Outlaws Podcast: Embracing Career Freedom – Details, episodes & analysis

What happens when the job you thought you'd stay in forever — the identity you've carried since age 17 — stops feeling right?

In this episode, Shayla and Kate sit down with David (Dave) French, former infantry officer turned leadership coach, who spent 21 years in the Australian Army, followed by a second act in corporate consulting, and now has started his own business to follow his purpose. Dave describes a deeply personal reckoning with identity, values, and purpose - and a brave decision to walk away from stability and seniority to start over.

This is not your classic “pivot” story. It’s about responsibility, guilt, family, and the hard emotional work of letting go — and what happens when you realise you don’t want to keep climbing the ladder.

Together, they talk about:

• The identity shock of leaving a long-term career
• Why walking away from command roles was harder than it looked
• The pressure men feel to be providers — and how that shapes career choices
• How networks and connection can be two very different things
• What happens when your kid’s playdate leads to your next job
• The tough, transformative work Dave is now doing with incarcerated veterans

This is a story about honour, courage, and values — not in war, but in everyday life. And it’s about knowing when to stay loyal… and when to let go.

In this episode:

– Dave’s story of turning down the job he thought he wanted – Why success stopped meaning rank and started meaning alignment – How military belonging compares to the identity of lawyers – Leaving consulting after confronting a values clash — and what happened next – The power of purpose, and how it guided every step that followed

📚Book - Man's Search for Meaning: Viktor E Frankel  

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– Share it with someone questioning their own career – Rate and review us on Apple or Spotify — it helps more Outlaws find us!

🌐 Website: www.outlawspodcast.com 📸 Instagram: @the.outlaws.podcast 📘 Facebook: Outlaws Podcast Community 💼 LinkedIn: Outlaws Podcast 📬 Email: contact@outlawspodcast.com

🎙️ Hosted by Shayla Strapps and Kate Offer 🎧 Produced by Shayla Strapps 🏠 Hosted on Podbean

In this episode, Shayla and Kate sit down with global burnout expert Sally Clarke to discuss burnout prevention and how to achieve sustainable work-life balance. Chronic stress can hijack our energy and identity, but through actionable insights, we uncover how to reboot before we break. Drawing on her extensive research, bestselling books, and experience with Fortune 500 companies, Sally reveals the warning signs of burnout and offers her BRNT framework for sustainable wellbeing.

Listeners will learn to: - Differentiate between fatigue, stress, and full-blown burnout - Understand why controlling burnout often leads to more stress - Navigate Sally’s three-phase roadmap: Recognition, Recovery, and Resilient Redesign - Implement the BRNT model: Breathe, Rest, Nourish, Talk - Leverage reduced work hours and intentional boundaries as secret weapons against burnout

Whether you find yourself leading a high-pressure team or simply grappling with the next wave of overwhelm, this episode provides clarity on maintaining a sustainable work-life balance.

Tune in if you: - Have ever pushed past your limits and paid the price - Are responsible for others and fear letting them down - Seek immediate, actionable tools to reclaim your energy - Believe in better alternatives to hustle culture and burnout.

🔧 Resources & Links Connect with Sally Clarke: https://www.salcla.com/ Protect Your Spark (Prevent Burnout Authentically): https://amzn.to/3Immg65 Relight Your Spark (Evolve from Burnout): https://amzn.to/44K7hdJ 

If you loved this episode… Share it with someone running on empty. Rate and review us on Apple Podcasts or Spotify to help more Outlaws find us!

Hosted by Shayla Strapps and Kate Offer

Produced by Shayla Strapps

🎧 Find out more Website: www.outlawspodcast.com Email: contact@outlawspodcast.com Instagram: @the.outlaws.podcast Facebook Group: Outlaws Podcast Community

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Outlaws is the podcast for professionals who look successful on paper but feel stuck inside. Hosted by two (out)laws who walked away from traditional legal careers, we explore bold career pivots, honest stories, and practical tools for rewriting the rules of work and life. If you're craving more meaning, freedom, and truth in your career—this is your space. Subscribe and start your own outlaw journey.

