On Loss, Legacy, and Genealogy Research with Jill Johnson

Jill Johnson, author of "Compounding Your Confidence" and founder of Johnson Consulting Services, joins us to discuss the year her incredibly motivated and accomplished career in business was put on pause as she faced two back to back difficult losses. She discusses the way her grief changed her perspective on life, and how she found new purpose when her Mom left her with one final challenge. That challenge led her down a path of legacy work and genealogy research- taking her all over the world.

To connect with Jill, visit her website at www.jcs-usa.com or find her on Social Media and LinkedIn @JillJohnsonUSA

Transcript

0:01

Hello, and welcome back to the grief trails podcast. I'm your host, Amanda. Kernaghan from, remember Graham's a small business dedicated to helping you support those in your life. Experiencing grief. I hope you'll consider sending someone a personalized card or grief support box shipping within the us is always free. And we treat each order with special care paying attention to every detail. A topic that can go hand in hand with grief and loss, but is often forgotten about is legacy work. This can mean many different things to different people. It can be the legacy you intentionally leave behind or the things you want, your loved ones to remember you with memories of how you lived rather than how you died. And the legacies, the stories of our family's lives can go back centuries. Those are often found through genealogy research, finding family members, going back generations and uncovering the stories they left behind. Can sometimes come as a comfort, even when you are grieving someone close to you. This was the case for today's guest, Jill Johnson, who dove deep into our family's genealogy. After a year of losing both of her parents. It was a journey that brought her new perspective and purpose. Jill Johnson, author of the book, compounding your confidence. And founder of Johnson consulting services, a management consulting firm, specializing in strategy. He is a well accomplished and recognized business woman. It was ambitious career goals had to take a back seat when she was faced with two back-to-back losses. She's here today to share how looking back into her family's history helped her to move forward. Let's take Alyssa.

Jill: 1:38

You know, I was on a really amazing career trajectory. I was, you know, Little Miss everywhere in business. I had come out of a lot of success. I'd been named Minnesota's Young Entrepreneur of the Year when I was 29. I had started serving on boards. I was on national boards. I was serving on our chamber board and the executive committee of the chamber. And, you know, I was this little media darling, even within some of our local media, whenever they were trying to feature some rising young star and young professional. And, you know, it was very heady stuff, but A lot of that was really in great part due to the cattle prodding, if you will, of my mother. My mom had been an executive secretary at 3M's world headquarters when I was very little. And we also, my father owned a small auto body repair shop. So I had this very upbringing where I had both the entrepreneurial interest and experience combined with sophisticated, savvy, smart corporate perspective. So that all merged together. And, and when I was in my late twenties, I had left the large corporate consulting arena to start my own management consulting practice. So I'd had experience doing it for a number of years and then went out on my own. And my mom was working with me. She was my bookkeeper and she was my administrative assistant and background and support. And, and my dad was a cheerleader but in, in his own unique and, and different ways. And so I had this amazing psychological support system. And. There were lots of expectations for me to be very successful and continue to elevate and climb in that corporate career. And the beginning of the recalibration of that started in March of the year I turned 35.

Mandy: 3:37

Before we get into that, I actually just wanted to make a comment because I have such a similar experience where my dad is an entrepreneur. And I definitely think children of entrepreneurs sort of inherit that entrepreneurial mindset and spirit. And so I know my brother and I always were talking about like, what kind of business could we create and you know, You know, how do we get started on something like that? And our dad was always there, like cheering us on. And when I started my website, my dad is actually the one who like helped me with all the background tech and, you know, all of the nitty gritty details that I didn't know how to do and was like there to guide me along. So I love that your mom was that person for you. And we had like very similar journeys of that. But take me to that time you said in March, what happened?

