Stories are incredibly powerful – their ability to teach, inspire, and create understanding is why we are so in love with storytelling. Most stories have a defining moment and so we’ve asked some of the most talented, insightful folks across a broad range of industries and markets to tell us about a defining moment in their story.

Scott StJohn

My defining moment led to my professional career. I was about seven years old when I complained to my grandfather about not being able to accomplish a task. “I can’t do it”, I said. He stopped me in my tracks, looked firmly at me, and pointed his finger at me, saying, “Don’t ever use the word can’t; it’s not in the St.John dictionary.” I never forgot that moment, and from then on, I never used the word can’t. Read more>>

Lucy Liu

I love this question because for many years I always felt less confident of myself because I didn’t have a specific turning point or defining moment in my life that changed the trajectory of my life. And for this exact reason, I stopped dreaming, I lived life on autopilot, and I didn’t feel fulfilled or purposeful. I waited for that defining moment to come for something greater to happen in life, but that moment never came. Read more>>

Violet Hategan

Oh gosh, where do I begin. I suppose there have been several pivotal moments in my life that shifted my trajectory and led me to where I am and who I have become today. But I will say what knocked me off my feet and opened a huge door for me was the passing of my Mother in 2013, My whole life I have been sensitive and innately aware of energy & Spirit. Read more>>

Keeley Bruner

A few months after my third child was born, I was having dinner at a friend’s house, who happened to mention that her nanny was expecting. Because the nanny’s partner was deployed, I felt she might be able to make use of several of the resources for parents in our area. After sending my friend 6-8 of these resources, it occurred to me that this might actually be a job, which it is. Read more>>

Phyllis Douglass

The defining moment was with my mother’s passing from cancer. A few years prior to her death, see phoned me and asked, “I don’t understand why I am becoming like you”. Trying not to be offended, I asked her what she meant by her statement. She told me she no longer believed in God, and was confused about why her religious beliefs were faltering. Read more>>

Mingjie Zhai

There’s a saying, “Trust your guts.” Gut feelings can also be self-realized through expressive writing. It can inform when we pay attention to the details, when we document what we have observed so it is clear, and the truth becomes self-evident. It was through expressive writing that it became quite apparent that I have to pilot The Love Story’s expressive writing program in Los Angeles first, the city of Angels, the place I call home. Read more>>

Brandi Webster

During my time at the Department of Veterans Affairs, I had a clear plan for advancing my nursing career. But then, the pandemic hit, and the constant daycare closures forced me to stay home with my precious daughter. While it initially felt like a disruption, it turned out to be a profound period of self-reflection and transformation. Read more>>

Lindsay West

In the early stages of my nursing career, I was diagnosed a thyroid disorder. Despite having only two years of experience as a nurse, I was already experiencing the Read more>>

JuJu Robinson

After being a yogi for ten years and developing a lifestyle with a deep love for movement, breathing, and self work I reached a point of wanting to pour out the very practices that were poured into me. As I completed yoga teacher training I was also in a space of building deep connections with others while aligning new beginnings for more community and healing work. As I continued to chew on the idea of becoming a yoga instructor I quickly came to a realization that incorporating my passion for women into my practice was most important for me to succeed. Read more>>

Veronica Clanton-Higgins

Initially I started out doing business coaching and non-profit support. I was working on my Doctorate in Social Work, and often found myself in situations where individuals were reaching out to me for a different form of coaching: life and professional development. I never forget my first client was the Sister of a friend. Read more>>

Bethaney Clark

In 2012, my husband was diagnosed with an Auto Immune disorder. He was 29, and it completely debilitated him. He went from being extremely athletic to being unable to work, and barely able to walk upstairs. We sought out advice from both the traditional western medicine and natural medicine lines of thought, and everywhere we went, the biggest factor they had in common was “stress”. Read more>>

Zalina Iminova

My defining moment was last year. Last fall opened my first location in Burbank, and I had to start over, accepting all clients in the office, instead of doing house calls. Most of the clients wasn’t comfortable to travel to my location, and I could totally understand that with LA traffic. LA traffic was actually the reason why I couldn’t go from one appointment to another anymore. Read more>>

Jan Canty

I was in the 10th year of training to become a psychologist; within two weeks of finishing my post-doctoral fellowship. My long-range goals were within reach and I could start to exhale. I could actually picture myself launching my own private practice. Read more>>

