#awinewith Ashleigh Conwell
MEET Ashleigh Conwell, Founder of Yellow Falcon
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Transcript
Danielle Lewis (00:00):
You are listening to Spark TV, where we bring you daily interviews with real women in business at all stages. I'm your host, Danielle Lewis, and I am so grateful to have you here. Amazing. Ashley, welcome to Spark tv. I'm so excited to have you here.
Ashleigh Conwell (00:16):
Me too. Thank you.
Danielle Lewis (00:19):
So good. Let's start out by telling everyone who you are and what you do.
Ashleigh Conwell (00:23):
Yeah, absolutely. My name is Ashley Conwell. I am a triplet mum. What? I am also a widow.
Danielle Lewis (00:34):
Oh gosh.
Ashleigh Conwell (00:36):
I am a speaker, podcaster and CEO of my company, yellow Falcon, and I am all about empowering women to own their story and embrace resilience.
Danielle Lewis (00:51):
Oh my God, I love this already. This is going to be a very interesting chat. So I do love that you answered that question by talking about something other than business. It doesn't always happen on this podcast, but I find it beautiful when people have a whole life and are really conscious of the things that make up their identity. So yeah, so I'm super interested to explore that with you. What made you start your business?
Ashleigh Conwell (01:24):
So my business started from personal experiences, so I always lead with saying that I am a mom because that is my number one thing above work. But what led me to creating Yellow Falcon was the last four years. So to share a bit of context, my story really started in 2020 and everyone has a story from that year.
Danielle Lewis (01:51):
Yes, usually not great,
Ashleigh Conwell (01:54):
Usually not great. And sadly my story wasn't great either for that year. So the quick version is that I lost my father-in-law. I lost, well, I was stood down from my job. I was working in travel, so I stood down from my job and then my husband and I found out that we were pregnant, which was amazing. And then just a few months, sorry, two months later, my husband was in an accident and passed away in an accident and my wife changed forever and I was 17 weeks pregnant with triplets and I was just frozen in life and didn't really know what to do. Like I said, I was already on stand down, so already didn't have a job. And then now I'm sort of left without a husband and three babies on the way high risk pregnancy and knowing that they could come or I could lose them at any point. Wow. So that was 2020. Pretty brutal.
Danielle Lewis (03:05):
Holy. I want to swear a lot. I feel like I'm going to swear a lot in this podcast, but the Did you do, what did do next? This is horrific,
Ashleigh Conwell (03:15):
To be honest. I just went into complete survival. I shut down from the world, I just went completely internal and I kind of hid away from everything as best I could because I had a funeral to plan and dealing with the estate and preparing for babies that we were told would be born prematurely as well. So there was just this very real reality of getting things done. I had to tick off some big boxes, make sure everything was sorted, and to be honest, I had to just really honor myself and just sort of detach from everything and go, I just need to tap out and survive this pregnancy basically. And so that was the focus, and I'm very relieved that the babies were born in 2021. So 2020 and we were able to start fresh year with some fresh hope. My granddad passed away 12 days later when I'm faced.
Danielle Lewis (04:25):
Oh my God. Yeah.
Ashleigh Conwell (04:27):
So that 12 months was full on, but when I eventually was ready to return to work, my employer said, of course you've got a job back here when you are ready. I ended up taking two and a half years off,
Danielle Lewis (04:43):
And
Ashleigh Conwell (04:43):
That was due to stand down, personal leave and then extended maternity leave raising triplets on my own. So solo parenting. So I then got to a point of needing to return to work, and I did that very gradually. I literally went back one day a week. I had an employer who was incredibly flexible and just so gracious and supportive, and I often think that in business they kind of don't owe me anything. Businesses can be cutthroat. However, there was so much heart and love. So I was very grateful to have that returned to that
Danielle Lewis (05:23):
Such an amazing moment. I know that wasn't a lot of people's experience with employers during that time, but it's interesting. I like how you said they don't owe you anything but how nice when good humans exist.
