Episode 49: The GPS to Joy | Maryl Petreccia | Author & Entrepreneur
Maryl Petreccia is an entrepreneur, dancer, author, and self-proclaimed Joy Expert who has lived through nine major losses in seven years, including the death of her husband, and still chooses to live life at an 11+. Drawing on her book GPS to Joy, she shares how to navigate life’s toughest transitions, find your way forward, and create joy even in the midst of grief. Maryl opens up about becoming an entrepreneur at 21, building businesses without a mentor, and the resilience it took to rebuild her life after unimaginable loss. She reflects on lessons from her immigrant family, her love of ballroom dancing, and the golden breadcrumbs of wisdom she leaves for others. If you’ve ever wondered how to transform challenges into possibility, Maryl’s story will show you what’s possible when you trust that what you need will find you.
“Anything that feels like a roadblock or challenge is the access to what’s possible and where we want to be.”
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Follow along using the Transcript
Chapters
00:00 Meet Maryl Petreccia
04:20 The First Business She Launched at 21
09:10 Lessons from Building Without a Mentor
14:30 Growing Up in an Immigrant Entrepreneurial Family
19:45 Partnership and Building a Distribution Company
24:10 Surviving Nine Losses in Seven Years
30:25 Why She Wrote GPS to Joy
35:15 How Ballroom Dancing Helped Her Heal
40:50 The Role of Faith and Spiritual Practices
45:35 Golden Breadcrumbs: Wisdom from Her Journey
50:20 Navigating Grief with Optimism
55:15 Creating the Joy Movement
59:40 Mentors and Figures Who Inspire Her
1:04:10 Advice for Anyone Facing a Transition
1:08:25 How to Connect with Maryl
The greatest thing to realize is that anything that feels like a roadblock or a challenge is the access to what's possible is the access to where we wanna be.
That's Maryl Petreccia and this is The Powerful Ladies Podcast.
Hey guys, I'm your host, Kara Duffy, and this is The Powerful Ladies Podcast where I invite my favorite humans, the awesome, the up to something, and the extraordinary to come and share their story. I hope that you'll be left, entertained, inspired, and moved to take action towards living your most powerful life.
Maryl Petia is an entrepreneur, a dancer, an author, and known as the Joy expert. After experiencing nine losses in seven years, she found herself in a depth of loss. Few people experience. She knew she had to crawl out to honor the vows she gave to her late husband, and the commitment she was making to her daughter.
Through her transition from grief to joy, Maryl saw that if she could do it, anyone experiencing grief and life's moments of transitions could do it too. She had to share what she learned from that Springer book, GPS to Joy, navigating Life's Turbulence and Toughest Transitions to Find Your New Direction.
On this episode, we discuss how she became an entrepreneur at 21, how GPS to Joy came to life, and how she's now living life at an 11 plus, all that, and so much more coming up. But first, this episode of The Powerful Ladies is Made Possible by our Patreon survivor. Did you know that for as little as $1 a month, you can support this podcast?
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Thank you for coming to the Power Police Podcast. Thank you for having me. I'm very excited to be here. Of course. Yay. Let's start introduce yourself
and what you're up to in the world.
Sure. My name is Maryl Petia and what I'm up to is being an author, being a coach, and what's inspiring that is I'm about loving people and I'm about walking with people through their transitions.
Getting them standing up again after they've been taken off the horse
And helping them. Empowering them to find their joy again and unfold their life in the most powerful way that they can now. Yeah. In light of where they are and what's occurred. And and I wanna really, and the really, the thing I'm really up to is I wanna create a joy movement.
Who doesn't want a joy movement.
Yeah. Yeah. Because life has a lot of not joy. It can. And so if we can create a movement that is a stand to have it, regardless of the circumstances and we do it. Together in a very unified, cohesive, collaborative way then I think there can be more joy in the world.
100%.
What I think is fascinating about the little bit that I know about you is that while you gain popularity through your book GPS to Joy you've had many phases before that and you're building many phases after. So I think it'd be great to tell people from the beginning, you you're born in California, born and raised here.
Yes. Yes. And you got your kind of first bit of notoriety as an entrepreneur, very young. I did. What is that story behind, being an entrepreneur? I think 23. 21.
21? In college actually. Yeah. So I went to the Claremont Colleges, Claremont McKenna, and at the time we were in a recession.
And I was interested in marketing and entrepreneurship and the only degree I could get in that area was economics.
And so for my senior thesis, I thought I'm gonna actually write a business plan to launch a business. And and then we're in a recession and there were a lot of really smart people at the school Yeah.
That were competing for great jobs. 'cause the employers would come to the school and you'd interview those people. And I thought, oh my gosh, how am I gonna get a job in the face of this competition? My backup is I'll have a business. I'll just come up with a business that I could do and that should give me competitive advantage.
I'm not just smart, I'm actually like in action. But it ended up actually being a business that took root. And that's how it started. And I believe you received some early accolades
for this business.
I did. I, I was involved with women in business and I submitted my business plan to be considered for an award, and I won the Women in Business Entrepreneur Award for the year when I was 23,
which is crazy.
Yeah. Was it crazy in the moment or was it more in hindsight?
No, it was
in the
moment. I'm like, seriously? Like, how did I even win this? I didn't know what I was doing. I had no, my only role model had been my family. I saw they could do it. I don't know what they did or how they did it.
All I knew was that you could do it. So that was all that I had. Is that they can do it. I could do it.
Yeah.
