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Hello, my name is Leslie and I am the host of the Why Not Today podcast.

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This is a podcast to celebrate people who have been courageous and said, why not today?

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I started the podcast in honor of my father, Patrick Kane, who often did say, why not today?

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I'm based in Reston, Virginia, a planned community right outside of Washington, DC, and thanks

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for joining us today.

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So I'm really excited about my guests today, that we had a great conversation the other

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day about different subjects.

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I'm like, oh my goodness, you need to be on this podcast.

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And so Liz, is it pronounced Grieven?

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Yeah.

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Nailed it.

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Yay.

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So we met at Smith Mountain Lake that if you've listened to the podcast at all, that's one

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of my places to hang and go.

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And it was definitely a Godwink introduction.

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Like I walked into my friend, Stor J. Bond, who's been a guest on the podcast, and you

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were there and just we were talking and assuming we knew each other.

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And then I think a couple of days later, walked into another coffee shop and there you were

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again.

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And just like, we need to connect.

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So we connected on social media and I just was watching things you're posting.

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I'm like, okay, there is a story behind this girl and I need to know it and we need to

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be friends.

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And even though I'm not at the lake right now, we're in separate places in Virginia,

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but we still could be friends.

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And we're talking about some power sessions and all kinds of fun things.

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So I'm really excited just to have this conversation with you, Liz, and share some of your why

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not today moments.

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And it's kind of opposite of a lot of what people on my podcast we've talked about.

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And you are Liz Greven and not a company, which I love and it's who you be.

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So introduce yourself, just a quick who Liz is and a fun fact.

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And then we'll talk about courage and all your stories.

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Absolutely.

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Well, first of all, thank you so much for having me.

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It's always a pleasure getting to chat with you.

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I am like a little butterfly.

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I float around Smith Mountain Lake quite a bit.

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So it's not a coincidence that we ran into each other in two different places.

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I do have fun getting to meet all of the locals here at Smith Mountain Lake.

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And I do consider you kind of a local even though you are in the rest.

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Because when you are here, I do get to see you quite a bit.

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So the story of Liz Greven, I'll give you a quick fun fact about me.

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I have moved actually about 38 times in my life.

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Oh my goodness.

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And I'm young.

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I'm in my late 30s.

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So it's about as old as I am.

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And they're not to different places geographically, so to speak.

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But they're just, I've moved around a lot.

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And some of it has been for job opportunities.

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Other times it's been with my family.

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Other times it's been just to start a new adventure and seek out a new opportunity.

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So that's a fun fact about me.

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If I think if opportunity knocks or if there is an opportunity to start something new or

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meet new people.

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I think it's you just kind of have to trust God that that's where you're meant to go.

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I love you.

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Moving and doing things for new adventures, which speaks to my heart and soul and I'm

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always up for adventure.

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Yeah.

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And that's sometimes I, and that's kind of a fun fact about me is that I am very trusting

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that there is a purpose to my life and I trust that there's something greater for me to be

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doing.

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One of the things that drew me to you and I just knew in our conversation, I just like

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I knew I needed to know you and I've been really trying to be obedient to the Godwinks

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and the meeting people and the people in my path.

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And just, you know, it's just one of those coincidentally.

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Just meet someone who needs to introduce you somebody else to somebody else and you know,

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I think we need to be open to that.

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Yeah, absolutely.

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I know it's being such a hurry.

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Yeah, well, I think that's that's another thing too is I think people are always in

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such a hurry that they don't pay attention to some of the things that are handed to them

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or put in their path.

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Because we're always in a hurry to do things that are in art that we have planned out that

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we don't pay attention to the things that maybe are put in put in front of us for a

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reason or the people that are put in front of us for a reason.

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So yeah, and I think that's one thing I like about being at Smithmount Lake because I live

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in Northern Virginia, which can be crazy and busy and it's like a badge of courage or badge

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of honor that you're busy.

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And I'm from New York.

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I'm from New York.

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So I completely understand that.

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So if the lake is kind of more chill, people aren't as big of a hurry.

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You stop and talk to people and you say hello and you have a conversation and get to know

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people.

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And that's one of the things I love about there, whether it's you're at the coffee

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shop or you're Jayvon store, you know, met so many people there, you just and I've got

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a great group of friends and as you said, I don't even live there.

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Yeah, it's beautiful.

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Yeah, and it's a beautiful area to do that too.

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Yeah, exactly.

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So what does courage mean to you?

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What's your definition of courage?

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So and it's and it's funny because I really listening to your prior podcast and some of

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your guests, I think a lot of them have nailed it in so many different ways.

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And I really gave this thought and I love that you asked this question.

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So for me, it's kind of a combination of Latin, you know, you always hear that courage is,

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you know, feeling the fear and doing it anyway.

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And I honestly, I agree with that, but I think that people leave out, I think the most important

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piece of that, and it's the decision part.

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It's feeling the fear and deciding, making that decision to do something anyway, and

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then taking the action.

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So and I can give a personal example.

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Like for me, it's, you know, feeling, feeling fear and what I moved down here, for example,

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I didn't know anyone in this area.

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I had never been to Smith Mountain Lake, and I was given the opportunity to move down here

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from New York to Virginia to an area that I knew no one had never been here and start

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my life basically fresh.

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And I was petrified.

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Because I thought, you know what, like, this is going to take a lot of courage, it's going

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to take all of me to do this.

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And I made the decision and I think a big part of courage is when you make a decision,

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you invest, it goes from your heart, it goes from your head to your heart.

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And that's where that's where courage really comes from is your heart.

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So I think that's the biggest piece that people miss when they just, when they define courage

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is that it involves your heart.

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And so once you make a decision with your heart, you're fully invested and nothing can

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stop you.

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Totally agree.

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You know, it's interesting just you saying that the visual that came to my mind is Wizard

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of Oz.

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You talked about courage and hard and I love the story behind the Wizard of Oz and the

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symbol of all of it and how true that is.

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Courage is making a decision which deciding is cutting off all other options.

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It's like, okay, what are the things I'm going to do, you know, words that and I just created

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and people can get it and sign up for my email list, courage hack that I have saved on my

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phone as a screen saver.

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And it's like the letter Y and then NT for why not today.

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Basically taking the action.

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What's that one thing and courage doesn't have to be big.

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It doesn't have to be moving to another state.

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Courage can just be getting up in the morning sometimes.

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Yeah.

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And that's so that's the other thing too is I decided to go back to school and major

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in psychology while I was here taking care of my parents and helping out with that.

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And I've learned so much that it sometimes for some people it is just getting up in the

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morning.

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It is just making that decision to say hello to someone when you have so much anxiety that

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around social anxiety that you can't talk to people or for some people it's just leaving

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the house because there's so much anxiety about leaving the house, especially after

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a pandemic or interacting with people.

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So we're in such a different place with our mental health.

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And that's one of the reasons why I decided to go back and study psychology is that there's

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such a you know you have people have to give themselves permission to find out where they

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where they're at and and then.

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Alright, those internet's breaking up a little bit.

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Okay.

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Okay.

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I'm sorry about that.

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So then what I was saying was that some days you have to take one step and use that courage

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and then maybe it's the next day or after that a week later use two steps or three steps.

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Yeah, and then but it's making that decision to just be be more courageous than you were

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the day before.

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Yeah, what do they say it takes five seconds of courage.

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And because Mel Robbins talks about she has a great to talk about five second rule.

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I love Robbins.

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She's wonderful.

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And so it's talking about when there's something you want to do from getting out of bed to

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making that phone call to say hello to somebody you go you count down five four three two

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one instead of going one two three four five then you can go six seven you don't do it.

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So you know it's just making that decision.

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So you're young and you've had a lot of life and a lot of experience and we could talk

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about lots of stories.

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So I know when we talked yesterday you we were talking about businesses and people that

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we've interviewed I've interviewed and talked about they've started business or nonprofits

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and you would be opposite and I kind of I left corporate America also but I had another

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business to start but you left a successful business corporate to take care of family

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which is so admirable.

