What if the hardest thing you’ve ever faced ended up being the biggest gift of your life?
My guest on The Ambitious Introvert® this week is Krista Ryan – a Workplace Performance expert, speaker, coach, and former HR director who brings nearly two decades of leadership experience to her mission of helping individuals and organizations thrive through change. But this conversation isn’t just about leadership – it’s about resilience, presence, and how a stage 3 cancer diagnosis changed everything.
Krista shares how surviving colorectal cancer reshaped her life, her leadership, and her priorities. We talk about what resilience really looks like (hint: it’s not just powering through), why vulnerability is one of the strongest things you can practice, and how living more in the now can create greater impact than chasing future goals ever will.
Whether you’re leading a team, navigating a personal challenge, or simply trying to stay grounded in a fast-paced world, Krista’s wisdom will leave you feeling both seen and inspired.
Tune in to hear us discuss:
1. Why resilience is a practiced skill, not a personality trait – and it starts with pausing before reacting.
2. How vulnerability and asking for help aren’t weaknesses, they’re accelerators for growth and connection.
3. Why the best life is the one happening right now; chasing the future often pulls us out of alignment.
4. The way a single resilient person can shift the energy of an entire organization.
5. How simple daily rituals like solo walks or intention-setting can restore clarity, energy, and focus.
If you’re ready to redefine resilience on your own terms, this one’s for you.
LINKS AND RESOURCES:
◾️Krista Ryan
◾️Krista Ryan on Linkedin
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Krista Ryan: You know, he said, Krista, what gives you the right to decide how someone else heals or lives their life? And I was like, gulp. And he’s like, you are. The only person you’re accountable for is yourself. But it sounds like right now you are doing everything to avoid it. And I was like, darn it, Rul. So I had to, like, acknowledge, like, okay, Krista, focus on yourself. You are using everyone else’s journey of healing and how they’re living their lives as a distraction. And it was to avoid my own healing. So we need those people.
Emma-Louise Parkes: What if the hardest thing you’ve ever had to face ends up, being the biggest gift of your life? That is exactly what happened to this week’s amazing guest here on the ambitious introvert, the wonderful Krista Ryan. Krista is a workplace performance expert, keynote speaker, coach, and a former HR director. She has spent almost two decades in leadership and now her mission is helping individuals and organisations to thrive through change. Now, this conversation isn’t just about leadership. It’s about resilience, presence, and how, in Krista’s case, a, stage three cancer diagnosis changed everything for her. Although in the best possible way. She’s sharing her story of resilience, how it looked like getting through those tough times. And I know that whether you are leading a team, part of a team, navigating your own personal change, or just trying to stay grounded in the world, as crazy as it is right now, Krista’s wisdom is gonna leave you feeling seen, inspired and ready to take action. So please enjoy this wonderful conversation with Krista. As much as I enjoyed having it, Krista, we have been discussing having you on the podcast for Ikon about six months now.
Krista Ryan: That might be about right.
Emma-Louise Parkes: So I’m very happy to see you here and we’ll dive into. One of the reasons that we got so delayed is that you have recently had a huge health scare that you’ve overcome. Do you wanna share a little bit about that and then we’ll give the context for what we’re gonna talk about?
Krista Ryan: Yes, absolutely. Well, first of all, it’s just I’m so honoured to be here and to be in conversation with you and your listeners. So thank you for having me. Yeah, we were connected. And then, like a lot of things in life, we had to pause and pivot. Right? So, unexpectedly, I was diagnosed with stage three colorectal cancer last May. So I was one of these rare cases that you’re hearing more and more of right now of. I was 44 at diagnosis. I actually had zero signs and symptoms. So I was one of those rare, I say rare unicorns that just happened to go in, ask for a colonoscopy and some blood work. And a little to my, I mean, I had no idea. Completely came out of left field. Got a call about three days later that I IND did have cancer. So it is just really a bizarre journey on how I got here and the last 11 months. So we’re coming up on May’quickly approaching. But the last 11 months, I would say, have been probably the most impactful and in all honesty, probably the biggest gift of my whole life has been what has shown the last 11 months. And it’s really because of the way I chose to show up through the journey, the choices I chose to make and how I chose to respond to what was happening to me. So it’s just been such a wild ride, Emma Louise. It’s been a wild ride, but such a gift and such a blessing. But to be honest, I’m here today, I’m super happy to say I’m two weeks out of my last surgery. So that was my fourth, surgery was two weeks ago today. This is where they kind of put my body back in place. So I had my tumour removed. They did a ostomy, which is something to keep me safe and healthy. While my body was recovering, they removed all of the cancerous area, so I am missing part of my colon, my entire rectum, a lot of the area that your GI needs. And then this last surgery, they just kind of put me back together. I say they put Humpty Dumpty back together again. And now I’m learning how to live with my new body and how it takes the nutrition and nutrients and food and it’s just our bodies are such a miracle. They’re so amazing and fascinating to me and really our minds are connected to our gut. So I’ve just learned so much in this last 11 months about the power of being resilient is not just for our mental health, it’s actually for our physical health as well. And that if we are able to navigate challenges and change, beauty is on the other side. No matter how challenging that changes. It’s really, really true. So that’s a long winded answer of why it took so long for you and I to connect. But here we are in conversation finally.
