00:00:00 Thanks for joining us on episode 696 of the inspired stewardship podcast, a special rebroadcast of episode one Oh one with Shannon mills. I'm Shannon miles from ballet. I challenged you to discover your calling and find your third option so you can be empowered to live every day to the fullest. One way to be inspired to do that is to listen to this, the inspired stewardship podcast with my friend and Scott Mader.
00:00:35 We just had a conversation. We have a nine year old son and a 12 year old daughter, and we just had to have that conversation with our son this week. Cause he, he came up with his magic trick that he just could not wait to show it. My husband was on a video call and he's like, buddy, that was not an emergency scenarios where you get her up.
00:00:56 Welcome. And thank you for joining us on the inspired stewardship podcast. If you truly desire to become the person who God wants you to be, then you must learn to use your time, your talent and your treasure for your true calling in the inspired stewardship podcast. We'll learn to invest in yourself, invest in others and develop your influence so that you can impact the world In today's interview with Shannon miles from ballet.
00:01:33 I asked Shannon about how you don't have to choose between career and family and how you can have both what you can do to invest in yourself and be ready to explore the third option and how to find good mentors and lots more. One reason I like to bring you great interviews. Like the one you're going to hear today is because of the power in learning from others.
00:01:59 Another great way to learn from others is through reading books. But if you're like most people today, you find it hard to find the time to sit down and read. And that's why today's podcast is brought to you by audible, go to inspired stewardship.com/audible to sign up and you can get a 30 day free trial. There's over 180,000 titles to choose from.
00:02:24 And instead of reading, you can listen your way to learn from some of the greatest minds out there. That's inspired stewardship.com/audible to get your free trial and listen to great books. The same way you're listening to this podcast. Shannon miles is the CEO of belay, inc a inc 500 fastest growing company and winner of culture, IQ and entrepreneurs. Number one,
00:02:51 company, culture awards since 2010, the company has grown to nearly 700 team members and nearly 1000 clients on a daily basis. Whether through team development or balanced mentoring, Shannon is passionate about serving others and inspiring them to live life more fully while firmly remaining her own worst critic. While on Necker Island with Richard Branson, she learned that if your dreams don't scare you,
00:03:20 they simply aren't big enough. Shannon lives in Atlanta with her family. Shannon, thanks so much for coming on the show. Thank you so much for having me Your book. The third option lays out that men and women don't have to choose between career and family, but can have both and be a success. So when we think about third options, why do you think our society and culture is often so fixated on the either or the take it or leave it mentality instead of recognizing that there's always a third option.
00:04:05 I think our society in America is so driven that there seem to be only two obvious choices. One is, you know, go to college, get the job in the company, climb the ladder, move on to the next position, work, work, work, or abandoned all of that to have a family. And there's so much space in between to craft either your own business or your own work from home opportunity,
00:04:34 you know, part time, full time that isn't tied to going to a corporation, but the people just don't talk about that. It's not necessarily a sexy way to, to live, but when you look at, you know, large corporations, there seems to be this big appeal, like that's the right path. Or if you don't do that, then you just need to stay home.
00:04:54 So when someone begins to have that dream of exploring a third option for themselves, what are the most important things for them to do to invest and prepare themselves before making that leap? You know, when I talk about a third option, it's often the beginning of a journey and not something that can just happen overnight. I think there's two different types of people that the third option appeals to.
00:05:23 It is somebody who is in that first scenario. I just described, you know, working in a corporation, burning the candle at both ends and not having enough time and energy to focus on the things that are actually really important. And those people, you know, oftentimes pursuing a third option, which is, you know, virtual working may have to take a pay cut to make that transition for,
00:05:48 for the quality of life that they desire. And so sometimes that can't just happen overnight. You have to make a plan, you have to set a budget. Sometimes you have to update your resume cause been in that position for a while. And then the second audience that this appeals to is, is the other scenario. I talked about somebody who maybe made the decision to stay home with children,
00:06:08 be a stay at home. Dad, stay at home mom, or maybe they're staying home because they're caring for aging parents. We're seeing that more and more with the baby boomers at the ages that they are. Sometimes you have both, which is really tough. But in that scenario, what I've found in my research is sometimes there's still something missing. Even though,
00:06:28 you know, you made that decision for the right reasons to care for your family. If you're geared toward a profession or a vocation that that feeling and that calling doesn't go away just because you decided to stay home. And so for those types of people, sometimes the planning and preparation is around coming up with some childcare or care for your aging parents. Or once again,
00:06:51 updating that resume, maybe it got a little stale, maybe it's time to brush up on September some technologies that would enable you to live out the third option. So I think there are definitely steps to be taken in either scenario, but it doesn't happen overnight. Hm. And again, I I've talked before on the show about how I made the leap to running my own business and I would agree fully.
00:07:16 We did almost two years of prep work before we felt like we were ready to make that leap. Uh, my wife and I, you know, making sure we had financial things in order we had, like you said, just life care stuff in order, there's so much to take care of before you do it, but you can do that. Absolutely.
00:07:36 Somebody that I interviewed for the book said, I actually had to retrain my family when I started going back to work. Because you know, you just settle into your routines and your rhythms and ended up handling things in your life when you're not working that you simply can't do. Once you start taking on a part time job or full time jobs, there's almost a retraining of family that has to happen sometimes too.