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Yeah, yeah, thank you.

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Let's talk a little about that and the steps behind that and you know ironically when

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I quit my job it was I did have another business behind but not knowing my dad six months later

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would have a stroke and I would be up to be there and I had position in my life.

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So you just never know but taking those steps which can be scary.

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Yeah, so for me it was honestly it was petrifying.

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You know I think that it started essentially it started with a Tony Robbins weekend that

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I did virtually and then he talked about service and a life of service and stuff like that

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and I realized something clicked in me there that I was very driven by my career and so

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there was there was just that in the back of my head and but nothing really triggered

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me yet and then I was doing great with my career and then my mom got sick and it just

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turned it turn of events happened where it was time for me I made a decision like we

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talked about to just kind of step away and really help out with family but the thing

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that really triggered me the most was in 2019 I lost my aunt who had fought for the majority

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of her life to breast cancer and for the last like two weeks of her life I was there by

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her side day in and day out put her on hospice and was by her side watching her through that

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and I had survived breast cancer myself so when you watch someone pass away from a cancer

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that you have had it is a totally it puts you in a totally different mindset a totally

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different place and so you start to realize and I think this was the biggest the biggest

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decision for me was that you realize that there's very little time you change your focus from

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being career driven and what's important in life to your your your front side focus needs

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to be on the people that are important in life and that no matter whatever time you have

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left or they have left it needs to be you know and this was just for me it could be

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different for other people but it needs to be about who and not what.

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Absolutely and I think that's one of the my passions with this podcast is to give people

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courage to do those things in the last few months I have no friend at 57 that didn't

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that was found not alive another friend this week I heard her she had a best friend at

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44 that they found again not alive and then somebody else was telling me about somebody's

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mother although she's in her 70s that's not that old again nobody could get in touch with

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her so three instances where people couldn't get in touch with somebody and they were not

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with us anymore.

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Well right.

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You know we're also career focused and what are we what's the next rung on the ladder

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and and then family and life and what's important and why are we doing all these things.

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Yeah and that's what I found my I mean my mom you know her health is not great she's wheelchair

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bound right now and and pretty much to her bed and she has a lot of health issues especially

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with her mobility and she's she's not even 70 yet she's in her 60s and to me she that's

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a baby.

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Yeah I'm almost there.

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Yeah that's what I'm saying there's so many people there's that I know people that are

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in their 60s were still running marathons but it's you know it's you don't know when

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or what's going to happen in life and especially after this pandemic we had people that were

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babies just passing away so I've learned I've lived like I said like you said I've lived

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a lot of life in my young life and I've learned that life is really fragile so part of and

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there's different ways you can be courageous I think you can be you know physically courageous

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you can be spiritually courageous you can be emotionally courageous there's just different

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ways you can be courageous and so for me part of the way that I found that I needed to be

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courageous not just for me but for my family members was that I needed to switch from being

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driven for myself and then wanting success for myself and really define what success

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meant and say what is this what is this game of life really about you know like kind of

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just shift that focus and say you know who do I show up for because 90% of life maybe

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even 99% of life these days is showing up and who do you show up for and how do you show

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up for them and you know you need to show up for yourself and and what does that mean

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you know and define that and then when you show up for other people are you showing up

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kind of part in the French half-assing it are you showing up like you know where you're

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there but not really present or are you are you all in and when they need you to be and

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be so key and yeah well exactly and I found that when I was showing up for my parents

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when I was showing up for my sister and her kids when I showed up for my brother and his

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kids even if it was on a phone call I was talk where my friends I was talking to them

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but I was texting while I was doing it because I had stuff that I needed to get done for

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work and yada yada yada and that just that's not who I wanted to be so you know I decided

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I made that like we said I made the decision to do a courageous act for my life and it

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was just to take a step back from my career and you know the catalyst was my aunt passing

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away and and just show up go all in for the people that I cared about awesome and so I

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was speaking to her aunt today I know we're recording this not the day the same day we're

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going to post it but the day we're recording it happens to be your aunt's birthday it is

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my birthday you told me today she's hanging out with my dad but you told me when I don't

