Balancing Head and Heart: Finding Purpose After Loss | Lisa Cooper

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I questioned them. But then I realized, and I think that on some level, that was part of the lesson that I needed to go through, to be able to embrace something that maybe wasn't rationally defined. Then it became very gratifying for me. And then the more I embraced it, the more experiences I had, which led me to the book, which led me to really help people when they're grieving, to let them know that they're not alone.

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On this week's episode, I speak with Lisa Cooper, and Lisa Cooper and I had a wonderful conversation about something really hard, and that is grief. But what she shared in this story about losing her mother and then kind of holding on to this love because love never dies, she was able to kind of create a new version of herself, leaning into things that she had never really explored before or felt...

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the permission to do so. And so I think her journey is something that a lot of people can resonate with. I think there are elements to it in which you'll be inspired that through a grief journey she was able to create something that now helps thousands of other people across the country, world, wherever, just because of the journey that she went on after losing one of her parents. Before we start this

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Big thank you to Miki, Traci, and Emily for all sponsoring two episodes of the show each month. This support through Patreon allows me to grow the show and continue bringing all of these wonderful stories to the public, so thank you. If you're interested in helping support me as an indie podcaster directly, head on over to patreon.com forward slash the Life Shift podcast, and you'll see a bunch of different tiers with bonus episodes and early release episodes.

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I also do a t-shirt giveaway whenever five more people join the Patreon. So thank you for any support you can give, whether that's financial or just sharing these stories with the people that you think they will resonate with the most. So without further ado, let's jump into my conversation with Lisa Cooper. I'm Matt Gilhooly, and this is The Life Shift, candid conversations about the pivotal moments that have changed lives forever.

02:29
Hello, my friends. Welcome to the Life Shift podcast. I am here with someone that I've been talking to for a few minutes now, so you don't get to hear that. But hi, Lisa. Hello, Matt. Great to be here. We have Lisa Cooper here, and she's going to tell you all about her life story and where she's going. But I think I'm looking forward to your conversation. As we were talking before we recorded, I mentioned to you or reminded you of something that the listeners know. I don't.

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do a lot of research. I don't do any research actually. And I send my guests that one form that you had, which maybe had like three questions and like send me your picture kind of thing. I love having just that one or two sentences about your life shift because I feel like it gets me in the head space, but also it doesn't put any kind of questions in my head. So welcome to the experience that we're calling the Life Shift Podcast.

03:24
Excellent. Thank you, Matt. You know, when you were talking just now, it reminded me that because you're not researching your guests, you're in a heart space too. I try. Yeah, a place of, you know, no judgment. And I'm just going to open these people onto the show and and we'll have a phenomenal conversation. So thank you for that. Right. I think, you know, there are plenty of podcasts out there where

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Experts can come on and teach us the top three things that we could do in this space or the top five things we should never do in that space, but you know I my true want for the life shift podcast is that maybe this is maybe like a big idea, but maybe people listening feel inspired to have these types of conversations with the people around them and Feel comfortable

04:16
asking the questions that aren't so surface level. And maybe probing on what does a life shift look like? And I know personally, well, first of all, I'm Lisa Cooper, thank you for having me. And right now I'm the co-founder of a company called Workplace Healing. I'm an author, I wrote a book after my mother passed away. And I'm also a mom and a wife and a daughter.

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So I guess those things- You're a human. And no priority, because mom, wife, daughter's right up there, right? When you talk about life shift, and interestingly enough, when I was listening to your podcast, sometimes at the time, we don't realize we're in a shift until we look back and really garner the lessons, the impact, and the effect it's had on our souls.

05:07
And I sometimes when I was thinking about the podcast this morning and, you know, kind of thinking through, you know, what I might say and what I might help your listeners with, one of the things that came to mind is that oftentimes I feel like life can be a bit like a puzzle. And we've got all these pieces, but as we go through these different experiences, we begin to put these pieces together. Because, for example,

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Just a quick background, my professional background was advertising and marketing. And I loved that career and it was gratifying, crazy, and a bit of a roller coaster, you know. But I look at that piece of the puzzle and then I look at the piece of the puzzle of being a daughter. And after my mother passed away, I wrote a book to inspire others on how her love never dies, which I'll come back to that. And then taking the marketing.

06:03
the book, the lessons I learned about death and about grief, and then applying it to how can we help people with grief in corporate America? How can we train managers on what to say to people when someone comes back from bereavement? So getting back to the puzzle pieces point, I didn't until recently, I looked back at workplace healing and I can see clearly that the puzzle pieces came together.

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the business strategy component, the marketing component, the heart part of being able to talk to grievers after I wrote a book. And I realized I talked to the grievers at maybe an evening event or at a lunch event. And I also realized they were going back to work and they were going back to work discouraged, grieving and not 100% present. And so I realized there was a disconnect there.

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And then I also realized that when I wrote the book, it's specifically, it's my spiritual book, it's not a corporate book at all. It's a short memoir about the experiences I had after my mother passed away. And you're just giving all the secrets to your story. I don't know. No secrets anymore, right? But it's interesting because my mom passed away in 2011, and immediately I started like having dreams, having signs.

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and really feeling her presence. And that's not my corporate message, but it was my personal experience that literally took me from being a very left-brained, linear, business strategist, marketing brain, to a right brain more open, more creative, perhaps believing in things you cannot see, and changing my personal shift of awareness of life.

07:56
So that shift, again, the puzzle pieces of going back and thinking about experiences and putting it all together to take us more towards our life purpose. I mean, I think, honestly, I think we have had this conversation with a lot of people is each decision that we're making truly is another opportunity for your life to go in a completely different direction. And it sounds like you have the two sides of

08:26
of shifts that I talk to a lot of people about, or the way that I've kind of categorized them. I myself had a very external shift, which you can also relate to, in the sense that I had no control over the shift that was truly going to change everything that was in my life. So, you know, I'm eight years old living with my mom in Massachusetts, my dad's living in Georgia, my mom dies, I suddenly have one parent, I suddenly have to go live with my non-primary parent.