Ashleigh Conwell (05:38):
And I think that's what I saw beyond the profit and loss statements and beyond all of that, there are humans that genuinely care and unfortunately, COVID was a tough time for business and individuals like everyone had a lot of stuff going on. And so to be welcomed back with so much love is I think sometimes rare in organizations. So that was a really, I needed it more than I can explain. And so I just feel so much gratitude that I got that experience. Also, I'm mindful that not everyone gets that from an employment world, so I feel very lucky to have had that. But I basically got to a point, and I'm still in this journey of going, but what else? And I've had this experience. I actually love my corporate job and I'm still there,
(06:34):
But I now have, and the way that I've often described losing that is the universe picked up the book, ripped out every page, and then handed me an empty book. And I went, well, now what do I do? So I've had to pick up a new book, but the pages are all blank, and I get to write that and I get to choose that. And so now I am creating a life that is wholesome and purposeful and not without challenges because life happens, but I'm very, I guess strategic now in, well, what do I want life to look like? And we all need a job. I got bills to pay and three dependents. However, I also want to enjoy life because I've learned how precious life is. And so that has been the opportunity to make those decisions, to reduce to part-time employment in the corporate world, which is a job I still really love. So I didn't want to lose that either. And I wanted to have quality time with the kids and I wanted to create a business that was impactful and inspiring and aligned to who I am now.
Danielle Lewis (07:58):
This is incredible. I just love the only once upon a time did I come across the idea of lifestyle design. And I feel like a lot of us, me included, ticked the boxes, got good grades in school, went to uni, saving for a house, did all the things, got the corporate job climbing the corporate ladder, and then I switched into running businesses and I was like, oh, oh my God, this is what I want to do. This is so exciting. And then it was only in my business personal development journey that I learned about lifestyle design and has. So you can just create a life that you love. And I feel like what you described is this real intentionality around professional career, home, family life, personal business, and you've kind of come up with a way to bring together all of the pieces that make you,
Ashleigh Conwell (08:56):
I think it's so true. We are so conditioned even as kids like this is the path you take, this is how you do life. And it wasn't really until I lived this experience that I knew that I could choose. I thought you had to be a corporate or a tradey or a business entrepreneur. I didn't know that you could have it all. And everyone kind of says you can have it all just not all at once. And I've now really challenged that and I was like, but I want it all and I can have little bits. And I've been really transparent with myself probably more than anyone, particularly in the corporate world, to say, I can give you two and a half days. I can't give you any more, but I'm going to make those two and a half days. Great. And is the workload five days? Yeah, of course it is. But this is what I can give. And so I've had to make those choices and be honest with myself about that life. So choosing to have it all that comes with prioritization. It comes with saying no to things and the benefit is far greater anyway. I get quality time with the kids, that's my number one. I get to run a business and that fulfills other dreams of mine as well. So it is hard though. It takes a lot of courage. So particularly when we are so conditioned that this is the path that you take and you get into that lane and you stay there and you do well a term, and I believe that the younger generation are thinking a little bit more aligned to this is having a career portfolio.
Danielle Lewis (10:34):
Yes, I love that. Yeah, why
Ashleigh Conwell (10:37):
Not?
Danielle Lewis (10:40):
So how did you get from this 12 months of, I can only imagine unimaginable of all grief and challenge and holy shit, my life is falling apart to where you are now, which is having created such an amazing new chapter for yourself. How did you bridge that gap? Because that seems pretty heavy to me.
Ashleigh Conwell (11:09):
So heavy and the person that you are talking to now with confidence and with alignment and vision. She was not here five years
Danielle Lewis (11:19):
Ago.
Ashleigh Conwell (11:21):
I was a shell of a person and even I could see that everyone around me, I had lost so much weight, you could see my rib cage. I was just so fragile physically, mentally, and emotionally. I was just a wreck. And I look back now and think, oh my gosh, you have been through so much. How I've got here though is through so much work. And the main reason for that is the desire to not live and not stay in that state.
