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!

What if healing doesn’t come from fighting your way through grief but from accepting what is, one honest step at a time?

In this powerful episode of Finding Your Fierce, host Carolyn Colleen sits down with John DeDakis: award-winning novelist, writing coach, and former Senior Copy Editor for CNN’s The Situation Room with Wolf Blitzer to explore the quiet, courageous work of healing through loss.

John shares the pivotal moments that shaped his life: facing an existential crisis as a young man during the Vietnam War draft, choosing acceptance over resistance, and discovering only in hindsight that grief had been woven through his writing for decades. What began as storytelling became an unintentional path to healing, clarity, and purpose.

Together, Carolyn and John reflect on why healing is often gradual, why it’s only visible in the looking back, and how creative expression, whether through writing, art, or reflection, can help us process grief without forcing outcomes. This conversation reframes fierceness not as pushing harder, but as the strength to surrender, listen, and trust what’s unfolding.

If you’re navigating grief, transition, or a season of deep uncertainty, this episode offers a compassionate reminder: acceptance can be one of the fiercest acts of healing there is.

Links and Resources:

1. Dr. Carolyn Colleen Website
2. Join RESET: a free daily reset for clarity, calm, and intentional living.
3. John on LinkedIn
4. Upcoming Retreat with John DeDakis: Writing Through the Pain of Loss

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!

What if chronic pain isn’t just physical? In this deeply personal and insightful episode, Brianna Greenspan—inspirational author, speaker, and CEO of Brianna Greenspan International (BGI)—shares her powerful journey of overcoming debilitating symptoms and unimaginable suffering to reclaim her life. As a global leader in educational training, tools, and support, Brianna reveals the unexpected truths about fostering a growth mindset and the catalyst moments that change everything. From navigating a lifetime of medical complications to discovering the transformative power of self-resourcing, she shares how she moved from a state of being "complete" to finding her fierce. If you've ever felt stuck in a cycle of pain and limiting beliefs, this episode will challenge what you think you know about healing and empower you to take control of your future.

Chapters:

1. 00:00:00 - Meet Brianna
2. 00:01:45 - Living in the Fire: Leading While Managing Complex Illness
3. 00:03:30 - Radical Authenticity: Choosing Visibility Over Hiding
4. 00:04:40 - Polished vs. Real: Letting Go of Perfection
5. 00:06:15 - A Critical Neurosurgery Appointment
6. 00:07:00 - Childhood in Crisis: Early Medical Trauma
7. 00:08:15 - Hitting the Breaking Point: Losing Basic Functions
8. 00:10:45 - A Call That Changed Everything: Losing Her Best Friend
9. 00:11:45 - From Despair to Curiosity: Asking What Else Is Possible
10. 00:12:45 - New Paths to Healing: Shortening Symptoms from Months to Minutes
11. 00:14:40 - Turning Pain into Purpose: A Global Impact

Links and Resources:

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

What if chronic pain isn’t just physical? In this deeply personal and insightful episode, Patricia Nesler, a chronic pain specialist, shares her powerful journey of overcoming fear, trauma, and physical suffering to reclaim her life. From navigating a traumatic birth experience to discovering the mind-body connection in healing, Trish reveals the unexpected truths about pain, resilience, and the power of self-awareness. If you've ever felt stuck in a cycle of stress and symptoms, this episode will challenge what you think you know about healing and empower you to take control of your body and your future.

Chapters:

1. 00:00:00 - Pain Isn’t Your Enemy—It’s a Messenger
2. 00:00:45 - Welcome to Finding Your Fierce: Meet Trish Nesler
3. 00:02:22 - Trish’s Story: From Struggle to Strength
4. 00:03:36 - Healing Through Vulnerability: The Power of Alchemy
5. 00:04:10 - Breaking Free: How Trish Helps People Overcome Chronic Pain
6. 00:05:17 - Parenting, Trauma, and the Stress We Carry
7. 00:05:55 - A Birth Experience That Changed Everything
8. 00:07:13 - When the Body Breaks Down: Searching for Answers
9. 00:14:07 - Unlocking the Mind-Body Connection
10. 00:15:22 - How Repressed Emotions and Anger Manifest in Pain
11. 00:16:58 - The Hidden Impact of the Fawning Response
12. 00:18:46 - How to Recognize and Overcome Fawning
13. 00:19:54 - Why People-Pleasing Might Be Holding You Back
14. 00:21:04 - The Science of Pain: Amygdala, Fear, and Social Exclusion
15. 00:22:29 - How Your Brain Shapes Your Pain Experience
16. 00:26:07 - Somatic Healing: Moving Beyond the Pain Cycle
17. 00:35:20 - The BFF Framework: Breathe, Focus, Take Fierce Action
18. 00:40:55 - Healing, Connection, and Reclaiming Your Power

