This Is Woman's Work with Nicole Kalil - 144 / Jay & Nicole Kalil on Partnership, With Guest Host Lynn Casaletto

Episode Date: June 28, 2023

On this very special episode, guest host Lynn Casaletto takes over the mic and not only interviews Nicole, but also her partner in life, Jay Kalil! They talk about everything from how they make their marriage work (and some things they do to get back on track when it’s not working), pet peeves, parenting, planning, and more! Questions were collected from Nicole’s community, and Lynn dished them out… listen in to hear their responses and perspectives. Partnership can be hard, especially when two career-focused, busy, goal-oriented people come together… and partnership can also be the thing that makes it all better, easier, and fun! We know Nicole would never want to send the message that anything in her life is perfect, and this episode is not about offering marriage advice.  This is two partners sharing how they manage it all, and a glimpse behind the scenes to meet Nicole’s favorite person on the planet, Jay, and hear from his perspective how he supports Woman’s Work. Here’s access to our Family Planning Agenda as well as the TIWW podcast episode #003 Family Planning where Nicole breaks it down step by step.  To learn more about Lynn, her team, and her work please visit: Website:  https://www.coregrowthconsulting.com/ To join Nicole’s pod (to get all the inside scoops, free stuff, and the occasional rant), click here

I am Lynn Casaletto, and you are listening to another episode of This is Woman's Work. Okay, you may be feeling a little confused since you're hearing a different voice today and a different name than you usually do when you tune in. Well, that's because for this special episode, I've taken over the mic and we'll be interviewing not only Nicole, but also her partner in crime, Jay. It is a special day here because Jay is Nicole's very first male guest on the podcast. So fitting and so right. I'll be asking how they make their partnership work while navigating marriage and raising their awesome daughter, JJ. For those of you who've been listening to this podcast for the past three years, we know Nicole's mission is to eliminate gender expectations and redefine women's work. Today, I feel like we all get a front row seat to hear

how Nicole and Jay are both figuring out how to do this in real time. Okay, so you may be wondering, why me? Why am I asking the questions and getting to lead this conversation? Well, the answer is twofold. First, I am one of a handful of people in the unique position to know both Nicole and Jay at a really deep level. I've been one of Jay's business coaches for the past seven years and Nicole's friend for about that same time. And when Nicole and I became friends, our original intention was to connect monthly and simply support each other in business, but it's evolved into so much more than that. And because I'm connected to both of them, but talk to them individually, I get to hear the way they talk about each other, their relationship, and even their challenges.

And the second reason is much more simple. Nicole asked me to. And when you get an ask like this, even if at first it makes you feel like you're going to hurl from nerves or imposter syndrome, you simply say yes. So here we are, and I feel honored to get to ask the questions so many of us want to know. Let's welcome our guests. Okay, so Nicole needs no introduction. Nicole, you are refreshingly real. You are so freaking funny. You're wicked smart. You make us all feel like we're your best bud. One thing I know to be true about you is you challenge us to dream bigger. And sometimes you even dare us to dream smaller. Jay, you are as genuine as genuine comes. You are so comfortable in your own skin, and you're the person people just want to be around.

I've witnessed the way you serve women and men in your firm with love and truth. You are blazing a new trail in your own right nationally. You lead with a quiet confidence. You listen more than you speak. And you're the exact opposite of a me guy. And I love that your MO in life is, I just want everyone to win. Welcome to the podcast, Jay. So my first question, Jay, I would love for you to kick us off. You guys each have your own thriving career. And we're just curious, like, what are some of the biggest challenges that impact you as a couple? Yeah, I think, you know, first, just really excited to be here. I know I'm the first male guest on the podcast.

