Episode 210: How to "Be Better" in 2025, with Mary Fran Bontempo
Release Date: 12/31/2024
How to Manage--and Change!--Chronic Pain with Pain Reprocessing Therapy and Patty Tashiro
Brilliantly Resilient
"Acute and chronic pain are processed in different parts of the brain. If you aren't healing and are still in pain, it's possible that your brain has established learned neural pathways that can continue to cause pain, which becomes chronic." Patty Tashiro ~ Is your brain keeping you in pain? The emotional responses we have to trauma--which often stay with us--can trigger the brain to continue to send a physical pain response in our bodies. Huh? Isn't pain caused by a physical issue in the body? Well, yes. Unless it isn't. Patty Tashiro experienced a mother's nightmare when her daughter and...
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Episode 213: How to Expand Diversity and Inclusion to Include Everyone, with Toby Mildon
Brilliantly Resilient
"There is diversity within diversity itself. Even people with shared disabilities have different experiences. We are all diverse. Diversity includes everyone." ~ Toby Mildon, Author of Inclusive Growth: Future-proof Your Business by Creating a Diverse Workspace, and Building Inclusivity: Making Your Workplace Equitable, Diverse and Inclusive How many people in the world are exactly like you? EXACTLY like you, no differences. The answer is no one. Every single person, because of countless factors including genetics, personal experiences, education, inherent skills--the list is...
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Episode 212: Advocating for Kids Without "a Voice," with TeamChild's Christina Sorenson
Brilliantly Resilient
The Maasai tribe of Africa greets one another by saying "How are the children?" We have to recognize that all the children in our community are our children. Christina Sorenson Attorney and Advocate for Foster Children at Christina Sorenson was in 15 different foster care homes from ages five to fifteen. Separated from her sister and eventually adopted at age fifteen, Christina has made it her life's work to provide legal and supportive aid for children and young adults in foster care. An attorney at in Seattle, WA, Christina has thoughtfully incorporated her own life experiences into...
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Episode 211: How to Live with a "Pilgrim's Heart" with Christine Eberle
Brilliantly Resilient
"Be where you are on the way to where you want to be going." ~ Christine Eberle, Author: "Be where you are on the way to where you want to be going." Um...huh? The above sounds like a riddle, doesn't it? Then again, isn't life a kind of riddle we try to figure out every day? Christine Eberle, author of , decided to seek clarity in answering life's riddle by undertaking a journey--literally and figuratively--as she and her husband walked the Camino of St. Ignatius Loyola in 2022. For the uninitiated, the Camino (there are two--one of St. James and one of St. Ignatius), is a...
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Episode 210: How to "Be Better" in 2025, with Mary Fran Bontempo
Brilliantly Resilient
I came down to those two words. Be better. I think if we can boil it down to something, 'Be better' might be the most that we should be asking of ourselves. ~ Mary Fran Bontempo, Author It's 2025. How are you feeling about that? I find the time right after Christmas to be a bit challenging. After a month of being jolly buying, planning, decorating, eating, drinking, visiting with family and friends, suddenly it's over. And sure, New Year's Eve is fun, but it's also accompanied by that feeling of 'Oh my God, now I have to improve myself again.' Enter the dreaded New Year's...
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Episode 209: Mindfulness and Honoring the Pause with Shawnta Hooks
Brilliantly Resilient
"I needed to embark on a journey to reclaim my connection, both personally and professionally." Shawnta Hooks ~ Leading Belonging and Mindfulness Speaker. Shawnta Hooks was never a believer in meditation or mindfulness. Working in accounting and corporate compliance during her 20 year corporate career, Shawnta found herself in a toxic work environment after a company reorganization, feeling completely disconnected, unseen and unheard. Her first instinct was to lay blame on the company, until she realized it wasn't entirely her work environment that was causing her challenges....
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Episode 208: New Book! From Broken to Brilliant: How to Live a Brilliantly Resilient Life, with Mary Fran Bontempo
Brilliantly Resilient
You have everything in you already to live a Brilliantly Resilient life. You have Resilience and you have your own personal Brilliance. It's already there. You were born with both of those things. ~ Mary Fran Bontempo, Author, From Broken to Brilliant: How to Live a Brilliantly Resilient Life Have you uncovered your Resilience yet? Since Covid, we’ve been reminded constantly about the need for resilience, as though every day, we must gird for battle before we wander into the unknown terrors of the world. Truthfully, that scenario doesn’t seem that far-fetched anymore. If you’ve...
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Episode 207: Finding the Brilliance and Resilience in Generational Relationships with "Gentelligence" Author, Dr. Megan Gerhardt
Brilliantly Resilient
Let's have smarter intergenerational conversations. Let's be OK and not threatened by the fact that you see this differently than me. Let's figure out why and how that could actually be helpful and beneficial. Dr. Megan Gerhardt Author of Do you work with people of different generations? Do you live with people of different generations? Do you have public contact with people of different generations? Unless you live alone on an island, the answer to at least one, if not all, of these questions is yes. And in your interactions with those of different generations, it’s almost...
