Welcome to Nobody Told Me. I'm Jan Black. And I'm Laura Owens. Is the COVID-19 pandemic forcing you to take a sabbatical? Our guest on this episode, Shelley Paxton,

says there's always a gift in upheaval, pain, and discomfort. As Shelley sees it, this time offers us

a chance to reflect, reset, and redirect our lives, and we couldn't agree more.

Shelly is the author of the new book, Soul Batical, a corporate rebel's

guide to finding your best life. Shelly, thank you so much for joining us today. This is so timely.

Oh, ladies, thank you for having me. I'm super excited to be on here. Yes, it is timely as well.

You know, the subtitle of your book is so interesting where you talk about yourself as a corporate

rebel. How did you become a corporate rebel? And what really is one?

Well, let's be honest. I think I was born a rebel, period, before I was a corporate rebel.

I think I came out of the womb just rebelling against all different, you know, just rebelling against everything.

My parents and authority and tradition and religion and you name it, the list is really,

really long. And so what I realize in hindsight is that rebellion shifted over time from

rebelling against so many things, including a traditional corporate path. Now, the reality is,

I spent 26 years in corporate America. So I followed a pretty traditional path. But the rebel part of it

was in how I led, you know, in honestly, like what Brunay Brown talks about today, wholehearted

and courageous leadership,

bringing my own humanity and messiness to my leadership. And the other piece of the rebellion was

I really chose, well, maybe these jobs chose me. I chose moves that were different, that were like

blanks, you know, blank white pieces of

paper, things that no one else had done. Like at 26 years old, they said, well, you go start the

run the McDonald's business over in Istanbul Turkey. And at 26, I was single. And I was like,

why not? Send me to the place where no one else wants to go. And I think that's been a bit of a

...