SHOW NOTES
About the Guest
Jen Oliver is a speaker and communication coach who helps women speak from a place of authenticity, power, clarity, and courage. After experiencing the exhaustion of people-pleasing and silencing her own voice, Jen made it her mission to help others communicate in ways that are real, relational, engaging, authentic, and life-altering.
Her coaching goes beyond stage presence. She helps women bring their truest voice into every part of life, from high-stakes presentations and public speaking to meaningful personal conversations.
Episode Summary
Jen Oliver joins Jen Aks for a real, powerful, and beautifully human conversation about embodied communication, intuition, people-pleasing, radical honesty, and learning to stop overriding the wisdom of the body.
Jen shares how her work as a speaker and communication coach was born from the very thing she needed herself: learning to find and trust her own true voice. For years, she entered relationships while ignoring the cues her body was giving her. She pushed past the “no,” muted parts of herself, and tried to make situations work even when her body already knew the truth.
Through her own healing, embodiment work, and communication practice, Jen began to recognize that the body carries essential wisdom. Instead of muscling feelings into submission, she learned to sit with them, get curious, and let them reveal what was true.
Jen also shares her commitment to a year of telling no lies, explaining that lying is not only about obvious dishonesty. It can also mean saying yes when your body says no, sugarcoating your truth, or denying what your body is trying to tell you.
Together, Jen Oliver and Jen Aks explore what it means to speak from the body, live from integrity, communicate with authenticity, and choose impact over perfection. This episode also includes a very real fire alarm interruption, which becomes its own unexpected example of presence, humor, and staying connected in the middle of life happening.
This conversation is a reminder that your voice matters, your body has data, and the courage to tell the truth can change how you lead, love, speak, and live.
What You’ll Learn
• How Jen Oliver’s own disconnection from her body led her into the work she now teaches
• Why many people override their intuition in relationships, communication, and life choices
• How people-pleasing and self-silencing can keep us from speaking our truth
• Why feelings and emotions contain information, data, and wisdom
• What Jen means by committing to a year of “no lies”
• Why saying yes when your body says no is a form of dishonesty with yourself
• How embodied communication helps people speak from a more authentic and powerful place
• Why strong speaking is not only about stage presence, eye contact, gestures, or polish
• How moving the body can help unlock creativity, clarity, and deeper truth
• Why impact matters more than perfection when speaking or leading
• How authenticity gives others permission to be more real too
• Why leadership begins with listening to the body and honoring what it tells you
Key Concepts Introduced
• Embodied Communication — speaking from a connected, grounded, whole-body place rather than only from the head, performance, or memorized words
• Overriding Intuition — ignoring the body’s cues, especially when something does not feel right, in order to please others or avoid discomfort
• People-Pleasing as Self-Silencing — shrinking, muting, or editing your truth to maintain connection or keep others comfortable
• Sitting at the Feet of Your Feelings — Jen’s practice of becoming curious about emotions instead of ignoring, numbing, rationalizing, or pushing them away
• A Year of No Lies — Jen’s commitment to radical truth-telling, including not saying yes when her body says no
• The Body as Data — the idea that sensations, constriction, expansion, and emotional cues are not random; they are meaningful information
• Essential Self — the deeper, truer part of the self beneath ego, personality, protective patterns, and outside influence
• Inside-Out Speaking — Jen’s approach to communication that begins with connection to the self rather than external performance techniques
• Impact Over Perfection — choosing real connection, honesty, and service over trying to look flawless or impressive
• Authentic Leadership — leading by telling the truth, honoring the body, and giving others permission to do the same
Quotes From This Episode
“The lies are denying what your body is telling you.”
“I want to sit at the feet of my feelings and emotions.”
“Lying is saying yes to something that’s a no.”
“My truth inhabits in my body.”
“It is radically changing me.”
“I feel a bigness and expansiveness happening in me that I can’t explain.”
“The lies are not listening to our own body or denying what our body’s telling us.”
“I want to coach speakers who are determined to have impact over just being impressive.”
CHAPTER MARKERS
00:00 Opening: Mindset Meets Bodyset
Jen Aks introduces the Wisdom From Within podcast and the connection between mindset, bodyset, authenticity, empowerment, and leadership.
01:00 Learning to Stop Overriding Your Intuition
Jen Oliver shares how her work as a communication coach was born from her own experience of being disconnected from her body and silencing her voice.
03:40 Called to the Work She Needed Herself
Jen explains how coaching others to find their truest voice revealed the work she needed to do in her own life.
04:54 Relationships, Body Cues & Hitting Override
Jen reflects on entering relationships while ignoring the body’s “no” and muting parts of herself in order to make things work.
06:30 Sitting at the Feet of Feelings
Jen shares how she began listening to her body by becoming curious about emotions instead of ignoring, numbing, rationalizing, or pushing them away.
08:00 A Year of Radical Truth-Telling
Jen introduces her commitment to a year of telling no lies and explains that dishonesty can include saying yes when your body says no.
12:00 Follow Your Body Instead of Fear
After an unexpected fire alarm interruption, Jen shares a recent relationship decision that required honoring her truth even when it meant letting go.
18:00 Embodiment Changes the Way We Communicate
Jen explains how embodied speaking helped her bridge the gap between her work as a communication coach and her own personal growth.
20:12 From the Head to the Body
Jen shares how she helps speakers identify mental chatter, drop lower into the body, breathe, move, and listen for what is true.
24:05 Movement, Creativity & Finding the Real Message
Jen describes how stepping away from the laptop and moving the body can help people access clearer ideas, stronger creativity, and deeper wisdom.
28:00 Impact Over Perfection
Jen and Jen explore embodied leadership, truth-telling, and the ripple effect that happens when people speak and live from authenticity.
30:15 Speaking as an Inside Job
Jen explains why powerful communication is less about external performance and more about being connected to your essential self.
32:22 What Embodied Speaking Looks Like
Jen uses TEDx examples to show how authenticity, movement, imperfection, and real presence can create deeper connection with an audience.
37:00 Courage to Live Authentically
Jen and Jen reflect on honesty, parenting, imperfection, and the courage it takes to say, “I don’t know, but I’m doing my best.”
40:30 Final Reflections & Bonus Fire Alarm Blooper
Jen Oliver shares where listeners can find her, and the episode closes with humor, gratitude, and a reminder that real life is part of the message.
CONNECT WITH JEN OLIVER
• Website: RealJenOliver.com
• Instagram: @realjenoliver
• Podcast: Listen for Real
If this episode moved you, share it with someone who needs to hear that the transformation period is supposed to be hard — and that asking for help is not weakness. It’s the sign.