Jill: 4:23

So, In early March, I got a call from my mom out of the blue. You know, I was working hard on projects. I had clients that I was working with around the country in between board meetings and my mom called to tell me that my father had had a mild heart attack. And the way it was framed up for me, it was, it's not that big a deal, but he had been having issues all day long and had come home, but he had promised a client that he would finish painting a car so, but he couldn't drive. And so he had my mom drive him back into the body shop and we lived about. Mom said it took almost an hour because he had to make her keep stopping the car so he could get out of the vehicle to stretch his arm, stretch his leg, to grimace and whatever. Now my dad was a stubborn descendant of Polish people and And, and, and, you know, and, and the, and a stoic Swede. So he was adamant not to go to the, he should have been in the ER, right. But he insisted, no, I have to get this car done. I promised the customer to be ready for him in the morning. So my mom took him, you know, they, she navigated the extended long drive, got him into. the shop. What should have been a quick five minute paint job took another hour. And the whole time he's clearly, you know, at the throes of his heart drama, but he wouldn't go to the hospital. He wouldn't go to the doctor. Well, in the morning, my mom just stamped her little foot down and, you know, she was all a four 11 and three quarters but she, she could be very big in when she needed to be. And she insisted she just was done listening to him say no, took, got him into the doctor and they were like, Bob, you've had a heart attack. So that got his attention and it certainly got hers. And so I get this call and I'm like, okay, what are they going to do? And they said, well, they're going to run some tests on him. They're going to keep him at the hospital right now for a little while because they knew he'd go back to work. Doctors were very smart. And so he's in the hospital and he was just this ornery, you know, he was not a good patient because I think he was afraid and he really just didn't like that feeling of that loss of control. And he just did not want to be there. So I went over because he was also really bored and it was clear they were going to keep him for a few days. And. I brought over some old pictures that I had and some notes that I had made from conversations with his mother about where the family came from in Poland. I'm like, I got nothing else to do and he doesn't, so this will, this will entertain him in a different way. So I was showing him the pictures and, and you know, we're having this conversation and I had brought my tape recorder with and so I'm tape recording him. And, you know, of course, initially he's very. Don't don't record me. Don't record me and whatever and you know, so we have this great conversation turned out. He was going to need to have triple bypass surgery. It was pretty significant, but they're like, Bob, you know, you're 64. in otherwise good health. This should be a piece of cake. The, the mortality rate for somebody like you is less than 3%. I'm like, we're all like, Oh, good to go. You know, some, my brother was working for my folks. So he kept the, the business going during the day. And you know, my mom was in and out doing the things that she did to keep the business running. And, but I kept going to the hospital to talk to my dad and he was, In the surgical unit and they pulled him out because there was a more emergent case. He was already, you know, almost ready for anesthesia. So we're like, wow, great. So this is not that big a deal. And then the next day came and We were all there for the surgery. Surgery goes fine. They get him out. They're taking him to ICU, so we got to see him for a minute, and they're like, he couldn't be doing any better. His cheeks are rosy, his blood is good. We'll have him in ICU for