What if the most rebellious thing you could do wasn’t to break the rules — but to stop worrying what everyone else thinks?

In this episode, Shayla and Kate crack open Mel Robbins’ bestselling book The Let Them Theory and explore why these two tiny words are such a potent tool for living like an Outlaw. Because Outlaws don’t build their lives by managing everyone else’s opinions — they build them from the inside out.

From family expectations to tricky work politics, they dive into how letting them think, feel, and do what they want (without you trying to control it) is actually one of the most radical ways to reclaim your time, energy, and joy.

It’s not just about ignoring people. It’s about getting very clear on what’s yours to carry - and letting the rest go.

Inside, they unpack:

- Why Let Them is the ultimate Outlaw move for stopping the exhausting job of managing everyone else’s feelings - How Let Me gives you permission to take up space, rest, fail, and chase dreams (even if no one else gets it) - Why guilt, culture and gender norms can make this shift feel “selfish” — and why that’s the very reason to do it - How letting go of control doesn’t make you a doormat — it actually clarifies where your real power lies

Whether you’re a recovering people pleaser, stuck in overthinking, or just tired of asking for permission to live the way you want, this is an episode for Outlaws ready to build life on their own terms.

- What exactly is Mel Robbins’ Let Them Theory (and why it’s a bestseller) - Shayla and Kate on people-pleasing, perfectionism, and why this has been life-changing for them - The hidden role of gender, culture & family messages that make letting go so hard - Why professionals often think they can — and must — fix everything and why it is uncomfortable to think you can't - Practical ways to start small: one let them or let me moment at a time - Scripts for when your brain spirals: “Their comfort isn’t more important than my peace.”

– You’re tired of spending energy on what other people think – You keep bending yourself into knots to keep everyone comfortable – You want to live more from your own values (like a true Outlaw), not from guilt or expectations – You want real stories about how this simple idea helped two professionals stop burning out

📚 Read Mel Robbins’ book: The Let Them Theory 📝 Carolyn Hax, the advice columnist we love: Carolyn Hax at The Washington Post 🤯 Tim Urban on procrastination: Why Procrastinators Procrastinate 🎥 Tim Urban’s TED Talk: Inside the mind of a master procrastinator 📅 Wait But Why Life Calendar: Track your 4,000 weeks 🎵 Frank Sinatra’s “Love & Marriage” (for the bit Kate sings!): Watch on YouTube

Share it with a friend who’s always worrying what others think (or a recovering people-pleaser who needs a nudge). Rate and review us on Apple Podcasts or Spotify — it helps more Outlaws find us!

🔗 Website: www.outlawspodcast.com

🔗 Connect & Explore Hosted and produced by: Shayla Strapps and Kate Offer

🌐 Website: www.outlawspodcast.com 📬 Email: Outlaws Podcast Community 💼 LinkedIn: Outlaws Podcast

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Ever feel like there’s something you’ve forgotten to do — but you can’t quite name it? For Sulari Gentill, leaving the law and picking up a pen finally let her breathe.

In this episode of Outlaw Diaries, we talk to the incredible Sulari Gentill — a former corporate lawyer who swapped contracts for crime fiction, and found the thing she didn’t even know she was missing. From astrophysics to cow pregnancy tests to bestseller lists, her story is a beautiful, funny, and surprisingly relatable exploration of what happens when you finally listen to that quiet itch inside you.

