An Unscripted Woman Podcast

Lael Couper Jepson's latest book, Ignite: Lighting the Leader Fire, was released on November 13, 2019. Part heat-seeking memoir and part fiery missive, Ignite is what it looks like when a woman taps into her power with her whole heart and unapologetically leads with all of who she is—without asking for permission or pausing to to explain why. Come and sample the opening chapter read by Lael—and bring your match. Because now is the time and this is your moment, which is also our moment.

Lael Couper Jepson's latest book, Ignite: Lighting the Leader Fire, was released on November 13, 2019. Part heat-seeking memoir and part fiery missive, Ignite is what it looks like when a woman taps into her power with her whole heart and unapologetically leads with all of who she is—without asking for permission or pausing to to explain why. Come and sample the opening chapter read by Lael—and bring your match. Because now is the time and this is your moment, which is also our moment.

Nadine Farag shares a story on stage at SheSpeaks in December 2018 at One Longfellow Square, Portland, Maine. As the final speaker of the first night of this annual women's storytelling evening hosted by SheChanges, Nadine's story is about her own personal revolution—one that had her examine the contractions that lie within herself, understand who she is on the inside, and who she is on the surface, and how to best to adorn that woman. Her story is entitled: The Vessel Of Self. "After a lifetime of rule following...I walked into my advisor's at my doctoral program at Harvard, and I dropped out. I dropped out because I wanted to be wearing completely different clothes... I wanted to whole shebang of sartorial dressing to be at my disposal...this began a complicated and fraught process for me of unpacking what the word 'fashion' meant to me...and also other women." - Nadine Farag http://www.shechanges.com/experiences-for-women/shespeaks-womens-speaking-series/upcoming-shespeaks/ Photo Credit: Melissa Mullen Photography

Lael Couper Jepson tells a story on stage at her annual women's storytelling series, SheSpeaks, in December 2018 at One Longfellow Square in Portland, Maine. In this story, Lael shares a story about how sometimes the real value of something is hidden inside a crusty layer of shit. She speaks about her experiment to see if she could value and appreciate both the shit AND the gold in a surprising way. "...It brought me to this place of appreciating the need for outfitting as well as adorning...When I outfit myself, I'm ready for a street fight—that's my amour. But when I adorn myself..feel the regal nature of that word? That's me assuming the throne of my life..." - Lael Couper Jepson FMI: www.shechanges.com/experiences-for…ming-shespeaks/ Photo credit: Melissa Mullen Photography

Lyn Carter shares a story on stage at SheSpeaks in December 2018 at One Longfellow Square, Portland, Maine. Building off an ancient story of the Fox and The Star, Lyn's story at this this annual women's storytelling evening, hosted by SheChanges, is about knowing who we are, and where we came from so that we might re-member all the pieces of ourselves—to learn how to put all of our pieces together when it's hard. Her story is entitled: Women's Ways of Knowing. "That rootedness has helped me in times of my life that were hard—and set me on a journey. ...and while I don't have any magic wand, I know that my next steps are to work to empower women as the best that we can, and go back and reach those stories...bring them forward into modern day, and start to create a picture. I want stories that I can tell my grandchildren that are ours, and all of yours as well." - Lyn Carter, SheSpeaks 2018 http://www.shechanges.com/experiences-for-women/shespeaks-womens-speaking-series/upcoming-shespeaks/ Photo Credit: Melissa Mullen Photography

Lael Couper Jepson tells a story on stage at her annual women's storytelling series, SheSpeaks, in December 2018 at One Longfellow Square in Portland, Maine. Using the Game Of Life board game as a metaphor, Lael talks about the rules we are taught about life—the ones that are generally not ours, nor were they designed with us in mind—only benefit those who are set up to "win." She offers up some new rules she's crafted for herself, borrowing this one from Monica Lewinsky: "No one can tell me I am not a reliable narrator of my own life." "My relationship with rules has been rather loud, and I've had lots of consequences for that. But I find with every year I live my life...I'm getting louder, which is saying something, because I was loud before..." - Lael Couper Jepson FMI: www.shechanges.com/experiences-for…ming-shespeaks/ Photo credit: Melissa Mullen Photography