about 12 hours, but he could not be doing any better. We take my mom to dinner, and as an afterthought, my sister and I decided to go back to see my dad. He was still in ICU and he was alert enough that we were able to kind of have a mini conversation with him. And, and you know, my sister asked him if he was in any pain and he said, no. And, you know, we just kind of were there for a minute and I said, well, I'll see you later alligator. And cause that was the phrase we always used. And we left at a one 30 in the morning. I got the call that changed my life and the call was from the ICU head nurse telling us to get the family there that he had taken a turn and it was highly unlikely that he would survive. So, you know, I've just been woken up from a deep sleep. I'm like, he's what? And she said, yeah, you need to get your family here. It's, we don't think he's going to last very long. They're getting ready to take him back into surgery to see if there's anything that they can do, but we're not expecting a good outcome. So I made the hardest phone call I ever made, which was to call my mom. to tell her what was happening and I said you need to call my brother and have him drive you. I don't want you driving. Let him drive you. I'll call my sister and we'll all converge at the hospital. So we get to the hospital. It's a little after two and it's clear this is bad. This is really bad and and our brains haven't caught up yet because he was fine. They called him Rosie. How could this be? And And I'll never forget, we saw him, he was unconscious, but we saw him before they took him into the surgical suite. And then we went and sat and waited. And at four o'clock in the morning, the doctor came in, the surgeon, and he said, I'm sorry, but it's not looking good. We're going to continue to try, but you need to prepare. We believe we're at the end. And 20 minutes later, they came back and said he was dead. My brother made a sound I've never heard a human make. And. We were all just reeling and spinning and in shock. And, you know, you pack up your belongings and, you know, we go home and we divvied up, you know, so I called all of his sisters because nobody knew he was sick. He wouldn't let us tell anybody he'd been sick. So I'm having these conversations with people who are just as surprised as we are and they're now trying to catch up. So during that summer after he died, you know, of course we all just went right back to work because That's what you're supposed to do, right? That stoic, you keep going, you go back and, and just one foot in front of the other. And during that summer, I had all these notes of these wonderful insights that I'd gotten from my dad when I had taped him in that conversation. And he told me stories that I'm sure he had told me before. I clearly hadn't listened to or heard. So. My mom and I were going to all these different places to do genealogy research and all these old cemeteries and at one point my mom said, well, what about my family? I want to learn more about where my family came from. Like, okay, fine. So we were doing that. But the more time I spent with my mom, I knew something wasn't right with her. And so the question was, you know, was she just in deep grief, which of course she was, they'd been married for 45 years. They were, you know, teenage sweethearts. And finally one night I just said, mom, that's it. You're either going to the doctor or you're going to a grief and loss group. It's one or the other. You don't get a choice. And then I called my sister and she, you know, she kind of pushed mom through that final, I'm going to do it. So mom made an appointment to the doctor and called me to tell me that the doctor had diagnosed her with lung cancer. from an x ray. I'm like, my vet won't even diagnose from an x ray. So, all of a sudden, six months later, you know, dad's died. Now we're trying to deal with the health crisis of my mom, and she was only 64.