Emma-Louise Parkes: Well, I am grateful to have you here. I’m so glad to see you well, because although we didn’t know each other particularly closely throughout your journey, we were in contact and, and messaging. I was Hoping to see you in December at an event and you can make it. And ye then we’ve had this. So, yeah, like you said, beautiful things always come to fruition. They really do at the right time.
Krista Ryan: They really do. They really do. And there’s so many gifts. Even during the mess. I always say, life is a beautiful mess. It’s always messy, it’s always going to be messy, but it can be a beautiful mess.
Emma-Louise Parkes: So resilience is a term that I think is quite often used without any context. I see a lot of people saying, yeah, like, be resilient. And it’s like, okay, but what does that actually mean? And in my own the experience when I’training to be an air traffic controller, that’s some of the toughest training that you can do. It’s three years constant y where you learn something in the classroom. You go into a simulator, and you practise it, usually badly because it’s new, it’s a new skill. And then you practise it again and you go, oh, yeah, okay, I’m kind of starting to get the hang of that. And they go, oh, good. Here’s another skill to layer on top of it. And you do that and it’s this constant. You never plateau for three years. It’s built, built, built, built, built. And that I now see gave me a type of resilience that I wouldn’t have had without doing that training.
Krista Ryan: Oh, 100, 100%. And that piece right there is so key to our human experience. So we navigate things even as children, we go through hard things as children, right? It’s something to say to someone, you can be resilient, you’ve got this, come on, you can do this. But unless we’ve put the reps in, right, unless we’ve actually gone through hard things, navigated them, it doesn’t have to be perfect. And please, I mean, perfection is such a myth. It won’t be perfect, it’s gonna be messy, it’s gonna be hard, it’s gonna be, clunky. But the more you go through something like that, the better the next time. As long as we’re living, we’re always gonna have to find some resilience. We’re gonna. Well, we don’t have to, but I encourage everyone to try to, right? But as long as we are practising the human experience, we have the option to be resilient. So let’s go way back in time to your point, right? Practise, practise, practise the reps we’re actually flexing that mental resilience muscle every time something happens. I’m going way back to 2017. I was kind of. My resiliency journey started then because I was involved in a mass shooting. So really like bizarre experience. We were, my husband and I wrote in Las Vegas. We got involved in into mass shooting, got separated. I saw things I was not prepared to see. And to be honest with you, I was mentally unaware of the lack of resiliency that I had. I thought I was resilient, but when push came to shove, it actually took me two years to kind of heal from that, to reach out, ask for support. And I’m so glad that I went through that experience because I had to access tools, right? Resiliency tools and tools to help me heal, tools to help my mindset. Just so much awareness came after that event that when I was diagnosed with cancer, I anchored into what do I need to do right now? Okay, I know what I don’t need to do is I don’t need to self sabotage and go into that internal narrative that’s false. I legit the moment I was diagnosed, anchored in some of the tools that supported me way back in 2017 because I realised I’ve done a change before that was tough, I can do it again. And let me tell you that I was able to do it so much faster. It really made a huge difference because I was like, I can do hard things, I’ve done this before. I got this, okay, what do I need to do? You know, check off this, check off that. So I started to anchor in some of those tools. If I had not gone through that experience in the past, I wouldn’t have been able to get to that resiliencyast as fast as I did because I had those reps in place. So I think what to your point, practise is so important in life, right? Practising how to be resilient, it is a common, I like to say it’s like the ocean waves, it’s constantly going to be coming, right? There’s gonna be opportunities for resilience as long as we’re on this earth. It it’s a guarantee.
Emma-Louise Parkes: And your examples are on the extreme end. You have for experienced two extremely challenging situations there, with your health and with the shooting. And I think it’s important because people might think, oh well, you know, Krista had that and that and that was awful. And you o my thing I had wasn’t that bad. It didn’t seem that bad. So therefore I should just be okay with it. But recognising that resilience affects everyone differently, and we all respond differently. And a challenge as a challenge is a challenge. Like I was talking to a client about this, where she can now look back at periods she’s gone through in her business that felt challenging and she now goes, but it’s always okay in the end. Yeah, it’s always okay. And yeah, she didn’t go through something as traumatic as you’ve experienced, but she recognises the lows or the periods that felt hard and she can learn from that and build from it. Does that resonate?