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Episode 206: How to Mourn the Loss of a Sibling with Annie Orenstein, Author of Always a Sibling: The Forgotten Mourners Guide to Grief
Brilliantly Resilient
No one checks in on them, right? They often delay their own grief, put off their own mourning in order to support their parents and step up. But then? They remain there and they never really get a turn to express their own grief, or to be the mourner in the room. Annie Orenstein ~ Author of Do you have a sibling? Most of us do. And according to author, Annie Orenstein, as children, we often spend more time with our siblings than with our parents. Yet as we grow, our sibling relationships are pushed to the background as we form other adult relationships in our lives. So...
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Episode 205: Empowering Those Who Stutter, with Nolan Stuttering Foundation President, Brian Nolan
Brilliantly Resilient
“I'm trying to open stutter more. Because I I've reached a level of of acceptance that I'm proud of, but I'm nowhere near where I need to be. I interview people on podcasts who openly stutter, and I'm so proud of them because they do it without shame and that's the real issue. The real issue is shame, every day, when you stutter.” Brian Nolan President and Co-founder, Have you ever heard someone stutter? If you don’t stutter, it can be uncomfortable to know how to react. Do you try and finish the person’s sentence? Do you look away? Do you simply wait? While a...
info_outline~ Mary Fran Bontempo, Author 'From Broken to Brilliant: How to Live a Brilliantly Resilient Life'
It's 2025. How are you feeling about that?
I find the time right after Christmas to be a bit challenging. After a month of being jolly buying, planning, decorating, eating, drinking, visiting with family and friends, suddenly it's over. And sure, New Year's Eve is fun, but it's also accompanied by that feeling of 'Oh my God, now I have to improve myself again.'
Enter the dreaded New Year's Resolution.
I've never been a fan of New Year's Resolutions (caps to emphasize the IMPORTANCE of them!). Usually, we end up expecting gargantuan feats of ourselves that we would never ask of anyone else--often dooming us to failure. Given that I'm at an age where I'm tempted to dismiss the whole thing, I'd like to, but I can't. I'm committed to living a Brilliantly Resilient life. Quitting entirely is not in the game plan.
However, I do believe we must be more gentle with ourselves, in all of our human frailty. To that end, I've settled on two words for my 2025 resolution: Be Better.
By simply resolving to be better, I'm afforded endless opportunities each day to improve in small ways, which bundled together, can create profound change. Each time I attempt to be better, I am living the Brilliantly Resilient concept of taking small, imperfect actions to move forward. So much easier and more life-affirming than trying to remake myself, which, let's be honest, isn't going to happen. (I will, however, try to be better when driving behind some soul who seems to have forgotten where the gas pedal is. Patience is not my strong suit.)
As we enter 2025, be kinder to yourself, and resolve to Be Better. It's doable, and will create wins in every day. And do more that makes you happy. We all deserve that.
Finally, thank you with sincere gratitude for your support of me and Brilliantly Resilient. It means more than I can say to share this powerful message for good and I am beyond appreciative.
Tune in to hear more brilliance (yes, mine--remember to pat yourself on the back regularly, too!) on this week's podcast and check out the new book for a great start to 2025.
- For me the time right after Christmas is a little bit hard. We've been so jolly and spirited for a month with buying and planning and family and friends and cooking and the lights and everything else, and then all of a sudden it's over. And sure, New Year's Eve is fun. But it's also accompanied by that feeling of 'Oh my God, now I have to improve myself again.'
- If we can be a little bit better every time we catch ourselves doing something that we don't like about ourselves...we can decide that's not the way we want to live.
- Mindfulness means being where you are. Be in that moment and just in that moment, try to be better.
- Come up with little short questions. Am I being better right now? Is this what I really want for myself right now? Am I here where I am right now? Be here and be better, instead of thinking about remaking yourself.
- Look back through your calendar of the last year. And review that. See the events that you went to see the things that you did and look at the ones that really made you happy. (Thank you, Fran Hauser!)
- I hope you all had a fantastic holiday season. I hope that the new year is full of light and joy and love and purpose and health and happiness for all of us.
As we enter 2025, I thank you again and wish you every joy and blessing. Let's be Brilliantly Resilient together!
XO,
Mary Fran
Mary Fran Bontempo is an award-winning 2-time TEDx and Keynote speaker, workshop presenter, author, humorist and podcast host who teaches audiences to uncover their Brilliance and Resilience 15 minutes at a time. A sought-after speaker for ERGs, BRGs, DEI, conference and association events, Mary Fran is author of From Broken to Brilliant: How to Live a Brilliantly Resilient Life, The 15 Minute Master, The Woman’s Book of Dirty Words and co-founder of the life-changing program Brilliantly Resilient. To bring Mary Fran to your company or organization, visit www.brilliantlyresilient.net.