Episode 372: Parental Leave, Workplace Culture & Becoming Your Own Advocate | Emily Mueller-Lennox | Founder of 29 Weeks
What if taking back your power at work starts with knowing what you’re actually entitled to? Emily Mueller-Lennox, founder of 29 Weeks, joins Kara Duffy to unpack the complicated world of parental leave, workplace culture, and advocating for yourself through major life transitions.
Together they explore why California’s parental leave benefits can be so difficult to navigate, how employees can become their own advocates, and what the US can learn from European approaches to work, rest, and humanity. Emily shares her journey from corporate life to entrepreneurship and how becoming a parent reshaped the way she thinks about boundaries, leadership, and building a life that works around us - not against us.
“I don’t see people having families as a negative. I think it’s important because it helps bring some different weight to the work”
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Kara Duffy: Welcome to the Powerful Ladies Podcast. I'm Kara Duffy, and today's guest today is Emily Mueller-Lennox, a friend of mine and the founder of 29 Weeks, the parents' guide for taking parental leave in California. Now, California in the US has some of the best maternity and paternity leave coverage that you could find.
But that doesn't mean that it's easy to make sure you're getting all the coverage, both time and money, that you can be getting, let alone understanding it. So often, the HR teams at corporations don't know all the rules. Sometimes the insurance providers don't either. You can have a really great time off to bond with your baby and recover yourself, but only if you know where to look, what to ask, and how to advocate for yourself throughout this process.
And that's what I think is so cool about what she's created because it truly is a course that you can do either in really bite-sized [00:01:00] chunks or within about an hour to just get all your questions answered, have action steps for what's next, and make sure that you're getting what you are actually paying into already as an employee.
29 Weeks gives you that clear path to understand the laws, make choices for yourself, and of course, speak up and talk to your company about the time that you need. So in this episode, we of course dive into all of those things, but we also talk about the differences of living in the US and in Europe, how deep toxic workplace culture goes in the US, and why we so often here build our lives around work instead of building work around our lives.
So a whole variety of topics, kinda all about taking your power back when it comes to you, work, and becoming a parent.
welcome to the Powerful Ladies podcast
Emily Mueller-Lennox: Thanks. I'm excited to be here
Kara Duffy: I am very excited to talk to you today. It's such a pleasure when [00:02:00] I get to speak to people who are friends in real life already.
Emily Mueller-Lennox: Mm-hmm.
Kara Duffy: not only do I get to introduce the world sometimes to my people, incredible people in my life, but it just makes it so much easier. I saw you on the schedule, I'm like, "Yes, whatever we talk about, it's gonna be great, no matter what."
It doesn't matter the topic. But before I go any further, let's tell everyone your name, where you are in the world, and what we're here to talk about today.
Emily Mueller-Lennox: Yeah. Well, I'm Emily Mueller Lennox. If we're in Germany, we pronounce it Mueller Lennox. And right now I'm in Los Angeles. It's nice and sunny outside. And yeah, we're here to talk about, I guess, career path, where I'm coming from, where I'm going, what I'm building. It's a big moment of transition for me and my family right now, so I think there's a lot to talk about. There's been a lot of learning of-- over, I think, especially the past three years, which I'm excited to share about. So yeah.
Kara Duffy: And you have this great [00:03:00] course and agency called 29 Weeks
Emily Mueller-Lennox: Yes. Yes, exactly. So this is part of what I've been working on in the past... I would say, I think we started working on it about a year ago. The agency, it's called 29 Weeks. I'm building it with my business partner, Kenza. And it's a consultancy about how to really maximize your parental leave time in California.
I had my second baby 19 months ago now but it was my first baby in California, and I realized navigating the system here was pretty crazy. I was a full-time W2 employee at a company that had, pretty decent parental leave but was located in a different state. And so, I was talking to friends and trying to sort together, like, all the information, and I was like, "Gosh, this is like another full-time job to figure out w- what to do."
And there's a lot of kind of veiled information, and [00:04:00] you have to know exactly what to ask in order to get what you need. And HR is definitely not there trying to help you take, as much time off as you can with your baby. And so my business partner and I, she was going through the same thing at the same time at the same company, and we were like, "You know what?
We need to make this more clear for other people and make it easily accessible in a way that, that really speaks to them." I mean, there's a couple of similar maybe kind of like courses out there, but it didn't really feel like they spoke to me and my situation and broke it down. There was still a lot of empty questions, I think with the info that's out there. So we were like, "Let's do this. We're gonna do it."
Kara Duffy: Well, and I love on your website you say that California has some of the best parental leave available in the US but it's really confusing to activate all of the possibilities. Even for myself, 'cause y- what I also love is that the, I believe, final chapter of your course talks about kind of [00:05:00] the exceptions to the rule.
It includes 1099 employees as well, or consultants if you're kinda doing things on your own. And even my own journey of trying to claim my disability with the state went into a black hole, and I was like, "Wait, I'm doing all the right things and no one's responding to my communication." So I had to let that go, and I'm sure I could come back and get my money back at some point, but there's a bunch of disability that's hanging out that I was owed and have not received
Emily Mueller-Lennox: Yeah. This brings up also a really good point is with parental leave in California especially, it's not something that you're getting for free. If you go on disability, you have paid into the system, and it is something that kind of you already saved up for. So if you don't claim those benefits back, you're not getting what you saved.
It's yours already, and it's just, there's a lot of hoops that we have to jump through in order to get it back. But, [00:06:00] as people employed or working in California, this is a system that we contribute to. It's not a free handout for, people who want it. It's, That's how it works.
So I think that's also a important distinction to make as well because I know a lot of people feel like, "Oh, I don't need it." It's well, you paid for it. You need to get it. You paid for it
Kara Duffy: Well, there's also y- you know, the logic of the more people who are taking the steps and claiming it, it's gonna change the s- the statistics and the data that our state and federal leaders are using to decide if we should keep having this, these programs. And so it's if you don't use it, I don't know when or if we will lose it as a collective.
so we should be activating it. We should be using it. If you want more people to have maternity, paternity leave, paid time off, we have to activate the system and be using it 'cause we deserve it, and new parents need all the support that they can get, [00:07:00] even if you think you're gonna be fine.
Emily Mueller-Lennox: Yeah. And even if you feel fine, like you need to have also time off. I think... I mean, I did my first parental leave in Europe, in Germany, and the culture there is just so different surrounding it. I went back to work, I think, at, it was like 10 months, and I went back part-time, and people were shocked that I came back then.
They were like, "Oh my God, where's your baby?" I was like, "In childcare," where they can be happily and play with other babies. But it was... the culture there is like you stay out at least a year, of course. And even though to be really honest the financial support from the government isn't really that high.