Krista Ryan: Oh, absolutely. And it’s really important piece too because what we often do is we often start to compare stories, right? We’re all of a sudden saying like, well, you went through that. I can’t relate to that. Like Krista, mass shooting and a cancer, a stage three cancer diagnosis. I don’t have that. I can’t relate to that. All of us can relate to each other because we’re all navigating something. So whether you have a teenage daughter that you’re really having a hard time having conversations with because you’re both, you know, trying, they’re trying to carve out their path in their life, you’re trying to help guide them, right? There’s a, you know, I like to say a buttinging of heads sometimes, right? This is resiliency. This is how do we navigate this together. How do we stay grounded? And when I say stay grounded, it’s really staying in that neutral space where we’re not going toxic positivity, but we’re certainly not going negative negativity. As you know, as your listeners know. That’s how we’re wired. We’re wired to go negative first in anything. Flat tire, waking up late for an alarm, a tough conversation with a spouse or a loved one. We have tendency and we are wired, hardwired to go negative first. Resiliency is knowing and catching that moment so that you can make the choice of something different, right? What? How else can I choose to respond in this moment? To me, that is resiliency.
Emma-Louise Parkes: I love that because I always say that power is in that pause. And that toxic positivity that you’re talking about is very much just don’t think bad thoughts, just only think positive thoughts and don’t ever be negative. And you know, and okay, that can be helpful in certain situations. But you’re never gonna not think next.
Krista Ryan: No, we’re way.
Emma-Louise Parkes: Because like you say we’re hardwired that way for survival. And that’s why I always say you’ve gotta catch that pause and that choose and how you are gonna respond at that moment, rather than just letting your brain go off and just respond how it naturally wants to 100%.
Krista Ryan: And it happens even. Especially when we’re negative, right? Especially when we are in a challenge and we’re approached to something. The opportunity to be resilient. We’re gonna go negative first. But it’s so interesting to me, and I love to play with this. Even the most positive experiences, we tend to go negative, right? We find out, like, a, friend’s getting married, Fantastic, beautiful event. All of a sudden, we go negative first, thinking, oh, I need to book a flight. That’s gonna be really expensive. Oh, my goodness, I need to lose, like, £6 for this wedding. Oh, my goodness. We are hardwired to find somehow to go negative first. You get a promotion you’ve been going after immediately. Oh, man, what if I’m caught? What if they think I’m a fraud? What if I actually don’t deserve this? What? Can’t handle the workload, right? So it is insane and so fascinating to me how we are hardwired this way to go negative first into your point. The power and my first step in all of this, especially the resiliency journey, is power in the pause. Take a moment, take a deep breath, and acknowledge what the situation actually is that you’re in. And that is facts, right? So for me, when, like, I’ll use my cancer diagnosis, when the call came through from my doctor and I made them actually say the words. Cause I wanted to make sure I was not creating false stories. I said, Dr. Sow. And so, you’re gonna have to actually say the words, because I think I know what you’re saying, but I need you to say them out loud so I’m fully understanding the truth in this moment, and I’m not creating false stories. So when they said the words that you do have colorectal cancer, I did the whole, like, power in the pause. I took a moment, I took a couple really deep breaths, and then I started to really anchor in that neutral space of, okay, I do not know what this means. I don’t know what the future holds at this time. I wasn’t told Stage three. That comes after a lot of tests. And, you know, there’s steps that happen for that, but it was just a cancer diagnosis. So I acknowledged the power and the pause, took a couple deep breaths, and then I just asked myself the question of what is my next best step in this moment? And it was, to be honest, it was at the salon. I had foils in my hair, so I had to. My next best step is I gotta get these stinkin foils out of my hair and I have to go home and have a conversation with my husband. So I need to lean on someone for support. But it was the first step is always just, whoo, take a breath, take a breath, a ah, deep breath. And acknowledge the situation that you’re in as the truth of it. So not the spiralling out of control like, oh my goodness, this is gonna be so bad. I’m so scared. You know, like all of the emotions can get involved really quick, but then all of a sudden you’re off the rails. And so power in the pause is always the first step.
Emma-Louise Parkes: I’m glad you said support because I wanted to touch on that from what you said about your experience after Las Vegas, where, you know, you feel like you didn’t cope with it, that well and it took you a long time to reach out and get support. A lot of people, especially very successful, ambitious people, feel like they should be able to do everything themselves. They should be able to work through it and you know, they should be strong enough and all of this. And I see that a lot where people don’t reach out for things like therapy or coaching because they’ve got this narrative of I can do it on my own. And it means that almost like it means that I’m a failure if I need or I’m weak if I need to go and lean on someone else. What was the kind of story around that with you? Why did it take you so long after Vegas to reach out and get that support?
