Episode Transcript
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Speaker (00:00):
We all want to live our
lives with no regrets.
(00:03):
We'd like to think that we justplay full out on everything.
But there are times when we stopand we go, Hmm, could have done
that different.
Today, I am really excited tohave with me a guest, Leanne
Marie Webster,.
And we're going to talk aboutplaying full out with life to
live with no regrets, no limits,and just go full into life.
(00:26):
So I hope you'll join us forthis wonderful conversation.
Speaker 3 (00:30):
Do you fear what lies
beyond retirement?
What if it's a gateway to a lifefilled with purpose, meaning,
and adventure rather than anend?
Discover peace and fulfillmentas you boldly enter this new
chapter in CourageousRetirement, a Christian podcast.
I'm your host, author and coach,Vona Johnson.
Let's get started.
Speaker (00:49):
Thank you for joining
me today.
And I just want to jump rightin.
This is such an important topicbecause it's so easy to think of
the woulda, coulda, shoulda.
So tell us just in a nutshell,why no regrets?
What, what brought you there?
LeeAnn Marie Webster (01:06):
Well,
first of all, thank you for
having me here.
I'm really excited for thisconversation.
The you know, I always share mykind of an origin story.
I don't know what you want tocall it.
The, the, the reason, the bigwhy, the big why.
And that is because when I wasfour years old and my brother
was 12 years old, one of mybrothers, he was killed in a car
(01:28):
accident.
And, you know, it's the earlyseventies.
He was 12 at the time I was fourand it was just one of those
kind of freak accidents.
And I always think that nobodyknew, you know, that, that
spring, it was a Saturdaymorning in the spring and nobody
(01:49):
knew that was his last day inthis realm that kid, they were
out playing and riding bikes anddoing their normal thing.
And then this, this accidenthappened.
And so I believe that that meansthat those of us who are still
here, who have been given, youknow, we're breathing, we're up,
we're moving, that we have anopportunity, and I would even
possibly say a responsibility tojust do what we can to live our
(02:10):
lives to the fullest every day.
Speaker (02:13):
Yeah.
Well, first of all, I just wantto say, I'm really sorry for
your loss.
I'm guessing something like thatobviously is always with you or
you wouldn't be still talkingabout it today.
LeeAnn Marie Webster (02:23):
And you
know, it's interesting.
It took me, I've done a lot ofhealing around it and I don't
think I realized the depth ofhow it affected me until
probably you know, five or sixyears ago.
And because it's one of thosethings, my family never talked
about it.
I was four years old.
And yet I remember it veryclearly.
(02:43):
I remember situations around itvery clearly.
And what I've come to realize isthat there's kind of an imprint
that happened when thathappened, which was, you know,
I'm, I'm going to be on my own,you know, cause everyone kind of
turned inward to deal with theirown wounds, which makes sense,
you know, therapy, wasn't anoption, early seventies, a poor
(03:04):
family in Southern Ohio, like,you know, It's the time when
it's like, walk it off, like,you know, so, and so I didn't
really fully realize, and I'mstill probably unpeeling layers
of how that impacted me.
So,
Speaker (03:18):
yeah, well, it's
interesting because part of my
story too, is I lost a cousin toa tragic car accident years ago,
and it was that going throughthe grieving process and that
realization that we don't know.
When our time is up, which iswhy we live full out.
And so that's, I love having youhere today.
(03:41):
My, my tagline is live yourmore, and the tagline for
courageous retirement is answerGod's call to more.
And I feel that there's, there'sthat.
That thing inside of us thatdraws us closer to our life's
purpose.
So tell us, tell us what noregrets your, your, your work
(04:04):
looks like.
LeeAnn Marie Webster (04:05):
Yeah.
Yeah.
Well, I'm, I'm fascinated by thetopic of regret because I find
that no matter how you grew up,where you grew up, your
politics, religion,socioeconomic background, like
all of that, we all have them insome form.
