The Soft Power Project is a podcast about the courage it takes to become who you’re meant to be. Through intimate conversations and personal stories, host Sherry Fang journals the journeys of women navigating reinvention, uncertainty, and growth. This podcast explores the messy middle — the quiet seasons, the pivots, and the moments that don’t always make it onto highlight reels. The intention is simple: to remove the shame around starting over and remind women that transformation is rarely linear. Through shared stories and practical insights, The Soft Power Project encourages women to trust themselves, embrace change, and move toward the next version of their lives with softness and strength. If you like to share your story on Soft Power Project, please fill out this from --> https://forms.gle/wE4it5KSXfu815dw9 ✨Soft Power Coaching Program✨ A coaching experience for high-achieving individuals ready to step into their next level of leadership without abandoning themselves in the process. This program is designed for high-achievers navigating career growth, executive visibility, leadership transitions, and identity expansion. Because moving from high performer to influential leader requires more than working harder. If you want to have a chat to see if you are ready for leadership embodiment, fill out this form -> https://forms.gle/BfPnrra7v1CuDCsC6 👉For any questions, please find me at softpower.you@gmail.com
Podcast
91 episodes
2026-06-02
I Spent Years Performing Confidence
For most of my life, I thought confidence was a performance. The right body language, the right phrasing, looking sure of myself on stage even when I was terrified. I learned that version growing up between two worlds. In Taiwan, humility was the virtue: speak up only when you have something worth saying. Then I studied in North America and got the opposite lesson: just speak, it barely matters what you say. I spent years getting good at performing confidence. I never had much fun doing it. Now I teach communication back in Taiwan, and I keep meeting people with PhDs and real experience who still feel like it isn’t good enough. So I’ve been rethinking the whole thing. Maybe real confidence isn’t the loudest voice in the room. Maybe it’s the soft power of trusting yourself enough to speak the truth without softening it, and to say “I don’t know” without flinching. It’s the question I keep coming back to on the Soft Power Project, and I’m still figuring out what it looks like in 2026. If you’ve ever performed a certainty you didn’t feel, this one is for you. What does confidence mean to you? 0:00 - The Journey of Understanding Confidence 4:03 - Cultural Perspectives on Confidence 7:54 - Redefining Confidence in the Modern Age #SoftPowerProject #Confidence #SelfTrust #PersonalGrowth #SoftPower Leave a comment and share your thoughts: https://open.firstory.me/user/cm5etbvm00a1i01sl6k6h99de/comments Youtube Instagram Would you like to share your life stories? Please fill out this form. See you there~
2026-05-28
What I manifested last year is coming to reality
In New York City on June 20, I'm hosting my first in-person event for The Soft Power Project. A three and a half hour Soft Power Summit, and the theme is coming home to yourself. I've been quietly manifesting this for a year. When I started this show, I was craving honest women's conversation. The real talk that happens before the recording starts, when we skip the small talk and say where we actually are. After eighty something episodes and around sixty women on the show, I wanted to bring that off the mic and into a room. The day moves through an arc: release with face yoga from Teja of Butter Be Kind, listen with nutrition from Tammy of Everglo Wellness, embody with boxing taught by Bella, a stunt woman who's going to close us out. I'm not building this alone. The women in this community made it possible. This is your invitation. Early bird seats are limited. What part of yourself are you ready to come home to? REGISTER: https://luma.com/q8i8ubvg?coupon=FRIENDS20 TIMESTAMPS: 0:00 - Announcing my first in-person event 0:50 - Coming home to yourself 1:30 - Release: face yoga with Teja 2:30 - Listen: nourish with Tammy 3:30 - Embody: boxing with Bella 4:30 - The tote bag and the goodies 6:00 - Why I wanted to bring this offline 8:30 - The women who made it happen #SoftPowerProject #SoftPower #SoftPowerSummit #ComingHomeToYourself #WomensWellness Leave a comment and share your thoughts: https://open.firstory.me/user/cm5etbvm00a1i01sl6k6h99de/comments Youtube Instagram Would you like to share your life stories? Please fill out this form. See you there~
2026-05-21
When the Body Starts Speaking with Alica Glavanova
Alica Glavanova was 18, in her last year of high school, when the panic attacks started. The doctors ran their tests, handed her pills, and explained nothing. She did her own research, realized it was anxiety medication, and decided she wasn't going to take it. Right after school she started traveling. India, Nepal, Thailand, Indonesia. Somewhere in those years she found a different way to understand what her body was doing, and it became the work she does now. Sherry and Alica talk about what happens when you stop overriding your body and start listening to what it's trying to tell you. Alica decodes a rash that kept showing up on Sherry's knuckles and ears after stressful morning meetings, and what it meant that it landed exactly there. They talk about why symptoms so often surface in the healing phase, once the stress is already over, and about the one thing none of us can control alongside the one thing we always can. This is a Soft Power Project conversation about emotional healing, and it goes somewhere unexpected. TIMESTAMPS: 0:00 - The body starts speaking 1:18 - Panic attacks at 18 7:04 - Western medicine vs TCM 8:29 - Growing up without roots 11:32 - The seminar that changed everything 15:13 - You have to do the work 20:33 - Decoding Sherry's mystery rash 31:35 - Finding the source of a symptom 39:02 - A chaotic world and soft power MENTIONED IN THIS EPISODE: Free German New Medicine masterclass (on Alica's Instagram): https://www.instagram.com/shenmentherapies/ Carl Jung's dream analysis: water as a symbol of emotion ABOUT ALICA GLAVANOVA: Alica Glavanova is a certified complementary therapist based in Switzerland with more than a decade of clinical experience. After severe panic attacks at 18, she trained in traditional Chinese medicine, German New Medicine, hypnotherapy, and nervous system work. She now helps clients trace physical symptoms back to their emotional root, in person and online. https://www.instagram.com/shenmentherapies/ | https://www.shenmentherapies.com/ #SoftPowerProject #SoftPower #Healing #MentalHealth #WellnessJourney Leave a comment and share your thoughts: https://open.firstory.me/user/cm5etbvm00a1i01sl6k6h99de/comments Youtube Instagram Would you like to share your life stories? Please fill out this form. For Soft Power Leadership Program, fill out this form.