It maxes out at a pretty low rate at that time, and now even I think they've added in a new layer where actually if you're over a certain income, you don't get financial support. You have job protection, but you don't get, your [00:08:00] salary. But still, people take the time off. And part of it is really the culture around.
People prepare, they save up, and, of course, it's a luxury to be able to do that, but, it is a very different kind of mindset behind taking the time off. And even, it's getting much more common there for the non-birthing partner to take time off, so the dad or whoever. And that's starting to be more normal which I also would love to see, I think, here as well.
So in California, we also have this split between the job protection and the wage replacement. I think it's really important to separate those two when we're thinking about taking time off and what the state gives you. I think in California it's like the protection is pretty decent and the wage replacement as well is...
it's actually more than what I got in Germany. The wage replacement was about, I think, four times as much here. 'Cause I think the maximum per week was about the maximum per month that I got in [00:09:00] Germany. And, non-birthing partners also get a really big chunk of time to take off with their baby.
It's 12 weeks for both parents and when a new baby arrives for bonding, and that's not even about the disability, and there's wage replacement for eight weeks of that. So it's not bad. Even if your company is "Oh, we don't have a policy," well, the state does. So, it's really interesting, and I think the more people take it, the more it becomes normalized, like you were saying, where it's not seen as this huge risk.
It's just, people go out, they bond with their babies, they come back, and they, go right back into their jobs, and they show that this is just a part of life, and the more that we can also build our businesses around that in a way that, we can share tasks or, I don't know, automate things or whatever it is that we can help to cover while people are gone and support them, and that I think it's really important for the overall wellness and longevity of an employee in a company
Kara Duffy: Can we talk about that for a [00:10:00] second? 'Cause I know that you and I both have opinions having... We've worked at the same corporate company at different time periods, despite everyone thinking that we knew each other that way. And we've been in, in different companies, we've worked in different countries, and like I have a lot of opinions about how I don't think working in Europe we were any less productive than people are in the US, but the level of ease that production happens in Europe is so strikingly different.
And I was speaking with a previous podcast guest who does a lot of DEI and leadership work, Stacey Gordon, and we were talking about how there's this lack of humanity in like how we treat employees in the US. And it's not necessarily that it's always like it's a bad manager or a bad leader.
We have a bad cultural context. [00:11:00] How would you explain the differences of working in Europe versus working in the US, and where there's opportunities to for lack of a better term, chill the fuck out in the US?
Emily Mueller-Lennox: Yeah. I think part of where the lack of humanity comes from is an insecurity in the US, which is really, actually, to be honest pretty well-founded. I think employees are treated as disposable, and so they act disposable. And I've seen it around me a lot. Employees are afraid of losing their jobs,
Kara Duffy: Mm-hmm.
Emily Mueller-Lennox: but they are also happy to leave.
They will change their job much more easily. So there's there's not really a lot of loyalty in either direction. And because of that, I think that employees take advantage of what they can while they're employed. So, I don't think they take their working hours as seriously because there's no time off, so they're like, "I gotta get my [00:12:00] rest somehow."
I it really makes sense to me. I'm not faulting anyone for this. But, I don't have that much time off, so I will minimize the amount of time I need to spend to get my work done, and when I'm done with my work, I'm done. Not "Okay, I'm employed for 40 hours a week, and if I don't have anything else to do, then I do something better or I innovate somehow or contribute to the company because they also maybe contribute to me.
And I know that when I take my time off, I get time off." so I think that's a little bit of a mindset situation, and it might also be a little bit, generational and post-COVID and remote work, that there's a lot less transparency into who's doing what where. But my experience working in Europe was that people, I think, took a lot more pride in the outcome of their work.
The expectan- like, the level of delivery that people had carried themselves to and and really expected of themselves [00:13:00] felt a lot higher. I-- One of the first lessons that I learned, I was an intern. I just joined a big corporate company, and I delivered something to my intern boss, and I was like, "Yeah, let's discuss it."
And it wasn't quite done, but I wanted to talk about it. It was, like, a very kind of American approach. And she was like, "This is not finished. Please finish and come back to me when you're done." And I was like, "I've always been an overachiever, an over-deliverer. No one's ever told me something wasn't good enough."
And and so I learned right then and there oh, only done is done. Like, when I'm finished, it's done. And I think that's kind of generally the approach is if I bring something to my boss, I want it to be in the best situa- like, the best status that I could get it to before I asked for input.
I'm like, "Okay, here's where I brought it to. Now let's bring it to the next level." So I think that's generally the work approach. And then when people go on vacation, they know that they're on vacation. So they really check out. They take one, two [00:14:00] weeks off. Two weeks is normal. Yeah.
And there's, discussion of "Ugh, you really need that first week to just calm down." Of course. What's a long weekend is just a long week. That doesn't even count. That's not a holiday. You need at least a week to calm down, and then you can relax for a week, and people come back fresh. They come back with new ideas, and and there's not a fear of "Well, if I'm not there, they'll realize they can't do it There they'll realize they can do it without me. I think that's a little bit of a mindset here is if I'm not engaged, if I'm not responding, then that means that they can live without me, and then therefore I might lose my job while I'm gone.
Which I don't believe to be true. I usually-- my point of view is people notice you're gone when you're gone, and they notice what you're delivering, if you're delivering. But and if things run smoothly without you while you're gone, well, maybe you set them up for success, and then that's [00:15:00] also clear.
Or, maybe there's something else that you can grow into when you come back because actually you've outgrown your task and maybe, they can be handed to other people, and that would be an interesting discussion, I think. But
Kara Duffy: I do think that there's a-- I felt-- I remember the first time multiple team members of mine in, in Europe were taking holiday at the same time. I was like, "How is this gonna work?" And then it did work, and seeing people take two, three longer periods of time away from work and the work still happening,
Emily Mueller-Lennox: Mm-hmm.
Kara Duffy: and no one doubting that they should come back, no one doubting that they were still a core contributor to the team.
And everyone kind of being like, "Well, yeah," "we're doing a little bit more right now because they're gone. We're very excited when they get, come back and I don't have to do those things." But we're still getting it done. There's a, there was a level of what feels like adult [00:16:00] responsibility that everyone's kinda holding.
There's a collectiveness of we'll all get it done together. There's less thought process from the top down of how do we keep cutting and being efficient all the time, which I think is an ongoing conversation in US businesses. And similarly, I remember watching the garbage collectors going through, and they all wear specific uniforms that are always clean.
They are-- Someone's driving the truck, other people are walking next to the truck. They're putting everything back perfectly. They're picking up random trash they see on the street. And I'm like, "This is bizarre." I have never seen garbage men or women have such reverence for the work that they're doing and their contribution to the community.
