In High Alignment Ep. 1 – Why a Podcast? Why Now?

Listen on Apple Podcast | Spotify

In this intro episode, Kerry digs into the paths that led her to starting this podcast, and why she knew that now felt like the most aligned timing to begin this journey.

What to expect from the In High Alignment Podcast:

• “Listen To This When…” Episodes for a little on-demand coaching and extra boost of motivation whenever you need it
• A reclamation of my voice and my life story- one that I used for so long to speak on stages for others, and am ready to hold for myself again now
• Amazing guests sharing their own stories, tools, and expertises so we can build our toolkit as a community
• Tangible tools you can pick up in your day to day, and use whenever you need to- either for your business or for you, the human behind the business.
• Growth moments and stories of times that changed the game for me
• LOTS and lots of FUN!!

Thank you for being here with me on this new journey! It’s going to be a wild ride, and I cannot wait to dig in with you! 

Episode Transcript:

Hiiiiiii!!!!

Ok here goes…

I think intro episodes are so much like an “about me” page on your website– they are the hardest to write because you’re talking about yourself but also one of the most important because it’s someone’s first impression of you…

And don’t get me wrong, i love a good “first date feels,” but I can also can definitely get in my head about potential judgment from the world at large who will obviously be listening to this podcast and *PHEW!* does that potential judgment feel like pressure?! 

Buuut if you’re here, actually here listening and consuming this very first intro episode of my podcast, I’m choosing to believe it’s because you love and support me and you’re celebrating this podcast launch and my 31st birthday with me in style.

As i like to remind myself and I’m reminding you: 

My friend, we do not need to be anything but ourselves to be wholly lovable and intriguing and magnetic and exceptional. As someone who helped me come home to myself repeated to me over and over, 

“Just be you.”

And that’s why I created the podcast, really. Because we constantly hear messages – either outright or through media + advertising – that we need to be different than we inherently are in order to be worthy of the attention, love, success, joy and that couldn’t be further from the truth! 

Just by existing, just by being born, it is your BIRTHRIGHT to experience all the attention, love, success, joy, abundance, healing, FUN, PLAY!! And all the good things you could possibly experience in your time here on earth. 

And the path to navigating your experience of all those good things can come in a million different “right” ways. Which is why, on this podcast, I’m going to be sharing lots of life lessons, stories, and tangible tools I’VE picked up along the way, AND interview guests with different life experiences… all to hopefully serve as a guide towards living in alignment with your highest and best self. 

To me, my highest, best, most aligned self is experiencing all that attention, love, success, joy, etc all of those things in a way that feels so natural and good and light. It feels light. I feel grounded and whole and satisfied and fulfilled and safe and can stretch to new spaces and heights while still caring for my whole self, while still calming my nervous system. It’s a really good feeling to be honest. And I want that for you too.

Now… by no means am I saying that I get it ALL right ALL the time and I live in this blissed out, MOST aligned, very special space every single day. 

I’m human, I get off course, but the important thing is to be able to recognize WHEN I’M getting off course AND THEN make an active choice if I’m going to actually course correct or not. Sometimes i will, sometimes i wont! Like I said I’m human and I’m not perfect all the time but it’s about being able to find the space between action and reaction because in that SPACE is where we can make a choice.

Buuuuut I’m getting ahead of myself (as my excited, ADHD brain tends to do).

So, who am I?? Even though I’m believing you already know me and support me and that’s why you’re listening to me right now.

Hi, my name is Kerry Walsh, and I am many things. For the purpose of this podcast, I’m a business and sales coach for creative entrepreneurs, I’m an applied positive psychology practitioner, I’m a decorated highschool and college coxswain with 8 years of sports psychology and visualization experience.

I’m a former corporate sales gal who loves big goals and deep conversations. I’m a creative entrepreneur myself who hit the ground running and closed 6-figures in 6 months when I started my wedding photography business then had to figure out the systems to support my workload. 

It has been a JOURNEY since I founded my business 5 years ago and I’m creating this space to act as a guide and take your hand, even if only for a short time, while we navigate this expansive, beautiful, sometimes stressful, often times awe-inspiring world of creative entrepreneurship. I’ll share lessons I’ve learned and bring on guests from the expansive and interesting network I’ve been lucky enough to create- to share their own lessons and perspectives too.

Because one of the things that nobody tells you before you start a business is that you bring all your STUFF with you into your business.

If you have money problems, your money problems show up. If you have boundary issues, your boundary issues come with you. If you have insecure attachment and codependency issues, guess what my love? They come with you too. 

