If you set big goals in January and you’re already feeling unsteady about them, this episode is for you.
In today’s powerful episode, Nicole introduces a transformative reframe: You are always on a hero’s journey. The question is — are you the one choosing it?
Drawing from her own experience as a new mother with a bold, world-changing mission, Nicole shares what it looks like to pursue massive dreams in a season that doesn’t look “ideal” on paper. Working just 12 hours a week while raising a newborn, she had to confront a powerful truth: growth doesn’t disappear when life changes — it just requires a new lens.
So many of us were raised to make others proud, to wait our turn, to accept what’s given. But what if this is the year you choose your own path? Tune in to learn how to recognize when you’re living someone else’s version of success, and how to pivot toward the journey that actually fulfills you.
“You are always on a hero’s journey. The question is, are you choosing the challenge that you’re in, or you’re just dealing with the one that has been handed to you?”
“It is not only important, it is essential for us to learn to be the one to choose our hero’s journey, and to stop letting other people choose it for you.”
“I spend a lot of time with my clients working through cultural conditioning…becauseit’s so important for Asian American women to really see the places where they’re holding themselves back.”
“How can we start to pick a pathway that we’ve never tread before and then take the lessons from that journey and then apply it to the next one?”
“If you are on a journey that is not yours to be on, it’s because somebody else is saying this is the right journey for you. Now is the time to say, oh, let me take stock of this.”
“When we are really clear on the journey we’re choosing, that’s what we get to do – we get to go to the other side and the end result gets to be so impactful and so big.”
NICOLE
Hello everyone. Welcome back to the School of Self-Worth. I’m your host, Nicole Tsong. Today, this episode is perfect for you if you set a bunch of goals in January and you’re already feeling a little wobbly, and you’re just like, “I’m not really sure what’s going on and how am I going to get the things that I really want to achieve in 2026?” This is exactly the episode for you. And before we dig in, if you are a high-achieving Asian American corporate leader who wants to be visible to the right people so that you get a promotion and a raise in the next 60 days, DM me @promoted@nicoletsong on Instagram because I’ve got something special over there for you. Okay friends, let’s dig into this super expansive episode.
Welcome to the School of Self-Worth, a podcast for ambitious women who know they are worthy of an astoundingly great life. Join us weekly as we get on the right side of your intuition, redefine success, and reclaim your self-worth. I’m your host, Nicole Tsong, an award-winning journalist who left it all behind to become a bestselling author of three books and a work-life balance expert helping ambitious women unlock their intuition and step into a life of fulfillment and radical joy. Every single week, I will bring you diverse and meaningful conversations with successful women from all walks of life who share insights about what it takes to be brave, joyful, and authentic every day. Every episode is thoughtfully designed to leave you feeling empowered with tangible tips and advice that will lead you to your next breakthrough.
All right, friends, we’re going to start here with a story time. So I am a huge reader. I love to read. It’s my favorite thing to do to wind down, just to get immersed in stories. I love books of all kinds. I read 52 books in 2025 while having a newborn baby, which for me was like a major accomplishment. I’m a fan of so many genres. I just love to read, and I read a ton, as I am sharing with you.
You want to know the worst book that I read last year? It was a romance novel where the couple got together about a third of the way into the book, and then they spent the rest of the book trying to deal with long distance. Now, I’m like a big supporter of authors and books, but honestly, this book was a big thumbs down. Why? Because these people were on a hero’s journey, and it ended too early, right? The challenge was over before it even began. Like, the whole point of a romance novel is that you wait till the very end, and you’re always guaranteed that they’re going to get together. It’s like why K-dramas are so popular. You might have to watch 16 episodes, but at the end, they always get together. This really resonated with me when I read this book. I was like, “Why don’t I like this book? Why am I so disappointed in this book?” And it’s because this hero’s journey was not really complete, right? There was no challenge; the trajectory, like all the things that get in the way, none of it was occurring.
I want my characters to go through every possible hard challenge, even if I’m frustrated while I’m reading it. That’s actually what I want, or else I honestly kind of get bored, right? Now how does this apply to you, or even to me? I am a new mother, as anybody who’s a regular listener knows. I am also super ambitious. I have big dreams. I have lots that I want to do in the world. So when I came back last year from maternity leave, I had to figure out how to reconcile having a child, a new child, and then also having these big dreams and goals that I wanted to reach in my career and my work. And I have to tell you, at times it felt pretty impossible. Like, how can I continue to even work and then work less than I was working previously, but still pursue my mission? And the mission and the vision for Nicole Tsong Coaching is so big.
It is to break generational cycles for Asian American women. Like, we are out to make massive changes in the way that Asian American women see themselves, the way they are visible, the way they use their voice in the world. And it feels so, so important – like, in my cellular being – not just to me, but to the world. But how can you do that? How can you have this world-changing mission working 12 hours a week? I mean, I had no idea how to do it, right? But then what I realized is I needed to do a really serious reframe of my goals for 2026. And my understanding of what was ahead for me. I needed to recognize and see that this particular version of my life was my current hero’s journey. My hero’s journey is being a new mom and having this big world-changing mission and vision for my business. Because the truth is, you are always on a hero’s journey.