I do have a suspicion that like the first two or three on the list were probably just unavailable. It said no. Adam Grant said no. Simon Sinek was probably in Europe. But here we are honored to be on the same list. So, you know, when we think about challenges, I mean, Nicole and I talk about this a lot, but I think it's really making sure that we're staying connected in the face of all the responsibilities that are either through our

businesses or even at home and really making sure that we're taking the time, have some things in the calendar to look forward to, or it's just us and gives us the space and venue to decompress a little bit and reconnect and talk about the things that we enjoy doing, that we're looking forward to. And then sometimes just reminding ourselves that it doesn't always have to be so serious where, you know, working home can be demanding at times and there's different stressors, but also just reminding ourselves to lighten up and have some fun. I'll also add that, you know, like every couple, we have some bigger challenges, like Jay mentioned,

the staying connected in the face of all the priorities and really prioritizing our relationship always at the front of everything else. But there's also some small challenges that I'll put in the category of pet peeves. Like, I don't care what couple you talk to. We all have things that just drive us batty about the person we're doing life with. I do not understand why his socks cannot find their way to a laundry basket like ever. I will find them in the craziest places, but never the laundry basket. And I am sure he could give you a laundry list of ones about me. I mean, my inability to multitask is unparalleled. Like I cannot

watch TV and answer a question at the same time. We must pause the TV. I can't, I don't know. So like there are just little things that I think bug us. And I think at least for me, I often check in with myself, like, is this the hill I want to die on? And the answer is no. At the end of the day, I'm so grateful for all the things that we have, all the positive in our relationship that the socks, like I try to put that in the funny category, like, oh, there they are. Of course they would be there by the bathtub or by the front door. Like what happened? I'm just saving them for later. So good. Okay. You guys, my curiosity goes to, is there anything you do intentionally to kind of keep things light?

Right? You guys, I mean, how do you get anything done at home when work is so big for both of you? You want to stay connected. You love to travel. You're raising an amazing human. Yeah. Give us some insight on how do you get anything done at home? Yeah, I think on the home front, we really try to just divide and conquer, right? So, you know, there's chores that just need to get done. And I think for us, coincidentally, some of them just line up with things that we enjoy doing. And, you know, I don't necessarily know that it was natural, but I do a lot of the food shopping and cooking.

And Nicole does a lot of the bill paying and kind of logistics around running the household. And, you know, obviously there's chores that we don't enjoy doing or love doing, but we try to just put those under our umbrellas. That way there's just kind of clarity on like, okay, I'll get this, you get that. And then, you know, as far as having things in place, I mean, we both love to travel, I feel like a lot of people do. But we always try to make sure that we have something in the calendar to look forward to, if you know, there's not kind of that stake in the ground. And we'll kind of pause and say, like, hey, what's coming up? Should we plan a little staycation, even if if maybe travel isn't on the horizon? And I think that just kind of allows us to know that we're working hard.

We have the ability to have some impact in our businesses, but that we also have time just for us set aside that we can really look forward to. Yeah, I would add, yes, we divide and conquer. And I think some relationships like that means you do it one day and I do it the other day. In our world, it's like you do that and I don't touch it. Or I do this and he has like, I don't think Jay knows where we bank. And I have not cooked a meal for our household in, I don't know, five years. And so when we say divide and conquer, we really divvy things up.

I might have taken the trash out here or there, and he might've washed a dish here or there, but for the most part, we just really separate things and that's what works for us. And then whatever it is that lights you up, I think that needs to be prioritized. And for us, yes, it's traveling and we genuinely like spending time together. And we're both very different. Jay's more extroverted. I'm more introverted. Jay likes going out and seeing people.

