Latest / Dots and Dreams / Episode 12: Nobody Was Going to Give Her Permission. So She Gave It to Herself.

Transcript

Episode 12: Nobody Was Going to Give Her Permission. So She Gave It to Herself. · Dots and Dreams

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_01: Biggest thing for me has been getting comfortable with not having it all figured out
• 0:07
  SPEAKER_01: and still moving forward.
• 0:11
  SPEAKER_01: And I think unfortunately a lot of people get to that point before they really wake up.
• 0:16
  SPEAKER_01: But that was like a huge aha moment for me.
• 0:20
  SPEAKER_01: I can't allow this.
• 0:23
  SPEAKER_01: This cannot be normal.
• 0:24
  SPEAKER_00: That's Simone Thomas,
• 0:26
  SPEAKER_00: and she's not choosing between the life she has and the life she's building.
• 0:31
  SPEAKER_00: She's doing both.
• 0:34
  SPEAKER_00: Welcome to Dots and Dreams,
• 0:36
  SPEAKER_00: a podcast about the real vulnerable and my sometimes-in-the-moment stories
• 0:40
  SPEAKER_00: of life transitions.
• 0:42
  SPEAKER_00: I'm Jenny Sidorova, and I've been an immigrant, marketer, mother, and serial reinventor.
• 0:49
  SPEAKER_00: And today,
• 0:50
  SPEAKER_00: I'm talking to Simone Thomas about her meaningful shift,
• 0:54
  SPEAKER_00: both figuratively and literally.
• 0:57
  SPEAKER_00: She has been going through a major life transition in the last few years,
• 1:01
  SPEAKER_00: and she has changed her way of thinking,
• 1:04
  SPEAKER_00: If you've ever felt like you needed permission to want something different,
• 1:08
  SPEAKER_00: this one's for you.
• 1:28
  SPEAKER_00: So I have a little exercise that I wanted to do.
• 1:33
  SPEAKER_00: If you were to close your eyes right now and just kind of like let your mind flow
• 1:38
  SPEAKER_00: for a bit just to let it wander,
• 1:41
  SPEAKER_00: what's an image that comes to mind that makes you both feel hope and dream?
• 2:00
  SPEAKER_01: This is probably three years from now
• 2:05
  SPEAKER_01: because Aki House is done and I have a toddler
• 2:11
  SPEAKER_01: and we're in the greenhouse
• 2:16
  SPEAKER_01: with our hands in the soil doing some work to prepare.
• 2:20
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know if it's for guests or for a dinner, but it's like the clearest picture that I have.
• 2:31
  SPEAKER_01: Of work that I want to do that integrates the family that I want to have.
• 2:37
  SPEAKER_01: And something that I know is going to put joy on someone else's face
• 2:42
  SPEAKER_01: when they experience the outcome of it.
• 2:45
  SPEAKER_01: I think that's what I envision.
• 2:48
  SPEAKER_00: Wow.
• 2:49
  SPEAKER_00: My mind wants to know more about Jamaica.
• 2:53
  SPEAKER_00: But you also said the words Aki House.
• 2:56
  SPEAKER_00: What is Aki House?
• 2:57
  SPEAKER_00: And...
• 2:59
  SPEAKER_00: How did Aki House enter your life?
• 3:04
  SPEAKER_01: Aki House is a sanctuary in the Jamaican rainforest that I am building as a new form
• 3:16
  SPEAKER_01: of hospitality in Jamaica.
• 3:19
  SPEAKER_01: I call it the haven for eco-luxury in Jamaica, which doesn't really exist.
• 3:29
  SPEAKER_01: You feel connected to the people, to the land, and hopefully to yourself when you leave.
• 3:36
  SPEAKER_01: It's going to be capacity for 20 people,
• 3:39
  SPEAKER_01: so it is small,
• 3:40
  SPEAKER_01: but the idea of it feeling intimate and feeling almost like I'm welcoming you
• 3:44
  SPEAKER_01: into my home is really what I hope to do.
• 3:51
  SPEAKER_01: And it really is a retirement dream that I had 15 years ago that has been kind
• 3:58
  SPEAKER_01: of coming to life over the last five years because I envisioned being
• 4:04
  SPEAKER_01: a much older woman pursuing this.
• 4:10
  SPEAKER_01: And then I think the realities of work and me realizing what I wanted the next phase
• 4:18
  SPEAKER_01: of my life to look like I'm 37 now and thinking about wanting to have a family
• 4:23
  SPEAKER_01: and have kids.
• 4:25
  SPEAKER_01: I didn't see a way to do that in my current career that felt in alignment
• 4:31
  SPEAKER_01: with what felt right to me.
• 4:33
  SPEAKER_01: And so these two things kind of collapsed from like a retirement dream into,
• 4:38
  SPEAKER_01: well, let's try to build this next.
• 4:42
  SPEAKER_01: And yeah, that's what I've been working on since it really started.
• 4:46
  SPEAKER_01: Crystalized for me that this is something that I wanted to pursue in 2023.
• 4:50
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, 15 years ago, then you were 22.
• 4:55
  SPEAKER_00: And so at the age of 22, you knew what your retirement dream is.
• 5:00
  SPEAKER_00: That is quite amazing.
• 5:03
  SPEAKER_00: I am 42 right now.
• 5:04
  SPEAKER_00: And I have...
• 5:09
  SPEAKER_00: Seven different visions of what my retirement could be like.
• 5:13
  SPEAKER_00: So I'm just really interested in 22-year-old Simone right now and what was she like
• 5:20
  SPEAKER_00: and what was going on in her life that at 22 she knew I have a retirement dream
• 5:27
  SPEAKER_00: to build something in Jamaica.
