Choosing Hard instead of Safe: Lessons From Joelle Cavagnaro on Courage, Identity, and Building the Life you want.
KEY TAKEAWAYS:
Growth requires uncomfortable decisions.
Joelle’s journey shows that building a life aligned with your values often means walking away from safety and choosing uncertainty with intention.
You don’t have to sacrifice identity for success.
Entrepreneurship, ambition, and parenthood can coexist when you lead with clarity, boundaries, and purpose.Choosing hard is choosing alignment.
The most fulfilling paths aren’t the easiest ones — they’re the ones that honor who you are becoming, even when others don’t understand it yet.
There are guests who come on the Choose Hard Podcast because they’ve achieved impressive things.
And then there are guests who come on because their story reflects the exact tension most people live inside every day:
The tension between safety and growth.
Between comfort and calling.
Between who you’ve been and who you know you could become.
That’s why this conversation with Joelle Cavagnaro matters.
Joelle is the co-owner of Levolution Coaching, founder of the Fitness League training and habit-tracking app, a successful entrepreneur, a wife, and a mother of two. But her story isn’t about credentials — it’s about the decision she made years ago to walk away from a “safe” path in education and choose something far harder: building a life aligned with her values, her ambition, and her identity.
This episode isn’t just for coaches.
It’s for anyone who’s ever felt pulled toward something bigger — and scared to admit it out loud.
Who Joelle Really Is (Beyond the Bio)
On paper, Joelle’s resume is impressive.
But what stood out most in this conversation wasn’t her business success — it was how intentionally she’s built her life.
She didn’t stumble into entrepreneurship.
She didn’t get “lucky.”
She didn’t wake up one day with a perfectly balanced life.
She made a series of uncomfortable decisions over many years.
She chose to:
Leave a stable teaching career
Bet on herself when others questioned her path
Build businesses from the ground up
Become a mother without abandoning her identity
Grow companies while protecting her family dynamic
Continue evolving instead of settling into comfort
That’s what choosing hard looks like in real life.
The Hardest Part Isn’t the Work — It’s the Decision
One of the core themes of this episode is something most people relate to deeply:
The moment before the leap.
The moment where you know:
You’re capable of more
You want something different
You’re not fulfilled where you are
You have a bigger vision for your life
But you also hear:
“That’s risky.”
“Why would you give that up?”
“What if you fail?”
“You should be grateful for stability.”
Joelle shared openly about navigating those voices — not just from others, but internally. Because often, the loudest doubt isn’t external. It’s your own.
What separates people who build meaningful lives from people who stay stuck isn’t confidence — it’s willingness to move forward while still feeling unsure.
Joelle didn’t wait to feel fearless.
She moved while afraid.
She moved while doubting.
She moved while being questioned.
That’s choosing hard.
Entrepreneurship Without Losing Yourself
One of the most powerful parts of this conversation was the way Joelle talked about identity.
Too often, entrepreneurship becomes:
Hustle at the expense of health
Growth at the expense of family
Success at the expense of self
Joelle’s approach is different.
She didn’t build businesses just to prove something. She built them to support the life she actually wanted to live. That meant having clear values around:
How she shows up as a mother
How she shows up as a partner
How she shows up as a leader
How she structures her time
What she says yes to
What she protects fiercely
This is something most high-achieving people struggle with:
You can build anything… but will you like the life that comes with it?
Joelle’s journey shows that success doesn’t have to come at the cost of your humanity. But it does require clarity, boundaries, and intentionality.
Motherhood and Ambition Can Coexist
There’s a narrative that many women are still forced to navigate:
You can be a great mom…
Or you can be highly ambitious.
But trying to be both is “too much.”
Joelle’s life challenges that narrative completely.
In this episode, what becomes clear is that her role as a mother didn’t make her less driven — it made her more intentional. More efficient. More purposeful. More grounded in her “why.”
Motherhood didn’t shrink her world.
It clarified it.
And that’s an important message for listeners — especially women who feel like they have to choose between ambition and presence. You don’t need to abandon your goals to be a great parent. But you do need to evolve how you pursue them.
That evolution is part of the hard path.
And Joelle walks it with humility and honesty.
Ignoring the Projection of Other People’s Fear
A major theme in the episode is something that holds almost everyone back at some point:
Other people’s fears being projected onto you.
Often, the people who love us most are the ones who discourage big moves — not out of malice, but out of their own discomfort with uncertainty. They want safety. They want predictability. They want protection.
But those desires can become chains if we internalize them.
Joelle’s story reflects what happens when you choose to honor your own vision instead of absorbing someone else’s insecurity.
That doesn’t mean the path was easy.
It means she kept walking it anyway.
That distinction matters.
Building Multiple Businesses Without Losing Alignment
It’s easy to start things.
It’s hard to scale them sustainably.
Joelle didn’t just build one business — she built multiple. But what stands out is that both Levolution Coaching and the Fitness League app are extensions of her values, not distractions from them.
This is a crucial lesson for entrepreneurs:
You don’t need to build everything.
You need to build the right things.
Each of Joelle’s ventures ties back to:
Empowerment
Structure
Support
Habit-building
Long-term success
They aren’t random opportunities. They’re cohesive expressions of the same mission. That level of alignment is rare — and it’s what prevents burnout and identity loss.
Why This Episode Matters So Much Right Now
We live in a time where:
People feel pressure to perform
Parents feel guilt around ambition
Professionals feel trapped by golden handcuffs
Entrepreneurs feel forced to sacrifice everything
People feel disconnected from their own identity
Joelle’s story cuts through that noise.
This episode matters because it shows:
You can choose growth without chaos
You can pursue ambition without abandoning family
You can evolve your identity without losing yourself
You can leave safety without becoming reckless
You can build something meaningful with patience instead of urgency
It’s not a “how to get rich” story.
It’s a how to live well story.
And that’s far more valuable.
The Real Definition of Choosing Hard
Choosing hard doesn’t mean grinding nonstop.
It doesn’t mean sacrificing everything.
It doesn’t mean glorifying struggle.
It means choosing:
The honest path over the comfortable one
The aligned path over the approved one
The growth path over the familiar one
The intentional life over the default one
Joelle embodies that philosophy.
Not because her life is perfect.
But because she continues to choose with intention.
Again and again.
Final Thoughts: You Don’t Need Permission to Want More
This conversation with Joelle Cavagnaro is ultimately about permission.
Permission to:
Want more than what you’re “supposed” to want
Build a life that fits you, not just looks good on paper
Outgrow old versions of yourself
Make decisions others don’t understand
Change directions when your soul asks you to
Believe you can do hard things and still live fully
If you’ve ever felt torn between who you are and who you’re becoming, this episode will resonate deeply.
Because Joelle’s story isn’t about perfection.
It’s about evolution.
And that’s the real work.
If you’re ready to evolve, apply for coaching with Tailored Coaching Method.
Catch Joelle’s full episode on The Choose Hard Podcast below: