Latest / The Generalist World Pod / Leaning into wintering

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Leaning into wintering · The Generalist World Pod

• 0:00
  Hey, it's Millie, and welcome to the Generalist World Podcast. This is the podcast for people who have never fit into a box at work, and to be honest, we don't really want to.
• 0:09
  Every week, I chat with a new member of Generalist World, and I share their stories, their philosophies, their frameworks of how they are living their life and creating work that actually aligns with their generalist skill set.
• 0:22
  So if you are someone who has had a non-linear, squiggly career, this is the podcast for you. Alice, we got Alice in the studio. Welcome. Thank you, Millie. Thank you for having me.
• 0:34
  Oh, so great to have you here, and there is a bunch of different threads that I want to pull on. But I wonder if we could start with this idea of squiggly careers.
• 0:46
  I know this has been something that's, like, really formed and resonated for you. And so why does that resonate? What is it about squiggly careers that you feel drawn to? Yes.
• 0:57
  And it took a few years in my career before I heard about it, and then I thought, "Yes, this is what I've been missing, and now it makes sense."
• 1:05
  Through university, I was studying engineering, and my first job was in engineering, but I was trying out different teams, and my boss was very much like, "You don't need to be an expert. You're good at other things."
• 1:15
  And I was very confused by this because expert was sort of linked to progression. And actually, I really enjoyed being in different teams and lots of teams knowing who I was and wanting to help out in different ways.
• 1:27
  And my interests were really general, and I was helping lots of different disciplines.
• 1:31
  And then I took an interest in project management, in big bid management, in enormous global event management, and then sustainability. And I felt like I was wandering a lost path and hadn't found what I was doing.
• 1:43
  So when someone said, "Oh, you can just move and squiggle, and actually that's, that's your thing in itself," I was like, "Yes. That covers my personal life and my work life. I'm...
• 1:55
  I've got so much use in so many different areas. Oh, I'm so glad to have seen that."
• 2:00
  I remember the moment when my friend Hannah introduced me to Generalist World, and I remember thinking, "Oh, [laughs] there's other people like me. Oh, here's my people. I can do it. We're not different. We're great."
• 2:12
  And I think it took maybe six years to get to the point where I said, "I'm not an expert, I'm cool with that, and I'm a generalist, and that's great in its own right," and I'm so confident with it now.
• 2:25
  Whoop, whoop, whoop, whoop, whoop. Uh, James, James our producer, can we get some, like, celebration horns or something? [party horns blowing] [laughs] Like, yeah.
• 2:33
  [laughs] That is unreal and so amazing to hear because I was in the exact same boat, like the exact same boat where I was like, "Oh man, I've made such a mistake here [laughs] by not specializing."
• 2:46
  So it, it kind of felt like a mistake, but it also felt like it wasn't an option 'cause I was like- Mm...
• 2:51
  "I'm just not someone who can, like, pretend to be really interested in this really narrow thing for 40 hours a week for the next 40 years. I can't do it. It's just not gonna work."
• 3:03
  And there is such a relief that comes with finding, like, other people who see the world this way. So what does it... What does your work look like today? What are you up to?
• 3:14
  So for the last few years, I have been working in sustainability. And I feel a real proudness of saying I work in sustainability.
• 3:21
  And at the moment, that is in the built environment, helping both public and private sector make their buildings more energy efficient and resilient to future climates.
• 3:34
  So that can look like reducing energy bills from energy efficiency. That can look like renewable generation to then make the cost of energy less because you're in- generating it on site.
• 3:45
  So you're making your utility bills less because you're becoming self-reliant. And because you do the work on the building fabric, you're more resilient to future climates as well.
• 3:55
  So where in the past it was a do it for low carbon, it's now do it 'cause it makes business sense. Mm, which is a compelling argument, right? It ought to be.
• 4:04
  [laughs] That's how, that's how you get, I don't know, the masses. It reminds me a little bit of, like, you know how people can be quite disconnected to, like, where their food comes from. It's just like- Mm...
• 4:13
  you go into a supermarket, and it's like, "Oh, I get avocados 365 days of the year," but you don't really question what is that chain, what is that supply, how are those avocados being there 365 days a year.
