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Elisa Haggarty: How to Find Your Flow & Have More Energy · The Bold Lounge

• 0:07
  SPEAKER_01: Welcome to the Bold Lounge Podcast.
• 0:10
  SPEAKER_01: My name is Lee Burgess and I will be your host.
• 0:13
  SPEAKER_01: If you're anything like me, you love hearing inspiring stories of people who have gone on bold journeys and made a positive impact in the world.
• 0:20
  SPEAKER_01: This podcast is all about those kinds of stories.
• 0:23
  SPEAKER_01: Every week we'll hear from someone who is taken to lead or marked on an extraordinary thing.
• 0:28
  SPEAKER_01: In addition to hearing their stories, we'll also learn about their bold world mindset that they use to make things content.
• 0:35
  SPEAKER_01: Whether they faced challenges or doubt along the way, they persisted, and ultimately achieved their goals.
• 0:41
  SPEAKER_01: These impactful stories will leave you feel motivated and inspired to pursue your own culture.
• 0:46
  SPEAKER_01: I believe everyone has a bold story waiting to be free.
• 0:50
  SPEAKER_01: Tune in and get ready to do the five.
• 0:58
  SPEAKER_01: Welcome to the bold lounge.
• 1:00
  SPEAKER_01: Today I have Elisa Haggerty, very excited to introduce all the listeners to her.
• 1:04
  SPEAKER_01: She is a organizational consultant, a conscious leadership coach, and the podcast host of the School of Unlearning.
• 1:11
  SPEAKER_01: Nice to meet you.
• 1:12
  SPEAKER_00: Thanks, Lee, for having me.
• 1:13
  SPEAKER_00: I'm really excited to be here and I have some bold stories to share.
• 1:16
  SPEAKER_00: So I love that you reached out.
• 1:18
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I'm ready to jump in.
• 1:19
  SPEAKER_01: So we connected through Claude Silver, which is fun.
• 1:22
  SPEAKER_01: And I think it's always nice to see the common threads of just connectedness of people and energies and things like that.
• 1:29
  SPEAKER_01: So I'm very excited to hear your bold journey.
• 1:31
  SPEAKER_01: I thought for the listeners, if you could do just a brief introduction and maybe even talk about what's a conscious leadership coach as you're introducing yourself.
• 1:38
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, sure.
• 1:39
  SPEAKER_00: So, you know, you were spot on with the introduction.
• 1:41
  SPEAKER_00: You got everything that's most important.
• 1:43
  SPEAKER_00: You know, I'm based in Brooklyn, New York.
• 1:44
  SPEAKER_00: I'm a cat mom.
• 1:45
  SPEAKER_00: I'm an avid athlete as a background, just as a person.
• 1:48
  SPEAKER_00: And the work of conscious leadership, really in my realm, is working with individuals and teams to help reduce what's called the drama tax.
• 1:55
  SPEAKER_00: So every team, every organization, every family unit, anytime there's multiple people in a room, there's going to be a level of natural drama.
• 2:02
  SPEAKER_00: And sometimes that drama creates positive friction, innovation, uh, people challenging themselves and growing.
• 2:08
  SPEAKER_00: But a lot of times it's redundant patterns that don't serve people, you know, listening to correct diagnosing left and right, not being a team player, wanting to be right, being committed to being right.
• 2:19
  SPEAKER_00: And a lot of these drama patterns are really disruptive to what teams say the bottom line is.
• 2:24
  SPEAKER_00: You know, they say what matters most is creating a product that helps the world, making some money, changing, changing people's lives, especially I have a background in healthcare too.
• 2:33
  SPEAKER_00: And what ends up happening is there ends up being a lot of interpersonal drama.
• 2:37
  SPEAKER_00: And that ends up preventing people from finding joy and fulfillment in work.
• 2:42
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm a big advocate that, you know, as a conscious leadership coach, that work is actually a place for joy.
• 2:48
  SPEAKER_00: It's a place for love, it's a place for connection, it's a place for personal growth.
• 2:51
  SPEAKER_00: And if you can see it that way, you know, you you really have all kinds of good data and experience to work with each and every week.
• 2:58
  SPEAKER_00: So I help teams and individuals reduce their drama tax.
• 3:02
  SPEAKER_00: I teach them core skills to do that, and I help them fall in love with the concept that work is designed for a connection and love.
• 3:09
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I really wish I had you earlier in my career.
• 3:12
  SPEAKER_01: You know, as you're like talking, I was like, yes, yes, and yes.
• 3:15
  SPEAKER_01: Like so much drama in our lives, personal and professional work can pop up.
• 3:20
  SPEAKER_01: And sometimes it's it gets in the way of everything.
• 3:23
  SPEAKER_01: It gets in the way of your opportunities, your success, your relationships, your communication.
• 3:28
  SPEAKER_01: Can't wait to dig into this with you and your expertise.
• 3:31
  SPEAKER_01: For sure.
• 3:32
  SPEAKER_01: So I'd love to start off with the question of your definition of bold, and you've got some bold stories that I can't wait to hear.
• 3:38
  SPEAKER_01: How would you define bold?
• 3:39
  SPEAKER_00: You know, it's not so much in like a single word or a phrase.
• 3:42
  SPEAKER_00: What I think of bold, I think of arms being big.
