Join host Dan Aberhart on the Growing the Future podcast as he welcomes Jessica Janzen, a motivational speaker, mindset coach, author, and philanthropist. This episode dives deep into the importance of self-worth, the power of choice, and bringing joy, even in the hardest of times. Don’t miss this emotional and inspiring conversation that is sure to leave a lasting impact.
Jessica Janzen grew up on a grain farm west of Winnipeg. She traces the way she thinks about all of this back to an orange chair in a hospital room, watching her grandmother unwrap a piece of homemade pie for a husband who had just been told he was dying, and the two of them bowing their heads over it.
Years later she and her husband were given a diagnosis for their infant son that came with a life expectancy measured in months. What they decided to do with the time is what this conversation is about.
What's Inside
- The hospital room in her twenties that set the terms for everything after it
- Arriving in a new city at twenty with very little, and the work that followed
- How a boy in a Sunday school class introduced her to a rare disease years before it arrived in her own family
- The diagnosis, and the decision they made in the days after it about how the time would be spent
- Why she believes you do not choose the circumstances and you do choose the response
- The foundation they built, what it funds, and the families it reaches
- A four year campaign that changed newborn screening policy in one province, and why that means other families get a different answer
- What she tells rooms full of leaders about burnout, playing small, and scheduling joy on purpose
Connect with Growing the Future
Website: growingthefuture.ca
YouTube: Growing the Future
Instagram: @growingthefuturepodcast
LinkedIn: Growing the Future
Subscribe to the Growing the Future Podcast wherever you listen, and register for Convergence Conference 2027 at convergence.ag.