In today’s episode, host Lorie Jones is joined by Erika Walters. Erika is the powerhouse founder of Walters Law, a venture she launched almost overnight out of sheer determination and a drive to succeed after finding herself suddenly unemployed. Her journey is a testament to resilience, humility, and the power of asking for help, showcasing how you can craft a thriving career on your terms.
From dreaming of the corporate law world to building her own successful practice, with candid reflections, Erika shares insights on navigating life’s twists with authenticity and determination. Her story is not just about legal triumphs but about designing a life that honors personal values and professional aspirations.
Tune in to discover how Erika blends passion, faith, and a relentless drive to inspire every growth-oriented woman standing at the crossroads of ambition and action.
Show Highlights:
- Why choice of specialization is the answer to practicing law while prioritizing family. [07:14]
- The joys of lifelong learning. [11:04]
- Do cultural norms inhibit your career progression? [12:51]
- Insights on wealth building by embracing passion over profit. [17:52]
- What a truly supportive marriage is that TV romances aren’t. [21:58]
- The power of innovating quickly when challenged to start a solo practice. [23:25]
- The benefits of embedding your authentic identity in your business. [26:00]
- The importance of humility and asking for help to navigate your career. [27:41]
- Learn about the pregnancy bias in legal hiring. [31:28]
- Advice on living in the now and creating family memories. [34:09]
To connect with Erika Walters, please visit https://www.walterslawyer.com/.
If you enjoyed this episode, please go to Apple Podcasts and leave a review!
For more information about Lorie Jones, go to https://fearlessfinancialadvisors.com/fearless-females.
See below for the entire interview transcript 00:01.07 - Lorie Good morning, Fearless Females. So I'm so excited today we have with us Erika Walters. She's the owner and attorney of Walters Law. And I've known Erika for almost a year now. I am so excited for you to get to hear her story. Thanks so much for joining us, Erika. 00:18.81 Erika Yeah, thanks for having me. I'm excited also. 00:22.94- Lorie So Erika, I always start out with the same question. I'm a reader. I love books, any kind, shape, size. What is your favorite? 00:32.96 Erika That is such a hard question. There is zero way that I can answer that question. I mean, like, I feel like we have books for our seasons of life. I mean, I'm a millennial, so Harry Potter is, I'm a Harry Potter freak. I love all things fantasy, probably because my job is so technical that it's nice to be able to escape into another place. But I go through like phases. Every now and again, I want a romance. I read a really fabulous mystery yesterday. Highly recommend. It was called The Silent Patient. If anybody wants to check it out, it was really good. 01:10.01- Lorie Cool. That's great. I actually do think that's the hardest question because ah you can't ask me to pick just one favorite. You can ask me to pick one favorite today, but... And I love the Harry Potter series too. Have you been to the ah Universal or the Harry Potter land yet? 01:30.68-Erika Oh, I have. Yeah, I mean, it's been years, so I think they've done some updating to it. But my favorite is like when I'm feeling down, my husband can always tell because I have all the audio books by I like the narrator Jim Dale version. And it'll just be like on in the background of whatever I have going on in my life. And I find it very comforting. 01:52.21- Lorie Yeah, yeah, I love that. I love that. I actually felt a little sad when they stopped putting out the Harry Potter books because it was always kind of a thing to go to the bookstore and camp out at nighttime and buy the book. 02:13.37- Lorie Tell me a little bit about your journey, Erika. Tell me how you got started, where you're at today, kind of what you're doing, just a little bit about you. 02:23.65-Erika And we're talking professional journey. Yeah. Yeah. 02:27.10- Lorie Yeah, but you know, if you want to start a little bit sooner and go into like grade school and high school, like why you decided to be who you are, that works. 02:37.77-Erika Yeah, I mean, so professionally, I'm one of those people that never ever thought I would end up where I am doing what I'm doing in the way that I'm doing it, right? My life took a lot of really unexpected turns, and so did my career. And so now I own my own law firm. I run it with my husband, who is not an attorney, right? And so people find that very strange, and how did it happen? And I don't know, I couldn't tell you how it happened, right? It happened. God, it happened. That's how it happened. But I have been on my own for a little over two years now. I couldn't be more grateful to have that ability. But in terms of like going to law school, it was very by accident. I had a completely other career. My husband and I were kind of doing our pre-baby bucket list of travel. We were at this random restaurant in Italy and we were like at the table that was there, use or it's communal, everything is communal. So the person