(11:56):
I said before that I really initially needed to honor that and go, you know what? I am going to be sad. I am going to be crippled. That's where I need to be right now. But there was a moment when I had the realization that I had cried every day for 365 days and not just like a tear full on hysterical tears at least once often multiple times a day. And I got to that point and I went, I don't know if I can do this anymore. And that came with a lot of feelings of isolation even from the workforce because I wasn't working adult life. I didn't know who I was as an individual, let alone how I fit into the world, all of the things. And I would see our babies and I decided that I didn't want our kids to see that me as only sad mommy. And that was when I knew I had to do something about it. And I knew at that point when I had made that realization that they were so young that they were unaware, and I knew I kind of had somewhat of a short timeframe to start resolving that before they started cottoning on.
(13:20):
And that's when I knew I've got to do something here and I've got to do this myself.
Danielle Lewis (13:30):
It's just incredible to pull yourself out from 365 days of consecutive grief, tears, anguish, and to make that decision to change and know that you've got this window of time to make that change. I mean, I can understand how it would've been difficult to actually choose that path and not another path
Ashleigh Conwell (14:01):
Really hard. And I challenged myself a lot and it was persistence and I had to keep trying. But it's also, obviously it's not an overnight solution either. It's continual work. But even, I actually posted on my Instagram last week that for the first time in this four and a half years since losing Matt, I completed a gym workout for the first time.
Danielle Lewis (14:26):
Wow, congratulations.
Ashleigh Conwell (14:30):
So I love it. That's how long it has taken me to complete a gym workout. I've gone multiple times and I've had to leave and I'm like, so there's a lot of unseen things, whether that be in personal or business. There's so many silent struggles that trigger us for whatever reason. And so it is also accepting for me, I've had to really be compassionate I guess with myself to say, I'm not going to solve this. This never goes away. This is part of me. How do I chip away at it literally and acknowledge that it's not like a to-do list. We love a to-do list, we love little Asana board. It doesn't work like that. So I've had to unlearn some of those things as well.
Danielle Lewis (15:17):
And I am really interested in even that idea of this is the first time that you completed a full gym workout, but at the backstory, and I think that's so important, the fact that you said, but I went, I was going and it just never made it. I try, I think sometimes, and that's why I'm always interested in the gap, what happened between then and now. Because I think some people do feel like, well, if I'm not, I'm going to run a marathon tomorrow and if I don't run the marathon, I fail. It's like, no. It is turning up and failing, turning up and failing, turning up and getting a little bit better and still failing, turning up until you finally get it. There's such value in just showing up and putting the foot in front of the next foot, putting one foot in front of the other. And I think that we really need to reframe a lot of the challenges in our life to just taking the next step because if we keep focusing on this huge goal, we keep thinking about the fact that we are not there and realistically the thing we have within our power in the day is putting the next foot in front of the next foot.
Ashleigh Conwell (16:31):
Yeah, absolutely. But also I would say to that as well is connecting with support. I have not got here on my own. I have had beautiful family and friends, I have had psychologists, I've had other mentors and coaches. So that is also, it is combination and it is that chipping away at it and like you said, putting my foot in front of the other, and it's the same when I said, okay, I'm going to start this business. I don't know how to start a business. I have never done this before. I was googling how do I create an A BM? I didn't know anything. And I did the same thing. I reached out to coaches and I aligned and just even started following just on Instagram initially before I actually made that human connection. But it's the same whether that be business or otherwise in your personal life is connecting with someone who's gone before you or just taking inspiration from someone who you go, look, it's a completely different industry, but I really like how they're going about that or I really like what they're doing and learning. We don't need to have the pressure of creating new. We can learn so much from each other. And that's what I've learned in this process as well is I've had to lean on support personally to be here. And professionally I have the vision of the business. I don't actually know how to do it.
(17:57):
It's aligning with that support network as well.
Danielle Lewis (18:02):
Yeah, absolutely. I think there's just such value in community, isn't there? And I love that you bring it up because you're so right. I reflect on my last 40 odd years and everything. You're right. Everything I have attempted has been better when I have looked for support. And whether it is just that person that you're looking at from afar who's doing great things, it doesn't always have to be that kind of one-on-one mentoring capacity. It doesn't have to be paying for a coach. You can read a book, follow a person, you can take those smaller steps, but when you do connect with other people and look outside your sphere, sometimes things feel a little bit more achievable.