And I'm like, "Why do they here?" And I'm like, "Oh, 'cause they're [00:17:00] respected." They're given the same amount of minimum time off that the corporate executives are. They are given the same, healthcare and pensions and human right.
Emily Mueller-Lennox: Mm-hmm.
Kara Duffy: no matter what your job is, you're treated like a human
Emily Mueller-Lennox: Mm-hmm.
Kara Duffy: And we're looking-- like, everyone's contribution to the community is equally valued.
There's not good jobs and dumb jobs. We have this perspective in the US that you're only as good as you're proving to me in the moment, and, oh, doing these jobs is, settling for less, and only what-- only certain people have these jobs, and these jobs over here are what you're really striving for.
And it's such a nonsensical cultural norm that I don't think we realize how it limits everyone's freedom, and everyone's ability, and everyone's peace of mind, because we've decided you have to work [00:18:00] your butt off to get anything. And there's this system of always moving the carrot away
Emily Mueller-Lennox: Mm-hmm.
Kara Duffy: versus just being like, "Can we just stop this?
Everyone gets a carrot." We all have to go to work and do something to contribute.
Emily Mueller-Lennox: Yeah. Yeah, exactly. And I think that one of an offshoot of what you're talking about is also that everyone contributes kind of, in a percentage. So, of course, in the US we have percentage-based tax system, but not really. In my experience in Germany is okay, first off, the tax system is very clear.
There's percentage of tax and you're paying it, and that's it. There's no loopholes. We bought an apartment and I was like: "Where's my mortgage interest tax deduction?" And they were like: "What are you talking about?" So, everyone just pays tax. And also healthcare, it's a single-payer system.
You pay a percentage of your income up to a certain point, so you can always afford it. And there's a lot of other things that are, based on percentage, so you can always afford it. And there's not anyone who's falling out the [00:19:00] bottom. You can't fall out the bottom of the system, and no one at the top is complaining that they're subsidizing the person at the bottom.
There's maybe some talk about oh, someone who's living on welfare, but not really. it's not such a huge theme, and no one is, thinking like: "Oh my God my percentage is subsidizing this family over here who's collecting the trash." No, everyone just gets really decent care.
And even if we're talking about healthcare, which now we're getting into political land, but if we're talking about healthcare even very high earners opt into the same exact healthcare system as the person picking up the trash. So they're going to the same doctors, they get the same treatment, it's the same kind of decision-making.
There's no... Y- there's an option to opt out of that public system, but not e- not even the people who can afford it all take it because the public system is very good and very reliable, and there's nothing worse about that one versus others. And I think that's pretty impressive, actually. But [00:20:00] again, comes back to mindset because there is...
we all pay into it at a percentage that we can afford, and then we all benefit equally. So, there's some subsidizing going on, which I think Americans have a really hard time subsidizing other people because we're all about bootstrapping and it must be your fault if if you don't get that carrot, which I don't believe, but
Kara Duffy: No, and I don't-- and I think that's changing so much, right? You mentioned no one falls out of the bottom, and there are-- the percentage of who falls out of the bottom is so small that you don't, on a regular basis you're not noticing it. Whereas right now in the US, the majority of Americans are falling out of the bottom, and we don't acknowledge it because what do you mean someone who's earning six figures is currently falling out of the bottom?
And it's
Emily Mueller-Lennox: Yeah
Kara Duffy: yeah, like our previous socioeconomic tiers don't apply [00:21:00] anymore. The... I was reading this for an article I'm writing on Substack that the definition of middle class has been that after you pay for your house and your car and your groceries and your insurance and your utilities, you should have more than 50% of your monthly salary still available And I was like, "Okay, based on that definition I don't know anyone who qualifies as middle class."
Emily Mueller-Lennox: I definitely don't. I definitely don't. I mean, definitely not in Los Angeles. I don't know, I don't know anyone.
Kara Duffy: I don't know anyone in Texas. I don't know anyone in California. I don't know anyone in Massachusetts, in New York. I will keep digging. I'm gonna be-- I'm putting this out now. If anyone listens to this and you get to keep over 50% of your salary a month after you pay those core things, I wanna know where you live and how much money you're making
Emily Mueller-Lennox: Yeah.
I was gonna take it back to the employee [00:22:00] behavior piece of this and the fear of falling out the bottom. And I think that because there is... in Europe, because there's not a fear of falling out the bottom, people can behave differently at work because they could maybe take a risk at work.
They also know that if they're laid off, they're gonna have a long period of time, and they will be, like, compensated probably at their layoff in a way that they can go further even before government benefits kick in. So I think that they don't feel this kind of anxiety that they either need to be on all the time or they, need to extract as much as possible from their company, whether it's given or taken either.
And on the other hand, I do think that the insecurity leads also to a lot of creativity. So, if you have an idea in the US and California, [00:23:00] fine. You have a motivation to go and do it because if it might make you some side income, that will significantly help the way you live.
And if you can automate it back to the maternity leave piece "Oh, well, that might help me while I'm out." Of course, it impacts your benefits from the government and everything, but there's a real motivation and a real payoff, and I definitely think that encourages creativity and innovation and might turn into something totally independent where you're like, "Well, I don't need a corporate employer anymore anyway."
So there's... On the other, there's kinda pros and cons, I think, to the situation. But to get those pros, you already have to be in a pretty, I think good situation really.
Kara Duffy: There's so much different layers of privilege based on what type of employee class you are, and I think that's also such a hindrance, right? Like The great example that c- that Stacey was mentioning is that as a... To do a leadership test is [00:24:00] if you have to ask permission to take the time off that you legally have access to, and someone has to review it and approve it and say yes, that's not treating people like adults.
Like you should be able to just say, "I'm taking it. I've, planned ahead. I've delegated my things. Here's the plan for while I'm gone, and I'll be back in a week." Like it shouldn't be up for conversation when you take your time, assuming that if... 'Cause there w- there's like this element of if we treat people like grownups, they will rise up and be grownups.
Like no one... To get time off when I was working in Europe, there wasn't like... No one's doing the scam of "How do I maximize all of this time because I don't get any, and I'm gonna stick it to the man." There wasn't this stick it to the man feeling
Emily Mueller-Lennox: No
Kara Duffy: because there wasn't a man to stick it to. It was like there's...
I feel like there's a level of building things for a reasonable [00:25:00] man standard where it's yes, of course, it might take someone nine months to find a new job. That's actually quite typical, so maybe we cover people for nine months when they're laid off. Or what if we remove your healthcare from being tied to your job because then you don't need to be a slave and stuck at a job because you'll have healthcare no matter what.
Emily Mueller-Lennox: Mm-hmm.
