Creating Space for Change: Daniel Ludevig on Leadership, Feedback, and Team Dynamics

Welcome to the Social Community Show, where it's Argo to help you learn, grow, and transform into person you wanna become. Today, I'm talking with Daniel Ludwig. Daniel is a newer born facilitator trainer and certified transformation coach now based in Germany and Spain. With a background in psychology and economics, he brings a wealth of diverse experiences to his work. He found Move Leadership in 2010 and recently established the modern leader, an executive leadership mastermind community. In his coaching, whether 1 on 1 with executives or teams, Denner aims to transform my intents and behaviors, increasing integrity, confidence, clarity, and resilience. His clients experience profound shifts, gaining greater vision, influence, and authenticity that resonates through their personal and professional lives. This is a great fascinating interview.

He he really is very generous with all his information. We go into a bunch of different things. The courage for him to to to move to Europe from from New York City, tons of different techniques and and all kinds of things. I really think you guys are gonna get a lot about it value out of this episode. I've got a bunch of notes for things for me to work on. Hopefully, if you guys are experiencing some of these things for you guys to work on. Without further ado, let's talk to Daniel. Daniel, welcome to the Social Security Show.

I've been looking forward to having a chat with you today. Thanks so much for taking the time. I know it's quite late in Germany there. I really appreciate you, taking the time in the evening to get with us and share some knowledge. I'm really excited about this.

Awesome. Total pleasure. And actually, today, I'm in Barcelona, which is the same time soon, but slightly slightly sunnier. I live between so you'll get a more positive vibe from it than you might usually.

Awesome. Well, that's great. So as, as a good podcast host, I was Internet stalking you, and I came across that you did yoga and dance. Well, how did you get into that?

Oh, yeah. I mean, that was my, my backdoor entry into this whole world of leadership that I'm in right now. So how I got into it, you want the shortest or the slightly longer one?

Whatever story you wanna share.

Alright. So I grew up in New York and, like many Americans, especially Americans of immigrant parents, was put on a very clear path of,

you

know, high school to a good university to get a good job and move up the hierarchy. And I found myself, at some point in that corporate ladder climb realizing that actually I don't necessarily know if I wanna keep doing this. And that I'm meeting people who are, you know, working on cruise ships or who are, you know, living on wolfing farms and are just seemingly doing very different things than I'm doing. So in 2009, when I, found myself getting laid off from the architecture job that I was doing at the time during the financial crisis, That to me was an opportunity. It was either, you know, keep figuring out how to desperately pay rent in New York and jump to another job and, you know, I'm not a saver, so I was living check to check, or do something I've actually been wanting to do for a while and had promised myself I would do, which is move to Europe. And that opened up this whole different, life of kinda taking a break and asking myself, you know, what do I actually want? And if I was gonna design a career that was made up of the things I'm really interested in and not just, you know, how do I pay my rent, what would that look like? And the things that I was living off of to make that lifestyle possible were the hobbies that I had when I grew up. And one of those hobbies was dance. I competed in ballroom dance, in college.

I was really into it growing up as a kid. And so I just started, you know, basically paying my super cheap Berlin rent, which was, like, 300, you know, euros a month at that time. This is back in 2009. Off of dance lessons, dance performances, piano lessons, piano performances. And I started dating someone who was a yoga teacher who was living in Morocco at the time. And when I went down to visit him and stay there for a week, what was supposed to be a week turned into a year, and what was supposed to be a vacation turned into taking over a hotel on the coast of Morocco and opening up this yoga, advanced, vegan food vacation destination for people from Europe to come down to. And, that's how I got into that chapter of my life. It didn't last long.

It lasted for about a year, but it was someone there, a a a guest who had visited that planted the first seed in my mind of, a path that I never knew would, you know, result in the kind of work that I was doing. And what they mentioned to me, which really started it all off, was that dance and in particular the way that I teach dance would be this fascinating metaphor and experience for leadership development. And I had never really thought about leadership development. I didn't really know anything about coaching at the time. I didn't know anything about, you know, corporate team events or any of that kind of stuff. But it planted a seed that when that project came to an end was the beginning of an exploration that, you know, 15 years later now has led to the evolution of the work that I'm doing. And that's that's how, when I look back now, I I couldn't have thought of a better way to have gotten into the work that I was doing. But you can never plan these things forward.

I think it only makes sense in hindsight.

Wow. What a great story. Thanks for sharing that. Yeah. Well, how serendipitous. Right? The all of that just sorta lined up in a way. Right? And it led you to this unbeknownst path to you, something like you're saying you never would have thought of. How interesting.

All of those little things. If you didn't have that courage to go to Europe, who knows what you'd be doing right now. Right?

Oh, I mean, a million other things. Right? Yeah. And and when I look back at the path that my life was taking in New York, I you know how sometimes you meet these people. I have these, you know, super close friends who are in their late seventies eighties. Mhmm. And you know that if you don't change anything in your life, you're gonna end up exactly like them. And there was absolutely nothing wrong with that because they're epic New Yorkers, but they're like those New Yorkers that have never left New York and have lived there their whole lives. And now they have their, you know, penthouse at Gramsci Park that they never leave.

And I just felt like, you know what? I'm okay if that is my final destination, but I just wanna make sure that I know what else is out there before I go down that path. And now looking back, I mean, the life that I have come to live is one that I couldn't have dreamt of if you had asked me to come up with the wildest version of what was possible. So yeah. I mean, those serendipitous dots and what I, you know, now realize is an active process of being very open to opportunities when they come in front of you and when you, you know, when you kind of have them walk past you is the story of my life. And I think it can be the story of many people's lives, but you're absolutely right. It takes courage because behind that leap was a tremendous amount of fear and a tremendous amount of what if and no real, you know, resources or money or anything to pay rent if things didn't go well. And it was, you know, when I look back on it now and I was very aware of it then, it required me to get into a relationship with fear of the unknown, fear of ambiguity, fear of independence, fear of making huge mistakes, fear of having everybody tell me, you know, you're gonna be back in 2 months and you're wasting your time and why would you go to Europe and finding out that they're right. Right? I mean, there was a lot of worry coming up that I had to move through and kinda learn to embrace in order to actually make that leap.