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who wasn't quite ready to take on that responsibility, started a new school. It was the beginning of the school year, different accents, that plays a role into that. I remember you said that in the podcast. You said that you had an accident of being an eight-year-old and being different and coming in on the second week of school and after your mom passed away, how horrible, yes.

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But we have these moments like that one literally, like there was nothing I could do about it. I couldn't stay in my existing house. I couldn't go to my existing school. There was a lot of things like that. But then there are other moments in which we, it's an internal fire. It's something that we've, like something happens inside us, whether that's kind of your experience that we're gonna talk about, I think we'll go into more detail about what you've kind of hinted at already. But it's so interesting to me to see how.

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they kind of all interplay. And so many people talk about that butterfly effect of like, had I just opened that door two minutes earlier, XYZ could have happened. Or had I run down the road on the other direction for my run, I wouldn't have been hit by a car. You know, like whatever that may be. And you know, it's so interesting that if we get, or if we're lucky enough to get to the place in which we can look back on those moments and reflect and see what...

10:13
What can we learn from that? What have we grown because of that? I mean, it took me like 20 years or 20 plus years to even analyze the effect beyond the service level, obvious effects of what it did to me and how I let it do all that to me. I didn't know better, but I also let it do it to me. And so I think we get lucky when we're able to analyze those moments and see how, in your example,

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these puzzle pieces kind of all fit together. You know, like you would never, if you took this high level view of your life, you know, 10, 15 years ago and you look down, you would just see them as these like separate puzzle pieces before they kind of started interlocking. But I think that's a lot of your work. I think that's a lot of human work to make those puzzle pieces go together. I don't think it's just like, ooh, everything, you know? So it's just, you know, it's fascinating. But maybe we can have you kind of

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lead us up to those? I mean, I feel like there's a couple little moments in that big shift. You have that external and internal pieces that are happening to you. So maybe you can tell us what your life was like a little bit before leading up to that so that we can see kind of how these changes have made. Sure. Well, as I mentioned, I was in marketing and advertising and a mom, which was very fun. Our daughter actually is in college now, so empty nesting is a different journey, but it's a fun journey as well.

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So, but when my mother passed away, it was a shift. I'm an only child and she is an only child, actually our daughter's an only child. And so there's a- Me too. Okay, well the land of only children here. But it's a, there's a special bond, I believe. Again, I would never have considered myself a writer, not even a person that particularly kept a journal. But after my mom passed away, I just began to write and pause.

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And my mother was one to say to me while she was alive, Lisa, you've got to take time to be. And instead of always being a human doing, try to be a human being. And it was hard to articulate those words when I was busy and being a mom and you have a lot of parenting responsibilities, professional responsibilities. But I remembered thinking, okay, one of these days I will be more. That will be my goal.

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But it literally with her passing, for some reason there was a personal shift that I felt in my heart that I worked to be more. And part of it was a slowdown. I think sometimes when our loved ones pass away, we go through a period that I used to call the business of death. And that is the furniture, the clothes, the things, the house.

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And when my mom passed away, my father was still alive at that point in time and really left it up to me to do a lot of the purging, if you will, you know, and so which was fine. And actually, it was a cathartic journey for me because it offered me the opportunity to have some beautiful memories when I was going through things. But specifically, that really was when a big shift for me occurred, because I just felt a new

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I guess you could just say a new insight into life and death. After, like how long, you're saying like after the grieving period? Well after just like she passed away on October 2nd, 2011. And it's been a long time, but a long time ago. But I would say within a couple of weeks, I really felt her presence. I have a question before you jump into that. I'm going to be known for this like checklist life comment, but I say it.

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pretty much on every episode because I very much ascribe to this. And it sounds like you were very driven. It sounds like your mom was like, you don't have to accomplish all the things. Exactly. Yeah. But I grew up feeling, and part of this was my obligation to feeling like nobody would abandon me if I did all these things. But I also think society around, maybe up until recently, was very much like, you have to graduate high school and then you have to go to college.

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then you have to get a good job, then you have to get married, then you have to have kids, and then you have to buy a house. And then, you know, like, and everything was like this very much a checklist for me. Were you someone that as soon as you check something off the list, there was always another thing on the list to accomplish or do? I would say yes to that. And maybe that's kind of in the way that your mom, your mom was like, there are more, there's more.

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There's more out here if we don't take things off. Because I'm very much like, I have checklists all over my desk still. And it's very satisfying, right? Because you're like, yeah, I did another thing. But when we stop and think about it, not too many people care that we just did that next thing. And so I can say. You're absolutely right. Same thing, kind of what you're saying is that when your mom passed, probably that echo of her saying you need to be more.

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but now you have this opportunity, you've accomplished the things, getting rid of things, and the business of grief, is that what you said? Oh, I call it the business of death, but yes. Business of death. Yeah, you just take care of all the things, it keeps you busy, it's a checklist, it's another thing to accomplish, but then when there's time to sit, you realize, okay, what is actually important to me? What's, and I had the same thing when I watched my grandmother die. So I just wanted to interject that idea of like,

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go, go, go, accomplish things, accomplish things, performative kind of mentality, because I think so many people can relate to this. And then it takes, I don't know, was this your first experience with a major loss? You know, my grandparents had passed away before that, but I would say, and that was, I loved them very, very much, but it was different with my mother. Why do you think it was different with your mom?

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I just think we were closer. I mean, I loved my grandparents, but just a different... And I guess we just spent more time together. It's interesting because I think back to even a lot of trips that we'd taken before I got married and just experiences that we had again, looking back and saying, wow, I can see why that happened because it opened my heart to hear something else later or a book particularly, or even after. I mean, if you had this with your grandmother.