• 4:26
  And for a long time, I felt the same about energy in that I turned the light on, and it generally turned on. And I didn't really think, "Where is this coming from, and how is it being powered?"
• 4:38
  And it was only when I moved to this little island and we had a lot of power cuts [laughs] because we were so remote, and yeah, sometimes our power would be off for many days.
• 4:49
  And it s- got me thinking much more about energy, and it was the first time I heard the words fuel poverty. Mm-hmm. And it was quite like a... I was like, "Well, what is that? What does that mean?"
• 5:00
  Again, it hasn't been in my, in my frame. Can you speak to that a little bit? Like, what does it mean? What, what is fuel poverty, and why should people care about it?
• 5:09
  That's not one I've spent a lot of time looking at, but you're, you're right.
• 5:13
  There's just an assumption that certain things are always available, whether that's access to food, to energy, to water, to internet, to information, I suppose.
• 5:25
  I guess how I kind of came to see it was that in, particularly in Scotland, we produce an enormous amount of energy, and yet where I was living on this little island, there was some of, like, the highest energy bills in the countries.
• 5:39
  And it was only then that I connected, like, oh, we're producing it, but why is it not, like...
• 5:44
  And so to kind of tie it back to, like, sustainability, you said that you're really proud to work in the space, which number one, I think what an amazing thing to be able to say, that you're really proud to be able to work in the space.
• 5:56
  What is it that drew you to sustainability? So one of the big things, I actually live in Bristol in the UK, and it's a big sustainability hub. It's an echo chamber that I delight in being inside, [laughs] if I'm honest.
• 6:09
  It's very open, very inclusive, very diverse. And just living here for my job, I realize how much sustainability becomes part and parcel of your, of your day-to-day at the small individual scale.
• 6:21
  So whether that's refilling your jars, repairing your jumper, making your own b- bread, growing your own. Those are the small actions that you, that you build, and the, you know, the secondhand market.
• 6:32
  And that was my initial interest.
• 6:34
  I started looking in a way to do it through my, through my first job, and that was helping with our first carbon footprint and net zero target, and working as an environmental champion in the business on electric vehicles, and it really just scaled out of that.
• 6:48
  And that's when I pivoted. That was my first job pivot from engineering to sustainability. And I'm forever grateful for the company that did that. They let me say,
• 6:56
  "You've got a, a token of knowledge but a ton of experience that will transfer across. You might go back a step, you might do a sideways step, but you get thrown in the deep end. You apply your other skills."
• 7:07
  And I learned about carbon footprinting, about packaging, about net zero, about energy, and it all starts scaling from that. And the biggest bit you can have your control over is your energy use. Mm.
• 7:18
  So that's where energy comes from, and you look at generating on-site, but it's also about reducing your need for energy in the first place, and then it's that, that resilience element, so.
• 7:26
  I know you have moved to a tiny house, and that was very exciting. And I'm just seeing all these little micro actions, and I'm like, "She's becoming very self-sustainable- [laughs]...
• 7:35
  and I don't even know what I'm doing." That's the plan, Alice. That's the plan. Or I, I like the idea of, like, resilient.
• 7:43
  Like, I don't, I don't necessarily want to, you know, move completely off grid and be away from people. And I'm like, I love being in community.
• 7:51
  I love having neighbors that I can help and work with, where I can also see that the world is heading into this, like, quite unpredictable, quite unstable, very, very fast-changing...
• 8:02
  I mean, I was just down your way for a festival, and the drought was like nothing I've ever seen. Mm-hmm. It was like a desert. Mm. The, the land was so dry.
• 8:12
  And I think climate change is something that, you know, you and I would've both grown up with the word- Mm... almost maybe to the point it doesn't mean so much, 'cause you grow up hearing it.
• 8:23
  But it's now, I think, getting to the point where we're seeing it and we're feeling it every day, and it's not, I don't think, sustainability or kind of resilience can be, like, an afterthought anymore.
• 8:34
  It's like, actually, what are we doing today? Absolutely. And climate risk is a great topic for that. It converts the climate change into a business financial risk.
