15 : Leaving Google For a Career In Sustainability and a 3 Month Break with Julia Li (Part 1)

“There's also this idea of neuroplasticity. It's something we talk a lot about in mindfulness, which is that you have the power to change your brain based on what you pay attention to.” - Julia Li

Welcome to the Mindful FIRE Podcast, where we explore living mindfully on the path to financial independence and beyond. I’m your host Adam Coelho and I’m glad you’re here. 

In this episode, I'm joined by my friend, Julia Li. 

Julia and I met a few years ago when a mutual friend of ours introduced us because she was interested in becoming a facilitator of the popular course search inside yourself, which is an emotional intelligence course at Google, which teaches emotional intelligence through mindfulness.

I'm excited to bring you this interview with Julia, because she's at a point in her life where she's about to make a big move. She's about to leave Google and switch into a totally different space of sustainability. 

And this conversation goes into a lot of different areas, but it really. Points to the importance of creating sustainability within your own life. Being intentional and thoughtful about how you're spending your time and figuring out what's important to you and where you want to go with your life.  Julia share some really practical tips and practices for envisioning the future that you want to live, including thinking about how you want to feel in the future and how we can start to bring those feelings and practices into our life right now.

Julia and I are planning on recording another episode, maybe five or six months down the road, once she's taken this time off and started thinking about embarking on her next chapter in the sustainability space.

So definitely subscribe so that you can see that future episode as well. And see what Julia is up to in the future.

In this episode we explore: 

• How Julia and I know each other
• How her interest in mindfulness led Julia to wo

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🔥 WHO I’m creating this for

This is for you if you’re at or near FI (Coast FI or full FIRE) and:

• You feel stuck after “doing everything right,” but you’re not sure what you’re optimizing for anymore.
• You’re caught between freedom and overwhelm (“I could do anything… so I do nothing”).
• You want clarity and momentum—but you don’t want someone to tell you what to do.

🔥 WHAT we’ll do together (over 10 weeks)

In a small group (mastermind-style), you’ll:

• Get clear on what you actually want (beyond expectations, comparison, and “shoulds”).
• Create a big, meaningful vision for your next chapter—one that fits who you are now.
• Learn the brain science behind envisioning (why it works, and how to use it).
• Turn yo...