921 Nina Sossamon-Pogue: Writing Your Next Chapter

What Athletes Can Teach Us As Entrepreneurs

When I was just 6 years old, I won my first figure skating trophy. I loved the feeling of freedom and flow as I learned to “become” the music in my routines—and the pride of accomplishment of learning difficult spins and jumps. What I didn’t love was all the hundreds of painful falls on hard ice about 5 hours every day through my competitive career, cut short at national senior level at age 15 by a debilitating knee injury, my Olympic dreams dashed.

So, when Nina Sossamon-Pogue shared her journey as an elite gymnast competing with Mary Lou Retton, I was, I admit, a little jealous of the large padding the gymnasts had to break their falls. 

Turns out both of us have a lot in common – athletic career-busting knee injuries, and award-winning careers as television news anchors and entrepreneurs. 

Nina is an inspiring entrepreneur, keynote speaker, and two-time bestselling author whose resilience and success overcoming daunting challenges is nothing short of inspirational—with an extraordinary journey through elite athletics, television news, and corporate America from startup to IPO, overcoming immense personal and professional adversity. 

For anyone facing their “now what” moment, often a regular occurrence for most entrepreneurs, Nina’s book “This Is Not the End: Strategies to Get You Through the Worst Chapters of Your Life” is must-read. And if you’re looking for help on your journey, Nina has also built the innovative online courses known as the Now What Workshop. 

Today we talk about those essential entrepreneurial skills learned in the gym and the rink – persistence, discipline, and the ability to get up after a fall and turn adversity of all kinds into steppingstones for success.

Driven by a commitment to wellness, Donna dispels the notion that gardening is too difficult by emphasizing its universal benefits and helping anyone overcome the common refrain of “I don’t know how, I kill everything” by empowering them to cultivate their own green spaces and improve their well-being.

Gardenuity demystifies gardening and sets us all up for success, with customized container gardening experiences crafted for your lifestyle, your local environment, and your needs with its powerful AI platform, Gardenuity Match. With a vision for a garden on every porch and balcony, Gardenuity mixes nature with cutting-edge predictive technology to personalize the experience. Donna also has a plan for businesses, bringing nature to the workplace from kitchen gardens to corporate workshops to enhance employee well-being and creativity.

Drawing inspiration from her daughter, a 4-time Special Olympics gold medalist, Donna shares her entrepreneurial journey and proves that every challenge can bloom into an opportunity. She says gardening is not only a personal sanctuary for health and wellness but a powerful analogy for entrepreneurship itself—and all the challenges of raising capital, leading a team and scaling growth.

More about Nina Sossamon-Pogue at www.ninasossamonpogue.com

Create and share clips of your favorite moments of this or any other podcast episode on across social media via Podopolo, and join the conversation with Nina and me in the Wings episode comments section.

More about Nina at Nina Sossamon-Pogue

Nina Sossamon-Pogue is a sought-after speaker, two-time bestselling author, and entrepreneur whose journey through elite gymnastics, TV anchoring, and Corporate America from startup to IPO defies the ordinary. An Olympic hopeful on the USA Gymnastics team with Mary Lou Retton, an injury crushed her dreams before becoming a catalyst for a 20-year career as an Emmy Award winning journalist and anchor. Another transformative challenge led her to technology and a journey navigating startup growth to a highly successful IPO. Drawing on her expertise across communications, corporate leadership and resilience research, she now helps others conquer life’s obstacles to reach new levels of success. Author of This Is Not the End: Strategies to Get You Through the Worst Chapters of Your Life and But I Want Both: A Working Mom’s Guide to Creating a Life She Loves, Nina also founded the innovative online coaching company Now What Workshop.

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