And then here I was, two years later, I was blown away because they had their own businesses as well. Yes. Came from an immigrant family and a lot of, they come here, they start businesses, they do their thing, and some of both my grandparents had their own businesses with their wives. Very, very much a team effort. Yeah. And then my. My uncle had a swimmer manufacturing company, my parents. My father had a medical practice, my mother had a medical practice or a psychological practice. So yeah, I just saw that's what you do in our family.
You just make it yourself.
You just make it yourself. Yeah. No, I think that's so incredible. So many people don't realize that's a choice to make it yourself.
There's been a lot of discovery on this podcast of people when they realize that you don't need to just get a job or have this corporate expectation or follow into a typical path.
Once they realize oh, like I can just do this myself. It was a full light bulb moment for people.
Let me tell you what really, I mean from my, when I was 16 years old I had seen my father's nurses come in day in and day out, and I looked at their life and I thought, this is what it's like to work for somebody.
So from very early on, I thought how am I gonna actually. Have freedom in my life. How am I gonna dictate where I work, how much I work, how much I earn? Because I knew if I work for somebody, that would all be decided for me.
And so freedom to pick how much I wanted to earn and how much I wanted to work, and the freedom to be the mother that I wanted to be, stay at home mom.
That I wanted to be. That is really what motivated me to find a way from 16. Yeah. I just knew I knew that if I worked, I would be told how many hours I'd have to work, how much vacation I would get when I could go to lunch, when I could go to the bathroom. I thought, that sounds like jail to me.
Yeah. And I just, I was mortified. Yeah. So I had to find a way. So that's really, it was fear. And just this just compulsion or this just drive to have freedom in my life. Complete freedom of choice.
Which is, that's one of the bi biggest ways that you can be truly wealthy in, in my personal opinion.
If you have money and no freedom of choice than you're trapped just like everybody else. I
saw that. And I saw a lot of that was really, and also, so it became a game to me, this whole thing of how could I actually have everything that I want in this life? Yeah. Let me see, let me play this game.
And I saw a lot of people that did really well and, but they had no time freedom. Yep. They didn't have the freedom of time. And so I began to really look at what does success mean to me? Everybody has their own version. And I started to speak about it. I'd go to colleges and I'd speak about what does success mean to you and what does entrepreneurship mean to you?
And do you have what it takes to be an entrepreneur? Yeah. Because you can have all the money in the world, but if you don't have your health and you don't have control over your time, then to me that wasn't complete and true freedom.
Yes, completely. So for everyone whose curiosity is now peaked, what was your first business?
If you can share. Sure.
I created a product that we called the Caplet. And it was the caplet protector clothes. It was a Tryon garment. Yeah. A sheer garment that would be worn over the head, like a wit, like a veil. And it would be used by boutiques to protect the inventory from from damage and protect women's hair and makeup.
So it was a win-win for the boutiques and for the women. So I created, and it was based on the story of the Caplets. Yep. The caplet protector clothes. Thought that was cute. It is cute. And that was my first product and it was just adorable. And it was in this really fun package, and that was washable.
And then it occurred to me it got the request from boutiques. So you have one that you can throw away, use it once and throw it away. And so then I created the second product, which is a disposable version of the Caplet.
And then called that the fashion mask. And that was my first business. And is that business still going on to this day?
Funny enough, the business has had many iterations. But yes, I have now I have one client that orders annually. And they order, a large order and it gets drop shipped to their warehouse and it's custom made for them. It's disposable. It's single use. And yes, it's in its own fashion.
It's
continued on. That's very cool. Yeah. 'cause when you start a business, most people don't think about how it's going to end or evolve. And especially if you're entrepreneurial, like I know you are about how many ideas come up all the time. I think it's almost the responsibility we don't talk about as entrepreneurs is thinking about.
Either when you want to move away from the company yourself or evolve to keep changing with your lifestyle. We don't think about the end. Yeah. The end game. Yes. Huge.
I didn't know. I didn't know even to think about that. Oh, you start something and and then maybe you sell it. My, that's what I wanted to do.
I ultimately, I wanted to sell the business and I created five divisions in my head and the like. But yeah, you're right. That is as important to the launching. In my mind. As anything.
Yeah. So after you started this company, it's going well. You're speaking at schools. How'd you go from there to being an author?
There's a window of time there, like what was happening in that transition.
And to be, to be in full candor, it took me seven years before I made money.
But because I didn't have a mentor, I didn't even know to, I didn't even, it didn't occur to me to have a mentor or a coach.
Yeah. But but I figured, what the heck, I'm not married, I don't have children. I, rent, rent is minimal. I might as well figure this out. Yeah. For the sake of freedom. And so ultimately, I did that business and then my late husband and I, we had a distribution company together, so we did a business.
So that was our kind of side hustle. Yep. And and then. I've always been a writer, but it really came to fruition to me when my creativity got sparked when life happened and life happened again. Yeah. And it opened up my heart. It opened up my pain, it opened up, it, it opened me up to a whole dimensions of life that I didn't even know existed.
I knew it, but hadn't experienced it, and that's when I became an author.
Yeah. We don't need to go into it, into to death, but to give everyone listening, what happened in a span of, I believe it's one year, two years, you lost both of your parents and your husband.
Yes. I went through nine losses in seven years.
Nine transitions slash losses. Slash throw your life on the ground, throw your ass on the ground and have to keep trying to get back up. There I was, I literally, everything that I had was gone. Everything that I identified with was gone. So my, I was no longer a daughter. I was no longer a wife.
I was no longer a homeowner. I was no longer an active business owner. I was no longer a stepmother. I was no longer a dog owner. There was nothing set. And so I thought so what am I gonna do? And so I thought I'm gonna give myself a job, my job, year one, don't die of a broken heart.