I like my couch. But we are both very productive, but low energy people. And so I think that actually works for us because our ideal vacation is to do nothing. So we go to these amazing places and we might do one touristy thing, but for the most part, we're just spending time with each other. It revolves around meals and laying by pools and having a cocktail and taking naps and things like that. And so that works for us and it helps us feel connected in the chaos and the busyness of life. And it allows us to have conversations about maybe how things are changing or evolving or, hey, I need some help with this

or this new thing popped up. I mean, as JJ is getting older, there are different needs or tasks. It used to be who's going to watch her when somebody travels. And now it's a little bit more like, who's going to drive her to this sport or to this friend's house. And these times that we spend together, give us an opportunity to talk through that and create a ideal situation. This is what we want it to look like proactively versus reactively. Yeah. Okay. You all. So when you travel, right. Or if you have a getaway, there's like that built in space. What happens in, you know, the traditional Monday through Friday, when you guys are both spent or that energy is like just pretty close to empty. Is there anything that you do intentionally to, I don't know, not let it get the best of you, right? If you're low energy or if you're at odds or need to talk about something really important

in the thick of it all. Curious if you have any systems or anything that just supports you when kind of stress and overwhelm might be kicking in? So my immediate reaction goes to, we'll look for the opportunity, like, Hey, do you have five minutes if something's going on? And, and I, we try really hard not to do the, Hey, I need to talk to you about something later. So it's not this thing that's going around in your mind for the whole day, but we look for that opportunity where there might be five or 10 minutes to have a conversation. One of the tactics, I don't always do it, but when I do it, it makes such a huge difference. One of the tactics that really works for me is to bring up whatever it is

and to clue Jay into what it is that I need or what it is that I'm looking for in that conversation. So for example, I need you to just listen, or I need you to help me problem solve, or I need or what it is that I'm looking for in that conversation. So for example, I need you to just listen, or I need you to help me problem solve, or I need you to get really pissed off with me or whatever it is, right? Because when I have a conversation like that, I'm usually looking to him for something. And rather than making him be a mind reader or setting up a situation where I may or may not get what I need. It's just being upfront about what it is that I'm looking for. And then he has the opportunity to say, yeah, I can do that. Or no, I can't, or, you know, at the very least we're just setting each other up to win. So that was my

first reaction to your question. I don't know, Jay, do you have anything to add? Yeah, I think too. I mean, there's definitely times, especially kind of early on in our relationship, or maybe when JJ was a lot younger that, you know, when you described it perfectly, right? Like the fuel tank is just on empty at the end of the week. And I think what we both have done a pretty decent job at, and the thing that I'm always trying to look through this lens is how can I be really impactful at work and make sure that, you know, I'm getting results and getting the job done and help supporting the people around me, but not over-rotating so much that it's at the expense of my family, right? So that when I get

home, you know, the gas tank's on complete empty, right? Or, you know, are there certain things that I can do throughout my day, throughout my week to put me in a position to kind of re-engage as I get back home or give myself a little boost of energy to get JJ out to our soccer game or for Nicole and I to have a little bit of a date night and not just be falling asleep on the couch all the time. So it's a little bit easier said than done, But I think for me, it's just looking for those opportunities to say like, Hey, today's going to be a busy day at work. I have a ton of opportunity to have impact. And then how do I protect or kind of re-energize myself so that it's never at the expense of Nicole and Jalen. It's so beautiful day. I hear you saying like kind of keeping first

things first, right? Like they matter most. And Nicole, I loved your guidance on J. This is, I need you to listen. I need to help you. I need to, I need your help in problem solving, or I just need you to be pissed off with me. Just the way that you're like guiding, right. And not expecting Jay to be a mind reader. And I'm laughing because more often than not, I need Jay to just be pissed off with me because I like get, you know, fiery and Jay does not get pissed off easily. That's not his go-to. So it makes for funny conversations. So good. Okay. My curiosity goes to you all, not only our husband and wife and parents together, your

colleagues too, you know, you started as colleagues, you still work together. And I'm curious how you navigate that part. Like if you talk about work, is there, I don't know, I've heard some people say, oh, we only talk about work in the home office or we schedule time for that and treat it like a business meeting. I'm curious if there's anything you guys are aware of that you do to take off the husband-wife hat and put on the colleague's hat. Well, okay. So first, how we work together has evolved quite a bit. And it used to be we worked in the same office with the same people and we were peers. I technically, maybe Jay reported to me a little bit, but that wasn't how it was set