Krista Ryan: Beautiful question. I was one of those individuals. So at the time of Las Vegas when this happened, I was a mental performance coach. So I was coaching executives worldwide on their resiliency, their mental conditioning, their strength. I was a fraud to myself. So I was pouring into others, supporting them. It can be a lot easier supporting others than the self support. So if anyone listening, you’re not alone. This is very common. I was pouring myself into others, but I was doing so as a mask to not actually investigate and help myself. So I was being a fraud. I was really helping others with their resiliency, mental strengthening. And then I was coming home and I was self sabotaging. I was isolating. I’m a very, I’m the type of individual that I thrive through connecting with others. That is how I know I’m aligned with my internal gps. My core values are joy and connection. But during this time, the number one red flag was I wasn’t feeling the joy. And I was certainly self sabotaging. Cause I was isolating. So I was avoiding conversations. I wasn’t going out with friends and family. I was really self sabotaging. The moment I realised I needed to change something is I was watching my marriage really take separate directions. My husband and I were both healing in very separate ways. So we were at the event together, but we got separated during the shooting for a very long time. So part of my upbringing, I had always thought I would be a helper. You if there’s a burning building, I’m gonna be one of those people that runs into the building and I’m helping everyone, I’m dragging everyone out. Like that was just instilled in my mind, I’m gonna be a helper, right? And I had to learn how to forgive myself because the night of the shooting, I only was thinking about my three children and I was running for my life. You know, I was thinking, keep freaking going kfg, keep freaking going. I had to run and get home to them. So to be completely honest, I ran over the top of people that were very hurt. They were crying out for help. And in that moment I just kept going. You. There was 22,000 people in attendance there. Over 800 had gotten like injured or shot. 58 lost their lives. So very. It was very much like a war zone that I was ill prepared to be in. So when I got home, m in my head I was like, okay, I’m safe, I’m good. I’m going back to the life that I had before. I’m fine. Everything’s fine. Fine is my most dreaded four letter word. I hate it. It means something’s not okay. So it is. When I hear the word fine, I’m like, let me dig in more. What’s really going on here? But I was telling myself, I’m fine, I’m fine, I’m fine. I was not fine. And I realised that the way I was living, I was extremely depressed. I was having nightmares, I was really sad. And I realised that I remember looking out over the lawn in my backyard one day and I was just like, I’m not feeling the fulfilment that I want in my life. And it was almost like a tonne of bricks just dropped on me. And I realised, oh my goodness, if I don’t figure this out, guess what? The person that chose to Unleash that barrage of bullets that night onto the crowd that actually claimed 58 lives, took them off this earth. He also was taking mine, and I’ll be damned if I’m gonna let that happen. Like, he set out to destroy as many lives as possible. I’m gonna flip this narrative and I’m actually going to live my best life. He’s gonna have given me the opportunity to live my best life. But it’s up to me. I gotta do the hard work. I gotta do the reps. So that day, that moment, I reached out and I went and got some PTSD therapy. I started my journey of PTSD therapy to really work out some of that trauma. I got into a normal local therapist every two weeks, started a therapy journey. I had an executive coach that was military trained that was supporting me through all of this and not afraid to call out my B’s. And I promise you, I absolutely promise you, if I had not made that choice that day, I would not be here where I’m at today, I would not mentally be the person I am today. And it is the most, strong and probably largest awareness is like, we’re not built to do this life alone. You know, I thought, I got it. I’ve got all the tools to help others. I can certainly help myself. We’re too close to ourselves. Our nose is in the ground, right? Because we are who we are. We need others to help support us. I called these my parachute people. When I’m free falling and I need someone to help me pull the cord so I can land a little bit softer. Those are my parachute people and we all need them. Otherwise we’re free falling alone. And that’s. That’s not what life is about.
Emma-Louise Parkes: I like the nose and the ground analogy. I always say you can’t read the label from inside the jar.
Krista Ryan: Oh, I love that.
Emma-Louise Parkes: Cause you’re too close and it’s wrapped up in emotions and filters and assumptions. And like you say, you get a coach or a therapist or someone that is removed from the situation and can look at it in a very unemotional way and they hear you and they’re like, yeah, no. And they’ll call you out on something and you go, oh, oh, yes, yes, my coach.
Krista Ryan: I remember the day, like I was stuck in this automatic negative thought, blaming, complaining. I was really criticising my husband on how he was healing from that Las Vegas event. He wasn’t in therapy and he wasn’t doing X, Y or Z. I was. I was. So I was like, judging and Comparing and my coach, I was verbally venting to my executive coach. He stopped me and he gave it to me hard. You know, he said, krista, what gives you the right to decide how someone else heals or lives their life? And I was like, gulp. And he’s like, you are. The only person you’re accountable for is yourself. But it sounds like right now you are doing everything to avoid it. And I was like, darn it.