Corinne shares a story on stage at SheSpeaks in December 2018 at One Longfellow Square, Portland, Maine. The story Corinne tells at this this annual women's storytelling evening, hosted by SheChanges, plays at the intersections of motherhood, identity, and creativity. Her story is entitled: Water Witching. "For all I gained by becoming a mother, there is plenty that I've lost. ...like a big 'ole dump truck full of expectations and anxiety and overwhelm, just fucking unloaded all over who I was...all over my creative source, my creative practice...it just poured it on, packed it tight, and smoothed it over until I no longer recognized the landscape." - Corinne Mockler, SheSpeaks 2018 Please note: the audio on Corinne's is a bit lower, so you might need to adjust accordingly... http://www.shechanges.com/experiences-for-women/shespeaks-womens-speaking-series/upcoming-shespeaks/ Photo Credit: Melissa Mullen Photography

Lael Couper Jepson tells a story on stage at her annual women's storytelling series, SheSpeaks, in December 2018 at One Longfellow Square in Portland, Maine. In this story, Lael talks about the "red light moments" of life when the dashboard alerts you something is amiss, and how these are the moments of the unknown where women start to get really resourceful...and busy. "When the red lights go on on our dash, we reach for the answer as if there is an answer....Intellectually we know there's no owner's manual for living a human life...but there are just so many unknowns...The holy grail is inside us, but so often we reach outside ourselves for the answer..." - Lael Couper Jepson FMI: http://www.shechanges.com/experiences-for-women/shespeaks-womens-speaking-series/upcoming-shespeaks/ Photo credit: Melissa Mullen Photography

Louisa Irele shares her story on stage at SheSpeaks in December 2018 at One Longfellow Square, Portland, Maine. Louisa's story at this annual women's storytelling evening, hosted by SheChanges, is about learning to love yourself and tell yourself that you belong—you deserve to be here—as a means of decide how to be in the world. Especially when you're emotionally busy. Her story is : My Queendom. "We can't truly see anybody else's story—we have to have them tell it to us, and we have to be able to hear it and listen to it. My story is important because it says a lot about how I move through space...I spend a lot of time in spaces where it's really, really visually obvious that I'm different...which means that I spend a lot of time in spaces that I exist in thinking that everybody around me is wondering..do I belong..." - Louisa Irele, SheSpeaks 2018 http://www.shechanges.com/experiences-for-women/shespeaks-womens-speaking-series/upcoming-shespeaks/ Photo Credit: Melissa Mullen Photography

Lael Couper Jepson tells a story on stage at her annual women's storytelling series, SheSpeaks, in December 2018 at One Longfellow Square in Portland, Maine. In this story, Lael speaks to the power of making art as a means to figure herself out: "I just keep making shit as I go—sometimes it's good shit, and sometimes it's bad shit—but that's how I figure out everything. It's my go-to interface and how I make meaning in my world...and there's no roof on me anymore...I'm just constantly conjuring..." - Lael Couper Jepson FMI: http://www.shechanges.com/experiences-for-women/shespeaks-womens-speaking-series/upcoming-shespeaks/ Photo credit: Melissa Mullen Photography

Anne Morin shares a story on stage at SheSpeaks in December 2018 at One Longfellow Square, Portland, Maine. As the first speaker of this annual women's storytelling evening, hosted by SheChanges, Anne brought the full house to its feet with her story: Whispers Under The Words. "After years and years of listening to other people's subtext, and hearing and trying to tease out their truth, and their opinions...I suddenly looked around and realized that I had kind of gone mute to my own opinions, and a little deaf to my own subtext..." - Anne Morin, SheSpeaks 2018 http://www.shechanges.com/experiences-for-women/shespeaks-womens-speaking-series/upcoming-shespeaks/ Photo Credit: Melissa Mullen Photography

An excerpt from Lael Couper Jepson at SheSpeaks 2018, sharing a story at her women's storytelling series at One Longfellow Square in Portland, Maine. This story bit frames the overall theme for the storytelling series: Sovereign. "Being sovereign for me, now, isn't about being possessed...it's about being in FULL possession of everything I am, everything I see, everything I feel, everything I know to be true for me." - Lael Couper Jepson FMI: http://www.shechanges.com/experiences-for-women/shespeaks-womens-speaking-series/upcoming-shespeaks/ Photo credit: Melissa Mullen Photography