Your business can be your biggest mirror and growth opportunity and so, so healing if you’re willing and able to look at all those things and with the biggest hug and so much self compassion say to yourself, “I love you, thank you for getting me to this point, let’s find a new way that feels better moving forward.”

So, so, so  much of this has to do with nervous system regulation and re-writing our neural pathways but the really exciting part is that our brain is actually very malleable. It can be somewhat slow, definitely repetitive work, but you can do it, I know you can. And I also plan to fill these episodes and our website with resources of where you can find the help you’re aching for.

Because, as I’m sure you’ve found from all of the competing advice on the internet, every single possible subject, there are a million “RIGHT” ways to do something. But the important part, and the part I want for you, is for you to find what the right way is FOR YOUUUU. That’s the alignment I’m talking about. 

And I’m going to say the most cliche and frustrating thing that people tell you about life and love, “when you know, you know.” You’ll feel it. And everyone feels it differently which is why it’s a big question every interview guest will share their own answer to. But when you listen for the answers making their way to you, you’ll know what’s right for you and your business.

Again, this is why starting a business and every next level of expansion in your business is gonna push all your buttons.

Side note: I imagine this must be a taste of what parenting is like but I have no idea as I do not have any children of my own – I’ll just speak from my experience in business owner instead. Ok back to it…

You bring all your stuff with you into business. 

You, my beautiful, radiant, powerful friend, are ONE WHOLE PERSON – you cannot separate CEO You and PERSONAL LIFE You. You just can’t. 

If you try to separate yourself, it’ll cause a lot of confusion and fragmentation and dissociation and frustration – and I know this because I tried it too. And it sucked. And truthfully, it ended up limiting me in my potential. 

So when I began the scary and vulnerable feeling thing of integrating more and more of myself into my business, unmasking if you will – that “Kerry Magic” (as my coaching clients loving dubbed it) came to the forefront and has been the deeper WHY of why my clients and I *click* . And it grew my self confidence AND it gave me permission to bring more of my full self to all parts of my life. I stopped censoring myself so much or holding myself back from things my heart and gut wanted me to say. I stopped being this chameleon that was so celebrated in my office before in my corporate role. “Wow Kerry she’s such a chameleon, she can adapt to anything.” I could. And I bet you can too. But it’s not very useful because oftentimes it is self abandoning and that hurts after a while and is not necessary to be successful too.

It made me think back to my racing days as a coxswain on my high school and college rowing teams (I’ve referenced being a coxswain twice now and if you don’t know, a coxswain is the little person in the back of a boat who steers and yells and is traditionally portrayed saying “stroke stroke stroke” and I don’t think I’ve ever said but now you can picture what a coxswain is- ok back to the Race Day memories)

When I think back to those races and practices that I KNOW I called the best and had the biggest impact in, the races we were neck and neck with another boat and I called that race directly from my heart to the heart of my rowers – they are the races we won. They’re the races we made in school history. They’re the practices that the rowers who were by all measurements and purposes, slower than another boat but we were beating the other boat during pieces. 

So I know I can trust my heart here too, to tell you the magic you need to hear. To help move past any limiting beliefs that were likely placed on you by someone who is not…you.

Which brings me to the other kind of solo episodes I’m going to be releasing which are, “Listen To This When…” episodes. This is a concept I’ve had for a long time but wasn’t sure how to get out it into the world, until now 

SO – these “Listen To This When” episodes are going to be for you to listen to when you need an extra boost. When you’re feeling lost, or uninspired, or need encouragement, or just to know you’re not alone. They’re a little “coaching with me in your pocket” kind of thing.

The first one is going to be released with the first bulk of these episodes (WOO!) and is going to be on the subject of value and worth as a creative entrepreneur. It’s a subject that almost everyone I know grapples with at one time or another – unless you’re a unicorn and I sincerely hope that’s you! – but if you’re not, this first “Listen To This When” episode. 

They’re going to be shorter in length. Maybe 10 minutes or less, and just a little love note and encouragement to listen to whenever you need it. It’s something I’ve always ached for and looked for but I haven’t been able to find anywhere. And I really really hope that they serve you well. And they are something that are empowering for you. Take a listen and let me know if there are other scenarios you can think of where you would like a “Listen To This When” episode.

So I guess I’ve talked a bit about who I am and what I envision for the podcast, but haven’t really dug into the WHY yet.

Why now?

Why a podcast?

Well, it’s something people have been asking for for a while and it lights me up in a full-body YES kind of way, and I finally have space to create it now. 