And, you know, let's just say let's just say you failed in too much. That's I think that's okay. Like, you know what I'm saying? Like, you actually went. You felt what it was like. Whatever the reason why, so what? I don't why are we so fair scared of failure? Like, there's all those people that said that to you. They don't even know what it would be like to move away for 2 months.

I think that what what you're also pointing to is what exactly would I have failed at.

Right.

And I think if you look at it from, you know, this really holistic perspective of adventure, trying something new, you know, breaking out of the mold, then going there and coming back at 2 months would not have been a failure, and I would have still seen that as something quite positive. But I had a different story at the time. Right? The story was I'm moving to Europe. Right? I'm living my Vicky Cristina Barcelona life. Right? Like, I am breaking free of, you know, this, where do you live, what corner, you know, is your apartment on, how much money do you make, what's your job status, you know, kind of standard, And I'm moving on to something that is hopefully better. And I think if I had failed at that adventure, right, or failed at that, you know, that that kind of exploration, it wouldn't have just been that I didn't make it over there. But I also would have had to come back and continue the exact same life that I was looking for. And I think that would have felt like a failure.

It would have felt like a, you know, I had a huge going away party. I gave away all my stuff. I rented out, you know, like, my apartment to a friend, but I planned pretty much never to return. Right? It would have been really hard to come back and kind of reconnect with a life that I was pretty much ready to say goodbye to. But now from the perspective of, you know, growth and personal development and, you know, just trying things, Yeah. I mean, what is failure? Right? It's just one more step in the, you know, in the journey that unfolds your life. But at the time, it felt it felt like there was a lot at stake.

Yeah. That goes I I feel like this reminds me of the old adage of burning the boats. You literally burn the boats. Because it would have been easier to, like, oh, let me put my stuff in storage or my parents or whatever, And then I'm gonna sublet to a friend and you you gave yourself that safety net. Right? You gave yourself that little plan b. Like and so I I like your way. It feels like that in history, that works out better when we burn the boats in a way. Sometimes that can be catastrophic.

And but it's how you frame it. Like, you're, you know, even if you like you said, even if you did fail, quote, unquote, whatever that is, but you knew what success was, it sounds like, already going into that. Like, going here and doing this, this is already success. Everything after that is a bonus. Am I hearing that right?

I think you are hearing it right. And, you know, when you say burning the boat's note, I remember, and I I've thought about this many times whenever making a big leap, is my the question I've asked myself is, if this all goes downhill, what is the absolute worst that can happen? And that it took me a while to land at that question, and it took me a while to unpack what am I most afraid of. Mhmm. And, you know, what I realized through it, and I also realized through that how incredibly lucky and fortunate and privileged I am to to have what I now call cushions that I can land on. Right? So let's say that, you know, the Berlin thing didn't work out. You're absolutely right. Like, I was subletting an apartment, you know, to a friend with the understanding that I could come back and take over that apartment if I needed to. Even when I was living in New York, you know, when I graduated university, I was working for a couple of years in, in a cancer hospital.

And I met, while in New York, a very brave and courageous architect who decided to take me under my under his wing if I wanted to come and intern with him for no particular pay, but just kind of learn what it's like to be an architect and potentially get trained up without any actual architecture background. And that too was a leap of faith. That too meant, you know, trusting that there's something on the other side that is possibly, you know, greater than my current situation. But But I remember leaving the hospital job and and really digging into asking them, if this architecture job doesn't work out, will I still have a place here? And they said so clearly, like, you will always have a place here. And that was, you know, so I I think that it's easier to make leaps of faith that are both, you know, courageous and free falling and, you know, really, like, fully committed if you're also aware, or at least in my case, if I'm aware that this is not, like, a completely idiotic choice. Right? If everything doesn't work out, I can come back. And honestly, when I look at what I did with Morocco, like, leap to move there and, you know, live with a new partner and open up a hotel, there was also a backup plan with Berlin. Right? Like, if Morocco didn't work out, there was this little place in Berlin that belonged to a friend that she said I could come back to.

And to me, that's that's kind of, I don't know if you would call it safe courage or smart courage. Mhmm. But it's kind of courage that allows me to jump in fully because I know that there's, you know, some sort of safety if I need to fall.

Mhmm. I guess that feeling of certainty, right, that helps us a lot as humans too when we have that feeling of certainty. We're we're we feel safe and stuff. And and it sounds like that helped you, feel that courage to be like, you know what? I I do feel safe. I do feel supported, whatever it was, that making this is not catastrophic. Right?

That's right. And then, you know, when you say certainty, I mean, that sort of brings up for me, like, I think all humans have craving for certainty. I think all humans have craving for uncertainty and variety and, you know, diversity. But it is very hard to sink your teeth into the desire for uncertainty if your basic needs are not certain.

Right.

And so for me, you know, it absolutely it it was really important to know that I had that that kind of foundation on which I could fall back on. And that's the part where I also realized the privilege, where I realized, you know, the the support, where I realized, you know, the the surroundings that I have that enable that because how many stories are there of amazing entrepreneurs, of, you know, amazing people who have transformed their lives or transformed, you know, a company or whatever and did it with no certainty. Right? They just had to bite into the uncertainty, you know, golden apple, and they were not guaranteed any kind of safety if things didn't work out. And for that, I have so much more respect than even, you know, people who are doing things like I did because you have to face the fear, and there's nothing that makes that fear tamed.