Kara Duffy: there's just these logical things that like I feel have been applied and I don't know. I'm... this scarcity, this that other people are not working as hard as we are, that other people can't run their lives properly, like despite there being conversations about "Don't tell me what to do in the US," we actually tell most of the working class people exactly what they can and can't do.
Emily Mueller-Lennox: Yes. We're not that free here in the US. Like, when you really boil it down, we're not at all. And the things that we are beholden to are [00:26:00] corporations, our jobs our bills, and that's been... I think-- I moved back here three years ago. That was a really interesting experience.
I'd done, like, all of my growing into big adulting in Europe, and coming back here, I was kinda shocked. We would complain about the bureaucracy in Germany "Oh my God, the paperwork." I'm like, "Yeah, but you submit the paper and it's fine," It's usually relatively clear what you need to do, and then you do it, and then it's fine.
But I felt like here I just was, like, drowning in personal admin. My personal life admin just got huge, and in order to then make up for that time, there's a lot of convenience features, but those take time to manage too, and they cost money. So, I'm taking all this time for my personal admin, and then I have my convenience stuff, but I gotta manage that too, so that adds to my personal admin. And then it all just kind of, turns into this wheel race somehow of I'm just trying to catch up, and I feel like I somehow can't get ahead of this. And
Kara Duffy: [00:27:00] At a both a time and money perspective.
Emily Mueller-Lennox: 100%
Yes because the more you have, the more you manage, and then you-- the more time you need to manage that.
And your leisure is then managed. And I don't know. It's-- there's some-- there's just this frenetic kind of movement that happens here. And there's not I think it-- there's not that pause, really, There's not really the downtime. And don't get me wrong I enjoy the busyness.
Like when I first moved back I remember I said to my husband, I was like, "Oh my God, people here are so busy. They're so busy." And now we're super busy, and but I like it because if I want to I can call my friends and, we'll spontaneously meet up somewhere. And there's always someone who's ready to do something, and there's not as many noes.
There's just a lot of yeses, and that's really fun,
Kara Duffy: yeah. But this personal admin piece, ties back to why 29 Weeks matters so much because [00:28:00] figuring out what it means to take maternity or paternity leave is a full-time job.
Emily Mueller-Lennox: Yes.
Kara Duffy: And it, it really is. So having a course like what you put together and having the consulting services like you put together, it gives just people a checklist to here's what to ask, here's what to follow, here's what to do.
And it's cutting that personal admin time from hours and hours of research and feeling like you don't have all the questions, let alone the answers, to it just being like, it's done.
Emily Mueller-Lennox: Yeah. Yeah. So our course is like a little over an hour of video. It's very digestible, like very small chunks, so you can do it like piece by piece. In every module, we have all the links that you need, like back to the California website, and to like EDD, defines all the terms, because the whole thing's to start off, it's like alphabet soup, and you're like, "I don't even know what all this is." We have visuals [00:29:00] that break it down. So just like kind of collecting everything into one spot was, I think, a big piece of the work. And then we made a, like a calculator that just starts with a form, and you just answer the questions like, are you planning this? Are you planning that? How much time have you taken?
How much do you plan? And it like calculates into a Google sheet that then you can play with later, but it starts already filled for you. Because I think that's really kind of the hardest part is like, how much can I take, and what does it look like in real life?
Because the reality is, in California, you can be out for like up to a little over seven months if you know how to listen to yourself, how to advocate for yourself with your doctor and what the system really affords for you. And that's a lot of time. That's just for i'll speak for myself as a birthing person, like I could take that much time, and then as a non-birthing person, you can do another 12 weeks.
So you can really maximize the time that [00:30:00] if you can and want to, you could be, like your new baby could be with one of the parents. and then there's some other things that California law allows, like also if you're a person who wanted to care for the birthing person and you are an employer, employee, you actually have the right to take time off to care for the birthing person even if you're not related.
So, if your relationship is like family, you have the right to take time off to care for the birthing person. So, It's very interesting what you can do under California law or what you might have the opportunity to do. I guess I have to say it that way. But again, you have to know what those like potentials are and where those inflection points are.
So I think one of the other points that, 29 Weeks helps with is like this uncertainty. Because when I was going through it, I was like, "Okay, so I think this is how it works. Is that... Am I doing something wrong?" What's that [00:31:00] moment where when do I ask my doctor? Like, when do I tell my doctor I don't feel great?
Like I-- In my-- In both of my postpartums I was really anxious. I think this is very normal. I kind of like-- As you're caring for this like new little human and you realize your job is to not have them die, that's like pretty much the job in the beginning. They're not responding to you.
They're just like a human who can't do anything, and I had these like moments of realizing I'm like, "Oh my God, my job is to keep this thing alive, actually. Like this baby, keep them alive." It becomes for me like very anxiety ridden. I get a lot of intrusive thoughts. Like example of intrusive thought that doesn't have to do with the baby, I was at the ice cream shop yesterday, and they give you the sample, and then there's like this spoon, dirty spoon disposal.
My intrusive thought is, "Don't take one of those dirty spoons. Be sure you don't take one of those dirty spoons." And I'm like What kind of a thought is that? I would never. I would [00:32:00] never. But the brain offers up these scenarios to keep you from being in danger. And in your postpartum, that portion of your brain kicks into overdrive because it's really important that as a caregiver, you're scanning for danger, you are checking to make sure...
It's it's very evolutionary. Think of yourself in a cave. you're checking for the coyotes that are maybe gonna come, in our modern world, there's not really that much to be afraid of, but the brain is still offering up these, these scenarios, and they can be really upsetting.
And so it goes beyond an ice cream spoon that's been licked by a stranger. But so y- there's all kinds of things like that, that we don't talk about. We... They aren't normalized, so you might be thinking like, "Well, that's just how it is," and it's no, that's not how it is.
And you don't have to suffer. You need to tell your doctor about those things. And, the doctors, of course, are also trained in this, and they can refer you to a mental health specialist, for example who can, help give you [00:33:00] suggestions. I w- was talking to a therapist after...
during this postpartum and, I'm a normal thinking person, but she gave me the advice "You need to find a group to join. Find a mommy and me group." And I'm like, so lame. I don't wanna, I don't wanna join a mommy and me group. What are we gonna talk about? Our drooling babies? And it turns out that, things like that are helpful for, just meeting other people, having a routine to get yourself out of the house.
This can be very difficult when you have a fresh baby and you don't have practice getting out. And so can start to get very in these depression cycles of staying home and worrying and being alone, and then it kind of, reinforces itself. And so when you reach out for help in California, one, you can have your disability extended, which is amazing because, I mean, there is a really long period of time that you can be under disability in California and a pretty [00:34:00] decent amount of time, seventeen point three weeks, that you can have wage replacement under disability as a pregnant person or a birthing person in California.