Today
I Spent Years Performing Confidence
For most of my life, I thought confidence was a performance. The right body language, the right phrasing, looking sure of myself on stage even when I was terrified. I learned that version growing up between two worlds. In Taiwan, humility was the virtue: speak up only when you have something worth saying. Then I studied in North America and got the opposite lesson: just speak, it barely matters what you say. I spent years getting good at performing confidence. I never had much fun doing it. Now I teach communication back in Taiwan, and I keep meeting people with PhDs and real experience who still feel like it isn’t good enough. So I’ve been rethinking the whole thing. Maybe real confidence isn’t the loudest voice in the room. Maybe it’s the soft power of trusting yourself enough to speak the truth without softening it, and to say “I don’t know” without flinching. It’s the question I keep coming back to on the Soft Power Project, and I’m still figuring out what it looks like in 2026. If you’ve ever performed a certainty you didn’t feel, this one is for you. What does confidence mean to you? 0:00 - The Journey of Understanding Confidence 4:03 - Cultural Perspectives on Confidence 7:54 - Redefining Confidence in the Modern Age #SoftPowerProject #Confidence #SelfTrust #PersonalGrowth #SoftPower Leave a comment and share your thoughts: https://open.firstory.me/user/cm5etbvm00a1i01sl6k6h99de/comments Youtube Instagram Would you like to share your life stories? Please fill out this form. See you there~
5 days ago
What I manifested last year is coming to reality
In New York City on June 20, I'm hosting my first in-person event for The Soft Power Project. A three and a half hour Soft Power Summit, and the theme is coming home to yourself. I've been quietly manifesting this for a year. When I started this show, I was craving honest women's conversation. The real talk that happens before the recording starts, when we skip the small talk and say where we actually are. After eighty something episodes and around sixty women on the show, I wanted to bring that off the mic and into a room. The day moves through an arc: release with face yoga from Teja of Butter Be Kind, listen with nutrition from Tammy of Everglo Wellness, embody with boxing taught by Bella, a stunt woman who's going to close us out. I'm not building this alone. The women in this community made it possible. This is your invitation. Early bird seats are limited. What part of yourself are you ready to come home to? REGISTER: https://luma.com/q8i8ubvg?coupon=FRIENDS20 TIMESTAMPS: 0:00 - Announcing my first in-person event 0:50 - Coming home to yourself 1:30 - Release: face yoga with Teja 2:30 - Listen: nourish with Tammy 3:30 - Embody: boxing with Bella 4:30 - The tote bag and the goodies 6:00 - Why I wanted to bring this offline 8:30 - The women who made it happen #SoftPowerProject #SoftPower #SoftPowerSummit #ComingHomeToYourself #WomensWellness Leave a comment and share your thoughts: https://open.firstory.me/user/cm5etbvm00a1i01sl6k6h99de/comments Youtube Instagram Would you like to share your life stories? Please fill out this form. See you there~
1 weeks ago
When the Body Starts Speaking with Alica Glavanova
Alica Glavanova was 18, in her last year of high school, when the panic attacks started. The doctors ran their tests, handed her pills, and explained nothing. She did her own research, realized it was anxiety medication, and decided she wasn't going to take it. Right after school she started traveling. India, Nepal, Thailand, Indonesia. Somewhere in those years she found a different way to understand what her body was doing, and it became the work she does now. Sherry and Alica talk about what happens when you stop overriding your body and start listening to what it's trying to tell you. Alica decodes a rash that kept showing up on Sherry's knuckles and ears after stressful morning meetings, and what it meant that it landed exactly there. They talk about why symptoms so often surface in the healing phase, once the stress is already over, and about the one thing none of us can control alongside the one thing we always can. This is a Soft Power Project conversation about emotional healing, and it goes somewhere unexpected. TIMESTAMPS: 0:00 - The body starts speaking 1:18 - Panic attacks at 18 7:04 - Western medicine vs TCM 8:29 - Growing up without roots 11:32 - The seminar that changed everything 15:13 - You have to do the work 20:33 - Decoding Sherry's mystery rash 31:35 - Finding the source of a symptom 39:02 - A chaotic world and soft power MENTIONED IN THIS EPISODE: Free German New Medicine masterclass (on Alica's Instagram): https://www.instagram.com/shenmentherapies/ Carl Jung's dream analysis: water as a symbol of emotion ABOUT ALICA GLAVANOVA: Alica Glavanova is a certified complementary therapist based in Switzerland with more than a decade of clinical experience. After severe panic attacks at 18, she trained in traditional Chinese medicine, German New Medicine, hypnotherapy, and nervous system work. She now helps clients trace physical symptoms back to their emotional root, in person and online. https://www.instagram.com/shenmentherapies/ | https://www.shenmentherapies.com/ #SoftPowerProject #SoftPower #Healing #MentalHealth #WellnessJourney Leave a comment and share your thoughts: https://open.firstory.me/user/cm5etbvm00a1i01sl6k6h99de/comments Youtube Instagram Would you like to share your life stories? Please fill out this form. For Soft Power Leadership Program, fill out this form.