• 3:45
  SPEAKER_00: I think of movement, I think of jumping up and down, I think of mobilization, you know, I think of everything opposite of staying stuck and stale and recycled energy.
• 3:55
  SPEAKER_00: So I think of it as newness, as a strategic choice to do something different.
• 4:00
  SPEAKER_00: That's what I would see bold as.
• 4:01
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, as you were talking, like I was just visualizing movement, you know, like it's it's big, it's broad, it's not one thing, and it's moving forward.
• 4:10
  SPEAKER_01: A great definition.
• 4:11
  SPEAKER_01: So in your life, when was the first time you felt bold?
• 4:14
  SPEAKER_00: I think there's many times, but I think anytime as a, you know, I grew up playing basketball in the streets of New Jersey and growing up as the youngest of seven kids.
• 4:23
  SPEAKER_00: And I think anytime I would assert myself with my voice and want to play in the game, play against the guys, play against the bigger people, I was making a bold choice through words and through my actions.
• 4:33
  SPEAKER_00: You know, I'm a whopping five foot four, you know, above 30, stopping wet.
• 4:37
  SPEAKER_00: I'm pretty tiny in in the scope of sports, you know, but I had a big bold energy about me.
• 4:43
  SPEAKER_00: And that energy was kind of like, let's go play.
• 4:46
  SPEAKER_00: You know, I don't care if you're six foot one, six foot two, or if you're a senior and I'm a freshman, like I'm gonna try to at work and outskill people.
• 4:52
  SPEAKER_00: So I think there was an energy of boldness just about my child and how I tried to assert myself through sports.
• 4:58
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, that was the only medium that I felt really, really confident in.
• 5:01
  SPEAKER_00: School was hard for me in many ways, and sports was my place to to shine, and I knew that.
• 5:06
  SPEAKER_00: And so I kind of went out there and went after it.
• 5:09
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 5:10
  SPEAKER_01: I have a similarity in the sense of like sport became my way of like feeling like I could be totally me.
• 5:16
  SPEAKER_01: I could be free.
• 5:17
  SPEAKER_01: And we didn't have a lot of girls' sports when I was growing up.
• 5:20
  SPEAKER_01: So, like, if I wanted to play, I had to play on the guys' team, I had to be on the boys' soccer team, for example.
• 5:26
  SPEAKER_01: Started playing soccer in second grade, but man, I just loved it.
• 5:30
  SPEAKER_01: It was just like I could totally just be me and let it out.
• 5:33
  SPEAKER_01: And just the motion and being out there was just very freeing.
• 5:37
  SPEAKER_01: And so I think you know, I kept at that, you know, through high school.
• 5:40
  SPEAKER_01: And and you know, school, even when I was going, wasn't you know, middle school and high school can have its rough moments now.
• 5:45
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know if I'd even survive with the social media stuff that goes on.
• 5:49
  SPEAKER_01: But even as an adult, sometimes you don't know if you're gonna survive.
• 5:53
  SPEAKER_01: But I think, you know, it's just I love that as an outlet and being able to have that movement not only literally but figuratively.
• 6:00
  SPEAKER_01: So some similarities there for sure.
• 6:03
  SPEAKER_01: So as you kind of went throughout your life and ended up kind of where you are, where you are actually a leadership coach, you help organizations really move the needle and understand kind of is it like almost the ramifications of the drama?
• 6:16
  SPEAKER_01: Or how does someone who doesn't even think they have drama identify that they have drama?
• 6:22
  SPEAKER_00: Well, I it's it's a little bit of education, you know, it's a little bit of understanding pain points, it's it's asking people what are the things that keep happening that frustrate you that you wish you could, you know, get off your list, you wish you could make three wishes and these issues would go away.
• 6:35
  SPEAKER_00: You know, it's with a little bit of detective work, people start to see things that are creating dramatic energy in their organization.
• 6:42
  SPEAKER_00: And again, I would say it's it's things that we don't really think.
• 6:44
  SPEAKER_00: It's meetings after the meetings, you know, because they're inefficient, because people don't know how to speak up and say what they need in the meeting because they're scared.
• 6:51
  SPEAKER_00: It's it's gossip, which is, you know, you can define it as ill intent.
• 6:55
  SPEAKER_00: And I wouldn't say it the same way to you as if I said it to someone else.
• 6:58
  SPEAKER_00: So, you know, not having the courage to say to give candid candid feedback can turn into a lot of gossip behind the scenes.
• 7:05
  SPEAKER_00: And and that again will be there in some way, but I find a lot of times this happens more often than we we want it to.
• 7:12
  SPEAKER_00: Other forms of drama are procrastination and staying small and not asking for that raise or the right project or the right equipment to do your job.
• 7:22
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, or you know, feeling like a victim, like you're powerless, like, oh, the people at the top make the decisions, I can't do anything, you know, hands tied kind of thing.
• 7:30
  SPEAKER_00: That that's a form of victim consciousness and that's a form of drama.
• 7:33
  SPEAKER_00: And that takes up a lot of mental real estate.
• 7:35
  SPEAKER_00: And, you know, and we expect healthcare companies, teams, organizations to come up with innovative ideas that progress humanity.
• 7:42
  SPEAKER_00: And yet all of us are generally behind our desk for hours at a time throughout the week, feeling at the effect of, blaming, gossiping, feeling a little bit like frustrated, not happy.