• 5:29
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I don't even know if I knew it was Jamaica or Well,
• 5:32
  SPEAKER_01: the funny thing is I think I had this grand vision of I'm going
• 5:35
  SPEAKER_01: to have like seven boutique hotels all over the world and travel between them.
• 5:40
  SPEAKER_01: And then that has been something that I think I've had to unlearn.
• 5:47
  SPEAKER_01: We don't have to be doing the maximum version of whatever it is that we envision.
• 5:54
  SPEAKER_01: It's like, what's the thing that feels slower and more aligned?
• 5:58
  SPEAKER_01: I think that's something that's come to me in the last five years.
• 6:00
  SPEAKER_01: But When I graduated from college,
• 6:05
  SPEAKER_01: I remember going to my first job for the first week and being like,
• 6:12
  SPEAKER_01: am I just supposed to show up here for the rest of my life until I die?
• 6:16
  SPEAKER_01: Like,
• 6:16
  SPEAKER_01: it was very strange for me because I think we have this clear roadmap and pathway
• 6:23
  SPEAKER_01: from probably the point that we're 10 years old.
• 6:27
  SPEAKER_01: It's like, okay, now what do you want to be when you grow up?
• 6:29
  SPEAKER_01: And then you start pursuing things.
• 6:31
  SPEAKER_01: And so when I got to my first job,
• 6:32
  SPEAKER_01: it just was like, well, what do I do with the rest of my life?
• 6:34
  SPEAKER_01: And I very quickly realized, well, I don't want to be these people.
• 6:52
  SPEAKER_01: Forever.
• 6:53
  SPEAKER_01: Like there were people I worked with that had been there for,
• 6:55
  SPEAKER_01: you know, 30 years and I just it didn't seem right to me.
• 6:59
  SPEAKER_01: And so I think I started thinking about retirement just because I was like,
• 7:04
  SPEAKER_01: well, that's what comes after working and this cannot be it.
• 7:08
  SPEAKER_01: But it was more of just like a dream or an idea.
• 7:10
  SPEAKER_01: It wasn't like a solidified thing.
• 7:13
  SPEAKER_00: But I find it interesting that.
• 7:16
  SPEAKER_00: You were already thinking about like what comes next after working.
• 7:20
  SPEAKER_00: I've definitely had the thought of there has to be more to life than this.
• 7:25
  SPEAKER_00: It can't just be that we graduate and then we have this like corporate identity
• 7:32
  SPEAKER_00: until we decide we can retire.
• 7:35
  SPEAKER_00: Like even the word retire actually never really made a lot of sense to me.
• 7:41
  SPEAKER_00: And so...
• 7:42
  SPEAKER_00: The fact that you saw that so young shows that you are someone who,
• 7:49
  SPEAKER_00: when the right moment came,
• 7:51
  SPEAKER_00: your mind was going to probably go into the place that it went
• 7:56
  SPEAKER_00: to whenever you pivoted from retirement.
• 7:59
  SPEAKER_00: Doesn't have to be seven boutique hotels all over the world.
• 8:03
  SPEAKER_00: And maybe it doesn't have to be retirement.
• 8:06
  SPEAKER_00: So I want to talk a little bit about that.
• 8:09
  SPEAKER_00: What was the moment in your life when you went back to that dream and realized,
• 8:17
  SPEAKER_00: I need to unpack this and it needs to be a part of my plan now?
• 8:23
  SPEAKER_01: You're pointing out something that I never thought about.
• 8:29
  SPEAKER_01: Because I didn't realize that I've kind of had this train of thinking this entire time.
• 8:32
  SPEAKER_01: And even when I talk about retirement, I'm like, oh, my retirement, I'm still working.
• 8:37
  SPEAKER_01: But for me, that feels like the right thing.
• 8:40
  SPEAKER_01: So I love that you said the idea of retirement never really gelled.
• 8:46
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I don't want to just sit on the beach and read.
• 8:49
  SPEAKER_01: So I went to business school in 2016.
• 8:55
  SPEAKER_01: So after I had that aha moment of like,
• 8:57
  SPEAKER_01: well, wait a minute, I can't just sit at this desk for the next 50 years.
• 9:02
  SPEAKER_01: Then I started talking to people and trying to figure out like, well, what else could I do?
• 9:05
  SPEAKER_01: And so what I've always done is kind of look for other people and see like,
• 9:10
  SPEAKER_01: what does their life look like?
• 9:11
  SPEAKER_01: Do I like that?
• 9:12
  SPEAKER_01: What parts of that do I like?
• 9:15
  SPEAKER_01: And try and model it a little bit.
• 9:17
  SPEAKER_01: I've never had a lot of I'm not true mentors,
• 9:21
  SPEAKER_01: but I kind of seek out what I call possibility models.
• 9:25
  SPEAKER_01: And that is always something that helps me.
• 9:28
  SPEAKER_01: And so even when I was working,
• 9:30
  SPEAKER_01: I worked at an ad agency and I would look at a lot of the marketers and I was like,
• 9:34
  SPEAKER_01: oh, I feel like I like their career path more than mine.
• 9:38
  SPEAKER_01: How did they end up there?
• 9:39
  SPEAKER_01: A lot of them had MBAs.
• 9:40
  SPEAKER_01: And so I went to business school.
• 9:42
  SPEAKER_01: And so That gave me something to work towards.
• 9:46
  SPEAKER_01: And then the two years in school and then kind of coming out,
• 9:49
  SPEAKER_01: I got back into that place of like, okay, I checked the boxes again.
• 9:54
  SPEAKER_01: I followed the path.
• 9:55
  SPEAKER_01: That was like maybe a five, six year stint.
• 9:58
  SPEAKER_01: Now I'm back in the open ocean and I'm like,
• 10:00
  SPEAKER_01: I gotta figure out what I want to do with my life again.
