the expert, but if you know how to do it, then you know what to expect and you know what to hire for and you know where to go next when you, when it gets beyond what you, you can do yourself. Absolutely. Well, and I, I, another fear, a big one just came up for me and I, I think the listeners hopefully can relate to this too. And maybe the two of you as well. What happens when employees behave badly? Boy, we could, we could do an entire TV show.

[00:17:46] Maybe, maybe a Netflix special on that. Well, Ryan and I sat down and recorded episodes for FOMA and we asked practitioners, give us your most outrageous story. You know, the sales leader that brings cocaine to work, you know, whatever, just bring us the outrageous and it is funny. So if you need a laugh, which we all do from time to time, search for workplace misconduct

[00:18:14] wherever you get your podcast and you'll find it. And trust me, you will laugh and cry, but you'll definitely laugh. All right. Thank you. I had a fear of being, not being taken seriously because for a long time I had this messaging in my mind of, Oh, you're just a musician or, Oh, you're just a singer or, Oh, you're just a songwriter, which that was part of my own personal development journey. I, I got to learn how to rewire some of the negative thoughts and behaviors that I had established within my music career.

[00:18:44] And there was a story I told myself for a long time that maybe this is all I'm good at, right? Maybe, maybe music and singing and, and performing is all I'm really good at. And maybe I'm not going to be good at running a business, or maybe people aren't going to take me seriously because they'll see that I'm a musician, but then they'll think, well, wait a minute. Well, how are you a leadership coach now too? And not understand that I've been through the trainings and I've been through the education. So for a while, when I first started, and I think we're probably going to circle back

[00:19:12] around to this at some point, but I kept those two careers very, very separate. When I first started a lot of people, when I moved to Raleigh where I'm at now, because I was in Nashville before a lot of people in Nashville don't really know that I'm a coach or didn't for a long time. A lot of people in Raleigh don't really know a lot about my music career because most of my marketing was under my, my previous LLC, which I actually just decided not to renew because I'm blending my two businesses together now. But it, it was a lot of the imposter syndrome, right?

[00:19:41] Which I think we all experience no matter what career field we're in or whatever we're doing. There's always the, you know, in my, I believe in myself, I think, but are other people going to believe in me too? You know, there's that, that question. Yeah. And you go into a room thinking when, when somebody hires you to do something, you think, okay, they expect me to be the expert. And the first thing you're thinking about is what if they know more than me? And I, I look like an idiot, like my God. Yeah.

[00:20:10] It's, there's so many fears. Yeah, there, there definitely are. I'm grateful that I've, I've done some good communication trainings too, that now I know that if someone does know more than me, there, there's a way you can kind of not, and I embrace it. I'm the type of person that you know more than me. Great. Let me learn. Tell me all about it. Exactly. And tell me more. It's one of my favorite questions. Right there is a great way to spin it as opposed to, oh my gosh, I didn't know that. It's like, oh, that's really interesting. Tell me more about that.

[00:20:39] You know, like there's, there's communication ways that you can, you can shift it to not feel dumb in that moment, you know? So talked about kind of letting go of the, the one LLC and, and blending. And, and really it sounds like you're integrating the two parts of your life. How did that idea emerge, Amy? That has happened or, or come along probably within the last six months. In fact, I haven't even really announced it yet to everyone. And I just said it.

[00:21:09] What happened was I got ahead of myself. That's some news. You know, now that I'm, I'm starting to play music again, I took, I took about five years off of music and everyone asked me if I had quit music. And, and the reality is, is I don't think you can really quit something. That's a part of you. You can stop doing things for a while. I told people they were, they were like, oh, Amy's retired. I'm like, I'm not retired. I'm in, I'm in hibernation. I'm sleeping. I'm just doing a very long five year sleep.

[00:21:38] And, and, and I needed that. I needed the, the, the break from the constant need of, I need to put out new music and new songs and tour and do all of these things. And then I, I, you know, started the coaching business. And like I said, I kept those two things separate. And then last year I started dipping my toes back in the water again with music. And I realized it was so fun to get back out on the road and play and not have it have to be my only source of income. And, and, you know, I, I, I full transparency.