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I kept a lot of the books and I would open them at a certain time and there'd be like a bookmark where she'd written a note on it. And it was appropriate to whatever I was maybe going through at the time. Yeah. Was she more like that through life? Was she more like the heart centered, the heart first kind of person? Yeah. And so she was probably like that guide that you weren't listening to until it was time to listen to? You're right. Yeah. And it's interesting because like my father on the other hand...

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was a Marine and an engineer. And so it's interesting how, I guess it's interesting how opposites attract, but specifically how with one parent being very mother earth-like and the other being very analytical, and then sometimes I think as children, we kind of tend to go maybe towards one, or maybe land in the middle ideally. But I think again, the pivot moment of just the lessons I learned from her

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insights, if you will, and which what led me to the book to help people understand that love never dies. That was always my headline, to help people understand that love never dies and to let them know that that energy of love never goes away. It's interesting. I don't know that I have that same feeling, which is fine. And I think it, well, at least about my mom, because I was so young. You were so young. I didn't know what...

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I don't think I knew what love was outside of what I experienced there. And I didn't really, and part of it is that my parents divorced young, so there was a lot of like, not, it wasn't bad, you know, in a bad sense, but I just, it was always a fractured kind of family. And so it's interesting because I hate saying this now, but it's true. I don't remember my mother and essentially my mother is kind of like a figment.

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of my ex, like I knew I had one and I knew she existed, but I don't remember her. And it's hard to say that, but I think it's also part of that grieving journey that I've been on. And so it's so, you know, and people like you, you were able to live a lot of your life with your mother. Yes. And so after she died and you got into this period of where you were thinking, okay, I'm gonna be more, I'm gonna live in this B space. Like, was there something that like...

19:17
Do you feel like something specifically triggered you to open up that a little bit more? It's when I literally started to experiencing some unusual circumstances that were beyond my left brain to understand. And just like one example, it was about a few months after she passed away and my dad and I were talking about selling their house because really he was going to look for like a maintenance free villa type arrangement.

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And it was a very stressful time at that point in time, personally for me, and just a lot going on with my some advertising work and just some other things that were happening in my world. And I had a dream where my mom came to me and she said, Lisa, and this would be like she would say in on earth, she would say, try not to be so stressed out right now, number one. And she said, the painter that you and your dad have hired.

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is going to reschedule for Saturday when you've got more time. And she gave me the exact dates, October 24th, October 26th. And then I woke up and wrote those dates down because I thought, okay, there's some things happening that I can't explain right now. And about an hour later, the painter called and he said, I'm so sorry, he said, I've got to reschedule for Saturday. Are you and your dad going to be available? And I said, yes.

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And from that moment on, I'd already had many dreams about her after she passed away. But after I called it the October paint dream with the dates, I realized that this was something that was occurring that was beyond my imagination and that was beyond the physical. And that's when I really began to understand that there's a lot of things going on with our brains.

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We only perceive about 1% to 2% of what's around us. And that 98% of what's occurring, just like Einstein even said, the energy never goes away, it just changes form. That's really when I realized that we're never alone in our grief journeys. And I began to embrace that. And the more I embraced that, more things began to occur that I couldn't explain. Because you allowed it. And that's why I wrote the book, To Give People Hope.

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So were those moments for you, like, were those hard for you to embrace because of your kind of the way that you operated before in your corporate kind of life? That's a great question. I questioned them. Yeah, but did you try to explain them away? At first, yes, of course. Yeah, yeah. And, but then I realized, and I think that on some level, that was part of the lesson that I needed to go through, to be able to embrace something that maybe wasn't rationally defined.

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Then it became very gratifying for me and when it and then the more I embraced it the more experiences I had which led me to the book which led me to really help people When they're grieving to let them know that they're not alone and again, it's not then it shifted towards Well, let me I'll stop for a second and then tell you how I met my co-founder And and that's kind of leads to a whole nother journey as part of the puzzle piece Yeah, there's I mean there's a lot to

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to impact there because I think, you know, coming from that corporate world, I feel like working in corporate, there's always an answer. There's always like, well, there's always a result. There's always like some kind of data that we can back things up because we're working on these projects, especially in your world, you're like, especially in advertising, you're like, here are the numbers, this proves that this was a good project. And I think so many people are in that.

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you know, everyday kind of feeling. And when you see something or you hear something or you envision something, I think that would be hard for a lot of people to kind of, to move forward with. Was this something that was just like happening on the daily? Was it something that was happening sporadically? How often was something like punching you in the face trying to wake you up to this experience and this reality for you?

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weekly occurrence at the beginning. Okay. And it was something that could be like this example of the painting? Were a lot of them that kind of way that you got this kind of premonition or some kind of advice that eventually happened? Some of them were. And this is something that a lot of times when our loved ones pass away, they're in a painful state. Or they're in a, especially with an older parent, they're in an elderly state, right?

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actually the first dream, if you will. And now, looking back, I would consider them more visits than dreams. But one of the things, my mother and I went to Sedona, Arizona a few times for, when I was there for like a jazz festival. And the first dream I had after she passed away, and she was only 78, but we were walking down a path in Sedona. And the mountains there, if you've ever seen it, are just gorgeous. I mean, it's just nothing. It's very, very

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colorful and brilliant against a blue sky and In the first dream we were walking down this path and the colors were just spectacular and she put her hands out And her hands look like she was about 30 years old. I Mean just young hands, you know, and and she said Lisa she said I'm out of pain And she said I I feel really good and my love for you will never die

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And so that really was the kickoff, but it wasn't a practical, rational data point like the paint story, right? So, but that was kind of the kickoff when I realized how that energy and then, you know, I would tell people in the workshops, there's dreams, there's signs, you know, some people have signs, you know, whether they have coins that appear on their paths or feathers or birds or whatever the case may be. So it was just a journey, you know, and, and

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But interesting that... An acceptance. An acceptance, I think. Yeah, absolutely. Here's my perspective as someone that lost someone at an early age. I felt that people were trying to convince me of this message. And it wasn't serving me. Cause it didn't make any sense to me, at that point, because I hadn't been having those experiences. I didn't quite understand the grasp of death and everything. And so it's very interesting, but...