that we shared a table with was also an attorney. And we got to talking and I was kind of dissatisfied with the trajectory of my career. And he's like, you know, have you ever thought about going to law school? And that kind of put the bug in my ear. And then it was very much, well, like, let's just see if I study for the LSAT and let's just see if I apply and let's just see if I get in. And then I found myself in my first year law class and it was a property law class and it was like something clicked immediately like oh this makes sense this is what I'm supposed to be doing and then it was very much like that throughout the rest of my career like I had a very different type of law in mind that would not have been a family friendly career. That would have been very, very high stress. I would not have been able to be my own boss. And, you know, doors were closed and other ones were opened at different phases that very much put me in the position that I am now. 04:39.95- Lorie So what did you, what were you going to school for? What were you trained for before you went into law? 04:47.12-Erika I was in higher education, so I did like financial advising, student success and support. I worked at DU. 04:53.77- Lorie And you just traveling and see, that's why you need to travel, So that you can have these conversations with people that kind of it lead you to your life's path. What was the other branch of law that you were thinking of going into that wouldn't have been so family friendly? 05:14.96-Erika I wanted to do like the bougie corporate law and the big downtown building with like mergers and acquisitions and contracts. I actually did an internship doing that. And you know, the people there were not still married. And if they were still married, they had one spouse who primarily stayed at home, it was very difficult for them to see their children. And this kind of piggybacks into also how I add it ended up doing the type of work that I do, but I lost my mom really young. And so the most important thing in my life, the most important job for me is being a mother. And so I tailor everything else in my life to that. And so the inability to have the type of relationship that I wanted to have with my daughter and that type of law completely changed the direction for me. I also got pregnant in the middle of law school and so that was an unexpected blessing and changed a lot of things for me. 06:14.78- Lorie It does change your outlook and when you're thinking of being in charge of these small human beings, it does change the way you look at your whole world. 06:28.23- Erika It does. 06:28.62- Lorie And your husband was, he, you said he works with you, but he's not a lawyer. 06:35.56- Erika No, his background is in finance. He ran the operations for a bank. He has a master's in finance. But he's got a knack for marketing. And he was kind of unhappy with the place that his career was also. And you know we just decided to take a leap of faith. like If you can get me busy enough to support both of us, like let's do this together. And we are one of those couples that i don't know I don't know what you would call it, like maybe some people would say we're codependent, but we prefer to be with each other most of the time. Now that doesn't mean that we're talking that whole time, right? But in the general vicinity of one another most of the time. And so it's actually worked really well for us. I don't know that would be true of other people, but for us it works. 07:28.20- Lorie I love that. I love that you that you've worked your world organically so that you can have your live your best life, right? Tell me a little bit about the best investment you've made in yourself. Is there something that you can kind of look back on during your journey and say, oh my goodness, if I hadn't done that, I would not ever be where I'm at today. 07:55.40- Erika I mean, for me, that's for sure my education, right my law degree. And I struggle with the fact that I think I am a lifelong learner. And at some point, like you have to stop. right We're talking about buying a house right now. And my inclination is like, oh, well, I could just get my real estate license. right like I constantly want growth, change and education for me is such a deep part of my soul. That like for me, that was the best investment that I made in myself. But if you want like a smaller scale one than my education, I recently got LASIK. It has been game changing for me. I have very, very poor vision. So poor that like when I had my glasses off in the morning and I went to go Like if they weren't right where I left them on my nightstand, I needed help to find them. So having the ability to have vision has been crazy. And I was getting like really bad migraines all the time. And so it's been a thing that I didn't expect to be as life changing as it was. 09:03.28- Lorie I would actually agree with that. I got Lasix four or five years ago and I was like, oh my goodness, why didn't I do this sooner? 09:12.58- Erika If I could go back and like kick myself to go to it a long time ago, I would have. 09:20.39- Lorie But I love the idea too of a lifelong education. And ah my mom went back for a degree, a master's degree at age like 65 or something like that. So I'm not sure you do ever have to give up learning. 