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Welcome to What's in YOUR Neighborhood?

Welcome to What's in YOUR Neighborhood?Welcome to What's in YOUR Neighborhood?Welcome to What's in YOUR Neighborhood?

Conversations for the shame shifter in all of us.

Apple
Spotify

Welcome to What's in YOUR Neighborhood?

Welcome to What's in YOUR Neighborhood?Welcome to What's in YOUR Neighborhood?Welcome to What's in YOUR Neighborhood?

Conversations for the shame shifter in all of us.

Apple
Spotify

Welcome to the neighborhood!

About our podcast

We all carry emotional neighborhoods. They are  the quiet backstreets of ambition, shame, and identity.
What’s in YOUR Neighborhood? is a podcast about exploring those inner landscapes: how we remove masks, reclaim identity, and learn to come home to ourselves.


Each episode is a walk through the stories that shape us. It's the bold, the broken, and the becoming.  Guests share moments of transformation with honesty and heart, reminding us that none of us walk alone. 


This is a space for the high achievers and perfectionists, or anyone who may have felt they had to hide parts of themselves to succeed. 

Listen to our trailer

Let's Walk these Streets Together...

A little more

What you'll hear

A little more

This podcast born from a lived experience and a deep belief that the most transformative leadership starts not on the stage or a spreadsheet, but in the quiet corners of our inner landscapes.


This is the real work that needs to be done in this next era. The leaders who thrive in what’s coming will be the ones who have done the deep inner work.   


Our guests

What you'll hear

A little more

We invite our guests into raw, human stories of identity, shame, failure, resilience, and healing. 


Leaders, rebels, and real people who have dared to remove their masks, talk about where they have they have made major pivots, learned from failure, sat in discomfort, or done something bold. 

What you'll hear

What you'll hear

What you'll hear

You'll hear from truth-tellers and leaders willing to sit in discomfort, challenge the status quo, and rise after walking through fire. 


You’ll hear about leading with truth, authenticity, and vulnerability. You'll also hear about mine. 


About your host

Melanie Vargas

I have worked for decades across a broad range of organizations and industries primarily in technology startups. I have worn the hats of both the  entrepreneur and the executive and coached hundreds of executives and teams early-stage to Fortune 50 organizations.


I have also experienced my own patterns of work addiction, burn out, imposter syndrome, and how it no longer serves me or the people I love. 


I have come to believe that some of the most important work we do as leaders, isn’t on a spreadsheet or stage, it’s in the quiet corners of ourselves, our emotional neighborhoods. This has become even more evident in today's organizations. It has also become my passion.


I learned the most through my lived experience with more than 40 years of generational trauma, PTSD, struggles with mental health, teenage addiction, and then having children with some of these challenges. I now walk proudly with over 30 years of recovery from alcoholism. I'm also extremely dedicated to my work in exploring my inner landscape through my work in therapy, as a mom, wife, woman in recovery and training/practice as a coach. 


I am a person who has lived in adversity, but I am also a person who walks with hope and resilience. I Iive today in acceptance, vulnerability and truth.  I am a proud neurodivergent, woman in recovery. For many many years, I hid these truths and wore masks and armor as shame shields. I believed deep inside I was never enough and tried to prove my worth through performance and achievements. I told myself a narrative that I had acted my way to the top. You can hear all about this journey if you choose to read my companion book hopefully in 2026.


Come walk these streets with me, because I want to hear what is in YOUR neighborhood?

More about me

For Listeners and Guests

For Listeners

 If you’re a leader, change-maker, someone carrying a heavy story, or someone wearing masks you are ready to unveil, this space is for you. You’ll hear voices from business, art, recovery, therapy, coaching, and life reflecting on what it means to stay grounded while navigating growth and uncertainty.


My awakening happened when I had the courage to dig deep into what was in my neighborhood. I want to explore the inner landscapes we walk every day, and the power of owning our full, human stories. The work on our inner landscapes is what’s needed in this next era. Technical skill will only take us so far. The leaders who will thrive in what’s coming are the ones who’ve done the deep inner work. 

Because real leadership begins when we ask ourselves — What’s in my neighborhood?

Trailer

For Guests

I’m interested in the real stories. It’s the ones that shaped you. Tell me about the failures, the heartbreaks, the masks you felt you had to wear, the tragedies you’ve lived through and your lessons learned. I want to explore how those experiences reshaped your leadership, deepened your empathy, and brought you closer to home and gave your life meaning.


Together, we’ll explore the neighborhoods we all carry: the hidden streets of burnout, work addiction, failure, and reinvention.


Maybe you’ve had an awakening about your identity. A moment when you realized who you truly are and began to live from that truth. Or perhaps you’ve made a bold, courageous shift in your life, one that required vulnerability, trust, and the willingness to be seen.

Reach out

Get in Touch & Guest Invitation

Guest Invitation

This isn’t about highlight reels or polished success. It’s about the moments that cracked you open. It's a failure that taught you something essential, a loss that changed how you lead, an awakening that redefined who you are, or a bold step that required you to let go of who you were before.


If you’re ready to share your story with me. It's not the one on your résumé, but the one that lives under your skin. I’d love to walk that road with you.

Our Neighborhood

3326 160th Avenue Southeast suite 215, Bellevue, WA, USA

Episodes

Welcome to the Neighborhood Episode 0

Listen to our trailer. The tone is grounded, reflective, and real. This isn’t a performance or a promo conversation; it’s a shared space for honesty, vulnerability, compassion, and curiosity. My hope is that these conversations help you see your own story with compassion and curiosity.

Teaser Episode

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