• 7:52
  SPEAKER_00: There's there's very few employees who I talk to who are in flow the majority of their day.
• 7:58
  SPEAKER_00: Most people struggle quite understandably with the interpersonal elements of these soft skills that are all the buzz these days.
• 8:05
  SPEAKER_00: And I find that once you just have a conversation with people, people are like, oh, there's there's a lot of that for me in my life, and I actually would want less, you know.
• 8:13
  SPEAKER_00: And and then it's it's helping people imagine what's possible if they were to just reduce, you know, the drama in their lives and their workplace and their organizational relationships by 20%.
• 8:23
  SPEAKER_00: What's possible?
• 8:24
  SPEAKER_00: You know, how much more joy and connection could exist that way?
• 8:28
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, but there's a lot of head nodding wherever someone's listening right now for sure.
• 8:32
  SPEAKER_01: Thinking of examples.
• 8:33
  SPEAKER_01: So one thing I was thinking about, there has to be the type of environment that exists within organizations where no drama can actually grow, right?
• 8:41
  SPEAKER_01: So it can't actually percolate or, you know, and if it does pop up, it gets kind of cushioned down, you know, nicely and kindly, but it doesn't get to grow.
• 8:50
  SPEAKER_01: So what does an organization look like that doesn't have that ability to actually create or have drama live on?
• 8:58
  SPEAKER_01: Or if it's easier to define what does it look like when it's there, which probably a lot of us could probably name a few things, but like what needs to be in place if we want to be drama-free?
• 9:06
  SPEAKER_00: What needs to be be in place if we want to be drama-free is a commitment from the top to develop their people and to develop themselves.
• 9:13
  SPEAKER_00: Our leaders of organizations have to take a really, really honest look in the mirror about how much they might be perpetuating drama, benefiting from drama, not preventing it from being stopped.
• 9:23
  SPEAKER_00: You know, we have to take commitment number one of the methodology that I use is taking radical responsibility.
• 9:28
  SPEAKER_00: Leaders at the top have to be radically responsible for their energy, their words, what they do, what they don't do, what they share, what they don't share with the organization.
• 9:37
  SPEAKER_00: And that is where it begins.
• 9:39
  SPEAKER_00: And when that happens, organizations decide I'm gonna invest in my team and support them through leadership coaching and through training.
• 9:46
  SPEAKER_00: Everyone's level of awareness and consciousness improves.
• 9:50
  SPEAKER_00: Even, you know, inch by inch, it gets better and better.
• 9:52
  SPEAKER_00: And people start to see, like, oh, I no longer want to participate in this gossip circle.
• 9:56
  SPEAKER_00: I no longer want to bash my boss.
• 9:58
  SPEAKER_00: I'd rather just get the courage to say what I need to say and see if we can have a better relationship.
• 10:02
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 10:03
  SPEAKER_00: You know, so it takes a level of commitment from them from the top down, and then it takes skill development, it takes coaching, it takes training, it takes consistency.
• 10:11
  SPEAKER_00: I think a lot of people walk around feeling like they're aware, and then they get a mirror held up to them lovingly, and they start to see, like, oh, I might be the center of the reason why my organization is struggling.
• 10:23
  SPEAKER_00: But that's what I would say needs to be in place.
• 10:25
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 10:25
  SPEAKER_01: Or you come into an organization where you aren't a drama person, or you know, it's not in your nature, but you come into an organization where it be is the norm.
• 10:35
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 10:35
  SPEAKER_01: I remember I came into an organization once and I'm fairly bold, I'm outspoken, I'm going to stand up for the little person and you know, the person that doesn't have a voice.
• 10:44
  SPEAKER_01: And a lot of my bold moves, I think, are around that, you know, when it comes to our patience and making things right and at the highest levels of quality, those types of things.
• 10:52
  SPEAKER_01: And and I remember one of the employees is, and I was newer in the role, and they said, I'm I'm frightened for you.
• 10:56
  SPEAKER_01: I'm scared.
• 10:57
  SPEAKER_01: And I said, Why?
• 10:59
  SPEAKER_01: Like, because no one's ever stood up to it.
• 11:02
  SPEAKER_01: No one's ever stood up or kind of been bold or like shut down some of the things like you talked about.
• 11:07
  SPEAKER_01: But I think sometimes our environment can take over and almost make us someone we're not.
• 11:14
  SPEAKER_01: And I don't know, do you do you think that way, or is that just something that, you know, maybe I was too weak and it just kind of started to it started to change me?
• 11:21
  SPEAKER_01: And not that I gossiped or anything like that, but like I became a little bit more reticent to speak out towards the end of my role.
• 11:27
  SPEAKER_01: And I I became a little bit more reticent to be bold.
• 11:30
  SPEAKER_01: And that's when I knew I needed to go.
• 11:32
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 11:33
  SPEAKER_01: And I did make that move.
• 11:34
  SPEAKER_01: But I mean, do you feel like it's something that we just need to constantly be aware of so that we don't let it overtake us?
• 11:41
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I think that we're products of our environment, you know, and I think you put anybody, you catch me in four hours at a play in New York City, I'm gonna have a different energy about me.
• 11:49
  SPEAKER_00: You know, you catch me next when I'm playing basketball, I'm gonna have different energy about me.
• 11:53
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, you know, we all uh adapt to the rooms that we enter in some ways, really adaptive, productive ways, in other ways, we play small.