• 10:05
  SPEAKER_01: And I think after working
• 10:10
  SPEAKER_01: In tech for a few years where I was like, okay, I have reached the upper echelon.
• 10:16
  SPEAKER_01: These are companies that like people have a coveted job.
• 10:20
  SPEAKER_01: And I still was looking around at people and I was like, I don't think this is what I want.
• 10:26
  SPEAKER_01: And that was when I started to realize that maybe I had to carve a path out
• 10:31
  SPEAKER_01: for myself, which was very, very scary.
• 10:35
  SPEAKER_01: But Yeah.
• 10:52
  SPEAKER_00: Through media,
• 10:53
  SPEAKER_00: through social media,
• 10:55
  SPEAKER_00: and then like when we think about our parents' generation,
• 10:57
  SPEAKER_00: that there are all these boxes to check.
• 11:00
  SPEAKER_00: And suddenly,
• 11:01
  SPEAKER_00: especially in today's world,
• 11:04
  SPEAKER_00: a lot of myths,
• 11:05
  SPEAKER_00: I guess, are being debunked, which is something that
• 11:12
  SPEAKER_00: we're kind of living firsthand.
• 11:15
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 11:16
  SPEAKER_00: I did want to ask you because you mentioned Jamaica immediately
• 11:20
  SPEAKER_00: when you were dreaming with your toddler three years out.
• 11:24
  SPEAKER_00: I want to hear more about Jamaica and you have roots there.
• 11:28
  SPEAKER_00: So can you maybe share a little bit about why Jamaica for this specific project?
• 11:34
  SPEAKER_01: When I had this idea of like seven places all over the world, Jamaica was always one of them.
• 11:40
  SPEAKER_01: I think a lot about storytelling and And
• 11:49
  SPEAKER_01: think the Caribbean
• 11:50
  SPEAKER_01: in general just has like a really rich history and uniqueness
• 11:56
  SPEAKER_01: that I don't think is really well communicated through hospitality
• 12:03
  SPEAKER_01: and tourism today.
• 12:04
  SPEAKER_01: Like it's a real culmination of lots of different people who have come together.
• 12:09
  SPEAKER_01: For many different reasons over a lot of times,
• 12:12
  SPEAKER_01: a long time and contributed to the language,
• 12:18
  SPEAKER_01: the food, the way of thinking, the culture.
• 12:21
  SPEAKER_01: And so that was always a vision that I had for hospitality.
• 12:25
  SPEAKER_01: Jamaica felt like The right place to start and ultimately the place
• 12:31
  SPEAKER_01: that feels like home for me because it's allowed me to like reconnect
• 12:36
  SPEAKER_01: with my own roots.
• 12:37
  SPEAKER_01: So my three of my grandparents are Jamaican,
• 12:40
  SPEAKER_01: one's from the American South,
• 12:43
  SPEAKER_01: but I grew up in the U.S.
• 12:45
  SPEAKER_01: My parents grew up in the U.S.
• 12:47
  SPEAKER_01: and so I felt a few degrees removed from Jamaica and like I didn't have a lot
• 12:51
  SPEAKER_01: of Ownership over that part of myself.
• 12:56
  SPEAKER_01: And then when I met my fiance who was born there and went back with him,
• 13:01
  SPEAKER_01: that was when I first started to like reconnect with the place in a way
• 13:05
  SPEAKER_01: that felt really authentic to me.
• 13:06
  SPEAKER_01: And it's always something that I wanted to do.
• 13:08
  SPEAKER_01: So it just felt like the right thing to tell that story.
• 13:13
  SPEAKER_01: And then selfishly for me to think about building the next part of my life in this place.
• 13:21
  SPEAKER_00: I love that.
• 13:21
  SPEAKER_00: And I love that you said it feels like coming home because I know as someone
• 13:27
  SPEAKER_00: who was born in one country, grew up in the U.S., now I live in France.
• 13:32
  SPEAKER_00: That's a notion that I kind of struggle with and that I find myself constantly looking for.
• 13:38
  SPEAKER_00: And I haven't really found that place yet.
• 13:41
  SPEAKER_00: For the few people that I know for whom it is like a physical place,
• 13:45
  SPEAKER_00: I think that's so beautiful.
• 13:47
  SPEAKER_00: And you said it was scary.
• 13:51
  SPEAKER_00: When you kind of realize this.
• 13:54
  SPEAKER_00: But I also,
• 13:55
  SPEAKER_00: through my own experience,
• 13:57
  SPEAKER_00: feel that the hardest part is kind of knowing what to put on the page of your dream.
• 14:03
  SPEAKER_00: It's like you're making it happen.
• 14:06
  SPEAKER_00: So I'm not saying it's easy, but...
• 14:10
  SPEAKER_00: It was probably harder to identify that it's a sanctuary in the Jamaican rainforest,
• 14:16
  SPEAKER_00: a haven for eco-luxury.
• 14:18
  SPEAKER_00: Like you probably spent a lot of time looking for those specific words, right?
• 14:23
  SPEAKER_00: So can you maybe share a little bit about what role did Aki House
• 14:27
  SPEAKER_00: and what you're building and like this future vision of your life,
• 14:31
  SPEAKER_00: what role did it play in The internal shift that I guess you went through at
• 14:37
  SPEAKER_00: that moment when you realized I'm going to do this now.
• 14:41
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not going to wait for retirement or permission.
• 14:45
  SPEAKER_00: I'm going to roll up my sleeves and figure out what does this actually look like?
• 14:51
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I will say the shift is still ongoing.
• 14:57
  SPEAKER_01: Forever.
• 14:58
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, exactly.
• 14:59
  SPEAKER_01: There's a book that I read a few years ago.
• 15:02
  SPEAKER_01: And I read it probably three or four times.