That's a really long time. That's, four... over four months or exactly four months. and I think that it's really important to fully recover in all the ways while you're in disability instead of being like, "Well, I have 12 weeks more of bonding. I'll be better during that bonding time." It's no, you're supposed to be in very good health, so you can enjoy your bonding as a recovered person
Kara Duffy: And actually bond, 'cause you can't bond if you can't be making eye contact, if you don't wanna be holding them, if you're not engaged with them. What...
Emily Mueller-Lennox: every second,
Kara Duffy: Mm-hmm. And something that I was experiencing was the, again, totally normal chemical shifts is that all of our senses, the filters turn off. So suddenly you see a lot more stuff than you would normally [00:35:00] see, and like lights are gonna impact you more, sounds impact you more.
And again, it's that filtering for fear system. I'm in a position where I get to control my environments both at home and at work. But you can imagine that if you're suddenly, neurodivergent for a period of time while your brain is different than it was, being forced to go into a work environment that's just ramping up your anxiety and overwhelm is not good for anyone.
And if you have a supportive workplace, they might be like, "Okay, great. Work from home more," or, "Here's a separate room for you to work in." But most people aren't gonna get that because they've never experienced it. And just staying at home and waiting versus rushing back into
Emily Mueller-Lennox: Yeah
Kara Duffy: corporate life is probably not a bad idea.
And I just, I'm sitting here just like also thinking about so many people who are hourly employees
and that [00:36:00] don't have access to all of the levels and tiers. do you know where that dividing line is in California of what all employees have access to versus 'Cause I know there's like privileged employees if they're salary versus not.
Like who's paid hourly versus salary and like things like that shift your benefits sometime.
Emily Mueller-Lennox: I Don't believe they really do. It's, it's-- You have to reach certain thresholds in terms of how much time you've worked and how much money you've earned, but the thresholds are not incredibly high, so a average... a full-time hourly worker would easily meet them. And even a part-time hourly worker.
But then your benefits, of course, slide with how much, you've earned in the past quarter. But to qualify for benefits is a very low threshold, and the protection, like receiving job protection, starts also very early. So if your employer [00:37:00] replaces you and doesn't give you the same job back, even if you're an hourly worker, you have the right to, complain against them.
You have the right to go back into that same job after you've taken leave, and they can't tell you no. And even if you need accommodation while you're pregnant, they have to give that to you. And something else that, we bring up in, in our course is actually telling your employer earlier rather than later.
So one of the things that, that can happen, of course, is in early pregnancy, you can feel really bad, and you can call out from work sick more than you would, or you can perform poorly. If you haven't told them that you are pregnant, they can fire you for bad performance. But if you have told them, then you can request accommodation, and it could be retaliation if they then, remove you from your duties without agreeing that it's an accommodation or something like that.
So I think it, it's-- [00:38:00] there's also part of this kind of taboo, not only of taking the time but also of telling your employer that you are pregnant is... it, I think is really important because your protection is only there if they know. But if you're not performing and you didn't tell them, then they can, kinda do their normal thing.
So the law is actually quite generous in California.
And the protections kind of apply for a decent period of time after you come back, like the period of time. So I think one of the cool things that we did also when we created our course is we-- I mean, we're not lawyers. We're just conglomerating the information that we have.
But we did speak with a lawyer and had her review our stuff and talked about it with her before we published to make sure that, everything really was aligned. And obviously, it's not legal advice. But I think that it's much more comfortable for us. And also it's been vetted.
Exactly. It's been vetted. So, our experience is true and the information [00:39:00] that, that we've gathered also, Makes sense and is in line with what the law provides for us. And that's literally, that's all it is. It's it's what you already have. The law protects you. Let's tell you what the law protects you from and how it protects you and how to make sure that you are being protected what you can ask for from your employer under the law.
A lot of employers, they don't know. They don't, they really don't know. So you're the one who has to tell them. especially if your employer is across the whole country, they're definitely not experts in every state law, so you might have to tell them what your rights are. I definitely had to even inform my benefits provider.
my company had a separate insurance company to deal with leaves and short-term disability benefits that they gave as a separate benefit, but they were calculating my leaves completely wrong. And I knew that because I read deeply into what [00:40:00] everything was, and I calculated it myself, and I had to go back to them many times and said, "No, this doesn't make sense.
My disability and my bonding cannot run simultaneously. That's not how it works. Legally, by law, they cannot." And eventually, we got to, to the dates that were correct, but it took some advocating. So I-- that's the other thing that I think, 29 Weeks teaches you, is that you become an expert.
You become your own advocate. We have templates of how to communicate those things. Citing the different laws is always very important when you're stating what you're doing and going back to treating employees like adults. We don't talk about really asking. You are informing.
And of course the employer does need to agree in certain circumstances, but it's your right by law of many, in many of the cases. And you are telling them what you will do. And of course, as a good employee, you will do the things like when you go on vacation, like help make sure that your, your tasks are [00:41:00] covered.
And onboard if they're gonna have someone who's coming to replace during that time. Onboard that person. Be a nice person. You don't just check out and leave and say, "It's your problem," 'cause you don't wanna come back to a mess either, because you wanna come back, and you don't wanna come back to a mess.
Kara Duffy: I think that it's striking to me how much in the new mom maternity spaces, there's so much conversation about having to teach everyone what it actually looks like to advocate for yourself.
Emily Mueller-Lennox: Mm-hmm.
Kara Duffy: And I really see the gap in why are we not teaching people how to advocate for yourself in all the areas all the time?
Because, like, all employees have rights and laws that support them, and all humans have, boundaries they wanna be upholding and things that are not okay. And, somewhere in the same system that's taught us to be... That we are disposable and it's our fault if things aren't [00:42:00] working, we've also been taught to ignore what we are feeling and know and understand because we must-- If it's not working, we must have something wrong or incorrect.
Emily Mueller-Lennox: Yeah
Kara Duffy: I'm not surprised that there's a correlation right now between the biggest advocates who are speaking up for things right now happen to be parents and moms in particular because there's-- it's th-the first time in modern American culture where we have to come back to listening to ourselves and our bodies and turning that intuition and knowing on that we've been told for so long to turn off.
Emily Mueller-Lennox: I have a lot of thoughts around this. I think I experienced really for the first time what it was to like advocate on behalf of someone, not myself, when I had a child. So like I learned... I for example, I hate making phone calls, but I will always make a phone [00:43:00] call when it is in regard to my kid.
Like I, I don't like to make doctor's appointments. I will do it very on time for my child, but I don't like to do it for me. So there's like a lesson in advocating that comes when you have a kid because the stakes feel different somehow. They can't do it for themselves, so you step up and do it for them.