And before somebody says, Idon't have any regrets that
somebody always says that, youknow, if, if regret feels heavy,
(04:27):
you can think of this in termsof what you said a few minutes
ago, what would I dodifferently?
You know, and my whole thing isthat regrets actually aren't
bad.
They're indicative of what wevalue.
You know, you wouldn't regretnot having a conversation if you
didn't value a relationship.
You wouldn't regret.
(04:48):
Eating too much sugar or candyor cake, if you didn't value
health, so they can be reallyinteresting indicators of what's
important to us and valuable tous.
Yet the challenge comes whenthey kind of weigh on us, and if
we're not conscious of havingthem, then it can become
something that hampers ourability to move forward or
(05:10):
prevents us from taking actionor or, or causes stress or
anxiety or shame.
And that's really where I seethe, the real work is in how do
you identify it and then releaseit.
And that's one, one thing I'vebeen doing in my work is helping
people with releasing them.
Speaker (05:25):
Oh, I love that.
And you know, I am one of thosepeople, I say, I have no
regrets.
Not that.
Well, no, I was going to say notthat I wouldn't do things over
again differently, but I don'tknow that I would because I love
exactly where I am and, if Ihadn't done some of the things
that the world would view aswrong or inappropriate or
(05:48):
whatever, my responses would bedifferent and I would be
different.
LeeAnn Marie Webster (05:53):
Exactly.
Exactly.
Exactly.
I mean, we all, and I feel youbecause.
Before I started doing thiswork.
I always said I had no regrets.
I was like, everything happensfor a reason, you know and, and,
you know, connected to thehigher power, you know, and
I've, I've had some come up asI've done this work myself,
like, One I have is that I wishI would have gotten to know my
(06:16):
grandmother more as a woman, asa person, rather than just as a
grandmother, because, you know,she would tell us those stories,
you know, how to the grandma'shouse, every time you go over
and talk about this and that andthe other, and I wish I would
have recorded it or, you know.
I wish I would have just askedher questions about, you know,
who she was, how she met mygrandpa, like, you know,
(06:39):
understanding more about her asa woman, instead of just as this
kind of matriarch in the family.
And you know, that, thatopportunity is gone.
So, you know, so I do have alittle, it doesn't weigh on me,
right.
It doesn't, it doesn't hamper meinstead.
It fuels my future, which is.
Also part of the work I dobecause now I say, okay, I'm
going to have the conversation.
(07:00):
You know, I'm going to recordthem.
I'm going to go deeper.
If I get curious, I'm going toask the question.
Speaker (07:06):
Yeah.
Well, and, and, and I reallylove that.
And I think that that can applyto virtually any relationship
that we have.
LeeAnn Marie Webster (07:16):
Yes.
Yeah.
What I find is that too oftenpeople are waiting for, Not
waiting for that.
There's something that happensand that starts to trigger the,
Oh, wait, what am I doing?
It's kind of like a wake up calland it's, you know, getting,
getting fired or getting adiagnosis or having somebody
close to you die or become illor the fires that are happening
(07:40):
you know, or the snow stormthat's happening.
And, you know, there's, Crazyweather everywhere, but
sometimes we wait for that tohappen to kind of shake us awake
and say like, Oh, wait, what amI doing?
Am I really living the life thatI want?
And my message is you don't needto wait for the drama.
You can, you can start todaythinking about this and making
some shifts in your life.
Speaker (08:01):
Absolutely.
And you're reminding me, and Iactually wrote about this in my
first book, but I had decided, Ihad retired eight years ago to
become a health coach, then lifecoach, faith based, all, you
know, the trans, the transition,but I had decided I was going to
write a book and I had started,you know, putting things
(08:21):
together, whatever, but lifekept getting in the way and it
wasn't getting done.
And then came along my breastcancer diagnosis.
