Four years is a long time to spend on a degree that doesn’t fit you.

Choosing a major is one of the biggest decisions students make—often before they’ve ever experienced what the work in that field actually looks like.

In this episode of Finding Your Fierce, we sit down with Wendi Witzke, Program Director of the Legal Studies and Paralegal Program at Western Technical College. With more than 20 years of experience supporting students entering the legal profession, Wendi has seen firsthand how the right learning environment can completely change a student’s career path.

Instead of sitting in large lecture halls, students in her program gain hands-on experience—drafting real legal documents, walking through real legal processes, and building the practical skills they’ll need in the field.

But one of the most powerful insights from this conversation is something many students discover along the way:

Sometimes you don’t truly know what you enjoy until you’re actually doing the work.

Wendi also shares how her program emphasizes community impact and access to justice, preparing students to support individuals who may not otherwise have the legal representation they need.

If you’re a student, parent, or someone exploring a new career direction, this conversation offers a powerful perspective on how the right environment, practical experience, and mentorship can help people discover a path that truly fits.

Links and Resources:

1. Dr. Carolyn Colleen Website
2. Join RESET: a free daily reset for clarity, calm, and intentional living.

Thanks so much for joining us this week. Want to subscribe to Finding Your Fierce? Have some feedback you’d like to share? Connect with us on iTunes and leave us a review!

In this powerful episode of Finding Your FIERCE, Emilene Anna — He-ART-ist of Wholeness, midlife mom of four, CrossFit athlete, and founder of Driftless Retreats & Studios — shares the sacred transition that changed everything.

After 22+ years behind the chair and thousands of heart-to-heart conversations, Emilene realized she had been performing for love — building success, serving others, and over-giving while quietly losing alignment with herself.

Through grief, autoimmune healing, motherhood, and faith, she reclaimed her deeper calling and created her Holistic SOULutions spiritual formation framework:

Trust. Believe. Surrender.

Now she helps women unmask beauty culture, heal from the inside out, and build aligned lives and income rooted in wholeness — because beauty isn’t something you see.

It’s something you feel.

You don’t have to earn love.

You already belong.

Links and Resources:

1. Dr. Carolyn Colleen Website
2. Join RESET: a free daily reset for clarity, calm, and intentional living.
3. Emilene on Instagram
4. Driftless Retreats

Thanks so much for joining us this week. Want to subscribe to Finding Your Fierce? Have some feedback you’d like to share? Connect with us on iTunes and leave us a review!

In this episode of Finding Your FIERCE, Jodi Vandenberg-Daves explores what it means to lead with courage inside systems that were never designed for women to thrive.

Drawing on her work as a historian, leadership coach, and author of Leading With Courage, Jodi unpacks how women navigate careers, leadership, and caregiving within institutions that reward conformity, undervalue emotional labor, and often demand resilience without support. She challenges the idea that leadership belongs only to titles, emphasizing values-driven leadership, voice, boundaries, and integrity at every stage of career.

The conversation highlights expansive leadership for women, asking hard questions, resisting burnout, mentoring across generations, and building inclusive workplaces and communities that don’t require women to shrink, overextend, or assimilate to succeed.

This episode is a powerful reminder that courage for women isn’t just personal—it’s structural, collective, and necessary for real change.

Links and Resources:

1. Dr. Carolyn Colleen Website
2. Join RESET: a free daily reset for clarity, calm, and intentional living.
3. Jodi on LinkedIn

Thanks so much for joining us this week. Want to subscribe to Finding Your Fierce? Have some feedback you’d like to share? Connect with us on iTunes and leave us a review!