• 12:01
  SPEAKER_00: We adopt what's called the herd mentality and we stop owning our voice.
• 12:05
  SPEAKER_00: And we, you know, again, we want to fit in.
• 12:07
  SPEAKER_00: If you think about our primal, uh primal instinct, it's to belong at the table, you know, and have a voice at the table.
• 12:13
  SPEAKER_00: And if we fear that speaking up or asking for more resources or giving candid feedback to our boss would result in punishment, then we're gonna stay quiet, you know, like that that's a natural response for some people.
• 12:25
  SPEAKER_00: And I would say staying quiet is a form of drama.
• 12:28
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, it's it's festering, it's withholding, it's not being, you know, generous with the intention that the other person could receive it well.
• 12:35
  SPEAKER_00: That's a form of drama too.
• 12:36
  SPEAKER_00: So I think it's from a family systems perspective, from therapy all the way through like sports psychology, through organizational psychology, having a voice and using it consistently is our greatest tool.
• 12:47
  SPEAKER_00: And when we don't, it's our greatest barrier.
• 12:50
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 12:51
  SPEAKER_01: So how did you end up kind of in the role?
• 12:53
  SPEAKER_01: Did you say I'm always going to be a conscious leadership coach as you went through college and kind of got to where you are?
• 12:59
  SPEAKER_00: No.
• 12:59
  SPEAKER_00: The the background, I think, is that, you know, I've been doing this work pretty actively in-house and then now as a consultant for the last like four years.
• 13:07
  SPEAKER_00: When I first graduated college, I was a high school English teacher and I thought that I would be teaching English forever, you know, like teach literature, coach basketball, have a good life, summers off.
• 13:16
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, I didn't have any concept of what an entrepreneur was or what healthcare was.
• 13:20
  SPEAKER_00: I just thought that's what I would do.
• 13:22
  SPEAKER_00: And I got into, was 22, I got into a pretty bad car accident and uh had a bad concussion, and that resulted in a lot of depression and anxiety where I hadn't experienced that.
• 13:32
  SPEAKER_00: And so, you know, Western medicine said, okay, we're gonna put you on medication for the rest of your life, kind of thing, you know, just keep upping the medication dosages.
• 13:40
  SPEAKER_00: And I was depressed, I was stable, but just depressed.
• 13:43
  SPEAKER_00: And I remember feeling really like neglected by Western medicine that there was no other intervention, there was no other questioning, there was no other support.
• 13:51
  SPEAKER_00: It was just like see a therapist and take a pill.
• 13:53
  SPEAKER_00: And while I think that can be life-saving and supporting for many, many people, and for me, it served a role.
• 13:58
  SPEAKER_00: There was not a comprehensive medical plan for me.
• 14:02
  SPEAKER_00: You know, I was 22 and I was still eating like, I don't know, like fruit roll-ups for breakfast.
• 14:07
  SPEAKER_00: You know, I had no sense of mind-body connection, I had no sense of food and mood and meditation and spirituality.
• 14:12
  SPEAKER_00: And so what I did actually in one of my first big life bold moves was I went out there and I questioned the prescription that was given to me.
• 14:19
  SPEAKER_00: You know, I kept taking what was given to me, but I started to supplement and say, I'm gonna meditate, I'm gonna start reading books about equanimity and how to train the mind because I wasn't getting that from Western medicine.
• 14:31
  SPEAKER_00: I was just being told to take a pill.
• 14:32
  SPEAKER_00: And so I felt like that was a huge form of neglect, and I still would would would advocate that that's not that's not comprehensive, that's not personalized care.
• 14:41
  SPEAKER_00: And so that really frankly pissed me off and broke my heart.
• 14:44
  SPEAKER_00: And I remember thinking, if this is happening to me at 22 in a pretty affluent area, you know, how many people are just being numbed?
• 14:50
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and and no one really taught me how to use my emotions as data, no one really taught me how to somatically move through things.
• 14:56
  SPEAKER_00: I had to go out and research that all and figure it out.
• 14:59
  SPEAKER_00: So at 22, that's what started the pivot in my career.
• 15:02
  SPEAKER_00: You know, I ended up teaching for a bit, but I started on the side going to school for nutrition at night.
• 15:07
  SPEAKER_00: I started taking meditation classes and going to week-long experiences, silent retreats to learn how to work with the mind.
• 15:15
  SPEAKER_00: And that led me to about 10 years in nutrition and healthcare.
• 15:20
  SPEAKER_00: So um I ran my own company for many years.
• 15:22
  SPEAKER_00: I coached people, consulted people on how to improve their diet and their mindset so that they could live a life that felt joyful and felt empowered.
• 15:31
  SPEAKER_00: And then I spent the last five years of that career at a medical startup where I wore many different hats, including, you know, health coach, nutritionist, but also learning and development and corporate people development.
• 15:43
  SPEAKER_00: So I started to move away from food and into like developing thought leaders and developing psychological safety and developing soft skills so that people could sit at the table in meetings and feel confident.
• 15:54
  SPEAKER_00: So it was one of those things where it was just like following the breadcrumbs.
• 15:57
  SPEAKER_00: You know, I think when I look back on my life, most of my life has been surviving something that's been really challenging and then, you know, finding tools and skills to help me do that and then teaching other people those things.