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know if it's before she passed away or earlier in life that she challenged you about courage

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and you know I've talked about that because I think she did um so and it was it started

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when I was super young so every summer you know everybody has that aunt or that uncle

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or whoever that you'd go to their house you know she lived in Rhode Island right by the

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beach by Miss Quamicate Beach so I grew up going to her house every summer for a week

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or a weekend or whatever my parents would drop me off or she would come and get us and my

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siblings and I and we would go and spend you know the week at Aunt Gail's house um and

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we'd go to the beach and do all this other stuff well she would always get she'd always

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bring us to like these exotic seafood restaurants and do all this other stuff and I would look

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at her and I would say I don't like it she'd try to get me to eat you know whatever you

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know calamari squid whatever it was all these weird things um and to like a you know 10

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year old or whoever you don't want to eat squid you don't want to eat clams you don't

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like you want chicken nuggets or french fries yeah and so I would just tell her I didn't

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like it and she would say how do you know you don't like it if you've never had it and

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I would just say I don't because it doesn't look right I don't like it so she challenged

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me every single time I was with her to try something new but not just when I was with

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her she later in life she would tell me she would say she always called me Elizabeth

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with drove me nuts because nobody ever calls me my my full name um she would say Elizabeth

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from now on I challenge you to try something every day that either scares you that you've

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never done or that you think you could never do every day and then she made me promise

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her that I would do it for the rest of my life well which was yeah and now you know

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once she passed away too it was like crap now I really got to do it because now she's

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going to come back and haunt me so she's watching me now so now I even if it's something super

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small um that it's just trying a new food or trying a new coffee at the coffee house

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or um do something that scares me talk to you know I remember in I think it was high

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school or middle school I would go up and talk to a boy who I thought was really cute

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and it was and I would call her and say so I did something that scared me today um but

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it was and I knew she'd be proud of me so like I you know I always challenge my friends

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or people and I challenge anyone who's listening to this to do that find something that scares

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you try something new or you know just do something that you thought you could never

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do um and do one of those things every day just pick one love it yeah I love that challenge

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and you know they always say and I quote this often Daniel Pink wrote a book about the power

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of regret and says you you rarely regret the things you didn't do but you or no rarely

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regret things you did but not the things you didn't do didn't do like you know make the

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bold move so another thing we talked about the other day is your I mean breast cancer

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was a major health challenge but the other one that we talked about yesterday and the

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other day was with walking simple and yesterday you told me you had to kind of have a whole

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mind shift around that so share a little about that yeah so um I used to run marathons um

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and I bless you at the runner what's that God bless you not me it's just a lot of steps

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it's just a lot of steps in a row that's all it is the correct thing I was talking to somebody

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yesterday who was working in a facility with adults with disabilities and this woman who

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was 57 years old so younger than me was paralyzed from the neck down from from a I think a hiking

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something rock climbing but she had at age 50 decided to do marathons and did I think

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50 marathons and this man that was talking to her totally able bodied and he goes I'm

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so you know I think her name was Valerie's like that's amazing I could never do that

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and he's like what am I saying this woman who is totally you know disabled and can't

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move paralyzed and I'm saying that so he said he did it and we'd like prom promised her

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and raised like $10,000 and you know but it's like okay you can do it you just so that's

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my love side never got that people limit themselves in their own minds and it's amazing the things

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you can do if you ready decide right the theme all right yeah right marathons so um I used

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to run marathons and I was like this great athlete and all this other stuff so my whole

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life ever since I was you know probably came out of the I probably came out of the you

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know the womb running at this point I was just super active my whole life and I was

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at college waking up to run with one of the cross country runners and because we always

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went on our morning runs at some you know zero dark ugly and I went to get out of bed

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and couldn't walk I literally just I had lost function of my right leg and my I had no flexion

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extension in my foot I couldn't use my foot at all and I had this horrible pain up and

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down my entire leg my right leg and so I called my my one friend who was a paramedic on campus

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and he came rushing over and he was a he was an ex he's in the Navy X Marine kind of thing

