Sage Reflections: Bailey Parnell
"Lead With Love"
I just had to give Bailey Parnell her flowers. Within the first five minutes of Sage Advice Episode 4, I tell her, “You’re the most impressive person I know.” It’s something I often say to Bailey in our private conversations. She’s always gracious and humble in receiving the compliment—but I can tell she hasn’t fully internalized it. That’s why I had to share it again, this time with you, and with the world.
In every domain Bailey operates in—research, thought leadership, executive leadership, and entrepreneurship—she has achieved wild success. And I’ve watched her do it, start to finish, over the past ten years. As I said on the show, there are basketball players, and then there are athletes. Basketball players are great at basketball. Athletes can be dropped into any sport and be great at it. Bailey is the latter. In addition to being my partner in work and life, she’s also one of my sages.
I didn’t know where in the order of Season 1 I was going to drop the love of my life in, but it happened exactly when it needed to.
Because in her own words:
"The universe bends itself to meet that great outcome when you focus on love."
Here are my reflections on Bailey’s sage advice:
1. Enduring Wisdom
“Act from the place of the goal.” - Bailey Parnell
I go into every recording unaware of what the guest is going to say. I hope that’s refreshing for people who know me from keynotes and writing—where everything is practiced and polished. But this time, I had a sense of where Bailey was going, because, of course, she’s my wife and co-founder. I’ve had the unique privilege of watching her live this wisdom.
What I didn’t know was how many forms this advice would take. For example:
“Don’t fake it till you make it. Fake it till you become it.”
“Plan as if everything is working out for you. What if you just operated from there?”
“Who do you want to be? Then just be that—now.”
This segment became a meditation on a central question: Who do you want to be? Then study how that person acts. And then: be that. Do that. Now.
2. Unsettled Wisdom
“Expect the worst and hope for the best.” - Unknown
I’m not sure how I feel about this part. It’s the odd one out in the episode, because I don’t know if I’d personally endorse the advice as it stands. As I wrote in my reflections on Janany’s episode, I leave it up to the guest to define their relationship to the advice—some reject it, others reframe it.
Bailey, in true optimist fashion, remixed it. Her take?
“Expect the best. Not just hope for it—expect it.”
Janany—also one of Hina Khan’s coachees—touched on this in her episode through the lens of quantum physics. I introduced Stuart Kauffman's Adjacent Possible theory to see how Bailey would respond. The theory says that we’re always surrounded by shadow futures—unseen paths that emerge only after we take a first step. It’s not magic. It’s quantum mechanics. And Bailey got it. Of course.
“Sometimes you just have to take the first step,” she offered. “That’s when new possibilities open up.”
3. Legacy Wisdom
“Lead with love.” - Bailey Parnell
When I asked Bailey what sage advice she would leave our kids, she said the three words I hoped she would—but never expected she actually would: Lead. With. Love.
I’ve been sitting on a book idea for four years, and I’ve finally committed to writing it. But the biggest hang-up was how absurd the core idea felt:
The opposite of fear is love.
And that leaders must embrace love if we’re going to transform our systems to help people thrive.
It’s not something I’ve felt comfortable saying on stage. I haven’t yet cracked how to tell a room full of bank executives that their performance will improve if they lead with love.
But I believe it. Deeply.
It’s sage advice that has been moving through the world for a very, very long time. Echoed by the likes of Dr. Elizabeth Kübler-Ross, author of On Death and Dying—and best known for coining the five stages of grief—who shared:
“There are only two emotions: love and fear. All positive emotions come from love, all negative emotions from fear. From love flows happiness, contentment, peace, and joy. From fear comes anger, hate, anxiety and guilt. It's true that there are only two primary emotions, love and fear. But it's more accurate to say that there is only love or fear, for we cannot feel these two emotions together, at exactly the same time. They're opposites. If we're in fear, we are not in a place of love. When we're in a place of love, we cannot be in a place of fear.
“Lead with hope” has been my bridge. And for a few select audiences, I’ve taken them all the way to “lead with love”—because it’s adjacent. But when someone of Bailey’s caliber says it so effortlessly, it’s motivating to go all-in. Because it’s not fluff. It’s backed by a lifetime of research, experience, and reflection. And it’s grounded.
As Bailey puts it:
“Live the human experience, but do it from a place of love.”
4. Quotable Wisdom
Some sage gems from Episode 4 worth revisiting:
“You can be the CEO of your own life.” – Bailey Parnell
“Write your eulogy. Reverse-engineer from the legacy you want to leave.” – Bailey Parnell
“Don’t get caught up in the output—focus on the outcome. That’s where innovation lives.” – Hamza Khan
“Thriving is the universal goal. Everybody, across space and time, wants to thrive.” – Bailey Parnell
“Everyone can be a sage.” – Bailey Parnell
5. Emerging Wisdom
“Matrescence is like adolescence—an identity shift we haven’t learned to name.” - Bailey Parnell
Bailey recently wrote, “Every single woman has—or will have—a relationship with fertility. Even if she opts out, it becomes a thought at some point.”
Let that sink in. If someone as educated, attuned, and system-aware as Bailey considers matrescence—the identity transformation into motherhood—emergent wisdom, what does that say about society?
A term originally coined by anthropologist Dr. Dana Raphael in the mid-1970s, matrescence is essentially the process of becoming a mother. Dr. Aurélie Athan, a clinical psychologist and faculty member at Teachers College, Columbia University, revived the term for the modern era.
“I called for a developmental model of motherhood to normalize rather than pathologize the psychological transition women were experiencing, to ease suffering and finally shift the paradigm,” Athan writes on her website. Since then, matrescence has spread from academia to the general public.
I’m so glad Bailey’s drawn to this concept. Because it means she’ll keep talking about it, writing about it, and helping us all understand it.
Episode 4 of Sage Advice is a beautiful, unfiltered journey through self-trust, transition, and the undeniable power of love. Like every episode, it’s a roller coaster through the guest’s past, present, and future.
I’m still in awe that Bailey considers the “until one day” in her story to be meeting me. That makes the upcoming “until one day” in our story feel all the more sacred.
Thanks for tuning in. New episode drops tomorrow.
Sage Advice is available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, or wherever you get your podcasts. Please like, subscribe, share, and leave a review.
Until next time, stay hopeful.