That Salty Girl: Confidence, Reinvention, And Figuring Out What's Next

Have you ever gotten frustrated with people expecting too much of your time, only to realize you're the one who's been allowing it? After a busy week at The Salty Spray, I had to admit that my people-pleasing habits were creating some of my own frustration. This week, we're chatting about setting boundaries, learning to say no without feeling guilty, and why being kind doesn't mean being available to everybody, all the time.

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I'm from Louisiana, so people are always surprised when they find out just how much I love Alabama football. In this episode, I'm finally telling the whole story, from growing up in a tiny Louisiana town without a football team to learning the game from Jerry, attending our first Alabama game together, earning two degrees from the University of Alabama, and eventually making Alabama home. Somewhere along the way, Roll Tide became part of my life, and this is how it happened.

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I put off getting my first mammogram for seven years because I felt fine and breast cancer didn't run in my family. Then, at 47, the appointment I kept avoiding found my cancer. For Breast Cancer Awareness Month, I'm finally telling the whole story, my diagnosis, the treatment decisions I made, my military burn-pit exposure, the Marine whose advocacy changed screening access for other women veterans, and why I will never again assume that no family history means no risk. If there's an appointment you've been putting off, this episode is for you.

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There's a big difference between wanting a result and being committed to everything that comes with getting it.

This week, I'm talking about what commitment actually looks like, the boring parts nobody claps for, the micro-quits that keep us stuck, starting before we know if something will work, and knowing when changing direction isn't quitting.

I'm also sharing some very real examples from my own life, including the podcast microphone that sat untouched for three years, what the early days of The Salty Spray actually looked like, why I walked away from a successful VA...

What would I tell you if you actually asked me what I think? Probably to stop waiting for the perfect time, stop researching something you already know enough to start, quit letting other people's opinions live in your head, and do something about the things you have the power to change.

This week, I'm talking about networking, perfectionism, micro-quits, self-trust, comparison, bitterness, purpose, and why sometimes you just need to make the damn decision.

In This Episode

I had a completely different birthday episode planned, hated it, and decided to scrap the whole thing. So instead, I'm catching you up on life lately, what I'm loving, what's happening with The Salty Spray, what I'm learning, a military case that's been sitting heavy with me, and a few things I'm finally saying yes and no to at 52.

In This Episode:

01:52 — Why walking has become one of my favorite ways to work, think, and get new ideas
04:13 — The Salty Spray's summer slowdown, and the numb...

Have you ever talked yourself out of doing something because you were worried about what people would think? I went down a rabbit hole on the spotlight effect, the imaginary audience we carry around in our heads, and how much power we give people who probably aren't thinking about us nearly as much as we think they are. I'm also talking about confidence, being uncomfortable, and figuring out whose opinions actually deserve a vote in your life.

In This Episode:

01:54 — The spotlight effect and why we think people notice us mo...

What if the season you're trying so hard to get through is actually part of the life you're going to miss someday? After finding old letters I wrote to my husband while deployed to Iraq in 2003, I started thinking about how much of my life I've spent looking ahead, to the end of deployment, the next promotion, retirement, or whatever came next. In this episode, I talk about what those letters, getting older, a breast cancer diagnosis, and 26 years in the Navy have taught me about time, ambition, and being present in the life I'm actually living. I'm not...

How do you go from 26 years in the Navy to building a mobile spray tanning business? Holly gets asked that question all the time, and the answer involves a lot more twists and fresh starts than you might expect. In this episode, she shares the unexpected story behind The Salty Spray; from leaving the military and bouncing through jobs, business ideas, and career pivots to eventually building something completely her own. She also opens up about nearly quitting when the business wasn’t growing fast enough, the turning point that changed everything, and why the chapters that felt like fa...

What happens when the role that defined you for years suddenly disappears? For 26 years, Holly knew exactly who she was. Then she left the Navy and found herself asking a question she never expected: Who am I without the title? In this episode, Holly opens up about the identity crisis that followed, the humbling transition into civilian life, and what it took to rediscover herself outside the uniform. If you’ve ever tied your identity to your career, accomplishments, a relationship, or a role you thought would always be there, this episode will make you think differently about who yo...

What if you make the big decision and regret it? Leaving a career. Ending a chapter. Starting over after you’ve already invested years building the life you have. Sometimes the hardest part is wondering whether you’ll look back and realize you chose wrong. In this episode, Holly shares some of the biggest decisions of her life, from leaving her small Louisiana hometown at 18 to join the Navy to eventually walking away from a 26-year Navy career without knowing what would come next. She talks about why staying with what’s familiar can feel safer than listening to the vo...

Comparison can steal your peace in seconds. One minute you're perfectly content with your life, then you scroll past someone who seems more successful, more confident, more put together, or further ahead…suddenly, what you have doesn't feel like enough. But what if comparison itself isn't the problem? In this episode, Holly unpacks why comparison gets blamed for something it isn't always guilty of. She walks through what the Bible says about comparison, why measuring your insides against someone else's outsides is a rigged game from the start, and shares her own business slump as proof that a slow se...

You don't have to have it figured out to start.

In this first episode, Holly gets honest about the question most people are too embarrassed to say out loud: "What do I really want to do with my life?" She shares her own winding path of twenty-six years in the Navy, folding leggings at Lululemon while chasing a PhD, a corporate job at Amazon that looked perfect on paper, and finally building The Salty Spray, her own business, from nothing. If you've ever felt behind, stuck, or like everyone else got a manual you...

You don’t have to have it figured out to start.

After spending 26 years in the Navy, followed by a stretch in corporate America, Holly Taylor found herself starting over again in her 50s, this time, building a business from scratch. That business became The Salty Spray, a mobile spray-tanning company. If you’d told her at 18 that this would be her path, she probably wouldn’t have believed you. And that’s the whole point of this show.

When Holly retired from the Navy, the transition was harder than any...