Tag: personal-development

Support Without Pressure: Why Effort Matters More Than Results

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“Give light and people will find the way.” – Ella Baker

The other day, my six-year-old son, Mr. D, announced that he wasn’t going back to finish out the last 12 days of first grade. After some delicate probing, I discovered he was worried about a math test.

It’s hard to know what to say to help in a situation like that, isn’t it? And what does real support actually look like—especially when someone is struggling, failing, or figuring things out?

So in this episode of The Life of Try, I explore how to support others without adding pressure, and why focusing on effort instead of outcome can make all the difference.

Whether you’re a parent, coach, friend, or teammate, it’s easy to unintentionally turn encouragement into expectations. But research—and stories from figures like basketball coach John Wooden and psychologist Carol Dweck—show that when we shift our focus to effort, persistence, and growth, we help people stay in the process longer and build real resilience.

This episode dives into:

  • Why it’s often harder to watch someone try than to try ourselves
  • How subtle signals can create pressure without us realizing it
  • The difference between encouragement and expectation
  • How to support kids, friends, and colleagues in a way that builds confidence and persistence
  • Practical ways to reinforce effort, not just results

And fortunately this research helped provide me a roadmap to help with Mr. D’s math test. I reminded him that he’d already done the work and practice and so the test was just like a baseball game. All he had to do was do his best.

If you’ve ever wondered how to truly support someone you care about—especially when things aren’t going well—this episode offers a powerful reframe. Because sometimes the best support isn’t helping someone succeed… …it’s helping them keep going.

Here are some other ways you can listen and watch this episode:

Embracing What Makes You Different | Kym Gordon Moore – The Life of Try: Personal growth, one try at a time.

Are you different? Or simply finding your purpose?In this inspiring episode of The Life of Try, host Wynne Leon talks with author and educational advocate Kym Gordon Moore about her children’s book, Hennie and Her Poetry Eggs, a powerful story about courage, compassion, bullying prevention, purpose, and embracing what makes us different. Through the story of Hennie, Kym invites children, parents, teachers, and adults to have meaningful conversations about social rejection, self-worth, empathy, literacy, and building bridges for people who may feel left out. This conversation explores why standing out can feel vulnerable, how support from others helps us recognize our gifts, and why trying again after disappointment is part of growing into our purpose. Here are key take-aways for this episode: → Our differences are often where our purpose begins. Kym’s story reminds listeners that what makes us stand out may feel uncomfortable at first, but it can also become the source of our greatest gifts. → Kids absorb the language and attitudes around them. The episode highlights how adult fear, division, and intolerance can spill over into children’s behavior—making conversations about compassion, empathy, and bullying especially important. → Bullying and social rejection can hide someone’s gifts. Hennie’s journey shows how shame and exclusion can make a person feel small, but encouragement from others can help them see themselves differently. → We all need bridge-builders. One of the strongest themes is the idea of building bridges for people who feel like they are facing a ditch—offering support, kindness, and a way forward. → Purpose is personal; we can’t borrow someone else’s vision. Kym emphasizes that each person has their own dream, voice, and path, and trying to copy someone else can keep us from discovering what is truly ours.If you’re looking for encouragement, personal growth, children’s literature with a message, or a hopeful conversation about kindness and resilience, this episode offers a beautiful reminder that our differences can become the very thing that helps us shine.🔔 Subscribe for more:Subscribe to The Life of Try for more conversations on:personal growth, creativity, reinvention, resilience, writing, and mindset.📌 Subscribe To Our YouTube Channel & Stay Updated: → https://www.youtube.com/@thelifeoftry?sub_confirmation=1ABOUT MEHi, I’m Wynne Leon — host of The Life of Try, a personal growth and self-improvement podcast exploring resilience, reinvention, uncertainty, and the courage to keep trying.Through thoughtful interviews, reflective conversations, and real-life stories, I share insights to help you navigate change, get unstuck, and move forward with more intention.🌍 Website: https://wynneleon.comBook: Hennie and Her Poetry Eggs🎥 Watch Next➡️ How to Reclaim Fun in Adult Life | Burnout Recovery, Joy & Resilience with Mike Rucker➡️ How to Celebrate Small Wins | Tiny Habits, Resilience and Personal Growth➡️ Fun: The Key to Habit Formationhttps://youtu.be/37ICdxs3168🔗 CONNECT WITH ME:• Website:→ https://wynneleon.com/• Instagram:→ https://www.instagram.com/wynneleon/• Facebook:→ https://www.facebook.com/wynne.leon/ • Amazon: → https://www.amazon.com/stores/author/B002IKWX14
  1. Embracing What Makes You Different | Kym Gordon Moore
  2. Motive + Means = Opportunity: A Life of Try Story
  3. How Writing Helps Us Survive Chronic Illness and Loss
  4. Near Death, Deep Faith, New Life | Liza Anderson’s Extraordinary Story
  5. Encouraging Effort, Not Outcome: The Secret to Helping People Keep Trying