And it was one of those stop inthe tracks moments when it was
like, you know, before I knewanything about it, other than I
was, I had the diagnosis, Ididn't know how severe or
(08:43):
anything, but I just rememberthinking, okay, God, if this,
this is it.
What do I need?
Where's my legacy?
What do I need to leave?
Right.
And the answer I got was finishthe book.
Wow.
So I had been so busy working onthe podcast and doing this and
doing that.
And I literally did an episodeon Longing for More called
(09:05):
Permission to Pause.
Wow.
And it was just like, put all ofthose things on hold and get
this done.
And it truly was a gift.
I know most people would say,what, breast cancer, a gift, are
you kidding me?
But it was just that, that wakeup call, that nudge that I
needed to do something thatneeded to get done.
LeeAnn Marie Webster (09:27):
Yeah.
Speaker (09:28):
Yeah.
LeeAnn Marie Webster (09:28):
You know,
you're bringing up something so
important that is I, I believethere's power in all of us,
right?
Is the the power to, to choose.
The cancer, right?
The power to say, you know what?
This is actually good thing thathappened to me.
I
Speaker (09:43):
was gonna say, I don't
know that I would choose.
Okay,
LeeAnn Marie Webster (09:46):
okay.
Speaker (09:47):
I chose to view it as
something that God could turn to
good.
LeeAnn Marie Webster (09:52):
Yes, yes.
You chose to trust in God.
Yes.
God is not going to give methis.
This condition this path this ifI'm if I wouldn't be able to
handle it.
And if there's not somethinghere for me to help me with the
work that I'm on the planet todo.
So, that's what I mean forchoosing.
Yeah, yeah,
Speaker (10:10):
yeah.
Okay.
I know.
I agree.
So, One of the things that Ilike to talk about is we touched
on it before we hit record.
And that is in my career.
I, I talk about in CourageousRetirement.
It isn't always, you know, afterretire, it's also the courage to
retire.
(10:31):
But it's also the courage to dothe things, to finish well, to
do the things that we've had onour heart to do in our career
that maybe we haven't allowedourself time to get done.
And I, part of my story is whenI, when I was cleaning my
office.
And, had all of that going on.
I was trying to do some editing,and I was like, Oh my God, I
(10:56):
forgot that I have to put thisin the file.
and then the phone would startringing and the emails would
start coming in and I never gotback to him.
And so it was like.
That honestly, if I had aregret, it would, it would be
that I could go back and reallydo some of those amazing things
(11:17):
while I still had theopportunity.
Can you speak to that at all?
LeeAnn Marie Webster (11:21):
Yeah,
absolutely.
You know, the, this is theimportance of having a a plan
and I believe having support in,it could be in a variety of
forms, but having, you know,working with someone like, you
know, a coach, a mentor, even,even a friend as an
accountability buddy to, tobring forward what is really
(11:41):
important and then to create apath for you for how to get
there.
And then and then help you stayon the path, you know, and
decide, you know, you mightstart down the path on something
and say, ah, you know, I don't,I don't really care about this
anymore.
Like you could have started thebook.
And then at some point said, youknow what, cause I really don't
(12:02):
think I want to write a book or,and I want to write this book
and you could have put it aside,but being intentional about that
instead of just letting it kindof sit over there and gather
dust.
You know,
Speaker (12:12):
drift, yeah,
LeeAnn Marie Webster (12:13):
so two
things,
Speaker (12:14):
two things on that one,
what's coming up for me is if
you're still in the work worldand you can relate to that, he's
got these big things that I wantto do is like find somebody in
your work community or a friend,if it's not, if it's not
appropriate in the work, but tolike, Write it down, put it on,
(12:34):
put it somewhere where you cango back and check in once a
while.
But then have somebody to talkto about, is this still
important?
Should we be working on this orshould I get rid of it and get
rid of the space that it'staking up in my mind, right?
Exactly.
LeeAnn Marie Webster (12:47):
Exactly.