up. And at that time, we talked about work all the time, like at home. And we were passionate and we were excited. And we're often on the same page, which is really nice. So we didn't really have any buffers or whatever as our careers have evolved and changed and whatever. I think for the first time now, we're a little bit more in the, how was your day, honey stage, right? Like I know enough about his work to be dangerous and he knows enough about mine. And so we can ask some thoughtful questions and all that. But I feel like

in the last year, it's actually been sort of important to interact about work as husband and wife, not as colleagues or, you know, with both of our business hats on, because I think sometimes, especially me with him in his work, I can like be too coachy, right? Like I can feel myself getting into my coaching space. And then I like have to go, wait a minute. I'm not his coach. This isn't my role. That's not what he's asking for here. And if he needed a coach, he would hire me. It's not what he's looking for. He has people like that in his life. So like taking that step back and, and being wife, I think has been really important as of late. Yeah. And I think to, to add on that, what has been helpful to, and especially for me, what's been helpful is for us to just share what's important in our businesses right now and what we're working

towards, not from like a giving feedback or anything like that type of scenario, but really just creating the space to share what the priorities at work are so that we can support each other, right? So there's, you know, different seasonalities to our business and there's, you know, different priorities throughout the year. And I think we both have a pretty good understanding that we each work really hard, but to understand what we're working towards. So if there's a certain day where one of us is a little bit more stressed out, or also knowing if there's a big project for either one of us that, you know, we might be putting in a couple more hours or just be working a little bit differently, that we are being proactive about that and understand it about each other and also can support each other throughout the process. Yeah. So it's not like, you know, oh, she's just traveling for fun or he's just working late

because he's not prioritizing his family. It's no, we understand what each of us is up to and why it's important. And I think that allows us to support each other better and give each other a little grace when things get messy, which they do. Beautiful. This is a question that came in from the listeners for Jay. Jay, when it comes to marriage, what are the positive impacts of having a truly confident wife? And when do you see and feel Nicole stand in her confidence the most? Yeah, I think one of the things that stood out to me really from the beginning when Nicole and I met and started our relationship is I felt like she didn't really need anybody else to be confident. And I feel that in our relationship, right? So I feel like Nicole

doesn't need me to be confident in her work and the decisions that she makes. And I think vice versa. But I also think for both of us, it doesn't mean that we can't be better together, right, to support each other and kind of build on each other's confidence, but also to be careful that we're not in a space where we're like looking for each other to like validate. And I think where I see that as I think Nicole's intuition is incredible. And, you know, I kind of learned that from her, right? So I kind of see, you know, some of the decisions that she makes in her business and how she navigates. And I think that that helps me. I think there's probably a couple things on the flip side there, but again, not really knowing that we're both good decision makers, confident people, but when we're together, you know, that, that kind of puts us on a different

playing field on what we can accomplish or, you know, some of the things that, you know, we try to teach JJ and accomplish throughout our personal lives. I love it so much. Jay, I love that you brought in Nicole's intuition. I think back to, gosh, it was when you guys were moving from the West coast to the East coast and you were just so incredibly intentional and said, Hey, we're about to go into a season of change and we want to get ahead of stress. And we want to make sure that we're not taking it out on each other. You know, can you take us through this, this team graph so we can see what we need to look out for. And I remember the way that you all approach decisions, Jay, you're both, you know, very analytical, but Jay, you're at the time, again, you guys,

this is like six years ago, Nicole, you were a little bit higher on intuition and the beauty of the marriage of that. It's like the facts and the sensing, the knowing the thing you can't define. Yeah. Right. The better together, Nicole, can you, can you live an incredible, successful life on your own? Do you need Jay to go do that? No. But I love Jay that you said, like together, I mean, there's something so much greater. Okay. What does confidence look like to you? Nicole, I'm going to ask you first, what does it look like to you? Well, so my definition of confidence is when you trust yourself firmly and boldly. And there to me is like an element of action behind that. Because when you trust yourself firmly and boldly, you don't just sit around in a room trusting yourself. You do something with it.