09:35.16- Erika My husband would love it if I gave up learning. He's like, are you tired? Like, isn't it enough? But no, I don't know. It's who I am. 09:46.88- Lorie Yeah, you're like, I want to know all the things, right? 09:51.51-Erika Or just like, I don't even know that it's the knowing it's the process for me. Like, I loved law school I loved the setting of like having like I don't I don't like online learning. That's not the jam for me. It's sitting in like a lecture and having someone frame something. 10:09.66 Erika in a way that you never thought of that's really, and constantly being around people who are smarter than me and learning from those people, that is so exciting to me. Even if it's a topic I'm not particularly interested in, if the person is an amazing speaker and an incredibly bright han, I'm very like attracted to that as a han. 10:30.54- Lorie Yeah I agree with you and I think it's just it's so fun to kind of have that knowledge sort of poured in and understand a lot of different things. I love people who are passionate about what they do. They love what they do and they're passionate about it and that brings that sense of like I don't know, learning and joy. I once listened to an engineer tell me about how air and water flow through a building for close to 45 minutes because they were so passionate about that. 11:10.11 Erika Isn't it funny, but like you have no interest in how air and water move, right? But when someone else is super interested in it, it can change your perspective completely. 11:28.40- Lorie So, what about the worst advice you've ever been given? Is there some advice that someone gave you that you're just like, ugh, that was bad? And did you take the advice? Did you not take the advice? What did you learn from the experience? 11:49.70- Erika I mean, there is advice that I have gotten from various sources repetitively throughout my life. So I come from half Hispanic, half Palestinian background, right? Both of those cultures are very heavy, like stay at home mom type of messaging. And so a lot of the people that I'm close with, a lot of my family are stay at home moms. And with that came a lot of mom guilt about being a working professional and like a lot of negative messaging about well someone else is raising your kids and having your child in daycare and like I could never imagine doing that. And so I have with both of my girls done this stay at home mom thing for probably about a year each And I think I was the worst version of myself and the mother during those periods of time and I treasure them right it's really special. That I didn't miss a lot of their first and I I’m so glad that I had that time, but I also have come to find that I need the professional fulfillment that I get out of my job and I am better to them when I have that and so you know it's a battle I fight a lot right if I pick up my kid from school later than I like that day I feel terrible that day and it's just a little voice that I have to silence but I've gotten that advice a lot like oh don't prioritize your career like Prioritize being a stay-at-home mom. You'll never get that time back. And who knows, maybe 10 years from now I'll regret working, but I doubt it. 13:40.45- Lorie You said the worst version of yourself as you were stay-home mom, like what was what was hard about that? I know what was hard for me. What was hard for you? 13:54.08- Erika I was impatient. I felt unaccomplished. like it wasn't that I didn't enjoy the time with them. It's just I would end my day and be like, what did I do today? And I had no motivation to get dressed, to do my hair. like there were things that were better. Like right now, I'm lucky if I get to cook a meal for my kids a couple times a week, like really cook it. You know what I mean? 14:31.06- Lorie Yeah. 14:32.07- Erika And so I did a lot of that. And Naomi and I got to make meals together and that was really fun. But me as a person, I don't think I was as excited as I am. And I think that the quality of the time that the girls and I get to now get together now is better. And we also had no structure. Like I don't And I've been this way since I was a little kid. I need to be busy in order to have structure because otherwise I just kind of meander through life, right? 15:07.02-Erika When I didn't have to be anywhere and I didn't have anything to do, it was not natural to me to be at like, okay, at eight o'clock we do this and at nine o'clock we do this, but the structure has organically formed around my life the way that it is and all of us are better that way. I like that structure. My husband likes that structure. My daughter Naomi is very structured. Like she likes this way at this time every day and so she has really thrived on that. 15:36.70- Lorie I think that you'll be happy to hear there's some research coming out that just talks about ah kids of working moms and dads, you know, but working parents and the amount of success and self-esteem that they find is higher in those kids. They know that they can do things because they've seen their parents do things. So yeah, I'm not saying I was a stay-at-home mom for a lot of years, and I really appreciated that time I had with my kids like you. But I also appreciate the working environment and being able to have that validation that comes with a job and I think the kids look up to that as well and they can see that mom is doing really neat things in her career and that they could also do really neat things in their career. 