Emma-Louise Parkes: O.
Krista Ryan: So I had to, like, acknowledge, like, okay, Krista, focus on yourself. You are using everyone else’s journey of healing and how they’re living their lives as a distraction. And it was to avoid my own healing. So we need those people.
Emma-Louise Parkes: Something I’ve seen a lot with business owners when I’ve coach them is this comparison because they’ll see someone very successful and. And, we might have a strategy for visibility or for marketing or something like that, which they’re not really fully embracing. And then they’ll be like, oh, but that person doesn’t do that. And they’re successful, but this person, they do something different and they’re okay. And almost looking for the excuse to not do the uncomfortable thing because, oh, we’ve got these people there and they’ve done it differently and they’re okay. And that’s not fair. And why do I have to do this if they don’t? And I say, you didn’t have to do any of it, but you don’t know the full story of someone else’s journey as well. Whether it’s healing or growth or business or career or whatever. We never know the fall behind the scenes. And it’s so easy to look at the highlights and think, o, well, they’ve got easy. That’s not fair.
Krista Ryan: That’s exactly right. That’s exactly right. We are human and we play that comparison game like, well, they don’t have to. It would be like the same thing as saying, like, well, that person looks good with blue. Like, why can’t I wear. It’s just crazy how we all of a sudden just attach ourselves to other people’s journey. We don’t know anything about the reps they put in on the backside. Life is really a resume if you think about it. People are only putting out the good stuff. You don’t see all the mess behind all the building blocks it takes to get them from point A to point B to point C. You don’t see all the guts. You just see the glory. But there’s so much behind the curtain for all of us. And so I think the holding your hand out and saying, I don’t wanna do this alone, you know, help me understand. How did you get from point A to point B? Help me understand without saying, I wanna do it exactly like you or I wanna be exactly like this person. It’s just not possible.
Emma-Louise Parkes: And there’s a vulnerability element there. and I talked about this when I recorded the episode with Jim Morehead, who I know you’re friends with also. Lovely. And, we talked about this. It’s brave to be vulnerable. We’ve got this idea of bravery. Funnily enough, my example was pulling people out of a burning building. That, oh, great, your childhood dream was my definition of bravery. And yet when I was leaving my career, people were saying to me, oh, you’re so brave. I was like, well, I don’t know. I’m just leaving a job. I’m not running into a burning building. But I think that this ties in really nicely because that vulnerability to ask for help is incredibly brave for a lot of people.
Krista Ryan: Yes. And, there’s so much self suffering if you avoid or delay. I look back and think, man, that was two years. I’m so grateful. I see all of the beauty on support and the person we can become through other people, through their love and their care. Because, like I said, that Las Vegas experience became the biggest gift for me because I really learned the power of connection, the power of allowing others to help support you. You know, the world is full of angels. I think that there’s so many people that are just waiting. They’re holding their hand out. They’re waiting for an opportunity to help and support you. They don’t know how to do it until you have the courage to ask and to say, you know what? I’m having a hard time. And it doesn’t, you know, let’s go back and not use Las Vegas or cancer as an, example. It could be in your work, if you’re feeling overwhelmed or you have anxiety or you’re feeling stressed. There’s such beauty in holding your hand out because there’s a million people around that are waiting for, you know, waiting for that moment they’re ready to support. And you say, hey, you know what? I’m feeling really overwhelmed, or I’m feeling unsure of my job performance. How am I actually doing right now? Can I get some feedback from you? That takes courage, that takes vulnerability. But on the other side is such a beautiful gift, because then someone else is like, oh, my goodness, you’re inviting me into this human experience with you. Wow, What a gift for both of us.
Emma-Louise Parkes: And it’s always nice to know that someone trusts and values your opinion.
Krista Ryan: Yes.
Emma-Louise Parkes: I feel like that if someone reaches out and, you know, a friend reaches out and say, oh, can I just run this past you? Or. Or I could do the pep talk. I’m like, oh, and I feel very honoured that you’ve chosen me.
Krista Ryan: Absolutely. And the biggest gift we can give them is honesty. Instead of saying, like, it’s fantastic. I wouldn’t change a thing. Being like, you know what? I think this is brilliant, but have you ever thought about X, Y or Z? You know, that’s true. Courage is giving that beautiful feedback, but also through, a lens that you have, whether or not they agree you. That comes and goes. But having the courage to also be transparent and authentic in the feedback as a gift.
Emma-Louise Parkes: This is very timely because I’ve heard a lot of clients and peers using chatpt a lot. I use it quite a lot as well. But using it in conversation almost to coach them. And, they go, oh, it was really great. I feel so much better. And everyone was raving about it. So I had a go and chat. GPT will just excuse my language, blow smoke up your ass. It will not say, have you thought about this? Or this could be better. It will go, oh, that’s wonderful. Oh, you’re so great for thinking of this. Unless you specifically say, roast me. Be critical with this. And I think it’s really interesting because that plusates on a surface level, but it doesn’t actually help you in what you’re asking for.
