"I Don't Want to Win the Trauma Olympics" — From First Employee to Sole Owner: Lana Hailemariam on Why Financial Literacy Is an Energy Problem

She was married nineteen years. When she left, she took twelve boxes, bought an air mattress, and had to almost beg a stranger to believe in her enough to sign a lease — because her credit was a mess. Lana Hailemariam is the CEO and sole owner of StandUP, a leadership development company serving community-serving organizations from the American Red Cross down to the local nonprofits nobody outside the neighborhood has heard of. She has owned a Gold's Gym franchise, an indoor football team, and a personal training company with four locations. She has worked in sales, event management, ministry, education, insurance, and the cheerleading industry. She speaks three languages. She holds a degree in International Business from the University of Maryland. And she did not found StandUP. She was its first employee. Years later, the woman who founded it sold it to her. In this episode of Plunge Into Prosperity, Lana walks through the seven levels of energy — an assessment-based framework that measures how your energy actually shows up in the world. Level one is living in the problem. Level two is blame. Most of us have presence in every level, and most of us have no language for any of it. Brandi Kolosky and Lana go far past the framework. They talk about the friend who said the sentence that changed everything: "because you're never gonna leave." They talk about the four hours Lana spent pulled over on the side of the road with her shoes off, grounding in the grass. They talk about epigenetics, inherited trauma, and the great-grandmother Brandi discovered in a concentration camp photograph — smiling. And then they talk about money. Only 1.1 percent of all capital raised and allocated in the world goes to women and multicultural led businesses. It used to be 2.3 percent. It went down. Lana says something in this episode about victim energy and financial access that most people would not say out loud — while being clear that the structural barriers are real. It is the most nuanced conversation on this show to date about who gets access to capital and what we do about it anyway. Lana has made her Energy Profile Quiz free for every listener. Twenty-five questions, a pie chart across all seven levels, and a detailed report on your primary.