Ashleigh Conwell (18:45):
Yeah, absolutely. And that's where the value is. And that's something I really love is that connection piece. And so now through starting this business, I'm connecting with people like yourself that I would've never connected with otherwise. And I'm getting to have all these new conversations with new people and I'm building a completely new set of this community. I'm like, oh wow, this is so refreshing. It's a really beautiful, something beautiful to have come from such tragedy.
Danielle Lewis (19:18):
Yeah, I just love that. I love that. So how have you found navigating both corporate life and business life and family life? How do you do it all?
Ashleigh Conwell (19:31):
It's wild. I've just had to be honest with myself more than anyone, as to what I can actually give. And it's still a work in progress, don't get me wrong. But to accept that this is the, I like to operate at a high quality
(19:50):
And then I need to go, it's time to close the laptop and walk away. So a business coach actually said to me, she was asked the question in an audience, actually, do you feel guilty stepping away from mum life and attending events or being working so much? And she said, absolutely not the main thing that I do. And she loves shoes. So she said, be where your shoes are. I went, wow, that's really powerful. So we can do all these things and to remove the guilt. So that's what I'm really trying to do now is be where my shoes are. And sometimes I'm wearing heels at the corporate job. Sometimes I'm working from home in my pajamas. So other times I'm at the playground and it's about being in that moment and I've got a schedule. I know what my work days are. I know what family days are.
(20:44):
The other thing is that I am very firm on anniversaries and birthdays. Previously a birthday was just another day and I was like, oh, well, of course I'd go to work, but now it is a non-negotiable. I take the kids out of daycare and we have a family day for all of our kids, including my husband's, and we have family day and it's just not an option to go to daycare or work and we just spend the day together. So it's incorporating things like that and being really intentional with not only my boundaries, but boundaries for the kids so that I can do it all. But it's also about learning. And this probably a bigger work in progress is progress over perfection and to sort of unwind from those expectations of myself that it doesn't need to be perfect. I'm doing it and I'm living it and I'm authentic. So that's probably another lesson that I've learned.
Danielle Lewis (21:38):
And I just love that idea. We've used the word in intentional intentionality a lot, and it is, as I'm listening to you speak, I feel like it is a matter of, you do really have to be honest with yourself and sit down and what is important to me. And if that thing is really important, well we know on that day this is what happens or something gets scheduled out. And unless you make things a priority, your to-do list will become the priority.
Ashleigh Conwell (22:06):
And it's easy to do work, and particularly when it is work that you enjoy that you are good at that strokes the ego. So it is about having a place for that and being able to step away. I think particularly as business owners, it is our business. It is our baby. We put our heart, soul, time, effort, and money. So to step away from that can be hard. And when you're so close to finishing something, you're like, oh, just one more thing. It's not one more thing. If only it was one more thing. And I think there's another analogy about the rubber ball and the glass ball. If you're juggling rubber balls bounce up, and that is work. There is always something to do. The work just patiently waits for you while you have a sick leave. The glass balls shatter. My husband is not coming back. The kids, I don't get this time. Again, like family health, they are glass balls. If you drop it, it's gone. So I guess at what cost, and I've learned that the hard way. At what cost are we choosing those priorities, I suppose?
Danielle Lewis (23:16):
Yeah, that's exactly right. Yeah, and it does, it makes me reflect, and I really love the shoes analogy. It made me think of a couple of things that I've done this week, and I was there physically, but in my brain I was like, oh my God, I don't have time for this. And I was just reflecting on how to be fair, stupid. That is because you cannot physically be somewhere else if you've committed to something. So why ruin that opportunity or not give your whole self to that person or that thing that you're doing because your brain is worried about all of the things that you really can't control anyway. So I love that frame of being where your shoes are. I just think that that's really powerful.