25:58
At the same time, my grandmother was very much like experiencing things like you describe. There was a moment, I don't know if I said this in my episode, but my mom was not my grandmother's daughter. My mom was really close with my dad's mom. That's the grandmother that I talk about regularly. And so they were like best friends. And my grandmother had this refrigerator that the light would never turn on, like ever.

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and she would replace it. Never did it turn on, ever. And she would complain about it till she was so mad about it to my mom. And about, probably about a week after my mom died, the light went on and it never burned out after that. And my grandmother was like, you know, she, that was just how she felt. You know, like that was my mom fixing that for her after she died.

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And for me, it didn't make any sense, right? Because I was just young. A lot of things don't make sense when you're eight years old. But I know my grandmother attached to that. But what I found, because of that, my grandmother never truly grieved my mom, like grieved losing my mom. She always held on to it. Do you see that that could be also a fear of not moving through the full grieving journey because you are so attached to it? I think everybody's grieving journey is different.

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And I think that like Elizabeth Kubler-Ross, you know, wrote the book about the stages. I don't think there's linear stages. I think that everybody's unique. And, and I think that like, I don't know if you're familiar with David Kessler, he wrote the sixth stage of grief and it talks about purpose. And, and that's really important, I think, because when you lose somebody you love, whether you believe in after death or not, you've got a, oftentimes a renewed purpose.

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And like David Kessler writes that there's actually a saying even called post-traumatic growth. And it has to do with after someone experiences a grief event, then whether they participate on a board for the American Heart Association, let's say if their loved ones has a heart attack, whether they write a book, a short inspirational memoir, whatever the case may be, whether they just help others in a new way, the person is forever changed.

28:17
You know, their spirit has forever changed. And I think that, you know, again, whether people believe it or not is up to them. But I do believe that it helps people understand that life is just not finite. And that there's more that we can see and understand. And I think that even with workplace healing, you know, it's clearly not, I don't go in with my spiritual message like I did with my grief support groups, but what I realized...

28:46
was, and even working in just a couple of examples of in the ad agency world in Chicago, I had a couple of incidences where there was a woman who didn't come to work on a Wednesday morning. And we found out later that afternoon that she had died by suicide the night before. And this was in the early 90s. And at that point in time, there was really a lot of discussion about mental health in the workplace. And it was very awkward.

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and no one really talked about it, you know, and just being in other such, because death was always the elephant in the room. We're all gonna do it. Yeah. At some point. And, yeah, or even situations where, and it didn't matter who believed what at that point in time, it was just very uncomfortable and awkward and sad. And then I had another situation where one of my coworkers was a young mom, she had three little kids at home, and her husband had a massive heart attack and died.

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And you know, and when she came back to work, and I'm sure she, I don't recall exactly how many days bravement she had, but when she came back to work, of course, everybody was so sad and grieving for her and with her, but nobody said anything. And so just having like the book mission, what I did there in that world, again, just giving permission to people. And one woman said, you're giving me, allowing a place, they're witnessing.

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my experience and letting me share and letting me talk. And if it's for their grief journey, phenomenal. If it helps them on whatever journey they're on. It might help them help someone else too, I think. Exactly, exactly. Did you start writing that book for yourself or was there a purpose? Okay, so it was more of like a... I honestly, I started writing it down because I'm like, for anything, I thought I'm gonna leave this, just this word document for my daughter when I die.

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because I wanted to know that I'll be around, you know? And so I just literally started it for my own healing. And then, you know, maybe there are no such things as coincidences in life. We'll find out someday. But I happened to meet a woman who started up, yeah, exactly. That's part of the puzzle pieces, I believe. But I met a woman here in Kansas City that was starting a publishing company.

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And she said, I work with people like you that just have a, they have an idea, they have a thought, but they don't know an art director who can design a cover. They don't know the steps and editing and how to make it happen. So literally we would meet at Starbucks once a week after I had all my word documents organized and, and we went from there. So, and it's interesting. I, I came out in 2015 and then I.

31:34
Mindy Corpran, who's my partner with Workplace Healing. This is another no coincidence story, but of a friend of a friend had given Mindy my book. And then she reached out and said, I have the same feelings about my son, who was 14 when he was murdered, and my dad, and who was murdered along with her son by a white supremacist, a horrible tragedy here in Kansas City back in 2014. So.

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About the same time that was going on in her world, we didn't really know each other that well, but she had started a foundation, post-traumatic growth. Faith always wins after Reid and Bill Corcoran were murdered. And then I spoke at her foundation event in 2016. So then we, you know, kind of our circles, our Venn diagrams began to overlap. And then...

32:29
In May of 2018 or March in 2018, we ran into each other again and said, let's have lunch. And we sat down for lunch and my father had just passed away, but I coincidentally, the house had sold the week before. I'd gotten everything, the business of death wrapped up as I talk about. And we sat down and said, you know, what can we do in corporate America to help people when they come back to work? And not just help the grievers themselves, but help people.

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talk about the elephant in the room. Because if we talk about the elephant in the room, we're helping people heal and bringing up grief awareness in the workplace. So all that puzzle pieces, they all kind of, like we said before, they just kind of mingle and come together again. Well, and it all started, I mean, you started earlier in the conversation saying, like, you weren't one to journal, you weren't one to kind of write your ideas.