And I-- then as they get older, you start to see how I'll speak for myself, I started to see how I was taught to quiet myself my whole life, and I don't know if it's Because I'm a girl, because I'm a woman or what the aspect is. I, and I, of course, I go back to, I'm sure it's because I was brought up in a family with I have three sisters and a brother.
It was important that we were kind of the ducklings in a row. This was, like, a point of pride in the family. We were all very well-behaved. And that meant [00:44:00] following and falling in line, and not necessarily speaking up for my own perspective or what I needed because it was about the the family and how things are working.
And I think there's something interesting to think about there when it comes to collective societies as well, because I don't... I think this is one of the negative things that comes out, is you don't know how to advocate for yourself. But what I've learned as a parent of two girls is when they speak up for themselves and say what they need or even in public asking very clearly for what they need or even at a friend's house asking for what they need.
I sometimes get very uncomfortable, and I realize that's because I was brought up to go with the flow. And I try very hard to not silence that intuition from my own children of what they need and the innate ability to ask for that without any [00:45:00] shame. And it's really interesting that flows into, of course, the people who are silenced are then the ones who need to advocate them, for themselves to get what they need when it comes to their recovery from, giving birth, or transitioning into parenthood.
And it's kind of a cruel joke that and it's not a joke because it's kinda how the system works. We're supposed to be quiet and come back to work and pretend like we don't have a family at all, and we're fine. Even though if you follow the normal timeline, you are still probably pretty broken when you go back to your hourly job or your salary desk or whatever it is if you haven't taken advantage of what's actually available to you because our, corporate masters, it's really in their interest that we stay within the lines, and that's, that whole system I think is very-- it [00:46:00] intersects, and it builds on itself, and it's very... There's a lot to think about and unpack in that whole situation.
Kara Duffy: it reminds me of like other things that surprised me working in Europe was how aware of what the boundaries were and the rights were, like every employee knew. Like the second you tried to tell them they had to stay late or that they, that maybe that's not a good time to take a vacation or something, like they were immediately like, "You can't tell me what to do here." Like the level of awareness and like we don't cross this boundary was like really interesting to me because while yes, often we'd get to a resolution of, "Okay, for the next week we're having an important sales meeting, like we're gonna, we're requesting that you can st- if you can stay later. Thank you, I appreciate it." But the idea that the boundaries between what happens outside of work and work, like work is contained
Emily Mueller-Lennox: Mm-hmm.
Kara Duffy: in a way that most [00:47:00] of the American workforce doesn't understand that it can be contained that way, even if it's a job that you can leave at work. So we don't realize how often work is spilling into the choices that we make.
"No, I can't volunteer at my kid's school because I have to work," and, "No I can't be the one that picks them up because I have to work until this certain amount of time." There's all these things that we don't even like question like could it be done a different way because work is first and everything else is second.
Emily Mueller-Lennox: And I mean, to the point of volunteering at your kid's school, there actually is a California law that you are allowed to... You're protected during that time. You're not-- You don't have to be paid, but you're protected. But in a, on a bigger picture, another kind of reflection that I had when we moved back here and the contrasts were still really obvious to me was that in Germany specifically, I felt like people were more integrated.
So, here in LA, I felt people had [00:48:00] really siloed their lives. So, at work, they were their work persona, and they didn't have families. They they didn't have kids, and they pretended everything was okay, and it was like this on and off thing. And also, work did influence a lot of the decisions, but there was, like, this kind of different them, and then there was, like, their family them, and then there was also this individual them, and they weren't integrated together.
So, like, when people were with their families they also still really yearned for this non-family self, and they needed to go and I don't know be alone, get away from the kids, and whatever. And I'm like, I-- It was really shocking to me when I got here that ultimate relaxation was something that excluded, their family, and that was, like, the best thing they could really think about. And I do get it, of course. I do enjoy time just with my partner or just with my girlfriends. But it was, like, the way that it was somehow approached and the [00:49:00] fact that at work, no one really like, mentioned their families
Kara Duffy: It's like it's a secret burden
Emily Mueller-Lennox: Yes. You can't really talk about it.
You can't... I don't know, when I was in Germany, I would clearly say that I was leaving early to pick up my kid for a doctor appointment, but I felt like here it was like, "Oh, really?" "Oh, should I li- should I lie about it?" "Oh. Oh, I guess we're not transparent about that."
Or it was much more common for a kid to pop up in the Zoom, or like the Teams call. It was really common and we kinda knew each other's kids that would show up in the background and we, we knew what was going on with them. And when I changed companies while I was here in LA, and in the, in my new one no one-- I didn't know who had kids, and I never saw them in a Zoom, and I was like, "Oh, okay."
No one... We- we're definitely not doing that. And I thought that was really interesting because people worked really hard to silo their lives, and I feel [00:50:00] like that causes a lot of tension and a lot of anxiety and a lot of stress as well, 'cause you're not your whole self.
Kara Duffy: And I don't know if this is just my personality or it's built up of the journey that I've gone on so far. I just, I have no patience for being a different person in different spaces. I just, I can't. Of all the decisions that have to get made in a day, I'm like, m- I can't be bothered to be performative in a masking way.
I have no patience for having to do interoffice politics. I just, I'm choosing to delete those things from my life. And even being a parent I really hear myself and you talking about I, like, why are we separate? I chose this. I want this all in one because that's kind of, [00:51:00] it's all me showing up all the time.
And it's been really interesting where there's certain days that I have support and coverage with a nanny, and there are other days that I don't. And if people want to have a meeting or do a networking lunch or or a working lunch even on the days I don't have the nanny, I'll say "Sure, I'm available, and my kid's coming if we're doing that day."
Emily Mueller-Lennox: Mm-hmm.
Kara Duffy: can choose. If you want, if you're okay with the kid being there on the call or in the in-person meeting, great. But if you, if we have to meet those days, that's what's happening." The other days, I can show up without them. M- and of course, there's things where I'm like, that's not appropriate, and I don't...
I'm gonna make sure it's on those days. But it's also really not a big deal. I did one yesterday. I'm like, this is fine. She's behaving. Everything's fine. I come prepared. To know that there would've been 50,000 other steps to do it a different way, [00:52:00] again I don't know if it's just that my, I'm so programmed for what's the simple, easy, efficient way?
But I'm like, this dividing of things, I just don't have capacity for. And I think that it's an illusion that's really taxing on our mental and emotional states for no reason, 'cause we, it's not necessary 90% of the time
Emily Mueller-Lennox: Yeah, 100%. I mean, when it comes to the masking I don't have the energy to keep it up. I forget. So like it's not really a choice. I just am me all the time.