Links for this episode:

Other Episodes you Might Enjoy:

⁠ Letting Go Of Outcomes: The Mindset That Keeps You Moving⁠

4⁠8: How to Get Unstuck: Michael Yang on Saying Yes, Resilience and Coming Alive⁠

⁠How to Reclaim Fun in Adult Life | Mike Rucker, PhD, on Joy, Burnout and the Fun Habit⁠

(featured photo from Pexels)

Creating Without Elbow Grease

Posted in thelifeoftryTagged , , , , , , , , , 50 Comments

“Do the difficult things when they are easy and do the great things when they are small. A journey of a thousand miles must begin with a single step.” – Lao Tzu

What if “trying” doesn’t have to mean pushing harder?

I’ve been in a flow state often enough to know it exists but not so often to know how to reliably get there. Is it really possible to regularly create — to write, to connect with others, to co-author life in a way that doesn’t leave me sweaty and tired? My guest on this week’s podcast had some insight about finding flow. Even if it falls into the category of easier said than done, it’s the quietness of the approach that makes me think it’s possible

In this Life of Try episode, I talk with author and New York Insight Meditation Center co-founder Joseph Schmidt about The Torchbearer—a collection of short stories born from an unexpectedly effortless creative process. Together we explore the mindset shift from effort to openness: how letting go of the agenda can create space for insight, transformation, and a deeper, more alive way of meeting each moment.

  • Try smarter, not harder: why forcing outcomes can block creativity—and what changes when you partner with the process instead.
  • Mindset shift to “empty hands”: Joseph’s Zen chaplaincy training and the practice of entering a room (or a moment) without an agenda.
  • Personal growth through discovery: how his characters—and we as readers—find the next move by noticing what’s already here.
  • Feeling alive at the edge of the unknown: mindfulness as the place where consciousness meets what happens next.
  • Belonging as a practice: building a bond of belonging by showing up with curiosity, care, and presence.

If you’ve been working hard but feeling flat, this conversation is an invitation to loosen your grip, step back into the present, and discover a more natural flow—one where growth comes from attention, not strain. Listen in for a gentler (and often more powerful) way to create, connect, and keep beginning again.

Here’s great clip of Joseph describing the lesson he learned from a Zen monk about a powerful mindset shift:

This is a great episode if you’re craving a mindset reset, rebuilding your creative confidence, deepening a mindfulness practice, or simply want to feel more awake and engaged in your everyday life.

Here are some ways you can listen and watch this inspiring episode:

Please listen, watch, provide feedback and subscribe.

Embracing What Makes You Different | Kym Gordon Moore – The Life of Try: Personal growth, one try at a time.

