Find Your Passion in 15-Minutes a Day with Kelsey Murphy

by Robyn Conley Downs on Feb 20, 2019 (last updated Jul 29, 2022)

Looking to find your passion in 15-minutes a day? This episode is for you.

Find Your Passion in 15-Minutes a Day with Kelsey Murphy

In today’s show we’re talking with Kelsey Murphy about the ever-illusive idea of work-life balance, how to find more satisfaction in what you do, and how to discover your passion in just a few minutes each day.

Today’s episode is how to find your passion in just 15 minutes a day, and how better to do that than to talk to Kelsey Murphy?

Kelsey’s a career, business, and life coach for Fortune 500 companies like Facebook and Twitter, as well as the founder of Whiskey & Work, an online community dedicated to honest conversations about ambition, goal setting, leadership, and striking a healthy work-life balance.

We’re going to talk all about work-life balance because Kelsey’s specialty is really working for people who want to feel different at work, who want to feel more purposeful, more lit up, more satisfied (and that purpose part is what we’re all about here at the Feel Good Effect).

Finding purpose, finding meaning, spending time on what you really care about, whether that’s in your day to day, whether that’s in your 9 to 5, in the way that you volunteer or give back to your community, the way that you parents, the way that you are in relationships.

Finding your passion and pursuing it does not mean quitting your job and starting something new, although that is an option for those of you who are looking to refresh and to pivot, this is really about connecting with yourself.

What lights you up and how do you add more of that into your life?

I know some of you are interested in the wellness space or online business, and this is a great one for you.

This episode is brought to you by our Wellness Personality quiz.

I know there are some of you who still haven’t taken the leap and taken the quiz and I urge you to go for it!

The quiz is a few questions and you’ll find some insight into how your brain works and how to leverage that, including a free research guide and tips for taking this wellness game to the next level.

Get your personality guide here!

On Kelsey and finding her passion:

In this episode, we talk about career and finding your passion and how they relate to wellness.

Kelsey is such a wealth of information and she is going to have so many tactical tips and ideas for us.

Before we get to those, Kelsey has a website, a thriving business, and a podcast and she has a story that lead her to the different things that she does.

She definitely is a multi-passionate person and entrepreneur.

But she also feels kind of funny even saying the word “entrepreneur”, because growing up she never envisioned herself starting a business, which is relatable for a lot of people in similar positions.

Starting a business was not on her list, but being a stay at home mom was, that was actually her dream: to grow up, have a successful career, do fun things, and then be a stay at home mom.

But what she realized when she was growing and evolving was that she actually wanted both of those worlds.

Looking back, Kelsey laughs because as a kid she was smart but never was really overly ambitious.

She notices now that it wasn’t laziness, she was learning about who she was and how to love and embrace that but when things got hard or difficult for her, she tended to shy away from it.

She just didn’t have the tools to go after what was holding her back, what about herself was she trying to fix and change that she more needed to just love and embrace in order to leverage them and move forward.

Kelsey is a night owl, but she has evolved to become someone who talks about morning routines and she’s embraced them with her family because she realized that she actually had a lot of control over who she wants to be and how she wants to show up in the world.

She realized that there were a lot of ways that she could change her brain and change the way she was operating to be a little more effective, efficient, and productive, but also to focus on more meaningful things in her life.

To start her day with more intention, to be able to have the time and the space to laugh with her husband and have spontaneous morning dates with him and really fun adventures as well as downtime with her kiddos.

Ultimately, she learned that she wasn’t lazy, she just was not doing things that lit her up, and she wasn’t loving all the different parts of herself.

She also learned that she needed to embrace and love that she was so highly emotional.

After graduating college, Kelsey went home and ran a business with her family for a few years.

She took it over and helped them run it, but it was in a very small town, and she realized that as much as she thought she wanted to move back home and be a stay at home mom, she needed to get out into the world and have some experiences.

She was just feeling that itch, so she threw all her stuff in her car one day and drove up to San Francisco, slept on her best friend’s couch for a couple days and realized that this was the adventure she was meant to be on.