Ashleigh Conwell (24:01):
And I think to that point, that's probably part of the journey that I've been on as well, is making those choices
(24:07):
And through this transformation. And I've done a lot of work on journaling and just sort of reflection of self to understand what I really want. If we're not fully there, maybe we need to say no and that's easier than done. I'm people pleaser and all that sort of stuff as well, but we need to then go, well, hang on, let's take stock here. And that's probably what I mean when I was saying about that blank canvas. I've got the blank book now to make these decisions. I don't always get it right obviously, but ultimately I'm genuinely striving for that. So making those decisions of how we actually want to spend our time, because work is one facet of what we do as well. And we're very lucky if we get the opportunity to run a business and to create a business that is genuinely aligned to our passion, but we should enjoy it too.
Danielle Lewis (25:04):
Oh God, yeah. So talk to me about your vision for the business. So when you think about why you started it and what's ahead for you, what is the grand plan?
Ashleigh Conwell (25:16):
Yeah, the grand plan is to create an online course currently. I do have some online resources, so downloads to support people in the initial phases, but I want to create a online course that is self-paced for them to actually work through the transformation and all of the tools that I am putting in that I tried and tested because I've done it, I've gathered lots of information from various experts as well on my own journey. But it is also about acknowledging that everyone's journey is different. So just because mine is a story of grief and solo parenting and triplets, not a lot of us out there with that.
(26:06):
So it can be any transformation. It might be grief, but it might be being made redundant. It might be starting a business, feeling a bit lost. Everyone has a story of transformation. And like I said, it's about owning your story and really not being defined by your past, whether that be tragedy or otherwise, and choosing that next chapter and taking action to create that life. So it is that transformation, embracing that resilience and finding the courage as well. So it's an online course, predominantly some additional resources. I'll continue working on those. And yeah, really creating online community, but I do keynote speaking as well as my own podcast also. So there's a bit few layers.
Danielle Lewis (26:50):
So good. I just think it's incredible. I mean, I talk to mostly women, but so many women in business who do find themselves stuck do find themselves in a life that they have created that perhaps they are looking at going, I don't know if this is actually serving me. So I just feel like all of these resources both now and into the future as you develop them out are just incredible. So congratulations.
Ashleigh Conwell (27:21):
Thank you. What
Danielle Lewis (27:21):
A journey.
Ashleigh Conwell (27:23):
But I'm so excited. I see a real vision in where Yellow Falcon is going, I just need a bit more time to do it.
Danielle Lewis (27:31):
Oh, I love it. But I just have this, I just can tell just by talking to you, you just will keep at it. You will keep chipping away and it will become, and it already is, but it will become everything that you want it to be. So absolutely incredible. Now, I always love to wrap up these podcasts with one last piece of advice. So reflecting on your time in business, and I would extend that to your journey in life, what would be a piece of advice that you would give to another woman on her business journey?
Ashleigh Conwell (28:07):
I think that this would apply to someone in business, but just generally speaking, and it is a quote that I myself follow, and it is from Elizabeth Gilbert and she says, what are you willing to give up to have the life that you keep pretending you want? And so it is about that choice to say, if you have that dream, whether that be personal or in your business going to, what are you going to get rid of then to make it happen?
Danielle Lewis (28:41):
Oh my God, that one got me good. I say that to myself so many times. I was just thinking about the little tantrum I was having to myself this morning, not wanting to get out of bed, and I feel like the media mogul that I would like to be wouldn't have that little tantrum, would she?
Ashleigh Conwell (29:00):
Yeah, that has been sound advice that I try to live out as well. So I'd like to share that with everyone too. Oh,
Danielle Lewis (29:09):
You are absolutely incredible. Ashley, thank you so much for being here, for sharing your story so openly and honestly. And I just know that so many people listening would have resonated, and I feel like you've given me hope and inspiration, so I'm sure you've done that for the Spark community as well.
Ashleigh Conwell (29:32):
Thank you so much. Truly appreciate it.
Danielle Lewis (29:34):
That wraps another episode of Spark tv. Shout out to Spark TV sponsor IP Australia for their amazing support of the Spark Podcast and women in business. And if no one tells you today, you've got this.
✨ Thank you to IP Australia for supporting the SPARK podcast and women in business ✨
