Episode 305: Living Unconventionally and Writing Honestly | Brianna Madia | Two-Time Bestselling Author and Van Life Enthusiast
Brianna Madia is a two-time New York Times bestselling author, unapologetic storyteller, and one of the most influential voices in van life and self-defined living. In this episode, Kara and guest co-host Shae LaPlace sit down with Brianna to talk about identity, rebellion, and what it means to live without a script. From desert adventures to navigating imposter syndrome, Brianna shares her path from social media to bestselling books and how she’s reclaiming creativity on her own terms. A must-listen for anyone exploring personal growth, women’s empowerment, and life beyond expectations.
“Real rebellion is not really caring what other people think about who you are or what you’re doing.”
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Karen Duffy Powerful Ladies Podcast
Alice Reed (Stay tuned for her Podcast episode)
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Follow along using the Transcript
Chapters:
(00:00:01) - Introduction to Brianna Madia and Her Journey
(00:00:46) - The Nomadic Lifestyle and Its Impact on Creativity
(00:02:53) - Self-Discovery and Embracing Multiple Facets of Identity
(00:07:24) - Collaboration Over Competition Among Women
(00:40:30) - Defining Power and Womanhood
(00:54:46) - Closing Thoughts and Future Aspirations
Women have two options. Seeing someone who's doing something that impresses you or maybe you want to do that and you can either say, I'm jealous or you can say, look at this amazing woman and then turn it around and say, what about her is like stirring up something in me?
That's two time bestselling author, Brianna Madia. I'm Kara Duffy, and this is the Powerful Ladies Podcast. Special note that in this episode, we have an extra co host, Shae LaPlace. Let's dive right in. Let's everybody. Who you are, where you are in the world, and what are many of the things that you're up to.
So my name is Brianna Madia. I am an author. I am what was formerly known as an influencer, but I believe we're calling it content creator now. That's still very much a part of what I do, so I have to mention it. Currently, I am in Bend, Oregon, where my fiance lives, but I live in Utah, my out of state husband and, I am really excited because in three weeks I am moving back into my van for three and a half, maybe four months and really getting back to, my, I lived out of my van for many years, my gigantic orange, constantly breaking van. And that was really when I started writing on social media, which then led to my books. But it's been, it's really been a very long time since then. before my divorce that I have gotten in that van for like months on end, months and months on end and so I'm really excited. It's, I'm like super excited.
I'm excited to get back to, sometimes I feel like if I don't go live like that for an extended period of time, I like, I feel like I lose. It's like some sort of muscle atrophies. It almost feels like an emotional muscle. But I just feel like when things were really easy, like when there's just like running water and temperature control, I feel like I get lazy. And so I'm like, I need to remind myself that I'm like very capable and I'm ready for the end times. And so I just, I don't know it's interesting to be like, Oh, I can't wait to go like struggle and like figure stuff out again and hopefully stay off tow trucks for once in that van's life.
I totally get that feeling. I, without planning to ended up in living in Orange County, California right now, which is the easiest place probably on the planet to live. Whatever you need. It's 10 minutes, 5 minutes, 20 minutes. An airport. Every literally whatever you can dream up, it is right here. And there are, I, that's, I've moved all around the world. I have I'm like, we were talking about Shae and before about oh, there's, we're both city girls, but also outdoor girls. Does that make sense? And I was just in New York and I'm like, I have to like, go into these other environments where it's send me back to Mongolia where I don't know what's happening because I, it's like forgetting how to do something to your point. It's wait, can I, am I still that person? Have I gotten too soft?
This is what my entire third book is about that I'm currently writing. So I'm writing my third book right now. And yeah, it's really about I'm 35 now and I feel I went from being like, I still am this very like rebellious I'm like, I don't want to do dishes. That's for like regular people just there's still this part of me. And I think it's because in order to live.
The life that I was living for so long, like in the van, living on a sailboat for a little while living in my trailer on my property with no amenities whatsoever. In order to like really lean into that kind of life, I had to just wholesale disregard, like regular life and like very anti.
And by the time, I'm 30, 33, I think when my fiance bought this house, I was like, I literally felt like I had failed in some way and it's not my house, like it's his house. I don't know the paper. I'm not on the paperwork. But I felt like I was like failing somehow, especially when I started to really like aspects of a flushing toilet houses. Yes. I'm going to, and I'm going to decorate and something is going to start to feel like. A space that is like permanent, but I still like, even saying that I'm like, but I do not claim Ben. Just flown through. And I think so many people feel the pressure to like, every single day, tell the world exactly who you are, but that changes day to day minute for me, minute to minute. This morning I was out walking around with the dogs and I was like, Oh, you're going to get back to. Like being in the van, you're gonna go feral. You're gonna be naked and feral and running around all over the place. It's gonna be awesome. And then I got back here and I was like, what butternut squash lasagna recipe should I make for my friends who are coming over to play board games tonight? Yesterday I did a fucking puzzle of cats having a tea party and I'm like, I don't, but then, three weeks from now I'm going to be back. And so it's it, I've tried to embrace that like we all have so many different sides of us and you can love each of those things equally one year you might want, sometimes I really just want to be here, and I just want to hunker down and like hibernate and then. Then I, all of a sudden, I know when I want to go, like I get itchy feet, like I'm like, it's time to go. Even my fiance is you should go to Utah.
Can you please go to Utah like tomorrow?