00:08:00 And I talk about in the book, he can't, he can't do it alone. So you need that support. Yeah. I'm laughing because hanging on the door to my office right now is a do not disturb sign because that's my cue to the family that, Hey, you can't just come walking in right now. Something's going on. I need uninterrupted times.
00:08:21 We just had a conversation. We have a nine year old son and a 12 year old daughter. And we just had to have that conversation with our son this week. Cause he, he came up with his magic trick that he just could not wait to show my husband was on a video call and he's like, buddy, that was not an emergency.
00:08:36 That is no areas where you could interrupt. Exactly. If you're not bleeding and you're not in fear for your life and the house isn't on fire. Don't interrupt. Shannon. One thing you talk about in the book is the idea of having good mentors and actually go through and talk about some of your mentors that you've had over the years. And I particularly loved the mentor.
00:09:02 Who's who asked that question? Is this something you want me to help you solve? Or do you want me to listen so I can tell you, you know, that's something I've used a what back when I was in management, I use that with employees, but I use that when communicating with my wife and my son as well. Can you talk a bit about how people can find a good mentor for themselves as they begin to invest in themselves?
00:09:27 How can they find those people? You have to be intentional and seek them out very rarely will a mentor identify you and see potential in you and say, let me invest my time and energy into you. Like you have to want it and you have to find it. Oftentimes it's somebody that you work with who emulates the type of leader that you want to become and they may carve out time to invest in you.
00:09:55 So there are formal mentoring programs out there that are vocation specific or, you know, maybe through your church or radical mentoring is one that my husband went through. That's a program that's becoming more and more popular nationwide. It's pretty prevalent here in the Atlanta area, but they're out there. I think that the key is to seek them out in a funny story about that mentoring in particular sod,
00:10:20 it, she was my boss and by nature of, you know, there's me reporting to her, right. I leaned into her pretty heavy and I reconnected with her because of the book. And I wanted to send her a book and thank her for her investment in me. And so we ended up FaceTiming recently and she said that her daughter read the book and was cracking up.
00:10:39 She was like, mom, you have sat on us at home all the time. So it does apply to, to home and work life because sometimes, and my husband's a verbal processor. And so sometimes it's wants to talk about an idea or a problem, but doesn't necessarily need my input or he just needs me to listen. And so, yeah,
00:11:00 I've used that at home too. That's a good reminder that we don't have to solve all the problems Well, and, and my wife is the verbal processor in our relationship. So very early in the marriage I learned, she's not always coming to me to solve the problem. Sometimes she just needs to talk about it and I just need to shut up and listen and say,
00:11:20 okay, that's it. That's what she wanted. So she's happy. I'm happy. You know, that's how that works. And I'm not sure if it's this this way in your relationship, but for Brian and I, he's the visionary, the big picture dreamer, you know, all these ideas all the time. And I'm more like the, how are we going to do that girl?
00:11:38 And I've learned to like, um, just to listen to those and not immediately go to how are we going to make this work? Because not all the ideas were ever going to come to fruition. He just needs a safe space to talk about them. I think, yeah, the same is true for problems. Absolutely. That's a, that's a really good point.
00:11:58 Shannon. If you had to share your top two or maybe three resources that everyone should use to invest in themselves, especially as they're kind of exploring this idea of living a third option, what, what are some of those resources, you know, other than your book, of course. Oh, of course. Well, let's just make that obvious. Right.
00:12:21 You know, I think there's never been an easier time to branch off and create your own things. I mean, the internet is there's no shortage of information there that will equip and resource you to do all the due diligence. You need to start your own business to learn a new industry, a new skill you can learn to code. Like there's so much available to us that if you're passionate about something you can find a way to learn about and fuel that passion for me,
00:12:51 I love podcasts. I love hearing other business owners and the successes and failures that they've had. So I listened to how I built this. It's an NPR podcast. Fantastic. The Andy Stanley leadership podcast is an incredible resource. If you're thinking more tactically for the third option, lynda.com is a great resource that has a repository of training videos. That if you're somebody who maybe has been out of the workforce for a while and want to get brushed up on some of the technologies that have emerged in your absence,
00:13:28 that's a great resource to find out about specific applications and how they work. You can connect with Shannon by following her on Instagram. She's at Shannon K miles. And of course there'll be links in the show notes or connect with her via the third option on Instagram as well at my third option, be sure to check out the info from Shannon's book over@mythirdoptiondotcomorcheckoutbelaysolutions.com to find out more about working with their company belay.
00:14:04 They're actually looking to hire great people now as virtual assistants. So if you're interested in maybe pursuing that as your third option, go there and apply to join the team. Shannon, is there anything you'd like to add? I'm very grateful for the opportunity to be on this interview and I hope that it helps them. Somebody who's feeling a little stuck, a little uneasy,
00:14:29 maybe in what they're doing to, to just make a change in life is really short. And it's such a cliche to say it, but it's true. I would say to the listener and get your ducks in a row and go for it. Thanks so much for being on the show. Thank you. Don't forget. We're running a contest this week in honor of the hundredth episode,
00:14:50 which came out last, go over to inspired stewardship.com/giveaway, and you can enter to win three books and a 30 minute coaching session. Thanks so much for listening to the inspired stewardship podcast as a subscriber and listener, we challenge you to not just sit back and passively listen, but act on what you've heard and find a way to live your calling. If you enjoyed this episode,
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