[00:22:08] I'm a single woman, no kids, never married. If I'm, if the Lord does not bring me my future husband that to help with my bills, I'm, I'm in charge of it all. So there is, there is the thought of like, okay, this, this economy is getting pretty pricey and expensive. So it was really nice to be able to play music last year and to have it be sort of the bonus income and the extra. And then it got to be fun because there wasn't so much pressure related to it.

[00:22:35] And so, you know, I, I had started, this is going to be Susan, a really complicated answer to your, to your question or a complex answer to your question. Cause it wasn't just one thing that, that made me decide to sort of let go of a higher way of living. I'm still, it's almost like a little bit of a rebrand. I'm not giving up my coaching business or my speaking business. I'm still doing that. I'm just learning how to integrate them into Amy Gearhart's as the umbrella and having the

[00:23:02] umbrella be Amy is the, the musician, the coach and the speaker and letting it all sort of evolve also with my rise up buttercup podcast and, and be a little bit more blended and organic. I will say that, you know, I, I love training and I'm, I'm good at training in the leadership space and the communication space. But I found that there was a big difference between the companies that would hire me in to do trainings for people that did not want to be there versus people like associations

[00:23:32] or organizations that would hire me in for the people that were paying for a ticket or a conference fee that really wanted to be there and wanted to learn. And there was a lot of self-discovery, which happens in any field for any person in any time of life of, do I really enjoy doing this? And some of the forced trainings weren't, they were great. And, and 90% of the time the people were amazing that 10% of the time though, I was kind of like, Oh man, am I even making a difference?

[00:24:02] Am I really doing what I feel like I'm called to be doing while also making money? So there's, there's, there was just a lot of that. And then, you know, I, I am in the thick of my perimenopausal journey and I'm, I'm in the thick of my midlife epiphany and we're not calling it a crisis. According to my bass player, we're calling it an epiphany. I like that. I like that. I did. And so, and so I, I, I had a lot of things to just kind of come together and a higher way of living.

[00:24:31] You know, the idea behind that, that company was really to help people to understand that there's a better way that they can be living every day. There's a, there's a almost like pulling you up, like rising up out of, out of the BS that we tell ourselves and the, all the stuff that we talked about earlier to just, we can do things better, right? There's, there's gotta be an easier, more fulfilling way of doing this. And, but there was this kind of understanding of, okay, well, you know, my website's really corporate. The stuff that I'm doing is really corporate.

[00:25:00] Maybe I can explore what it would look like to transition that. And I've started doing this last year, transition into doing women's associations and women's groups. And I still work with men too. I just want to make that very clear with everybody listening. But what would that look like to, you know, get back to the roots of the stuff that I really love to do to begin with. And so I'll be honest saying it here. I have no idea how it's going to evolve. Who knows? I think that's kind of the freedom and excitement of this whole transition.

[00:25:28] But I am right in the thick of, you know, starting a brand new adventure of going back on the road with music. I actually have a call after this today about doing a speaking event while I'm in Denver, Colorado and, and, you know, adding more speaking events in while I'm on the road. I've got a couple of new clients starting up with coaching. So I think it gets to be a really fun transition and, and it gets to be whatever it's going to be without the pressure of it needing to look a certain way. That sounds really powerful, Amy. Thank you.

[00:25:59] And super, super exciting. I'm like, where do I sign up for this? I want that. Come on in. Yeah. Step one. And as you, as you were talking, you know, there's, there's this, this thing that I have about being authentic in everything I do. And there has to be a little fun in what I'm doing or, or I just, I just opt out. I'm like, I'm not doing that anymore. I don't want to. Yeah.

[00:26:26] But I think that that's, that's, that's a gift that we get as we get a little more advanced and a little more wisdom in our life. So I loved hearing that story. So just, just a couple of like lightning round thing. And, and don't forget, we're going to come back to, to Terry's question. What's something that you're better at today because of the pivots that you've made? Patience, patience.

[00:26:54] When, when I was younger, I wanted everything to happen so fast. And even when I started my coaching business, you know, I, I, well, let's go back to music when I was in music and, and I guess I still am in music. I've got to work on my language. But when I first started my music career, it was like, oh my gosh, I want to win a Grammy and I want to have a label and I want to be a famous songwriter. And I, and if I don't have it figured out by the time I'm 30, then, you know, it was just all of this pressure.