• 15:05
  SPEAKER_01: It was about minimalism.
• 15:07
  SPEAKER_01: At the end of the book, the woman says, I am not a grown woman.
• 15:11
  SPEAKER_01: I'm a growing woman.
• 15:13
  SPEAKER_01: May always be growing and never fully grown.
• 15:17
  SPEAKER_01: And I remind myself of that constantly because this journey has lots of ups and downs.
• 15:23
  SPEAKER_01: And I expect some of the harder days are not even, haven't even come yet.
• 15:28
  SPEAKER_01: But yeah.
• 15:31
  SPEAKER_01: I think the
• 15:35
  SPEAKER_01: biggest thing for me has been Getting comfortable
• 15:40
  SPEAKER_01: with not having it all figured out and still moving forward.
• 15:46
  SPEAKER_01: Because the moment when I realized that I wanted to pursue this, I was really at rock bottom.
• 15:54
  SPEAKER_01: Like I hit a point where I was super burnt out at work and it was impacting my health.
• 16:00
  SPEAKER_01: I ended up having to take time off.
• 16:03
  SPEAKER_01: And I think unfortunately a lot of people get to that point before they really wake up.
• 16:08
  SPEAKER_01: But that was like a huge aha moment for me.
• 16:12
  SPEAKER_01: I can't allow this.
• 16:15
  SPEAKER_01: This cannot be normal.
• 16:16
  SPEAKER_01: And so it felt like it was only up from here.
• 16:20
  SPEAKER_01: But I also look back and
• 16:29
  SPEAKER_01: Like some of the things that I wrote or even things that I was saying
• 16:32
  SPEAKER_01: to people three years ago and I didn't have the language that I have now.
• 16:36
  SPEAKER_01: I didn't know what it was.
• 16:38
  SPEAKER_01: I had people looking at me like what is she talking about?
• 16:42
  SPEAKER_01: And so there's a lot of really overcoming the discomfort of how other people respond
• 16:50
  SPEAKER_01: to what you want to do.
• 16:54
  SPEAKER_01: And being okay with the fact that you don't have it all figured out.
• 16:57
  SPEAKER_01: That you might take two steps in the wrong direction and need to start over.
• 17:02
  SPEAKER_01: Those are all things that I've had to continue to work through.
• 17:08
  SPEAKER_01: But I try to reflect on them.
• 17:10
  SPEAKER_01: And actually writing on Substack has been helpful for me to have a space
• 17:15
  SPEAKER_01: to actually just reflect a little bit out loud.
• 17:18
  SPEAKER_01: Because...
• 17:21
  SPEAKER_01: I have come to terms with the fact that I am not perfect and I'm going
• 17:24
  SPEAKER_01: to make mistakes and that is all part of me being human.
• 17:30
  SPEAKER_01: And so you talk about the shift.
• 17:32
  SPEAKER_01: It's like all of those things.
• 17:33
  SPEAKER_01: It's being comfortable with that,
• 17:36
  SPEAKER_01: not worrying so much about what other people think and just like continuing
• 17:41
  SPEAKER_01: to move forward and try to make progress until things make more sense
• 17:45
  SPEAKER_01: or they become more clear.
• 17:48
  SPEAKER_00: I think that's really meaningful though and actually really brave because sitting in
• 17:55
  SPEAKER_00: the space takes a lot of strength and courage because it's so uncomfortable.
• 18:02
  SPEAKER_00: But from my experience,
• 18:04
  SPEAKER_00: I find that it's when you sit in that space that you start to have ideas,
• 18:10
  SPEAKER_00: that you start to carve a path for yourself.
• 18:13
  SPEAKER_00: And it sounds like Aki House has been your sanctuary before it even had a name.
• 18:21
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, that's true.
• 18:23
  SPEAKER_00: That's beautiful.
• 18:24
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 18:27
  SPEAKER_01: And I think people are like, oh, my God,
• 18:28
  SPEAKER_01: you're doing so much because I'm still working my full time job to try
• 18:31
  SPEAKER_01: and fund this.
• 18:33
  SPEAKER_01: And people are like, how?
• 18:34
  SPEAKER_01: But to your point, it gives me so much energy and actually is the thing I tell people.
• 18:40
  SPEAKER_01: This is what's keeping me going.
• 18:43
  SPEAKER_01: Having something tangible,
• 18:45
  SPEAKER_01: having that vision that you had me kind of close my eyes and think about,
• 18:49
  SPEAKER_01: that is the thing that allows me to just keep showing up.
• 18:54
  SPEAKER_00: I love that.
• 18:54
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm really glad that you brought up the fact that you have a full-time job
• 18:59
  SPEAKER_00: because I feel like There's a big polarization of go corporate or go home
• 19:05
  SPEAKER_00: or like quit corporate and become a millionaire overnight.
• 19:09
  SPEAKER_00: There's this dialogue happening, especially on Substack, I find.
• 19:14
  SPEAKER_00: But that's obviously not the whole story.
• 19:16
  SPEAKER_00: So as you do still have a full time job,
• 19:20
  SPEAKER_00: it sounds like you are someone who believes in the gray.
• 19:25
  SPEAKER_00: What I mean by the gray is like, I'm still very much looking for full-time work right now.
• 19:31
  SPEAKER_00: I'm also building out to other projects and I don't plan to let go of
• 19:37
  SPEAKER_00: the projects once I go back to full-time work.
• 19:40
  SPEAKER_00: The projects are what kind of give me joy and energy.
• 19:43
  SPEAKER_00: And well,
• 19:44
  SPEAKER_00: full-time work is because there are financial obligations and my family
• 19:49
  SPEAKER_00: and I have some There's a master class I watched probably during the pandemic.
• 20:09
  SPEAKER_01: Um, of this woman, Elaine Welteroth, who I originally started calling my possibility model.