16:34.45- Erika I hope so. I hope she's proud of me. Like I was really proud of my mom. I don't actually remember that much about her, but she was a physician and that has always been like a point of pride for me. Like that is a hard thing to do and it's a hard thing to be good at. And I hope that my girls recognize that in me also. And like you said, have the thought that they want to do something that they can be proud of and that they can make their kids proud of too. 17:01.45- Lorie Is there anything that you look back on now, Erika, through your professional journey and you're like, Oh my goodness, I wish I had known back then what I know now, because I would have done that entirely differently. Is there anything you can go back and talk about that you would have changed? 17:24.44- Erika Yeah, this one for me is a money thing. I think that there are so, like, have you ever heard that expression? There's so many ways to skin a cat. 17:36.97- Lorie Yeah. 17:37.45-Erika Right? Like in law school, there's this messaging that the way to make money and the way to make big money is to do like the corporate scary law. Right? And so I was like, I'm going to do that. That's the hard thing. That's the thing that makes the money. I'm going to do that thing. Right? And I didn't even think about the option of going on my own or owning my own business and both professionally now like the way that my career has gone and then also because of the clients that I have, right? Like I am intimately familiar with people's wealth and how they built that wealth. And so much of it is people who take risks and people who do things differently than the way that you're told to is the easiest way or the best way to make money. So I would say that that old adage that people say that you hear a lot like, do what you love and the money will come. I totally believe that. I would have focused more on what I liked and what I enjoyed and what I was good at than what they messaged made the most money. 18:48.18- Lorie Did you, you did eventually come back around to focusing on what you loved and what you enjoyed, right? 18:55.51- Erika Yeah, but in a way that I wouldn't have expected. like I never like and Nobody goes into the, I mean, I don't think, goes into the area of law that I am and like, oh, it's going to be fun like writing stuff like wills and trusts for people when they die, right? That's going to be a really interpersonal type of law, right? It's kind of sad. but It took I so I have a master's in communication, I'm really good with people on an individual level I have trouble with large crowds. But what people don't really associate with my type of law is that most of the time it's getting to know families and it's getting to know their stories and it's flesh. Like some of it is like a little bit therapy like, right? And that is what translated well into my personality that I never could have predicted. And I also, because I was raised by my elderly grandparents and I've always been kind of an old soul, like a lot of the population that I work with is elderly and I enjoy that and I love that and I connect with that and I'm passionate about that. And that was something that was a part of who I was that I didn't even realize. And I just kind of stumbled my way into this work. 20:12.78- Lorie Yeah. I love it. I love that you found your way to what you love and what you're passionate about despite the like the messaging out there. And I love that you can do things your own way using your own way of, you know, your own personality and your own way of doing things and still what you love. I think that's the phrase that I liked the most is you can do what you love and still be very successful at it because I'm different from other people in finance. I'm a woman, they're mostly male, you know, and I come at it with more of a relationship kind of feel to it. And that is not typically the way it's been done. And so I hear a lot of messaging about, well, that's not the way you do it. I love that you've managed to find your own place and your own niche and your own love, and you're doing it the way that you think it needs to be done and being very successful at that. 21:20.57- Erika Well, I would encourage you to own it because no, you're not going to be for everyone, but there are people that you will be perfect for because you are that way. And I have noticed that a lot. I'm not a fancy buttoned up suit and tie kind of lawyer. Some people want that. If that's what they want, there's certainly someone out there for them, but it's not me. 21:41.44- Lorie Yeah, I like that. I think that's important to know yourself and know who you are and who's going to work with you and then you're both happy, right? On both sides. 