• 8:46
  And even a year or two ago we were saying, "Oh, we're gonna pass these tipping points. We've got this 1.5 degree threshold. We know we're on track for that."
• 8:56
  Now, in the last just few days, weeks alone, we've been hitting some highest records that are akin to sort of 1.8 degrees warming, and that's wild. You know, I've been in Winchester earlier this month, and it was dry.
• 9:08
  There was dust. It's, there's wildfires all over the country, and it's really shocking, and it's really apparent. It is. How do you, like, balance? This is something I don't- Mm... know how to do.
• 9:20
  'Cause when I think about it too much, I'm like, "Ah!" Yeah. Like, uh, we...
• 9:25
  It's, it's too late and, or we don't have enough momentum, like, collective momentum, and then it's easy to fall into this, like, apathy of, "All right. Well, it'll be what it'll be. Throw my hands up."
• 9:38
  So, like, how do you... 'Cause I imagine you spend a lot of time thinking about this. This is, like, your work.
• 9:42
  And how do you, like, protect yourself, like, your mental health and being able to, like, yeah, keep moving forward when we are talking, like, about, like, you know, we're talking about extinction events every day, when, like, species are disappearing every single day.
• 9:57
  How do you, like, stay positive enough to, like, keep going every day? That's a big question. It does. [laughs] It's a lot. And when you, when I'm thinking about my own choices in life in five, 10, 20 years,
• 10:11
  it is a huge stakeholder in those decisions. What will the world be like in 20 years from now? Will that be full of robots? Will that be dry? What will the energy stability like? What will the food situation be like? And
• 10:26
  I don't know, and I don't know if I'm gonna love those. What I do is I really curate my news feed to topics that I do care about.
• 10:34
  I do hear about the rest of the world, but there are some particular news feeds that I follow that keep it more focused and more science-based about other technologies, about really positive things happening.
• 10:45
  There's a lot of great work going on in regenerative agriculture.
• 10:49
  And in fact, an ex-colleague of mine now makes coffee in a regenerative way, in small batches, in shaded forests, so that you don't require deforestation, and they co-plant cereals to re- renourish the ground.
• 11:00
  And there's, there's some really fantastic pockets of really great work, and I no longer think that that's the minority. I think where carbon was originally spoken about, nature's now getting a seat at the table.
• 11:11
  It's a really cool stat. Nature is, like, one of the strongest, like, defenses against climate change for biodiversity, or biodiversity is our strongest natural defense against climate.
• 11:24
  I s- and I curate my LinkedIn feed as well, so I follow some big nature names as well, and I think that helps create this big body and momentum of people are doing things in the right way.
• 11:35
  E- even the countries that have, are less developed, they're actually really, like, jumping, like, light years ahead in terms of really simple solutions that are more energy efficient, use resources in a better way, are more self-resilient, and that just creates a big body of positivity that there is hope.
• 11:50
  Mm. And then lastly, surrounding people around me who share that view, who challenge that view, but again, provide that body and evidence that there is something to be working towards.
• 12:00
  Well, I'm so glad that there is this body of people who, in big and small ways, are doing this work. What is your, like, day-to-day kinda look like?
• 12:10
  I know that you kind of went from being an engineer to more, like, helping engineers collaborate. Can you speak more about, like, what you do? Yeah.
• 12:20
  It's, it's so funny 'cause I work in a, in a team of engineers, and I'm pretty sure my job description says something about doing engineering.
• 12:26
  But for a while now, the job description has just been, like, a thing that puts you in the, in the company rather than what you do. [laughs] And I, I love that. And people say, "Oh, what do you do?"
• 12:35
  And I'm like, "Hmm, what do I do at the minute? You're right. What am I solving right now?" And I would say
• 12:42
  what I really love that I do is that your stereotypical engineer who is very comfortable in a linear career, and they're experts, and we love them for that, they like to work in their silo, in their box, and they know their bit really well.
• 12:56
  What they might not do is know their relating disciplines, or they'll be speaking to a second discipline and still have a gap or a problem that they can't put their finger on.
• 13:07
  And what I really like that I can do is go, "Well, that sounds like an instrumentation problem," or, "That sounds like a structural problem. I happen to know the person that can help you with that.