You’re always on a hero’s journey. We’re always in the midst of some kind of challenge. And the question is, are you choosing the challenge that you’re in, or are you just dealing with the one that has been handed to you? Are you just dealing with what other people’s expectations are and all of those thoughts? So we’re going to get into that a little bit more, but that’s the question I want you to start to look at. And this is something I’ve been talking about with my clients because we really always do a lot of deep work in January looking at goals, looking at the things that we desire and care about. And we just did a three-hour workshop on this, and it was so powerful for people to start to understand how to choose their hero’s journey, how to choose their challenge. Because I would also argue that it is not only important; it is essential for us to learn to be the one to choose our hero’s journey and to stop letting other people choose it for you. And especially for Asian American women, we are so accustomed to letting other people pick the journey for us.
You know, you grow up, and you’re supposed to make your parents happy, meaning a lot of your goals and your dreams are really framed around what would make the family look good – your kind of career, the kind of money you’re making, how your family shows up. And now it can show up for letting your boss say it’s not promotion season. So you’re just waiting around rather than actually pursuing the thing that you care about. Or your parents wouldn’t approve if you made a change in your career, so you’re not doing it even though you’re kind of not interested or maybe even bored in the career that you’re in right now, or not even really feeling fulfilled by it.
Or society says you have to look a certain way to be accepted, or you have to make people like you to make life work. So we’re looking at all these things where other people are actually choosing the challenge that’s in front of you. You are on the journey that they’ve decided is yours.
How do you start to have the hero’s journey that’s right for you? That’s really the question at hand. And the first step is to understand that somebody else is choosing your hero’s journey. It really is. It’s that awareness and understanding, because when you start to move through cultural conditioning – and I spend so much energy with my clients working through cultural conditioning. If you haven’t really listened to other podcast episodes about it, I have a lot on this topic because it’s so important for Asian American women to really see the places where they’re holding themselves back, where they’re doing things to make other people happy rather than actually venturing forth into the things that are going to fulfill them, help them feel like they’re on purpose, and really get into that next level of their own career in a way that feels really deep and validating. Because when you do that, that’s when your hero’s journey gets exciting. That’s when you’re like, “Okay, I chose this challenge, and this challenge is intense. This is a lot, and I picked it, so I’m all in for it.” When I wrote my books, this was a for sure version of I chose a really difficult hero’s journey.
I’d never written books before. I was really feeling overwhelmed by the whole process of writing. I was overwhelmed by the process of marketing my own books. And that challenge felt really, really intense. And I remember at the time when I chose my first books, I did them specifically because I wanted to learn about the publishing industry. I did it with the intention of learning, not for a smash success. And now I know a lot about the publishing industry. People come to me and ask about writing books all the time because of it.
Now for my next book, I know what process I need to go through to get through that challenge and to get to the other side. It’s going to feel more familiar. And that’s what I always want for my clients. It’s like, how can we start to pick a pathway that we’ve never tread before and then take the lessons from that journey and apply it to the next one? So this is like an ongoing cycle and process for everybody. But the first question at play before you can get to that point is understanding when you are on a journey that is not yours. If you are on a journey that is not yours to be on, it’s because somebody else is saying this is the right journey for you. Now is the time to say, “Oh, let me take stock of this.”
Like, are these goals mine? Are these the things that I really want, or are they things that other people have said I can get or can’t have? Sometimes you’re told you can’t have the thing. A lot of women come to me because they want promotion, a raise, the next level, and then their bosses are like, “This is not the year for you.”
Are you just accepting that? Is that actually true, or is there a way for you to start to pivot and to see something else? Recently, one of my clients was not really happy with the progression and what was happening at her job, so she started to look around. And this was 2025, which was not an excellent market year for looking for a job, but she ended up leaving her job with literally six figures and bonuses and options because she was clear that she wanted to be choosing that next journey for herself. And now she’s in like literally the perfect fit job for herself. So when we are really clear on the journey we’re choosing, that’s what we get to do. We get to go to the other side, and the end result gets to be so impactful and so big.
What I’d love to hear from you is what is your hero’s journey for this year? Like, what is it? What is that goal? What is the thing you’re stretching for yourself? And if you’re like, “I am not exactly sure, I think that I’m actually stretching towards…” – because, I know you’re listening, you’re an achiever, and you probably have a lot of goals and dreams. But if you’re stretching in a direction, you’re like, “I don’t know if this is the right one for me,” let’s chat and let’s talk about really getting clear for yourself about what is the place for you to stretch into this year. What is the place that’s going to actually feel the most fulfilling and give you that purpose and that end result where you are like, “Yes, I know I’m in exactly the right place for me.”
So if that’s you, if you’re an Asian American high achiever who wants to reverse the conditioning, so you get the promotion and the raise sooner and on your terms, DM me @promoted@nicolesong on Instagram and let’s chat. And then if you’re just like, “I know what my goals are,” and you want to share them with me, DM them to me because I would love to hear from you.
Okay, friends, thank you so much for this really expansive and powerful conversation, and I can’t wait to see you next time.
Thank you so much for tuning into today’s episode. Before you go, don’t forget, if you are a high-achieving woman who wants to uncover your biggest blind spots preventing fast intuitive decisions, I’ve got a 72-second assessment for you. So make sure to DM me “quiz” on @nicoletsong on Instagram. And thank you for being here and for listening. We read every note that we get from you about how the podcast is making a difference in your life. Please know how much we appreciate each and every one of you.
Until next time, I’m Nicole Tsong, and this is the School of Self-Worth.
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