Melissa NicholsoN INTRO

MELISSA NICHOLSON: I really was thinking about our challenge a lot because I was forced to take a break, but I didn’t have to. I could have gone the other way. In fact, normally I might have gone the other way. I really feel like the Be Your Best Self in 2025 Challenge, it made a huge difference in my life that I can immediately see.

Introduction

INTRO: Welcome to Job Share Revolution. The show about job sharing—a partnership between two people to bring two minds and skill sets to one full-time position. I’m Melissa Nicholson, former job sharer turned founder of the first U.S. job share company. But it wasn’t long ago that I felt like an utter failure at work and as a new parent. Job sharing was my game-changer. I reclaimed four days a week to fully engage in my life while my capable partner handled everything. Together, we achieved more than I ever could solo. Fast forward to many lessons learned to bring you the training and support I wish I’d had to change lives and the modern-day workplace. Let’s live life and slay work.

Melissa NICHOLSON

MELISSA NICHOLSON: I am so excited that you have joined me on the show today. And I’m going to be very honest—this was not an episode that I’d planned, and that’s very un-Mel if you know me at all. In fact, it wouldn’t surprise me if that’s not unlike you as well, because I really do know my audience quite well, and a lot of you are a lot like me.

One of the things that drew me to job sharing was the fact that I know that I can tend to be a little bit of a workaholic. Those are things that, as a culture, we’ve really been taught to lean into, like to have a lot of pride in that. And you have to really step back and go, what is the work filling instead of what I should be focusing on?

It’s one of the reasons that job sharing was so life-changing for me. It wasn’t just about working in this hyper-efficient, productive, very satisfying way to work with this work bestie, which, it was all those things. But the built-in structure of the job share prevented me from falling into that workaholicism if that’s a word. It wasn’t even only the structure. It was the fact that you know, you’ve got that partner. And my partner would say, ” Hey, put the brakes on. I’ve got it, I’ve got the baton. You go be sick. You go take care of your family. You go do (whatever it was that I needed to do when I needed that break.)” And 1,000%, I did not worry about one thing, not one iota, because I knew my partner had it. But maybe even the more important thing was that they said, “Don’t. Don’t work. Don’t overwork. Take care of yourself.” Your job share partner was there to literally look at you and say, “I care about you. You have to put your health first. You have to take a break. You have to rest and recharge so you can come back to work super-enthusiastic and excited to be here and we can hit the ground running.” 

That was the genius of the job share for people who had my personality type, which I’m guessing a lot of you can fall into being those high achievers who might put in work when you know you should be just putting your health and well-being first.

There are two main reasons why I felt I’ve got to do an episode on this. I’ve got to share this with you. First, I’ve got a feeling that you might be a lot like me. You might be that high achiever who has a hard time turning it off, not putting in 110%. The other thing is, above all else, with job sharing, I know that the people who create their job shares are the people who create their job shares. And as I’ve shared many times on this podcast, you have to believe that you can job share. It is the one thing that I feel very deeply separates the people who create their job shares from the people who literally sit on the sidelines dreaming about their job shares, thinking about how amazing it would be to work with a partner, thinking about how amazing it would be to actually unplug half the week and engage fully with their family, with themselves, doing things that fill their bucket.

These are all just dreams. If you don’t actually do the work and do them. If you don’t believe that your boss is going to say, “Yes.” If you don’t believe that you will find the perfect job that can be shared. If you don’t believe that that job share partner is going to walk through your door and that there are a lot of people who could be your job share partner, not just one.

So this is why I feel like this episode is especially important. You may have noticed we skipped a podcast episode very unwell, but it finally happened after escaping Covid for five frickin years, I finally got Covid. It definitely taught me my lesson about putting my guard down when I am speaking in front of a large crowd of people. In some ways, even though it took me off my game for literally nine days positive a week and a half. I’m really glad that I didn’t go with my instinct to work through Covid.

I have talked about my Ladies of Brilliant group. We get together once a month. They’re amazing. I tapped in and said, “Oh my gosh, Covid got me.” And I was like, “Well, I’m getting up tomorrow. I’m going to work through this.” And my friend Jonelle said, “Maybe you shouldn’t do that, Mel. Maybe you should just take it easy.” So here is what Jonelle said, I’m reading our text, “Please try to rest. My work friend ended up in a week-long hospital stay when flu turned to pneumonia. I know it’s hard, but trading health for work is not worth it. And from a work perspective, my work friend will probably need like a month to recover enough to fully get back to work.”

