Most people walk into a personal development event looking for an answer. A framework, a fix, a clear path forward. What happened at HeartWork Live on March 13th and 14th was something entirely different. In this episode, Sara and Marisa take you inside the weekend, the 13 acres, the art, the movement, the tears, the breakthroughs, and the moment a 60-year-old woman asked herself what she wanted for her life for the very first time. This is not a highlight reel. This is what it actually looks like when people stop outsourcing their direction and start listening to themselves.

🔥 In This Episode:

• Why chasing the how before you know the what will land you in the exact same place with a brand new problem
• What happened when a room full of leaders, associates, and team members stopped performing growth and actually went there together
• The moment one breakout session threw out the whole plan because the room needed something more real than the worksheet
• Why people who had been in therapy for three years had more movement in one weekend, and what that says about the kind of space Sara and Marisa hold
• What the HeartWork Collective is, who it is for, and why they are intentionally keeping it small

The inner work is not a detour from building a thriving business and a life you actually love. It is the whole road. If this episode stirred something in you, the HeartWork Collective is where the real work continues. Over six months, you and your team will get monthly group coaching calls, private community access, a growing resource library, and real time support from Sara and Marisa as you navigate the personal and professional work that actually moves the needle. Spots are limited and intentionally so. If you are ready, do not wait. Join us here.

Connect with us:

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

Email: support@theheartworklife.com

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There is a moment most practice owners know well. A seat opens up, the pressure builds, and every instinct you have screams to fill it fast. What nobody tells you is that the urgency you feel is data, and it is worth sitting with before you act on it. In this episode, Sara and Marisa get into the real, unfiltered conversation about what hiring and firing actually looks like as you grow as a leader. Not the polished version, not the version where you always knew what you were doing. The version that includes holding out for eight months, learning to separate your intuition from your anxiety, and recognizing that sometimes the most strategic thing you can do is pause.

🔥 In This Episode:

• Why putting a warm body in an empty seat is a short-term fix that often creates a longer-term mess, and what to do in the waiting instead
• How Sara's team spent months simplifying systems and refining culture before making their next hire, and why that season made the eventual yes even clearer
• The difference between hiring out of fear and hiring from a place of quiet, grounded certainty, and how to tell the one from the other
• Why your team is the most honest mirror you have as a leader, and what it means when hiring keeps falling apart
• Marisa's honest look at how timelines she had mapped in her head collided with reality, and what she learned about trusting herself through the uncertainty anyway

The leaders who build teams that last are not the ones who always make the fastest decisions. They are the ones who do the inner work between hires, trust what they have built, and stay grounded enough to let the right people find them.

Connect with us:

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

Email: support@theheartworklife.com

Support the show

You opened yourself up. You shared your heart, bought the coffees, said yes to every request, became the kind of boss people loved. And then one day you found yourself fuming over something small, exhausted by everything, quietly resentful of the culture you built. This episode is for every leader who got so busy taking care of everyone else that they forgot to take care of the business, and themselves. Sara and Marisa dig into a real listener question about where vulnerability ends and over-exposure begins, and what it actually looks like to lead with warmth and a spine at the same time.

🔥 In This Episode:

• Sara gets raw about hiring friends, becoming a mother figure to her team, and the slow build of resentment that forced her to finally have the hard conversations
• Why over-giving does not create loyalty, it creates entitlement, and how to recognize that pattern before it derails your culture
• The 10-minute vulnerability practice Sara uses in leadership meetings that creates real connection without blurring the lines of authority
• Marisa on how team turnover can send you into a spiral of "was I enough" and how that spiral quietly poisons your next round of hiring decisions
• The temperature check every leader needs: are you resting, or are you running on empty and calling it dedication?

You can build a team that feels deeply human and still hold a clear line between friendship and leadership. Those two things were never meant to cancel each other out.

If you are in a season of rebuilding your leadership from the inside out, we want you at HeartWork Leadership Live on March 13 and 14 in Knoxville. This is the room where that work actually happens. Reserve your spot here: https://theheartworklife.myflodesk.com/rfi6abz6yv

Connect with us:

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

Email: support@theheartworklife.com

Support the show