Krista Ryan: Absolutely. I think of it. Let’s use sports as an analogy here. I think of it like as a sports team. If you are looking for, like, if the players are out on the field, right? It doesn’t matter what the sport is. If the players are out on the field, are they looking for the cheerleaders for feedback? Like, where they’re like, yay, yay, you’re doing awesome. yay. Go, go, go. Are they looking at their coach where the coach is like, next time, try this. Next time, run there. Next time do this. I’m always looking from a coach, right? I’m always. It feels good. It boosts up my ego. It makes my heart happy to hear cheerleader once in a while. Right? But if I really want to grow as an individual, as a human, as who I am, as Krista, I’m looking for a coach. I’m looking for that person that can give me a vulnerable assessment or something. I haven’t really to Your point of inside the jar, we can’t read the label. I’m looking for someone to tell me what’s on the labels on this side know, should I try different ingredients? What else can I try to mix it up here? Right. So, I love that how it’s. We all can use a cheerleader once in a while, but if we really, really want courageous feedback, we really wanna be vulnerable. Get yourself someone that’s not afraid to give it to you as a coach. And when I say it like in a loving, supportive way, it’s okay to have a very high standard for that individual as well.
Emma-Louise Parkes: Yeah, this is rubbish.
Krista Ryan: Yeah, yeah, they say this is rubbish. Maybe that’s not quite the right feedback.
Emma-Louise Parkes: I had a friend when I was younger and, oh, before the days of the Internet, so we used to go to actual shops to buy clothes at the weekend. Oh yeah. And try them on the fitsing room as one did not try them on in the bedroom. And she would always say, oh, that’s really nice. And I’d be like, no, it’s awful on me. She was just so sweet and polite that she’d say, oh, that’s nice. And I wouldn’t even be asking because I’d seen it in the mirror and you. I have eyes. So I could tell that it was awful. I’m five foot two. Not everything’s gonna look good on me. That’s y. I acceptt that. But she would never say, I’d be like, but look at this bit, it’s terrible. And she’d be, oh, no, it’s not. It’s fine. Say it’s fine, it’s fine, fine, fine.
Krista Ryan: And look at the damage that that can do. Like, then it breaks down trust. All of a sudden you’re like, I do not trust this person to give me accurate feedback because I know they do not have the confidence or the courage to be able to do so. And that can really break down trust in relationships. That can break down trust. You know, I see it in organisations all the time where, feedback is a gift, but you have to be honest, vulnerable and courageous about it in a loving way. Otherwise you are breaking trust.
Emma-Louise Parkes: I read something great about that the other day. I was reading an article about news, funnily enough, and about trusted news sources. And, the quote was something like, trust isn’t about news organisations being perfect, but it’s about them being consistent and having integrity. People will trust news where there’s a consistency and integrity, but no one’s expecting it to be faultless. 100% of the time. And that is so true. Like you say that, trust gets eroded when someone over and over and over again is’s saying something. You’re like, yeah, that’s not right. That’s not true.
Krista Ryan: Yah. And I have to ask myself when I’m having a hard time being honest and vulnerable. So say my daughter’s having a bad day playing volleyball or sport or something, and she asks for some feedback from me. Sometimes I don’t want to give it to her. Cause I don’t want her to get hurt, right? So I’m like, sometimes I’ll be like, oh, you’re doing fine. You know, just keep your chin up, just keep smiling. Keep. Just have fun at the end of the day. But then I have to pause and ask myself, am I being selfish with my feedback? Am I avoiding my own discomfort to by not giving her some more honest feedback? So if the answer is yes, that’s so selfish. Like, I’d rather be comfortable than give honest feedback. that’s selfish of me. So instead, what I will say like, you know, sweetheart, I’m seeing you do this, this, or this. Have you thought of maybe when you would approach the ball, you do it the two steps further back or find something constructive to offer her that can maybe better the situation instead of keeping her comfortable or me comfortable. Rightuse. That actually just sabotages and it doesn’t offer her a solution or even it does break down the trust. So if I find myself in those situations, I will oftentimes say, am I avoiding this feedback for my own comfort? And if it’s yes, then I’m like, ooh, that’s selfish. Okay, I need to figure out a way to be more vulnerable and courageous.
Emma-Louise Parkes: I envisioning you going, no, honey, you’re doing great. And then, going, no, actually, yeah, hold on.
Krista Ryan: Come back.
Emma-Louise Parkes: I thought about it.
Krista Ryan: Time out.