Mhmm. Yeah. That's that's an interesting thing you break up because I think about that, like, with my own son and stuff like that. Having that, you know, DIY kind of mentality of, like, let's look around and grab parts and fix things. Let's and there's a there's a there is a certain element to that of like, you see like, you're seeing entrepreneurs and things like that, business people, whatever, where you've gotta, like that adage that sometimes doesn't make sense, but pull yourself up by the bootstraps in a way because, like, I don't have nothing else. Like, I don't know if we're gonna eat next week. I don't know if we're gonna do this. So you you've gotta find that thing within you.

You know? And that's hard too, I think. You know? Like, my son doesn't have to do that. He doesn't understand. Like like, let's generate some stuff. He's like, why don't you just get something on Amazon? Like, what are you doing? I'm like, I don't need to. This I can figure out how to fix this. I can figure out how to I got some parts. I just need a couple of bolts.

I don't need to buy a new one. And that's a different mentality. Right? So there it could be that could go both ways. And and I wonder if that's nurture versus nature kinda thing where you grew up a little more privileged. So you don't maybe have that tenacity or whatever it is, that grit or something, where you've gotta figure things out versus when you grew up maybe a little bit more poor or something like that. You've gotta figure things out. So you've got your back against the wall in a way. There's 2 different, juxtaposed positions that seem to turn out 2 different kind of interesting people.

And I wonder if like, I try to make things hard on my son on purpose because I don't want that to happen. Like, we you kinda were talking about earlier. I think Seneca, one of the stoics, he talks about something along the lines of, what are what are we afraid of? What do you like, spend a day or month eating scant food, sleeping on the floor, wearing tattered clothes. Like, what are you afraid of? Are you afraid of sleeping outside? Like, what are you afraid of? And when we get past that, you know, it we like, you discovered that freedom. So I try to do it with my son. Like, we have we we eat beans and rice. I'm like, listen. If everything went to shit, like, I'm letting you know right now, we can survive on beans and rice.

And he actually enjoys these. Like, this is actually pretty good. You know? So I try to bring those hard lessons, and I know it's not the same as actually being poor. But, I think there's something there. Sorry. My thanks for coming to my TED talk.

No. I listen. I think, first of all, there's there's 2 different parts of that that that come up for me. I think one is, you know, what what type of environment or background are you are you coming from when you're making a decision. Right? And the second is then, you know, how do you instill that in other people? Right? So my own background, you know, my both my parents are immigrants from Russia and Poland. They came over to the US with absolutely nothing, and then they pursued their version of the American dream and were able to achieve a kind of middle class life. And so I grew up with an understanding of both the risk that you need to take in order to improve your life and in order to make a change and seeing that in them as part of their story and as part of my inherited story was, you know, foundation of just how I how I think about the world. Right? You don't Things don't happen if you don't change things.

Right? Nothing changes if you change things. Right. On the other hand, I think it's a very common, story with a lot of immigrant children, and it sounds like you might have, instilled something similar in your own son, which is a constant reminder of what life could have been like. And I grew up with a constant reminder that my life is so much better. Thanks to the decisions that they made and that I better finish the food on my plate because they didn't have the option to not finish their food. Because those privileges. Right? And so I think that that reminder, that constant, sometimes it's called, you know, comparative suffering. Mhmm.

Sense, like, our suffering was so much worse than yours, and so you should be grateful for everything that you have. I think it's both a blessing and a curse. Right? Yeah. On the one hand, it can be very humbling and it allows you to appreciate what you have and it allows you to recognize that you really do have privileges and opportunities that other people didn't have. And I think on the other hand, it can set in a certain kind of shadow for never being able to fully enjoy what you materialize and always somehow feeling guilty for what you have and always somehow feeling like you can't really just fully appreciate that you've created a life and that, you know, certain things can be taken for granted, and that's just enough and not feel like you somehow have to always either give back or be worried that it's gonna be taken away or yeah. I've had this fear that, you know, nothing is stable. Right? Mhmm. So it I I think I think it goes in in in beautifully different directions.

It keeps people humble, but it also can make it difficult to fully appreciate things. Or in my case, I think it also made me not wanna be frugal and not wanna save and not wanna be, you know, constantly worried about, you know, do I have enough money? Am I preparing for my And am I living for, you know, one day when I can retire? But actually, just wanna kinda say live in the moment, not be so worried about always being prepared for things. Right? And that that is part of the shadow side that I inherited from, from my story, which is, you know, on the one hand, a lot of ambition, but on the hand, a, a fear of really being able to live in the present. And I have to constantly overcome that because of the history that I am living on. Mhmm.

Through this whole journey, I'm wondering, what was the self talk like? How did that evolve from maybe the early stages of of leaving the the oncology and going into the dance and moving. What was your self talk like? Has it evolved at all, or has it been sort of steady? What was that like?

I love that you're asking that because I think self talk is such a important topic and becoming more and more important the the deeper I get into it. You know, I I often find myself like very embarrassed and humiliated by my own self talk when I think about me in the past. Right? Or when I reread journal entries or or things like that. I think that honestly when I was, you know, younger and, you know, now I'm 40, so I'm talking about when I was, you know, early twenties living in New York at that time, I was just so focused on what other people thought of me and how to fit in and what I'm not enough in and how much, you know, cooler and more interesting and more, you know, rich and more vibrant everybody is around me that I'm not really sure if I knew at all really what my worth or value was. I kinda felt like I was pretty much on autopilot, basing the majority of my identity on what was in or not in around me. And I think there, you know, there's a second thread that also was unique and was someone trying to find his voice. I mean, I remember very clearly the first time that I moved from living with roommates in New York to having an apartment in New York from, I was 23 at the time. That was the first time when I started hosting, you know, brunches at my apartment or, you know, some systematic evening or whatever that I actually started making friends that felt like they were friends on my own terms.