That really stopped me. I thought, “Oh my God, Jonelle is right.” I’m really glad that I took that advice. I truly do not think that I would have totally leaned in that way, had Jonelle not been such a good friend and stepped up and stepped in and said, “Don’t do it. Don’t do it. You need to recuperate,” and had given me something that was big enough that I thought, “I don’t want to be sick for a month.” Who would that help? Nobody.

The second part of this that I think was helpful to me is that we live in a 1940s bungalow. We love it. We love our neighborhood. We love our community. But for something like isolating from the entire family, that was going to be nearly impossible. So I’m just very grateful that my neighbor had his Airbnb available. On top of that, it was a rainy, dreary, cold week. So there was zero thought in my head that I needed to come back to the Work Muse HQ, which is conveniently located in our backyard, and get to work. Once I made the decision in my head and really had this separate place to be where I could completely just kind of put my I’m in a rest period mindset on by being in that second location, it was like having the vacation with myself that I’ve been wanting for years. 

Immediately I took a book I wanted to read very badly that I had just bought for myself to let them theory. I thought to myself, don’t check in with the news. We are not going to watch the news. You’re not going to pipe into all the mayhem going on around you. You’re going to focus on resting and getting better.

I decided to rewatch The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel. There are five seasons of that. It is so up my alley. I am such a theatrical girl. I love all the sets, the set design, the romance. It’s amazing. So that was where I went for the week. I really was thinking about our challenge a lot, because I was forced to take a break, but I didn’t have to. I could have gone the other way. In fact, normally I might have gone the other way. I really feel like bringing the Be Your Best Self in 2025 challenge to the podcast, having all of these podcast episodes for you, in addition to your incredible workbook and the challenge emails—I really feel like it made a huge difference in my life that I could immediately see.

The thing is, as I’ve mentioned before, you’ve got to believe you can job share. You have got to believe it with all of your heart. You’ve got to want it. You’ve got to believe that you’re going to find that job share partner. You have got to believe that your boss is going to okay your job share. Or, if you’re finding a new job or finding your job share partner and are going to job share in their job, that their boss is going to approve a job share. You’ve got to believe that you are going to make it happen. You’re going to manifest it just like to Be Your Best Self Challenge. And I am convinced that doing this challenge really is the way, especially right now with what we’re going through.

So for this episode, what I want to do is I want to share how when I took this nine-day break and I really had the time to focus in on all of these exercises, how it showed up in my life. And if you’re just joining us and you’re wondering, what the heck are you talking about? Melissa, we have done to Be Your Best Self in 2025 Challenge over a series of episodes from January until now, and you can go back and find those episodes. They start at episode 23 to episode 28. And I go over all five challenge exercises, plus the bonus, which is extra special. All of that is going to be in the show notes, but let me take you through it. Okay?

Think about this. Day one of our challenge was, what are you going to leave behind in 2024 as you move into this brand new year?

We are in this brand new year. For a lot of us. It’s not like a dumpster fire of the things we can’t control that are outside of our control, right? So we need this, especially right now. And the things that I was going to leave behind were things that were outside of my control and also fighting with my family. You have to isolate when you have Covid. It really forced me to say, “You know what? It’s outside of my control. I’m not going to push through it like I normally would.” And then I thought about day two of our challenge: choosing your Word of the Year. In the last five years, I’ve chosen a word of the year.

This year I chose two. My personal word was to SURRENDER. And I just really thought about that. I am going to surrender. The world has put something in my path right now to force a break, and I’m not going to ignore what the world is telling me right now. The universe is speaking. It’s saying, “You need a time out, young lady.” And so I took my time out. I surrendered to the situation. My professional word was EMBRACE. And I was going to embrace this break. As I am sitting here making this episode, something would even be brought to my work because of the fact that I needed to embrace a break. Day three’s challenge: setting achievable goals using science-backed research picking 1 to 3 goals. Making your goals ambitious but achievable. Hitting that sweet spot.