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so he was a medic a field medic and he came rushing over to my dorm room and I remember

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him being like I don't know what's wrong with you I don't know why you can't use this like

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so they brought me to the hospital they rushed me to a bigger huddle they did all that stuff

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it turned out after 26 hours in the ER I got diagnosed with this rare neurological pain

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disorder thing um which I still do have so I'm in pain pretty a level of pain pretty

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much all the time but after four years um of off and on basically four years of of crutches

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oh no you froze again all right you froze again oops go back you froze to oh you're

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coming back let's see all right here's a crutches okay so on four years of crutches um basically

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off and on um I finally had surgery at Columbia Presbyterian um in New York City to basically

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reroute and reconstruct some of the nerve pathways in my leg and so now I am no longer I can

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I can walk you know and I function in my leg but you know when you go from being a runner

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and a an avid athlete and then just have that taken away for years of your life and you

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you basically learn that you have to mourn the person you were before yes because mentally

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you you just that person is now dead and and so mentally that takes a huge toll on you

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and so I went through a lot of of a mental health um journey and I think with that the

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courage piece to be able to recognize that okay I've got a mourn I have to move past

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I can't live in the wallow in the self pity of this but this is now the is yeah you had

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to I had to make a decision there and I learned that and um I was very thankful I leaned on

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um I leaned on some mental health professionals in my in my life because I didn't know how

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to handle that I didn't know all I kept saying was um and I think there's a really big lesson

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here for people is you have to when you have to reach out for help because I didn't know

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how to handle the fact that every single thing that I knew about myself was gone like every

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way that I defined myself was now gone it was I was active and I was an athlete and um

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when I got stressed I went for a run and every way that I handled everything about life was

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physical and I couldn't do anything physical I couldn't use my legs essentially so now

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what do I do and so I had to learn a couple new things the one thing I had to learn was

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I'm really really smart and I'm really talented in other ways that don't involve my body so

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I had to say okay that part of me essentially is gone it's dead so what other ways can I

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use my body can I use my mind can I use my gifts a to give back to be successful and

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to do the things that I want to do in this world to accomplish the things that I want

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to do and to make myself a better person to learn and grow that don't involve any limitations

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right what a great pivot and what a great mental shift and I love in accompanying with

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that going back to school for psychology and mental health um because I think there's such

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a need there's something I heard about yesterday or the other day which is the coolest thing

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this man started a nonprofit it's called the confess project have you heard of that I haven't

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tell me about it all right so it's the coolest thing and I would he was on the Mel Robbins

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podcast so I don't know if I could ever get him on here but he started training beauticians

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and barbers on mental health yeah you mentioned it yeah yeah yeah crazy like because if you

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think about it those of you sit in the hairdressers chair and you share everything yeah and it's

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just and the other thing I was talking to somebody about the other great way to have

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converse hard conversations with people and I know people have kids say the best conversation

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they ever had with their kids is when they were in the backseat of the car you're not

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I love I know a pastor of the church he said the best way to have conversations with people

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is side to side me and for a walk so I'm like we need some walk therapy you know that we're

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going to have some we're having those discussions well that's one of the things that I learned

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was my best friend and I grew up um basically brother and sister he and I were just since

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fourth grade best friends you know doing all these great things and we would have our friendship

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developed over going runs together he was my run partner and we would go for runs and

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I learned so much about him um going for a run because he wouldn't he would never open

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up to me if we were just talking right but I'd be eyeballed eyeball but no he was so

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insecure and he was so afraid to like have that vulnerability with me but when we would

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go for a run and we were doing something else and and his mind was somewhere else he would

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just talk and he was next to me and then he would open up so there's something to be said

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about you know being able to have someone be vulnerable while they're being active yeah

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we need to all need those people that we can talk to and reach out to and unfortunately

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a lot of people don't have those people now so anybody listen to podcast if you need that

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person I am my phone is always I was just gonna say find me on follow so well we can

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talk forever and ever and I know we're gonna brainstorm all kinds of fun things together

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and do some so the Leslie Liz show is not over but how to empower what would you suggest