Mhmm. But so much of those few years, you know, 1st few years in New York were dominated by thoughts of, you know, wow, everybody is invited to parties and is going out. There's so much happening. And what am I getting invited to? And what am I doing? And why am I the only one who's sitting at home now? And how uncool to be sitting at home? And what a loser? And, you know, I just didn't feel like I fit in. I didn't really date successfully in New York. I certainly had close friends, you know, that I met, but I didn't feel like I was in a particular tribe or, like, that I found my people or community. I think I was just very reactive to things. And if I compare that, you know, I mean, and then and that's why I think there's sort of 2 strands because there was also a strand that got me to move to Europe.

And, you know, compared to most people that I was hanging around, that was certainly not something that where people, you know were doing and definitely not places like Berlin which you know in before 2010 was still not like a place to be in You know now it's considered in many ways New York's 6th borough because so many people are talking about it at the you know, all the time. But at the time, it was like, why would you move to Berlin? I mean, New York is the center of the world. Where would you go? Yeah. And I think now, you know, if I compare that I mean, first of all, it's a constant evolution. Right? I I still am consumed with being very aware of what other people think about me. I'm still very attuned to, you know, how my identity and brand and style and personality land with other people. Mhmm. But I think the difference is that I'm hyper aware of that.

I'm aware of it showing up. I'm aware of it playing a role in my life. And there's a whole other set of voices that are much more focused on, you know, internal things and not external things. So I'm trying more and more these days to shift my sense of identity to what I think is important, what I think is valuable, what I think is unique, what I think really has impact and can make a difference, and is, you know, something that is worthy. And that sense of identity is less and less connected to what people think of me, and in particular what people who aren't important to me think of me, and more and more kind of grounding into what real experiences actually show and what real experiences give me feedback on and not what my head is making up. Right? So a lot of the work that I'm doing today with myself and a lot of the work I'm doing with my clients is around recognizing how much time we spend living in stories that we make up about reality around us and how much that informs our own thoughts, our behaviors, our emotions, and everything that we interpret around us. And what I recognize in them and what I recognize in myself, because the work I do with them is ultimately the work I'm doing on myself, is that you change the story and you change your life. Right? And that inner story is a 100% our own choice.

Right? It is completely in our own making. I think in New York, I was just starting to discover that, but I was on autopilot with so many things. I think now I'm less on autopilot and more aware of where the autopilot is still playing and which parts are in my control. And I think when I'm, you know, 60, 70, 80, as I listen to other podcasts from, you know, people in that generation speaking, I'm less and less and less concerned with what anyone else thinks of you, and you just become really grounded in a certain natural kind of confidence that just fuels how you perceive your experience of the world, and that's a beautifully enlightened place to arrive to.

So it sounds like, over time, you had 2 competing voices. I guess, the the the younger voice was there, and then slowly, the second voice has come into play. How did you how did you do that? How did you switch that? How did you how how did that happen? What what was going on there?

So I think that probably the majority of what triggered that evolution and that growth has proved the work that I'm doing today and that I've been doing in the last years. Right? So when I left Morocco and when I started this, you know, crazy idea called dancing with management at the time to to bring, you know, leaders into their bodies to explore leadership styles. I had no idea what I was actually stepping into. Right? And over the last 15 years, my work has evolved drastically so that what we're really doing today is all about helping leaders and teams unpack the many, many, many layers of masks and patterns and beliefs that are holding them back from actually showing up fully and being able to work well with each other and being able to actually, you know, create environments to thrive instead of just survive. In order to hold space for that, in order to facilitate those journeys, in order to be able to sit in a room and understand in people's conflict what they're actually protecting and what feels at risk and what stories they're making up and where they're going that, you know, become so defensive and personal and feeling attacked when, you know, the topic seems so so service level. To be able to do all that is a 100% a reflection of my own inner work. And so as I've, you know, been mentored and shadowed and, you know, been trained in a variety of, you know, methodologies including coaching, I just started recognizing more and more and more that what I'm seeing for my clients and what I can hold for them to to step into and to discover will only be as deep as the work that I'm able to do on those same topics within myself. Mhmm.

And so I've always felt that my greatest growth happens through the work. It happens through amazing colleagues that I get to co facilitate with who, after a session, hold me accountable for a moment in which I got triggered. Right? Or it happens with clients where things don't go well and go down the train, and I have to really think about what are the shadow sides of me that showed up that made that interaction not look well. Or it happens with sessions where I noticed that I had a preference for one direction, but totally missed out on something else that was happening in the room and then start to unpack why was I totally, you know, sucked into that particular piece of content but completely ignored another one? And the more and more I dive into that, and frankly, I think also personal relationships are a huge space in which that kind of inner voice and inner world that we create gets mirrored back to us in full transparency. The more I, you know, have been given the chance to dive in and notice what are those inner voices. What are my saboteurs? What are my inner devils? What are my inner critics? What are the things that I'm telling myself over and over and over again that is, you know, not good enough or not, you know, belonging enough or not smart enough or not, you know, respectable enough that the external environment keeps trying to tell me it's not true. And at what point do I start to lean into the external environment as a way of recalibrating the story. I think a lot of these internal voices, like some of it you can recalibrate on your own, but most of it gets recalibrated when you start paying attention to really great people who are your biggest fans and champions and who have your best interest in mind, and they keep telling you over and over and over again, that story that you're telling yourself is not true.