[00:27:20] And, and I've learned, and even, even when I, sorry, I have ADHD. So if you haven't figured that out yet, so I, my brain skips a little faster than my mouth. So I, even with my coaching business, it was like, okay, I'm going to build this business. I'm going to bring on hundreds of clients. Not that I have the time to coach hundreds of clients, but I was going to, you know, I want to make millions of dollars. It sounded good, didn't it? It sounds great. And then you get into the work of it and you're like, I don't know if I want to do that work. I don't know. It's exhausting. Yeah.

[00:27:49] I, I'm, I'm self-employed for a reason. I don't, I'm not trying to work an 80 hour week here. And so, so there was a lot of, but I need, there was this need to have it happen very quickly. Need to have the first course I ever create be the big course, right? Or the, the first keynote that I ever do is going to be the one that everyone's going to want to hire. The stuff that I did at the beginning of, of everything and beginning of music, the songs I wrote at the beginning of music are nowhere close to the level of songs that I write now.

[00:28:18] The, the programs that I created when I first became a coach are, are what they are. They're not as good as what I would create now with the experience. So I've, I've gotten to learn how to be more patient and to learn how to tell myself that sometimes if it happened too quickly, would I really appreciate it? And would I be as good at it as I am now? And would I enjoy it as much as I do now because of the time that it took to get there? Yeah.

[00:28:47] I think that's so important though. Like you have to have the goals, right? You have to have goals because that directs the activity and the things that we do to get us there. But at the same time, we can't have everything tomorrow. And that is, has sort of been our culture for a while now in, in, at least in America, it's like, I got to do this and I got to do it tomorrow. Tomorrow there's just no waiting. I can't wait. Yeah. I'm, I'm in a season right now of learning how to slow down.

[00:29:14] And I don't know if everyone goes through this at some point in their life, but I do agree with you, Terry. We are in a, a season of instant gratification or in a culture of instant gratification. I mean, with dating, with things we can buy online with, you know, with social media, it is like, what's next, what's next, what's next. And we get all these little dopamine hits, but those dopamine hits, I don't think, although I'm not going to say there's anything wrong with Amazon. I love it. Getting my package tomorrow.

[00:29:44] I don't want to wait for it. But I also think that that causes me not to just take the time and not to just slow down. And so I'm in a season of, of stripping away all of the excess and learning how to just take things day by day and, and learning to live a little bit more in the moment and, and letting life and letting God like, just kind of figure it all out, you know, and, and like Jesus take the wheel at this point. I'm too damn tired.

[00:30:14] You, you let me know. I'm going to follow the calling of singing. I'm going to follow the calling of helping people. I'm going to follow my calling of, of speaking. But after that, I, I just don't think I need to have it all figured out anymore. And that's really exciting. Great advice. Love that. Love that. So what's next, Amy? Well, I did a post a couple of days ago on my Facebook profile that I am moving out of my apartment.

[00:30:40] I made the decision because I'm going to be traveling so much to let go of my apartment. This will be the first time that I don't have a quote unquote home. I'm not homeless. I'm just without a home. I have plenty of people and family that I can stay with, but I'm going to be traveling so much that, you know, going back to what we said before, I'm in a season of wanting to be a little bit smarter financially and a little smarter of where do I want to end

[00:31:05] up and what type of lifestyle do I want to have in the next 20 years or 25 years before I retire myself. Although I don't know if you ever retire, if music is what you do, but I, I just decided that I'm going to explore what it's like to be a bit of a nomad. So I might hate it. Prefacing this and taking it at six month increments. I might hate it. Check with me in six months and we'll do this again, but I have to be out of my apartment in two days.

[00:31:34] I don't know when you're going to air this podcast, but I'm sure I'll be moved out by then. And I, from there am going cross country again, touring with music. I have shows already scheduled this summer for Missouri, Colorado, Montana, Minnesota, South Dakota, Michigan, Illinois, Tennessee. And then I'm flying to Europe for a month to play two shows in Spain. I have seven shows in Germany.

[00:32:00] I might take like two or three days to go to Ireland because we know some folks over in Ireland and, and go visit there. And then I fly back home and I'm continuing to add shows and speaking events. And like I said, just allowing myself to be a little bit more open and free to what the journey can really look like, as opposed to trying to fit into a box. You know, I'm, I've sold almost all of my stuff. So it's all stuff. It can all be replaced.

