Our guest on this 40th episode of the Mitlin Money Mindset™ is Jennifer Louden. Jennifer is a personal growth pioneer who has helped launch the concept of self-care with her 1992 best-selling debut book, The Woman’s Comfort Book. She’s the author of six additional books, including The Woman’s Retreat Book, The Life Organizer, and her newest release Why Bother. She’s appeared on a number of podcasts, radio, and television shows, including The Oprah Winfrey Show. As an entrepreneur and educator, Jennifer has offered women’s retreats for over 25 years and she’s on a mission to help women create the life and work they love. There are some awesome takeaways from our conversation, so be sure to listen in.
You will want to hear this episode if you are interested in…
- Jennifer’s journey to becoming a personal growth pioneer [2:18]
- Who are the people Jennifer is looking to help; her target market? [6:45]
- How Jennifer helps people and her main areas of focus? [8:07]
- What Jennifer sees that hinders people from experiencing personal growth? [11:33]
- Setting yourself up mentally for retirement BEFORE retirement [15:18]
- What signs should you look for that indicate the need for personal growth? [19:09]
- Simple things that you can do to take action to improve yourself [21:57]
- How important is mindset when it comes to focusing on personal growth? [26:46]
- What Jennifer did today that put her in the right mindset for success? [28:37]
Becoming a pioneer of personal growth
Jennifer Louden says her journey to becoming a personal growth pioneer was a series of nudges and inspirations that came together and just worked out. She started off in film school at USC wanting to be a filmmaker but she had a hard time with the politics of the business. She was young and naive and had no idea that she should get mentoring or help. Jen says she went through what she now calls a quarter-life crisis, where she found herself depressed trying to write screenplays and finding a little success but not enough.
Out of that moment—that crisis—a book title came to her, The Woman’s Comfort Book. This was back in the late ‘80s early ‘90s, and that book became a bestseller. That started that path of being a personal growth pioneer because in the early ‘90s Jennifer was talking about topics that nobody else was talking about yet.
Being aware of the signs and knowing when to get help
Are there specific triggers that would indicate the need to start working on personal growth, or that it’s time to seek out self-care and start focusing on wellbeing? Are there triggers that say “hey, listen, you’ve got to wake up!”? Jennifer says yes!
A big sign is when we’re letting ourselves mindfully numb out. If you’re watching hours of TV or drinking too much and you’re numbing out in a way that makes every day feel, blah. That’s a sign. If you’re struggling with depression or anxiety that’s also a good indication to get help and get recharged in different ways. If you keep saying “I want to do _____” and you’re not doing it or you’re not keeping the promises you make to yourself in ways that build your sense of self-trust and self-pride, that’s another hint.
If your family or friends are telling you that you don’t seem to be moving on with something or that they hear you complaining about the same things—complaints are amazingly powerful indicators of what we want to change—that’s also a sign. The last thing Jennifer mentions is if you’re using the words, why bother, maybe you don’t say why bother, but you say something like it’s too late, I’m too old, there’s no point, it’s all been done before. That’s a clue too.
Things to do on your own to take action today
I asked Jennifer what are simple things that people can do to take action today that would help improve themselves? Things that will get them on that track without necessarily making that jump to contacting somebody like her. Things that they could be doing on their own? Jennifer says there are a million things!
She put that question back to you! Saying you already know what to do.
She asked what have you learned, tried, or done in the past that helped you? Don’t think about it as self-improvement, self-improvement is a trap! It’s based on the idea, subtly or not so subtly, that there’s something wrong with you that you have to fix. It’s the negative. She says forget self-improvement. There’s no perfect. There’s no arriving. There’s no done. That has such a deadness to it. The whole idea is that we get to have the fullest most alive lives that we can.
What do you know that returns you to a sense of self? Jen loves the phrase staying on our own side because we’re so often at war with or judging ourselves. We’d never speak to others the way we speak to ourselves. So that’s a really wonderful place to start.
Resources & People Mentioned
Connect with Jennifer Louden
Jennifer Louden is a personal growth pioneer who helped launch the concept of self-care with her 1992 bestselling debut book The Woman’s Comfort Book. She is the author of six additional books, including The Woman’s Retreat Book, The Life Organizer, and her newest release, Why Bother? She appeared on a number of television and radio shows and podcasts—including The Oprah Winfrey Show. As an entrepreneur and educator, Jennifer has offered women’s retreats for over 25 years. She lives in Boulder County, Colorado.
Guests on the Mitlin Money Mindset Show are not affiliated with CWM, LLC, and opinions expressed herein may not be representative of CWM, LLC. CWM, LLC is not responsible for the guest’s content linked on this site.
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