She started looking for a job and randomly stumbled upon and assistant job in an advertising agency which she fell in love with, the people, the creative work, the energy, and the environment.

It was one of those places that everyone brings their dog to work, wears hoodies and flip flops, and stays up late trying to create a beautiful piece of art together.

She worked her way up the ranks there, and ended up becoming one of the youngest Account Directors promoted there and took on these big accounts like Nintendo and Elizabeth Arden and she got to fly all over the world and do everything like research and focus groups to shooting big commercials with Britney Spears and Bono and all this stuff that she felt so lucky to do.

It was amazing, but maybe in the highly emotional person that she was, she knew within the first few years that it probably was not the job for her.

She just felt that sense inside of her, that it was a little bit off, that she didn’t feel super fulfilled by it.

She realized that the people around her were actually passionate about their job, they really loved what they did, but she didn’t, so it was time for her to find out what she was passionate about.

What am I wanting to google late at night, that I still have the energy for? Where am I being pulled to go after?

For a while, she thought that was just her emotional mind, but she realized maybe that’s just part of who she is; it’s a superpower, it allows her to be more empathetic, more compassionate, it allows her to dig deeper into what’s really going on with people.

But at that time, she just thought it was a nuisance, she thought it was blocking her, and was a fog not allowing her to clearly see what her next steps were.

Now we know that when starting a business, there aren’t a lot of clear next steps.

Maybe the one in front of you is clear, but the next ten are always going to be grey; you just have to take that one next step and see if it starts to feel right, if it starts to light you up, if it starts to build momentum and excite you.

When she was at the advertising agency, she started working one on one with people and was trying to figure out how they were going to manage maternity leave, and then helping clients learn how to deal with difficult employees or bosses, and how to plan small side businesses.

She started doing some consulting and that’s where she found out that she loved it.

“I wanted to wake up early in the morning and stay up late and give all my spare time to these conversations”.

She then went down the rabbit hole of certifications to try out a handful of different things, dabbling in different things trying to decide how she wanted to craft her own business.

She ended up quitting her job and traveling the world for six months with her husband, where she met with different coaches all over the world.

In these meetings, Kelsey asked these coaches about their craft, their practice, how they did it, what they loved about it, and also their business, how they ran their business.

And then she kicked her’s off; there have been some highs and lows along the way.

You think you’ve got it, you take a couple steps forwards, you hit a goal, and then you realize that target changes; you learn things about yourself and you grow.

She’s been doing that for a while now, and she’s been so lucky to work with amazing people, like Marie Forleo who brought Kelsey on board to coach her entire crew at B-School.

She does a lot of other business coaching and helps women who are transitioning in their first couple years of business, or transitioning out of their 9-5 and starting their businesses.

Kelsey sits down with these women to map it out from a holistic perspective of “what do you want your life to look like?” and “how to we build a business integrated into that?”

“It’s not “here’s work” and “here’s life”. I really believe when you’re doing something you love, those two things are very integrated”.

Fixing and changing vs. love and embracing:

Something we talk about here on the podcast is self-acceptance vs. self-improvement.

And they might seem like they conflict, but there’s a place where you can balance the two.

And maybe you feel like you have these parts of yourself that you love and embrace but you also want to fix and change some things, and that might feel a little uncomfortable.

Sometimes the way our emotions come out in different ways that can scare us.

Kelsey says that she’s always been emotional, and for so long she wanted to change that; she saw it hinder her in so many ways and she didn’t have the tools she needed in order to embrace it, leverage it, and really use that part of her in a way she felt proud of.

“I want to feel proud of the way I’m showing up with people”.

She had to learn to love that different piece of herself, that emotional piece of herself.

It really didn’t happen until she was working with her own life coach when she was able to admit and accept that it’s who she is.

She realized she could love that part of herself, she could love being emotional and still work on being a better person.

The more she could embrace it, the more she could make her story about learning to leverage and embrace being emotional, and manage it to a place where she shows up in the world proud of how she’s talking to people and acting.

The first place to go is to acknowledge where you feel shame and where you feel guilt.

Have you been telling yourself a story that maybe isn’t true?

A story about that piece of you that’s holding you back, that if you could just change that one thing you would be better off.