Mandy: 12:48

And at the time, like, I'm thinking about your experience with your dad, and how You may have almost felt lulled into this false sense of security by the medical system because, you know, they made it sound so positive and then like only 3 percent and just the outlook seemed so almost, not guaranteed, but like very likely that he was just going to be fine.

Jill: 13:09

And then it should have been no big deal.

Mandy: 13:11

Right. And that's not what happened. And so like then you're here six months later and you get this news about your mom. And. I, I can imagine it would feel, even if a doctor was like, you know, we feel pretty good about this, or we think things are going to be okay, it must be hard at that point to trust anything from the medical system after that experience that you just had.

Jill: 13:32

Well, and I work as a management consultant, a lot of my clients were healthcare providers, and so I had this very odd background, but what we found with mom is that they were very lax, they were very, Well, you know, part of us, she's 64 years old and she has lung cancer and they said, well, we can get her in at our clinic in a month. I'm like hello. No, we need her seen immediately and they said, well, that's the first openings that we have at our clinic in Stillwater, which is a town not too far from where we live. I'm like, we can drive her anywhere in the metro area. We are not limited to your one single location. This was a big medical practice. By the end of the week, we are, you know, within a couple of days, you know, we had her in a, you know, the top notch. practice that we could get her in. And, you know, but what we had to do was advocate for her in very aggressive ways. And, you know, so my life completely pivoted. Oh, the other little factor here too, Amanda, is that my sister was getting married in two weeks. So mom was diagnosed. We've got this wedding that we're trying to plan and prepare for and basically what my sister had been living with my husband and I, she lived with us for two years and was moving out the day of her wedding, my mother moved in the next day and we then embarked on this complex medical journey with her and they were pretty sure at the time that she was at stage two for lung cancer and, and that has a possibility of survival or at least a better recovery. at that time, better outcome and that they would, you know, likely have to remove a lung, you know, chemo and radiation. So we're talking about really a aggressive approach to, to a potential for recovery. But my mom had a strong will to live. She absolutely was not ready to die and she wanted to do everything that she could. So I put a pause on my business. When my dad had died, I had a client engagement that I was in the middle of, and I had asked my client for an extension on it and the client said, no. That was the other reason that I had to just kind of go back because I had a contract that I had to fulfill. And I found out later that the client was just being a jerk. So, you know, that, that had some effect on, on my relationship dynamic with him. But when mom had died, I'd already kind of slowed my schedule down a tad to be very present for my sister's wedding. And. then my mom became my full time project. So she was living here. We were dealing with her medical care. You know, every single day there was something that we were doing. And I was also trying to deal with all of the estate issues that were unresolved from my father because somebody had told my mom she didn't need to do anything. Well, she actually did. So my whole experience as we shifted into that was as caregiver, you know, estate advisor trying to find the right people to help us. She didn't even know where her investments and, and where their assets were or what they owned because dad did all of that and he never shared that with any of her. And so one thing I would encourage anybody that's in the throes of this or has a loved one that they're preparing to lose is get the proper paperwork in place. because it, it is essential to being able to get those decisions done. So when dad died, I did that with mom after she was diagnosed and we got power of attorney and we got the medical healthcare directive. We had all of those things in place, but it was still 36 hour days for caring with her. And when they went in and did the surgery, they realized the cancer really was a little further along. So it was a full blown stage two. So they couldn't remove the lung. And they immediately started her on chemotherapy and radiation every day. Well, I kept telling them she's really fragile. This is. You know, how we need more support in, in helping her and they ignored us. Well, mom ended up it, she just crashed because it was such, it was too much for her. She was maybe 105 pounds to begin with. And she got that cancer anorexia that they got. And, and it was, nobody was listening, even though, you know, I was being aggressive and pushing and whatever. But. was so sad because her cancer was so aggressive and she didn't have any physical reserves to draw on and she was already psychologically depleted from my dad's passing that she went they they thought we had at least six months. My mom went through cancer from stage two through stage four to passing in two and a half months. So I lost them both within eight months of each other, same age, both out of the blue and My world stopped. It just stopped because I was holding my mother's hand at the moment of her death. She did not say, I wish I had another mutual fund. I wish I had another client that we could work on. She didn't say any of those things that she had spent that whole 35 years before pushing me down a pathway that was solely focused on, on business success to the exclusion of almost everything else. And it was. A heart shock, a reality shock, and the grief was deep and real because what band, what I had band aided over for my dad got exploded as the whole thing ripped open. Yeah,

Mandy: 19:14

that's the thing with grief, you can't, you can't ignore it and hope it goes away. Never does. Well, years

Jill: 19:21

ago, you know, it's a little different today where people are talking about these things, but I didn't know anybody who'd gone through anything like that. I mean, it was bad enough to lose one parent at 64. You know, when you lose a parent that's, you know, in their mid 80s, you know, it's, it's a sad event, but it's not a tragedy because they've in full life. When you lose a child, that's just An unfathomable loss and, and, you know, part of you has gone forever and, and I think when you lose parents and people that you're very close with, you know, intimate family members, part of it is it shapes your body and, and your grief, I think differently, because it's, It's just so abrupt and you have a really hard time catching up with the reality of what's just occurred. And so for me, plus I was still dealing with all of the estate issues for my folks. So I had both estates that we were trying to resolve. I had property, you know, they had some small property things that I had to deal with that were going on. And, you know,

Mandy: 20:32

that's something people don't talk about often is dealing with the estate after. And also you mentioned between your father's death and your mother's death, how you encouraged her to fill out the proper paperwork, like healthcare proxy and power of attorney and all of these things that we do really need and to talk about, like, what Your wishes are, what would you want to live through? What do you, what is not a quality life of life for you? And when would this not be worth it to you? Those are the kind of conversations that we need to have even before people get sick, you know, to be able to have that paperwork and to know everything we need in order to know, like, how do we find out about. What finances? What you know, what assets do we even have? Because it leaves so much of a burden on family who are, who are here and grieving, but then also having to, to figure out the pieces of the puzzle.