33:22
I always wanted to. It was on my list. Yeah, of course. It's always on your list. I think there's a fear in it, too. I think for people that are very left-brained, that have these orders and things, we're fearful of the lack of structure that comes along with journaling. We're fearful of what might come out. But what's interesting is that you dove into it. Was there a particular trigger that made you like, I'm going to start writing this down? Instead of just keeping them in your head and telling other people about them.

33:52
Was there a reason you wrote it down? I think they were so, I mean, it was such a pivot for me. I mean, it was so, what would be the word? Like almost somebody hitting me over the head saying, pay attention. I just, it was so dramatic that I had to write it down. And the reason I ask this is like, I really do think that my, the first attempt at my healing journey really started when I was forced to write.

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something in my 11th grade English class. And we were supposed to write like a personal narrative of something and I just felt compelled. Like this was gonna be the first time that I was gonna write about the moment, the time. Like I recall the opening paragraph was something about like on the 344th day of 1989, you know, like at this particular time, like I was pinpointing this moment, but I truly think.

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that writing experience, I think I called out of school for like the next couple of days after writing that because I think it unlocked something. I think I'm sure it did, you know, and it was eight years after. It's like a cathartic moment. But like writing, it's so interesting because we can have all these thoughts in our head. They were the same thoughts that were existing in my head. But something about like and this was back in the time before we had, I think we had word processors or something that I wasn't about to write. You know, because

35:18
you can write one sentence and then print that and then write the next sentence and print that. But it was handwritten. And I really do think it kickstarted at least an opening or cracking open of something that that kind of I mean, it took a long time after that. But even to this day, when I need to process something I find I don't journal I don't like that. But I do know when I need to write and I do it. So it's very interesting that people are benefiting now from what you do because

35:47
you opted to do something that was previously uncomfortable for you to do? And in addition to uncomfortable, very vulnerable. Were you not someone like that before? I wouldn't say so. I mean, to talk about not only death, and even though I may have believed it in my heart, I'm not sure I articulated it to the world. And you know what's interesting? When I first started doing some of these grief support events,

36:16
This is before workplace healing, so let's be back in 2016, 2017. It was interesting that people believed me because of my experience in corporate America.

36:30
Yeah, that makes sense though, because we all grew up with that was so perhaps that's why on some level, you know, if we look at maybe that's why I was. Born to carry that message because you know, oh, she's been in corporate America for over 20 years. She must not be crazy. You know, I don't talk about judgment and I'm curious, you know, that's that's as I look back again. That's maybe a part of the puzzle piece. I

36:59
have an episode that I think you would like to listen to. I spoke with someone, her name is Elizabeth Rosenberg, and she was someone that was regularly getting migraines through her whole life. She still gets them. Very successful in corporate America, work in the PR communication space. And during the pandemic, she leaned into something she was avoiding her whole life, which was kind of this spiritual mediumship, Akashic reading kind of thing. Migraines started to be less severe.

37:29
It kind of opened up these things. But the way she was so afraid to tell the world, like, this is what I do. Like, I can do this. And to your point, people work with her because of that 20 years or however many years being a successful PR communications person. If she hadn't had that experience, she's convinced that maybe they wouldn't have listened or maybe they wouldn't. And so, yeah, there's a weird.

37:58
societal peace. But you know what? You know, you did it. And if that's the reason that they have to believe you and that helps them on their healing journey, then it is what it is, right? At that point. Exactly. But I love that you've created this workplace healing to have the uncomfortable conversations. But part of me thinks that we just need like this worldwide education on

38:28
how to talk about these things, because we're all gonna die at some point, we're all gonna know someone that dies, and we're all going to experience the grieving process in our own ways and how we do that. But I think we all might have a better, it's not the right word, but a better experience in that if we weren't so ashamed of something or some part of it.

38:58
If you didn't understand grief before 2020, you know, we like to say that grief is the loss of old ways. You know, and so with COVID, everybody knew that they lost some old ways. And that's it's almost like a universal understanding of grief. And we also realized, I feel like, you know, now with 2023, we're recognizing that people cannot leave themselves.

39:28
at the office door or in their apartment when they open their laptop to work remotely, whatever the case may be, people are bringing their whole selves to work. And they have been since the beginning of work. But as leaders, we don't often recognize that. Yeah, or we don't allow it. Or don't want to recognize that, right. Because it comes with more responsibility, because then we, as leaders, have to also be a fully formed human that brings all of us to work.

39:57
And I think there's vulnerability in that. And I think we were taught and conditioned to not be vulnerable, especially in the workplace, because it looks or we've designated it as weak. And it's not. Exactly, exactly. And this is what we tell the leaders that we work with, that we train, that we help develop. We say, you know, it's empathy is affecting productivity. It affects retention. It affects the bottom line. And there's statistics to prove it.

40:27
You know, and it's when people are recognized at work, you know, when people are like, let me just give you a quick story. We have a situation where one of our clients, there a woman comes back to work, she's 55, her mom just died. And literally her boss walked around the perimeter of the office space, so he wouldn't have to make eye contact with her.

40:50
because he was afraid she might cry, which he might cry, and they both might cry, and oh gosh, that's gonna be horrible, vulnerable. Terrible. Well, she left the company. Because she felt like. She didn't feel safe. And so that's the thing that we're trying to avoid. We wanna help managers talk about the elephant in the room, and then talk about the fact that you can have a team lunch to talk about the coworker, my example before, or we have.

41:19
148 tactics on our platform, but there's so many things that if people could just do this in the workplace, if they could be empathetic, if they could strengthen what we call your empathy muscle, it helps people feel supported. It helps them feel belonged. It helps the culture. Well, and I think, you know, there's, I often have this conversation with people that have experienced grief is, I think, the outside, since we've, nobody's ever taught us how to

41:49
to be around someone that's grieving or to help someone that's grieving. We feel that we're supposed to fix it, and we're not. And then we say dumb things, and then we offer advice that is not necessary and not helpful. And I think if we had some more conversations like this that you're offering in the corporate space, but just in general, I think we'd have.