21:54.66 Erika Yeah. 21:56.79- Lorie If you could go back and talk to your 20-year-old self at the beginning of your journey and tell her something, what would it be? 22:06.09 Erika That's a romance question. The man that I married was so different from what I thought I wanted. 20-year-old me thought that like a drama relationship was like what you see on TV where he's like constantly chasing after you and fighting after you and you have this really tumultuous like back and forth and he's always fighting for you. Like what I found in my marriage and a little bit later on was that every relationship that I had that had been difficult, that was not the right one and that's not what I wanted. I'm not saying that my marriage has always been easy, right? Like we absolutely have our up and downs, but the us part, the love part, the day to day for us was easy there was not like these huge hurdles that we had to overcome like we just fit and it just made sense and it wasn't dramatic or I don't know I yeah so I spent a long time looking for that and it wasn't actually what I wanted 23:15.19- Lorie I like that. That's kind of fun. And that's important. Marriage and relationship is a big part of your life. like It doesn't have to be dramatic. It can be easy. That's really valuable advice, isn't it? 23:29.68- Erika okay Yeah, it's like that saying like don't try and force a square peg into a round hole like quit trying to force it. If it's that hard, it's not the right one. 23:38.77- Lorie What scared you the most when you started out on your career? And does it still scare you today or not? 23:49.68-Erika I mean, so like when I left the firm that I was at before going out on my own, I had zero plan. I had, I borrowed $2,500 from my dad to start my business. I had no plan. My plan was I will do whatever it is that will allow me to be present for my children. So I was like, I'll go work at Starbucks. Like I can do anything. I don't need to use my law degree. If they're going to suck my soul out of my body, I don't need to do that. and so that was super scary. That was a super big risk, like no plan. and what I didn't expect was that a couple of clients came with me and I got this messaging like I didn't even realize this that when you leave a law firm they're required to offer your clients to come with you and so the lady that I was leaving kind of snarkily said to me like well I'm just gonna tell them that you don't have anywhere for them to go right because you don't and I got mad and I got bullheaded And I started a business literally overnight, like applied for my LLC, put together a website, like knows to the grindstone, I'm gonna do this and nobody's gonna stop me type of thing. And that was really scary. And yeah, I'm still scared sometimes. like if clients don't come in, if money doesn't come in, all of our lives are centered around my business. Now it's my husband and I working together, but like he doesn't have another income source outside of working with me. So if we can't keep the doors open with my business, like we don't eat. So yeah, that's scary. And that's a lot of pressure. I mean, I'm a person of faith. I believe that, you know, if that happens, it's going to be for a reason and God's going to have another plan for us. And it's probably going to be better than this one. 25:53.53- Lorie That is a lot of faith, Erika. I swear to you, I have that, I have that same thought where I'm like, just trust Lorie, just trust. But it is so hard going into that great unknown. So you, you actually started like all of the sudden you were on your own. Tell me about that. 26:22.21- Erika It was so crazy. It was so fun. like I had no idea what I was doing. right I had the benefit of my husband. like We are truly a team. The things that I didn't know, he knew how to do because he was running a large scale banking business. So he knew about marketing. He knew about websites. He knew about networking. He knew about all these things that I knew nothing about. But one thing that I will say is throughout that process, like I was mad enough and I was jaded enough that there was no part of me that was not willing to do things the way that I wanted. And I think in a way that that was really good. I wanted it to be clear that I wasn't going to be stuffy. I wasn't going to be buttoned up. I wanted to attract that kind of client. And so I embedded that personality throughout my business. I wanted to be transparent. I embedded that throughout my business. I wanted to be fun. I wanted to be very forward facing with my faith. It is on my website that I'm a Christian person. I wanted that. It is a fundamental part of who I am. I highlighted the fact that I have children. If someone doesn't like that my schedule is going to be somewhat tailored around them, then they can go find someone else. So I was true to who I was in every aspect of how I built the business. And you know I'm sure I alienated some clients from that. I'm sure some people turned away from me because of that. Even down to like, there were these folders that I had really liked, that I had presented at the firm that I was working at, like a stupid thing in an estate planning folder that I wanted them to use that they didn't want to spend the money on. And guess what? I bought them, right? Like things that I wanted to incorporate and a style that I wanted to incorporate that was rejected. It was cool because I was empowered to do it once I was on my own. 28:25.69- Lorie And turned out very successfully. Like turns out that when you embody, when you're authentic, when you, who are who you are, and that's the, you attract people that want that, right? 