But I think that, recognizing the humanity also of like our teams, like as a manager is the other piece of this. As I've, moved up within like different organizations, like one, I aim to hire a diverse group of people and that I don't mean just how [00:53:00] they look.
But if I come into an org and there's no one with families, I really try to hire people who have families if I can. Like I, I don't see that as a negative. I think it's important because it helps bring some, I think like different weight to the work. Like one, people have a reason to be showing up to work every day, and they also have something else, there's something else outside of work. They're not dying over this job. They're committed because they have a family to provide for, but they also have something, that's driving them outside of the company. And the other thing is I know and understand what it is to be a parent and so, I can be a very human boss for those people.
And I think that part of the culture is very important as a manager to drive. And yeah, of course, I want the highest output from, people who report to me, but I also I want them to be happy. And I [00:54:00] know that if you're happy and respected as a person, then you're very likely to be, like decently high performing and also loyal.
And it's not like just a strategic play. Like it's just-- it's nice to be-- to, to come to work with people who have diverse interests and have, different things driving them. And again, it doesn't have to be just family things. Like I, I think that it's important to also recognize that, for example if we're okay with someone with a-- with kids is like leaving at 3:00 for a doctor's appointment, there's also things that you as a non-parent need to do to take care of yourself, and it's also okay for you to take care of yourself obviously within the boundaries of whatever your company policy is.
But that's another kind of like dichotomy that I really try to work against is like just the people with families get the flexibility and everyone else has to pick up the slack 'cause that can happen sometimes. But like you were saying with, vacation approach, [00:55:00] we all pitch in and some people pick up at one point and some people pick up at another, and I think that's important.
So yeah.
Kara Duffy: I mean, I had an experience at one of my early corporate jobs where we did have a lot of women on the team. We did have a probably half that had kids. We were in a place where it was, there was a daycare on site. It was, like, very pro, like, how do we keep new parents employed and staying and wanting to be here?
But then those of us who were single in particular at the time and no kids kept being like, "Can you guys stay late?" 'Cause they can't. And I remember having to say, "I will be single forever if you don't let me leave the office." This doesn't work. Happy to support during working hours, but no, I can't do...
we're just, I just wanna leave at regular time. I'm not asking to leave early. Just no, but no, I can't stay late to finish the project 'cause someone had to leave at 3:00 today.
Emily Mueller-Lennox: Yeah. I can't be the default just because I don't have a family. I'm not I'm not [00:56:00] subsidizing that because I'm-- that's not my stage of life. And I think that's totally fair, and I think it's important to recognize that also like within your own team is like w- everyone needs to have the chance to have a full life, like outside of the office.
And to the, to that point too, like it can't always be the mothers, and that's something that I also, really try to focus on. I mean, when I came to LA and was building a team, like I hired dads, And they were also active participants in their families' lives, and I expected that, and I welcomed that.
And when it comes again to parental leave and then again back to 29 Weeks, like we do talk about what a non-birthing parent has rights for. And I think that just knowing that helps to encourage that kind of like equal participation because something that I really try to work [00:57:00] against is like that default parent always being the one who birthed because it's not fair.
And a lot of the situations that, that come up with that, the birthing parent becoming the default parent is because, especially even at the beginning, being like, "Well, what can I do?" And it's well, there's a lot that you can do after... just because, you didn't give birth to the baby, there's a lot that you can do during that time, and if you aren't involved during that time, the baby does start to default then to the birthing parent, and then it becomes like this self-fulfilling prophecy.
But it's important that, also the non-birthing, non-birthing parents understand that they also have rights and that they do start to take that time because in some of the companies that I've been in, like men are never considered like a risk when it comes to taking parental leave. And it's well, technically they should be an equal risk because they have like really close to equal rights.
They have the same bonding rights in California, and if they take [00:58:00] them, if they're aware that they have those rights, like we should consider that anyone in child-bearing situations might go on leave and should go on leave, and we should have a plan to cover anyone. Also because anyone can become disabled at any point in time, like it's not just about having a family. It's like anyone can have an accident and have-- or anyone can have a mental health crisis and go, like it
Kara Duffy: Or need to help someone else in their family who is.
Emily Mueller-Lennox: Yes.
Kara Duffy: a- and this really brings up the, this approach that I, and I... This may be, like, the defining factor between a European approach versus a, an North American US approach of US companies are always trying to operate at the razor's edge. the least amount of people with the most amount of money and the most projects we can squeeze through. And I don't... [00:59:00] That's not what I ever advise clients to operate at because it's not a sustainable, safe, reliable operating system. Because to your point anything could happen at any time, and one person needing to just simply cut back hours, not even take time off, just cut back hours, can completely ruin the system.
We shouldn't be operating at 100% or even 120% capacity. We really need to look at what does an 80% capacity look like for everyone on the team. 'Cause even if we were trying to fill up someone's schedule, everyone who's a manager needs 20% of time at a minimum to just manage the people. And
this-
Emily Mueller-Lennox: I almost say 80% of the time
Kara Duffy: could be. It could be. It could be, right? Depending on how many people you have and what's going on. But,
Emily Mueller-Lennox: Mm-hmm.
Kara Duffy: this idea that we're gonna give you 40 hours of work for all 52 weeks of the [01:00:00] year that's just... It's bad math. It's really bad math because we're not factoring in that there's, that we're working with biological humans.
We can- with robots, we still can't do that because machinery breaks and needs repairs, and sometimes goes in the fritz. and so I think that there's room to look at how we're building businesses at all levels, and also how we're designing our own lives, going back to your huge increase in personal admin.
What are we doing to not fill up all the spaces so that there's room for flexibility, there's good surprises out there too, and we're not leaving room for the good or the bad often.
I happened to see a client, we were screen sharing and they shared their calendar 'cause they switched tabs on accident, and I gasped out loud because they had so many back-to-back meetings every day.
And I was like, "Wait, hold [01:01:00] on a second. We have to redo your entire schedule." They're like, "What are you talking about?" I'm like, "You don't have room for lunch, for bathroom breaks, for stretch, standing up and not looking at your computer, for a meeting that runs over. there should be clear breaks between all of your things."
And I'm like and you own your business, so, there's no, no protections for you and your time." But, like, how do you function that way? And why is that what we are pointing to from your point earlier of our point of pride should not be, "Look at how insane I'm choosing to function."
Emily Mueller-Lennox: Yeah. And I do think that, again, because of the insecurity, having an insane schedule helps people to feel like they're needed and therefore not disposable. But it's like just 'cause you're in a lot of meetings doesn't mean that you're not disposable. I've-- I mean, while I was here in LA, I lost my job [01:02:00] twice, and That I really now I'm saying that it was the best thing that, that happened.