Links and Resources:

1. Join RESET: a free daily reset for clarity, calm, and intentional living.
2. Peaceful Warrior Website
3. Greenhouse Holistic Co-op Center
4. Trish on Instagram

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!

Carolyn sits down with Pam Dunwald, a veteran nurse turned fierce advocate for aging adults. With over 40 years in healthcare, Pam has seen it all—families lost in medical jargon, patients overlooked, and a system that often forgets its most vulnerable. She shares moments from challenges she faced standing up in a broken system, and how she found her voice as a nurse advocate. From confronting ageism to fighting for better patient care, Pam’s mission is clear: no one should navigate healthcare alone.

Chapters:

1. 00:00:00 – Empathy: The Superpower We Don’t Talk About Enough
2. 00:00:39 – Kicking Off with Fierce Energy
3. 00:01:33 – From Weak Stomach to Fierce Advocate
4. 00:03:49 – A Bingo Hall, A Life-Changing Moment, and a Nursing Career Born
5. 00:06:04 – The Secret to Staying Resilient (Even When It’s Hard)
6. 00:07:42 – Why Aging Adults Deserve More—and How to Fight for It
7. 00:09:17 – The Nursing Stories That Changed Everything
8. 00:11:04 – Spit On, Cursed At, Ignored—The Truth About Being a Nurse
9. 00:14:16 – Want to Be an Advocate? Here’s What You Need to Know
10. 00:20:08 – How to Find Your Fierce in 5 Minutes at a Time
11. 00:24:43 – The Self-Assessment Trick That Changes Everything
12. 00:27:14 – The Final Word: One Fierce Mission, One Powerful Legacy

Links and Resources:

1. Join RESET: a free daily reset for clarity, calm, and intentional living.
2. Pam on LinkedIn
3. Your Nurse Advocate Consulting, LLC

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!

Carolyn sits down with Jan Dégallier, a strategic business coach and consultant who transitioned from a long corporate finance career to entrepreneurship. Jan shares how she stepped away from a secure, traditional path to build a business centered on helping entrepreneurs and small business owners understand their numbers and make evidence-based decisions. She explains the power of tools like scorecards and weekly metrics in driving clarity and growth. Carolyn and Jan discuss resilience, faith, and the importance of staying uncomfortable to keep growing. Jan’s story is a testament to taking bold action, embracing curiosity, and building a business rooted in purpose and clarity.

Chapters

1. 00:00:00 – When Safe Isn’t Secure: The Moment Jan Stepped Off the Traditional Path
2. 00:01:02 – Behind the Numbers: Meet Jan Dégallier
3. 00:01:36 – Audit to Awakening: A 30-Year Career in Retrospect
4. 00:02:47 – Faith vs. Fear: The Decision That Changed Everything
5. 00:03:26 – Know Your Numbers, Know Your Future: Jan’s Mission for Entrepreneurs
6. 00:09:02 – The Scorecard Revolution: Measuring What Truly Matters
7. 00:15:11 – Accountability Partners Aren’t Just Buzzwords – They’re Lifelines
8. 00:16:41 – Resilience, Faith, and the Relentless Pursuit of Growth
9. 00:19:09 – The Pause Before the Leap: Wrapping Up with Jan Dégallier

Links and Resources

1. Join RESET: a free daily reset for clarity, calm, and intentional living.
2. Jan on LinkedIn
3. Catipult
4. Dégallier Leadership Solutions

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!