• 20:14
  SPEAKER_01: And I think she has what you refer to as a portfolio life.
• 20:20
  SPEAKER_01: You can see through her career where she's kind of made pivots and shifts and changes.
• 20:24
  SPEAKER_01: And then in the last,
• 20:26
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know,
• 20:26
  SPEAKER_01: almost 10 years,
• 20:27
  SPEAKER_01: it feels like she's just kind of been creating her own life and reality.
• 20:32
  SPEAKER_01: Um, And in her masterclass,
• 20:35
  SPEAKER_01: she talked a lot about finding alignment between your talents,
• 20:41
  SPEAKER_01: skills and values and finding your zone of genius is where all
• 20:44
  SPEAKER_01: of those things align.
• 20:46
  SPEAKER_01: And then she maps out kind of like a mind map of all the things that she wants to
• 20:53
  SPEAKER_01: and how what she does in her work and in her life can help her achieve those things.
• 20:59
  SPEAKER_01: And so I've thought a lot recently about
• 21:04
  SPEAKER_01: What does Simone's life look like versus what does Simone's career look like
• 21:10
  SPEAKER_01: or what is your title?
• 21:12
  SPEAKER_01: And I think what you're describing is similar.
• 21:14
  SPEAKER_01: It's like you can have your projects,
• 21:16
  SPEAKER_01: you're looking for corporate work because you need to support your family and
• 21:21
  SPEAKER_01: the projects maybe come and go.
• 21:23
  SPEAKER_01: But ultimately, all of that makes up Jenny and what Jenny's life looks like day to day.
• 21:29
  SPEAKER_01: And I think taking that perspective of just...
• 21:32
  SPEAKER_01: How do you want to feel in your life when you look back at the end?
• 21:35
  SPEAKER_01: Like, what do you want to say?
• 21:36
  SPEAKER_01: What do you want other people to say about you?
• 21:39
  SPEAKER_01: And so I've kind of let go of like the title and the career and all of those things.
• 21:45
  SPEAKER_01: And that's allowed me to start thinking more in this way of like, well, what am I good at?
• 21:48
  SPEAKER_01: What do I love?
• 21:49
  SPEAKER_01: What am I passionate about?
• 21:51
  SPEAKER_01: And how do I build a life that feels authentic and right for me over the long term?
• 21:58
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, you're hitting on what has kind of become my ethos since I worked in
• 22:05
  SPEAKER_00: a more values-led environment,
• 22:07
  SPEAKER_00: and it really showed me that The hill I will die on as a parent,
• 22:13
  SPEAKER_00: as a manager, as a person is that there is no professional and personal self.
• 22:19
  SPEAKER_00: We are just whole humans who show up whole to everything we do.
• 22:23
  SPEAKER_00: So I'm wondering, you mentioned having a toddler in your vision.
• 22:30
  SPEAKER_00: I think that that means that Your baby will be born soon.
• 22:34
  SPEAKER_00: And that brings me to where your life is right now, which is in Brooklyn.
• 22:40
  SPEAKER_00: And I listened to an episode of yours where you talk about what you called kind
• 22:45
  SPEAKER_00: of fake rules that you thought,
• 22:47
  SPEAKER_00: oh, I can't move to Brooklyn in my 30s and have a baby because people don't do that.
• 22:52
  SPEAKER_00: And that really resonated with me because I've had a lot of fake rules of my own
• 22:57
  SPEAKER_00: through the different kind of phases and decades of my life.
• 23:01
  SPEAKER_00: So I was just wondering...
• 23:04
  SPEAKER_00: How has moving to New York and now expecting to become a mother kind
• 23:08
  SPEAKER_00: of made you reflect on some of the other fake rules you may have lived by?
• 23:14
  SPEAKER_00: And how are you catching yourself shifting in regards to this?
• 23:18
  SPEAKER_00: Like when it pops up again, do you find yourself being like, OK, stop, Simone.
• 23:24
  SPEAKER_00: That's a fake rule.
• 23:26
  SPEAKER_00: I want to talk a little bit about that because I think that's a journey that a lot
• 23:30
  SPEAKER_00: of people and especially women struggle with.
• 23:33
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know that they're fake rules,
• 23:35
  SPEAKER_01: but I think that there's a lot of stress and pressure that we live with in the ways
• 23:43
  SPEAKER_01: that we have normalized living now.
• 23:45
  SPEAKER_01: And it really is unnecessary if we take a step back and really think
• 23:49
  SPEAKER_01: about what works for me,
• 23:50
  SPEAKER_01: what serves me,
• 23:52
  SPEAKER_01: and what is going to help me actually achieve what I want to achieve in
• 23:55
  SPEAKER_01: the long run versus what looks good.
• 23:58
  SPEAKER_01: Do I have the perfect home with the perfect nursery with all the...
• 24:04
  SPEAKER_01: If those things are going to add stress to your life, if you can't afford them, don't do it.
• 24:09
  SPEAKER_01: And I know that's easier said than done.
• 24:12
  SPEAKER_00: It really isn't, though.
• 24:13
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know if it's easier said than done.
• 24:15
  SPEAKER_00: I think you're just telling us remove should from your thinking.
• 24:21
  SPEAKER_00: And I know when my kids were newborns,
• 24:24
  SPEAKER_00: I removed all social media immediately because not going
• 24:28
  SPEAKER_00: on social media made me immediately feel like So, yes.
• 24:58
  SPEAKER_00: And it actually wasn't that hard to remove social media.
• 25:01
  SPEAKER_00: Like when you say, no, it's easier said than done.
• 25:03
  SPEAKER_00: In this case, no, it was easy.
• 25:06
  SPEAKER_00: It was easy, you know?
• 25:07
  SPEAKER_00: So I think the hard part is realizing that we have control more than we think.
