A radical new way to motivate yourself.

Tender Discipline is a 6-week course, led by Jocelyn K. Glei, about radically reimagining the tools & ideas we use to get motivated, accomplish our goals, and connect with others.

It’s time to center humanity instead of productivity.

Everything in our culture revolves around productivity, and the corrosive values that come with it: extraction, efficiency, and unlimited progress. As inhabitants of this world, we absorb and internalize those values. We strive to extract as much as we can from our days, our bodies, our relationships. We believe that we must always be optimizing toward our “best self,” a fantasy that's always just out of reach. And when we’re not able to be relentlessly productive, when we’re not able to be our best self, we turn to the toxic tools our culture has given us — anxiety, guilt, shame, and fear — to motivate ourselves.

But what if we put humanity, rather than productivity, at the center of our lives? Tender Discipline is about radically reimagining the core tools and ideas we use to motivate ourselves. It’s about taking an internal dialogue that's been culturally hardwired to focus on harsh, unforgiving self-critique and rewiring it with tenderness at the center. It’s about moving from a driving, productivity-obsessed mindset where you're always operating from a deficit, forever burnt out, never enough, into a mindset that prioritizes love, compassion, and spaciousness.

Listen to Jocelyn talk about her inspiration for creating Tender Discipline and what it offers.

Tune into this audio clip from a recent episode of Hurry Slowly to listen to Jocelyn share more about the course, including:

  • why embracing tenderness is so radical
  • how the course will change your perspective
  • the structure, design & flow of the course
  • how the course will help you relate to yourself and others in a new way

How the course will unfold...

At the core of the Tender Discipline program will be a series of six 90-minute gatherings. Each get-together will include a 45-minute talk followed by 45 minutes of “integration,” during which I’ll guide you through a series of exercises and prompts as well as respond to questions.

Each talk will focus on opening your mind to one key perspective shift: For example, shifting from an approach where you motivate yourself with punishing self-talk to one where you motivate yourself with encouragement and tender acceptance. Or shifting from a focus on pursuing relentless self-improvement to a focus on operating from a place of grounded self-trust.

Each of these talks, and the perspective shifts that I unpack within them, will give you a practical framework for reflecting on your thoughts, words, and actions and beginning to explore new behaviors in your work and personal life.

The Core Content

THe Talks

Week 1: Centering Tenderness

Colonialism, capitalism & technology have systematically detached us from the cyclical rhythms of the land and our bodies — leading us to privilege progress and productivity over nurturance and humanity. What if we made the radical choice to center tenderness in our words, thoughts & actions?

Perspective shift: Linear → Cyclical

Week 2: Showing Up in Fullness

Operating in a culture of extraction has drained our bodies of their vitality — leaving us disconnected from the Earth and dissatisfied with anything we accomplish, achieve, or acquire. What if we acted from a space of “showing up in fullness” rather than “running on empty”?

Perspective shift: Extractive → Generative

Week 3: Surrendering to the Bounded World

We have internalized the values of the apps & technologies we interact with everyday, creating a warped expectation of infinite, on-demand productivity. What if we honored the limited resources contained within our mind, body, and spirit and reclaimed our ability to decide what’s important?

Perspective shift: Unbounded → Intentional

Week 4: Letting Go of Productivity Shame

We weaponize our yearning for productivity, extraction & exponential growth against ourselves, creating a toxic internal dialogue in which whatever we do is never enough. What if we extended compassion to ourselves and began to act from a place of tender discipline?

Perspective shift: Punishing → Tender

Week 5: R.I.P. “Best Self”

Self-improvement culture and the idea of a “best self” prevents us from fully inhabiting and accepting our current self, relationships & achievements. What if we stopped second-guessing ourselves and chose to move into the world from a place of self-trust?

Perspective shift: Self-improvement → Self-trust

Week 6: What if you already knew “how to”?

The dominant culture trains us to look outside ourselves for advice, expertise & wisdom so that we will remain in a juvenile state — at arm’s length from our true power. What if we recognized our self as our most vital resource and tuned into the wisdom within?