Right? That fear that you have, that insecurity that you're carrying around, that chip on your shoulder it's not true. And at some point, you know, we start to or I think we're presented with a choice of starting to update our kind of database of information with all the stories that we've been telling ourselves, which is, you know, one set of data against all of the new information that keeps coming into that data bank from experiences and from people and from, you know, the way our environments respond to us. And if you allow that information in, at some point, you start realizing, wow, the stories I'm telling myself, not only are they not true, but they totally don't serve me. And every time I step into them, it doesn't help me show up. It doesn't help me perform. It doesn't help me have impact. It's exhausting. It, you know, keeps me up at night, and it, you know, makes me super, you know, sort of self conscious.

These news stories, they're they're the reason to believe them. Right? There's something about them. Let me lean into that and see if I can start giving that some bait. And the moment you start getting into it, right, then you realize it's a self fulfilling prophecy. Right? There's some powerful stuff out there that you just have to start believing that helps you rewrite, you know, 40 years, 35 years, 30 years of stories that you've been carrying with you.

Yeah. That's tough because there's an element of self preservation there. Right? You've learned this because of. Right? Even if even if your because of isn't true, but you've connected that pattern or something. Right? Like, if I step on this, if I did that, look what happened. This happened to this. So you develop these patterns or these self like you're saying, self reinforcing things. What's a technique that you use, 1, if you wanna share 2, however, to to show people or to break that?

Yeah. I mean, what you just said about patterns is is totally spot on. So what I'm really interested in, though, is, you know, we just had a coaching about this today, for example, with, a client of mine. You know, he notices he gets really triggered when somebody steps on his toes, asks him to do something he didn't expect, you know, leans in and kinda messes with his schedule. And so, you know, a normal reaction to that would be, well, I'm triggered. I'm pissed. And so that's what it is. That guy was wrong.

He shouldn't have bothered me. Right? I told him that I'm not available, and now he's pushing. Okay. So you can stop it there, and that's where most people would stop it. Right? Like, the other person, you know, is wrong. I'm right. Right? They're messing with me. It's their fault, not mine, where these typical kind of right wrong patterns or blaming patterns or character judgment patterns are how you know that you're in a triggered mindset and you're pissed off by something.

And I think the first place to start is to recognize, okay, I am triggered. Mhmm. Right? This behavior that I am exhibiting right now, this, you know, right wrong mentality, this anger that I feel, this heightened level of emotional reactivity, this, you know, putting people in a, you know, absolute generalized box of being a terrible person, a selfish person, a mean person. Like, these are only thoughts that we have when we're triggered. Mhmm. And triggers only happen when something that we value or something that we think is important is being threatened.

Mhmm.

So the place to start exploring is what is value, first of all, why does it feel threatened, And what is it about my relationship with that value that is making this situation feel like it's dangerous? Mhmm. So in the case of this client that we were talking about, k, so what's the value? He discovered the value has something to do with self determination. Right? He loves being in control of his schedule, being in control of his time, being in control of how he, you know, sets up his day. And when somebody else steps on that, it triggers him. Right? So that's the first insight. Right? Okay. So self determination is a value. Now he knows that.

And he notices that when someone steps on it, it brings up this trigger. Now the question that gets underneath and where it's really starts to become interesting is why. Right? What is that being connected to? Now in his case, I could actually relate to that quite easily because I also have this kind of control freak value of mine where I really wanna be in control of my schedule, my structure, whatever. So I'm curious then, and I'm curious on behalf of this for my clients. I'm curious on behalf of this for myself. What is the underlying story that my subconscious is telling me in the moment that I get triggered? What is really at risk right now? Right? So when I look into it for myself, if somebody breaks my schedule, if somebody you know, I hate when people, for example, like, call me out of the blue. Right? I cannot, like, spontaneously calls. And I get really, like, judgmental about it.

Like, Why would you be calling me right now? Why don't you know that more time is so precious? Just send me a WhatsApp message. Right?

Yeah.

If I go into that for myself, I start to realize, okay. So when I feel threatened, my control value flares up. When my control value flares up, it's because I feel that someone is taking away time from me, taking away control, taking away my ability to decide things. So why does that trigger me? It triggers me because I actually don't like letting go of control. Why? Because if I let go of control, then I suddenly have to be open to anything that might happen. And what's fearful about that? If I'm open to anything that might happen, then things might, you know, happen that I don't like. I might not know how to respond. I might feel like I'm wasting my time.

Okay. And what's annoying or fearful about that? I might feel like I don't know what to do anymore. I might feel like I am part of something that, you know, could have bad results for me. I'm afraid that, you know, I won't be able to actually respond in a smart way or do something that is impressive. Right? And then it all comes down to eventually, like, I'm afraid that I won't look good. I'm afraid that I won't be smart enough. I'm afraid that I'll say something stupid. I'm afraid that I won't be successful in what I'm doing.

I'm afraid I won't finish what I promised. I'm afraid people will judge me for it. Right? Those are all the things that are lying under the surface of me being annoyed when somebody calls me on my phone or this guy being annoyed when someone asks him for something unexpectedly. And that entire story is something that comes from my childhood. It comes from how much of a control freak I was when I was young. It comes from not liking it when other people told me what to do and I didn't get my way. You know, it comes from me being super pushy, which can be a positive attribute, but it also is something that's really negative when I had something determined on my mind and then didn't get it and reacted by just fighting until I would piss people off. Mhmm.

And that is a story that I carry with me today, and it's something that my own central nervous system is almost, like, looking for all the time. Right? Am I going to encounter a situation that will trigger this fear of losing control? Because when I lose control, I'm afraid that I'm not gonna show up in a good light. And the rewrite of that, right, once you realize what is kind of the underlying thing that your central nervous system is always looking for because it thinks that it's in danger right now. And that's, by the way, the fascinating thing about the central nervous system, right, is that it has no understanding of time. So in this moment when you get triggered here, it is flashing me back to when I was 13 years old and not able to get what I want. And it sees those two situations as the exact same thing right now happening simultaneously, and it doesn't see the difference. And the work is for me to start recognizing that actually what is happening today is different. There is no threat to my identity.