Take the dogs with you. Yeah, so I don't know. It's definitely, that's a big theme in my book and I feel like it's a big theme for a lot of women that I've talked to, especially like my friends are all becoming moms. And they're like, okay, so now am I just mom, I'm just mom and they're fighting so hard to be like, but I'm not, I still have these parts of me and it's and I'm like, I understand it's a fight, but I was like, you also have to realize like at certain times one. Aspect of your life is going to take up the majority of your time. Things are not going to be equally split. You're not going to be doing all the really fun stuff that you used to do and being a super awesome month, but that will come like it's like a balancing act. And I just, yeah, I feel like especially with social media, we're all just so obsessed with knowing exactly how to present ourselves at all times when it's an ever changing thing.
And it's been so interesting. Oh, go ahead, Shae.
All right. I was gonna say, I think we're pushed to define ourselves a lot. And I started writing myself about something that I'm calling the everything girl, because I think a lot of us are everything girl, city girl, mountain girl. I'm not just a mom or a person or a partner. I'm not just a marketing professional, but I'm also like all of these different things. Yeah. We have to give ourselves permission to exist in all of those facets at the same time.
It almost feels like protest, even. I think that's why we constantly feel like we have to prove it is because it feels like just by the act of embracing all of these sides of you almost feels like protesting this there's either, I feel like people either think of like women as like these like feral witches, man hating living in the woods. Or a 1950s housewife and that's it, and there's so much in between there at the everything girl. I love that. That's great. I can't wait to read it. Where can I read it?
Hopefully I will share it with others.
Email it to me.
It's also why that my one of my clients, Andrew Patterson is a fine artist and we were working on his art show last October and it was a whole Italy themed collection. He goes to Rome every year and makes amazing things, but there's that, that an Italian phrase, dolce Farnetto. the joy the sweetness of doing nothing. And he's that phrase is so dumb. He goes, and we change it. And he was very sweet. He made me a journal with we have matching journals with the prints on the top that says Dolce Fartuto, the joy of doing everything because who wants to do nothing? Like even the things that feel like look like we're doing nothing. We're like no. Or we're charging. We're like laying in the dirt. We're in a river, like we're still doing something. And I always thought I was the weirdo who was like, guys why do you want this preset cookie box life? There's so many things to do and see and taste. And don't you, aren't you curious? Like the, this podcast has been so rewarding to me simply from finding other women who are genuinely curious about all the things there is to like. Do and see and participate in and I'm always shocked, especially in the dating world. And you're like, you have no questions to ask me. Okay. Wow. Awesome.
Honestly, that is, it's so cool how many different types of women like just scrolling through. And then I know you have to talk to Alice. She is our friend, Alice, the one who's going to be a pilot because I always say this is my friend, Alice. She could fit in the overhead compartment. However, she will soon be the pilot of the, that everybody's flying. Yeah, but there's it's so cool to see how more women are. Embracing like both sides. And I think that kind of comes with age too. Like I feel like when I was younger, I just wanted to be rebellious, like that was just and then yeah, you realize the real rebellion is just not really caring what other people think about who you are or what you're doing.
That's where you've really and that's what I think that's why the thirties have been so weird. My thirties have been the started out really rough and then. I don't know. I just feel I almost wonder if COVID had hit, if I had started getting, going through my divorce, if I had been like in my twenties still, if I would have, I think it would have really wrecked me. Whereas it was horrible when I got divorced, but I think like that time my life fell apart right when I turned 30. And I really did feel like this is. I felt more like myself every day, even though I was, like, shedding all of this stuff. It was almost overwhelming. And I don't know how I got onto that topic. As Shae knows, I will just, we never know where we're going to end up.
I have a seared image in my head of you and Jed sitting next to each other at the book signing at Mountain Film. And I had the thought, I'm like, how does it feel to you when you look at The list you were on and the list that you are on with people you admire. Being on them because I for my own experience when that's happened, you're like, Oh, wait, like I put all this distance between me and these people and it just gets collapsed. Like, how has that experience been for you? To truly be sitting at the table of people that you've admired and respected and be suddenly be like, we're knighted as equals. How did this happen?
That is, that's such a good question because it's still so surreal. Like when Jedidiah Jenkins started following me on Instagram, I screenshot it and sent it to my friend Kaylin because, and now Jedidiah Jenkins literally just texted me an hour before this asking about swimming with whales. But it's really weird. And I am someone. Like I actually was really mad at myself recently and I was like saying to my therapist, I was like, how many best selling books do I have to write before the imposter syndrome goes away? I still feel, I don't know, I feel like I'm not. On those ranks. I also feel like I, I don't spend a whole lot of time in the community of like writers and like attending writers things and being a part of. I'm such like a hermit. I just go hide in the desert with my dogs. And and I also think that would probably make me feel a little better because I think, when you look up to somebody I think sometimes it's like they say, don't meet your heroes or never meet your heroes. But I think it's so comforting when you meet people and realize they're just people. They're just well and they probably either did at one point or still do feel the feelings of what do I, why am I at this table? Especially authors. I don't know that there's many as well. Memoirs at least. I don't know that there's many like really snobby, like you don't belong. Like I think a lot of doubted themselves and are welcome with open arms, other writers and stuff, but yeah, it's surreal. And I actually said this morning, I Laney Wilson is my, she is my Taylor Swift and she is coming to bend. And I immediately went and bought five tickets. Just because I was like someone's gonna, my mom's gonna fly out to go to the concert with me. Like we're big. And I was like, Oh my God, I'm so excited.