28:41.89- Erika Yeah, but I I feel like I should also say too that a huge part of this process for me was humility. Like, I knew that I was new. I knew that I didn't know what I was doing. And I was very forthcoming about that and I went to so many people and had so many coffees and so many meetings with other professionals who do what I do and several of them have become like lifelong friends and mentors for me and I took a little something from each of them like I would have these conversations about what I was building with each of these people and there are pieces of the advice that they gave me sprinkled throughout my business right and I found that people were much more willing to help me when I didn't bring an arrogance to it. like It's okay to be like, I'm super scared and I don't know what I'm doing, please help me. like Someone who is successful is going to be excited for the most part, unless they're a butt, right? But for the most part, they're going to be excited to impart their knowledge. I've had a couple people come to me now and say, hey, I'm on this journey. What advice do you have for me? I'm super excited to give that advice. I'm super excited to help someone. And it comes back in spades right when you do that. But I was so blessed with so many people who supported me. like One of the friends that I'm talking about, who I modeled some of the things around my business, she let me use her space for free, for like three months, right? Nobody does that. Who does that? Out of the goodness and support of her heart and of another woman. And I hope that someday I can, I can pay her back in some way. And I hope that I can pay that forward to someone else. But I came to her very clearly. I don't know what I'm doing. Please help me. And she did. 30:38.81-Lorie I love that. I love that sense of tribe, you found your tribe, you found your people that were willing to help you grow and just because they're good humans and you're a good human. That gives me hope for human race, honestly Erika. 30:58.73- Erika You know, people say all the time, like it's the world we live in is terrible. The world we live in is awful. But you know what, like most of the people that I encounter in everyday life are lovely, are good people. I think that the outliers and the jerks like are the loudest, but 99.9% of the population is pretty cool. 31:24.87- Lorie Yeah, yeah. Supportive, nice, trying to make this world a better place just a little bit at a time. They're not hard to find either. I agree with you. They outnumber the jerks. 31:40.95- Erika They do. 31:41.28- Lorie you just have to yeah just have coffee with them I love that you did that. 31:47.66- Erika I did that a lot. I had, I'm telling you, I had borrowed money from my dad. Like my budget was so limited. I had a brand new baby. like brand new baby. And a huge portion of that money that I borrowed from my dad was spent on taking people to coffee, right? Because you don't invite someone to coffee and then not pay for them. So I had my little budget of like, how much coffee I could buy for people in order to like invite them, right? But yeah, I spent a lot of money on taking people out to coffee. 32:23.51- Lorie Oh, I love that for you. I want to donate to the coffee budget. Like, like that would be the way need to give back. You know what I'm saying for someone else. Like, do you need a coffee budget? 32:34.02- Erika That's a really good idea. 32:36.49-Erika Maybe I'll like propose that to the coffee place that I frequent. Be like, hey, if there's young professionals who want to set up coffee on me, maybe that's the cool thing they can do. 32:47.43- Lorie Did you face any unique challenges because you were a woman? 32:56.34- Erika Oh, yeah. Remember when I told you that I wanted to do like the big fancy corporate law? so in law that's very tied to how you perform in law school in your rank. So literally like, are you first in line? Are you second in line? And if you are not in the top 10% of your cohort, you can't even apply for these positions. I was, I worked my tail off and I was second. My best friend was first. so I should have gotten a lot more offers than I did at a lot more prestigious firms. As part of the on-campus interview process, like I checked all of the boxes, but when I interviewed, I was eight months pregnant and I did not. I still got, I still got a couple offers, but not the same ones that people who ranked lower than me got. 33:55.21- Lorie Really? 33:55.88- Erika Yeah, there's nothing more integral about being a woman than being pregnant. Like I was visibly pregnant. There was nothing I could do about it. So yeah, that was a unique challenge that I faced as a woman. 