She shares:

– Why being a lawyer never felt wrong, but never felt whole – The moment writing made her feel like she was breathing properly for the first time

– The identity crisis that comes with leaving a high-status profession – How leaving a stable, high-status profession can make you feel untethered — and why that’s part of it – Why she “corporate-lawyered” her way into a sustainable creative career (yep, you can do that)

– How her legal background (and a bit of astrophysics) helps her write brilliant mysteries

– What happened when she tried to write literary fiction (spoiler: a body showed up)

If you’ve ever dreamed about writing a novel, leaving your profession, or just finding the thing that feels like breathing — this episode is a must-listen

💡 This episode is for you if: – You’re stuck in the “shoulds” and wondering if it’s too late  or too hard to start again – You’re craving a more creative life but worried it’s impractical – You’re torn between security and soul-sparking joy – You’ve ever told yourself “I can’t afford to leave” and secretly hoped someone would prove you wrong – You need permission (and a strategy) to make your leap

🔧 Resources & Links 📚 Explore Sulari Gentill’s books — including The Mystery Writer and the award-winning Crossing the Lines (due to be released in August) https://ultimopress.com.au/collections/sulari-gentill 

❤️ If you loved this episode... Send it to a friend who’s got “write a book” on their someday list. Leave us a review on Apple or Spotify — it helps more Outlaws find us.

🔗 Connect & Explore with us

🌐 Website: www.outlawspodcast.com 📬 Email us: contact@outlawspodcast.com

💬 Join the conversation: 📸 Instagram: @the.outlaws.podcast 📘 Facebook Group: 💼 LinkedIn

Hosted and produced by: Shayla Strapps and Kate Offer

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Chapters

00:00 From Lawyer to Author: A Journey of Transition 07:30 The Search for Identity and Fulfillment 11:13 The Creative Awakening: Discovering Writing 16:18 The Leap of Faith: Embracing a New Career 18:56 Untethered Identity: The Transition from Lawyer to Writer 24:06 The Solitary Nature of Writing: Finding Community 27:20 The value of Sulari's legal education in her writing 29:42 Using Life Experience as Material for Writing 29:47 Redefining Success: A Writer's Journey 30:21 Navigating Financial Realities in Writing 31:40 The Shift to Contemporary Writing 33:03 Strategising for Success in a New Market 34:35 Preparing for Opportunities: The Importance of Readiness 35:07 Building a Supportive Community 37:40 Advice for Aspiring Writers: Planning and Community

What if success wasn’t about ticking boxes, climbing ladders, or polishing your LinkedIn profile — but about something quieter, deeper, and more you?

In this episode, a follow up to our very popular Backwards Budget episode, Shayla and Kate take the conversation beyond the Backwards Budget and dive into the real question underneath it all: What does success actually mean to you?

Spoiler: it’s probably not “I worked 80 hours a week and missed all the good bits.”

From French school lunches to flow states, from joyful routines to redefining ambition, this is an invitation to slow down and think about how you really want to live — and how to put that in the budget.

🎧 In this episode, we talk about: – Why your version of success might be totally different (and why that’s a good thing) – The difference between happiness and fulfillment – How daily routines, small pleasures, and deeper conversations can signal what really matters – Cultural differences in how we value time, connection, and work – The power of “flow” — and how to know when you’re in it – Practical steps for weaving more meaning into your days — without burning everything down

💥 This episode is for you if: – You’re tired of chasing someone else’s dream – You want to feel more joy, energy, and purpose in your everyday life – You’re craving space to ask bigger questions – You want to shift how you spend your time, not just how you spend your money – You’re ready to start building a life that feels like yours

🎶 Bonus inspo from the episode 📚 Flow by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi → Penguin link 🎵 Turn! Turn! Turn! by The Byrds → Listen on YouTube

📚 2025 Personal Planning Template by Grace Clarke at (grace-clarke.com)

🔧 Resources & Links 🎁 Download the Backwards Budget Tool: Sign up on our website to get your copy! 💬 Join the Facebook Group and let's get chatting in real life: Outlaws Podcast Community 📩 Subscribe to our newsletter via the website www.outlawspodcast.com: Tips, updates & occasional shoe reviews.

❤️ If you loved this episode... Send it to someone who’s been questioning their 9–5. Rate and review us on Apple or Spotify — it helps other Outlaws find us.