• 16:08
  SPEAKER_00: So it's been just very organic.
• 16:10
  SPEAKER_00: It's not been planned at all.
• 16:12
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 16:12
  SPEAKER_01: And that's kind of the cool part, right?
• 16:14
  SPEAKER_01: Like where I am now, I never would have planned it.
• 16:17
  SPEAKER_01: And I didn't even consider myself an entrepreneur, but I think I have been entrepreneurial.
• 16:21
  SPEAKER_01: Like I think every now and then when I would get in trouble for like pushing too much on mediocrity or wanting to innovate faster or be more agile, like I wouldn't have been able to even tell you that this is where I would be right now.
• 16:33
  SPEAKER_01: And I think that's good.
• 16:34
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, good for the listeners to understand too, because we're a lot of us are planners and like we have this plan for our life or a plan of how something's going to go.
• 16:43
  SPEAKER_01: And, you know, I don't know what the percentage is, but a lot of the time it doesn't go as planned.
• 16:48
  SPEAKER_01: You know, so I think, but it's it's embracing that, right?
• 16:53
  SPEAKER_01: It's embracing the the detour or usually something that's you're overcoming or working through or stepping through or learning through, right?
• 17:00
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, that's the fun part of it, you know.
• 17:03
  SPEAKER_00: I think developing the emotional confidence to be able to do that and to to be agile and to pivot.
• 17:07
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, some of the best, some of the best moments of my life and turning points in my life from a business perspective have been when I pivoted and I was like, well, that's not working, let's go this way.
• 17:16
  SPEAKER_00: Um, so that's that's that's what makes it fun.
• 17:19
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 17:20
  SPEAKER_01: So I think some of the things you talk about, like being in flow, and I've seen this a lot on posts and things like that recently.
• 17:27
  SPEAKER_01: What does that mean?
• 17:28
  SPEAKER_01: Like to you?
• 17:28
  SPEAKER_01: Like what does being in flow mean?
• 17:31
  SPEAKER_00: It kind of just means that time goes out the window and you could keep doing that thing for some time.
• 17:35
  SPEAKER_00: And, you know, you're you're not checking your phone, you know, you're just completely immersed in whatever's happening.
• 17:41
  SPEAKER_00: Whatever you're doing is compelling, it's got your interest.
• 17:44
  SPEAKER_00: You're able to have focus in two places, outward and inward.
• 17:47
  SPEAKER_00: You know, we would call that essence pacing.
• 17:49
  SPEAKER_00: So I can, if I'm in flow, maybe in the kitchen, I'm I'm able to cut the carrots and cut the vegetables in a rhythm and a pace where I'm smelling everything.
• 17:57
  SPEAKER_00: There's an aromatic experience, and I'm aware of my breath and my thoughts.
• 18:00
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not lost one place in one place else.
• 18:03
  SPEAKER_00: So to me, flow is something that you love.
• 18:05
  SPEAKER_00: Time goes out the window and you can be fully present with it.
• 18:08
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 18:09
  SPEAKER_01: And would you say, like, if you're not in flow, there's indicators.
• 18:12
  SPEAKER_01: What are like the alerts for us as human beings when we're not in flow?
• 18:16
  SPEAKER_01: Are there any that you can think of?
• 18:18
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, forms of drama, forms of resistance and friction, you know.
• 18:22
  SPEAKER_00: And and I will say too, it's really important for us to know from like a neurochemical perspective that friction within learning is an important milestone.
• 18:30
  SPEAKER_00: The brain needs a little bit of friction to move through tough, tough learning acquisition moments, uh, skill acquisition moments.
• 18:36
  SPEAKER_00: That's a part of a learning process that we actually need to celebrate a bit more.
• 18:39
  SPEAKER_00: That's when synapses and neurons form is moving through that friction and completing the task.
• 18:45
  SPEAKER_00: But I think when there's repetitive patterns of drama, when our energy dips really low, when we feel powerless, when we start to get into the sort of the triangle of blaming and maybe shaming, or, you know, just having an energy about us that is like we don't even want to be friends with ourselves.
• 19:03
  SPEAKER_00: Like, you know, like you get to those moments where, like, oh, like I just I need to shake things up.
• 19:07
  SPEAKER_00: I think those are moments where, you know, you need to kind of check what am I doing and am I aligned with what I'm doing?
• 19:12
  SPEAKER_00: Is is what I'm doing congruent with my values in life?
• 19:14
  SPEAKER_00: And I think generally if you're congruent and aligned with your values in life, there there's going to be more ease than there's going to be resistance and threaten.
• 19:24
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 19:24
  SPEAKER_01: And there's a connectedness to our health, right?
• 19:27
  SPEAKER_01: And I'm very open about this, like way out of flow.
• 19:29
  SPEAKER_01: So when I I moved here and I got really into my work and working head down all the time, I gained 50 pounds, which I'm working to lose.
• 19:38
  SPEAKER_01: And like I would definitely say I was out of flow.
• 19:41
  SPEAKER_01: I wasn't sleeping well.
• 19:43
  SPEAKER_01: I would get irritated easily.
• 19:44
  SPEAKER_01: Now identify myself as being burnt out when I left corporate, but you know, I wasn't, we didn't, I don't think we called it that in in 2020, 2019 as much as we are recognizing it now.