And more deeply, it’s a reclamation of my voice and my life story. 

When I was 11 I was diagnosed with Leukemia (which is now and thankfully has been in remission since shortly after I started treatment) and from that very first hospital stay, I have been a voice for the cause. I was interviewed just 2 weeks after being diagnosed for the Children’s Miracle Network Radiothon reaching millions nationally and bringing in hundreds of thousands of dollars raised for the hospital I was treated in (amazing- so proud).

Then I spoke at events for different non-profits that supported my family and other families going through a similar experience as mine for the next 15 years. FIFTEEN YEARS! On stages, at fundraisers, at the programs, I was consistently asked to share my cancer story and how these programs supported me through that time. And trust me, I was happy to do so and proud to do so and grateful for everything that these charities provided for us in that time of need.

But looking back… it really messed with my head. 

I already stood out my whole life because I had red hair but THEN I was thrown on a pedestal as this MIRACLE CHILD who, “beat the odds” despite experiencing SO MANY complications, surgeries, and flat-lining multiple times.

Which like… yea. Insane. There were times when doctors told my parents to prepare for the worst and one surgeon came out of the operating room literally said to them, “I’ve done everything I can, the rest is up to Kerry.”

And my stubborn self was like “not today Satan!” and yes, I also had a ton of people supporting me despite that doctor washing his hands of my outcome (to which my catholic upbringing says “how very Pontious Pilot of him, right??”). There’s a whole long story about that ICU stay I’ll share in a future episode…

But so much of my identity became this miracle survivor girl – a celebration of living despite all the peers that passed around me. It was really hard to grapple with. This survivor’s guilt felt like an owe-ness and something I had to pay back or pay forward. I had to take advantage of the time that I was gifted when so many people were not given the same gift. 

It was suffocating. And not one of my friends, not one of those peers that passed away, would ever put that pressure on me, I know that they wouldn’t have. Its a weight i felt every time someone said to me, “everything happens for a reasons” or “you’re a miracle” and “you’re here for a reason” and “you’re meant to do great things” or “you’re going to change the world” or “you’re going to take over this place someday”- speaking about one of the organizations I was involved in

And by no means do I fault the people who said those things to me. They were meant to be encouraging, I know that. But it took until really really recently to peel back the layers and layers of obligation I felt because I’m still here, and shift my motivation away from that survivor’s guilt being my driver. 

It’s a strong driver. A really noble driver, even. But ultimately stifling. So over the last couple of years, I’ve been experimenting with what it would feel like to do things from a place of desire and excitement, instead of obligation. And that’s again a whole episode or a few we’ll get into later too.

So Yes, I survived adolescent cancer but there are a lot more interesting parts of me beyond that chapter too. 

Like how I manage, physically, mentally, and emotionally the PTSD of that whole experience. 

How I found a way back to athletics despite the physical limitations I had post-treatment. 

How I navigated relationships and love and college and career, and creating an entire career from my passions. 

And yes, all of my life could relate to the chapter where I had leukemia, but the “having leukemia” isn’t all that fascinating. Thankfully today, leukemia is one of the most curable childhood cancers out there and I lived only 25 minutes from one of the best Children’s hospitals in the US. 

Was it easy? Hellllll no. 

But really, it’s everything beyond my cancer diagnosis that’s fascinating. The “what happened next,” part. The post traumatic growth part – that growth that happens and perspectives you gain after living through something completely harrowing. The part where I had to learn how to release everyone else’s expectations of me and tune into my own heart and desires and to create a life from there.

So all those “what happened next” stories and lessons and ah-ha’s and growth moments are what we’re gonna get into on the podcast. Because they’re powerful and impactful and worth being told too. And don’t get me wrong, plenty of this podcast will have depth to it but there’s going to be lots of goofing off too. “The world ain’t all sunshine and rainbows” but a lot of it can be silly and playful and light if we’re open to that option too.

So, if you’re still here, thanks for sticking it out and Buckle in Baby! It’s going to be a wild ride. And I cannot wait to dig in with you talk again very soon. 

Love ya

That was it! The very first intro of the In High Alignment Podcast! Thanks for listening in. I hope this intro episode gave you an idea of what you can expect as you listen to and become a super fan of the show! Haha

Truly though, I couldn’t be more grateful that you chose to spend this time with me. If you like what you’re hearing so far, please rate and review us on Apple Podcasts + Spotify— it really helps so much with discoverability and also feels like you’re giving me a giant virtual hug so… Thank you. 

Until next time, this is your host Kerry and remember to stay In High Alignment.