That was my whole job. The good job. Yeah. So don't die of a broken heart. So what does that what do I need to do to have that happen? And and then year two was the unknown fricking sucks 'cause we had a plan. Yeah. And my late husband was a physician, an infectious disease physician. He got his degree, he got his CMO, which is Chief Medical Officer Degree from Carnegie Mellon, with the intention of going to Harvard School for Public Affairs.
Because he wanted to participate in national healthcare.
In that dialogue, in that policy. Yeah. So I was like, I'm on board. That sounds like a really good thing to make a difference in. I'm in. And so that was gone. Yeah. So year two was. Unknown sucks. And how can I get it to, at least I'm neutral to the unknown.
Let me just do that. And so then I took a course and I began to do journaling and writing. And then I found a coach who was really good at bringing out people's passion projects. And my friend said why don't you talk to her about your passion projects? Pick one. And so she interviewed me and there was all this content, and she said, do you see, you have a book here, do you see, you have a program here?
And it changed everything, I imagine.
Yeah. Do you see the differences can make?
Yeah.
Okay. So I picked a title for the Body of Work. And the bo, the title would've been Becoming The Woman of Your Dreams. Oh. Shifting from the, becoming the woman of his dreams to becoming the woman of your dreams.
And so I wrote inside of that and then and then I realized, you know what? That's not quite it. That's a thing that will happen, right? That'll be an automatic, that'll be an automatic that outcome, right? But what is it? So my friends and I were traveling in Europe and we were in a car.
And and the car broke down in the middle. It's unclear which country we were exactly in. Yeah, it was the, it was hysterical. Yeah, because the, it, because the whole situation was hysterical. The kids were hysterical. My friend Jackie, who was loves drama, was hysterical. The car the tow truck driver came, had two teeth left.
We were wondering if he really was a tow truck driver. Maybe he had some other thing that he did Instead, he puts the car on top of the tow truck. He puts us in the car. On top of the tow truck. No, on the highway. So we're on the bed and I said, Lily, I need a title. It's not becoming the woman of your dreams.
It's something about like GPS, like GP, I'm like Joy, GPS, and I go, that's it. G Ps to joy. I'm hashtag joy expert. I'm all about activating your joy. Holy crap. That's it. How do we get to joy?
When we think we're on the highway, all is well. The fricking car breaks down.
We think we're gonna be, we think we're gonna be who knows what's gonna happen with these truck drivers on the road. We don't speak the language right. We, there's no call box. How the hell do we get out of this? GPS and get back to life. So that is how the title and the whole title is GPS to Joy.
Navigate Your Transit, your Toughest Transitions to Find Your new Direction.
Yes. Which, and I don't think people. I think looking for joy. Everyone understands like people are always looking usually for more joy and happiness and how do we make life better? What I don't think people are good at is acknowledging when they are going through a transition or when they are having a hard time and really taking time to like just pause and stop and be with it.
Deal with it. Figure out a plan. When you're working with people to get them back to joy, like where do you tell people to start?
I've created the joy activation process. And there's steps. So the first step is to identify what it is that you want. So there you are, you've broken up your, with your boyfriend.
What do you want? I want a new boyfriend, or I wanna be at peace with him. Or, I'm, whatever the issue is, I'm not talking to my mother. So what is it you want? I wanna talk to my mother. So I actually, this first step is, let's look at what do we want.
And then when we know what it is that we want, then we can begin the process of distilling down what is in the way?
But we really get to see in the middle of the process how what we have is what we've created.
And if we've created it, then we can create something else.
Yes. Yeah. It's so powerful to really get that we can create something, anything, and change it. Like we're not stuck with what we've made if we don't want it.
And to really come to terms with, and this is just the biggest aha moment for people. Do you see that what you have is a function of what you've done so far? Can you see the link? Because if you can see that link, then you can do other things to have a different outcome if you choose, and even if the boyfriend doesn't want to talk to you again, for example, you still can choose to have peace, to generate forgiveness, to give grace to you and him.
And allow for healing to occur. Yeah. And not suffer. And by doing that, it's just amazing the miracles that happen with other people and how they get the benefit of you doing that for yourself and for them.
Yeah. Nothing makes people happier than seeing the people they love be in the place that they should be.
Where they get lit up. We yesterday we were at a memorial service for one of Jesse's cousins who passed away unexpectedly recently. And his fiance's there, they have a 6-year-old son, and at the end of the night we're saying goodbye. And she's I just don't know what to do. She's like all she's like, all of it's like she feels all, she's in the weight of all of it, right?
Yeah. Like, how do I be a mom and a dad? How do I figure out what my career path can be so I can support him? She doesn't have family around. And I'm like, yeah, but this room is full of, this is the biggest family besides my own that I know. So and I understand it's not her biological family.
I'm like, lean in on them. I'm like, the only advice I have, 'cause I have never been in that position, I'm like, is just ask for help. That's the only thing I could recommend. And it was so heartbreaking to leave seeing her in that state. Of just. Like in the swirl?
Yeah.
Like how long should people, accept the swirl happens?
And know that it's not like the swirl stops and then you start, it's like the swirls happening and you're starting with the swirl. That's how it occurs to me, would that be accurate? What? Yeah.
When someone dies scientifically speaking, and I wish I could quote the source, a part of us dies in that moment, and literally the energy that we have left to live goes from a hundred percent to 10% over death.
So imagine now you're trying to function, brush your teeth, feed your kids, and you are now operating at 10% over the lowest energy, which is zero.
Because your body needs the, that energy to process what you're dealing with.
So the swirl. Is inevitable. Yeah. And it really is a space that you need to allow your body to work through itself as you work through the grief in the morning.
And they're two different t there are two different things.