• 25:15
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 25:15
  SPEAKER_01: And the word should is so important.
• 25:18
  SPEAKER_01: I think spending a couple years in therapy was the first time that I started
• 25:21
  SPEAKER_01: to question when I say I should.
• 25:23
  SPEAKER_01: And she's like...
• 25:24
  SPEAKER_01: Say more about that.
• 25:25
  SPEAKER_01: And so now when I hear people say they should do something, I'm like, I just push.
• 25:31
  SPEAKER_01: Just think about that a little bit.
• 25:33
  SPEAKER_01: Like, where is that coming from?
• 25:35
  SPEAKER_00: I also had experience with therapy where my therapist would say, why?
• 25:41
  SPEAKER_00: Why should you?
• 25:43
  SPEAKER_00: And I'd be like, I have no answer.
• 25:45
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 25:48
  SPEAKER_00: I want to talk about what the meaningful shift is because I've used
• 25:54
  SPEAKER_00: the word meaningful,
• 25:55
  SPEAKER_00: I've used the word shift in this conversation,
• 25:57
  SPEAKER_00: but there is actually the meaningful shift.
• 26:01
  SPEAKER_00: So can you tell us a bit about what it means for you figuratively and,
• 26:06
  SPEAKER_00: of course, share what it is literally?
• 26:09
  SPEAKER_01: Figuratively,
• 26:10
  SPEAKER_01: it's just an acknowledgement that The world that we're living
• 26:17
  SPEAKER_01: in is changing beneath our feet.
• 26:22
  SPEAKER_01: And we are all very uncomfortable,
• 26:27
  SPEAKER_01: as we probably should be,
• 26:29
  SPEAKER_01: but thinking about the fact that we can make really big shifts and changes in
• 26:35
  SPEAKER_01: the ways that we think about our life,
• 26:37
  SPEAKER_01: what good looks like,
• 26:38
  SPEAKER_01: what we should or shouldn't do, and kind of find our way through all of this.
• 26:47
  SPEAKER_01: Is what I mean about the meaningful shift because there's like people make pivots,
• 26:52
  SPEAKER_01: people make hard choices,
• 26:53
  SPEAKER_01: but the idea of it being really meaningful is almost like you have to be ready
• 26:58
  SPEAKER_01: to shed some really long-held beliefs.
• 27:05
  SPEAKER_01: You have to be ready to blow up your life.
• 27:07
  SPEAKER_01: You have to be ready to say things.
• 27:10
  SPEAKER_01: Know in ways that you've never said it before,
• 27:13
  SPEAKER_01: like really big shifts and changes that are going to result
• 27:18
  SPEAKER_01: in something like really, really meaningfully different happening in your life.
• 27:24
  SPEAKER_01: And the literal description is also the platform that I'm using to kind of build
• 27:32
  SPEAKER_01: in public and tell my story of building Aki House with the world.
• 27:39
  SPEAKER_01: I talked about possibility models.
• 27:41
  SPEAKER_01: I think the,
• 27:43
  SPEAKER_01: I want to be really honest with people about how hard it is to make these changes,
• 27:48
  SPEAKER_01: how emotional and, um,
• 27:54
  SPEAKER_01: That you're not always moving forward.
• 27:55
  SPEAKER_01: Sometimes it feels like you're stagnant.
• 27:57
  SPEAKER_01: Sometimes it feels like you took a step back.
• 28:00
  SPEAKER_01: And when I thought about doing this,
• 28:04
  SPEAKER_01: it didn't feel right for me to just talk about myself constantly.
• 28:07
  SPEAKER_01: So what I found is sharing other people's stories helps me and also helps.
• 28:14
  SPEAKER_01: Incidentally helps other people because I have possibility models that I see
• 28:19
  SPEAKER_01: that have helped me keep going.
• 28:21
  SPEAKER_01: Maybe they're five years ahead of me, 10 years ahead of me.
• 28:25
  SPEAKER_01: Some people who feel like peers that maybe we're on this journey together.
• 28:28
  SPEAKER_01: But I think just realizing that we're not alone in acknowledging
• 28:33
  SPEAKER_01: when something doesn't feel right,
• 28:36
  SPEAKER_01: but realizing that there are steps that you can take to make things feel more right
• 28:42
  SPEAKER_01: in your life.
• 28:46
  SPEAKER_00: I love that.
• 28:47
  SPEAKER_00: And I think that it's really inspiring to hear other people's stories.
• 28:52
  SPEAKER_00: I know for me as well,
• 28:53
  SPEAKER_00: especially when you have moments of doubt,
• 28:57
  SPEAKER_00: there's something about knowing that it's possible and here's how it was done.
• 29:03
  SPEAKER_00: And I love the building in public.
• 29:07
  SPEAKER_00: Because if you talk to me about Aki House, I would be so intimidated.
• 29:14
  SPEAKER_00: But when I actually see the process and see how slow,
• 29:20
  SPEAKER_00: and I put that in quotation marks because it takes a long time, it actually is slow.
• 29:29
  SPEAKER_00: So, going into the kind of...
• 29:55
  SPEAKER_00: Wrapping up part of this conversation,
• 29:58
  SPEAKER_00: I wanted to ask you,
• 30:01
  SPEAKER_00: if you connect the dots to this transition that you're talking about,
• 30:06
  SPEAKER_00: the meaningful shift,
• 30:07
  SPEAKER_00: Aki House,
• 30:09
  SPEAKER_00: shifting your vision,
• 30:11
  SPEAKER_00: if you go back to even your 22-year-old self who had that literal retirement plan
• 30:16
  SPEAKER_00: to how you visualize it now,
• 30:19
  SPEAKER_00: so from start to where you are now,
• 30:22
  SPEAKER_00: is there one detail,
• 30:24
  SPEAKER_00: moment, Or even like a learning that looking back changes the whole picture.