Cause yeah, that stack, I wouldargue that that stack, took a
little bit of energy every timewe saw it, you know, because you
knew there's a part of yourbrain that knew there's
unfinished business over there.
And and it probably, and it tugsat you a little, it's subtle,
Speaker (13:05):
right?
LeeAnn Marie Webster (13:08):
It's not
even there anymore.
And it's so, and so there's alot of power in just clearing
that space and freeing up theenergy so something else can
come through.
Speaker (13:17):
Yeah, yeah.
No, I think that that'sbeautiful.
The other thing that came up asyou were talking about that and
I shared with it earlier toowas, and I've shared it on
previous episodes, is a storyabout my mom.
It doesn't always have to be bigthings like writing a book or
finishing projects at work.
And my mom's story was that, at80, she had started painting
(13:40):
again.
She had painted when us kids,like after we had left.
The house and she had the timeand then, you know, like that
busy and she was either too busyor she didn't have the right
light or she didn't have theright space and years, decades
went by where she hadn't pickedup her paintbrush, the thing
that brought her joy.
And at 80, she had started againand was really excited about
(14:03):
that and was actually enteringher very first art show.
And, and she paused that day asI was helping her set up for the
art show.
And she just said, you know, Ifeel like I've wasted my whole
life.
And of course she hadn't becauseshe'd done so many amazing
things, but it's a good reminderthat we can, life can just
consume even the things thatbring us joy.
(14:24):
They can take those away from usif we let it, if we're not
intentional, right?
LeeAnn Marie Webster (14:29):
Yeah.
And that's really the keymessage is being intentional,
you know, and, and looking atwhere am I spending my time and,
and, you know, not getting onthe, I call it the groundhog
day.
Kind of wheel right like youkind of you get up and then you
go go to work or you know,whatever it is If you're
retired, maybe you go play golfor you do but it's like you get
(14:50):
in this routine and then it'skind of like Once you get
comfortable in a routine, thenit's like, ah, tomorrow I'll,
you know, do X or Y or Z or planthe trip or whatever.
The, the other thing I reallywant to bring forward is you
bring a great point forward thatit doesn't have to be big
things.
Sometimes we think about bigthings, right.
And taking a big trip or, youknow, selling the house or
(15:13):
moving somewhere, you know,retiring, or it can really be,
and there's a lot of gold inwhat I would call micro Micro
action, right, which could bejust saying I love you more to
your spouse or your children,or, you know, taking that time
to have a conversation with yourchildren instead of just, you
(15:33):
know, texting or, you know,having doing the utilitarian
part of the call, but like, youknow, having a conversation
about what's really important tothem or to you.
Spending time with friends.
It can be, you know, being agreat neighbor or being a great
you know, what, if you're, itmight be being a great golfer,
that's your thing when you'redoing whatever it is, you know?
(15:55):
Yeah.
Speaker (15:56):
Yeah.
Thanks for bringing that upbecause I think especially for
people, this is on courageousretirement and people at this
age, I mean, I think sometimeswe For me personally, and many
of the people I've spoken with,have a tendency to, if we've
worked our full career at doinga certain thing, we, we, we put
(16:18):
our, our identity on the title,the paycheck, the, the, just
being who that is.
And, and to shift thatperspective and that identity
more towards, you know, whowe're being and who we're
serving and what we're doing andserving can be in a small way.
It can be playing with thegrandkids like you talked about,
(16:40):
you know, wishing you had spentmore time with your grandmother.
Yeah, but being that grandmotherand spending the time and
sharing those stories can bepriceless.
LeeAnn Marie Webste (16:51):
Absolutely.
Absolutely.
Yeah.
I think there's a lot of littlemoments for us to grab onto with
that and, and being very presentwith it.
And then and you know, andthere's the bigger things too,
right?
Like, Hey, I never, I'm going totake painting lessons or I never
went to Italy.
I want to go to Italy.
I mean,
Speaker (17:12):
And I will just, you
know, to me, when I talk of
courageous retirement and thecourage isn't the, I've said the
courage isn't the hand glidingand the, you know, things like
that.