One, one is immediate and the other is longer term.
It's like you have to let your body get more energy again. And you can't rush it. And so there really isn't a timeframe for that. But I can tell you at about six months I came out of the fog and many people that widows that I know about six months is when they would come out of the fog and when the pain would really hit. The good thing is about with when you have kids is you have to keep going. Yeah. But you know what you do automatically, the automatic just keeps you going.
And the other stuff you just.
It comes to you. Yeah. It just comes to you like there isn't a way to find it. You just find yourself having a knowing. When the time is right for you to know.
When you went through this process, did it, did you, did it connect you to being more spiritual or religious or relying on, things outside of the people and the tangible that we talk a lot about in, Western society.
I've always
had a connection to God and so that was never a question for me. I didn't ask why him, how did that happen? I didn't have any of those conversations.
My whole conversation was the cancer was smarter than the medicine. And that's what happened. Yeah. And with my folks, they had smoked for 30 years.
That was just one of the big factors for their, for their early demise. 78, but still, yeah. My grandparent, my grandfather lived till 99.
So I don't think that there's I don't think that there's a clear path really. It's almost like we just have to organically allow it to unfold.
Yeah. So when, now that you have, you wrote the book Yes. And then how did your life change once you wrote the book?
Just, writing the book was painful.
It was, it in some ways it was excruciating. Yeah. But the book was really my daughter, the book was really this, it was really a love letter to my daughter.
And it was saying thank you to my husband.
It was an acknowledgement of the love that we had shared and how he really had given, taken me, given me everything that I needed to move on and to move forward. Yeah. And so what changed? I was able to get through the process and that was a miracle.
And I was able to work through some, some deep things. And and then I finally decided to put it into the world. And when I put it into the world, it was like, okay, I put my stake in the ground. This book is now in the world.
And I didn't really know what I would do with the book. And I didn't know if it was the end of an era or the beginning of a new era.
But I knew my daughter had so many losses in her life. She had lost both grand, both sets of grandparents. And she had lost, aunts and friends and then she lost her stepdad.
And her own dad had cancer. So I thought this book is gonna be a how to live life in case frankly I get taken out.
If I get abducted by aliens, then you have a guidebook Yeah. For your life from me. So that book was really had to be written by me and whatever I had to go through, I had to go through because I needed to give, even if she never read it, I needed to give her something that she could hold onto. Yeah. So that she knew no matter what I had her back.
Yeah. That changed my life. And turned me more that had me realize that I'm a healer and a teacher. That I didn't really wasn't present to before. 'cause I was such an entrepreneur and business person. I was so in the numbers part of the brain my whole life.
And would you say that your focus since discovering that, has transitioned to sharing that piece of you, the healing and the teacher part more than anything else?
Yeah. I've gotten very
heart-centered and I've really cultivated I've cultivated grace and compassion and self love and and laughter and lightening up. And seeing a bigger picture and trusting a bigger, a bigger game plan or bigger energy or trusting, source. And and playing more. I'm playing more than ever. If it's not fun, I don't wanna do it. Yeah. And how much freedom is there that, how much freedom is there to that? And I didn't have that at first. I didn't have that, but when the book came out, it's okay, now let's get back on to playing.
Yeah. What the heck. Life is short. I saw it firsthand. Yeah. Might as well have fun. And when you're playing, what does your playing look like? Oh, my playing. I'm a dancer. I'm a ballroom dancer, so playing includes dancing.
And it can be dancing conversations, it can be dancing to music, it can be dancing with the Sunset, whatever, love to dance.
I love to travel. I am world. I'm a world traveler. I love growth and development, so I love learning. I'm got this insatiable appetite to learn, about all kinds of different topics and subjects. And I love people. So one of my things that I do for fun is I meet people and talk to them and, get in their world and connect.
And one of my favorite things to do is leave people better than I found them. So if it's in the Starbucks line or if it's on a date or it doesn't really matter, like really I'm, I created a commitment. That all people, long time ago, I created a commitment that all people would have access to and utilize effective communication that moves life forward.
Love and abundance are present. And when I created that as part of a course that I did, it's wow that's my life. If I did that every day of my life and love and abundance are present and people can effectively move their life forward in, in a beautiful way, then that's a life well lived.
So there you go. That's a pretty fun way to wake up every morning. It is. So every conversation can be, can be it doesn't have to be deep. A lot like. My housekeeper, her name is Hilda. She comes over and first thing I do is give her a gigantic hug. She loves to come over just for the hug and she gives me the hug back, yeah. It's like loving and empowering each other and she takes care of me. I take care of her. It's, it's a beautiful life.
I was lucky enough to meet you through the wonderful Nancy Eaton. Yes. And we had an amazing coffee that like, went way longer than I expected it to.
I like run outta the house to come say hello and I was like, but instantly I was like, no, there's so many parallels about who you are and what you're up to and what you care about that I saw in myself and what I'm creating. I'm like, we have to be doing things next. Which was how you got here pretty quickly.
Yes. And as I was reading your book, I'm gonna quote this passage 'cause I think it's aligned so nicely with what. We're up to creating here at Powerful Ladies. On page 14, you say, I distinguished how we are dimmed to our own light, beauty, and power. I saw how many of us don't see our unique and extraordinary cap capacities and our own magnificence.
I wondered why. Yeah. I, it like the whole reason that we, I started Powerful Ladies was because I did not understand and it broke my heart. Every time someone said, I'm not powerful, I'd be like, what? I'm not like, that doesn't mean that you have $10 million. It doesn't mean that you've been president. It doesn't mean that you have the laundry done and the kids, it doesn't mean any of those things.