• 13:18
  Let's bring them into the room." I'll often be the, you know, the extra person in the room to facilitate that conversation.
• 13:24
  I've then got enough knowledge to keep it on track and get a tangible action out of that and enable them to make progress.
• 13:31
  So what I say is my super strength is enabling multi different disciplines to come together and to help them collaborate with no ego on my part in the room to help them be their best versions of themselves, where the sum is greater than the parts, and then also do that on time, to schedule, to cost, in a better way than last time.
• 13:50
  [laughs] Amazing. Have you taken the archetype quiz, like the generalist quiz? No. I'm curious, like...
• 13:57
  Well, 'cause when you were speaking just then, I was like, "Well, it sounds like you're a translator," but then I'm also hearing some connector in there. Mm.
• 14:04
  'Cause you're not just translating, you're then like, "Oh, and I know this person." Do you remember what your quiz results were? In a classic generalist way, I had elements of all. [laughs] Yeah.
• 14:14
  [laughs] The strongest, I guess, was connector and translator. I spot gaps, join dots, help them understand the gaps. [laughs] I love this.
• 14:24
  Shout out to Ramiro who developed that quiz, the, which is just the gift that keeps on giving. Okay, so I'm curious, like, people listening, maybe let's say they're an engineer- Mm...
• 14:35
  and they are in this position where they're like, "Ooh, Alice is, uh, kind of speaking my language. Like, I wanna do that, but I have no idea how. I'm stuck in this box. I'm in my, my rigid box."
• 14:46
  What steps could they take? Who could they speak to? What... How should they... How could they think about it to maybe get to become more of this energy that you've cultivated? Thank you for saying my energy.
• 14:57
  Cultivated is s- so worth going after. [laughs] I love that. I have reflected that what you study at university doesn't have to link to what you do, and I didn't realize that for a long time.
• 15:10
  And again, if you are in engineering and those around you are following a path, you don't have people around you to say there are other options.
• 15:19
  So what I've said to other people who are interested in sustainability, regardless of their background actually, is find an area you are interested in, be that nature, be that packaging design, be that energy,
• 15:31
  and find someone in there, have a conversation, understand it. Because for any of those industries, there is a team of people. There'll be an engineering function within that.
• 15:41
  And even if it's not an engineering role, because you have such great understanding of first principles, of data, of modeling, of pattern tracking, there are so many transferable skills, I think it's getting away from the need to have a title that matches the last one.
• 16:00
  And it's not saying just follow your passion, it's saying if you have an interest level, there'll be a transferable role, and just speak to people and network and understand it and go for something.
• 16:09
  I, I also love this idea of starting with the problem that you care about. Mm. Because you just, like, you just never know what the thread might lead to.
• 16:18
  Like, when I think of my last big transition, which I was like, "I don't know what I wanna do. I'm a generalist. I'm like... I got all the... I could do anything."
• 16:27
  And I was like, "Okay, Millie, let's try and narrow it down a little bit. Like, what do you care about?" And I really...
• 16:33
  I had just gone through this amazingly transformative therapy journey for many years, and I was like, "I really care about, like, people's mental health.
• 16:41
  I think that mental health is, like, really pivotal to the society, but I don't wanna go become a therapist. I don't wanna go, like, train for four years, five years, six years to, you know, be a psychologist."
• 16:52
  And so that is what led me to working with my previous job, which was a mental health tech company.
• 16:57
  I was like, "Oh, I care about this problem, and I can apply all these skills of entrepreneurship and building companies to this company." And that job was the director of miscellaneous.
• 17:08
  So that job was the one that was, like, the, the seed for everything generalist world.
• 17:15
  And I just share that little tidbit for people who haven't heard it, because sometimes you just need to take a direction, and you're like, you...
• 17:23
  I think if you're, like, trying to decide what to do next and it feels like you've got zillions of options,
• 17:31
  just picking a line, and a line that, you know, if you really care about a problem, that's a pretty good line to pick, and then you don't know where the next steps will unfold.
• 17:41
  But sometimes that momentum can be really helpful. I think that's a really common problem with generalists because you are so capable. It's not really what can you do, it's more what can't you do?
