{"version":1,"type":"rich","provider_name":"Libsyn","provider_url":"https:\/\/www.libsyn.com","height":90,"width":600,"title":"Risk, Resilience, and Reinvention: How to Turn Life\u2019s \u201cTerrible Gifts\u201d Into Your Next Chapter With Tom LeNoble","description":"What happens when the challenges you\u2019ve spent years trying to overcome become the very experiences that shape who you\u2019re capable of becoming? In this episode of The Story Engine Podcast, I sit down with Tom LeNoble, a former executive at companies including MCI, Palm, Walmart.com, and Facebook, who has been given six months to live three separate times and has lived with metastatic cancer for the past fourteen years. Rather than allowing those diagnoses to define his life, Tom has built his philosophy around three powerful principles: risk, resilience, and reinvention. We dig into what it actually looks like to stop living in the past, stop waiting for a \u201cdo-over,\u201d and start using your past as evidence of what you\u2019re capable of. Tom shares how his childhood, health crises, and willingness to take enormous risks\u2014including leaving a dream corporate position to join a then-little-known Facebook\u2014shaped the way he now advises executives and professionals. We also explore the hidden problems beneath the problems people bring to coaching, the six forms of energy that can become imbalanced, why curiosity and psychological safety can accelerate change, and how \u201cacting as if\u201d can help you move toward a life that doesn\u2019t yet exist. This is a conversation about resilience, but more importantly, it\u2019s about what becomes possible when you decide that your past can inform your future without controlling it. Highlights (01:56) \u2013 Risk, resilience, and reinvention: Tom explains how two life-threatening illnesses forced him to rethink conventional approaches and develop the three principles that now guide his work with executives. (02:59) \u2013 Stop waiting for the \u201cdo-over\u201d: We explore why living in the past can consume the time, energy, and consciousness you need to actually create your future. (04:10) \u2013 The problem beneath the problem: Tom reveals why clients often arrive with one business question but leave with an entirely different answer\u2014and how going one or two layers deeper can uncover what\u2019s really blocking them. (04:58) \u2013 Turn your past into evidence, not a ball and chain: Tom explains how previous experiences can either keep you stuck or become proof that you\u2019re capable of handling what comes next. (07:17) \u2013 The six forms of energy: We break down how time, physical vitality, relationships, money, support, and other forms of energy interact\u2014and how depletion in one area can create problems everywhere else. (08:17) \u2013 Are you missing the butterfly?: Tom shares a powerful metaphor for how being mentally stuck in the last email, conversation, or upcoming meeting can cause us to miss the renewal and opportunities happening right in front of us. (08:55) \u2013 Stop searching for the story that makes you look good: We talk about how entrepreneurs and leaders can filter their own experiences through the wrong lens\u2014and miss the stories and insights that would actually connect with their audience. (10:23) \u2013 Curiosity as a coaching superpower: Tom explains how watching behavior, facial expressions, and vocal inflection helps him identify what\u2019s really happening beneath someone\u2019s words and create a safe space for honest conversations. (11:57) \u2013 The investor call that was costing an executive his relationship: Tom shares a specific example of helping an executive recognize that the sacrifices he thought were necessary for business success were actually creating the same relationship problems he had experienced before. (13:57) \u2013 What changes when you\u2019re told you have six months to live: Tom describes the perspective shift that comes from facing death repeatedly\u2014and why he became more interested in what he could do while living than in dwelling on the possibility of dying. (14:39) \u2013 Resilience is a muscle: Tom explains why resilience gets stronger through use and why looking forward, rather than wallowing in what happened, can fundamentally change how we experience adversity. (16:14) \u2013 The lifestyle that forced Tom to wake up: Tom gets specific about the years when he worked 12\u201314 hour days, partied afterward, neglected his health, and lived almost entirely for future outcomes. (18:34) \u2013 Growing up in \u201cthe shack\u201d: Tom takes us back to his childhood without hot water or a refrigerator and explains how realizing at age five that his life was different became an early catalyst for risk, resilience, and reinvention. (21:01) \u2013 The phone call that changed everything: Tom tells the story of being recruited by Facebook when it was still a little-known company, interviewing with a 19-year-old Mark Zuckerberg, and taking the enormous risk of leaving his dream job at Palm. (23:50) \u2013 Building a career while fighting for your health: Tom reveals what it was really like working at Facebook while dealing with a serious diagnosis\u2014including being more concerned about where the bathroom was than whether he was in the right meeting room. (25:01) \u2013 My attempt to reflect Tom\u2019s story back to him: I take everything Tom has shared and connect the pieces\u2014from his health struggles and relentless work ethic to his decision to fight forward and reinvent his life. (28:55) \u2013 Why your story can reveal possibilities you didn\u2019t see before: Tom explains why having someone accurately reflect your story back to you can help you see the person you\u2019re capable of becoming. (29:29) \u2013 The hidden power of writing your own story: Tom shares why writing his memoir was so cathartic and why every part of our past\u2014even the parts we would rather hide\u2014can be essential to understanding who we are today. (31:03) \u2013 Where to connect with Tom: Tom shares how you can learn more about his work, his books, and the Opening Pathways Collective. ","author_name":"The Story Engine Podcast","author_url":"https:\/\/podcast.thestoryengine.co\/","html":"