Confidence to me looks like choosing to marry Jay, even though prior to meeting him, I was like, no interest in marriage, never going to have kids. I'm going to do this on my own. And trusting that this person made that different for me. And confidence is leaving a phenomenal career with great income and upward trajectory to start a business because everything in my being said, I have to do this. is birthing a book and going through the challenges and the unexpected and the whatever. And no matter what comes on the other side of that, knowing I was supposed to. Confidence is raising a girl in today's day and age. It's raising a child in today's day and age. But for me, especially a girl and just like trying not to overthink it, trying not to let guilt and shame and worry in the driver's seat, trusting that my child came through me on purpose and it could be no other way.

And so she must need me to be me or she would come through someone else. So there's so many ways. And I see so much evidence of confidence being acted upon in the work that I do. And that's why I love it so much. I mean, even you hosting this episode is for me, what confidence looks like and God, I could cry the amount of times I see it. And I just love it. I'm obsessed with it. I can't get enough of it. And that's, I think, why I do what I do. Long-winded answer to the question, but that's what confidence looks like to me. Well, it's tough to follow that. Maybe in editing, you can put like my answer first. Yeah, I think what confidence means to me, and you know, again, I learned so much from Nicole and the work that she does and the work that she does with our firm. But I think what confidence means to me is to get into action, but to not

be afraid of making mistakes. And that nothing is ever really going to be perfect. And I know that for me, confidence doesn't come when I'm overthinking things or when I'm trying to like perfect an idea before I put it into motion, but being able to trust myself, get it into action, have the ability to own when things aren't going maybe the way that I thought that they were gonna go. And then also not being so maybe stubborn or be able to be a little bit more agile to pivot and change the way that I'm working on something

to get towards the results that I'm looking for. That's a mic drop right there. I know, I'm pretty proud. Maybe he should mic drop right there. I know I'm pretty proud. Maybe he should have written the book. Oh, good. One of my favorite parts in the book, Nicole, is when you go, um, my confidence isn't walking around in Jay's pocket. Yeah, that'd be weird. But yeah, hearing how much love and appreciation you have for each other and what you've learned about confidence from each other. It's just beautiful.

Let's talk about Jalen Khalil. Let's talk about JJ. And as a parent, just what's truly important to you about raising her and helping her build her confidence. We'd love to just know, I mean, are there any pain points or compromises you guys have had to make about the way that you view confidence and what you want for her and how you're raising her? I can't really think of any situations where we don't see eye to eye or where we've been like adamantly opposed to how we should raise her or, and I think a lot of that is because of proactive conversations with our family planning, we've started talking about what's important to us as parents, and we kind of have this like, there is going to be so much messaging sent her way. What are the top things that we want to be intentional about and focused on? What do we care the most about? Like if she could learn nothing, but these few things from us, what would they be?

And so that's really helpful, I think, for keeping us on the same page and really focusing on the right things. I think one of the things that's really important to me and has been all along, and I'm so, so, so grateful that it's important to J2 in raising a right now nine-year-old girl, is that we're approaching the preteen years. A lot of the conversations about, and I'm going to put in air quotes, girl stuff is starting to come up. And it's so important to me that Jay be engaged in those conversations and he be there. So I think even just a couple of weeks ago, Jay just started asking me some questions about puberty and Jay had just come into the kitchen from a run and he stayed in the room with us while we were talking about it. And he piped in on a couple of things and asked a question. And I just felt so good because it's so important to me that we parent together and that JJ doesn't think that any of that is

embarrassing or weird or shouldn't be talked about or isn't normal. And to me, that is important as it relates to confidence, because I think girls are getting the message subliminally or in their faces that being a woman or turning into a woman is something to be embarrassed about. And that has to separate us from our trust in ourselves. If I think what my body is doing is weird and not normal, I'm going to stop trusting my body and what it's in. And so like, I don't know if that totally is a direct answer to your question, Lynn, but that's just what popped into my head as far as things that might be uncomfortable that we're being intentional about in the goal of having a confident child. And even before I got so big into confidence and was speaking about it