Emma-Louise Parkes: But it’s the whole thing with constructive criticism. And, that in sports in particular. I’m thinking back to school. You know, if someone’s yelling at you, just go faster or just throw it harder. That’s not helpful. But if it’s like, why don’t you try this? It’s gonna improve your performance. I’m on board with it.
Krista Ryan: Yeah. Nothing makes me cringe more. When a parent says, like, well, that wasn’t great. What went wrong? What was that about? I’m like, you think again. You’re asking them to read the jar on the outside. They’re inside the jar. Like, help them out here and say like, I don’t know. Something was off today. Let’s have a conversation about it.
Emma-Louise Parkes: When I was a trainee controller and then when I went on to train controllers, we got a report at the end of every day and you had to do a course on writing the report because it was a very specific way of capturing the facts of what had happened that day in their training so that they could recognise it. And it had to, because it was like a daily, it was building up. It had to accurately reflect what had happened because whether someone qualified or not could depend on that. But it also had to serve in a way that they could look back at it and go, oh, yeah, I remember that day and I got some feedback of what to do differently or, what to improve on. And I remember getting one report, there’s as many years, like two decades ago, and it just said, not your best day.
Krista Ryan: What does that mean?
Emma-Louise Parkes: And you know, there was, there was nothing with that. Whereas other reports might say, oh, you had this situation and you chose to do this. In hindsight, this might have been better. Because of B and C, here are some things to consider.
Krista Ryan: Great.
Emma-Louise Parkes: I could go and read that a month later and still take something from it.
Krista Ryan: Right.
Emma-Louise Parkes: And I think that’s the point. Like you’re saying there’s a difference between just telling someone everything’s great or you’re rubbish, but there’s a middle ground where we can actually be helpful.
Krista Ryan: Absolutely, absolutely. And it goes back to even being resilient. If you’re offering some feedback, you’re helping someone and build a resiliency muscle. Like, okay, I got this, I’m gonna try this next time. So even feedback can be a challenge for some people, but it is all part of the flexing of that resiliency muscle. Like, okay, I’m gonna try this different next time. This could be a wholeher conversation. But some individuals really have a hard time with feedback.
Emma-Louise Parkes: Right.
Krista Ryan: Because that becomes a breakdown for them. Like, it’s hard for me to hear courageous criticism. It’s really hard. Cause I take that as I’m a failure, I’m not good at what I’m doing, I’m a bad employee, I’m a bad mom, I’m a bad wife, I’m a bad friend’all. Of a sudden they’re like going down that negative spiral. So feedback again is another place to practise resiliency because we get to choose how to receive it.
Emma-Louise Parkes: So you are obviously coaching way before you know your major life events. from M an HR background, how has what you’ve experienced changed your perspective. Like what did you believe say in 2016 that you can believe the complete opposite today?
Krista Ryan: Oh, I love this question. I believe that we, I believe that the best life lived is the one that’s happening in the moment right now. I, I never knew that back in 2016. I didn’t even know that back in 2023. I fully believe in all of my heart that we have the opportunity to have our best day and our best moments right now. I was so focused on my future goals. I was so focused on like the future and building this life and building my career and building my business and everything was so outward on outward trajectory, right? So, so in the distant horizon I was grinding and building and building and building. And what I realised is I was missing the magical moments of being in the present moment. And I have just. I live such a grateful and fulfilling life right now because I’m so intentional about my present moment experiences. So I really wake up and I’m intentional about my conversations with my kids and I’m intentional about like the way I’m choosing to pick out my thoughts. Like we really get to choose our thoughts like we choose our clothes. We really do. I’m intentional about the conversations I have with individuals. I’m intentional about driving in my car and looking around and being grateful for all the things around me. This is something I was not actively practising years ago. And I think it has just brought so much beauty to me that I really do believe that I no longer am really focused on building this massive career and looking out and having like a 5, 10 year goal, you know, all the. My goal is to have a kick ass day today. Like my goal is to make someone smile today. Cause that just warms my heart. My goal is to make sure that my loved ones know how much they’re loved. Like that’s today. So I think it’s more of like the power of present and being in the moment. Because otherwise what is this all for? Like sometimes I have to be like what is this all for if we are not enjoying every dinkin day.
Emma-Louise Parkes: You have a great quote. I think it’s on your website where you say happy productive people make happy productive or organisations. That’s so essentially when people can show up in that way if they can cultivate the resilience, the mindset, not the toxic positivity and spiritual bypassing of pretending everything’s okay when hard things happen. But if they can adopt these skills, what kind of effect does it have on organisations?