I can't believe I'm going to see her again for the second time. And then Willie goes, is it weird to think that like people get really excited to see you like in that capacity? And I was like, not on this scale, not on the scale. And he was like, how do you know? And I was like, because I'm not Lainey Willis I just, it's it's strange. And even people coming up to hug me and I can feel that their like hands are shaking and they're nervous. And I just want to be like, but it's me yeah.
And I mean that you, what? The first time I met you, I was so nervous. Are you kidding? Really? Yeah. And now you know what a total idiot I am.
No.
You just immediately made you made me feel so comfortable right out, out the gate. Yeah. And I think that helped. You're just a very, you are exactly who I expected you to be. Oh, good. And that just. In the best possible way. But I think people, I will absolutely back Willie's statement.
I think I told him that day that I was so nervous to meet you because I had, I've known who you are forever. Yeah. I've always looked at you. You're an incredible thing. Like people definitely feel that way about you. Granted, you're not a country music singer, but not yet, right?
Or just wait, the third book, that's the next tour.
Yeah.
But yes, you are, you very much are that kind of a presence. Yes.
Thank you. I can vouch that what Shae is telling is the truth because I'm pretty sure I got a text message immediately thereafter being like, you are not going to believe what happened today. And I'm like, this is what manifesting is Shae. You be a good person and you work hard and you just keep no, it's going to happen. And you mentioned not meeting your heroes. Like I, one of our trademarks in my coaching business is a ridiculous and extraordinary life. And it has to have the ridiculous component. And so I we've had previously in the podcast, Duff, the MTV VJ from the 90s.
She reached out to me and it's I love your podcast. Can I be a guest? And I was like, of course you can, like you were on my wall when I was a teenager. What are you talking about? And then I was just in New York and we. I went to her apartment and we had a coffee and we hung out for two hours and it was, I was levitating walking out of there because like when you do get to have these ridiculous experiences where you are meeting heroes or just people that you were like, there's no way that's ever going to happen. There's something like, this is going to sound so woo, but there's, it proves to me like that there is magic and that there are these things happening to conspire to make sure the right people are getting connected. Because I've never met anyone that I was excited to meet and been disappointed. And it's so cool when you meet someone you want to meet and you're like, and now we're friends.
Yeah.
But Jet is now texting me. What is happening?
Yeah. I will say, I will say a brief. Aside, I think the most surreal, and I still it'll hit me every now and again and I just can't even believe it's true, but you guys remember the talk show host Rikki Lake? Oh yeah! She and I chat all the time, incredible, she's one of my DMs, she's a big dog lover, but like we're talking eight year old me, homesick from school, sitting in front of the TV, watching these crazy talk shows, Rikki Lake, and then the fact, I was like, Rikki Lake knows who I am. Not only does she know who I am, she knows all my dog's names, and I don't know why, because that's really the only. Like the scale of it, just like I remember seeing that person on TV and in a world where that person Talks to me. Not only are we very like the age difference is significant Yeah, it's just it's It's crazy. But I think it's so fun. I think the wackier the connection, the better.
Yes. Yes. Like it's I'm now challenging clients and people in my life to like, do you have a ridiculous list? Because you make one and it is such a delight when you check something off the box because you don't even try. You're like this is the, it'll never happen list. And then when it does. You feel like you are eight years old and just got the best glitter rockstar outfit you could ever have. Yes.
Yes. That's amazing.
Coming, I also grew up in the Northeast I consider Boston home. And there's something I think also about that is not talked about enough, and maybe it is and I'm not reading the right books. But there is something about The weird mix of progressive and Puritan and having to deal with the hardships. You get this touche from Pittsburgh as well, like there's something in that weird petri dish that just shifts how you think about the rest of the world. When you look at your life, how has growing up in Connecticut shaped how you see everything else or the grit or whatever you might have?
Yeah honestly, it sounds so mean because, I love, there's plenty of people in Connecticut that I love and I have plenty of wonderful memories there, but Connecticut is, growing up in Connecticut is what inspired me to move out of Connecticut. To move out of New England, out of, and it's interesting because I think what I found the most, I haven't, I moved to Utah almost 14 years ago, almost 14 years ago now.
I haven't lived. I think I've lived. Pretty soon I'll be, I will have lived like out of the state longer than I was ever in it, but I just, I feel like I felt this way before I had even traveled and now that I've traveled so much, I really feel this way. It's a melting pot. There's all kinds of people in the area, but it seems like everybody believes that this is the best and only and most superior place in the whole world.
Why would I ever leave? I just, I feel like it's cause I grew up around lots of different kinds of people who spoke different languages and different religions and different races. In, in a certain puppy But in a certain regard, it still felt so sheltered, very sheltered.
And I don't know, I just, I wrote this in my first book, but it's just, I feel like it's still just really encompasses how I felt about growing up in Connecticut. It just felt like what you had was more important than who you were. And if you didn't have the right car and the right outfit and the right Ivy League degree and the right, then it didn't matter.
Didn't matter if you were funny or, like it was, Kids just weren't allowed to come trick or treat in my neighborhood. And my neighborhood was really cute. It just happened to be in a city that was like, we don't go there. And it's just like all of these little make believe Oh, the little sign on the back of your car, someone makes you better than this other person.
It just felt it didn't feel like a real life. I was like, this doesn't feel like substance. Yes. The author I feel like it's, it just felt fake and manicured. And I was like, everything is perfect. And that, and now it's boring me to fucking tears. Like the perfectness, the fat, like driving through a place where every house looks the same.
