Julia Starr blends a deep understanding of adult development psychology with a background in strategy
Sign up to join us this Thursday 6/18 at 4PM PT/7PM ET. Free! Virtual. One hour.
Prepare to be liberated from freeze. 🥶😎
This can reference internal or external prestige, how you perceive yourself is just as important as how other people see you. Do you have good points of reference that reinforce a competent capable individual that doesn’t rely on the brand name of your company in order to give yourself a sense of self-worth and confidence?
Are you signed up for my live event this Thursday? "The Allegory of the Career Cave" is a workshop to help you evaluate whether you should stay, pivot, or burn it down. Decide once and for all if you're in a role where you are getting your needs met. If not, can you fulfill them in that role, or do you need to leave? If you were to leave, what would you be looking for? This is free and open to everyone. Link in bio.
06/12/2026
A friend & client recently wrote and shared the below with me:
“Julia is very resilient. She succeeds in environments most wouldn’t and has an energy inside that allows her to rise in challenging circumstances. I wish she didn’t have to lean on this strength so much but I believe her experience tapping into her resilience is part of what she taps into when she guides others. She also deeply knows herself which is part of the resilience (or potentially a product of it?...They are connected but I am not sure 100% how)”
Let me tell you how. This is a post about spirituality, faith, and consistent practices of knowing and understanding yourself.
As I approach 10 years in business, I have done what 90% of coaches are unable to do. I have been reflecting on what has led to my success, not only in business but as a coach for my clients. I have landed on two primary causes: creativity and gratitude (I’ll share more why later).
Practically speaking, the fact that I meditate roughly six out of seven days a week and have done so since I was a 19-year-old in college (aka for the last 17 years) is a root behavior. I talk to my clients about root behaviors all the time. What is the one thing that, if you did this, would affect to all the other behaviors that you know are going to contribute to moving you, your life, and your career or business in the direction you want it to go? For me, this is meditation.
I joked when I first got my rescue dog, Bija, that if you meditate long enough, you’ll be rewarded with a dog. Six years later, he is still my daily meditation companion. Whenever I need to elicit warmth in my heart, all I have to do is crack open an eye and see his furry little head resting on my foot. I get back in touch with the feelings of love and gratitude, which ultimately create safety, assurance, optimism, and generosity, qualities that can easily be pushed aside when you’re experiencing the opposite, which is fear.
Entrepreneurship requires risk. Visibility requires risk. Risk induces fear for most people. I counteract that through faith, faith in myself and faith in a feeling, a state of being that some call God, that I call love. Does this resonate?
If your body has been telling you that it's time for a change, but you don't know how to decide once and for all if you want to stay, pivot, or burn it all down, sign up for my free workshop happening next Thursday, June 18th.
It's linked in my bio.
You'll leave knowing exactly what's present and missing in your current role and what the conditions of satisfaction are for you, whether you choose to stay, leave, or start something on your own.
You deserve to take action and no longer be frozen by the overwhelm of all of the what-ifs.
The workshop's title, "The Allegory of the Career Cave," alludes to Plato's "Allegory of the Cave," where prisoners think that the shadows reflected on the walls are reality.
Let's shine a light on what's really going on so you can work with tangible information and next steps. See you there. 😘
I know what it feels like to be at your desk, so overwhelmed about not only the work on your plate but also the existential question about if this is even a job that you want to be doing.
It feels like there are so many dancing shadows on the wall. You are overwhelmed to the point of freeze. When you get into that freeze zone, it's really hard for you to move without some support from somebody reframing the question.
Let me be that person who gets you out of the cave and into the light.
I’m hosting a free 🤩 workshop next Thursday, June 18th, at 4 p.m. PT, 7 p.m. ET. You are invited to join me and a community of other people who are all asking a similar question.
These workshops are fun, free, and will get you to a very clear understanding of what it is that you need in your current role for it to be satisfactory.
If it's not going to work there, what it is that you're going to be looking for next, whether it's a pivot or starting something new.
I can't wait to share with you this new workshop content. I really think it's going to blow your socks off, if I do say so myself. 🧦👏🏼
This is a lot more common than you think. Most high achievers have been driven to accomplish things because they have something in their history that trained them to prove their worth through achievement. This doesn't mean that you do not have any natural drive or curiosity or work ethic or energy that is satisfyingly translated through your work. It just means that that was probably paired at a young age with reinforcement that your achievement made you good and right and lovable.
When you're able to break that connection, you're able to allow your ambition to freely flow through you. You're able to work on unlimited numbers of topics or in a diverse set of environments, or on that startup that has been hanging out in the back of your mind for the last decade. You become liberated to actually choose the way that you're applying your ambition, rather than being forced to apply it in a way that is explicitly validated by the community you are currently a part of, your family unit, the industry that you've identified with for your career thus far, et cetera, et cetera.
There is nothing wrong with being ambitious and hardworking. Aligned Ambition gives you the path to unlocking how you can apply your innate talent and disposition in a way that is fulfilling, gratifying, and sustainable.
Application is now open for our next cohort. You can find the link in my bio. Feel free to comment below if this resonates. I love to know how the community feels about these messages that are coming through. 💗
06/05/2026
How to know the difference?
You build the internal compass.
Inside Aligned Ambition, we train you to tell the difference between the opportunity that looks good and the opportunity that is actually aligned.
We look at your values, strengths, energy, ambition, identity, and the version of success you’re ready to stop performing for, so you can make career decisions from self-trust instead of external validation.
Because the goal is not to chase every open door.
The goal is to know which doors are yours.
This week, current cohort members have been making this exact distinction in real time: good on paper vs. personally aligned.
And past members have been sending me DMs saying they’re so glad they waited for the right thing; because when it came, they knew how to recognize it.
That’s the work.
The June cohort of Aligned Ambition Studio kicks off Tuesday with our new member call.
If you’ve already applied for June and have questions about joining us, DM me and I’ll help you sort through what’s on your mind.
And if you’re interested in a future cohort, comment ALIGNED and I’ll send you the application.
One thing I've seen over and over again with clients that I work with in high-performing, high-demand roles is that once they are able to loosen their grip on their control of their performance in their current role, they actually find more sustainability and greater impact in that same environment. This comes back to the mindset of the overachiever or high achiever. We oftentimes have our self-worth really tied up in how we are perceived at work and in our role, and so it is very high stakes for us to be the best or the best that we possibly can be. When we're operating from that mindset, we will bend over backwards to do work outside of our scope. We will push our own boundaries to the point of burnout. We won't necessarily have the ruthlessness we need to with what we're asking for and what we are or are not willing to tolerate.
Once my clients see that there are alternatives that they're excited about, this usually has the magical effect of leading them into this place that I call the "f*k it" mentality, and then they oftentimes find more sustainability and sometimes even more impact in their current role.
This doesn't mean that they necessarily stay there, but it is a mindset that you can try on and use to see what kind of impact it would have for you on a day-to-day basis in terms of improving your quality of life and potentially improving your work product.
If it's hard to get there just by telling yourself to embrace this mentality, the work that I do is to chart out really wonderful alternatives to the path that you're on based on your strengths and values. Once you can see those more tangibly and start having conversations with people in those spaces so you make it very real for yourself, this just happens organically.
If this is something you've been craving and you really think charting out your alternatives and building a career based on your strengths and values is what is next for you, apply for Aligned Ambition. We are kicking off our June cohort this Tuesday and are starting to take applications for July 2026.