and writing a book about it, that was on our list from very early age. You know, we wanted JJ to be confident. We want her to be brave. We want her to be hardworking. We want her to be kind. Those are the four things that if she's nothing else and we can contribute in no other way, if we contribute into that, then I think we win. She wins more importantly. And I think some things to add that we try to be intentional is to also help her solve out, right? So if she's a little nervous coming into a situation or something sports or school related to remind her that, you know, she's capable of figuring things out. And, you know, we don't know what the end result is going to be. But we know that she's brave, we know that she makes good decisions and we know that she's capable, right? So to kind of support her

to figure some of the situation out on her own, rather than us stepping in and just giving her a solution. I'll also add, this comes up a lot. People often ask me like, how do you raise confident kids? And my initial answer is always work on your own confidence because people learn best via experience and observation. All humans do, including children. And so I think, you know, both Jay and I, it's important to us that we demonstrate confidence on a regular basis, but tactically, there are a few other things that I think we do on purpose. Number one, I don't ask, you know, JJ, how much does mommy love you? It's the, when does mommy love you? And the answer is all the time,

because I want her to know that our love is there. She doesn't need to earn it. She doesn't need to prove anything. She doesn't need to achieve to get it. Like it's just there. And then the last thing is we try to ask questions like, how did that make you feel as opposed to, or did you feel proud of yourself? Or did you feel brave as opposed to saying you were brave or I'm so proud of you? Because I want her, we want her to connect to the feeling she has first and foremost and want to feel more of that as opposed to, again, if I'm proud of her, then she's going to potentially be doing things to make me proud or to make Jay proud. And of course we're proud. Of course we are, but we want her to prioritize her own relationship and trust with herself over even our own. I genuinely hope as a teenager, young adult or adult, if her inner knowing tells her to be

or do something, even if it's against what I think that she'll choose it. What is so beautiful is I'm hearing the way you are partnering together, your partnership in parenting, but also this really intentional partnership with JJ. It's like a partnership with her that I'm hearing and observing. And it's so interesting. It's the first time in my 48 years that I'm viewing a parent-child relationship as partnership. And it's really special. Well, and let's be real. We have our moments. Like there are times we really suck at partnering each other and with her, like, and no way would I ever want to send the message that we think

we have it figured out or that things are working really well all the time. We're very aware, especially as we head towards those teenage years, there are going to be times where she hates me. And we've had conscious conversations, like she can't hate both of us at the same time. And so that's why I think it's so important that Jay be engaged with. And again, I'm going to put in air quotes, like the girl talk stuff, because if she's pissed off at me, she still needs somebody to go to, and maybe she'll be pissed off at him. I don't know. That seems very unlikely to me. If he knew us, I think it's highly probable that her and I are going to butt heads and he's going to be the, you know, the cool dad, but I'm all good with that. I love it. I'm curious just in Jay, when you think about what you've learned

about confidence and how it's impacted you at work, do you notice leading women and men differently? When you're leading a woman, how would you maybe coach or guide her differently than a man? Or is that not true? Yeah, I think, I think I have learned a lot from the woman in our office and coaching some of the women in our office. And I think the thing that is the most glaring is to make sure that I'm really listening, like actively listening to people when they're sharing, you know, their priorities, their goals and their challenges. And I think the importance there is actively listening versus passively listening. And I think working with women and people that have different backgrounds that maybe I had is that people go through challenges and work and life that I am

just completely oblivious to, right? Things that weren't on my radar or aren't on my radar. And by taking some time to slow down and look people in the eyes and actually listen to what they're working on or what they're going through, I think has allowed me to be a better coach for women and for men. So I think maybe my default prior to working with so many successful and confident women was, you know, to maybe be more passively listening and thinking for a solution and saying like, well, have you tried this? Or, you know, this worked for me. Have you tried that? And I think that in some instances that could work, but I think just being able to have a lot more awareness of what people are going through, even though I might not have the solution has allowed me to help guide people to get the solution or to overcome