• 19:54
  SPEAKER_01: But do you think there's connectedness to being out of flow with our health?
• 19:59
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, for sure.
• 20:00
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, I think that when you think about burnout, which is now like a clinical diagnosis, yeah, for sure.
• 20:05
  SPEAKER_00: It's like it's it's one of the things that, you know, that the body doesn't lie.
• 20:09
  SPEAKER_00: The body will always let you know when things are out of balance.
• 20:13
  SPEAKER_00: The body will always let you know if your blood sugar is low, if you're having a headache.
• 20:16
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, we think about in medicine and science, it's just that these are signals, these are just ways of your body communicating to you.
• 20:24
  SPEAKER_00: And I think as a society, especially in corporate America, we've become so numb to these um signs and symptoms.
• 20:31
  SPEAKER_00: We've just started to think as part of what has to happen in a fast-paced work environment, you know, high growth work environment that doesn't have to be synonymous.
• 20:38
  SPEAKER_00: But I think we we as people, we have to be radically responsive and responsible to our bodies and our minds.
• 20:45
  SPEAKER_00: And when we have anxiety, depression, maybe weight gain, or sort of different symptoms that might come up, we have to just peek under the roof and be curious and like tend to this body.
• 20:55
  SPEAKER_00: You know, we can't, we're not robots.
• 20:57
  SPEAKER_00: We're designed to be rhythmically working, like 20 minutes on, 20 minutes off.
• 21:01
  SPEAKER_00: Like we're designed to be rhythmic.
• 21:03
  SPEAKER_00: And I think that we're trained to be robotic and we have to break off.
• 21:08
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 21:09
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I I definitely think that also connects to unlearning, which is really that you have a podcast called The School of Unlearning, but I think there were things just using the word unlearn that after I left, I was like, I have to stop doing that.
• 21:21
  SPEAKER_01: I have to, I'm noticing it and being conscious of it.
• 21:24
  SPEAKER_01: And that was the like first steps, like just being conscious of like, whoa, why did I think that?
• 21:28
  SPEAKER_01: Why did I react that way?
• 21:29
  SPEAKER_01: Why did I need to whatever, you know, eat eat an Oreo, whatever it may be.
• 21:35
  SPEAKER_01: You know Oreos happen sometimes.
• 21:37
  SPEAKER_01: They they come.
• 21:38
  SPEAKER_01: I'm not, you know, and definitely not bashing the Oreos.
• 21:41
  SPEAKER_01: But you know, like what was that moment?
• 21:43
  SPEAKER_01: And this, I think it was like big for me that I took some time, and big for me, meaning like I actually gave myself time.
• 21:50
  SPEAKER_01: I actually cared for me and wanted to take time to to rebuild it.
• 21:55
  SPEAKER_01: But I think it's important for people to know like you can't have this conflict or this lack of flow.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_01: Professionally and not have it connect in some way to what's happening to you personally or your health or your mindset.
• 22:07
  SPEAKER_01: And so I think sometimes we think, okay, that's work and this is home.
• 22:11
  SPEAKER_01: And you know, they're, you know, I'll do my best to keep them disconnected.
• 22:15
  SPEAKER_01: But I think it's very difficult to do that.
• 22:17
  SPEAKER_01: It's it's pretty impossible.
• 22:19
  SPEAKER_01: I think everything's connected.
• 22:20
  SPEAKER_01: That's that's the vibe.
• 22:22
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 22:22
  SPEAKER_01: So when we're unlearning, tell me a little bit about your podcast in the sense of what have you learned from the folks who have come on, or what do you hope people learn from listening to the School of Unlearning?
• 22:33
  SPEAKER_00: Well, it's been it's been a really interesting journey.
• 22:35
  SPEAKER_00: I've had some incredible people on, you know, ESPN analysts, Claude Silver, who's the chief heart officer at Vayner Media.
• 22:42
  SPEAKER_00: Um, I've had a lot of authors come on, a lot of thought leaders come on.
• 22:45
  SPEAKER_00: You know, I and I think that I'm constantly surprised by what people say they believe unlearning is and what they're all actively unlearning.
• 22:52
  SPEAKER_00: And I think it's humbling to hear the success that's been on the podcast, the people, what they've done.
• 22:57
  SPEAKER_00: But also, like so many of them are still struggling to unlearn boundaries and slowing down and, you know, taking care of themselves or just enjoying things versus finding other things to be anxious about.
• 23:08
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, all very human things that it I think it kind of shows me and everyone who listens that no one is beyond reproach here.
• 23:15
  SPEAKER_00: You know, we all have to like be really attuned and aware to our human experience, or else we will get caught up in the hurricane of productivity and success and the cost of that.
• 23:27
  SPEAKER_00: And what I think what's been interesting is a few people said a few things that I thought were was great.
• 23:31
  SPEAKER_00: You know, Kate Fagan, she's a she's an author and former ESP and analyst, she said unlearning is basically like if I can unlearn just something by degrees, like 20%.
• 23:41
  SPEAKER_00: You know, that's a big thing for me.
• 23:42
  SPEAKER_00: I can't maybe shift it all the way, but if I can reorient myself around a concept or a construct, even just by a little bit, that's a big win.
• 23:49
  SPEAKER_00: Silver said unlearning is understanding that everybody and everything is a teacher.
• 23:54
  SPEAKER_00: And I love that.