• 17:51
  'Cause I know there's a, a very short list of things that I just... my brain just doesn't work with, and that's, like, enormous big data and software. I've tried them many times. They're not for me.
• 18:01
  But anything else, I'll give a good go at. And I think, so your options at every junction are, "Well, there's 100 things here. Oh, there's 100 things here," and it can be really overwhelming.
• 18:09
  So having that funnel of, you know, what do I care about? When I, when I speak to my mentees, I say, "What are your strengths and what are your interests?
• 18:19
  Draw that little graph, and then look at that top quadrant and focus there." It can be as simple as that.
• 18:25
  I think sometimes when I'm also, like, coaching or speaking to people, they want this, like, really complex formula of, like, this is how you...
• 18:32
  And it's like, it can be as simple as what are your strengths and what are your interests, and play in that zone as much as you can.
• 18:41
  I wanted to talk to you about, a little bit about your, some of the, like, the work philosophies or mental models that you kind of live by, and one of them that I loved to read was around assuming positive intent.
• 18:54
  Can you speak to that a bit? Yes.
• 18:58
  I did a industrial secondment as a grad to a particularly large manufacturing company, and because I was embedded, you hear all different things, and they had something called assuming positive intent,
• 19:10
  and I hadn't heard about it before. And being a young female engineer in a male-dominated environment,
• 19:16
  as a young [laughs], petite female engineer, there were lots of things that you'd hear or see and just be [laughs] like, "What? What?"
• 19:26
  I remember I wore a, a, a red dress to work, and someone said, "Are you power dressing today?" I'm like, "No, I'm just wearing some color because you're all wearing gray."
• 19:33
  [laughs] Um, and, you know, if you apply the, the, the positive intent lens, whether someone comes from a different background, uh, a different workplace, anything that someone says to you that doesn't land right- Mm...
• 19:48
  apply a assume positive intent lens first. Mm. Mm. And it may be that they mean well, they just don't know how to articulate it, and I think it just gives everybody a beat, a bit of grace to have a good chance. Yeah.
• 20:03
  And this rule is something I think about a lot on the internet. A lot, a lot. Like, comments, threads, particularly even in GW, like, we have... M- for many people, English is not their first language. Mm.
• 20:16
  And so sometimes things can come out quite direct. Mm. That is one of the... They'll... And people who if it is your first language and have this kind of like deeper nuance can be like, "That sounded a bit harsh."
• 20:27
  And it's like, okay, but what happens if we put this lens we're assuming positive intent? And I find that so much of this can be resolved with assuming positive intent and asking a question.
• 20:39
  Like, clarifying, "Oh, what did you mean by that?" Or, "Could you say that a different way?" And gosh, the internet would be a very different place if, if we assumed positive intent a- and our workplaces. Yeah.
• 20:52
  And even not just written words, I mean, in actions as well. You... I think particularly with how people explain their emotions differently.
• 20:59
  If you're in an in-person scenario and someone's running late, you could have somebody who's feeling a bit tense getting frustrated at someone who's running late. Mm.
• 21:06
  And actually, there's a very valid reason why that person's running late. They may always be late. It may be on that occasion. When they arrive, the value they bring to the room is no less. Mm.
• 21:16
  So let's apply a, a positive intent lens and not get annoyed at someone's particular behavior on the edges if the value they bring is still useful. I love this.
• 21:24
  I think, uh, especially if people haven't heard that before, it, it's also one that's really stuck with me. I wonder if we could talk about predictions.
• 21:32
  Like, from your perspective, what do you predict what is coming in, say, the next 12 to 24 months? There's been a lot of change politically. Mm. That seems to always be on the back burner. Yeah.
• 21:48
  Climate is accelerating really quickly. I know in the last few months I've seen the huge value of community in my own life.
• 21:57
  So I think it's finding what's resonating f- for you, for yourself, and finding people who align with that.
• 22:05
  So if there's a challenge around, you know, when you've got, got the US elections, the midterms, that will change things up. The winter could be a whole wild storm. Uh, so preparing ourselves for that.
• 22:18
  And with winter coming up as well, thinking about what we want to get rid of and what we want to keep through that, through that period of time is probably having a good clear out and keeping close to what's important, and really working on that.