an obstacle that has maybe been a speed bump in their way of getting to where they want to go. I want to add to just from observation, one of the things I'm so proud of and I think is so cool is Jay, as a leader in his organization, he could have answered that question of, oh, I just called Nicole in. If there's a woman struggling with something in my office, I just set her up with a call with her. And that doesn't happen. Jay very much prioritizes this work and prioritizes creating a culture where everybody feels like they belong and can succeed. And he does the work. Sure, we talk about some things at home home and I like to hope or think that maybe some of my work has influenced. And on occasion, I might go in and do something, but this is not something he's ever delegating. It's important. It's a priority. And he is doing the learning and the growth and the discomfort and all the stuff that comes with this work and not trying to pass it off to someone else.

You all, I want to ask you about something that, Nicole, you for the past three years, you've kind of dripped on us. And I think it's so special. And for those of you who maybe haven't heard about this, the planning, like the family planning piece that you all do, there's so much intentionality behind this. Can you just share for the listeners who may not be familiar? So first, I think we need to come up with a better name because sometimes people hear it and they think that we're planning to have a family or something like that. We're not having any more kids. We're not having any more kids. That is not being planned. So we listeners, if you have an idea of like a really cool name that lets people know what we're talking about, I would welcome it. But ultimately

what it is, is Jay and I purposefully and strategically set time aside twice a year. We're actually in our mid-year planning retreat right now. You can't see me, but I'm in a robe. We're in a hotel room together. We went out to dinner last night. We did all of our professional planning we each did and our personal finances already. We're going to go into relationship goals. We're going to go into calendar planning and we're going to go into our family. We're going to go into calendar planning, and we're going to go into our family, like parenting goals over the next few days. But ultimately the concept is we spent a lot of time doing business planning and being taught how to do that and teaching other people how to do that. And it just sort of occurred to us like, Hey, we actually know what we're doing as it relates to business planning. Is there a way we can apply this to our family? And so we came up with an agenda and then

we realized we have a lot to talk about. And if we're going to do it, we might as well make it fun. So twice a year, we go somewhere for at least a night, sometimes two or three nights. There is almost always some element of fun, dinners, spa, blah, blah, blah. But we have an agenda, which is available on my website for free to anybody who wants to have it. And that's the agenda we used. I pulled it up yesterday. It forces us to have these conversations. It forces us to be proactive. It forces us to have dialogue around these really important things. And I will tell you the women that I've talked to that do this, say the same thing that I experienced. I never feel more connected. I never feel more grounded in who we are and what we're up to. And I never feel more proud of us as a family

and a couple than I do when we do these. So we do this twice a year and then we have a quarterly checkpoint. And once a month we get together and do a few logistical things, but I can't say strongly enough. I don't think our marriage has ever been in danger. So I can't say that it's saved our marriage, but it's prevented us from ever being in a position where I think our marriage would be in danger. So. Yeah. I mean, some thoughts to add there is when we first did it, I'll say it was more of Nicole's idea. Like, Hey, I think we should do this. And, you know, here's some things that I think would be super helpful. And going into it, I had the thought of like, you know, like, Hey, I think we should do this. And, you know, here's some things that I think would be super helpful. And going into it, I had the thought of like, you know, yeah, this will be

fun. Let's go away. We can talk through some stuff, but I didn't really know how impactful it would be. So like going into it, I was open to it, but now I really look forward to it. Right. So like Nicole said, it, it gives us the opportunity to reconnect on a lot of things, right? On our business, on our personal goals. You know, some things are very tactical, right? We go through calendar and we go through finances and stuff like that. And then, you know, Lynn, you had asked questions around just like different challenges that we might have or, you know, nuances or pet peeves.