🎧 Find out more 🌐 Website: www.outlawspodcast.com

🔗 Connect with us 📸 Instagram: @the.outlaws.podcast 📘 Facebook Group 💼 LinkedIn: Outlaws Podcast

🎙️ Hosted and produced by Shayla Strapps & Kate Offer 📍 Recorded in Australia, available wherever you podcast.

We pay our respects to the traditional owners of the land on which we live and record this podcast, the Wajduk people of the Noongar Nation.  

💡 What if your budget started with the life you want, not the one you’re stuck in?

In this episode, Shayla and Kate unpack a deceptively simple but transformative tool: the Backwards Budget. Born out of Shayla’s own burnout and a desire to live more deliberately, this approach flips traditional financial planning on its head — starting not with income, but with the kind of life you actually want to live.

From spreadsheets to existential questions, they talk about:

– The real cost of the life you want (and how to calculate it) – Why your gut reaction to “what would you do with $70 million?” matters – The slow, doable steps toward change — even when quitting your job feels impossible – How financial clarity can give you emotional and creative freedom

🎧 Whether you're contemplating a career shift, craving more time for your family, or dreaming about becoming an author, this episode will help you turn that dream into a budget — and then a plan.

💥 In this episode – Shayla’s story of burnout and rebuilding her life from the budget up – The power of starting with what you want and working backwards – Kate’s thoughts on financial fear and practical freedom – The emotional side of money — and how budgeting can be liberating, not limiting – Why this isn’t just for rebels and risk-takers — but for anyone who wants to live with more intention

💡 This episode is for you if: – You’re constantly dreaming of quitting your job – You want more time, more freedom, or more space to breathe – You’re curious about how to start over — without starting from scratch – You’re craving real, grounded conversations about life design and money – You’ve ever said “I can’t afford to change” and wished it weren’t true

🔧 Resources & Links 🎁 Download the Backwards Budget Tool: Sign up on our website to get the spreadsheet as soon as it’s ready! 💬 Join the conversation in our Facebook Group: Share your budget stories, ask questions, or just lurk for inspo. 📩 Want updates and tips? Subscribe to our newsletter to stay in the loop.

❤️ If you loved this episode... Share it with a friend who’s always Googling “how to quit my job and not starve.” Rate and review us on Apple Podcasts or Spotify — it helps more Outlaws find us!

🎧 Find out more 🔗 Website: www.outlawspodcast.com

🔗 Connect & Explore Hosted and produced by: Shayla Strapps and Kate Offer

🌐 Website: www.outlawspodcast.com 📬 Email us: @the.outlaws.podcast 📘 Facebook Group: Outlaws Podcast Community 💼 LinkedIn: Outlaws Podcast

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In this episode, Shayla and Kate crack open Oliver Burkeman’s powerful book 4,000 Weeks — and let’s be clear, it’s not about to-do lists.

They explore the confronting reality that 4,000 weeks is roughly all we get in a lifetime, and how that number becomes a springboard for bigger questions: What truly matters? Why do we equate our worth with productivity? And how can we let go of the pressure to do it all?

With personal stories, a healthy dose of irreverence, and some classic Outlaw-style reflection, this first Outlawbrary episode offers insights on how to rethink your relationship with time — and find more meaning by doing less.

🎧 Whether you’ve read the book or not, this one’s for anyone questioning the hustle, craving a slower life, or wondering how the heck to use their 4,000 weeks.