[00:32:28] You know, the important, the important stuff's packed up, right? But the, the, the couch, the, the bed, like the, the furniture, it's pretty much all gone. And I'm, I'm just excited for the adventure and I'm excited to see what it feels like to not have as many attachments. Once again, might completely hate it. I might need my own space again for my. Yeah. That sounds like the ultimate pivot, Amy. It is. It's a big one. I would not, I will say this.

[00:32:57] I just did a podcast episode about this transition last week or the week before. I can't remember where it is, but you can listen to it on rise up buttercup podcast. But I, I talked about how I would not recommend this for everyone. Like I planned this out. This is not like a willy nilly, like I'm just going to give up my stuff and go. I made sure that I knew I was going to make enough money on the road that I knew that, you know, I had places to stay.

[00:33:23] I, you know, balanced out my expenses and income. And it's not like a, um, I'm not burning the house down, even though it sounds kind of like, I'm just, I planned it out. And like I said, at the end of the day, furniture is just furniture. An apartment is just an apartment. I also know that with this transition, transition, I have an amazing support system with my music

[00:33:48] fans, with my family, with my friends that even though it feels a little unstable, it's actually incredibly stable because of the fact that I, I will never be homeless, you know? And so it's going to be an adventure. And I'm, I'm keep reminding myself of that on the days I wake up thinking, oh my God, what am I doing? So if you get to Louisville, let me know. Yes. Yeah. And you know, if you need a place to camp out in Pensacola, I, I welcome to come and hang out here.

[00:34:17] So you ladies, hopefully you're going to love this. My, my stepdad used to do a lot of camping. He would do motorcycle trips and he hiked the Appalachian trail and he has all of this camping stuff. Now I am not a camper. Like I'm just, I'm, I'm not, I, I'm a, I'm a put me in a nice place, but I do have, because I do want to try new things on this, this road trip as well. I want to try new foods. I want to try new, new cultures. And, and although most of it's us, but you know what I mean?

[00:34:46] I, I want to try new things. And one of those things is going to be at least one night in a campground. Now I'm not going out in the woods in the middle of nowhere. There's gotta be a bathroom and there's gotta be like a place I can shower, but I have a tent and I have like some camping equipment and I, I think I'm going to video it because of just the comic relief that hopefully it'll bring to some people of me trying to set up a tent, having no idea what I'm doing. Oh yeah. We're going to, we're going to need to see it. But, but yeah, it's, it's going to be, it's definitely going to be an adventure.

[00:35:17] Amy, thank you so much for joining us today. This is the kind of conversation that genuinely changes a person's mindset. Where can listeners connect with you this summer? I would say go over to amygearhearts.com. So it's just my full name.com. Eventually there is a link right there or from that current website to my coaching website. Eventually they'll be blended together into one website, but you can see my travel schedule, my tour schedule, my speaking schedule.

[00:35:46] Um, I would also say that I'm adding in speaking events too. So if any listener is says, Oh my gosh, you're going to be in Montana or you're going to be in Chicago. I'd love to have you come and do a speaking event. I would love to add those in or a music event too, but I want to be able to make sure I have some time to give back while I'm on the road as well. So amygearhearts.com is the best place. All of my music and the podcast is up on Spotify. You can go to YouTube.

[00:36:12] I have some coaching videos on YouTube, but I will also say that my YouTube content is lacking. I think we all struggle with that. I'm one person. I can only do so much, but yeah, you can, you can follow all my stuff on, on my website. Wonderful. Well, it's been great to have you. We want to say thank you to our producers, the brand method media group and our marketing team. And thank you for tuning in with us today.

[00:36:39] If today's episode gave you something to think about, do us a favor, follow the pivot effect under the HR huddle umbrella, wherever you listen and share this with one of your friends who is thinking about doing something different. We'll see you next month for another conversation about the pivots that matter. In the meantime, the HR systems survey for 2627 is out and ready for your participation.

[00:37:04] Go to sapieninsights.com and click the link and you can share data about your HR tech data stack, data stack. Goodness. Be sure to listen to our other shows under the huddle. Stacey and Cliff do spilling the tea on HR tech and Cliff has taken over HR. We have a problem. And you know, that stuff is always spicy. Thanks everybody. Bye y'all. This was so fun. Thanks.