You hired them because you saw potential. You trained them because you believed they could step into what you needed. But somewhere between the vision and the reality, a gap opened up. They're not moving as fast as you hoped. They're not thinking the way you do. And suddenly, you're questioning everything: Did I hire the wrong person? Am I a bad leader? Why can't they just get it? Here's what Sara and Marisa know after years of building teams and training associates: sometimes the problem isn't the person. It's the expectation. This episode is a raw, real conversation about what it actually takes to lead someone into their potential without breaking them or yourself in the process.

🔥 In This Episode:

• The difference between hiring an adjusting horse versus a future partner, and why role clarity from day one changes everything about retention and performance
• Why placing unrealistic expectations on team members sets everyone up for disappointment, and how to get honest about what someone can actually deliver
• How to discern whether someone needs the full recipe with step by step instructions or just the ingredients, and why forcing your learning style onto theirs creates friction
• The evolution from wanting to be liked by everyone to becoming firm with expectations while staying kind, and why that muscle only develops through experience
• What it actually looks like to train someone up while trying to step back from your business, and why pouring your essence into a new team member now saves you time later

Leadership isn't about finding people who think like you. It's about creating the conditions for different humans to thrive within your vision. And that requires a level of self awareness and flexibility that most business advice doesn't prepare you for.

Bonus: If you're in the thick of training a team, struggling with expectations, or trying to build leadership capacity in your business, our Heartwork Leadership Live event on March 13 and 14 in Knoxville is where we're going deeper into all of this. This isn't a typical leadership workshop. It's heart work meets implementation strategy, and we're keeping it intimate so we can actually go there together. Grab your spot HERE!

Connect with us:

• Instagram: @drsaranelsongray, @dr.marisa.nicole10, @theheartworkpodcast

Email: theheartworklife@gmail.com

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Sydney Kaye Hagel was sitting in her corporate cubicle, successful by every external measure, and her nervous system was screaming. She had a stable job, benefits, and a wedding to pay for. She'd already built The Wealthy Circle, a community for women she truly cared about. And yet every day she showed up to her corporate role feeling more misaligned, more disconnected from the vision she held for her life. She knew she was meant for more. She just didn't know if she had the guts to choose it. The turning point came when mentors she admired asked her a question that stopped her cold: "Do you think you deserve to be in the room?" That question unlocked everything. Sydney left her corporate job, launched The Cozy Agency, and stepped fully into the identity she'd been holding back for years. This conversation is about what it actually takes to close the gap between who you were and who you're becoming, the hidden cost of people-pleasing, and how to build a brand and a life from authentic identity instead of someone else's blueprint.

🔥 In This Episode:

• The crossroads moment when Sydney realized she had outgrown her corporate identity and what it took to finally walk away, even when it felt financially reckless and emotionally terrifying
• Why your nervous system is your most accurate compass for misalignment and how to use it as a decision-making tool instead of ignoring the signals until you're burned out
• How to build a brand from your actual story and senses instead of copying what everyone else is doing, including the five-sense audit that transforms customer experience
• The shift from people-pleasing to boundary-setting and why communicating real feedback makes you a better leader, not a colder one
• What Sydney learned about hiring for grit and charisma over skill alone, and the one thing candidates do that makes her say yes immediately

This conversation disrupts the idea that choosing yourself is selfish. It reveals the truth: dimming your light to keep others comfortable is the real betrayal. When you step into alignment, you don't just change your own life. You give everyone around you permission to do the same.

Mark Your Calendar:
We're hosting another in-person HeartWork Leadership event March 13th and 14th in Knoxville, TN. If this conversation stirred something in you about stepping fully into your leadership, embodying your truth, and building something that actually feels like yours, this event is where that work happens. Sign up here.

Connect with Sydney Kaye Hagel:
Website: https://www.getcozy.co
Instagram: @wellsaidsyd @the.cozy.agency @wellthycircle

Podcast https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/well-said-with-syd/id1533334441

Connect with us:

• Instagram: @drsaranelsongray, @dr.marisa.nicole10, @theheartworkpodcast

Email: theheartworklife@gmail.com

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What happens when everything you've built suddenly feels like it was created for someone else's definition of success? Sara found herself asking a question that felt completely foreign: what does my heart actually want? Not what the industry says or what the next level of growth is supposed to look like. Just what does her heart want. And the answer was terrifying because it involved rest, trust, creativity, and play instead of more hustle, more systems, more metrics. This is the conversation about what happens when you stop chasing someone else's version of success and start asking what growth means when it comes from the inside out.