• 30:30
  SPEAKER_00: You know, the one that feels obvious now, but there's no way you could have seen it at the time.
• 30:37
  SPEAKER_01: I really loved that you asked me to reflect on this.
• 30:41
  SPEAKER_01: And I'm pausing now because it also feels connected to the point you made
• 30:47
  SPEAKER_01: about me having this thought at 22 and I hadn't really even connected those dots.
• 30:53
  SPEAKER_01: But In my first job,
• 30:57
  SPEAKER_01: I mentioned I worked in ad agencies and there's this thing that happens where like
• 31:05
  SPEAKER_01: a new CMO comes in and they maybe fire the agency.
• 31:10
  SPEAKER_01: That's like, we're starting from scratch.
• 31:11
  SPEAKER_01: I want to make my mark.
• 31:13
  SPEAKER_01: I didn't know this as a 22-year-old in my first job that that was something that happened.
• 31:18
  SPEAKER_01: But it's something that I witnessed in the first maybe two years of working
• 31:24
  SPEAKER_01: where there were people that I worked with who were just gone the next day.
• 31:29
  SPEAKER_01: One guy had just gotten hired like three months before.
• 31:32
  SPEAKER_01: And so I think that was kind of the first wake-up call for me of like,
• 31:39
  SPEAKER_01: Nothing is promised, you know?
• 31:42
  SPEAKER_01: And so I remember when I was applying to business school,
• 31:46
  SPEAKER_01: saying to myself that I wanted to be in a position where my life didn't happen
• 31:51
  SPEAKER_01: to me.
• 31:53
  SPEAKER_01: Like I wanted to somehow make my life happen.
• 31:58
  SPEAKER_01: Looking back,
• 31:59
  SPEAKER_01: I think it was good in spirit,
• 32:01
  SPEAKER_01: but there are a lot of things that are out of your control.
• 32:04
  SPEAKER_01: But I think that posture of like feeling...
• 32:08
  SPEAKER_01: Like I wanted to be an active participant is something that I've just subconsciously had.
• 32:16
  SPEAKER_01: And I didn't realize that that's something that I always kind of pull from
• 32:22
  SPEAKER_01: until you had me reflect on that.
• 32:23
  SPEAKER_01: So I would say that's that thing of like,
• 32:28
  SPEAKER_01: how can I make the life that I want happen on my terms and always feel a sense
• 32:33
  SPEAKER_01: of agency regardless of what's happening?
• 32:37
  SPEAKER_00: This is why I love looking back because if we knew these things up front,
• 32:44
  SPEAKER_00: It wouldn't be as authentic and it wouldn't be what it is.
• 32:47
  SPEAKER_00: But when you look back, there are so many learnings.
• 32:51
  SPEAKER_00: And this one, yeah, to me, it makes total sense.
• 32:54
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, at 22, you had the beginnings of Ekihaus.
• 32:59
  SPEAKER_00: So you were always kind of the maestro of your own orchestra without knowing it,
• 33:06
  SPEAKER_00: I guess, until a certain maturity point.
• 33:09
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 33:10
  SPEAKER_00: So what are also one to three things you wish you heard, read,
• 33:17
  SPEAKER_00: watched or just simply crossed paths with when you were at your hardest
• 33:23
  SPEAKER_00: or most uncertain moment during the transition?
• 33:27
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I don't know if I would have listened to them, to be honest, but.
• 33:33
  SPEAKER_01: There are two quotes that I've seen,
• 33:36
  SPEAKER_01: actually one I saw again this morning, that really speak to me.
• 33:42
  SPEAKER_01: One is, trust the timing of your life.
• 33:45
  SPEAKER_01: So to your point,
• 33:46
  SPEAKER_01: there are things that maybe I felt at 22,
• 33:49
  SPEAKER_01: but it wasn't the right time, like the right space.
• 33:54
  SPEAKER_01: Like all these things had to come together for me to be pursuing what I'm pursuing right now.
• 34:00
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 34:01
  SPEAKER_01: And I think when I was that young,
• 34:06
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 34:06
  SPEAKER_01: you're in this rush to kind of make things happen and the reality is you just have
• 34:11
  SPEAKER_01: to trust the timing and continue to move forward.
• 34:18
  SPEAKER_01: So I think having a little bit more patience and a little bit more trust would be great.
• 34:22
  SPEAKER_01: The other that I saw this morning is that courage comes from action.
• 34:27
  SPEAKER_01: This idea that sitting and thinking about Ideas is not how you build up the courage
• 34:35
  SPEAKER_01: and the bravery to start.
• 34:36
  SPEAKER_01: You actually have to just start doing,
• 34:39
  SPEAKER_01: even when you're really uncomfortable,
• 34:41
  SPEAKER_01: even when you don't know 100% where things are going to go.
• 34:46
  SPEAKER_01: And knowing to your point that I've had this idea for so many years,
• 34:55
  SPEAKER_01: I probably could have started Testing things,
• 34:59
  SPEAKER_01: pursuing things much earlier,
• 35:02
  SPEAKER_01: but the idea of being
• 35:06
  SPEAKER_01: embarrassed and like not good enough and am I
• 35:10
  SPEAKER_01: the right person?
• 35:11
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know.
• 35:12
  SPEAKER_01: Just all of those things got in the way.
• 35:14
  SPEAKER_01: And so building out loud and telling a story like that has taken a lot of courage,
• 35:19
  SPEAKER_01: but I do find that That helps me actually just like writing stuff down and sharing
• 35:25
  SPEAKER_01: and finding, oh, this one story did resonate with somebody.
• 35:29
  SPEAKER_01: And so you just have to start whatever it is.