It's the courage to have theconversations to do the things
that have meaning for us.
And sometimes it's hard.
Sometimes we need to have adifficult conversation with
someone, or sometimes there'ssomething we want to do,
(17:35):
something we dreamed about.
But we don't necessarily evenhave the confidence that we can
do it.
Maybe you've always wanted topaint, but you don't know
whether you can even do it.
And it's scary to do somethingwe're not used to.
Totally.
LeeAnn Marie Webster (17:48):
This
brings up another layer too,
which is The really tuning into, to, it's like the why and
the who, right?
Cause I think what also happensis, especially if we've been in
a career for a long time or, andlike you said, our identity gets
wrapped up in that our identitycan also get wrapped up in the
roles that we play within ourfamily or within our community
(18:10):
or, or and, and we, we kind ofbox ourselves in sometimes,
right?
I'm.
I'm a grandmother, so I can't golearn something new.
I'm a, you know, I'm an ex, so Ican't do this.
And sometimes we take on otherpeople's perceptions or
expectations of us, and we don'treally even realize it, and we
don't stop to think.
Hey, is this what I want?
(18:32):
Like, what am I interested in?
What do I love to do?
You know, who am I in this?
And, and kind of stepping out ofthe, the proverbial box to make
sure that, you know, in thisnext phase, you're doing what
really matters to you and notjust what you should or somebody
else thinks you should be doing.
Speaker (18:50):
Yeah.
I'm so glad that you broughtthat up.
What coming up for me on thattopic is, And I talk about this
kind of from the perspective ofyoung people and sometimes We,
as the older, wiser, havinglived it all person, can project
our expectations and our lifeonto those young people and
(19:12):
cause them to let go of who theyreally are and the dreams that
they really have because theyfeel that they owe it to us to
go do this thing that we always,maybe we've even talked about
doing it before and then we'vechanged our mind.
And, and so as.
As that older, wiser person, I'mgoing to say, really listen to
(19:32):
those young people in, in yourlives.
And when they're struggling withsomething, find out if maybe you
can help them change their ownperspective of themselves or
change the road that they're on.
Because there is no, there is nowrong path.
There is no, Right.
Yeah.
We, we have to be able to likeyou said, be intentional and,
(19:54):
and shift if that's appropriate.
We don't have to stay on thatpath.
Right.
Exactly.
Exactly.
Yeah.
You have the power.
That's what my, really, if I, ifI boil down what I'm all about I
have, I have a framework calledthe power path, which is an
acronym and it's about takingyour own power back, but that
that's really my big message.
And I think that's a reallyimportant thing to keep in mind,
even within the regret messageis that you have the power of
(20:16):
how you interact with that, withother people and with, with what
you're creating.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Beautiful.
And I think that really kind ofleads us to that next thing.
So if someone's listening tothis.
And they're like, Oh, Oh, wow.
I really, really need to havewhat Leanne's talking about
here.
I need that help with that powerpath.
(20:36):
How could they get ahold of you?
Or what.
Do you have something that canhelp them get started on that?
LeeAnn Marie Webster (20:41):
Of course.
Of course.
If you go to well, the easiestway is just go to my main
website, which is my whole name,Leanne Marie Webster.
A lot of E's in there, and onthere I have a no regrets
formula, the power path.
There'll be some informationabout that up soon.
We're updating the site.
And there's also informationthere about how I work with
people.
So there's that's a greatresource.
(21:04):
And then if you're on Instagram,I'm on Instagram, LinkedIn,
Facebook I think Instagram isprobably my favorite, and that's
just Leanne M.
Webster.
So, okay.
And I post a lot of interestingthings there.
I post a lot of, you know, I dothese regret release.
I have this regret releasemethod.
And so when I speak in person, Ihave people do these, releasing
(21:26):
their regrets.
And so I post these as well asother like.