Perspective shift: External → Internal

Meditations, Community & More

Guided Energy Meditations

I will offer four optional guided energy meditations to help you explore the concepts from the talks at a deeper level — beyond intellectual knowing — by feeling into how a shift in focus from productivity to humanity might play out within the body itself, on an energetic level.

Community Space

Participants will have free rein to start discussion threads, share their reflections, and get inspired in the community forum space, which will be hosted on the Circle platform. This is also where I will be sharing all course updates, talk recordings, journal prompts, and more.

Journey Groups

Journey groups are small gatherings of 4-6 folks who meet regularly during the course to share notes, swap ideas, and lend each other mutual support. I will be offering BIPOC and LGBTQIA+ affinity groups, assuming there is enough interest. Journey group participation is optional.

Journal Prompts

For each of the six weeks, I will share a journal prompt that is designed to help you reflect on, and more deeply integrate, the concepts and perspective shifts that I am sharing.

The Tender Discipline course is currently closed.

To be notified when registration re-opens & get a sweet discount, enter your email below.

Hi, I'm Jocelyn, host of the Hurry Slowly podcast and creator of the Tender Discipline course.

I have been lucky to accomplish some pretty cool things thus far in life: I created a bestselling book series at 99U, as well as a creative conference attended by folks from all over the world. In 2017, I launched my Hurry Slowly podcast and subsequently created a series of online courses — RESET, Hi-Fi, and Radiate — which thousands of folks have participated in. Alongside these pursuits, I have been practicing reiki and immersing myself in various healing modalities for many years.

But all of these “accomplishments” have really been practice containers for beginning to understand my own inner dialogue around motivation, self-worth, and achievement, and how it has been shaped by the culture and the technologies that surround me — and how I might remake that dialogue in a new image. One in which compassion and tenderness are at the root of how I motivate myself rather than perfectionism and self-criticism.

The impact of this inner work has been profoundly transformative — for myself and for everyone I touch. I would be honored to share what I have learned with you. Tender Discipline is an invitation to join me on the path.

Why I'm a trustworthy guide:

Over the past four years, I've worked with over 2,000 folks in various communities and courses. Here are a few of the kind words they have shared.

About Radiate:

“I can't thank you enough for this experience, it has truly and deeply changed me in ways I had never thought of before. It will have some really long-lasting effects on how I live my life, run my business, and raise my children.”

—Anna McAfee—

“I trust and appreciate you as someone who can guide me closer to myself — and as someone to help me navigate this world. It's not possible to fully describe what Radiate has meant to me, but I will say it truly has been a life-changing experience.”

—Ashley Bovin—

About Hi-Fi:

“Hand on heart, life is better after this course. I wouldn’t have thought an online experience could be so connecting and intimate and alive and fun.”

—Alice Ramsay—

“This is the best course I’ve ever taken. I feel the effects will be far-reaching and long-lasting. It has been transformational and helped me heal.”

—Cara Leopold—

About reset:

“RESET is the most humanistic method for professional development that I have ever experienced. It brought me energy and calm by reminding me of how much power we already possess.”

—Jesse Colby—

“RESET came at the perfect time for me. The tools I gained from the course have helped me create a new vision for myself. I’m excited and optimistic for the first time in years.”

—Karoline S.—

Who is this course for?

Tender Discipline is aligned for you if:

  • You are fed up with productivity & capitalism culture and would like to plant seeds for a new way of relating to the world
  • You suffer from perfectionism, relentless self-critique and/or any type of ongoing harsh internal dialogue or self-judgment
  • You are burnt out, or on your way to burnout, without a clear idea of what needs to change to get back on the path to health and vitality
  • You would like to embody, and/or advocate for, a more tender, compassionate approach to work & life

What the course offers:

  • Six 45-minute talks on how to shift your perspective and move into tenderness
  • Six 45-minute integration sessions with interactive exercises and Q&A
  • Four 75-minute guided energy meditations
  • A community forum space and optional journey groups for discussion & support
  • Weekly journal prompts for deeper reflection

The Tender Discipline course is currently closed.

To be notified when registration re-opens & get a sweet discount, enter your email below.