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to empower somebody else to be courageous to put family first to grieve over changing

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life to all the things we talked about so there's a there's a few points there that

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I would make and I'm I'll touch on them quickly the first thing as far as I'm being courageous

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I would say two things one make a decision and then jump you're going when you jump

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you're you know if you're jumping out of a tree you're gonna hit some branches on the

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way down you're gonna tear up your clothes it's gonna hurt but eventually you're gonna

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fly so you just have to make the decision to jump life is crazy and it's messy and it's

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beautiful yep so true so you just have to make this don't be afraid like there is no

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reason to be afraid of the chaos life is chaos it's messy don't be afraid of it embrace

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it the sooner that the sooner you embrace the messiness of life the sooner you will see

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how beautiful it is yep and isn't it the hardest things we've gone through or have the brightest

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shining light once you get through it and I went through that to get to that that one

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it's funny because I look it back at some of the stuff that I have navigated my way

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through in in my young especially my younger life and I think people are always like I

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don't know how you got through that and I'm like a I didn't have a choice you just go

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through it and be a I think those are some of the best things like somebody asked me

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what's the top you know I would name what other people think are the worst things in

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their life because I grew from them I look at them and I think I don't know I would

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not be who I am today if I didn't if those didn't happen to me and I love who I am today

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so um yeah and then as far as the as far as putting family first that's just a decision

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you have to make if that's something that fits in your life if that's something that

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you feel like you your heart is ready to have that focus um you know I think I think honestly

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it's you need to just take time for people be present in every moment um being present

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and and I think the biggest thing is is that put your phone away like make eye contact

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I think I think the phone is the I miss shaking people's hands and I miss making eye contact

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with people and I I missed doing that and now that I do that I think it is the decision

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I ever made yeah yep she's frozen again these fun looks hopefully you'll come back miss

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Liz something about Smith Mountain Lake internet I was just gonna say I'm on I'm on wifi like

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literally in like a thing so can you hear me now yeah I interviewed somebody else at

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Smith Mountain Lake and he got to a point it's Christian Q and he got to a point he

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was a little emotional let me cut out which his phone died but yeah technology speaking

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about technology it's gonna mess with us so yeah so many things and we could talk forever

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and ever and it's just making those decisions doing the things and you never know it's gonna

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take you and so I was trying to tie back in these like how do you connect with my dad

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and I said that to somebody one time I like well I never met your dad I'm like no you

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didn't but you know some of your life you've had some ups and downs and he definitely did

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on the I've had from a car accident he got into when he graduated from high school and

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sent his life a whole different trajectory and you know look at the trajectory in the

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path like he would that accident had to happen for me to be born because my mom lived in

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South Bend where he moved and went to Notre Dame in college so so many things you look

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at your life when you look back I'm like wow so glad that disaster happened so this blessing

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can happen so yeah your courage is amazing and I knew there was a story behind you and

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I'm looking forward to do another thing so we're gonna share in the show notes how you

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can connect with Liz she didn't have a business but she's on social and you can find her she

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posted some cool posts and cool stuff and as I said we're gonna do some other things

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together so I'm excited about that so anything before we close this list you want to share

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that we missed no I just really appreciate the time I appreciate all our conversations

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I think I think this show is such a blessing to everyone definitely I would tell anybody

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listening definitely go back and listen to some previous episodes because there's some

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fantastic guests and you know Leslie's definitely got this you know such a great thing going

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here so thanks and we're gonna yeah lots of other guests lined up and I keep meeting

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people and just the coolest people and I'm just like oh I have to have your story on

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the podcast so for sure for sure so if you like the podcast review it share it rate it

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and you can find all everything about the podcast on the website why not today podcast

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calm there's a courage hook hack you can get if you want let me know you can find me on

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all the social media places Liz as well we do have mine's a little beat up but why not

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today cups I have t-shirts which I'm working on some more vinyl stickers all kinds of stuff

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because we want this to be a movement for people to be courageous and live in courage

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and make those decisions so thank you for being my guest and there'll be more to hear

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from this we're looking at some other fun things together so thanks again everybody

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for listening bye