• 22:31
  If that answers your... Well, how would I manage the next 12 to 18 months, 24 months, and what's coming? I think half the time we don't know what's coming other than wild storms in many different flavors. Yeah.
• 22:42
  But that's actually a great answer, because no one knows what's coming. I don't know, you don't know, no one knows. It's all predictions, right?
• 22:50
  I think we can get a sense from history and from where the world is now as to where we're heading, and it's a great thing, you know.
• 22:57
  It, it's a great thing to, to have folks recognize that maybe the winter is a giant storm, and how might we, like, think about that, and what might we do today to kind of prepare for that? What do you do?
• 23:10
  How do you think about it? My local cycling group have a running joke, but they've come to, they've come to understand now that I [laughs] I only ride in the summer 'cause I do other things in the winter. Yeah.
• 23:22
  And when I arrive every spring they're like, "Oh, summer's here." [laughs] "You've arrived." 'Cause I just, I just lean into having other things that I do in winter.
• 23:29
  I go inside and I do my indoor hobbies that are very re- restorative, creative. You know, you've picked your berries from outside, you're making into your syrups for the winter to stay healthy.
• 23:40
  You've got your creative tasks that have fallen by the wayside ready for the indoor times. Mm. You know, all those sorts of things really. You're like a daffodil. You just, like, pop up back in spring.
• 23:50
  [laughs] Gotta hibernate, gotta recover. I think if we look to nature and these cycles, and the more I read about wintering and animals that hibernate, you can't be on 100% 10 hours a day every day.
• 24:04
  You know, there are natural cycles. If you look at humans in history- Yeah... you have longer days in summer. You, you make hay whilst the sun shines, literally. Mm.
• 24:11
  And then in winter we sleep more, we rest more, we prepare. You gather in summer- Yeah... sow in autumn, and then survive the winter and pop out in spring. I was, I was gonna mention wintering.
• 24:21
  I'm assuming you've read it. I have read wintering. Excellent book. Excellent book. And like, a breath of fresh air really, because we aren't machines that you can just add some oil to and we run 24/7, 365 days a year.
• 24:36
  But I feel like there is a pressure from society to do that, and I don't know if you've ever looked into, like our calendar, how like January 1st wasn't always the beginning- Mm...
• 24:47
  of the year, like it used to be the end of the year. I believe it was after Halloween. Oh, interesting. So it like finished around then, and then people started hibernating for the winter. Mm.
• 24:58
  But now it's like January 1st, depths of winter, the darkest time of the year in the, in the Northern Hemisphere, and all right, let's set some goals. [laughs] Let's change our lives today. Pretty wild.
• 25:10
  So if you're listening to this in December, maybe give yourself a little bit of grace. It's all made up. The calendar is made up. We made it up. We just picked a day. [laughs] And continue to give yourself grace- Mm...
• 25:22
  until maybe May. Mm. I don't know, I find that the accumulation of winter really builds into [laughs] February and March, where the, the mud is the hardest to cycle through. [laughs] Yeah.
• 25:32
  My year is very much built around [laughs] cycling, and it's, and, and it is very wet in Bristol in, in April. So you know, if you're- Mm... feeling it's still tricky, then that's okay. Mm.
• 25:41
  You can start to come out and flourish from the spring. And you're like the daffodils, you're very resilient. Whenever I see a daffodil out, I'm like, "Oh, you're out very early."
• 25:50
  [laughs] And then like the storms will come and batter, and they're kinda like hanging over a bit, but they're like... Oh, oh, they're some resilient, resilient flowers, those daffodils.
• 26:00
  I wonder, is there anything you wanna share about, you know, what it's been like to be a part of GW? I know that you said coming across it, it was like, "Oh, my God," like, "This is... I'm not the only one." Yeah.
• 26:11
  Anything you wanna share about what that experience has been like? I followed your content for the longest time.
• 26:17
  [laughs] And that is the real like theme and golden thread of what I love about Generalist World, from little essays that talk about how to present yourself or toolkits, how to say why you're even better because of the journey that you've been on.
• 26:32
  You've created how people join in different ways over time. I was part of a cohort, and I'm leaning into more of the events that happened lately.