🔥 In This Episode:

• Why growth doesn't always mean more volume, more revenue, more team, and what it looks like to redefine it from the inside
• The Italian concept of "dolce far niente" (the sweetness of nothing) and why American hustle culture keeps us disconnected from our hearts
• How Sara's best business quarter in three years came from stillness and alignment, not from forcing and strangle-holding productivity
• The gap between leading with frameworks versus leading with creativity, and why both matter at different stages of entrepreneurship
• Why sometimes the most growth-oriented thing you can do is make no decision at all and let the path unfold

Growth can be an internal thing. The metrics, the revenue, the expansion are just the fruit of the work you're doing inside, not something you have to control or rush after or grab. This episode is permission to not always have the answer, to let yourself feel lopsided while building a new muscle, and to trust that 2026 might be one of your best years not because you hustled harder, but because you finally let your heart lead.

Mark Your Calendar: We're hosting another in-person HeartWork Leadership event March 13th and 14th in Knoxville, TN. If you're ready to lead from a place that honors both the doing and the dreaming, this weekend is for you. Bring your whole team and experience what happens when you stop forcing growth and start allowing it. Sign up here.

Connect with us:

• Instagram: @drsaranelsongray, @dr.marisa.nicole10, @theheartworkpodcast

Email: theheartworklife@gmail.com

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You know that moment when you finally collapse on Sunday night after saying yes to everything all week long? When you've skipped lunch to answer emails, scrolled Instagram instead of taking a real break, and promised yourself you'll start taking care of yourself after you hit that next milestone? Here's what nobody tells you about burnout: it doesn't start at work. It doesn't start with your demanding schedule or your chaotic team or your overwhelming to-do list. Burnout starts the moment you said yes to the thing you actually wanted to say no to. It starts when you abandoned yourself for the sake of everyone else. This is the conversation about the internal work of burnout that goes way deeper than self-care Sunday and face masks, where we get honest about the cycles we create, the identity traps we fall into, and what it actually takes to break the pattern of burning yourself out in the name of productivity.

🔥 In This Episode:

• Why burnout is actually "burning the self" and how it's rooted in identity traps formed long before your current situation
• The dangerous cycle of over-giving in service professions and why you cannot carry your patients, clients, or team members
• Why your face mask and 15 minutes of red light therapy aren't actually solving your burnout when real self-care means saying no
• The practical reality of breaking burnout cycles through awareness, ownership, and asking for healing instead of just pushing through
• Why slower mornings and one intentional change matters more than overhauling your entire life at once

The life you're building is either going to honor your capacity or deplete it. That choice has always been yours, even when it didn't feel like it. This episode is your invitation to stop martyring yourself in the name of productivity and start asking what you actually need to feel whole.

Mark Your Calendar: We're hosting another in-person HeartWork Leadership event March 13th and 14th in Knoxville, TN. If you're tired of conferences that only focus on systems while ignoring the internal work that actually transforms how you lead, this weekend is for you. Bring your whole team and experience what happens when you stop burning out and start building from wholeness. Sign up here.

Connect with us:

• Instagram: @drsaranelsongray, @dr.marisa.nicole10, @theheartworkpodcast

Email: theheartworklife@gmail.com

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When you're building a team, one of the biggest questions is: what benefits do I actually offer? PTO, sure. But how does it accrue? Do part-time employees get the same as full-time? What about holidays that fall on days you're not even open? And what's fair for maternity leave when you're not a massive corporation with endless resources? This episode is us breaking down the employee benefits we offer in our practices and the logistics behind them. From raise structures to bereavement policies to why floating holidays might solve a problem you didn't know you had.

🔥 In This Episode:

• How to structure raises and performance standards so your team knows exactly where they can grow within your company
• PTO accrual systems and why the way you structure it (hours worked vs. anniversary date) matters more than you think
• What should be included in bereavement policies beyond just immediate family members
• Maternity and paternity leave clauses that work for small businesses, including paid vs. unpaid time and return-to-work expectations
• Why floating holidays solve the problem of holidays that fall on days your business is already closed

If you've been avoiding the benefits conversation because you don't know where to start or what's fair to offer, this episode gives you a framework. You don't have to offer everything, but you do need to be clear about what you're offering and why. And remember: you can always amend your policies as your business grows and situations pop up that you never anticipated.

Mark Your Calendar: We're hosting another in-person HeartWork Leadership event March 12th and 13th! This is the deep dive workshop where we walk you through exercises like this in real time and help you build the kind of leadership that actually empowers your team.

Connect with us:

• Instagram: @drsaranelsongray, @dr.marisa.nicole10, @theheartworkpodcast
• Email: theheartworklife@gmail.com

Download our Free Self Love Challenge PDF

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You think you know what you're feeling and why you're feeling it. You've identified the problem, you've made it make sense, you've got a logical explanation. But what if that's just the surface? What if there are deeper layers your heart is inviting you to explore? This episode is us sharing what happened in our recent coaching sessions when we realized there was so much more beneath what we thought we were processing.

