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About The Balance Institute

Miserably Successful.

I had the career, the house, the family, the life I'd worked twenty years for. Then I blew it all up.

This is the story of what shifted, what I learned, and what I wish someone had told me before I took such drastic action.
About The Balance Institute

 

Miserably Successful.

I had the career, the house, the family, the life I'd worked twenty years for. Then I blew it all up.

This is the story of what shifted, what I learned, and what I wish someone had told me before I took such drastic action.

Jo Stone, Founder & CEO

The founder's story

 

I had it all.
And I had no idea why I wasn't happy.

 

The Career

Asia Pacific Executive at 32. The title most people spend a career chasing.

Twenty years in global financial and professional services. Big teams across 6 countries. Big stakes. I was the one who got the midnight call from my Chairman before a hostile takeover and had a boardroom-ready plan by 8am. Four months pregnant. Across an ocean. I delivered. I always did.

 

The juggle

The career, the two young kids, the dream house, the triathlon training. All of it, all at once.

I wasn't just managing, I was excelling. From the outside, everything looked exactly as it should. On the inside, I was running on a cocktail of fumes and adrenaline so long I'd forgotten what it felt like to not be wired. Constantly busy. Perpetually guilty. Permanently redlining. Skipping pages of a bedtime story to prep for the next day.

The breaking point

I ended up in the emergency room with a suspected incurable autoimmune disease. And it was the full stop I didn't know I needed.

Everything I had built looked right from the outside. It felt like nothing on the inside. So I started changing things: the house, the job, almost the marriage. I blew it all up, assuming the circumstances were the problem. They weren't. The common denominator in everything was me.

 

The rebuild

One uncomfortable truth at a time. That's how I found my way back.

I'd tried the things you try. Retreats. Books. Productivity systems. None of it touched what was actually running underneath. I found the best coaches and mentors I could, and this time it was different, because the work was different. Not another strategy laid on top of an overloaded life. But the patterns underneath it. The perfectionism. The over-responsibility. The people-pleasing. Not personality traits - survival strategies I'd been running so long I'd mistaken them for who I was.

Things shifted quickly and I realised I wasn't alone. Thousands of women were living the same quiet contradiction: successful on paper, empty underneath.

They needed what I had found. They also didn't have time to waste. So I built it for them.

Jo Stone, Founder & CEO

The founder's story

 

I had it all.
And I had no idea why I wasn't happy.

 

The Career

Asia Pacific Executive at 32. The title most people spend a career chasing.

Twenty years in global financial and professional services. Big teams across 6 countries. Big stakes. I was the one who got the midnight call from my Chairman before a hostile takeover and had a boardroom-ready plan by 8am. Four months pregnant. Across an ocean. I delivered. I always did.

 

The juggle

The career, the two young kids, the dream house, the triathlon training. All of it, all at once.

I wasn't just managing, I was excelling. From the outside, everything looked exactly as it should. On the inside, I was running on a cocktail of fumes and adrenaline so long I'd forgotten what it felt like to not be wired. Constantly busy. Perpetually guilty. Permanently redlining. Skipping pages of a bedtime story to prep for the next day.

 
The breaking point

I ended up in the emergency room with a suspected incurable autoimmune disease. And it was the full stop I didn't know I needed.

Everything I had built looked right from the outside. It felt like nothing on the inside. So I started changing things: the house, the job, almost the marriage. I blew it all up, assuming the circumstances were the problem. They weren't. The common denominator in everything was me.

 

The rebuild

One uncomfortable truth at a time. That's how I found my way back.

I'd tried the things you try. Retreats. Books. Productivity systems. None of it touched what was actually running underneath. I found the best coaches and mentors I could, and this time it was different, because the work was different. Not another strategy laid on top of an overloaded life. But the patterns underneath it. The perfectionism. The over-responsibility. The people-pleasing. Not personality traits - survival strategies I'd been running so long I'd mistaken them for who I was.