And it's, every everywhere is somewhere to someone, so I tried it but. That's my fucking nightmare. I just would never. That's why I loved Salt Lake City. I do love that about Bend, too. Even though it's like suburbs, they're all cute little different houses and, but yeah, just that sameness and wanting everybody wants to be just like everybody else.
You don't really want to stand out and it's I feel this, I've felt this pull. I don't know where this shit comes from. I don't know, maybe you guys get I want to be different. Like it's a driving force for me. I don't know where that comes from. I don't know if it's from being traumatized or being inspired.
I don't know. But I've always wanted to be different. I don't want to be wearing what other people are wearing. I don't want to be since I, for as long as I can remember. I don't know if you guys at all feel that way.
No, I'm 43. And growing up in the 90s, like I graduated high school in 99, right? So like full middle school through high school grunge alternative experience. Yeah. And then I had gone away to live in Europe for a while. I came back and I'm like, When did we give up that we shouldn't look like clones? I, what's happening? And then when like the 90s and the Y2K trends were coming back into fashion, I'm like, ooh, are we also gonna bring back the mindset of being a little wacky?
Showing who you really are? And I would've Like we were horrified when we would show up wearing anything similar. Now granted, was our wardrobes, were there plenty of overlap? Did we all have converse? Yes. Like it was still a stone culture. But just the idea of celebrating the things that made people unique.
I have a unicorn on my finger for crying out loud, right? Like just, I don't understand like the celebrating. The sameness. I think it makes sense where we're trying to cross lines and come together at a human level. But otherwise it's also why my mind melts with all the DEI conversations right now. I'm like, isn't mixing it good? If nothing else, at a purely genetic perspective, shouldn't we be encouraging this? What I don't, I don't get it.
How much of it was the heat and the height of brand. Because I, I do think that generationally millennials in particular hit the sort of height of like brand mattering and brand name mattering.
It created a homogenousness in our style that. only people with that sort of like gut punk rock sensibility, which is what Kara and I talk about a lot, that we both sort of gravitate towards this. I don't want to be anything like you and not like a mean way. I just want to be, we all want to be different.
Yeah. We gravitated away from that because we were just like inundated constantly with this in order to fit in, you must use these brands and these are the best and still get called out by my friends for being like, no, I don't like that song. And it's not because I actually listened to it. I don't like it. It's because everybody else likes it. I just, it turns me off.
Yeah.
Like the chaperone thing. I'm sure she's so great.
Was just about to say, I was just in New Orleans and we were at a karaoke bar and it was my birthday. And
fabulous, by the way, I was like, just from now on, I'm just doing a birthday photo shoot. I don't even care what party it is, but we're doing the photo shoot.
It was so fun. I have, it's also easy for me because Willie is a photographer, so he's okay, let's tell them stairs.
Tilt your head up, turn it.
But so everybody in this karaoke bar starts like losing it when the opening lines of this song start. And I am looking around and I am the only person who is not. And then I heard again to the pink pony club and I was like, okay, I've heard this part. I've heard but I just, I, and it's not for, it's not even always just for not wanting to. It's just I like what I like. I'm stubborn and like my music tastes is erratic, but I like what I like. And it's just, but yeah, it is interesting when you have our face with those moments where you're like, I'm pop culture is passing me by, I think. I'm being left, I'm officially being left behind. I don't know who these people are.
One of the pop culture trends I totally got sucked into was the Nobody Wants This series on Netflix. Yes. Pure gold. But then everyone was like, Adam Brody OC. I'm like, I have never seen this show.
Me either. Wait, you're kidding! No! I've never seen Friends, I've never seen Breaking Bad, I've never seen Game of Thrones. And this is not, I, because I have to watch Law and Order the 500th time.
I think the argument can be made that you were living in a van during some of the peak of those shows. So like Breaking Bad, you were definitely like mostly off grid.
Yeah. And probably being compared to Breaking Bad. In fact, I think a lot of people probably made that joke, especially cause I'm out in the desert. And then I got the trailer. Oh, yeah. There was a lot of weight in this trailer. No math, but.
I think that there's some funny content ideas in there, but maybe you should watch the show before we dive into Bree's memes about Breaking Bad from this trailer. This is gonna be my Breaking Bad era.
Just an entire now I just want to organize an entire Breaking Bad photo shoot at your with the van because it's so easy and then and with the dogs we get them involved.
Like the little goggles or whatever, right? And like you get about stuff, not the details, and I was like, I know it's about a witch who goes to college. And that was the extent that I knew about it. I love it. Oh, my God. I wish I could. Maybe I'll watch that again tonight after I eat my butternut squash.
My mother was so upset we watched that. They were here. We watched it for Christmas, or New Year's Eve. She goes, wait, it's just part one? And I'm like, sorry. Yes, you're gonna have to wait. I don't know how many years.
I was horrified when I realized, I was like, it has to be coming to an end. Yeah. And then I was like, wait a minute, but the first scene she said she was dead. Like what? We're never gonna fuckers. I have no idea.
Have you ever seen the actual musical?
No.
No.
The only musical that I've seen is Book of Mormon, which is a requirement. If you're a non Mormon living in Utah. The shows in Utah are always, Extra lit. The crowd is just, it's a different vibe because we're all a different breed.
It's all true. It's like when I went to the movies to watch Devil Wears Prada when it came out and I was working in fashion at the time. And my friend and I were crying, laughing, not like no one else was reacting the way we were. And we're like, it's true. The Cuban cheese is true.
God, you've worked, you've done like every single thing and every, I've done a lot.
If anything you want to make, we can make it. You just give me a list. You're like, what do you want? What do you want? That's CBD, jewelry, clothes, shoes, all that podcast, which Congratulations.
