Jennifer Pastiloff

Keynote Speaker

National Bestselling Author; Keynote Speaker; Disability Advocate; Visual Artist; Celebrated Yoga Teacher; Creator of the Shame Loss Movement

National bestselling author Jennifer Pastiloff provides experiences, not “lectures.” Funny, honest, and structured around the belief that no one has to prove their worthiness, Jen’s keynotes stay with audiences long after the event. Her work has been praised by Anne Lamott, Cheryl Strayed, George Saunders, Maggie Smith, Rich Roll, Monica Lewinsky, and more.

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Jennifer Pastiloff doesn’t give speeches. She creates experiences. Drawing on two decades of sold-out workshops, bestselling books On Being Human and Proof of Life (Dutton/Penguin Random House), and a life story that includes childhood trauma, grief, hearing loss, a life-threatening eating disorder, addiction, reinvention, and becoming a prolific painter as an adult, Jen meets audiences exactly where they are and moves them with fierce candor, humor, and wisdom. All of her signature talks are immediately actionable and stubbornly memorable. She is radically relatable and funny in ways that disarm people. Incidentally, she is deaf, which makes her the best listener in the room. Whether she’s speaking to a corporate leadership team, a graduating class, or a writers’ workshop, the result is the same: people leave more willing to be utterly themselves.

Featured Videos

Jennifer Pastiloff

Jennifer Pastiloff on Fear, Love, & Loss

Jennifer Pastiloff

Jennifer Pastiloff on the Importance of Daydreaming

Jennifer Pastiloff

Jennifer Pastiloff – Tedx Nothing You Do Is Wrong

Jennifer Pastiloff

Jennifer Pastiloff – Why We All Struggle With Self Worth

Jennifer Pastiloff’s Speech Topics

You Are Your Own Proof of Life – Stop Waiting for Permission. Start Living on Your Terms

Most of us are waiting for something: the right moment, the right credentials, someone else’s approval, to allow ourselves to fully show up. In this keynote, Jennifer Pastiloff dismantles the permission-seeking patterns that keep us small, while offering a radical reframe: you don’t need to prove anything, especially that you deserve your own life. Drawing on her national bestseller Proof of Life, Jen weaves memoir, humor, and exercises (including her beloved sticky note practice) into a talk that is equal parts rallying cry and practical toolkit. Audiences leave with Jen’s signature frameworks, including how to quiet the Inner Asshole, practice Shame Loss, and become their own permission slip.
Shame Loss: The Freedom of Being Fully Seen – What Happens When We Stop Hiding

Shame is the most universal of human experiences. It’s also the most corrosive to creativity, leadership, and authentic connection. In this talk, Jennifer Pastiloff introduces Shame Loss: a deliberate, often funny, and always transformative practice of letting go of harmful stories we carry about who we are and what we deserve. Drawing on her popular workshops, this keynote helps audiences identify where shame operates as a control system in their personal and professional lives, and what to do about it. Practical, emotionally intelligent, and grounded in actionable methodology, this is the talk for organizations ready to build cultures of genuine psychological safety and authentic leadership.
The Listening Body: What Deafness Taught Me About Human Connection – The Surprising Path to Being Truly Heard

Jennifer Pastiloff is deaf, reads lips, and mishears almost everything. Despite this (or because of it), she is one of the best listeners you’ll ever encounter. In this unique, hilarious, and deeply moving talk, Jen shares what it took to stop hiding in shame over her deafness and how that bravery transformed her life. Most of us hear with our ears, while Jen listens with her whole body. In this keynote, she’ll share tools for audiences to reframe the way they think about attention, presence, and compassion, both for themselves as well as for others. Hers is not an overcoming-adversity story. It’s one of acceptance about what it means to be a perfectly imperfect human, and a practical, humorous, and eye (ear) opening guide to the kind of listening that builds trust, loyalty, leadership skills, and long-lasting, genuine connection.
Begin Again: On Grief, Change, and the Courage to Expand – It’s Never Too Late. And It Was Never Too Early

At eight years old, Jennifer Pastiloff’s beloved father died suddenly after she screamed I hate you to him. She locked her feelings inside and refused to grieve, deciding that change equaled death. Both quietly and ruthlessly, that belief ran her life. In this keynote, Jen dismantles that fallacy in real time as she shares about: having a baby at forty-one, buying a house, leaving a marriage, falling in love, becoming a prolific painter as an adult, navigating her mother’s Alzheimer’s diagnosis, and choosing sobriety, all while writing a second national bestseller. This talk is not about bypassing or overcoming the things that show up in our lives, but rather about letting go of harmful stories we tell ourselves that make change feel like an annihilation rather than an invitation for expansion. With humor, vulnerability, and hard-won tools, Jen helps audiences identify their own limiting beliefs so they may begin rewriting them.
Nothing You Do Is Wrong: The Art of Creative Permission – How to Create and Live Without the Voice That Says You’re Doing It Wrong

The voice that says you’re doing it wrong or tells you that you aren’t enough is the enemy of creation. It’s also the enemy of authentic leadership, genuine connection, and a life that feels wholly yours. Drawn from her acclaimed TEDx talk and decades of On Being Human workshops, Jen Pastiloff explores the mechanisms that shut us down (the Inner Asshole in her terminology) and offers tangible practices for quieting it, at least enough so that it’s not running the show. This keynote is participatory: audiences write, share, laugh, (sometimes cry), and always, always surprise themselves. It’s for writers, executives, educators, doctors and medical workers, caregivers, and anyone who’s ever been stopped by the voice that says you suck or not yet.

Works by Jennifer Pastiloff

Jennifer Pastiloff
Proof of Life: Let Go, Let Love, and Stop Looking for Permission to Live Your Life
Jennifer Pastiloff
On Being Human: A Memoir of Waking Up, Living Real, and Listening Hard

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Jennifer Pastiloff Topics & Types

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