Things shifted quickly and I realised I wasn't alone. Thousands of women were living the same quiet contradiction: successful on paper, empty underneath.

They needed what I had found. They also didn't have time to waste. So I built it for them.

You're not broken.
You're not behind.
You're running on an operating system that worked for twenty years and doesn't fit the life you actually want now.

Jo Stone  ·  Founder & CEO, The Balance Institute 
What makes us different

 

We look at your whole life. Not just the part that's the loudest. 

 

 

We assume you're already capable

You don't need to be fixed. You need a different success framework. Our work isn't about making you more, it's about helping you stop working against yourself.

 

 

We go deeper than productivity hacks

Better calendars and morning routines don't address what's actually running the show. We work on the patterns underneath, the beliefs, the behaviours, the unspoken trades you've been making for years. 

 

 

We don't separate work from life 

For ambitious women, they're the same thing. The meeting that ran long is the reason you snapped at your kids at bedtime. The patterns at work are the patterns at home. Trying to fix one without the other is why nothing sticks.

 

 

This is built for women who want to keep working

This isn't about stepping back. It's about going forward without it costing you your health, your relationships, or yourself. Ambition and ease are not opposites. We've got evidence from thousands of women to prove it.

THE TEAM 

We've walked this path ourselves. 

Every coach at The Balance Institute brings real-world experience, not just professional credentials. We know what it's like to be the woman in the room holding everything together. That's precisely why we're here. 

Jaclyn Urban-Luna

Body-Based Transformational Coach  ·  Los Angeles

 

Jaclyn works at the point where the mind stops being useful and the body takes over. Her specialism is helping women who are stuck in their heads - overthinking, second-guessing, unable to switch off - reconnect with what they already know. She blends psychology and neuro-somatic principles to create shifts that feel grounded, not just intellectual.

Jaclyn works with clients across all of our programs.

 

Jaclyn is a mother herself, navigating the same juggle, which means she brings both expertise and genuine understanding to the women she works with.

Sabina Lawrence

Mindset Coach & Former Global HR Leader  ·  Byron Bay

Sabina spent decades inside the corporate world before stepping out to help the women still in it. As a former Global HR Manager, she understands the specific pressures of high-performance environments, and how those pressures follow you home. Her approach blends practical strategy with deeper inner work, creating change that sticks.

Sabina works with clients across all of our programs.

 

Fifteen years of coaching. Multiple modalities. One consistent outcome: women who finally feel like themselves again.

Jaclyn Urban-Luna

Body-Based Transformational Coach  ·  Los Angeles

 

Jaclyn works at the point where the mind stops being useful and the body takes over. Her specialism is helping women who are stuck in their heads - overthinking, second-guessing, unable to switch off - reconnect with what they already know. She blends psychology and neuro-somatic principles to create shifts that feel grounded, not just intellectual.

Jaclyn works with clients across all of our programs.

 

Jaclyn is a mother herself, navigating the same juggle, which means she brings both expertise and genuine understanding to the women she works with.

Sabina Lawrence

Mindset Coach & Former Global HR Leader  ·  Byron Bay

Sabina spent decades inside the corporate world before stepping out to help the women still in it. As a former Global HR Manager, she understands the specific pressures of high-performance environments, and how those pressures follow you home. Her approach blends practical strategy with deeper inner work, creating change that sticks.

Sabina works with clients across all of our programs.

 

Fifteen years of coaching. Multiple modalities. One consistent outcome: women who finally feel like themselves again.

If any of this is landing, there's a next step.

 

Balance & Beyond is where the real work happens. Twelve weeks. Three coaches.
A cohort of women doing the same reckoning at the same time.
The patterns we know create miserable success, addressed at the root. 

 

The next Balance & Beyond cohort begins July 2026.

 

FIND OUT MORE ABOUT BALANCE & BEYOND

The Balance Institute acknowledges the Traditional Custodians of the land, the Wallumedegal people, on whose land we operate. We honour their continuing connection to this land and extend our deepest respect to Elders past and present.