My God. I'm sitting here being like, my podcast is nothing like it. My, it's basically several manic episodes on film.
Perfect. That's an entire genre.
And I've been trying really hard to like, this is something I still, again, really struggle with is if something isn't perfect and I compare it to other people's podcasts, like I had to look up like how to make. And it's still, it's so homegrown. It's like totally amateur and I'm fine with that, but it's almost humbling to start this new endeavor when I'm already so established on like Instagram. Like I'm like, Ooh, we got five followers. It's it's it's humbling to, and then to just not really know what you're doing and have to wrangle my best friend who is absolutely ungovernable.
She is truly one of a kind, one of a kind. And it's also nice to be the sidekick on an endeavor. Like she's definitely talks the most. It has all the zingers but I'm hoping like I, she had to talk me into, she's just post it, put the first video up. What's the worst that happens?
People don't like it and don't want to follow along. And I was like, so I have this problem with not putting things out until they're perfect because it's like a control thing. And I do this with my books and my editor gets really mad. But I hold onto those things for dear. fucking life. Like she's you can send me things in between due dates.
If you just want to send me like one chapter and I'm like, no, cause I don't know where that chapter goes yet. And I did needs to be exactly where I want. And so I just, and my editor was like, there's a reason I think that you don't have I don't get very many. Big edits, like feedback. It was like, you should take this whole thing out.
It's more like gentle prodding. And I'm like, probably because I'm not only my writing it, but I was fucking editing it and being obsessive about it. And yeah, I don't know. It's very challenging, but I'm trying to just let go of nothing's going to be perfect one day. Maybe we'll look back and be like.
Oh my God, that first episode was so ridiculous and but it's at the end of the day, I'm laughing with my best friend. So it's who cares, but yeah, it's been fun. My abs hurt for sure because we've been, and we have to talk like every day now. So we're constantly like we were just on FaceTime with each other just silently typing for an hour, not even talking to each other.
So it's been fun. Yeah. So thank you. I'll, I'm giving some tips.
Yeah, please do. It's the number, it's an honor. The number of people who call and they're like, so we've got an idea. What do we really do? And I'm like, okay, hold on. Cause I'm really proud of like the production quality that we've gotten to in our systems.
Like we we're dabbling about bringing in some new podcasts under the powerful ladies name and because we can just do this. Yeah. And so I'm really proud of that part. And it's also, I'm also not a perfectionist. Like I'm a, I know where it should be. If it's 80%, I know from launching so many products and things like we have to. The last 20 percent we'll never know until we start so we can be in a circle.
That is exactly what my buddy Jared, that very thing, he works, he's like THC seltzer company. And he was so frustrated because they just kept going back, like this should be, and he was like, If it's 80, he said, he was like, if it's 80 percent good, you got to just go.
You got to start. Yeah. So it's a good, but this is this is why I like doing things that like scare me. Cause then, or make me uncomfortable because I'm like, I don't want to be governed by those feelings, and so it's it's hard, but yeah, eventually you just got to take a deep breath and click.
It's so funny how quickly it's like we think, it's like we think so long about these decisions and all it really takes is like one moment. It's almost like getting to the cliff edge, like I'm a big cliff jumper, I love jumping off stuff. And I know that the longer you stand at the top, it really does, as someone who loves jumping off stuff, the longer you stand at the top, the scarier it's going to get.
And I just always feel like that's such an apropos for all different things in life, especially people read my books and how did you make these like crazy decisions? And honestly, sometimes my answers are like, not that pretty, but I'm just like, I don't know, I'm going to be dead soon. Someday I'm gonna die.
I don't know, like, why not? Like, whenever people are preserving themselves, either their bodies oh, I could never go skydiving, because what if I die? You're gonna die anyway. So it's what are you saving yourself for? Death? It's just, I feel like people don't realize, like, how much You can't, I don't know.
I get like down a rabbit hole about this. Also, that is, there's a large raccoon in that tree right now.
Just saying hi.
Good thing it's not in our yard because my dogs would try to kill it. He's just waiting for him to say hi. That's where that thought went. I was like, am I? Anyways something about raccoons.
I do know I was going to talk about jumping off things, because if I am on a pier, on a bridge, if there's a body of water below me I have my immediate response that I have to stop every time luckily my brain does this for me without me logically processing it, it's always ooh, jump. Oh yeah. Where, like, how did that sneak through the Intrusive thoughts. Yes. I was babysitting.
Oh my god. I was babysitting the other night. And I'm so comfortable with kids. I nannied, I could change five diapers at once with my eyes closed. Which is interesting. People are always surprised by that since I don't want to have kids.
But I still every now and again, like all my friends have started having babies. And so there's much more babies around me. And every time I hold one, I'm like, what if I dropped it? What if I threw it? No, I'm kidding. But just my brain will do. And then I'm like stop thinking that. Stop. You're not going to drop it? I'm like, I'm not going to drop it. I'm like standing in the living room. Just be like, what if I drop it? Weird little, our brains are it's so bizarre. So many times it seems like they're actually just actively working against us. Yeah, I'm joking. I feel normal today. Here's this fucking weird thing.
Cuteness aggression is like a thing. And my best friend from high school and I joke about it all the time. Like, why is that a thing? Like, why do I look at something cute and go,ahhh.
Literally grab banjo space and just gently shake it.
What is that?
You're not going to want to do with a baby.
No, that's not safe. But the question is why what in the genetic code allowed that to slip through?