Can you shift that story to love and embrace that part of you while still growing and evolving into who you want to be?

“Love and acceptance as a pathway to change”.

More powerful, more effective, and more enjoyable.

On the one next step for making change:

Kelsey’s idea of having that one next step is such a great way to flip the script on chasing what you’re passionate about or pivoting in your career, because it’s so tactical, actionable, and incremental.

She feels like we’ve created this idea of having a passion that is a be-all end-all thing that you have to wear on your sleeve, which is a lot of pressure to put on passion.

But the reality is, that’s not usually how it is.

“You don’t find it, you create your passion. You create it by listening to your curiosities, by listening and following those curiosities, those things that tug at your heart. You follow them in very small tip your toe in the water ways”.

Kelsey is a big believer in 15 minute a day things.

It’s been life changing for her, it’s how she became a morning person- she started a morning routine with 15 minutes a day.

And it’s how she started following a lot of her passions, everything from wanting to be a life coach to wanting to play the piano, exploring each in 15 minutes a day.

We can change our brains, stop looking at passion as this big end-all be-all thing and realize that we’re going to have lots of passions throughout our life; our job is to follow those passions.

If the word passion is too scary, start following your curiosities for 15 minutes a day and start going after those in a way that feels exciting with a little more ease and a little more joy.

Kelsey has a whole 30 day Passion Plan.

For 30 days, you start following one thing you’re curious about, one potential passion, and by the end of that month you will know whether that’s a passion you want to dig deeper into whether you start a business with, follow your career with, or it’s a really great story.

And you’ve learned so much about yourself simply by being consistent and by following something that potentially intrigues you or lights you up

Even though Kelsey has this business now, which has had its highs and lows but has been successful over the last few years, she’s still constantly exploring things within her business.

For instance, her podcast has only been going for a few months now, and while it’s seen some really great success, she had no idea whether she was going to like it or not.

She’d told herself to do it for 50 episodes, a couple minutes a day here and there, and at the end of 50 she’d know if she liked it or not.

Just letting herself off the hook and committing to that allowed her to get through the first 6 before she realized that she loved it

She thinks that’s part of her success with it, is that people can hear that it lights her up, and that she has wonderful guests to tell their stories

The 30 day passion plan for you:

For those of you who are wanting to start a business in the wellness industry, but it seems so daunting and overwhelming, maybe with a background experience in wellness but maybe not.

Kelsey is working with a lot of people who have already started their own business, but they’re doing it on the side for now.

What she tends to do for them, is together they’ll choose one thing that they’re really excited about.

Pick something that lights you up, or something that you’re curious about.

Decide that this month, that is what you’re going to explore: for 15 minutes a day, explore that.

Log it into your calendar so you hold that 15 minutes sacred.

Maybe you start by consuming information about it, listen to a podcast on it, look up some experts on it, get a book from the library on it, read articles on it.

And then look more into those experts, go a little deeper, watch their videos, see if they have a free course, maybe reach out to one of them and see if they’ll do a 15 minute coffee chat or Skype conversation.

The goal is to consistently consume this kind of information, dig deep into this one specific curiosity that you have because by the end of the month that time is going to pass anyways, you will blink, and next month you’ll know if maybe that’s a really cool secondary thing you want to have under your belt, or if it’s something that you just love.

And if it is your thing, you get to spend the next whole month exploring how to make that happen in your life, how to become an expert in that one area.

The dedication to one thing a month can be so powerful.

This is a chance to take action, and we want you to grab this and tag us so we can see what you’re doing.

This incremental approach can be used in so many different ways, even if you’re not looking to start a new wellness career, you could do this even if you’re just feeling really stagnant in your life, wanting to pursue something new but not sure where to start.

Kelsey works a lot with people on their values, but that is also intimidating for a lot of people.

But she says it can be helpful to look at the people around you and to the people who inspire you so that you almost feel a twinge of jealousy in a way when you see them (in a positive way).

You can make that your thing and focus on that for the next month.

For example, Kelsey had family friends who have a marriage that she absolutely loved, she loved the way that the husband and wife interacted together.

