Ever catch yourself thinking, “Am I happy, or am I just riding the emotional rollercoaster of everyone around me?” This week, Melody and Curt get brutally honest about the messiness of happiness—how much of it we actually control, how much is tied up in our relationships (and our businesses), and whether you can ever really keep your emotions in your own sandbox.

What We Talk About:

1. Why Melody’s version of “content” is surviving New England winter, missing her dog, and baby therapy air fresheners
2. Curt’s Viktor Frankl reference and the impossible standard of not letting anyone affect you—and why he’s nowhere close to that
3. The story about Melody putting her dog to sleep two days before Christmas (bring tissues, not solutions)
4. Curt’s pancake analogy: feeling both rage and joy about his daughter’s wedding, and why happiness can come from the same thing that makes you miserable
5. The “box-holding” framework—aka, when you accidentally end up emotionally carrying everyone else’s stuff (and how that plays out at home and in business)
6. How business decisions, delayed pivots, and letting things linger can keep you in “cat poop side” of the sandbox way too long
7. Why happy isn’t a permanent state, contentment isn’t complacency, and sometimes you just need someone to tell you your perception is dead wrong (hi, Brittany!)
8. The Mountain Biking/Yoga/Weightlifting coping mechanisms, and what actually works to get out of your head

Key Takeaways:

1. Nobody is completely immune to the emotions of people they love—trying to be might just make you feel worse.
2. Contentment isn’t laziness; it’s being okay with yourself and your life—even when it’s messy or in-progress.
3. You can’t always “think” your way out of unhappiness, but you can pay attention to where you’re spending your emotional energy (hint: not all of it belongs to you).
4. Sometimes, the bravest move is naming your overwhelm (and letting someone else hold your box… at least for a while).

Timestamps: 0:00 – “Are you happy?” and Melody’s tiers of existence

5:22 – Grief, joy, winter, and the myth of perpetual happiness

16:21 – Business overwhelm and box-holding dynamics

34:02 – Sacrifice, spirituality, and not becoming a martyr

53:05 – Why you can’t live in other people’s feelings forever

01:01:09 – The happiness/contentment split, summarized

Being present sounds easy, but for entrepreneurs whose brains never stop spinning business plates, it can feel downright impossible, especially when family and holiday expectations crash in.

In this episode, Melody and Curt talks about what it really takes to show up for your people, why “just turn your phone off” is terrible advice, and how guilt, workaholism, and that familiar business-owner urgency sabotage our best intentions.

What We Talk About:

1. Curt’s history of literally working through family outings and the moment he realized “being there” doesn’t mean being present
2. Why Melody felt mom guilt even when she was always aware of ignoring her family—and how it’s different for men and women entrepreneurs
3. The story of Curt being “white hot mad” on Christmas Eve and his sister’s reality check about presence and perspective
4. When providing for your family becomes the excuse for not enjoying them (and why that mindset is so seductive)
5. “Holding things lightly”—the Buddhist therapist hack that changed Curt’s approach to frustration, stress, and ultimately, family time
6. Melody’s transition from workaholic identity to re-learning how to savor moments with her kids, nephew, and actually herself
7. Meditating, being silent (even if only for a tenth of a second), and why decompressing is a skill—not an automatic reward for burning out
8. The only short-term hack that works: If all else fails, just make “being delightful” your job at the family party (it’s weirdly effective)

Key Takeaways:

1. Most family “resentment moments” aren’t about the actual holiday mishap—they’re business stress finding a scapegoat.
2. Presence is uncomfortable because silence and unstructured time can feel scarier than replying to emails.
3. Treating holidays like time you “give your family out of generosity” is an ego trap; true presence is a gift to yourself.
4. You won’t change overnight—getting present takes experimentation, therapy, self-mockery, and sometimes just faking it for a couple hours at a time.

Timestamps:

0:00 – Why being present feels impossible (especially during holidays)

4:05 – Curt’s all-time low point for family presence

15:00 – The “hold it lightly” therapy metaphor

18:46 – Melody’s three things that finally shifted her presence

25:55 – When your brain craves work stress more than silence

34:16 – Real secrets (and cheats) for putting down the phone and actually being there

Letting people go, holding your team accountable, and figuring out what kind of leader you actually want to be.. none of it’s simple. In this episode, Melody and Curt talks about the messiness of managing people you genuinely care about, the emotional cost of firing, and what happens when your "people-first" values run up against business realities. Expect stories, frustration, a little sparring, and a surprising amount of compassion.

What Melody & Curt Talk About:

1. Why Melody waited way too long to fire people (again) and regrets “keeping them because I love them”
2. Curt’s “boiling frog” metaphor for how dysfunction sneaks up
3. The comfort trap: when loyalty and long-term relationships blur the line between family and business
4. The great fight: Is it better to have relationships or to treat staff as interchangeable “numbers?”
5. Real talk on KPIs, weekly scorecards, and why “feelings aren’t data”
6. Melody’s February company reset: six weeks where everyone has to prove they can lead themselves
7. Struggling with being a “cheerleader” versus embracing the hard-ass accountability role
8. The exhaustion (and necessity) of moving someone out of a job, especially in a tiny team where roles overlap and money’s tight
9. The myth of “changing yourself” into the perfect leader and why building the right leadership team matters more

Key Takeaways:

1. Keeping someone just because you care about them is usually a sign you need to let them go.
2. Accountability doesn’t happen by accident—it takes structure, and sometimes, giving someone else the authority to deliver the tough news.
3. You don’t have to fit the old-school “boss” mold to be a real leader; your job is to find complementary strengths and let go of what drains you.
4. When self-accountability is missing, no number of meetings or systems will save you (but you still have to try).
5. Growth almost always means outgrowing someone. The worst part? You’ll know it long before you act.

Timestamps:

0:00 – Why it’s so hard to let people go

8:55 – Relationship vs. results: The accountability fight

31:28 – Wearing too many hats when the business is small

46:43 – The myth of the “perfect” leader and reframing leadership roles

57:58 – Growth, fear, and why change is always painful (until it isn’t)