Jordan Johnson

There was. I was teaching in a public school, a school that I actually really loved with administrators that I respected and admired but the more I learned and the more confident I became as an educator, the more I recognized that we were not serving our students well in a lot of areas. It also became really hard for me to imagine sending my own children to a school in my district where my values were not always in alignment with how I was being asked to teach. Read more>>

Nancy Davidson

I graduated from college and launched myself into a marketing career. I thought that’s what I wanted. However, I was spending a lot of my time volunteering at nonprofit organizations. I had worked my way into a corporate marketing job at Transamerica, and thought I was on the right trajectory. That all changed in a moment. Transamerica laid of 1,100 employees in one day. I was one of those. I wasn’t sure what my career held now. Read more>>

Darlene Taylor

Moving across the country from Ohio to Los Angeles at the request of my ex-husband so that we could co=parent our daughter in the same city. This prompted my shift from therapist to coach and was the impetus for writing my book “It’s Not About Us”. Read more>>

Sammie Mancine

There was indeed a moment in my professional career, that not only altered the trajectory of my career but also transformed my entire approach to healthcare. I had worked as a registered nurse in the hospital setting and I was dedicated to my job, but over time, I grew increasingly disillusioned with the system. It felt like we were simply masking patients’ symptoms with more and more prescriptions, rather than addressing the root causes of their health issues. This pattern left me with a sense of unfulfillment, as I craved to make a more profound impact on people’s lives. Read more>>

Tabay Atkins

When I was 6 years old, my mom was diagnosed with stage 3 Non-Hodgkins Lymphoma cancer, after being misdiagnosed for almost a year. This was before we knew anything about yoga or veganism. She had to go through very intense chemotherapy, which broke her down physically and emotionally. By the time she beat cancer, she could not even walk on her own. When she was 2 weeks cancer free, she (almost accidentally) got into a 200-Hour Vinyasa Yoga Teacher Training, without knowing a single thing about yoga. Read more>>

Jennifer Bizuneh

In 2018, there were many changes occurring in my personal and professional life. I was feeling somewhat stagnant in my career and I was going through a divorce. Ironically, the struggles a person faces can often be the catalyst for a renew passion in life. As I adjusted to my new life and to my role as a single mother, I learned that empowerment comes from within, through self-love and self-acceptance. Read more>>

Ebiye Jeremy Udo-Udoma

In Rio in 2016 I was young into my international career and in a game against the Brazilian National Team I scored a goal and celebrated with a now signature celebration in which I perform a forwards dive into a roll. Seeing this, the game’s announcer started calling me “The American Ninja” to the chuckle of the crowd and would repeat that nickname whenever I would score the remainder of that game. With the reception I received from the local crowd I shortly thereafter changed all of my public social mediums to @HandballNinja hoping to capitalize off of the nickname I was given in jest by one announcer in one game. Read more>>

Todd Vande Hei

It all started with a prostate exam. My ex business partner (Brad), within the first month of our new relationship, suggested I change my diet: remove gluten, dairy, eggs and sugar; add more red meat. He was a strength coach, and in the early years, we were primarily focused on personal training and nutrition. I took his advice, and by the end of the 2nd month, many of my chronic health conditions faded away, including daily headaches, periodic migraines, neck and low back pain, fatigue, and brain fog. Read more>>

Justine Feitelson

After 8 months of excruciating, unrelenting symptoms, I was finally diagnosed with Complex Regional Pain Syndrome via bone scan. On one hand I was so relieved to finally have some answers and my pain be validated by a diagnosis. On the other, that diagnosis was of an incurable, progressive disease that was poorly understood, with even poorer treatment options. Everything you read on Google is horrifying, it’s nicknamed “the suicide disease”, and the images of affected limbs are the stuff of nightmares. Read more>>

Dr Monica Krishnan

The defining moment in my career was when I began working as a Grief and Mental Health Advocate. After loosing my husband to cancer – I was lost . In 2018, I began my very first public speaking engagement on a show called Smashing the Stigma . Read more>>

Barbara Roux-Levrat

I had a Bachelors in Computer Science and an MBA. I was on track for a corporate career, when I realized that my personal life was taking a heavy toll on me – especifically my marriage. Read more>>