Yeah, or even the phrase, I want to eat you up
Or it's almost like you're so overwhelmed with how cute it is that your body just goes into shock and anger and fear.
All the emotions are cycling through as fast as possible. Speaking of dropping babies and a raccoon, have you seen the video of the dad getting bit by the raccoon and throws his kids? Yes.
Yes. I know a mother would have pulled out a samurai sword and yeah.
But I am a sucker for physical comedy. Like I will inappropriately laugh seeing people getting Injured.
Yes.
I dunno how to stop it. I've tried to work on this. I can't, I just now live. But I have watched that so many times and I full vibrating laughing on the couch and . I'm like, I don't, this is again, I think I might be a little broken and this is how I know. Aren't we all ?
No. Oh, physical comedy yeah. Afv, we all, America's funniest video. We were pre-programmed for this. Oh my God you're so right. It didn't.
Wow. That's a flash from the past.
There's an Instagram account called kids getting hurt. Just saying.
That we're not alone. There is. And they always clarify the kid was fine. They're resilient. They bounce. It's whatever. But another one that I love is kook slams, which is just like people follow it. So good. And again, they're not dead. So it's fine. If I had a hilarious, took a hilarious spill, I would absolutely post it online. It's your responsibility to bring joy to other people.
Yes. A hundred percent. A hundred percent. So we're going to make a little bit of a pivot. So we're cautious of our time. But when you think of the words powerful and ladies, how would you define them? And does that definition change when they're next to each other?
I think power powerful to me is I think being really the most powerful thing I can think of is being like very at peace. With yourself, because that creates like a shield and that's something that I've had to work on. It's just being like, I am safe and comfortable here and that is my power. My power is having not everything is going to pierce this. Not everything that someone does or says or every criticism or every, misstep is going to totally make me fall apart.
So I feel powerful in like having a real strong sense of stealth because that's very attainable and it's mine. It's yours. No one can take it. It's like a very safe thing to like actually feel that. Ladies, I think of immediately Beyonce is coming to mind.
I, I actually, I I love the combination of like powerful ladies too, especially cause like ladies is more. Like it sounds more like casual Ooh, ladies, but then you put powerful with it. And it's like that beautiful combination that we were talking about in the beginning. It's like multiple facets of being a woman is you can be powerful in whatever way that appears to you, whether it's strong, whether it's in your career, whether you're like physically a bodybuilder or breaking down any sort of barriers and then still be recognized as we're a bunch of gals, we want to sit around and gab.
Like I said I think that's what's really cool about it. Cause there is something about women gathering together that I think it's not only I don't, I feel like we've all done really cool shit, but I never feel like I'm in a group of women. And it's all we talk about.
It's all we talk about is like the big stuff that we did, the more, the importance that we talk about do you remember Ricky Lake? It's there's a sense of ease. And I think that's just makes women like when there's, when those conversations are taking place first and foremost, and that comfortability is established.
I think women are more comfortable hyping themselves up. I, talking to you guys, it I feel comfortable in saying things like, yeah, I really hope a third New York Times bestseller I'm really I feel more comfortable to say the things that I hope and want for myself that maybe I wouldn't just announce to a room of people, so I feel like having this specific place for that, but not having it be this like overwhelming like I'm being really like interviewed, prove to us why you deserve to be on a podcast called Powerful Ladies.
It's like I think women just sense that in other women and it doesn't even have to be because you're in the same field or you're in this, it's there's just something you sense and there's like a comfortability there because I think in order to be, like I said, a powerful woman, you have to be self assured because there is, it's, I think it's, I think women have two options.
And unfortunately, a lot of them pick the not great one, which is seeing someone who's doing something that impresses you, or maybe you want to do that, and you can either say, I'm jealous, and I'm, and by being jealous and hateful, that's somehow going to elevate me, it's not, or you can say, look at this amazing woman, and then turn it around and say, what about her, is like, stirring up something in me.
Is it that she made this big decision? And I'm thinking about that decision last year that I should have made. Guess what girl go make it not too late. You can either sit around and be bummed about other women doing stuff, but there's room for all of us, you gotta be a girl's girl.
And I think that so many women understand the collaboration over competition when we really talk about it. Like I was even trying to dig through, where did who said that first? Did a guy say that? Because I feel like there's so many things that get put on us. Even the descriptions we were talking about earlier. Of, oh, are you a horse girl? Are you an outdoor girl? I'm like, who? Who was giving us Barb singular Barbie outfit identities?
Last time I checked, there's a whole wardrobe.
Which American Girl doll are you? Yeah.
Exactly. And so I think it's unfortunate that I, we can see each other's power, but we also can sense when somebody isn't. connected to their power. And that's the part for me that's heartbreaking. Like I was in a room with people and they're like, I was being grilled about in a nice way.
I was more about my other business, but they were like if you're running powerful ladies what do you wish everyone knew? And I'm like, okay. I was like, I wish everyone knew that you are already powerful. You were born that way. What do you want to do with it? And I don't care if you want to be like i'm gonna make dog sweaters or i'm gonna run You know goldman sachs.
I don't really care what the thing you're gonna do is but please do your thing because yeah The state of the world is like...
Like of having the power of choice as well in obviously in every area Yeah, but yeah, I think I also think that's why being different or like always being comfortable being different has been helpful for me in terms of making bigger, more ostentatious, maybe life decisions.