42:16
a lot better of an experience because we'd all just be people with each other. Absolutely right. And the biggest thing we found is that managers, supervisors, whatever you want to call it, don't know what to say to somebody. And so then they don't say anything. And then to your point, the person feels alienated or they say something that's bizarre. And we always say, you know... They're in a better place. It doesn't help. No, no, no. Mindy has stories about that one. She's like, no, no.

42:46
I mean maybe but no doesn't help right does not help or or for example will tell a manager, you know What is your mother's name? Yeah, what's your mom's name Joan Joan? Okay, so by me bringing up Jones name, is it gonna remind you that your mother passed away? Me yeah, I'm just giving an example like people managers think like wait like let's say a spouse passed away in the office or and and

43:15
by me bringing up that spouse's name to the griever, is it gonna remind them that he passed away? You know what I'm saying? So it's like, on some cases, the person would like to tell a story about their husband who passed away or whatever the case may be, or Joan. Well, and to your point that this whole love never dies, it's the idea of...

43:39
this person, just because they died, they didn't cease to exist. So they're still part of memories. They're still part of that person's life. And to just ignore the fact that this has happened, I think that's really harmful to the person that's just lost that person, because they're already thinking that. And now they're like, everyone else has moved on, and now I need to hold on to this, which then can prolong other things in their own personal journey. So I think there's a lot of repercussions that come with it. I mean, for me, you know,

44:09
My mom died in 89. Nobody was talking about anything, especially with kids back then. And so I saw around me that everyone wanted to make sure I was happy. And so it was gifts, it was trips, it was making sure he's doing all the things that he quote unquote wants to do. And so what that person, me, the young version of me, absorbed was that everyone needs to see that I'm happy.

44:38
So I need to perform. I need to get, I became like, I was like a C student before my mom died. I heard that on your podcast. And now you're this over the top overachiever A plus. Right, which is obnoxious. But I absorbed that because I figured, well, if I don't bring straight A's home, my dad might abandon me too. Because my mom abandoned me in my tiny little brain, not on purpose, but she's gone. Maybe I did something. And so, we absorb these things.

45:07
And so by what you're doing, it's going to trickle into the real world, you know, because how many hours a week do we spend at work? It's a lot. Yeah, it's a third of our lives. Right. And so if we're learning that and we're having real conversations, I'm hopeful that coming out of this pandemic, people have re-evaluated who they are and what they stand for and how they want to interact with the world, I think. But I think, like you said, if you didn't have some of these

45:37
capabilities before, you maybe learned something during COVID, but I think you also maybe pushed really hard against that, and you still don't, and now it's worse. So I think there's a lot to be said there, but you guys are doing some good stuff in the world and probably changing a lot more lives than you realize that you are. You know, that's our vision. And again, there's a lot of initiatives to support Grievers.

46:07
to your point earlier, you know, there's grief support groups, there's employee assistance plans, you know, there's therapy, but there's nothing that truly helps a team know what to do and say, because they're walking around unsure, scared, awkward, walking on eggshells. Feeling helpless? Feeling, yeah, feeling helpless, great point. And then the downstream effect of that is you've got a person sitting at their desk and we call it presenteeism.

46:37
where you're sitting at your desk, you're looking at your laptop, everybody around you is walking on eggshells and you're not thinking about work. And nobody knows what to do or say to even help you in the workplace. So you walking through your journey with grief, writing through your journey with grief, took you here to this version of you. What's different about you? Like what's the biggest difference between

47:06
pre-mom passing and Lisa now. I think that I'm back in the corporate world, which I love, and I flourish in it because that's, it really helps my left brain, but the difference is I'm balanced now. And it's funny that I feel like in life, we're often given the challenges that we know we need to perhaps overcome on some level. And we say, and so coming from a very left brain,

47:35
pre-2011 mother passing state. And then moving into right, I mean, right brain, R-I-G-H-T and W-R-I-T, right and right. But moving into that space where I was very right, right brained and talking to people about signs and dreams and that kind of thing. And then with workplace healing, it's a balance of head and heart.

48:01
It's not just left, it's not just right, it's the balance. And interestingly enough, this is a bit of an aha moment that I'm having for the first time talking to you about this right now. But interestingly enough, we tell our potential clients and clients, we're helping you balance the head and heart of the workplace. Because if you're all head, the emotional wellbeing of the employee is not reflected. If you're all heart, the work doesn't get done. So we've got to find a balance and I've found my personal balance.

48:29
And now that balance is being articulated and materializing with workplace healing because we're helping balance the head and the heart in the workplace. When you were talking about that, I was totally picturing like a like the justice scales kind of, and I was picturing like pre 2011. Lisa, you like it was just like.

48:52
This side was all the way down. This side was all the way up. And writing your book was the was the thing that went. It went like this. And now finding the balance with workplace healing. I kind of pictured that that was the visual that came into my head. And I saw it, too. We're both on the same wavelength because and honestly, again, articulating it right now with you on this podcast. I'm not sure I've ever said that to anybody before, but it really makes sense.

49:18
You know, and I think there's value in that. I talked to a lot of people about like the power of like just telling your story and putting it out there and how that it actually has a lot of power selfishly for like us because, you know, like telling my story on the episode that you listen to when I was talking to my friend Kristen about my journey and then listening back to it, I was like, wow, I don't think I've ever told the story from this point.

49:46
to this point, it was always like, here's a chunk, here's a chunk, here's a chunk. And you know, what was so special about that episode is that when I told that story, my dad lived that experience with me, right? Like he was by my side and he lived all of those moments with me and he got to hear me say it from beginning to end for the first time. Because you know, if we talk about it, then he's like, no, that's not what happened. You know, if you were to have that natural conversation.