I'm not being threatened for how good I am or smart I am or, you know, how well I can belong to whatever environment I'm in right now. And actually, I can choose to look at this situation that I'm in today just from the pure content level of someone is asking me to do something that they just wanted in that moment for me to do, or someone is calling because they wanna connect, and this has nothing to do with a intrusion on my value of control. And when I start to rewrite that script and when I start to notice that pattern, my behaviors start to change and I can become more flexible. I can start to experiment with what it's like to be unplanned. I can start to dip my toes into what is spontaneity, what is having a schedule and then throwing it out, you know, out the window, what does it mean to just go with the flow and notice all the things that come up with me as I start to experiment with that new muscle or experiment with that new, you know, way of being? And that rewrites the script. Right? That in real time starts to give me new data, new stories, new knowledge, new feedback. And with time, you have enough of those new pieces of feedback, and they start to balance out the old story. And at some point, they start to overcome the old story.

And I get to a point where someone makes a request or someone gives me a spontaneous call, and I don't even jump to that old story anymore. I just default now to my new story. So that's a a a deferred process of reflecting, going through, like, when we get triggered, when we hear ourself talk, you know, voice that is negative, that is criticizing us, that is, you know, in some way showing up in a way that we don't think is functional. It always ties back to something that is being threatened, something that our internal radar, our internal nervous system feels needs to be protected and is in danger. And underneath that is a story that connects usually back to our younger years that if we can trace it and understand it and see that it is not relevant to that anymore, then we can start working with rewiring it. And rewiring it cognitively is one of the ways that I just talked about, like new stories, new ways of thinking about situations. There are also emotional ways that you can rewire things. There are embodied ways, somatic ways that you can rewire things.

You kind of work at multiple levels until someone really is feeling that they respond differently to those previously perceived threats. And that's incredibly, you know, to your point earlier, that is incredibly freeing. It's very liberating, right, to no longer be shackled and held down by years of limiting beliefs that shape every single day of our lives.

Yeah. Interesting. I I I can relate to you. I experienced that in a slightly different way. I like my calendar to be as empty as possible so I have room for spontaneity. And I I I I I know what you're saying. I definitely dislike when somebody jumps into that and ruins my opportunity as spontaneity even if that's not even real, I hear that, maybe 4 or 5 years ago, I was on, LinkedIn. And at that time, I had amassed, I don't know, several 1,000 connections and followers, and it was my birthday time.

And I had 100 and 100 and 100 of my and I was sitting there. I was like, this is some fucking bullshit. All these people watching me happy birthday. I don't have time to reply to all of you people. And then I said to myself, I said, are you kidding me? How lucky are you? All these people took time out of their day to wish you a happy birthday. And I sat there, and I was like, you know what? And I just said happy birthday to every single buddy. And then over the years, every time that comes around again, I have a little bit of that feeling pops up. And in this past year, I said to myself, you don't have to reply to anybody.

Why why do you think you have to reply to a 1000 people? And I did just kinda go through a few just to because I appreciate I've come to appreciate even though, like, you're saying it did steal my time. And I and I wrote down to myself here, what is my old story that makes me think that? I don't know. But I've done some work on this because it does bother me. Yeah. Yeah. Like, earlier in the school year, my, son's teacher emailed me and said, we have a parent teacher comments on Thursday at 5. I said, do we fucking do? No. We don't.

I don't know when you thought you had control of my calendar. And I said, I will not go to now I won't go to parent teacher conference. Like, we we we might have had an opportunity. We we might have an opportunity to talk about that. But now I don't know who you think you are, but you don't do that to my schedule. And then he called me, and I was like, I I thought it was pretty clear. Like, I'm not going. But I I gotta investigate more of that.

I've done a lot of work, but I wanna know I wanna know my old stories. I wonder what happened to me as a child or something that makes me protect spontaneity so much. Like, I enjoy, like, going on just where are we going? We're going north. What are we gonna do? I don't know. I like to vacation that way. I like to do that. I don't like to plan up. So interesting.

That's interesting how we're we're the same but opposite.

That that's, you know, just to double click on a couple things that you were doing there that are also quite powerful. Right? So with the example of friends on LinkedIn wishing you happy birthday, you were using a technique there that's, you know, a a much let's say, like, a great first step into working with triggers, working with stories before you maybe go down, like, deeper levels, and the technique is called reframing. Right? So Mhmm. You receive those birthday messages, and at first, you're kind of, like, you know, pissed off that there's all these, you know, birthday messages that you have to respond to. And then you reframe it and just say, actually, look how lucky I am that I have all these friends here. Right? That that they'll reach me. Right? And that that is a incredibly powerful technique. Right? When you have the ability to shift your perspective simply through seeing it through a different lens.

And there's a bunch of questions, you know, that I often offer clients that they can use to prompt their own reframing. Right? And then you did it again after and, like, oh my god. Now there's so much pressure to respond to all these people, and you reframed again and said, well, actually, I don't have to respond to everyone. I can choose to respond to the people that I want to and the people that I don't want to. Right? So those that's another technique. Right? Reframing is a great way in. I think that the the deeper, you know, process of reflection that I mentioned is one in which if you notice that you really can't reframe over and over again, you keep getting stuck or the reframe doesn't help, or you notice something like, you know, where you're going with spontaneity, another path in to starting to understand what is your relationship with spontaneity would be to ask yourself, what are you afraid would be taken away from you, or what would be afraid what are you afraid won't happen if you don't have spontaneity?