But I also feel like it's Still, I would never want someone I mean, if this is how I wrote my books, like I tried to make it very clear that there was nothing about me, particularly like the genetically coded that I was going to go live on a sailboat and then live in a van and jump off stuff all the time, like that's not who I just was like I did have to become that person and there's nothing so special about me That I could do this and you can't of course, you've talked about like privileges and baselines, starting places, of course, but at the end of the day, everybody has the power to just decide to change their life.
I sound like Tony Robbins, but I just feel like that's also another thing that feels so powerful. And again, maybe this is even like an intrusive thought, but sometimes I'm just like, isn't it weird that I could just put that sequin outfit on and go to the grocery store right now?
It's clothes. These are rules we made up. It's, we made up that would be weird. None of this is I have these weird thoughts where I'm just like, none of this is really real. And we focus on these tiny little things as opposed to just what do you want to do? This is your life.
What do you want? Who do you want to be? What do you want to do? What do you want to wear?
Just, that's why I think eight year old girls are like, I'm usually asking someone. You've already answered the question of Oh, but eight year old, you have expected, but it's no, cause eight year old, you got one foot into, I can make myself a grilled cheese and the other foot in like anything is possible.
Yeah.
Like I of course I'm wearing sequence to go to school today and I think that there's every like moment I have ever felt. the most powerful, like those 10 days when you're like, this is living. It has always been eight year old version of me. Who's been like, yes, in the background. And it's I remember even like people come back from Burning Man and they're like, I'm just going to wear a sequence for a month. And it fades off and you're like, maybe I shouldn't wear that to the grocery store or to work.
These are not work appropriate nipple tassels.
A little drafty. It's hard to type. But I do, I wish more people were just asking themselves, like, how do you make eight year olds you happy or proud? Yeah, you're gonna make the right choice. I also think we should let kids run for office because they also make the right choices.
It's interesting. Like I, when I was, when my whole life was falling apart, it's like the end of 2019, like my marriage, when I say that I was really lost, didn't really know who I was, if I was going to be able to finish writing my first book because now everything I had written about is like fairytale was like obviously had to change the ending on that book, but I felt like. I went into a petco, I think, to just to get dog food and there's a little ball python and I had a ball python growing up and I used to rollerblade around this little like waterfront spot and they had a picture of me in the newspaper that probably said like weird child rollerblading with a snake on her neck.
So Britney of you. Yeah. And so I was like, so I've just looked at this snake and just. was like, I need that. I can do that. Who's no one's going to tell me I can do all the stuff that I said I wanted to do when I was a kid. And then I went and bought fucking rollerblades. So I literally was like, I'm buying a snake and I'm buying rollerblades.
And I just remember thinking like, and I have my four dogs and I'm like, eight year old me would be stoked. And eight year old me would be like, Ew, we didn't end up with the boy? Who cares? We have the dogs and the snakes. So it was it was very liberating to just be like, Let's keep it as simple as can be for right now, because I am struggling.
What are these core things that make me feel like, safe again? And this is really me, this true se And it could be something as small as fucking buying rollerblades. Just anything that like, Connects you to like this, the joys that you felt when you were younger and like you didn't have to have a reason as to why you did stuff or why you wore stuff or, but yeah, I think it's a lot easier than people think to have that sort of connection to a younger version of yourself at the forefront as, as much as possible.
It's the number one way that, excuse me, I help people double their business. We do that exercise. And that's what your business should be towards.
That's so smart. Yeah. So like rollerblading snake tours.
Yes. That could be next. Come to our what's the TV show? Breaking bad.
I'm a breaking.
Come to the breaking bad van and then we'll do some roller skating python tours. This is.
Yeah. Hey kids, get in the van. You want to see some snakes? No, I actually did just say to my friend, I was like, I can't wait to be your, all your kids weird aunt who brings her snakes to their classroom for show and tell, who wants to pet the snake? Like I'm just going to lean in. It's so fun when you just finally get to lean into just being weird. Who fucking cares? Like I used to get teased for being like a reptile kid. And now I'm like, do you guys want to hold my snakes? 40 year old people come in my house and I'm like, do you guys want to see my snakes?
And they say, yes, that's who I am. Everybody says yes. Everybody says yes. You could sell tickets. That would be a really fun Instagram like giveaway.
Yes. Yeah. But it's just, it's so liberating to just be who you are. And I just hope people, I hope everybody, I think every woman, especially deserves to get to that place one day, but you have to put the work in. It doesn't just happen. And I've had to change a lot of things about myself. I, from 25 to 35, I love the person who I am. 25, I was really leaning in too hard to the stubbornness. And again, like I said earlier, it was like I had to be very anti in order to justify not only to my mom, but also to myself, that sleeping in a van in, on the streets of Salt Lake City was somehow really profound experience, and it was, but it takes a lot of convincing, it's not and I always tell people like, you're nobody has ever done something new for the first time and had no fear, no doubt. Willie would say he has but like that white male confidence. He is I just, I feel like I think I wrote that in my second book. So I just, I always thought it was brave people who did brave things. I never paused to consider how many of them were absolutely terrified.
And so I just feel like people think of like powerful women or brave women as other from them in some way. And that isn't like an attainable bridge and it's just not the case. I wish women would be fucking nicer to each other. Seriously, we got a problem on the internet.
It breaks my fucking heart. I'm like, this is the patriarchy at work You realize that right? like we are like The point is for us to go after each other and hate each other and things that think that's how we solve the problems I'm, like you guys are buying in Wake up Be girls girl
All right, so two more questions and then we can let you get back to your day the first is Where do you put yourself on the Powerful Lady scale?
If 0 is average everyday human and 10 is most powerful lady you can imagine, where would you rank yourself today and on an average day?