Jill: 21:24

And they're having to try and go through everything and sort it all out. And, you know, I mean, there were two elements about the, the healthcare directives and all of the paperwork, if you will. One is you can change it. Unless you do, there's one kind of trust that you can't change, but most people aren't dealing with trust issues, so, or, or formal trust issues like irrevocable, irrevocable trust. But, but the other part of it is, and I ran into this with my, when I was helping my mother in law as she was transitioning and dealing with dementia and we were trying to get her affairs in order. I had asked my sister in law, who's an RN, to get a health care directive done, and she didn't do it. And I'm like, I was confused because, you know, she was, she actually was the nurse in the cardiac unit that cared for my dad the night before he died. She was the charge nurse in charge, so, so he did get a little extra attention that last night he was on earth. But she just couldn't get it done. I finally gave her an ultimatum, either you get it done. by Tuesday or I will and she didn't get it done and I did but what I discovered later was that she thought that writing out the wishes and you know all of that was putting a DNR a do not resuscitate order on her mom like no Beth no no no she's like years from that. No, that's not what this paper is. And, but again, I think a lot of people have a misunderstanding of those things, even people that are caring professionals that should have a better perspective on it. But for me, after my mom died, I mean, I, You know, I ran away to the dog show. I mean, we literally, we left the funeral and went to a dog show to pick up one of my dogs. We had showed Rottweilers for many years and my dog was in Chicago with her handler. And I was so numb. I, I think I cried the whole seven hour drive. I just, until I just had dry tears. I mean, I just could not wrap my head around what had occurred. And. All I could keep holding on to in the months that stepped forward was the things that I had done with both parents towards the end of their life, which was this family history piece. And I had my mom on her deathbed made me initially when we were starting her recovery or what we thought might be a recovery. She said, well, I want to get well enough so that I can take all of us. to Europe and we'll go to all the villages. So you'll figure it out and we'll go to all the villages. And she was going to pay for the whole trip. I'm like, I'm in, you know, but. As everything, you know, transpired so rapidly in, in, in such a wild and out of control way. She made me promise on her deathbed that I would continue the research and that I would find all of the villages. No, we had six countries I had to deal with all the villages and that I would take her in my heart to all of them. I'm like, Oh my God, do you have any idea how big a goal that turned out to be? My life was not only not my own because of the estate stuff, but it was also not my own because I was honor bound to fulfill this commitment to her. Her last thing she asked me to do was that. And so I found. You know, my business became different. I, I started only working with clients that I liked and that I wanted to work with. So that, that March guy was like, yeah, you know, the fee is a lot more if you want to work with me, pal. And, and I just began. altering how I presented myself in the world. I was no longer rushing through a room trying to see how many business cards I could collect. It was, if I get one or two real connections with people at this event, that is more than enough. And it, Became about really connecting in very real and very human ways with the people that I was interacting with. And what it ended up doing is it deepened the quality of my consulting practice and the relationships that I had with clients. Brought me to my roles as a community leader in different ways, you know, it wasn't all look at me. Look at me. Look at me. It was more. How can I serve? Where can where can I have meaning and value? And it also altered because I started to look at how I lived my life as if. What if today is it and and I know that may sound trite to people who are listening to it, but when you begin to start approaching life about where can I leave my imprint? Where can I leave my pixie dust? Where can I make a difference to someone else? It alters how you. Live your life. And so I started doing a lot of mentoring. You know, it's not paid work, but it's legacy work and started passing the hand back to people behind me because now I was in my mid thirties and pushing to 40. And I had young people coming behind me that I knew some things that could be helpful to them. And, and over time, You know, as I began doing the genealogy research, you know, initially, the, the research is focused on the dead, right? Because you're looking for death records and, and historical information about people who've been dead for a hundred years or