• 35:34
  SPEAKER_00: Absolutely.
• 35:35
  SPEAKER_00: And your first quote that you shared is the perfect thing to look at
• 35:41
  SPEAKER_00: when you're feeling like you can't make the second quote happen.
• 35:45
  SPEAKER_00: So they go very well together.
• 35:48
  SPEAKER_01: That's fair.
• 35:49
  SPEAKER_00: Well, this has been a very inspiring conversation,
• 35:52
  SPEAKER_00: and there are a few words that stick out for me,
• 35:57
  SPEAKER_00: like the words sanctuary, haven, joy, genius.
• 36:04
  SPEAKER_00: I think these are words that I want to look at on a regular basis right now.
• 36:12
  SPEAKER_00: So where can listeners connect with you and learn more about your work?
• 36:17
  SPEAKER_00: Where's the best place?
• 36:19
  SPEAKER_01: The Meaningful Shift,
• 36:20
  SPEAKER_01: either on Substack or if you are a podcaster,
• 36:24
  SPEAKER_01: you can find the actual podcast and all the conversations on Spotify,
• 36:30
  SPEAKER_01: Apple Podcasts, wherever you get your shows.
• 36:33
  SPEAKER_01: I am talking about Eki House,
• 36:37
  SPEAKER_01: so you will hear a little bit about that and then Our hope is to be open next year
• 36:42
  SPEAKER_01: in the summer.
• 36:42
  SPEAKER_01: So if you want to come to Jamaica, I have a place for you.
• 36:45
  SPEAKER_01: But you can follow the journey on The Meaningful Shift.
• 36:50
  SPEAKER_00: Amazing.
• 36:50
  SPEAKER_00: I definitely will be coming.
• 36:53
  SPEAKER_00: We've already had some ideas with my husband on, so when should Jamaica be on our radar?
• 36:58
  SPEAKER_00: So count me on the list.
• 37:01
  SPEAKER_00: Well, thank you so much for the chat today.
• 37:03
  SPEAKER_00: It was very meaningful.
• 37:05
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you for the opportunity to reflect today.
• 37:09
  SPEAKER_00: What stands out for me in the conversation with Simone is the pace with
• 37:14
  SPEAKER_00: which she is building the life she wants.
• 37:18
  SPEAKER_00: On one hand, she's doing so much.
• 37:21
  SPEAKER_00: But on the other hand,
• 37:23
  SPEAKER_00: I feel a real, intentional, slow growth in her approach to everything she does.
• 37:31
  SPEAKER_00: It's almost like it has to be meaningful.
• 37:34
  SPEAKER_00: And for it to stay meaningful, she has to keep doing check-ins.
• 37:40
  SPEAKER_00: Working full time in tech,
• 37:42
  SPEAKER_00: about to have a baby,
• 37:44
  SPEAKER_00: building a new way of experiencing Jamaica,
• 37:47
  SPEAKER_00: creating her podcast, her newsletter, and the list goes on.
• 37:52
  SPEAKER_00: How is she doing it all without burning out?
• 37:56
  SPEAKER_00: I think she gave us the answer right in the conversation.
• 37:59
  SPEAKER_00: It's about figuring out what brings you energy.
• 38:03
  SPEAKER_00: What is your meaningful shift?
• 38:05
  SPEAKER_00: I bet for you,
• 38:07
  SPEAKER_00: like for me,
• 38:08
  SPEAKER_00: and like for Simone,
• 38:09
  SPEAKER_00: it's something that we've always had within us,
• 38:12
  SPEAKER_00: but we didn't have the tools or the time to figure it out.
• 38:17
  SPEAKER_00: The way I'm slowly figuring it out for myself is by sitting in
• 38:21
  SPEAKER_00: the uncomfortable space of uncertainty.
• 38:25
  SPEAKER_00: Actively taking that time out of the job market the last seven months,
• 38:30
  SPEAKER_00: despite society telling me I should have dove right back in,
• 38:36
  SPEAKER_00: it took me those 14 months of the square-in-a-circle feeling to allow myself
• 38:42
  SPEAKER_00: to even get there.
• 38:44
  SPEAKER_00: But once I did, I couldn't see any other path.
• 38:48
  SPEAKER_00: I'm also journaling regularly and being intentional about my pace
• 38:53
  SPEAKER_00: because slow growth is what makes space for conversations like the one I just had.
• 39:00
  SPEAKER_00: I'm telling you this because I can feel it from the conversation I had with Simone
• 39:06
  SPEAKER_00: and I truly believe that the only reason I even have the space
• 39:11
  SPEAKER_00: for these conversations today and the capacity within me
• 39:16
  SPEAKER_00: to actually get something out of them,
• 39:18
  SPEAKER_00: Is because I've done the internal work, I've sat in the uncomfortable space.
• 39:24
  SPEAKER_00: Unfortunately, there is no compass for any of this.
• 39:28
  SPEAKER_00: There is no compass for what I'm talking about.
• 39:31
  SPEAKER_00: It completely goes against our hustle culture that we find on LinkedIn,
• 39:35
  SPEAKER_00: on the job market, on social media.
• 39:38
  SPEAKER_00: But that is exactly why sitting in this space of uncertainty is the only way
• 39:44
  SPEAKER_00: to hear your true intuition and be able to forge a life forward that is aligned
• 39:50
  SPEAKER_00: with your values.
• 39:52
  SPEAKER_00: And I can see that when I do things that give me energy, my capacity increases.
• 39:58
  [music]
• 40:07
  SPEAKER_00: I'd love to hear about it.
• 40:09
  SPEAKER_00: If you enjoyed listening to me and could rate
• 40:10
  SPEAKER_00: and review this show wherever you're listening,
• 40:13
  SPEAKER_00: that will help others like you and me find this show.
• 40:25
  [music]