50:13
And what it allowed for was this really lovely conversation about like almost like a healing conversation of I didn't realize that's what you were doing. Here's how I saw it from my side. And we really found a deeper understanding just through me being able to tell my story. I love that. That's beautiful. And you know, as an addition to that, after I wrote my book, I would say that it helped my father and I.

50:42
before he died. So in your book, how is it structured? Is it more about the spiritual awakening, or is it more about this is how I was, and this is how I am kind of thing? No, it's more about the experiences. So I would call it, maybe it is more of a spiritual awakening, but it's basically my stories to help people understand that when they feel something,

51:11
It's not a figment of their imagination and to open their heart. And to like lean into it. And to lean into it, right. And I think that like again, to your point with your dad, I mean, that's beautiful that he could listen to your experience and your perception and what you were feeling. And like I said, that was a similar situation for me, when my dad actually was close, was about a week or two before he died and some things were happening in his life.

51:39
There were some strange electrical occurrences going on. There was just some bizarre things going on in the house. There were some different things. And he's, at least I finally believe. You know, but I mean, it's interesting because it's that left right brain and finding that balance. I don't know. I think your story is about putting your story out there and the power. Yeah, and being vulnerable. Well, and the power that it had to change your life because

52:09
Think about it, if you didn't write that book.

52:14
would you do? I mean, where would you be? Right? Like, I feel like you putting those feelings and experiences on paper created the rest of these puzzle pieces kind of inching their way towards each other. They might never have made it to the same box. No, I would not have. I probably wouldn't have met my co founder. Right? You wouldn't have to to create this company called workplace healing.

52:43
Right, because if you hadn't written the book, then her friend wouldn't have sent her the book. She would have sent her a different book, right? As something else. And it's always really interesting to me that when I talk to people here, when you're, most people, when they're compelled to do something and they kind of like push it off, push it off, and then when they finally do it, it's like, look at what it opened up. I know. And you know, this is interesting. I just had this thought pop in.

53:13
kind of wrestling with my brain back in, when I was having the experiences. So before the book came out, if you will, I was like, I don't have time to write a book. Okay, no one's gonna read this book and why am I gonna write a book, right? I would literally, I listened to NPR a lot in the car and I would literally, I kid you not, almost every day I would get into the car, turn on NPR and they'd say, and if you're writing a book or, oh.

53:41
this person just wrote a book. I mean, it would happen like daily. And I'm like, oh my goodness, the universe is hitting me over the head saying, sit down and write something. Yeah, and look what it did. Look what it did for you. Like, let's take everyone out of the equation. What did writing that book do for you, for your soul? What did it do? I would say growth is the first word that comes to mind.

54:07
It was growth. It was growth in a personal journey. It was growth in being vulnerable with my story. It was growth in understanding things that perhaps I couldn't see. It was growth in meeting. I met so many amazing people when I would do these workshops and talk to people. People from all, just such a diverse group of amazing people. And doesn't matter, religion doesn't matter, you know, but it was just a great group to learn from.

54:37
And I loved that. Did writing that book and kind of healing in that way, did that change your relationships with your daughter and your husband and your father? Definitely with my father, because he was not, if I was, let's say I was 70 on the left brain scale, George was 170. You know, which worked well for him in his life, and no judgment.

55:03
And I would say for our daughter, she was in fourth grade when my mom passed away and immediately read the book after it came out. So she was about in seventh grade, I guess, when the book actually came out. And she immediately, you know, she felt my mom's presence. And I think children, and you can speak to this, I'm sure they don't have as much judgment in life. So they tend to look at things from an openhearted perspective. And even as a, even at that point in her life, I mean, she was

55:32
I mean, happy for me, number one, that I felt it, happy for her grandmother that she was very close to. And we still have, and I'll just give you a quick sign. This is an example of a sign. This might be helpful to people. So during COVID, you know how we, our crazy world. So our daughter graduated high school in 2020. So, you know, talk about crazy for a high school senior, right? And then went to college in fall of 2020 and campus was shut down.

56:01
Nobody was living in dorms the whole bit. So and this was in Washington DC So Katie and her roommate are moving into an extended stay hotel So they could have some sort of college experience and not sit at their parents dining room table. Okay in Kansas, so so we're just moving in and At the time the exact time I kid you not when her roommate was pulling into the circle drive this big monarch butterfly

56:30
literally flew circles around my daughter's head. And for like two minutes, and I didn't have my phone with me, I would have loved to have like taken a little video, and we looked at each other and just truly knew in our hearts that that was Katie's grandmother, my mom, witnessing this bizarro college event and COVID, and knowing that everything's gonna work out.

57:00
Yeah, the reason I asked that is because you said that this was also a practice in vulnerability and sometimes the people around us were also afraid to be as vulnerable with. And then when we put this out into the world, it's like, oh, you can stop being so vulnerable now. It's a little bit much. I'm kind of speaking about myself here, but I'm curious. I was curious to see if that changed those relationships because now your heart's more cracked open, right? For the world to see.

57:27
And I think it was healthy for my for my family. Oh, for sure. I mean, it sounds like it unless unless they weren't prepared for it. And then that's a whole other story. Right. It was. Yeah. If you could go back to the Lisa that, you know, your mom just passed away, knowing what you know now, is there anything that you would say to her about this upcoming journey that she was about to go on? I would say thank you, because I think that her ability.

57:55
to help me open my heart with the signs, with the dreams, with all the bizarro circumstances that were happening have led me to a really beautiful journey today. It sounds like a really rich life, like really impactful, heart-rich, I mean, you know, in the sense that like...