more. And, but they're all very real to me. I took six trips to Salt Lake City to do research in the Mormon. library. I was up at seven o'clock in the morning to be in line so I could get the one machine that was my reader. I'm like, I don't get up that early at home as, you know, for a business meeting. But I, I had that thing and, you know, six years I would go spend seven to ten days in the library, you know, looking at microfilm and doing research. And when we were, we were still showing dogs and if there was an archive, a relevant archive where we were, I was in the archives. I was in the archives in New York City while my dog showed at Westminster. I was, you know, in, in Podunk, Wisconsin, trying to find a distant relative of a cousin of my grandmother, who I ended up, he's like, Take me to visit my son. So I'm like taking this 90 year old out of the nursing home and we're, and he's trying to remember how to get, how to drive to his son's house. And I'm like, Oh my God, what have I done? And we got to the son's house or whatever. And it was, it was a great perspective. Cause I already knew about his family. And, and he'd been put in an orphanage and I knew all the family back history because of all the work I had done and, and, and his mother really wasn't dead, but that's what women of that era had to do when their husbands died. And so I had all this knowledge and, but it was starting, the dead were starting to lead me to people that were alive. And I did two major trips to to Europe. The first one was for four weeks. The second was for three. And I found distant relatives in some of those old villages. The reason I had to do a second trip is I had pretty much everything figured out on the first by the first trip. I was I used every ounce of professional skill and insight that I have in research and analytics and doing cluster research of, you know, 80 years. Thank you. Families that lived in around where my family came to be able to figure out the rough region of where they came from in the old country and but I just couldn't figure out that last one who my mother was named after and so I hired a student to go parish to parish. And I didn't give her all the info, but I gave her some and she found the church that was the 10th church. She went to the priest knew exactly which family she was talking about because he had an article that had been written in 1940 about people who had left in the 80s. And it had all of the details, including things I had never told the student, and there was no question. So when I went to that parish, between his weak English and my marginal German, we were able to have a conversation. And he said he had remembered the article from when he had started working at the parish. And I said, when was that? And he said, 40 years ago. I'm like, The one person in the universe. So, you know, all the, those dead all led me back. I left, you know, a contribution for them to say masses for my folks. But what I realized on that second trip is that it was my mother's, not only her final challenge to me, but it was her final gift to me because she knew how hard her leaving would be. And by giving me the impossible challenge, she redirected that all of that skill and energy and resources that she had channeled into my career development to. something that would be very healing for my soul and ultimately gave me a way back to really being that caring, compassionate person again. But I also find too, and just one last thought, you know, when I was talking about how we present ourselves to the world, you know, we're all on social media and, you know, people leak information about themselves and if they're in a trauma state. And a lot of times what I do is I don't post, you know, oh so sorry for your loss, on somebody's feed. A private message. How are you? I know this is so hard and you know, or, or I will reach out or leave messages on their voicemail as they're getting, you know, where I know that they're in the three days of you're dealing with all the funeral preparations and now you're dealing with you know, the extended family that you don't like that you're having to be here and then you're getting your mom's house ready to sell all that. I'll leave voicemail or send texts or, or whatever. social media, private messages to people just to let them know that there's somebody in the universe that cares about them and knows what it's like to walk in that shadowed path. And I've had a variety of people that have reached back out later and said, I can't tell you. I sat and listened to your voicemail over and over and over. You know, before the funeral and, and after the, from the wake because I was just, I couldn't. Couldn't deal. And somebody who works with me right now just lost her mother unexpectedly. She was in her late mid to late 80s, but it was still unexpected. It wasn't like she was lingering and ill. And, and, and she said, I'm so grateful you know, for the messages because it was really helpful.