I had been employed for 13 years by one, one employer, and I-- it was shocking, of course, but it was so good because I found another job. Surprise, I found another job. And then when I started the other job, it was very clear to me, or much more clear to me what my skill set was when I changed employers, because the surroundings changed, and then it was really clear what I was doing versus what the environment was giving me or asking from me.
And so it was clear what was coming from me versus what was coming from the company. And so I was really able to identify oh, what was gaslighting? And oh, what are my innate skills? What do I naturally tend towards? And [01:03:00] so all of those things like all of a sudden became really clear.
And then at that new company they decided to move headquarters, and I actively chose not to move with them. Which again, can be a scary thing, but I was like, "I've been through this before. It's gonna be fine." I anyways am building up my consultancy, like in the background and the process of building the consultancy has been really interesting too because my business partner and I decided to do it together.
And it's been fun, like I keep coming back to this quote and I honestly, I should know who said this, but it's-- and maybe you know because it's a very common one. If you wanna go fast, go alone, but if you wanna go far, go together. And I am a very fast person. Like I, I love to go fast.
I like to make decisions. I like to make things happen. But how me and Kenza have been working on this together is it's been just fun. Like we're learning new [01:04:00] skills together. We're like brainstorming together. So it's been a much more kind of like life-giving experience rather than like I, I wanna make some extra income and I wanna support, other people on this journey.
It's been also like personally very enriching to do it in like relationship with someone. And so taking that as a benefit for myself too has been really nice, and so Having kind of the idea of well, we can really push like really hard with this if we want to, or, if we're both working full time and we- we're building it on the side and tapping into, you know, our different networks and talking to people that we know about it and, kind of taking it at a human pace that's a different approach.
So in any case yeah, it's been a very interesting experience building that and learning what my own skills are and why we do the things that we do. I think before, before we [01:05:00] started talking, I was looking up the name of a book that I read recently, and I always forget the name of it.
But, it's called "The Search," and it was very interesting for me because it-- I think that Gen Z understands this concept much more natively than millennials do, 'cause we really grapple with it. But that our work goals can be very different at different parts in life and the different jobs that we have.
We all have many different jobs, we're all caregiving in one way or another. We're, we have our big main job. We have our side job. We have our wish job. And all these different things that they can shift in importance, and they can shift in what they're giving to us. And kind of keeping that in mind as I build something on the side, or I take a n- a new bigger job or, whatever it is.
I take a risk by saying, "No, I'm not gonna move to North Carolina." All those kind of things I think are important to not judge yourself with, it's [01:06:00] okay if your big job just pays your money just pays your bills. That's okay. Maybe you're getting, your passion out in a side job, or maybe it's more of a wish where you hope that becomes your main job at some point.
But it doesn't have to be in a rush, and like I said, I think that's more of a learning process for a millennial who was told they need a career and this is a straight line. But Gen Z knows that it's not a straight line anymore, and they're kind of, open to opportunities, and I think that's a really worthwhile thing to spend your time even thinking about, and wrestling with.
Kara Duffy: and I think that's one of the gifts of becoming a parent is that it, it gives you a clear moment to reassess
Emily Mueller-Lennox: Mm-hmm.
Kara Duffy: what you want and what you don't want. And I think I drive my clients crazy sometimes because I want them asking those questions at least twice a year, if not quarterly. And granted, we don't need to go through the ent- all the areas.
I like people to go [01:07:00] back to their why for, but I don't think that We enough really sit back and say "Why this house? Why this relationship? Why this person? Why this job? Why do I eat this for breakfast?" We don't stop to look at it and reflect and then choose again whether it's that or something else, because we...
It's like it can be really overwhelming to have to be always in, in choice, so I don't want that for people either. But I think that we have opportunities to like just be more intentional and choose it for ourselves versus the, train we've been on and the track we've been following or 'cause we...
I don't think we realize how often the life we're living was designed by somebody else and not ourselves.
Emily Mueller-Lennox: Mm-hmm.
Kara Duffy: And we can make whatever rules up we want, and like we can really step into being the main character of our life if we want to. [01:08:00] And it actually im- opens up so many more things for us. A lot of the work I'll do with a client is about like the alignment component.
And like you and I were talking about this when we were spending time together a couple weeks ago of when things are aligned for you in ways in more than one box,
Emily Mueller-Lennox: Mm-hmm.
Kara Duffy: like this magnetic a moment happens where you're like, "What? That's so weird. Why are all these other things suddenly easier?" And it's yeah, 'cause you chose yourself and you just started doing what you were naturally doing anyway.
And you're like, "That's so weird." Like my natural... The things that occur to me as easy are actually really valuable and allow, together we're going farther, but it's like together in alignment, like that's when we start getting into the anything is possible phrases,
Emily Mueller-Lennox: yeah
Kara Duffy: from, our friends with the three stripes.
Or no, theirs isn't impossible, it's nothing. Yes.
Emily Mueller-Lennox: Yes. Yeah.
Kara Duffy: but so yeah, but I'm super grateful that you've made [01:09:00] this course and have the consulting option as well for people to ask their specific questions. I think it's so needed. And I think it's also really empowering for people to know that you've taken this on and you're doing it, and you've gotten another corporate job offer.
So you're not like... You're still living in both of these worlds as you're moving forward. So for people who want to buy the course, work with you, talk more about this, where can they find, follow, and do all of those things?
Emily Mueller-Lennox: Yes. I mean, our website would be the place to start. It's just 29weeks.com with two nine. And all the information is there, the links to our socials how to contact us, get on the mailing list. There's a little teaser kind of like taste test of the course where we kind of lay it out, which is great to go and watch. And it gives you a little bit of a preview of exactly what to expect. And yeah, everything you need is there.
Kara Duffy: I love it. Well, thank you so much for being a [01:10:00] yes to sharing about this. Again, thank you for making it. Thank you for being a friend. And yeah, I can't wait to continue having philosophical discussions with you about how we can change the world
Emily Mueller-Lennox: Same. Same. Thank you. This was fun
Kara Duffy: Thanks for listening to the Powerful Ladies Podcast. If you enjoyed this conversation, please subscribe, leave us a review, or share it with a friend. Head to thepowerfulladies.com where you can find all the links to connect with today's guest, show notes, discover like episodes, enjoy bonus content, and more.
We'll be back next week with a brand-new episode and new amazing guest. Make sure you're following us on Instagram or Substack @powerfulladies to get the first preview of next week's episode. You can find me on all my socials @karaduffy.com. Until then, I hope you're taking on being powerful in your life.
Go be awesome and up to something you [01:11:00] love
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Created and hosted by Kara Duffy
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