See, I'm feeling all gassed from chatting with you guys and from Shae saying that she thought I was cool. I think, I would honestly probably say, realistically, like I would think of myself as like an eight, but only because think that what has I feel powerful and it feels like a type of powerful that comes naturally.
To me in a way, like I I'm not trying to run a business. I know nothing about, I'm not like drowning myself in a hundred hours of work a week. Like I really just saw things that I love. saw different possibilities for how I could live my life. And it was very easy for me to make those decisions.
And so I think having that deep internal, Oh, having that deep internal compass has always made me feel like powerful and almost like by that, like safe, if I know who I am and I know what I want, there is a power in that. On an average day, we're talking two, three best. Again, the imposter's birdie.
She can tell that I'm getting upset about, okay, that's, thank you.
She's no mom, you're, yeah, she's.
You're very special. But yeah, the imposter syndrome definitely gets to me and I, and a lot of the comparison stuff still gets to me as in. All my friends started having kids and I really had a six month period where I was like Not for a minute questioning my decision, but just feeling left behind in a way I don't know. I don't know how that came up either birdie distracted me with her disgusting breath, honestly.
This is a community that is vast and connected and makes magic and ridiculous things happen all the time, so What is something that we can help you with? What's to do to manifest? Big? Small? What do you need?
What do you want?
I would love to come back and talk to you about my third book. Yes, please! That would be nice. Yeah, and I don't know, what else? Oh, interview my friend Alice. Because she's so badass and she deserves to be interviewed and she looked at me the other night and she goes, no one's ever interviewed me before, which makes for a really great interview.
I guess, especially like this type of like it's and that's what I told her. I was like, it's always just like a conversation, but I really am. It sounds so cheesy, but I really am genuinely thrilled and lifted up to see other women get recognized for things that are important. And or even just important to them, like I think that there's something, I feel like it fills my cup a little bit I would, yeah, I'd love to come back and talk about my third book, and I'm just.
I'm so happy that this podcast exists and that you guys, yeah.
No it's really an honor. You've been on the list of guests that we wanted since I think day one I don't know if like how Shane and I got connected. Like I worked with her brother in a, like three jobs before I did this. And one of my rules for clients when they launch anything is that you have to email everyone, that it is launched and give them three things that you want from them, follow, spread the word, whatever. Yeah. And I, with Powerful Ladies, I hesitated. I was like, Oh, maybe I should include all the men. That might be annoying. And then I had to stop myself and be like, Nope, follow your own rule. Yeah. And I did. And her brother was like, Love this. Congratulations. I think you need to know my sister. And she became like employee number two.
Oh my God, my brother would never say that.
That's so awesome. Yeah. Again, this is just like a Shae, like love fest. But I remember asking Willie afterwards. I was like, after I met you, I was like, Shae's so cool. Do you think she likes me? That's how much I had absolutely no idea. No idea.
Which is so funny.
But I prefer that. Like I'm like, I feel like maybe I would be nervous. Like sometimes my book events I get nervous. Sure. I'm like. I don't know. I feel like it's so much easier to just I love when people come up to me on the street and I can just be like, Oh, sorry. I was in my car crying. It's so nice to meet you. It's just because I'm a very, there's not like a professional bone in my body. I'm just very, so I think I'm constantly just like trying to be friends with everybody and make things comfortable and easy and conversation flow. And yeah, I'm too busy thinking about that. To realize the show and he thought I was cool under the pretense of work.
And then I was like, no, fuck that we're friends now. Yeah, exactly. I slept in your house. Yeah. Yeah. All right. The first time we met, it was like, let's do mountain phone stuff. Yeah, sure. And then within five minutes, I was like, no, instead, right here.
Yeah. But it's so cool. Especially working in this realm. How many amazing people you meet that are like, goes beyond oh, let's hang out. And that's something that's really cool for me because, like I said, I'm like a loner, like I I forget that there's like Lots of cool people that I've met that I want to hang out with more and that I want to go You know see where they live and so yeah, I feel like I'm late I had my like hermit years and now I think I was so like Overstimulated and traumatized for a while that I was like went into a cocoon And now just recently I just feel like I'm excited to go back out into the world again and meet people and have my time for myself this year to make the decisions like where I want to go, who I want to be with. So yeah.
I love that.
There we go.
We'll definitely be hanging out there in May. For everybody who wants to follow you that isn't already and is I want to hang out with you. Yes, I want to meet you at book signing. Where can they do all those things? So my Instagram is just my name, Briannamadia, B
B R I A N A M A D I A. And my website is briannamadia. com and that's got tour information, book information, you can buy stickers of my dog's butthole, just everything you could ever dream of. So yeah, that's where you can find me.
This has been such a treat. Thank you so much for being a yes to us and Powerful Ladies. And yeah, I can't wait to see you soon.
Yay. Thank you guys so much.
Thanks for listening. If you enjoyed this episode, please subscribe and share it with a friend. Head to thepowerfulladies. com where you can find all the links to connect with podcast, as well as learn more about Powerful Ladies. Come hang out with us on Instagram at powerful ladies, and you can find me and all of my socials at Kara Duffy. com. I'll be back next week with a brand new episode until then. I hope you're taking on being powerful in your life. Go be awesome and up to something you love.
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Instagram: @briannamadia
Website: briannamadia.com
Created and hosted by Kara Duffy
Audio Engineering & Editing by Jordan Duffy
Production by Amanda Kass
Graphic design by Anna Olinova
Music by Joakim Karud