Mandy: 32:27

Yeah, I think when we experience loss ourselves and experience the level of grief that We know other people are going through, we show up in the world differently for them, and it's one of the gifts of experiencing something so traumatic.

Jill: 32:42

Yeah, it's part of that circle of life, but you know it's also hard I think for a lot of us because if you were raised in that stoic way where you just get back on the horse and you keep charging along. It's. really difficult to allow other people to offer support. And it's, it's very difficult to allow other people to help. And you know, as I stepped forward to support my mother in law, I helped mid midwife the deaths of several aunts. But over time I realized, you know, even though I'm superbly capable of managing every aspect of their life and their end of life, I had to allow their kids. To do it and to not be perfect in it. I would offer suggestions and support. I would be a listening ear, but I had to kind of find those balances of when can you make an offer and when it's okay for those offers to not be accepted. And I think I'm at a stage now where I'd be more clear about what I need. Please make food for me. I can't

Mandy: 33:53

cook. Not another Italian casserole,

Jill: 33:57

that's what I would say. Yeah, I need high protein, high protein. But my husband nearly died 10 years ago. And I sat in the ICU in the twilight with they, they said it was very grave and it was very unlikely he would survive. And, you know, the power of prayer is, is certainly comforting in moments like that, but. I had to do this self check and go, okay, I'll be okay. I, you know, I manage our money. So I know where the assets are. I'm not going to have the same experience that my mom did. I will be tremendously lonely and I will be enormously sad for the loss of companionship, but I will be okay but I realized later, I don't cook like I'll have to move into assisted living to get three meals a day. But you know, it's it's that kind of moment. So what it allowed me to do was be his advocate as he was in that twilight and And asking the questions of the medical professionals and pushing back, well, is there anything else you can do? What else can you try? And, you know, after he survived, he had a really long recovery. So then it was pushing, okay, well, you know, what, what services can we get? What resources can we do? What can I buy? And, and we were able, my husband's fully recovered now, and you'd never know he ever had any, any issues, but it was a long slog. And, I interrupted my professional career. I stopped working. He was my project and, you know, I had that luxury because what I learned from my parents is that you have to prepare for the rainy day. So that means don't live on your income. That means put some money aside because there will inevitably be some thing that occurs in life that When you have some financial resources set aside, it gives you the flexibility and the freedom to be able to be fully present as you need to be in, in ways that matter. And I think for my parents passing, that was a really powerful legacy that they left for me, was really having that understanding that I could make a better difference by learning from the experience that I had from their loss. Yeah, there's so

Mandy: 36:22

much there that I love, especially this gift that your mother sort of gave you. This different purpose that you could follow and the power of having something to work towards and don't

Jill: 36:35

get me wrong. I'm still I'm still career minded and hustle and boards and, you know, working with bigger clients and all of that. I'm I'm living a lot of what she envisioned for me. But it's different. It's different. And, and one of the reasons that I wrote my book Compounding Your Confidence was because I knew if I had a bigger platform, I could share insights with more people. So again, that idea of leaving legacy. and touching people and giving support to people when and when they need it. The book became the platform for that. But the other thing I do, Amanda, and most people don't realize this because I never draw any real attention to it, is it's not uncommon for me to have a photograph with my parents. in a slide deck that I'm using for a presentation where they're, the image that they represent on the screen is the image that's a point that I'm making. And so I don't say, Oh, that's my dad. It's just, I know they're there. So they're always still there with me. Whenever I write a proposal, the you know, in a, in a formal letter, you know, it, it has like the initials the assistant who might've secretary that might have typed it out or whatever. It's a little old school but I still use my mother's initials on every proposal that I send out because she's there, she's still there. And so that's how I find small ways of keeping them present. I got a huge award a while back and I was standing on the on the side of the stage getting ready to to walk across to receive it and in my pocket was a picture of my parents and I had a necklace that my mother had given me. I had a ring that I had gotten from her and I had a little golden gloves boxing charm that my dad had given to my mom when she was You know, 18. They were all in my pocket. So no one in the audience knew, but I knew that they were there with me and I brought them the stage with me to accept this honor. And, but it was such an extraordinary mindful decision. to keep them present. I think sometimes it's really easy to push away and to forget, but you know, for me, I'm not afraid to talk about them. I, that's how I keep them alive. And my brother died unexpectedly a couple years ago. Also at the age of 64. Wow. And, you know, so that brought back a lot of traumatic dynamic because I'm next up, right? Age wise.

Mandy: 39:22

Yeah, I will say that's a real fear. When you lose parents young, it, it almost puts a stop. Like a stopwatch in your life where you think, I'm not going to live past that age. So I'm, my mom was 47, I'm 40 right now. And so I think about that, like, Oh, what if I only have seven years left? Because that's how