34:10.72 Lorie And this wasn't this wasn't like 20, 30 years ago. It was like, 34:16.27- Erika No, this was right now. But like, there's always I mean, these are lawyers, right? So there's always a like, what am I gonna do fight about it? Like, I'm second, I should have gotten this. Like, no, you just like, pick up your bootstraps and like, go do something else. And had I ended up in one of those jobs, I never would have ended up doing this. Who knows if I would still be married? Who knows if I would have another child? Like, my life probably would have been dramatically different. And not in a good way. 34:44.92- Lorie This was the path you were meant to be on, but it is hard that it came at that. 34:50.50- Erika Man, I cried. I remember being in my car and just sobbing. Like, how is this happening? What more could I have done? Like, i there's nothing else I could have done. And I was devastated. And that was not a high moment of faith for me. It didn't really show until two, three years later, the positive of that happening. It took time. It was not like immediately I was like, oh, this makes sense. This is so great. like It sucked. I had to live in the suck for a little bit. 35:36.42- Lorie I bet your husband was supportive though. He sounds like a great guy. 35:40.93- Erika Yeah, I mean, don't get me wrong. Every person has their shortcomings, and every person has their things that like annoy you. But he's very supportive. And he has, he has supported me and been proud of me throughout my journey. And that means more to me than I can even say. 36:06.60- Lorie Erika, what is the thing you are most proud of? 36:12.09- Erika My daughters, for sure my daughters, they are the most amazing little humans. Like it is unbelievable how much you can love something like I love them. They are my everything. Whatever their lives shape out to be will be my biggest accomplishment. 36:36.39- Lorie And that's if you run, I don't know what, how you gauge success in a law firm, but like a 20 person law firm with all sorts of important things happening. It's your kids that mean the most. 36:54.22- Erika Yeah and like their memories and their childhood and like we're very intentional about building memories for them and like we if we go on trips or if we do things or building experiences like it's this is so lots of people say that they're going to wait until retirement. I would really discourage that. Like my mom, I told you she was a physician. She was so successful. She had reached the peak of her success and she died. My dad has been a career pilot and had a really big health change in his life that has completely changed what he thought his retirement was going to look like. And he spent his entire life planning for his retirement. So I would encourage people, like, don't wait for retirement. Do the stuff that you want to do now. Like, you don't know what retirement is going to look like. 37:52.16- Lorie Yeah, I actually agree with you. And I'm a financial planner. But I love that. 37:59.26- Erika I know that's probably not the best messaging for me to give on your podcast. 38:08.80- Lorie I think that I think that putting off until retirement for living life is a bad choice. There has to be a balance for sure. But I think that waiting until tomorrow to do the things, you've kind of embodied that with the fact that you do put your kids first. You know you could have had a whole different career trajectory or a whole different set of values and you know what your values are. They include those two sweet little kids and you make sure that your life revolves around what's important to you. I think that's huge. 38:54.63- Erika Yeah, I'm really proud of it. 38:57.94-Lorie So Erika, any advice for a young lady who's just starting down the path that you're already so successful at? Is there anything you would, any advice you would give them? 39:14.97-Erika Yeah, I think I, I think I touched on it a lot. I think be honest with yourself. Be bold, take risks, be brave, be kind, be humble. And if you find someone who supports you, hold on to that person and support them, give it back. 39:44.99- Lorie I like that. I think those are all really good, really good pieces of pieces of advice for just about any stage of life. But I like the idea. I mean, the title of the podcast is fearless females. So I like the idea of being just a little bit fearless. You're scared to death, but maybe try it. You never know what's going to be on the other side, right? 40:12.22- Erika It'll be better. Don't try and plan it. It'll be so much better than what you thought. Let life shock you. It's so fun. 40:21.53- Lorie Well, thank you so much for spending some time with me today. If I have listeners that want to get in touch with you and ask for advice or just pick your brain or take you to coffee, how do they ah get in touch with you? 40:35.94- Erika Yeah, my, it has yet to become a problem that my cell number is the one on my website. So you can call, you can text, you can email. my website is walterslaw.com. yeah, reach out. I'd love to have a coffee. I'd love to have a lunch. whatever, whatever that looks like for you. I'd love to support you. 40:56.91- Lorie Thank you so much for your time, Erika, and for sharing your story and your journey. I really appreciate it. 41:03.20-Erika Thanks.