And I think this also just gives us the venue to get ahead of a lot of things, or even just kind of get some things on the table that may have been bubbling up that, you know, we didn't catch on a day to day or when things happen. So I think if we didn't do these, there probably are some things that maybe would go unsaid or that would continue to compound or create some resentment over time. And I think that, again, this just allows us to say like, when you are working a little bit extra here, here's how I felt, right. Or, you know, in that situation that happened, like, here's maybe a way that we could handle

that differently next time. Or, but I think it just really allows us to be way more proactive with what we want to accomplish versus being reactive and not being on the same page. And I want to reiterate the work that allows us to not hold onto resentment is a game changer. I'll give an example that came up in our conversation yesterday is how we aren't very good with each other when one of us gets sick. When one of us, and I'm sick right now, so this is a very relevant, real conversation. When one of us gets sick, we like almost go into resentment of how it impacts us because all of a sudden we're single parenting. And it's like,

is this person really as sick as, or are they just, you know, whatever, I don't know what it does, but we haven't been very good about supporting each other when we were sick. And I just have been wildly sick for last week. You can probably still hear it. And Jay had the conscious thought of like, I know I do this. I'm not going to do this this time. And we were talking about it and what a difference it made for me. And then like the conversation of like, yeah, I totally do that. I do that to him. He was sick a few months back and I had zero patience for it. And so now I think that that makes us better. And the next time either one of us is sick, I think we're going to come from a different place. We're going to remember this conversation. We're going to take care of each other better. And that was an agreement we

made early on in our relationship. If we're going to do this thing, then my job is to take care of you and your job is to take care of me. And we're going to do our best to do that. Because I think a lot of times in relationships, we spend, we can spend a lot of time thinking about this is what I want. This is what I need. And am I getting it or not getting it? And that's me worried about me. And if I set that aside and go, my job is to worry about him. My job is to think about what he wants and what he needs. And this works only if he's doing the same thing. And so if we're going to do this, we're going to be focused on how we support, take care of, and love on each other. And that's the agreement we make.

And when we aren't very connected or not having these dialogues, it's really easy to slip into paying attention to your own wants or needs and whether or not they're being met. And I think that's what really, really, that's the magic that happens when we do this as we, we focus back on each other. Like I'm so dialed in right now on Jay's business goals and what's important to him. And I'm like thinking about ways that I can be better for him, ways that I can take care of him, not because he needs taking care of, but because I want to. And he does the same. Nicole and Jay, thank you both for just being so incredibly generous and transparent and real with your time and for just sharing the reality of navigating your partnership and marriage while raising your family and crushing the impact that each of you are having on so many people in this world. If you haven't already done so, I encourage everyone listening to join Nicole's community at NicoleKhalil.com.

She will never jam up your inbox. And the emails you do receive are gold. Take my word for it. Get and gift Nicole's incredible book. Validation is for parking. Nicole made me promise that I would also share with listeners where you can find me and our team because let's face it, she is truly passionate about elevating all humans who are courageous, authentic, and committed to making a difference in their work. So if you are a leader who values emotional intelligence, people, and culture as much as strategy and are looking to build deeper partnerships at work, we would love to meet you.

Reach out to our team at coregrowthconsulting.com. In closing, I encourage you to reflect on your partnerships with the people who matter most to you. And to highlight some of Jay and Nicole's wisdom from today, guide each other. Ask for what you need. Your partner cannot read your mind. Tell them who you need for them to be for you in situations. Do you need your partner to listen or do you need them to help you solve a problem? Or in this situation, do you just need them to be pissed off with you? Confidence and partnership comes from getting into action, comes from trusting yourself and being willing to pivot. Partnerships deepen when we don't allow ourselves to stuff things down, when we have conversations about the hard things,

and especially during seasons of change. Spend some time thinking about your partner and ask yourself, how else can I support them? Who can I be for them? And above all, let's keep it light. Let's not take ourselves so seriously. We are all figuring it out as we go. This is woman's work.