It really is very much a way of being. Yeah. And I, that's the mission that we're on here is like, how do we get people to see their light, beauty and power, because. Like you've said, if you can see it in somebody else, or you can see it in yourself, you can see it in somebody else. So what, when did you have that aha moment for yourself and did it come through this book?
Did it come through the grieving process or has that been something that you've been aligned with from the beginning?
When David was at the end, so many people came and uplifted us. It's almost like people came together and they held their hands underneath us and we were elevated. We were held.
And most of them were women and they were extraordinary. They were like angels. That came Yep. To support us. Yep. And in talking to them, I would see what they were. What they were dealing with. And I saw how they would diminish their contribution, not on purpose. It was just a habit.
And so I started to notice who was on fire, who was loving themselves, loving life, who was feeling, who was seeing who they are and elevating others and who's living inside of light and who's living in inside of density and suffering. And and that's when I started, that's when my eyes opened up more to it.
People that were hurt, doing heroic things. Even then didn't necessarily affirm themselves or see. The beauty that that they brought and the goodness and the kindness and the the holiness that they cultivated. And I thought, yeah, we gotta change this up, man. We have got to change this up.
This is not, there's something missing here. And it was it's part of our culture, it's habit. It's in anar, it's in a narrative. I don't even know how the heck it got there. Yeah. It's let's change our narrative. And I like to talk so it works
out. No, it's, it really is a fascinating thing.
'cause anyone who's listening, if I call you and invite you to be on this podcast, you can assume you're already powerful. So if you don't think you are, then we can have a whole conversation about why and what you need to give yourself credit for. But yeah it's fascinating to me how. So much of the external qualifications of power and prestige or whatever you wanna call it, that people are chasing for the things that never give us the satisfaction that we're actually looking for.
How it's become so important, and I was speaking to somebody recently it about it in regards to clarifying capitalism versus consumerism. I was like, the guy on the news had used inverted them and said that we need to stop this negative impact of capitalism. And I'm like, no. I'm like, there's nothing wrong with capitalism.
It's like a separate theoretical entity. It's not bad or good. I'm like, the consumerism is what he was upset about. Of that's all that matters is the stuff and the more stuff and keep going. And I feel like it's the same way in regards to the identity of power and success, right?
If success as we talked earlier is about. Having freedom. Like we never said anything about money in that conversation. We never said anything about the size of a house or whatever the markers are, especially on social media today. So I think it's, I'm glad that more and more people are having that conversation and putting more of that out.
Yeah. What
are the metrics? What are the metric metrics that you're, is that a word? Metrics is what are the, it's now what are the metrics that we wanna reference to say that we're successful? My daughter, she's declared herself to be an environmental activist and I said, I'm behind you.
Go for it. Now will she make a lot of money? Who knows? That's just not in top of mind. And I said to her, whereas I grew up, it was top of mind. Yeah. I wanted to be a teacher or a psychologist. And they said no. That's not gonna have you raise your family. That's not going to empower you to be able to financially care for your family.
I was taught you gotta be able to pay the mortgage kid. You may have a husband that can, but what if you get sick? And I'll be damned. Guess what happened? Yeah. My husband
got sick. And I think it's so fascinating that you're now circling back to the teacher psychologist space.
Yes.
Yeah. The yes. And so with my daughter, I've said, listen, you're free, so free to. You are free to pursue what matters to you. And she said this planet matters to me.
And it matters that we have a planet that our kids and grandkids can thrive on. And I said, okay, get to work. What ha where do I sign up?
Yeah. And I love to empower the 20 somethings. That is just, I'm, I love it. And I get a lot of 'em coming to me because whatever they're dealing with and there's a lot of experimenting, they go to festivals and they do all kinds of stuff at the festivals. I don't care. Like you can, there's gonna be diversions in life and there's gonna be learning and stuff.
But ultimately, our future's in your hands. Our world is in your hands. So I'm here to stand behind you and to be the one beneath your wings. So what is it you guys wanna have happen? What do you want? Step, first step of joy, activation process. What do you want? And so it's, and. They have the biggest megaphone of any generation that's ever lived.
Yeah. It's we we had Rosalie Fish on a couple, I think she was episode 43 or 45 and she's 18, freshman in college. She's a track star and she runs with the painted hand on her face to bring attention to missing and murdered indigenous women.
Wow.
And we're talking to her and I'm sitting here with my jaw on the table because she's so wise beyond what you would account for at 18 and in a freshman in college.
And so peaceful and calm about the fact that she's taking on this mission while also all the things that are stereotypical for that age group. And it made me so proud to see that taking action is of course that's what you do, because I feel like there's so many people who. Whether it's taking action about what you care about or the life you want, it's something that other people do.
So anytime that I see someone being like, no, I have to do this. I'm like, yes, thank you. If we all do that, then it's like the pressure's off all of us to some extent.
Yeah. Like we, if we collaborate, like we're in this together we are in this together. I am a space where you can experiment, you can fall, you can stand up, you can try, you can make your hair pink.
I don't really care. Go for it. But I've got this giant umbrella of what's possible and possibility and that we can do it. That it's up to us. However you wanna play inside of that umbrella, it's fine with me. Yeah. And where I can support you or how I, where I can walk with you and you just let me know, but it's, yeah.
It's just really letting people be, letting them find their truth. And their true expression. And from that cultivate joy. Yeah.
And healing. Who are other women that have been an inspiration to you and have helped you define what it means for you to be powerful as well?
My favorite, powerful lady, her name is Elizabeth Turk.
She is an artist. She's a world class sculptor. She lives in Newport Beach and spends time in New York. And her work is, brings me to tears when I see it. She works with stone and she literally makes ribbons out of marble. So you look at this beautiful, what looks like a falling ribbon or a toffee and it's stone, she takes stone to its edges.