58:17
I don't know, it feels like when you know or when you get an inkling that there is some impact being made that's beyond the bottom line, that's beyond all those performative measures that we've all been trained to say that is success. I think there's a different feeling there. It feels very rich and that's kind of how I feel about this show. Yeah. When I hear from people, they'll send me like a DM on social media saying,

58:45
I really needed to hear that episode today because X, Y, and Z, this is what I'm going through. And I really thought I was the only person going through this. So thank you. You know, and it's like, I can imagine how much of that you feel because of the impact that just putting your experiences down on paper has led you to with the current journey that you're on. And just, and I feel like we're all, you know, we're born, we have gifts. Everyone has gifts.

59:13
And if we don't use our gifts that we feel intuitively that we have, then I feel like life would feel less meaning, less meaningful. And the thing that's very gratifying about today for me personally, is that these gifts, whether it's left brain marketing know-how or the vulnerability of the book and then bringing awareness into the workplace that people are struggling with grief.

59:43
helping people understand the prevalence of grief and how people are truly affected. If I didn't bring that gift, I think I would feel like I wasn't meeting my life objective or something, you know? It's really hard for me because I could never, 20 years ago, 10 years ago, five years ago, imagine that this would be my journey right now. Yeah. And the fact that I leaned into it.

01:00:12
And now, you know, recording, I have like 100 something scheduled already to record. And that eight year old would never have imagined that. And even the two years ago or the year ago that I started this podcast, I didn't know that there was still areas that I was trying to heal. And so, you know, this journey, like you say, like it's fulfilling that purpose. It's feeling like, oh, I was always supposed to get to this point.

01:00:41
And because I was, quote unquote, brave enough to start, this is what unfolds. Mm-hmm. You said it beautifully. And I'm sure you can relate to it. You know, it's hard. I think that I had to go through all these things, though. And I also say this, with sadness coming out of my mouth, I wouldn't change anything. Right. You know? And because.

01:01:11
Had my mom not died in that particular way, I wouldn't be here right now. Had I not sat with my grandmother for the last 96 hours of her life and watched her take her last breath, I wouldn't be this version of me. Had I said the plane flight was too expensive or whatever it may have been, I wouldn't be in this place. So I wouldn't change anything. And I think that takes a lot to come to that. I agree. Awareness and comfort. I agree.

01:01:40
Well, I appreciate you coming on and sharing your story and your journey. And I think people will get, you know, when I looked at what you submitted, I was like, OK, well, she's going to talk about her mom passing. And I don't think that's, I mean, that is a very big pivotal piece. But I think this book and putting these experiences into words and putting it out into the world, I think a lot of people will take some value in that and leaning into.

01:02:09
that vulnerability because I think a lot of people are afraid of it. And it kind of just shows that like, it's just baby steps at first. It's just little steps that can take you on this wild journey. And so thank you for just being a part of this. Well, it's my pleasure. And again, it's been a really fun opportunity to meet you and awesome. And I mean, I will say that it's been awesome to understand that perhaps on a simplistic way, it's all about the balance of head and heart.

01:02:38
Maybe this is all we're supposed to do, right? I think that's important, especially for people like my gen... I'm in my 40s now. My generation was very much taught to... It's all about the performance, the success, the head part of it. And I think that's important to understand that as full humans, we need to balance all the pieces that come along with it and not just like the thinking part because I think there's a lot more to life than that.

01:03:07
And you've discovered that after years of success in the corporate world. And coming back to it, you probably have a quite a different experience in the corporate world now, or appreciation for it in a different way than you did before. Mm-hmm. Truly. Yeah. If people want to learn more about you or connect with you or just talk with you, is that a thing? And can you share where they can do that? I've got, well, Workplace Healing. So one side that's our website is called Workplace.

01:03:36
workplacehealing.com and we've got a lot of resources for people too. We've got some great articles and then not only about how to work with people that are going through a grief event but also how, you know, caregiving. What's that like when you're working with someone who's a caregiver? You know, I think about like you and your grandmother or, you know, if you were a full-time caregiver for her, you know, what would that look like? You know, so we, so workplacehealing.com is our business where we are training leaders.

01:04:05
on how to respond to grievers and caregivers in the workplace. One of our goals, too, Matt, is to eventually get to a point where the software has expanded. Our software is called a human recovery platform. So helping humans recover, helping humans recover when they come back to work via the teams. And then my book, lisakcooper.com is my book website. And I will say in full vulnerability.

01:04:29
I don't have time to update the blogs on that website anymore. But it's where the book is on Amazon now. You're My Voice. It's called You're My Voice. How Love's Voice Never Dies. Awesome. We will put all those links. Are you a social person or no social media kind of person? Oh, no. For Workplace Healing, we're very active on LinkedIn because that's our target audience. So very, very active on LinkedIn.

01:04:57
We also, with Workplace Healing, we do have a Facebook page. And then with the book, I haven't been as active on social media with that lately, just because of Workplace Healing. But you know. Understood. It's on Amazon. People can find you. We will put all that information in the show notes so that people can check out your information and check out your book. And you know, you never know who's listening and what they need. Again, just our goal is to you and I on this podcast to raise awareness.

01:05:26
So if we can bring a little glimmer to someone's world, amazing. Exactly. I tell everyone, maybe too many times, success for me for this show is measured if each episode finds the ears that need to hear it at that moment in time, then we win. Absolutely. If we help one person, it sounds really small, but I think it's really big because that one person can then help other people. And so.

01:05:53
There's a lot of trickle down effect and trickle around and trickle up and all over the place. So I love it. Thank you for being a part of this. Thank you for we had a little tech issue. So nobody hopefully nobody can hear those when I edit those out. But thank you for being a part of this. And for those of you listening, I'd love it. I'm going to ask for something different this time. I'd love it if you are listening to an episode and you're really enjoying it. If you could share it with a friend. I think that does even more than reviews and ratings.

01:06:20
I'd be so appreciative of that. And we'll be back next week with a brand new episode of the Life Shift Podcast. Thanks again, Lisa. Thank you, Matt.

01:06:39
For more information, please visit www.thelifeshiftpodcast.com