💥 In this episode – Why 4,000 weeks hits harder than any productivity hack – Time anxiety and the trap of “trying to do it all” – How accepting your limitations can actually set you free – Stories from Shayla and Kate on how this book shifted their thinking – The case for slowing down — and living better, not faster

💡 This episode is for you if: – You secretly feel like you're always behind – You’re craving more meaning but not sure how to get there – You’ve ever googled “how to be more productive” at 2am – You love a good book that messes with your worldview (in a good way) – You’re ready to rebel — gently — against the cult of busyness

Learn more about Oliver Burkeman and 4,000 Weeks:

https://www.oliverburkeman.com/books

Oliver's last Guardian column

🎧 Find out more 🔗 Website: www.outlawspodcast.com

🔗 Connect & Explore Hosted by: Shayla Strapps and Kate Offer Produced by: Shayla Strapps

🌐 Website: www.outlawspodcast.com 📬 Email us: @the.outlaws.podcast 📘 Facebook Group: Outlaws Podcast Community 💼 LinkedIn: Outlaws Podcast

🎧 Hosted on Podbean

In this Outlaws episode, we kick off our first Outlaw Diaries as Shayla interviews Fiona McLay, a former litigation lawyer who made a bold career change into legal tech and authorship. Her journey shows how stepping away from the traditional legal path can lead to more balance, creativity, and a career that feels like your own.

Fiona shares candid stories about the messy middle of reinvention, the fears that come with pursuing a new vision of success, and the courage it takes to back yourself before you feel ready. Together, they explore:

• The unexpected turning points in Fiona’s legal career

• The messy process of career change and finding clarity and fulfilment

• How coaching and community can support you when leaving litigation

• Defining “enough” on your own terms

• Merging legal tech, creativity, and your personal niche

• Why stepping off the traditional legal script can open new possibilities

This Outlaws conversation is for anyone wondering if their current role is the right fit, standing at the edge of a big decision, or looking for an inspiring, real-world example of a successful career change story.

🎧 Press play to hear how Fiona transitioned from litigation to legal tech and author — and built a career that truly resonates with her.

Hosted by: Shayla Strapps and Kate Offer Produced by: Shayla Strapps

🌐 Website: www.outlawspodcast.com 📬 Get in touch: @the.outlaws.podcast

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Fiona is a legal tech evangelist, author, and consultant helping the profession evolve with purpose. You can find her work and insights and buy her book at: 🌐 www.fionamclay.com.au 🔗 LinkedIn: Fiona McLay 📘 Facebook: Tech Enabled Lawyer

In this episode of Outlaws — the career change podcast for high achievers ready to rewrite the rules — Shayla and Kate pull back the curtain on the hidden curriculum, the sneaky, unspoken rules that shape how we define success, worth, and ambition.

From career ladders you never questioned to the belief that being busy means you're important, they unpack the beliefs that ruled their lives (until they didn’t). They share five deeply ingrained “rules” they’re actively unlearning and how it’s changing the way they work, live, and measure success.

But this conversation goes deeper. They explore what happens when you realise you’ve been performing an identity that isn’t fully yours, the burnout that comes from trying to be palatable, professional, and perfect, the pressure to be “good” at everything, including being human, and the radical relief of asking: what if I just stopped?

💥 In this episode:

• The myth of the ladder: Why climbing higher doesn't always mean going further

• How we confuse busy with worthy (and how to stop)

• The sunk cost fallacy: Why time spent doesn’t have to equal a lifetime commitment

• External validation vs. internal clarity

• The cost of performance: When “doing it all” means losing yourself

• Why redefining success is a radical act, and a necessary one

💡 This episode is for you if:

• You’re in the middle of a career transition or questioning your career path

• You’ve ever felt guilty for not wanting more

• You’ve internalised rules that no longer serve you

• You’re tired of performing an identity just to “fit”

• You’re ready to design success, and your life, on your own terms

🎧 Listen now and start unlearning the rules that were never yours to begin with.

Links

Alain de Botton TEDX talk https://www.ted.com/talks/alain_de_botton_a_kinder_gentler_philosophy_of_success?language=en 

CREDITS

Hosts and producers: Shayla Strapps and Kate Offer

Website - www.outlawspodcast.com 

Get in touch  - Contact@outlawspodcast.com 

Join us on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/the.outlaws.podcast/ 

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/groups/1335594167730235 

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/outlawspodcast 

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