And it's not just her work, it's who she is and how she sees the world. And it's remarkable, just the, she created something called the Shoreline Project. Have you heard of it? Okay. The Shoreline Project brings community together with umbrellas. And the first Shoreline project was in Laguna Beach.
They had a thousand dancers with solar powered umbrellas, with drones filming at night and along the shore. You see these dancers, unc choreographed self-organizing to dance and move along the shore to bring community together, to dance with the planet, to dance with the ocean, to bring attention to how we are all part of it.
Every that there is no separation. And it was an extraordinary end. And she was in a hotel overlooking the project that was being filmed. And there was one person who choreographed like 20 of the dancers, but all the other people were volunteer dancers that came because they'd heard about it.
So she has now has funding for seven other installations of the Shoreline Project around the planet, and her next one will be in Laos. Very cool. And it's just, who does that? Who thinks of, and it was with Laguna Beach, it was with the Laguna Beach Art Museum, who thinks of dancers with solar powered umbrellas, dancing on the ocean to, to speak to a humanity, collaborating for, with the planet.
Like we're all one dancing, who does that's, who thinks that she's just, just extraordinary the way she sees what's possible. Yeah. Anyone else? I love. Yes, my daughter, of course my daughter she's been, she grows me up and whatever. I realize what, wherever I'm stopped, that since I have this vow to her to give her everything that she needs to have a great life, which I say she already has that, but wherever I'm stopped, I realize, oh, that could be an impediment to her.
Great. Having a great life. So I'm gonna have to take that on for myself. And blast that out.
Yeah. So that I can get to the other side of it, share it with her so that she can see that she can do the same thing. Yeah. So she's somebody of course. And and my parents, my parents believed in me.
When I didn't believe in myself, they always, no matter what I did, no matter what screw ups there were no matter humiliations that I might've felt, they just always loved me. They loved me for me, and I thought they loved me for what I did, but they loved me for me. They didn't care what I did.
And I had a colossal fail. I did with my first marriage. It was a colossal fail. And and they just, it's like moving on. Whatever, and I was just I was, I had so much shame around it, but, that was on me. It's they don't have that. Wow.
Okay. So that really, that was a big lesson. And really self forgiveness and just forgiveness and let what there is to let go to move forward powerfully. And so my parents, and then, Helen Keller. The story of Helen Keller. She was remarkable. Maya Angelou the poet.
Rumi. Yeah. Charlise. Therone. So these are all gold Maier, the first prime minister of Israel. And Greta Thunberg Thornberg. Is it Thornberg? I think the environmental activist the young lady. Isn't she interesting and extraordinary? Yeah. She just, it takes one. That's another expression I like to say.
Yes. It only takes one. So one person to believe in you. One person stand up for something, it just takes one.
We've had some conversations off podcast Yes. About, what you want to be creating next and where you're taking GPS to joy and. As you start building this next phase of what you wanna be creating for you and the world so what can you share with our audience about that?
Sure. When I asked myself is GPS to join the end of an era or the beginning of something, what I realized is it's a pillar. One pillar, if we had a chair, it's one of the pillars of the chair or one of the, one of the legs of the chair. So what, because we all have transitions, and they're gonna, the big ones, they're gonna disrupt our lives.
And we're gonna, we're gonna be off course and then we gotta get back up. But then what? And I thought okay, we're gonna find our joy. So I thought how do we do that? What's the blueprint for finding a life that is joyous now? 'cause whatever brought us joy before might not bring us joy now.
And what I thought about was, first of all, we have new normals, right? The transition comes, whatever was is gone. You can't go backwards. Someone died, the house is gone. The career's over, the kids are no longer five. Whatever, that's gone. So I realized we gotta really make peace with where we're at.
So we really have to acknowledge what is the new normal? What is the new, what is So now, and and once I did that for myself and I'm like, I realized I'm a family of two now. Immediate family of two. Now I'm single and live in a home by myself. I now live in San Diego. I moved from Orange County.
I just looked at a number of different the reality of my life now. And I thought, okay, that's fine. So what do I no longer wanna live without so I know what I don't have? From the past, but what do I no longer wanna live without now? And when I started to ask that question it took me out of the realm of what do I want?
Because a lot of us don't think we can have what we want. And so that works with one part of the brain. It took me into the other part of the brain. It's damnit, yeah, I want stuff. This is the part of my brain that I use to go get what I want. So I thought, what am I no longer willing to live without?
And as I looked at that, all of these things started to emerge. And and and then I thought all right, so now I have a way to figure out what it is I'm no longer willing to live without. And I can cultivate and take actions, cultivate whatever, take actions, steps to have that. But, all right, so now what does joy mean?
What does, let me define joy? And I thought on a scale of one to 10, what would it like to live life at 11 plus? I'm like I don't know. You know what? I don't know. Let me think about that. So I let's define 11 plus. And so then I defined 11 pluses. It's great, it's wonderful, and it's unexpected.
So what I wanna do now is I wanna work with people that are interested in wherever they are in the, in the phases of the transition. They're interested in letting go of whatever old messages they have around how they have to live.
And are interested in actually creating a life that looks like 11 plus.
Which I think is very exciting. I am very excited about it because now I'm starting to look in my day and I said, okay on a scale of one to 10, what is, how has that occur to me? That situation. And a 10 is, it's fricking awesome. It's completely aligned with who I am or what I want, and I expected that result.
And then I'm looking where are those 11 plus moments that are occurring? And every day I am finding 11 plus moments, and I'm telling you, my life is on fire. I feel so much passion and energy and this is my baseline. Yeah. Okay. Normally someone would think, what do you want?