• 23:54
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, that's cool.
• 23:55
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 23:56
  SPEAKER_00: So I get all these cool definitions from people, and it's it's it's expanded my own sense of the podcast that I started, which is kind of fun.
• 24:03
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 24:04
  SPEAKER_01: So when we think about like how do we unwrap that for ourselves, like I'm sitting here going, okay, what would I define it as?
• 24:10
  SPEAKER_01: And what would I, what am I actively trying to unlearn?
• 24:14
  SPEAKER_01: You know, I think I talked about a few things around the health piece, but I think there's, you know, if I had to think of a second one, it'd be like my negative self-talk about myself sometimes, you know, which makes me feel less confident.
• 24:24
  SPEAKER_01: But as we think about like a challenge, like for those that are listening, like how would they start to identify maybe what they need to unlearn?
• 24:31
  SPEAKER_00: Well, it's an invitation.
• 24:33
  SPEAKER_00: So, first of all, they don't have to, but I would say it's an invitation to look really closely at what's serving them, you know, what's easy, what's in flow, what's like generative, and what is really like this recycled again drama pattern of like, oh, I keep getting in these fights with my friends, you know, I keep trying to be uh everything to everybody.
• 24:50
  SPEAKER_00: You know, maybe you're embracing like the martyr code and you're just like sacrificing yourself so that everyone else is happy and pleased.
• 24:56
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, that's a common thing that people start to see as a drama pattern once they have some awareness.
• 25:02
  SPEAKER_00: But I think unlearning is just anything you want to examine and question.
• 25:07
  SPEAKER_00: It could be like, you know, again, you and I have similar paths in that, you know, fast-paced medical environment, made a switch to a different path.
• 25:15
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, I'm constantly unlearning like how how to redefine success now that my pace, my work pace, my living pace is slower, is less dramatic.
• 25:25
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, sometimes I have days where I'm like, how did I how did I exist in such a world where there was so much tension and anxiety?
• 25:33
  SPEAKER_00: Like I barely was existing for some time.
• 25:35
  SPEAKER_00: I was so stressed about that that corporate world.
• 25:38
  SPEAKER_00: I would say like looking closely at what's serving people, what's not, and and just begin the process of questioning.
• 25:45
  SPEAKER_00: And that alone is a big deal.
• 25:47
  SPEAKER_00: And that's where most of the the growth comes.
• 25:49
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 25:49
  SPEAKER_01: I love that it's invitation and not a have to.
• 25:52
  SPEAKER_01: You know, I love how you corrected me there because I think you're obviously spot on an expert in that more so than I am.
• 25:58
  SPEAKER_01: But sometimes there are things that we think we have to do, but it's what do you want to do?
• 26:03
  SPEAKER_01: What do you, you know, invite yourself to think about those things.
• 26:06
  SPEAKER_01: As you were talking, I thought I remember people who I worked with who I think liked drama.
• 26:12
  SPEAKER_01: And what I mean by that is like they probably are gonna spin and spin.
• 26:16
  SPEAKER_01: And I know when I switched and was less uh intense and less stressed and smiling a lot more, and me and me, like some people didn't like that because our commonality probably was the drama, right?
• 26:29
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, that's a big deal.
• 26:31
  SPEAKER_00: And I I think I think we that's why we become addicted to drama.
• 26:34
  SPEAKER_00: We get we get lots of unintended positive things from drama.
• 26:38
  SPEAKER_00: And by positive, I mean like things we like, maybe, maybe they're not truly positive, but they're they're a bit addictive, you know.
• 26:43
  SPEAKER_00: We always have something to talk about if we have something to vent about.
• 26:46
  SPEAKER_00: We're not we never have to sit in silence.
• 26:48
  SPEAKER_00: There's a benefit there.
• 26:49
  SPEAKER_00: When we're in drama, we never really feel emotions.
• 26:51
  SPEAKER_00: So, you know, we might talk about emotions, but we're not really feeling them.
• 26:55
  SPEAKER_00: So we get to kind of bypass the hard stuff of being a human.
• 26:58
  SPEAKER_00: There's just so much to gossip and talk about.
• 27:00
  SPEAKER_00: So why would we not?
• 27:02
  SPEAKER_00: You know, and and then I also think that like from a neurochemical perspective, too, like anger and resentment, these are very addictive states of being.
• 27:10
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, our brains light up when when you look at the human brain.
• 27:13
  SPEAKER_00: There was a study Dr.
• 27:14
  SPEAKER_00: Andrew Huberman talked about, and he was mentioning like a brain that had stimuli from like creativity, sexual response, like sadness, happiness, joy, and anger.
• 27:24
  SPEAKER_00: And the brain lit up the most in response to the the the stimuli that was associated with anger.
• 27:30
  SPEAKER_00: So the brain is they get we get a dopamine high, we get a a rush of neurochemicals when when we have drama.
• 27:37
  SPEAKER_00: And so it does become a little bit addictive in that way.
• 27:40
  SPEAKER_00: It's not letting people off the hook, but it's giving some background on the physiology as to why we would want to keep doing things that are actually quite harmful, you know.
• 27:48
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 27:48
  SPEAKER_01: And, you know, with addiction, you have to go through the paces of one identifying that you have it, right?
• 27:55
  SPEAKER_01: And making sure that you are the one that is the one that says it, right?
