What if the biggest warning sign in your life is hiding in plain sight?

Measuring Cumulative Life Stress: using the Holmes and Rahe scale as a prompt to rebuild

Most people don't realise how much cumulative stress they're carrying until it shows up as burnout, illness, or complete emotional exhaustion. Lauragaye introduces listeners to the Holmes and Rahe Stress Scale, a decades-old framework that measures the cumulative impact of major life events, and shares how discovering her own exceptionally high score became a turning point. Rather than seeing it as a prediction of what would happen to her, she used it as a wake-up call to intentionally rebuild her life through small daily choices, stronger boundaries, and a relentless focus on creating joy. This conversation challenges the idea that resilience means simply pushing through, showing instead why recognising your stress load early can change the trajectory of your health, your career, and your future.

About Lauragaye Jackson

Lauragaye Jackson, podcast guest

Global Marketing Leader and Executive Coach

MBA Schulich School of BusinessDual accredited ICF ACC and Association for CoachingChartered Marketer Canadian Marketing Association5 sectors CPG, retail, insurance, finance & resources

Lauragaye Jackson is a global B2B and B2C marketer whose career has taken her through Fortune 500 companies in CPG, retail, insurance, financial services, and natural resources, leading work across Canada, the U.S., and the Caribbean. She has spent years building brands, shaping full-funnel strategies, and helping organizations connect with everyone from high-net-worth clients to mass, newcomer and multicultural consumers. What runs through that work is a sharp understanding of people: how trust is built, how buying decisions are made, and how marketing lands differently across cultures, life stages, and markets.

Her experience sits at the intersection of brand and performance. Lauragaye has led teams, developed content that engages, and used digital strategy to drive quality leads and profitable growth, all while working inside complex businesses where relevance matters as much as reach. Having worked across industries and geographies, she brings a practical understanding of how companies grow without losing sight of the people they are trying to serve.

That perspective became more personal when her own successful career took an unexpected turn. When her executive role was eliminated, Lauragaye found herself confronting questions many accomplished professionals know sense privately: what happens when the title changes, how confidence holds up during disruption, and how to keep evolving and reinventing when the next chapter is not yet clear?

View profile →

Book Lauragaye Jackson for your show

Request an interview →