Marisa shares how she thought she was navigating feelings about team dynamics and her new leadership role, only to discover it was actually about her dad and her husband. Sara shares a visceral dream she thought was about processing assault trauma, only to realize it was inviting her into something completely different about money, protection, and the terror that comes up when she doesn't feel financially secure. This is what it looks like when you stop trying to logic your way through feelings and actually let your heart speak.

🔥 In This Episode:

• Why logic will try to make sense of your feelings but your heart just wants to be seen, heard, and talked to
• The invitation to explore something you don't initially resonate with and ask "if this were true, what would have to be true?"
• How stamping something with approval can actually be a way of avoiding processing a deeper feeling underneath
• Why healing and self-discovery literally never stop, and how the well of your heart has untapped potential you haven't even discovered yet
• The reminder that things are not always as they seem, and you need someone else to help you see what you can't see on your own

If you've been doing surface-level work and wondering why you keep hitting the same walls, this episode is your invitation to go deeper. Get a coach. Stop trying to logic your way through heart work. And be willing to discover that the thing you thought it was is probably not actually the thing at all.

Mark Your Calendar: We're hosting another in-person HeartWork Leadership event March 12th and 13th! This is the deep dive workshop where we walk you through exercises like this in real time and help you build the kind of leadership that actually empowers your team.

Connect with us:

• Instagram: @drsaranelsongray, @dr.marisa.nicole10, @theheartworkpodcast
• Email: theheartworklife@gmail.com

Download our Free Self Love Challenge PDF

Support the show

This year taught us how to recognize when our ego was driving versus when our heart was leading. Sara spent the first half of the year wrapped up in performance, chasing money and success and notoriety, until she started asking herself "is this what my brain thinks I should want, or is this what my heart actually wants?" Marisa navigated building her business, hiring team, creating space for rest, only to realize she's been searching for stability in all the external things instead of finding it within herself. This episode is us reflecting on what 2025 taught us. How our egos got us to where we are (which is beautiful), and also how this year invited us to go deeper and discover what our hearts have been trying to tell us all along.

🔥 In This Episode:

• The difference between building your life from ego (for protection and safety) versus building from your true self
• How comparing your current reality to what you think it should be keeps you from celebrating what's actually working
• What it means to find internal stability instead of constantly looking for it in your business, your relationships, or your achievements
• The invitation to exist and trust instead of forcing outcomes, and why that's so fucking simple but not easy until you've journeyed through it

If you've been running hard all year and wondering why you still don't feel settled, this episode is your reminder to pause. Reflect on where you've been. Celebrate what's working. And stop measuring your life by metrics that were never meant for you in the first place.

Mark Your Calendar: We're hosting another in-person HeartWork Leadership event March 12th and 13th! This is the deep dive workshop where we walk you through exercises like this in real time and help you build the kind of leadership that actually empowers your team.

Connect with us:

• Instagram: @drsaranelsongray, @dr.marisa.nicole10, @theheartworkpodcast
• Email: theheartworklife@gmail.com

Download our Free Self Love Challenge PDF

Support the show

We talk a lot about scaling your business, but nobody talks about what it actually takes to scale yourself as a leader first. The truth is, if you're frustrated with your team, resentful of clients who don't show up, or exhausted from giving so much to people who take without reciprocating, the problem isn't them. It's you. And we know that's hard to hear because we've both been there. This episode is about the shift that happens when you move from startup survival mode into actually leading an established business, and why the boundaries you didn't think you needed in year one become non-negotiable by year three.

🔥 In This Episode:

• Why having the same team for a full year changes everything and what it takes to actually get there
• The startup to scaling transition and how your leadership has to evolve when you're no longer just trying to survive
• How to recognize when your ego is disguising itself as generosity and why saying yes to everyone is actually hurting your business
• The red rope analogy and why raising your standards for who gets access to your business is necessary as you scale
• The mirror test: how to look at yourself first when something in your business feels off or out of alignment

If you're in that messy middle stage where you're no longer a startup but don't quite feel established yet, or if you're realizing that the way you led your business in year one isn't working anymore, this episode is for you. Because you can't scale your business without scaling yourself first. And sometimes that means getting brutally honest about the people, energy, and situations you've been allowing in. We are imperfect leaders leading imperfect human beings, and that's the whole point.

Mark Your Calendar: We're hosting another in-person HeartWork Leadership event March 12th and 13th! This is the deep dive workshop where we walk you through exercises like this in real time and help you build the kind of leadership that actually empowers your team.

Connect with us:

• Instagram: @drsaranelsongray, @dr.marisa.nicole10, @theheartworkpodcast
• Email: theheartworklife@gmail.com

Download our Free Self Love Challenge PDF

Support the show