So she sat down and looked at what they did that was different, and it was these small gestures of kindness that they did for each other.

So for a month, she really dedicated herself to doing those and exploring acts of kindness and these small gestures, and through exploring, she learned that there is a lot of research behind that and how much it does affect the way that relationships end up.

Just by dedicating one month of learning toward that and implementing it and trying to do something small every day, it changed the way that she looked at her relationship, it changed her marriage.

It doesn’t just have to be business, it can be something that you just want to have in your life.

The 30 day planner chunks it down into 15 minute increments so that you can start showing up in the world in the way that you want to

Productivity with purpose:

It’s not about organizing your time for the sake of organizing your time, it’s about being purposeful and thoughtful about productivity so you have more time to do the things you love.

Kelsey takes her calendar seriously because she’s noticed that if she’s not intentional with her time, then she will blink and the week will have gone by.

She knows that, for her, she needs to plan to have days that leave her satisfied and excited.

Kelsey always looks at what kind of week she wants to have.

She does a practice called a three year manifesto- she looks at where she would love to be in three years, starting with how she wants to wake up in the morning, and she looks at that when planning her week and thinks about what from that she can have right now.

What can I plan in my week that’s giving those things to me right now?

That’s when she’ll add in a note for laughter, or to take a minute to go have fun with just her and her daughter; she starts to really block off her time.

For Kelsey, blocking off time is really important otherwise she goes through her day passively.

But as moms know, when you have a child, you can’t always stick to this perfect schedule.

But if she finds that she is behind, she still has those times blocked off and knows that she still wants them in her life, so she just finds a way to move them for later in the week.

And she has to be a little more selective and minimize a little more, but they aren’t lost; she still looks at that day and is proud of what she wanted to happen.

It’s kind of like looking at your day and saying “maybe I’m still behind, but I can still get two out of three of these really meaningful things done”.

If you’re looking to be more productive with your time, you can use that 15 minute planner to time track, reflecting on how time was spent the day before and how that can inform how you want to spend the current day, even if it’s really simple.

There are some parts of our days that we don’t have as much control over, but there are usually pockets of time that can be spent in more intentional ways.

What’s coming up for Kelsey:

It’s the first quarter of the year which is so exciting for Kelsey because everyone is super hyped about their resolutions and goals.

Where January is a little overwhelming, by February goals are a little more clear and we know what we want to be focusing on.

For Kelsey, in February she dives deep into B-School with Marie Forleo where she hosts her own personal Mastermind, which she only does once a year.

She gets a small group of women who want to focus on the momentum and consistency of their businesses for about eight weeks in an environment of like-minded women on similar journeys.

She gets to dedicate and fully immerse herself into these incredible, soulful women getting after their businesses.

On another note, Kelsey’s podcast airs two episodes a week, Tuesdays are interviews with incredible people who share their stories and expertise and on Thursdays she has a 15-20 minute solo show that’s usually about what she has coached people on.

On what it means to be healthy:

“To me, being healthy probably looks like a day where it ends and I can breathe and smile and feel a sense of pride in the way that I showed up in the world, a sense of happiness in the way I treated my body, a sense of compassion for the areas I get to grow… and a sense of love towards myself, my body, and the people around me”.

Guest Bio

Kelsey Murphy is a Career, Business & Life Coach for Fortune 500 companies like Facebook, Twitter, Intuit – as well as the founder of Whiskey & Work, an online community dedicated to honest conversations about ambition, goal-setting, leadership, and striking a healthy work-life balance.

Her background comes from the Advertising industry as the Account Director for Nintendo, Dasani, Go Pro, and Elizabeth Arden. Today Kelsey coaches people who want to feel different at work— more purposeful, more lit up, more satisfied. She specializes in career strategy and communication, works 1:1 with employees from companies like Google, Apple, Gap, Glassdoor, Sundance and more. Kelsey has been featured as an expert for Forbes’ top ranked career sites, Huffington Post, Business Insider, The Muse, LiveStrong, Living Healthy, and LaurenConrad.com. But on her other business card it might say snowboarder, eater, dreamer and fresh-air-addict.