Are you different? Or simply finding your purpose?In this inspiring episode of The Life of Try, host Wynne Leon talks with author and educational advocate Kym Gordon Moore about her children’s book, Hennie and Her Poetry Eggs, a powerful story about courage, compassion, bullying prevention, purpose, and embracing what makes us different. Through the story of Hennie, Kym invites children, parents, teachers, and adults to have meaningful conversations about social rejection, self-worth, empathy, literacy, and building bridges for people who may feel left out. This conversation explores why standing out can feel vulnerable, how support from others helps us recognize our gifts, and why trying again after disappointment is part of growing into our purpose. Here are key take-aways for this episode: → Our differences are often where our purpose begins. Kym’s story reminds listeners that what makes us stand out may feel uncomfortable at first, but it can also become the source of our greatest gifts. → Kids absorb the language and attitudes around them. The episode highlights how adult fear, division, and intolerance can spill over into children’s behavior—making conversations about compassion, empathy, and bullying especially important. → Bullying and social rejection can hide someone’s gifts. Hennie’s journey shows how shame and exclusion can make a person feel small, but encouragement from others can help them see themselves differently. → We all need bridge-builders. One of the strongest themes is the idea of building bridges for people who feel like they are facing a ditch—offering support, kindness, and a way forward. → Purpose is personal; we can’t borrow someone else’s vision. Kym emphasizes that each person has their own dream, voice, and path, and trying to copy someone else can keep us from discovering what is truly ours.If you’re looking for encouragement, personal growth, children’s literature with a message, or a hopeful conversation about kindness and resilience, this episode offers a beautiful reminder that our differences can become the very thing that helps us shine.🔔 Subscribe for more:Subscribe to The Life of Try for more conversations on:personal growth, creativity, reinvention, resilience, writing, and mindset.📌 Subscribe To Our YouTube Channel & Stay Updated: → https://www.youtube.com/@thelifeoftry?sub_confirmation=1ABOUT MEHi, I’m Wynne Leon — host of The Life of Try, a personal growth and self-improvement podcast exploring resilience, reinvention, uncertainty, and the courage to keep trying.Through thoughtful interviews, reflective conversations, and real-life stories, I share insights to help you navigate change, get unstuck, and move forward with more intention.🌍 Website: https://wynneleon.comBook: Hennie and Her Poetry Eggs🎥 Watch Next➡️ How to Reclaim Fun in Adult Life | Burnout Recovery, Joy & Resilience with Mike Rucker➡️ How to Celebrate Small Wins | Tiny Habits, Resilience and Personal Growth➡️ Fun: The Key to Habit Formationhttps://youtu.be/37ICdxs3168🔗 CONNECT WITH ME:• Website:→ https://wynneleon.com/• Instagram:→ https://www.instagram.com/wynneleon/• Facebook:→ https://www.facebook.com/wynne.leon/ • Amazon: → https://www.amazon.com/stores/author/B002IKWX14
  1. Embracing What Makes You Different | Kym Gordon Moore
  2. Motive + Means = Opportunity: A Life of Try Story
  3. How Writing Helps Us Survive Chronic Illness and Loss
  4. Near Death, Deep Faith, New Life | Liza Anderson’s Extraordinary Story
  5. Encouraging Effort, Not Outcome: The Secret to Helping People Keep Trying

Links for this episode:

The Transformation That Changes Everything transcript

The Torchbearer: and other Stories of Borderline Redemption by Joseph Schmidt on Amazon

Joseph Schmidt bio – New York Insight Meditation Center

(featured photo from Pexels)

How To Share Your Best Self

Posted in howtoshareTagged , , , , , , , , 40 Comments

“When we do the best that we can, we never know what miracle is wrought in our life, or the life of another.” – Helen Keller

My 86-year-old mother recently bought an Apple watch along with the latest generation phone. She doesn’t like upgrading her technology but problems with her old phone made it necessary.

My mom is very smart but her strengths are in music and languages. As with so many of the people that I train in my job as a technology consultant, she’d rather focus her energy on what she likes doing and not have to bother with the rest. However, she is extremely independent.

She doesn’t often ask for help from me because it seems her conscientiousness about getting things done outweighs her frustration with technology. At least that’s my guess because I’m fascinated by how our mental makeup determines how we operate.

So I love this episode of the How To Share podcast with psychologist, talent agent, educator and author Dr. Albert Bramante because he speaks with Vicki Atkinson and me about some of the factors that contribute to how we approach life. He’s written a book called Rise Above the Script to help actors and performers break free of self-limiting patterns.

 His book reads like a toolkit for self-evaluation: taking a look at self-esteem, self-efficacy, and the big five personality traits (agreeableness, conscientiousness, extraversion, neuroticism, and openness).

Albert points out the many ways we self-sabotage. As he says in the podcast clip below, once we see our patterns, it’s much easier to address them.

Albert says his book (and this episode) is for “anyone feeling the friction between their ambition and their achievement.” It is a fascinating dive into the ways we can bring our best selves to our work and to the world. We know you’ll love it.