Jill: 39:39

long she had. And then you make the most of, because what if you only have three years left? Right. What if it's only, you know, three more weeks, you know, and I think that's where that setting that priority becomes. It's so vital that we make choice about how we live and, and I, I've spoken to grief and loss groups about what I call recalibrating your life after loss. And maybe someday I'll write a book about it, but I think what it really involves is it's, it's. honoring and understanding that the loss you've had will never be replaced. It will never be exactly the same as it was, but there are ways of recalibrating your existence to still have meaning and value and connectedness and relationship. You know, I look at the corporate world today and a lot of people are Very disconnected. You know, we hear about the quiet quitting and, and how, you know, people just, they, they don't like their jobs. They don't like their bosses. And the truth is they don't like themselves either. And, you know, COVID brought out, I think some of that, because, you know, people got very isolated, but. But I also think it's another form of grieving. You know, we're grieving the easier life that we had pre COVID. We're, we're grieving the, the things that we are in our workforce that we don't have any longer, that, or the relationships that we can't trust because, you know, families were pulled apart by, Are you going to vaccinate? Aren't you? You know, do you do this? Do you do that political this political that everything got bifurcated? And I think there's a lot of grief in our society right now. That is an unacknowledged undercurrent that. I think the more we can find our way to, to reclaim a sense of connectedness, the greater the, our ability will be to not only survive this complex, weird time that we're in, just like you survive complex, weird times after the loss of a loved one or a trusted ally or trusted friend. Three really good trusted allies pass during COVID from unrelated things, one of whom was, just had been such a champion for me that, you know, and, and she was only 62 and you just kind of go, this isn't possible, but yet. I, I will grieve and honor that loss, but then, you know, she's now coming with me to events and acknowledged in, in different places and, and, and I think that's how we honor it. And so, because I'm next up for that dreaded number age wise, I've decided I'm not dying. at that at 64. I'm breaking the family curse and so I'm starting, you know, I'm focusing on what can I do to build up my health and, you know, I'm, I'm looking at all of the different things that I can still control and in the big one is my mindset and you know, I got at least another 20 to 30 years of held arrays and I fully intend to do it because that's the last of the legacy from my parents is the commitment and the accomplishment and the impact that I have as as I continue to live the rest of this life.

Mandy: 43:10

Wow. I agree. I think mindset is huge and not enough people give it the power it deserves. And I just love being able to hear your perspective and your story. Thank you so much for coming on and sharing it with us. It's my pleasure. How can people find you if they're interested in connecting with you?

Jill: 43:27

Sure. Well, I'm I'm all over social media. My handle on all of them is at Jill Johnson USA. There was a Swedish singer that has the she has the claim to just the Jill Johnson. But so I linked in. It's at Jill Johnson USA. I'm on all the social media and my website is is for my business is JC s. usa.com for Johnson Consulting Services. So jcs usa.com. You know, I welcome to have your, your listeners reach out and tell me how my comments had resonated with them or, or what touched them. You know, you can reach me. I have email access and, and a form you can fill out to reach me on my website or if you connect with me on social media, just say, Hey, I heard you on Amanda's. Podcast and, and just tell me your message, but yeah, I'm, I'm, I'm pretty easy to find if you look. Perfect.

Mandy: 44:26

I love talking to you. Really interesting journey that you took. I loved hearing about the genealogy. I think that's really cool.

Jill: 44:33

Well, I wanted to weave that into because I think people often don't realize that they can be active in their grief recovery that, you know, just sitting around wallowing around in the dark is not good, but, you know, picking up and, and moving forward on something doesn't have to be the thing that will change your financial status or, you know, cure cancer, but, It doesn't matter to anybody but me, and that was enough, and, and so.

Mandy: 45:04

And I think so many people have, like, one thing that they really kind of latched onto, and it may have been something they didn't do at all prior to that loss that really helped them get through it and to heal. For me it was hiking, but I've talked to so many people through the podcast that it just seems so many people will find some random thing that they, like, really weren't. As deep into and then it becomes that, that thing that kind of carries them through their

Jill: 45:30

grief, it anchors you to something else. And I, and I think, and it brings you around different energy and different perspective.

45:40

I hope you enjoyed listening to Jill's story today. She says at one point that she asked herself, where can I leave my pixie dust? So for today's journal prompt, write about your own pixie dust, the legacy that you hope to leave one day. Like always let the writing lead you in whatever direction it takes. Thank you so much for listening, please make sure you subscribe. Share this episode with anyone who could benefit from it and as always visit remember grams. Anytime you need to send a little extra love to someone who's grieving. Thank you and have a wonderful day.