What am I afraid of? Interesting. Yeah. I think I'm afraid

to ask him.

I I think I we'll do a little therapy on me here. I think what I feel like what I my first thought when I when I hear that question is I feel like I won't be able to do what I want. I won't be able to read what I want, discover what I want, work on what I want. Maybe some type of freedom or something like that. Maybe that there's a freedom that I feel like you're taking away from me, and maybe it's an American thing as well. Like, you know, we do what we want in this country. We we go where we want, where we want. You can't tell me what I can.

I can't do. You can't tell me where where I can't go. I wonder if there's a piece of that there. That's interesting. I think that's what it is. I think it's I feel like somebody's taken away from something from me of an opportunity that I could discover something. I could learn something new. I I love learning new things.

Like, when I first got the Internet, when I was like, I don't I must have been 14 or 15 years old in, like, 96, it blew my mind that I could go on I think it was AOL, Amazon, whatever, and I could just type in something and it would come up. I'm like, oh my god. This is amazing. And I got, like, the encyclopedia CDs. I always wanted my parents to buy the set, but they're like, listen. We don't got the kind of money. Like, we don't eat if we buy that. And when I got that CD, I was like, I can look up anything and everything.

And I wonder I think there's something there to me as I'm thinking through this with you that I won't have the opportunity to discover something. That's how I'm thinking about this right now.

Yeah. That's great. So so the connection that I see that you're making is a connection which is spontaneity or being spontaneous enables me to learn, and spontaneity enables me to feel free. Is that true?

Yeah. Absolutely. And it's also and as I think this about this a little more, it's a crutch maybe as well, and it's it's it can be detrimental to my career, my life, because I'll go down those rabbit holes. I probably use that as a way of avoidance and procrastination as well. So there is that other element to that as well.

Yeah. And and I think that's powerful to recognize already how it can be used as a project because another way of framing it is that you have created now for yourself a dependency, ironic dependency, actually, in which you can only access freedom through spontaneity. In other words, your freedom is dependent on spontaneity, which is the absolute opposite of what you want to achieve, which is

Right.

Not dependent on something.

Mhmm.

Right?

Yeah.

So the exploration here for you would then be, what does it mean for you to be able to be free, for example, or to be able to learn with and without spontaneity.

Mhmm.

Like, what is learning looks like for you without spontaneity? What is freedom look like for you without spontaneity? And can you get curious? Can you dip into an exploration in which you discover that actually you are totally free regardless of whether you're spontaneous or not.

Right. Right. Right.

Right? That is a story that you have created for good reason. And part of that story is now limiting you because any opportunity where spontaneity is taken out of your, you know, domain or your ability to access it, you instantly associate it with, now I don't have freedom, now I can't learn.

Okay. Yeah. I see that. I see that. Yeah. You know what? A technique I've I wish I've been trying is I, I've been scheduling Monday morning before lunch, where I can just have fun and read and do whatever I want. And it actually has made me feel less guilty. Because then I know, like, listen.

I can do this. I can save this Monday. I don't have to worry about not doing any work, not being on any meetings. And that helps help me. I don't know if what your thoughts on that are.

My thoughts are curious about the guilt. What were you feeling guilty for?

Because I I'm not doing what I should be doing because I'm I'm like, well, actually, I just wanna finish that that documentary. I wanna finish a YouTube video. I wanna finish reading that book, or I wanna finish reading that thing or whatever. Like I said, I think I I use this as, as a reason to procrastinate. Yeah. So then there's guilt around that because at the end of the day, I'm like, 6 o'clock, 7 o'clock at night. I'm like, you think back on your day and, like, what did you do today? I don't do shit today because I I fucked off all day because I'm probably actually don't wanna do the thing I wanna I wanna be doing. And those things, I try to take off my plate nowadays that I've recognized that.

Like, I don't wanna do these, whatever, admin things. I need to push them somewhere else because I don't wanna be doing them. Maybe it's another teammate. Maybe it's automation or whatever it is. And I've kinda learned to do some of that as well.

Yeah. Well, I I I think it's super interesting. Right? Because as you said, right, we kinda develop a relationship between, you know, I the things that I wanna do, the things that I love doing, I can only do when I have kind of, like, free time. Right? And then there's other things that I don't wanna do that I have to, you know, push off. The the challenge, of course, is that the further you push off those things, the further you procrastinate those things, the further that you delay those things, what does that end up doing to your schedule in the future?

I think, unfortunately, I'm good at computers and things like that, and I excel under pressure, so I can knock these things out quick. So at the the 10th hour, 11th hour, I can bang this out typically at a high level quality, and I've been told numerous times that all also reinforces pattern. Like, how did you get all this done? This is amazing. I'm like, I didn't do shit. I fucked off for 3 weeks. You don't even understand how I didn't even do nothing. And and then but then there was a reward there that reinforced this pattern. Right? I know when I worked for the when I worked for the military, I don't understand how people could sit around for 8 hours and get nothing done.

I I was the top performer, and I would work Maybe 2 hours, I would take 2, 3 hour lunches. I would come in 2 hours late. Every day, I would leave early, and I was a top performer. But that like I said, that just reinforces this pattern. Right? So most times, there isn't a consequence because I can knock it out. But I'm sure that stress or something like that is gonna catch up with me. There's gonna be a moment where I do actually drop the ball. And like I said, I'm try I I and I I like that we're talking about this because I'm sure a lot of people have a similar type problem.

And, I do feel the guilt. I do feel that something when I'm when I'm not doing what I should be doing.