• 26:40
  And I think what's great is you can either join a different in-person day every year and meet the wildest, m- broader than you ever thought possible- [laughs]... absolutely, group of people on a, on Generalist World day.
• 26:53
  Did that last year and my mind was like, "Wow. [laughs] This is bigger." And then seeing, you know, the jobs board that comes through, and that's a wacky thing as well.
• 27:02
  Having some lovely sessions with EJ and Mildred about hearing how much you want to curate a space that really meets with people. You're really open to feedback, and every email I see is, what's the feedback?
• 27:14
  How is this helpful? How is this useful? Mm. The essays from different subjects that you can just really align with. Mm.
• 27:22
  I think in a particular time of so much noise and so many newsletters, there's lots that I've unsubscribed to. Mm. But I've kept the Generalist World ones- Yay... because they are varied, not...
• 27:33
  They're the right frequency, and you know what they'll be, so you kinda say- Mm... "Oh, not today, but other one, yes, I'll keep that one."
• 27:39
  And it's just a nice little light every now and again that there's people like you, that a, a month doesn't go by that I haven't thought about the value of people like me in this- Mm...
• 27:50
  effervescent cloud that's just around. [laughs] I, I think I need to write down, "Broader than you ever thought possible," because- [laughs]... that is so on point.
• 28:00
  Like, sometimes people will join and I'm like, "How many lives have you lived?" [laughs] Like, how, w- how do you have hours in the day and months in the year?
• 28:11
  And I just find it really inspiring to be like, oh, there are so many people living, living and working differently in a way that, you know, we thought it had to be this very specific follow this exact path.
• 28:22
  And I'm like, "That's bullshit." [laughs] You, you can, you can really design and shift and change your mind as many times as you like. Like, you've got one...
• 28:31
  I just was recording a podcast earlier today with Sarah, one of our members from Glasgow, and she quoted that quote where it was like, you know, "What will you do with your one wild and precious life?" And it's so true.
• 28:43
  It's like, oh, imagine getting to the, the end of your career and be like, "Well, I really spent
• 28:48
  40, 50 years of my one wild and precious life doing something that I didn't even enjoy or that, like, I was doing it for somebody else, for the benefit or the approval of someone else."
• 29:00
  And I think it's just really great to maybe winter it. Winter is the time to stop and ask these questions, like, "How am I spending my time?" Yeah.
• 29:08
  If you look about the different generations, in even just my parents' generation, you had a job for life. Mm. And maybe you didn't love it, but it was important to have a stability of work. Mm-hmm.
• 29:20
  And I think now we can just disregard that a little bit. Mm. Speaking to your predictions of the future, I've...
• 29:27
  Since I've seen your research in the world of work and the future of where it's going, the more portfolio career, I see a lot of the latest generation, how they treat work, and it's less about the, the hustle.
• 29:42
  It's more about the balance. It's, "I'm not gonna work harder or longer, I'm going to work smarter." Mm-hmm.
• 29:48
  And I think with the advent of AI, I think with the advent of freelance work or moonlighting or all the different, different ways you can earn, I am really seeing that come to fruition and come to life.
• 29:59
  People do want a unicorn for their job roles. I think that's never gonna go away. I think the job title will still be very confusing and not really necessarily be helpful and...
• 30:08
  [laughs] But I'm seeing a lot of my friends actually start to build up a freelance on the side and maybe go part-time. Mm. Maybe do something on a Friday afternoon or a weekend and bring different streams in.
• 30:20
  And it's certainly different to how I've seen our parents' generation do it. You can change jobs if you want to. You know, you're not rewarded for loyalty necessarily. And it's really refreshing to go, actually-
• 30:32
  I know those are the rules, but what works for me? Yeah.
• 30:36
  You can now got all these online marketplaces and all these different ways to create a life for yourself, and you can just re-restore what, I guess, what value means for you. I love this. Such a good reminder.
• 30:47
  I wonder, is there anything that I haven't asked you that you really wish you had a chance to speak about while we've got everyone listening? I think it's going back to that resilience and self-sufficiency piece. Mm-hmm.