Krista Ryan: Oh my Goodness. Well, first, it starts with them, individually. You can see that they realise that they have all the power already. They have ve every tool that they need. They have all the power to live their best life. It’s already within them because they’re here. Like, I, don’t care if you talk about, yeah, your dog just passed away, or you just had this happen or this happen. I know life can be challenging, can be tough. You can still love your can still choose to live your very best day today. You can still choose that. When people, like, start to understand that and not buy into it, not buy into it, but truly believe, truly believe it, it changes everything. And then all of a sudden, life doesn’t seem so hard and so complicated. It’s almost like it slows down, right? It. The hustle, the bustle, the crazy, like, all the stress and anxiety, all the workload. You might have a lot going on, but you can slow down and just take a deep breath and be so grateful for the mess, right? So grateful for the stress of your life because it’s such a gift. So when I start to see individuals start to embrace that and just really be like, you know what? You know, I’m gonna smile. I got a lot going on, I’m gonna acknowledge it, I’mnn smile and I’m gonna choose to have fun and I’m gonna ask for support. All of a sudden, you start to see organisations. It’s almost like the whole vibration changes, the whole mood and energy of the team changes. And all it takes is one person, one person can shift the energy and start to change that overall experience. So, when people say, oh, I know, I’m trying, I’m trying, but I have a really toxic team. Just smile, ask for help, say someone, you know what? I feel like you’re having a tough day. What can I do to support you? Boom. Energy changes. So we are here to support others. I believe that we’re on earth to be in service of others. And when I start to see individuals embrace this and just really live in the moment, teams start to thrive and start to get healthy and allow more space for breath and laughter. Enjoy. And we can be navigating some really hard challenges and we can still laugh and have joy through them. And I promise it makes the experience a thousand times more impactful, different and better.
Emma-Louise Parkes: Thank you so much for being so open and honest and vulnerable and obviously we’ve touched on some traumatic subjects today. So thank you so much for sharing your experience and just for being so inspiring and just wonderfully. Joyful to be around.
Krista Ryan: Well, thank you for having me. And just always remember, we are built to do hard things and we are not built to do them alone. So please always ask for support. And I’m always here to, to support. So don’t be strangers.
Emma-Louise Parkes: Well, I’m going to pop all of your contact details and your links in the show notes, so if anyone wants to hop along and say hello to you, they’ll know where to find you. Before we wrap up, I always end with this question. I have a sneakaking suspicion you are not an introvert.
Krista Ryan: Well it’s funny because years ago I would say I’m an extreme extrovert. The, the more I’m navigating in life, I think I am a little bit more of an introvert than I acknowledged because I’m very, I’m very comfortable in my own space and being alone and I find a lot of joy and peace in that. And I actually love my own company, which I don’t think I’ve ever been able to say. So I am a little bit more introverted than some might think.
Emma-Louise Parkes: That’s so interesting. and something that I see a lot when people have gone through personal development and they get to a more mature age like you and I, and go, oh, actually now that I’m comfortable with myself and now that I’m okay with what’s going on in my head, I actually really enjoy being alone.
Krista Ryan: I love myself. Date nights, I’ll take myself out to dinner in a movie and I find so much peace in that. And my children think it’s hilarious. But I find a lot of peace, in my own company.
Emma-Louise Parkes: Well, we may have done this backwards because I was gonna ask you what habit or ritual you have if you are an introvert that you feel really contributes to you keeping your energy high, not in a like ra ra highway, but keeping your energy so that you can do your best work in the world.
Krista Ryan: For me, it’s every single day getting out in nature and taking a walk. When I do it, I actually don’t, sometimes I will put my earpods in with nothing on so it looks like I’m listening to something and I’m not because it’s really important for me to have quiet and have peace and just allow myself to be in company with myself. But I avoid music or podcasts or book on tape during those walks because that is really important for me to really just do a self reflection and just remind myself of who I am and how grateful I am for, you know, the things that I’m walking by. That keeps me aligned and in neutral and it really does give me the energy to kind of have that reset and set me up for success for that day. So that’s my biggest ritual inhbit on a daily and then the second would be occasional. Now I don’t take myself on date nights and movie nights alone all the time, but I make sure that that’s something important. You know, going to a coffee shop by myself or lunch by myself and just people watching and smiling at others, not engaging in conversation, but, you know, just allowing some time for reflection and peace. Beautiful.
Emma-Louise Parkes: Perfect_tend into a perfect conversation Krista, I’m so glad we finally got to do this. I’m me so glad you are well. and thank you for sharing all of your wisdom with us.
Krista Ryan: Thank you for having me.
Emma-Louise Parkes: Thank you for tuning in into this week’s episode. I hope that you’re feeling expanded to what’s possible for you, motivated to take action, and inspired about how you can start to own your energy. I share even more tools and resources on my Introverts Only email newsletter. By signing up, you not only get early access to the ambitious introvert products and services, but you also get brand new podcast episodes delivered straight to your inbox every Monday, meaning you’ll never miss your weekly dose of introvert friendly inspiration. Sign up now at theambitiousintrovert.com newsletter or click the link in the show notes. See you next week.