Day four challenge: James Clear Your Year: Habits that Stick. How are you going to create habits that can become a lifestyle change for you this year? One of the things that I want to do this year is I want to be a reader. Now, I don’t want you to think I never read, but in truth, I do a ton of news reading and a lot of podcast listening, but, I have gotten away from reading books. I will pick up a book; I will have all the best intentions, and I’ll start reading it. I’ll put it down. I will get into a show or something like that instead of having a nightly routine of reading. I want to return to becoming a true reader of in your hands, turn the pages, mark them up books.

I dove into The Let Them Theory by Mel Robbins. I honestly felt like I had a huge life lesson in this personally, through a time in my life where I went through some really hard things when first becoming my mom’s caregiver. The Let Them Theory was something that I had to use with my family of origin. Their actions weren’t going to change, and what was I going to do about it? How was I going to compartmentalize? I started really thinking about this concept and applying it to a lot of areas of my life, because I’m a helper. I’ll jump in. I’ll give you some non-solicited advice here and there if I’m not careful, I’ve got to really watch myself. And I thought, “I need this book. It also is one of the goals that I have that kind of a framework, a practice that can really” bring me better inner peace. That’s a personal goal of mine, is having more inner peace.

So it’s like here I was taking a time out, putting myself in a different environment. I was getting into a different headspace. And all of these exercises that we were doing through the Be Your Best Self in 2025 challenge were all showing up over the week in my own life in a very powerful way that I could not ignore. And it felt really good. I was like, “This works.”

And if you remember, on Day Five of our challenge, we brought it home with Manifesting the Life You Want: How to Manifest and How to Be Your Best Self in 2025. Who are you going to be? Deciding who that person is. Manifesting is all about embedding these things using your senses, and trusting the universe.

All of the things that I really came to this year when thinking about how I want to lay my year out and why all these individual exercises kind of lean in the same direction is because they are about surrendering that power, leaning into your inner self, your inner life, your inner strength, trusting others, giving up control—all of those things were about inner peace.

And for me, so that I can be unlimited in my life’s work and in the work of being a mom to my family. Being a friend to myself.  You know, Viola Davis says something to her daughter that I think is amazing, “You’re the love of your life.” And I think it’s absolutely right. You have to be the love of your own life. Treat yourself the way you would treat the love of your life.

I just know this challenge is really powerful, and I hope that you’ve been able to participate in the challenge with us. I promise this is the last episode on it. But I know something. I know that if you actually do these exercises, the meaning, the purpose-filled job that you’ve been wanting, the work that you have at your current job that you’re wanting to find more purpose in, the flexible work practice that’s going to make the biggest difference for you, the job share that might just be life-changing for you is all possible. Because you will believe that you can do it. You’ll believe in your heart. You’ll believe so strongly that nobody is going to knock you off your game, and the universe will be conspiring with you.

That was my lesson: I had to stop. I had to listen. I had to get quiet. And I feel renewed by this time that I had by myself in this beautiful Airbnb with my sweet dog, Howard the Great. God bless my neighbor Chris who let Howard come over every day to keep me company because he was my support dog.

I want to hear how the Be Your Best Self in 2025 Challenge has shown up in your life. And I just thought it was really worth sharing because it showed up in such a powerful way right at the beginning, and I just know it is going to carry me through this entire year. I expect a very big year for myself this year, not only professionally, but maybe and probably more personally. This is the year my daughter graduates high school. So much of who I am, it has to do with my children. They are the loves of my life. I just know that I’m going to need every ounce of my personal best to be my best self this year.

That is why I felt like it was so important to take this time out and say, “Yes, here’s the reason that you missed an episode, but here’s what it gave me.” And think about this the next time that something comes up in your life, the universe is trying to talk to you. You’ve got to slow down so that you can receive the message. Maybe that means getting off of social media. Maybe that means putting your phone away. Maybe that means less news and more special time with your people. But you’ve got to be open to getting the message.

I did not expect to do this episode. I can’t wait to hear what you think about it. More like this or less like this? You tell me. You know, you can text me directly from the Apple Podcast app or DM me on LinkedIn. Let me know. And until next week, I’m sending you a lot of love, my friend. It’s all in you.