I am always open to surprise, but I was not expecting to fall in love with 30 women in Narberth, Pennsylvania.

What can I say? Things happen. It all started when I was in the Philly suburbs Tuesday to speak at a career counselors' conference, and the owners of a nearby store — Becoming You people — asked if I'd come by and talk with some of their friends and customers.

Which is how I found myself that evening at Shift, in downtown Narberth, population 4,500, talking about The Values Bridge with women of all ages and kinds, including doctors, accountants, entrepreneurs, fundraisers, and two moms who came with their teenage daughters, Maddie and Madison, who were, yes, besties.

We covered a lot of territory in two hours — how to balance Achievement and Familycentrism when your kids are young, what to do when your value of Belovedness differs from your partner's Belovedness, and when to make the leap to the life you've always wanted, but scares you witless. Everyone shared their views with love, and received each other's responses tenderly. And trust me when I tell you we were talking about tough stuff, because life is filled with it.

In the years when I was creating The Values Bridge, I dreamt of it enabling exactly such conversations. Self-aware, compassionate, empowering. We had all just met, these women and I, but, as the song goes, I think we could have danced all night.

Instead, I climbed into the car at 8pm so I could attend a faculty meeting in the morning. But I loved every minute of being in Narberth. Imagine it being where we all lived.

Hate of the Week

Last week, I mentioned I was making career advice videos with my friends at the Wall Street Journal. Well, the first of our series is out here, and, no surprise, when you join forces with a newspaper with 4 million subscribers, it gets a lot of attention.

​Don’t get me wrong, I love that! A lot! 

The only sad/bad part is the dozen or so people who found it necessary to post comments like, “Has Suzy Welch ever looked for a job in her life? What does she know?”

Excuse me? What is wrong with these individuals? Haven’t they read my memoir? Oh wait, I need to write it first? OK, stand by for that. 

Because it will certainly contain a whole chapter about my travails of working at Cumberland Farms at age 13, not to mention the roughly 50 jobs I’ve held since then, each obtained with blood, sweat, tears, luck, grit, grind, and the great Sicilian trait of revenge. 

Which is exactly what I feel like wrecking on the comments section sometimes, but only for a second. Or two.

​I know everyone in the world has seen Frozen. Not me, though, not until this weekend, when my beloved little Lirael and I put her parents and baby brother to bed for a nap, and spent two hours on the couch, transfixed by Elsa and Anna and Olaf, and a seemingly nice prince who is actually very, very icky.

Of course I’ve heard the music before, but it hits different when you’re watching the movie, and I am speaking in particular of “Let it Go,” which I had not realized was about…values.

God, I’m a bore!

But seriously, what is Elsa saying with that song? What? Well, I’ll tell you! She is saying, "Hallelujah, I am finally free to be who I really am. Up until now, I’ve been faking it. I’ve been who everyone wants me to be. But now, in the castle I’ve built myself, I can be me and it just doesn’t get any better than this. Yay!”

This, my friends, is the feeling you get when you’re living authentically. And not just when you are a Disney character. In real life. Really, in real life.

Are you surprised to learn that I tried to explain this to my three-year-old granddaughter as we were watching?

You are not? OK, well, neither am I. Nor am I surprised that she just took it all in with her big olive eyes, and finally muttered, “Stop…stop talking.”

I took her point. But this conversation will return. I will report it in my memoir.

Until then, keep dancing and singing, all night and day,

What's coming?

What If You Could Blow Up Your Life and Start Again?

What if blowing up your life isn't reckless, but actually the most rational thing you've ever done? This week, I sit down with two women who actually did just that. Cassie is a Forbes Top 200 CPA who walked away from 22 years of accolades, corner offices, and everything she was "supposed" to be. Marilyn Dollar is a certified Becoming You coach who helped her do it, and who has her own story of reinvention.

This episode is for anyone who has ever stood at the edge of their own life and wondered if it's too late to leap. It isn't. There is no use-by date on becoming yourself.