This Nashville Podcaster Has Us Rethinking Girls’ Nights!

Stephanie May Wilson grew up in Denver and pursued her passion for Broadcast Journalism at the University of Colorado in Boulder. But her path took an unexpected turn when she transitioned into women’s ministry, mentoring sorority girls.

Stephanie began blogging about her experiences, blending her journalistic skills with personal storytelling, which led to a career in writing. Nearly a decade into her marriage and life in Nashville, Stephanie continues to inspire women — from TedX talks to her podcast, Girls Night, and even a brand new book. Get to know this FACE of Nashville!

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What inspired you to help women navigate life’s transitional phases?

My mission in my work and life is this: Be who you needed when you were younger. The times I’ve most needed a mentor — a big sister or someone a step-and-a-half ahead of me in life who could help me through things — have always been during a big decision or life transition. So that’s what I’ve spent the past 10 years doing: helping other women navigate those times in their own lives.

Tell us about your podcast!

The reason my husband and I moved to Nashville was that we were both laid off from our jobs three months before our wedding. We were trying to figure out what was next for us, and after running into a thousand dead ends, we had a tiny little crack of an opportunity open up for us in Nashville. So that’s where we went!

Much of my future was in the air, and I had no clue what to do next. Do you know what helped me most in that season (and, actually, every season ever)? Girls’ nights.

Girls’ nights with my best friends were my lifeline that year. My friends and I would pool our pizza money (maybe spring for a bottle of Prosecco if we were lucky) and sit together and workshop our lives. Those nights made me feel less alone in my experiences. Having a safe space to process and dream gave me more than just a vision for the life I wanted; it filled me with enough courage and confidence to make it happen.

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Girls Night was born out of these experiences. It’s a safe place to bring the things you’re struggling with, the decisions you don’t even know how to begin to make, and the transitions keeping you up at night … And what you receive through the show is support, encouragement, and connection to other women who know how you feel because they’ve been there, too.

Best of all, you get to hear from women who can help you through the things you’re going through.

You just released your ninth book, Create a Life You Love. What can readers expect?

I am a first-born, Type-A, rule-following people-pleaser, which means I spent most of my years growing up looking to my right and left, wondering if I’m doing all of this the right way. I was looking for instructions. A life manual. A step-by-step guide for how to live my life.

The problem is that some of the people I looked to for advice didn’t know what they were talking about — they didn’t have good advice. Some people I looked to DID have good advice, but it was good advice for how to get where they were going, not where I wanted to go. The kicker was that a lot of the advice conflicted, leaving me more confused than ever. Finally, as I was trying to make a really big decision about my life, a friend grabbed my shoulders and said, “Stephanie, YOU GET TO DECIDE!” Those words absolutely changed my life.

That was the day I started to learn that I have agency, authority, and autonomy. I learned a beautiful life isn’t one-size-fits-all. And the more I embraced that, the more beautiful my life has become.

In the past 10 years or so, I’ve built a home, career, family, business, and life I love — a life that looks and feels like ME. Now, I’m on a mission to help other women do the same — to build a life that looks like them.

That’s what my new book is all about! It’s a guided journey of self-discovery that helps take pressure off what you think your life is “supposed” to look like by now and intentionally, confidently, and authentically build the life you actually want to live.

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Can you share a personal lesson about building and re-building a life you love?

This process isn’t a one-time thing. It’s a matter of imagining and re-imagining our lives as often as we need to. My little family is really in need of a change.

My husband and I made intentional decisions about work, home, childcare, and daily life. But then things changed a little bit, and we changed a little bit. We started to realize the life we’d built for ourselves was a bit too big. We were spending so much time juggling our life, taking care of it, and trying to pay for it all that we weren’t actually living it anymore. So we decided to make a big change.

We left our dream home in the city … and moved into a smaller place in a more affordable suburb. Once we did that, we realized the potential hidden within that flexibility. What if we did it again? What if we really leaned into this and checked a couple of items off our family bucket list in the process?

So, in July, we’re moving our family to Spain for a year — downsizing our schedules, home, and cost of living — to spend more time living and less time scrambling to figure out how to make it all work.

There are no rules, it turns out. Or at least, very few hard and fast ones. We get to decide. You get to decide.

If something would be helpful in this season, do it. If something isn’t working for you — even though it seems to be working for other people — change it. That’s what we’re in the process of doing.

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What’s the best piece of advice you’ve ever received?

 “You get to decide.” That advice helps me, frees me, and emboldens me every single day.

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Excluding faith, family, and friends, name three things can’t you live without.

1. My Soda Stream machine. I absolutely love sparkling water (my twin toddlers call it “spicy water”). I drink it constantly.

2. My Birdies shoes. They’re basically slippers-meets-stylish flats, and I wear them every single day.

3. My Pottery Barn blankets. I’ve bought several over the years, and my family curls up under them every single day — no matter the weather outside.

LIGHTNING ROUND

Last memorable meal? Boqueria, downtown. They have fantastic Spanish food.

Bucket list travel destination? Bali. I’ve never been, but I’ve always wanted to go!

Favorite hidden gem in Nashville? There are so many great places to choose from! The first one that comes to mind, though, is Sitar Indian Cuisine. They have this Peshwari Naan — it’s stuffed with coconut, raisins, and cashews — and it’s life-changing.

What book is on your nightstand? My all-time favorite author is Shauna Niequist. I’m currently reading her latest, I Guess I Haven’t Learned That Yet.

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Meet more inspiring Nashville women over at our FACES archives!