In this episode of An Unscripted Woman, I weave together some stories and riff on the themes of the urgency of our times, and how it is calling many of us to speak more clearly (plainly) and get naked with our truth —even if it makes us uncomfortable, is inconvenient, or unpopular. Even if you feel vulnerable and not ready. Even if you're wondering if you're the "right" person for the job. And with all that, I'll also speak to the things women are doing to stay rooted amidst the gale-force winds of these times—so we can stay whole and sane as we are deeply of service. Links referenced in this episode: In Her Words w/SheChanges http://www.shechanges.com/experiences-for-women/in-her-words-5-week-writing-experience/ (please note: this experience is now full for 2019) Witch Ways: You're Not Crazy, You're a Woman https://www.gofundme.com/shechanges-book-2-powered-by-women Layla Saad https://www.meandwhitesupremacybook.com/ Greta Thunberg at Davos https://www.theguardian.com/science/video/2019/jan/25/i-want-you-to-panic-16-year-old-greta-thunberg-issues-climate-warning-at-davos-video

A tasty morsel of an advance chapter from Lael Couper Jepson's upcoming book, Witch Ways, due to be released this summer. Go ahead, give it a listen... FMI: check out the story behind how this book is super-powered by women and the SheChanges community https://www.gofundme.com/shechanges-book-2-powered-by-women

A sneak peak, advance sampling of a chapter from Lael Couper Jepson's upcoming second book, Witch Ways, due to be released this summer. FMI: check out the story behind how this book is super-powered by women and the SheChanges community https://www.gofundme.com/shechanges-book-2-powered-by-women

An early release, sneaky sampling of a chapter from Lael Couper Jepson's upcoming book, Witch Ways, due to be released this summer. Go ahead...try it on for size... FMI: check out the story behind how this book is super-powered by women and the SheChanges community https://www.gofundme.com/shechanges-book-2-powered-by-women

Another bite-sized, early taste of Lael Couper Jepson's soon to be released second book...go ahead, give it a listen. FMI: check out the story behind how this book is super-powered by women and the SheChanges community https://www.gofundme.com/shechanges-book-2-powered-by-women

A sneak-peak, advance taste of Lael Couper Jepson's second book, due to be released in July 2019. FMI: check out the story behind how this book is super-powered by women and the SheChanges community https://www.gofundme.com/shechanges-book-2-powered-by-women

In this episode, I shine a light on the very thing we are trained not to look at in ourselves as women: Anger. And in doing so, my invitation is a call to let it out more, to listen to it, and to actually leverage it as rocket fuel to create change, rather than have it stew and sour inside us creating shame and ultimately disconnection and dis-ease. I explore the difference between anger (which is natural energy) and violence (which is harmful action), and play with my own desire to actually practice anger rather than doing what I'm told to do as a woman: "manage" it, hide it, or pretend it doesn't exist. The riff at the end of this episode shares my most recent reflections on this in light of the Women's Marches that happened all over the world on Inauguration Day this past January 20th.

This episode explores what lives inside each of — our essence — and is an invitation to live from that place with more intention. You'll hear about many of my stories that finally had me grab onto, own, and ultimately embody the part of me I had feared most. The part people could see and sense the minute they met me, but the part I felt compelled to hide or tightly manage. At its core, this chapter is a call to action — to come out from behind ourselves and live life as we are, not as we think (of have been told)we should be.

This episode examines how often many of us feel alone when we're surrounded by a crowd of people — like you're the only one that thinks and feels a certain way, and everyone else has it "together" and "figured out". It also examines the shame that can bubble up inside ourselves in those situations("what's wrong with you!?") that can have us withdraw even further — from others and from our own truth. At the core of this episode is a personal look at my own relationship to anger — then and now — and how I have sought to shuck the shame, while also leveraging it as fuel for my fire. For anyone who thinks your alone in this or who feels like people might not be able to "handle you" if you let that energy out/show more...this one's for you.

This episode explores the default so many of us have around "bearing down" on something we want to make happen — which means reckoning with our love affair of control, being busy, moving fast, and being "productive". At the core of it, there is an invitation to become more efficient with how we move through life — balancing periods of pushing with periods of yielding — and trusting in ourselves enough to honor both instincts and guidance to propel us forward.

This episode is about my long-overdue reclamation of a part of myself that was both my greatest strength and secret shame: my competitive spirit. In this chapter, I unpack all the rules that had me moving carefully — as if by a script — and holding myself full self back. But more than that, this is a story about alchemy — and how choosing to consciously burn off shame can offer access to even deeper reservoirs of personal power.

This episode unpacks my own story of competition, and explores how it tends to get a bad rap among women. It also looks at how our competitive spirit (ambition, drive, intensity, desire) can be a thin and tricky line to walk as women — triggering us to dampen, dumb down, or diminish ("play small" or "shrink") what is sometimes our greatest strength. This is my story of discovering how I was participating in my own shrinkage in this regard...and in how healing that shame and more fully owning the entirety of who I am is helping me to not only be more compassionate with myself — but also is greatly diminishing my experiences of judgement and disconnect from others.

This is the first chapter that I really dig into the stories of masculine energy and my experience of it as a woman. In doing so, I also explore how I wasn't able to even get to that conversation with myself until I really started to sit with my identity as a woman and how I had essentially dissociated from from that until my first pregnancy "outted me" and forced my hand. This is the story about how I actively participated in my own shame, and how once I could face it - with compassion - I was able to more fully access and leverage some of my favorite parts of myself.

This episode gets at the heart of what I mean when I say "luminous living" — it's about allowing ourselves to live the fullest RANGE of who we are, and in doing so amping up our wattage so that we are able to shine more brightly in the world. I also spend time exploring the value of "mustering" as a means to both honor and ready ourselves for making a courageous or bold move and talk about the tools I use (for myself and my clients) that help me grease the skids when I am most resistant or scared to move out of my comfort zone.

In this episode, I do my damnedest to drill down to the nitty gritty details of defining the masculine and the feminine for myself. In the process, I highlight why that process/conversation is so hard to have — with ourselves AND with others — and how easy it is to avoid it all together. I also shine a light on why I see it as one of the most central conversations of our time, and make a case (if for no one else than myself) for why differentiating and defining masculine and feminine energies within ourselves is at the heart of living and leading a more luminous life.

This episode looks at the ways we can SEE ourselves more clearly as women — and how the missing pieces of our self perception can inadvertently contribute to dimming our own lights and not showing up fully as we are. Embedded in this episode is an invitation to actively contribute our own visibility — first to ourselves, and then to each other — as a means to embody the fullest expression of our worth and more freely share our gifts (which adds value to how we live/lead).

This episode explores the hidden gems that lurk in the messy detritus of a life - and invites readers to put on some mud boots and dig in to the discomfort that can so easily be stepped over. At the heart of this topic is a call to examine all the data points inside ourselves — the good, the bad, and the often the ugly — as a means to shine a light on and validate our desire so that we can ultimately muster the courage to intentionally disrupt the status quo to get where we want to go.

This is Episode #2 of kickoff season for my podcast, An Unscripted Woman. After setting the stage for this latest creative endeavor of mine (hint: it's my response to the request I hear so often: When will the audio version of your book be released?), I jump right in by reading the first chapter (Unscripted) of my book Unscripted: A Woman's Living Prayer. I conclude by riffing a bit on what I've noticed, learned, experienced since writing that chapter. Note: Weekly episodes will begin starting in September 2016, with each episode corresponding to the next subsequent chapter of my book. If you'd like to follow along, follow me on Soundcloud, subscribe to the feed via iTunes, or look for each episode posted on my blog or the SheChanges page on Facebook. FMI: www.shechanges.com/ To order my book and read along: amzn.to/2a6tTdk

This is the kickoff episode for my podcast, An Unscripted Woman. After setting the stage for this latest creative endeavor of mine (hint: it's my response to the request I hear so often: When will the audio version of your book be released?), I jump right in by reading the beginning chapter (An Invocation) of my book Unscripted: A Woman's Living Prayer. I conclude by riffing a bit on what I've noticed, learned, experienced since writing that chapter. Note: Weekly episodes will begin starting in September 2016, with each episode corresponding to the next subsequent chapter of my book. If you'd like to follow along, follow me on Soundcloud, subscribe to the feed via iTunes, or look for each episode posted on my blog or the SheChanges page on Facebook. FMI: http://www.shechanges.com/ To order my book and read along: http://amzn.to/2a6tTdk