• 30:58
  If you really extrapolate, you take the rest of the world's noise and just put that on one side for a second. I think a way that we can do well with that is be resilient in our own, in our own little bubbles.
• 31:12
  So you building the community around yourself that, you know, helps your soul.
• 31:17
  We relearn some older skills, whether that's, like, what you can find from your hedgerows, what's it you can grow in the garden, a bit of, like, self-sufficiency.
• 31:25
  'Cause if you're getting a bit more self-sufficient around your energy or your food or your, like, herbs and whatnot, your, you've got a little bit of a buffer between you and the outside world.
• 31:34
  And I think in the, in a period of noise, relearning those old crafts will do a world of good. Preaching to the choir. Uh, I am so in on this, and I'm so new relatively.
• 31:48
  Like, my, my knowledge is still so nascent, but learning to forage is such a life-changing thing. I'm like, "What do you mean all this food is here and it's free?"
• 31:58
  And it's like, wow, it's on my doorstep, and I can just go pick it. And then I can turn into fuel. Like, it's... Somewhere along the way, we went really wrong in losing this knowledge.
• 32:12
  Um, it's the same with, like, don't get me started actually, but with, like, fermentation. I did a workshop with a woman who, her name's Janice. She is the most passionate person I've ever met about anything.
• 32:23
  Uh, she ferments everything and puts it everywhere. It's, like, her face. Yeah, she eats it. All her clothes are, like, ferments. And yeah, it was her that said, you know, this was, like, a survival skill.
• 32:35
  Our ancestors, not so long ago, like two generations, if they couldn't preserve food, they would die in the winter. There was no, you couldn't go to Aldi and, like, you know- There weren't avocados every day of the week.
• 32:47
  There weren't avocados. And so I'm so for this because not only is it a useful skill, it connects you back to your food and the land and your environment.
• 32:59
  And I think that can only be a net positive for, like, it's like you start with your bubble. You become resilient in your bubble. That can only be a net positive for the rest of the world. Yeah.
• 33:09
  It's so good for your mental health to go on a... I mean, even just at the weekend, I was picking fruit from fruit trees, go for walks on natural walkways and picking berries.
• 33:19
  Then you come home, and you make little syrups that will help you feel healthier over winter. And then every time you have some of that, you're reminded of that.
• 33:25
  You know, every week that I bake bread, the feeling does not get old. [laughs] Yeah. I love it. [laughs] It is so great, and it just, it brings you those little moments of joy that you can do it yourself. Yes, exactly.
• 33:37
  Like, for, from a self-esteem perspective, it's so good for your self-esteem. Like, wow, I come back with these, like, purple-stained fingers- [laughs]... from, like, all my blackberry picking.
• 33:47
  I'm like, this is not that cute. But, like, I now have a freezer full of berries that I didn't need to pay for, and there's no pesticides or anything on them. They're just wild, so.
• 33:59
  The first time you eat a homegrown cucumber, it's like nothing else. [laughs] You, you can't beat it. Never go back. Just, it's true, though. It's actually, growing your own food kind of ruins the supermarket.
• 34:09
  You're like, kind of tastes like nothing. Like, where's the, where's the taste? So this episode, it's, it's kinda niche. I wonder how many people are gonna be [laughs] gonna be into, like, foraging. It's very wholesome.
• 34:20
  It feels very accepting. [laughs] Very wholesome.
• 34:23
  If folks are still listening, and they're like, "Oh, my gosh, this sounds right up my alley or right up my hedgerow," maybe we should say, please, like, comment and share and, like, tag me and Alice in this because I think this is such a, a conversation I would just love to see more and more people having.
• 34:39
  I would love to see more people, even on LinkedIn, and every... You know, it is a space for thought leadership, but I think it is a knowledge that we should grow and we should share.
• 34:49
  Sharing seasonal things, knowledge that helps us connect with our environment in a time where it's so needed and so useful. Yeah. I think I'll start doing it a little bit more. Rooting for you always.
• 35:01
  Alice, thank you so much for coming on. This has been so wholesome. You nailed it, such a wholesome chat, and I'm really excited to share it with everyone. Thank you so much for having me, Millie.
• 35:10
  It's been wonderful to meet you and speak with you today.