Kind of things I do out in thepublic.
So
Speaker (21:34):
beautiful.
I love that.
That is wonderful.
So Leanne, what is one, like if,if you could just lay it all out
there, what is, maybe it'ssomething we haven't talked
about yet, or it's somethingthat's really important that you
want to make sure that theguests leave with today, what
would be that message that youcould leave with us?
LeeAnn Marie Webster (21:54):
The really
the big message is that you can
use your your past any regret oraccomplishment or whatever to
fuel your future that, you know,the past is an awesome resource
for you.
And, and we don't need to livein there, but we can use it to
help us move forward powerfullyand intentionally.
Speaker (22:13):
I love that.
I love that.
And it really aligns with what Ibelieve I call the breadcrumbs.
You know, God gives us thebreadcrumbs on the path.
And if we sometimes, especiallyat retirement, when we are
shifting the path that we're onand we're, we're using this,
what I call the best season tofill our lives with the things
(22:34):
that bring us joy.
Sometimes we can look back atboth the good things and the
regrets.
And use them to really embracethis, this season of life.
So beautiful, beautiful.
Thank you so much for joining ustoday.
It's really been a lot of fun tohave this conversation.
And I just pray that there arepeople that are listening today
(22:57):
going, yes, I can take thepower.
I can, I can move from here andreally live all out.
So.
LeeAnn Marie Webster (23:04):
Beautiful.
Thank you.
Thank you for having me.
I really appreciate it.
And I love the work that you'redoing in the world.
Speaker (23:09):
Likewise.
Speaker 2 (23:11):
So.
What are you going to dodifferently because of this
conversation?
How are you going to moveforward with no regrets?
Now in reality, we're alwaysgoing to have regrets.
I don't know about you, butthere are times when I am on the
phone, it's generally with atelemarketer.
(23:31):
Or a service provider thathasn't given me the answer I
want and my snap reaction is todo just that, to snap at them,
to say something that's notappropriate.
And hopefully before I hang upthe phone or walk away from a
conversation, I will catchmyself and I will stop, take a
(23:54):
breath and ask for theirforgiveness to apologize and
tell them that I didn't mean totake my frustration out on them
and ask them to have a good dayor whatever.
Literally a couple of weeks ago,I had a conversation with
someone.
And wasn't really pleased withhow the conversation went.
And I was doing my Bible studythat evening, and as I was doing
(24:16):
it, I was just so convicted bythe Holy Spirit.
And I literally went back,called the phone number again,
and fortunately got the sameoperator or desk representative,
and I just said, I am reallysorry, I apologize for behaving
the way that I did.
And he was like, oh, it's no bigdeal, and I'm like, yeah, it is.
You deal with real problems inthe world.
(24:38):
You don't need crabby people ontop of it.
So I'm just going to challengeyou that yes, we're going to do
things.
We want to go full out.
We want to live life in the bigthings, but we also want to be
the representative that we are.
in the little things.
And so I'm going to ask you tothink about how you can take
those small actions and livewith no regret.
(25:01):
Now if you struggle with this,first of all I'm going to ask
you to get in the word and andpray and ask the Holy Spirit to
guide you.
He's always there and ready todo that.
But if you need a littleadditional help, go to Leanne or
give me a call or find someonein your circle of friends that
can help talk through some ofthose things so that you too can
(25:23):
live with no regrets.
We'll always have small regrets,but there are things that we can
do to mitigate that.
Thank you so much for stoppingby today.
It's really been a blessing tohave you here.
Come back in two weeks, next fewepisodes, we're going to talk
about how to stay active in oursenior years.
And then another episode, we'regoing to talk about how to write
our story.
(25:44):
How can we get our story down sothat others can benefit and we
can actually truly leave thatlegacy of faith for others.
So again, thanks for stoppingby.
I look forward to seeing youback here next time.
And until then, I pray that youwill live with all the benefits
of courageous retirement.
God bless.