But I'm just so inspired. Yeah. And in love with this whole process. And so that is what I wanna work with women and people on, is finding our joy could be simply what context do we wanna have for our life? Yes. And are we willing to let go of the context that maybe served us before, but maybe don't serve what we want
going forward?
And even taking away the definitions within the context itself. So many people, when you think of what has to happen for X, Y, or Z to exist, when you suddenly say just if it's a way of being and not a thing, it gives so much freedom.
Yes. Freedom. Freedom. In fact, I created my my word, I created my word for the year.
Or I came up with my word. The word for the year is passion.
And my word for the decade is freedom. And the context for this year. Is passion on fire and what I'm up to is living 11 plus and that is what I want to bring to the world and play with. Play with people, dance. Yeah. Dance with people.
Let's dance together with this. I'm a dance where I lived. Let's come on ladies, let's dance. Yeah, let's do
this. Let's have some fun. So for people that the idea of a word of the year or word of the decade is a foreign concept. Once you define your word, how are you using it on a daily, weekly basis?
People use words in different ways. So for me. It infuses. It's a, it's an, it's a way to energetically infuse what I do. So whether I'm exercising or I'm vacuuming, or I'm with my friends, or I'm driving in the car, I just I choose to have the experience of bringing passion to it, which is liveness being present.
Like it's, just enjoying it. It's delicious. I use it. I use it like I use it like it's a spice in my soup. Yeah. So the soup is whatever's happening and then I spice the soup up. Yeah. Like that. And I ha and I enjoy the flavor of it. And and I just let it, I let it guide me and I let it teach me.
I let these words guide me and teach me.
And it sounds like in a very practical matter. That you, just by having the words or the phrase present in your mind, it allows you to be intentional or just like to set the ground for this word's gonna be in this space. So you don't really need it to work at it necessarily, because it's already in your head.
It's already there. It just starts to show up and you can be like, oh yeah, that, oh yeah, that,
yeah. I already the words, I already have it. I already am it. I already live it. Yeah. So there are people that'll say have your 10 words. And for me, I get confused with 10 words. So one's good. Yeah. Yeah.
Those are pretty robust words. They
are. They are. Yeah.
So when you look at what being powerful has meant to you from when you were a kid through to today, how has it changed and what has been the most like pronounced change for what your definition of power for yourself is?
So I thought about that. Because there's, there's all kinds of different definitions of power, but, so for me, what being a powerful lady means to me is, number one, embracing ourselves completely.
Which is in including not making ourselves wrong. And wherever we are, just loving on ourselves, embracing ourselves, affirming ourselves and we can always grow.
That doesn't mean that we can't grow. Yep. As long as we're live, we can grow. And accepting ourselves, using and enjoying our gifts, making each day count and mastering every aspect of our lives and elevating anyone in our lives. And bringing grace, compassion to life and leading from love and vision.
So these very poetic Yes. These are things that make me a powerful lady.
As well as being a hell of a negotiator.
Yeah. I think that there's always that mix, right? The feminine, the masculine as they're traditionally outlined. So I love that you added in and negotiating.
Yes. Also a powerful lady, a powerful person is someone who really understands how to.
Be fully empowered. So that they can bring all that if they want, bring everything that they have, their gifts to the world and really enjoy that. So those are some of the things I thought about.
Awesome. We ask everyone on the podcast where they put themselves on the powerful ladies scale. With it's one to 10, zero being average everyday human, and 10 being super powerful lady. Where do you put yourself today and where do you put yourself on average today? 11
plus and on average, probably seven and a half to eight.
Yeah. And does being asked to be put yourself on a scale, does it mean anything to you or is it a fun game that you see?
No it's just, it's fun. Yeah. Yeah. It's absolutely fun. And it's not even, it's not even a competitive or comparison thing.
It's really more, it's almost like taking your temperature. Yeah. So for me it's what's my temperature day today? And my results, I might have huge, tremendous results and that may or may not correlate to how I, how powerful I'm experiencing myself.
Yes. Yeah.
Yeah. Sometimes the days I feel the worst are the days that I'm the most effective and productive.
A lot of the noise goes away when you're focused on feeling like a one.
And I think that you've got effective. You've got productive and then powerful. Yes. And they're different.
There are different conversations. I
like that. Yes. I think that's an important distinction. So for women who are listening to your story and are inspired by you in addition to your book GPS to Joy. Yes. What are other resources that you recommend to women who are going through a transition or looking to turn what they've discovered in a transition into what's next for them?
I love it when people plug into their community. When you don't know what next, finding people that have been there are the biggest resources of information that at your fingertips. It could be in your neighborhood, it could be if you go to church, it could be there, or your yoga studio, like finding people that have been there. That alone can. Give you a sense of peace around, what's probably not peaceful. And meditation I think is huge because we really do need, when our nervous system gets impacted, which it does when, we've been thrown off course. We need, when we nurture our nervous system, like we would nurture a child that really does, it's like the inner work we have to do so that we can actually be clear more clearheaded about what next.
So I'd say the resources are people. Around you. And there are speakers like Brene Brown and Oprah Winfrey. There are resources like that too, that are wonderful that are inspiring. But I do think talking to human beings that are, that are in your midst is the first start. Is the first step.
And then finding ways to nurture yourself and to manage your nervous system, to calm it down so that you can be more thoughtful and clear thinking things can come to you. Because you're open to hearing your own counsel.
Yeah. And as you mentioned earlier as well, like there are angels that walk amongst us as our community members, our friends and family.