• 28:00
  SPEAKER_01: Because then if someone else says it, it's like, you know, it's not going to mean the same thing as you actually do that introspection of it.
• 28:05
  SPEAKER_01: So just something, because I bet there's a lot of people listening, I was like, Well, there's people that love drama, and how how does that work?
• 28:10
  SPEAKER_01: And I think one is just not feeding into theirs and knowing that you may be doing some things to actually, you know, get ignited by some of it, even though you don't like it, you might get pulled into it.
• 28:21
  SPEAKER_01: So just again, being conscious of when that happens.
• 28:23
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, big time.
• 28:24
  SPEAKER_01: As we kind of end, and I I really have enjoyed our conversation, and we're thinking about, and a lot of people listening are conscious leaders or they're they want to be.
• 28:33
  SPEAKER_01: What are some of the things just in in the sense of we've talked about unlearning, we've talked about flow, we've talked about boldness, a lot of good topics, and you know, reducing the amount of drama in being a conscious leader, you know, is something that takes effort, right?
• 28:48
  SPEAKER_01: It takes intention.
• 28:50
  SPEAKER_01: So is there like a daily reminder or anything like that for us, or a mantra we should remember, or something that can keep it in our forefront when things get really busy or things get very hectic or chaotic?
• 29:01
  SPEAKER_00: Well, there's two things that I think that this methodology that I use teaches that are that's really helpful.
• 29:06
  SPEAKER_00: The first thing is I might ask myself just at any given moment, where am I?
• 29:10
  SPEAKER_00: Like, where am I, where's my energy?
• 29:12
  SPEAKER_00: You know, like am I am I reacting from fear and reactivity, right?
• 29:17
  SPEAKER_00: Or am I barely breathing, or am I reacting from, you know, spacious energy where I'm open, I'm curious, I'm breathing deeply, I'm in my body, I'm pretty present.
• 29:25
  SPEAKER_00: There's generally two extremes here, and there's some life on the spectrum.
• 29:29
  SPEAKER_00: So at any given moment, I pull up to a meeting and I'm like, okay, where am I?
• 29:32
  SPEAKER_00: Like, am I fearful or am I open?
• 29:34
  SPEAKER_00: You know, I pull up to a friend hang out and I think, okay, am I, am I, where am I?
• 29:39
  SPEAKER_00: Am I fearful or am I open?
• 29:41
  SPEAKER_00: I just kind of ask myself a question to orient myself with my energy and my consciousness.
• 29:46
  SPEAKER_00: I think we have to do that probably dozens of times a day to develop the muscle of awareness that there.
• 29:52
  SPEAKER_00: And I think the other part of the question was, what are the ways, well, one of the things I do, which is part of again what the methodology teaches, which I live, I live it pretty much every single day as much as I can.
• 30:03
  SPEAKER_00: I, you know, adopt a belief that is loving about the world.
• 30:07
  SPEAKER_00: It's really easy, especially these days, to adopt a victim mentality, a villain mentality, uh, one of blame and disempowerment.
• 30:15
  SPEAKER_00: You know, like we can turn on our phones and start to scroll, and within seconds, we're pretty depressed about what's happening in the world.
• 30:22
  SPEAKER_00: It's pretty, pretty overwhelming.
• 30:24
  SPEAKER_00: This belief that I'll share with you doesn't bypass that.
• 30:27
  SPEAKER_00: It doesn't put me in positive Pam mode, but I do believe that life happens for you.
• 30:32
  SPEAKER_00: Even in the worst moments, there's something there to be learned.
• 30:36
  SPEAKER_00: So for me, it's a belief I have.
• 30:38
  SPEAKER_00: Contract falls through, clients don't renew, my landlord gets mad about something.
• 30:42
  SPEAKER_00: Life things happen every day.
• 30:44
  SPEAKER_00: And I have to believe that there's something there to learn.
• 30:46
  SPEAKER_00: And so when I put myself in a space to learn and to move through something, I'm far more open, I'm far more curious, I'm far more relatable, I'm less reactive.
• 30:55
  SPEAKER_00: So just my belief is there's something to learn in everything.
• 30:59
  SPEAKER_00: And because I have that belief, even in the worst times of my life, I'm able to get through things pretty well and come out the other side.
• 31:06
  SPEAKER_00: So I would say to people to adopt a belief that is loving in nature.
• 31:10
  SPEAKER_01: Excellent.
• 31:11
  SPEAKER_01: Great advice, excellent space to end in.
• 31:14
  SPEAKER_01: And I invite everyone to check out the show notes to learn more about Alisa and what she's doing, her podcast, as well as the services she can provide in the coaching.
• 31:22
  SPEAKER_01: Thank you so much for being part of the Bold Lounge.
• 31:24
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you for having me, Leah.
• 31:25
  SPEAKER_00: It's been wonderful.
• 31:28
  SPEAKER_01: Thank you for listening to the Bold Lounge podcast.
• 31:31
  SPEAKER_01: Through the continuum of bold stories, vulnerability to taking the leap, you will meet more extraordinary people making a positive impact for others through their unique and important stories.
• 31:42
  SPEAKER_01: By highlighting these stories, we hope to inspire others and share the journey of those with a bold.
• 31:47
  SPEAKER_01: We hope you've enjoyed this podcast and look forward to sharing the next bold journey with the video.