Takeaways:

  • Collaboration is key in personal and professional growth.
  • Self-evaluation is essential for breaking self-limiting patterns.
  • Lifelong learning is crucial for personal development and confidence.
  • Self-care practices significantly impact mental health and overall well-being.
  • Understanding one’s relationship with money can improve financial stability.
  • Acknowledging achievements helps combat self-doubt and insecurity.
  • The importance of developing business acumen in creative fields.
  • Taking responsibility for one’s actions is the first step to overcoming challenges.

Here’s a clip of Albert describing the power of self-awareness:

Here are some ways you can listen and watch this fantastic episode:

Please listen, watch, provide feedback and subscribe.

Embracing What Makes You Different | Kym Gordon Moore – The Life of Try: Personal growth, one try at a time.

Are you different? Or simply finding your purpose?In this inspiring episode of The Life of Try, host Wynne Leon talks with author and educational advocate Kym Gordon Moore about her children’s book, Hennie and Her Poetry Eggs, a powerful story about courage, compassion, bullying prevention, purpose, and embracing what makes us different. Through the story of Hennie, Kym invites children, parents, teachers, and adults to have meaningful conversations about social rejection, self-worth, empathy, literacy, and building bridges for people who may feel left out. This conversation explores why standing out can feel vulnerable, how support from others helps us recognize our gifts, and why trying again after disappointment is part of growing into our purpose. Here are key take-aways for this episode: → Our differences are often where our purpose begins. Kym’s story reminds listeners that what makes us stand out may feel uncomfortable at first, but it can also become the source of our greatest gifts. → Kids absorb the language and attitudes around them. The episode highlights how adult fear, division, and intolerance can spill over into children’s behavior—making conversations about compassion, empathy, and bullying especially important. → Bullying and social rejection can hide someone’s gifts. Hennie’s journey shows how shame and exclusion can make a person feel small, but encouragement from others can help them see themselves differently. → We all need bridge-builders. One of the strongest themes is the idea of building bridges for people who feel like they are facing a ditch—offering support, kindness, and a way forward. → Purpose is personal; we can’t borrow someone else’s vision. Kym emphasizes that each person has their own dream, voice, and path, and trying to copy someone else can keep us from discovering what is truly ours.If you’re looking for encouragement, personal growth, children’s literature with a message, or a hopeful conversation about kindness and resilience, this episode offers a beautiful reminder that our differences can become the very thing that helps us shine.🔔 Subscribe for more:Subscribe to The Life of Try for more conversations on:personal growth, creativity, reinvention, resilience, writing, and mindset.📌 Subscribe To Our YouTube Channel & Stay Updated: → https://www.youtube.com/@thelifeoftry?sub_confirmation=1ABOUT MEHi, I’m Wynne Leon — host of The Life of Try, a personal growth and self-improvement podcast exploring resilience, reinvention, uncertainty, and the courage to keep trying.Through thoughtful interviews, reflective conversations, and real-life stories, I share insights to help you navigate change, get unstuck, and move forward with more intention.🌍 Website: https://wynneleon.comBook: Hennie and Her Poetry Eggs🎥 Watch Next➡️ How to Reclaim Fun in Adult Life | Burnout Recovery, Joy & Resilience with Mike Rucker➡️ How to Celebrate Small Wins | Tiny Habits, Resilience and Personal Growth➡️ Fun: The Key to Habit Formationhttps://youtu.be/37ICdxs3168🔗 CONNECT WITH ME:• Website:→ https://wynneleon.com/• Instagram:→ https://www.instagram.com/wynneleon/• Facebook:→ https://www.facebook.com/wynne.leon/ • Amazon: → https://www.amazon.com/stores/author/B002IKWX14
  1. Embracing What Makes You Different | Kym Gordon Moore
  2. Motive + Means = Opportunity: A Life of Try Story
  3. How Writing Helps Us Survive Chronic Illness and Loss
  4. Near Death, Deep Faith, New Life | Liza Anderson’s Extraordinary Story
  5. Encouraging Effort, Not Outcome: The Secret to Helping People Keep Trying

Links for this episode:

⁠Albert Bramante⁠ website

⁠Rise Above the Script: Confronting Self-Doubt and Mastering Self Sabotage for Performing Artists ⁠on Amazon

How to Share Your Best Self transcript

From the hosts:

Vicki’s book about resilience and love: ⁠Surviving Sue⁠; Blog: ⁠https://victoriaponders.com/⁠

My book about my beloved father: ⁠Finding My Father’s Faith⁠