And sometimes it just takes us asking them to make a contribution, to let them step into that space. Yeah. For themselves and for us,
what is it? When the student arrives, the master will come. And I also think that there's trusting, which is, always the thing I'm working on, but trusting that when you're ready whatever it is that you need will find you. Whether it's a book or whether it's a poem you read, or whether it's something on the radio or if somebody mentioned something, it, synchronicity has a big part of all of this. Yes. Yep. And I, I call it following the breadcrumbs. Because, no, when you've been through something, even if you're a great planner, all of those abilities go out the window. Yeah. So at that point, what is there to do? To me it's get yourself. Nurtured, get your nervous system nurtured and you'll follow the breadcrumbs and you ask for help.
You talk to people, you bring in your community. 'cause when you say, this is what I'm dealing with, guess what? They may have the next breadcrumb. Yeah. So it's not, there's not a science to it and it's not hard and really letting go of it, you have to do it alone. Yes. That's not a resource.
That's just how many of us feel like we have to do everything alone. And because we're, I can do it. I'm powerful. Power comes in actually allowing yourself to be supported and nurtured.
Yes. And I think whether you are going through a transition or you are starting a business, or you are, whatever you are doing, that puts you in that.
Open, vulnerable, scared, I don't know what to do next. Space. It's amazing what can show up to just boost you past, right? The breadcrumbs show up if you are opening to see a breadcrumb.
Yes. And one what makes a powerful lady is someone who's really good with giving and receiving.
So a lot of us like to give, but we don't like to receive. And I call bullshit on that. The way that the world works and the way that nature works is it gives, and it receives the plants, give food, give sustenance, give flowers, and they receive water and sun and fertilizer. It's the way nature works.
And I don't know. Who said that we have to do it all alone and that we shouldn't rely on anybody and it's bad and we're weak and what have you. Whoever made all that stuff up. That's just a narrative that I say is so counterproductive.
So that also makes a powerful lady
completely agree.
Completely agree. This has been completely lovely. Thank you so much for being on. I'm sure that everyone listening is gonna be very excited about what you're up to next and how they can follow you. We will include all of those in the show notes as well. And is there anything, any breadcrumb you wanna leave for the audience to they can expect what's next?
Or should they just follow you at your website?
Oh. Living 11 plus ladies, let's do this. Yeah. Who wants to come play? We are gonna figure it out. We're gonna do it together. I wanted to say the greatest thing to realize is that anything that feels like a roadblock or a challenge is the access.
To what's possible is the access to where we wanna be. So without them, then we are where we are. So these transitions become the portals. For whole new realms or whole new possibilities, whole new ways of experiencing ourselves and life. And so on some weird level, like fricking embrace 'em.
Yeah. Embrace the roadblocks. Embrace the challenges, embrace the transitions and say, I don't really know why I should say thank you, thank you. And please show me this lesson as soon as possible. Yeah. What is it? What's the gift from this experience and the gift, I will leave people with this, the gift of my husband dying.
If there could be a gift is who I now get to be. Yeah. That I would be a different version of me with him, because he was a really big personality and just a bright light. He was a comet. And I would hold onto the tail of the comet and go for a ride. Now I get to be my own comet. And other people get to hold on and go for the ride.
Other people get to hold on for the ride and then they'll become a comet. So that is that's the gift, is who I now get to unfold myself and generate myself to be. For the fun of it. Yeah. And for the difference I get to make because that stirs my soul. So I have a favorite quote. There are many, but this one just really spoke to me for this podcast.
Okay. And can I read it to you please? Wonderful. Thank you. It's by Sarah Young Wang, and she says, when we think of things this way, there's nothing to figure out really. There's only listening to ourselves and following what brings us joy and makes us feel good. By dropping all the shoulds that don't feel in alignment.
We free ourselves from the boxes and limitations we've often subconsciously placed on ourselves that limit our access to happiness. I'm not saying to be reckless or to throw all caution to the wind, but rather to see past the shoulds to uncover what your heart and soul are really calling for. That's
beautiful.
Thank you so much. Thank you. This has been such a pleasure. I'm so happy you are a yes to be on The Powerful Ladies Podcast. You are definitely a powerful lady and I look forward to figuring out what else we can do together. So thank you so much. Thank you.
To experience such high highs and low lows in life and still be committed to living life at 11 Plus is courageous and a testament to both the human experience. And Maryl's Unwavering optimism and tenacity. The poetry and dancer's rhythm that Maryl uses to flow through life easily carries us along with her while she sprinkles words of wisdom, leaving some of those golden breadcrumbs she talked about on the podcast.
To connect, support and follow Maryl, you can visit her website, merril Petreccia.com. I hope you've enjoyed this new episode of The Powerful Ladies Podcast. If you're a yes to powerful ladies and want to support us, you can. Subscribe to this podcast anywhere you listen to podcasts. Make sure to give us a five star rating and leave a powerful review on Apple Podcasts.
You can also be one of our Patreons for as little as $1 a month at patreon.com/powerful. Ladies, we can get access to exclusive content that we're making just for you. Follow us on Instagram at Powerful Ladies, and be sure to subscribe to our YouTube page, and of course, visit our website, the powerful ladies.com for all the latest news details and updates.
I'd like to thank our producer and audio engineer Jordan Duffy. Without her, this wouldn't be possible. You can follow her on Instagram at Jordan K. Duffy. Thank you all so much for listening. We'll be back next week with a brand new episode. Until then, I hope we're taking on being powerful in your life.
Go be awesome and up to something you love.
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Instagram: @marylgpetreccia
Email: maryl@activateyourjoy.com
Website: marylpetreccia.com
LinkedIn: /marylpetreccia
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