That's right. So it makes to me, it it you've created system that reinforces, as you said, a comfort pattern. Right? Mhmm. So the system is I make time for spontaneity, for slacking off, or just getting whatever I want done, And I expand that time for as long as possible, as humanly possible until I absolutely have to crunch and finish all the stuff that I don't wanna do. And because I actually hate doing that stuff and postpone it until the last minute, I do manage to get it all done. But in the moment that I'm done with all that stuff, which is amazing that you can get it done, it makes me crave that spontaneous time even more because now I wanna relax or reward myself or free myself. Right? And as you say

me get on kitten. Right?

It's a total. Right? You are absolutely creating a system that Yeah. It's a reinforcing system of a comfort pattern that you like. Right? Like, any comfort pattern is something that we enjoy. However, as you notice yourself, and I'm glad that you brought it up, while it keeps you in one pattern that in some ways is comfortable, it also reinforces something that you know is unhealthy. Right? And whether it's the stress levels that hit, whether it's the sleep schedule that it impacts, or whether it's the feeling of guilt that you have because this expansion of your free time always compromises the stuff you actually need to do in a, you know, ultimately crunched time. And all of those setups are fine. Right? Like, it's not a problem until it's a problem.

Right? As you said, the thing that's interesting for me in these situations is who is controlling whom. Right? Mhmm. To actually feel you you're someone who loves freedom. Right? You said you love freedom. But in the current setup, you are actually being controlled by your discomfort, your avoidance of structured time. Right? And so that is like a narrative. It's like a story that controls that you end up having these huge times of, you know, spontaneous free open slots. Amazing.

But you're not fully in choice because what's controlling you is a desire to avoid the discomfort of getting that shit done that you know you need to get done. And I would be thrilled for you if you had the exact same schedule that you do, but you didn't have guilt. You didn't have the should voice. You didn't have the stress. You didn't have the feeling of, oh my god. This is only gonna get finished at the last minute because you are in control of creating that time block and that schedule and that balance of time Mhmm. Rather than doing it out of a default and a reaction to discomfort. Does that does that land?

Yep. Absolutely. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Fix this. How how how do we fix this? What are you thinking about fixing it? And this doesn't have to be about me, but let's let's talk about it.

Yeah. We're using it. It's a real example. Yeah. Right? So the thing with with fixing before I can, you know, come up with solutions to fix, the the real question is how urgent and serious an issue is this for you? And so if we're rating it from 0 to 10, how important is it? How, you know, impactful? How much of an issue does it create if you were not to make an improvement in this area?

Which is the problem. There's not enough pain right now there for me

That's right.

To change. That's right. Maybe a 5, maybe a 6 at the at the worst. Because like I said earlier, I can crunch and I can knock this stuff out. So there isn't enough pain at the moment. Occasionally, there will be some pain, which is when I get this done. You know, maybe I I need a I need a couple of invoices or something to come in or something like that. And I go or or I I do not like letting people down.

I do not like letting, if I promise you something, if I, you know, if I say I'm gonna do something, I don't like that to not be the case, especially if it's because of something stupid I did. You know? Like like, oh, I I sorry. I was Netflix had a bunch of documentaries come out right now. Sorry that project didn't get done. That would make me absolutely disgusted, and I will I I I don't I can't think of the time I've ever done that, so I would never let it come to that. But if something like that, that pain like that were to happen, I think, unfortunately, that would be the only time I think, was would bring enough pain where I would really willing to change. But this is on my mind because I don't like feeling guilty in the evening. You know? I like to be able to sit down at dinner and and suffer my son and and my family and say, man, I wish I did those things today.

I'm not sitting here thinking about this for a few minutes. It doesn't last long. I have a good ability to throw these things out of my mind. It doesn't ruminate long, but there would be a time at the end of the workday or something along those lines. Or especially when I wake first thing I wake up in the morning, I'm like, alright. You didn't do all these things yesterday. You got to do these things today. Like, look at your list.

Get these things done. So, yeah, there's a little bit of those things.

Okay. So, you know, there's there's a lot of of rich rich stuff that you're saying there. Right? Which is amazing. So, you know, first, you're absolutely right. Right? And that's why I asked the question. Humans are designed to avoid pain and try to move towards pleasure always. Right? So real change only happens when the pain of staying the same is larger or greater than the pain of changing.

Mhmm.

Right? And currently, the pain for you of staying as you currently are the status quo is not painful enough to actually merit the work for a real change. Right? And this is true of all humans. It's also true of every business, every group that I, you know, work with. You know, the the burning platform, you know, metaphor or the case for urgency. I mean, that is the only way that companies change. Right? It is the only way that you move people to shift. There needs to be an understanding that if we stay the same, it's gonna be worse for us than if we put in the effort as uncomfortable as that is to change. And usually, you know, where people kind of recognize these things are either, you know, on an individual level, like you mentioned, you know, at some point, you're just so not present with your son that you notice your mind is, you know, running these to do lists of stuff that you should have done but didn't.

Mm-mm. That, you know, eats sway at you. Or you notice that, you know, you can't sleep anymore because your business is growing, and there's so much to keep track of, and you don't have a structure in place for how to do it. But what I see with, you know, companies is that at some point when people develop a team and when that team grows, all of this stuff that kind of when you're just by yourself, able to make it work and kind of, you know, somehow get everything done at the last minute, when it suddenly involves other people and other people relying on you and, you know, reliance requires some sort of structure and and and predictability, then all of these things that just work for us 1 on 1 become massive issues when it comes to having a team.

Right. When you

then turn that team into a company, those become shadows in the company for how everybody works. Right now, everybody is procrastinating or everybody is, you know, assuming that you can only be creative if you're spontaneous or everybody's assuming it's okay to get things done at the last minute. And people are averse to structure and they're averse to routine and they're averse to predictability. You know? And and those little things that just worked on a individual level because we kind of can manage our own little system, they get amplified and turn into massive problems. Right? And that's why when I when I work with leaders, the the work that we're ultimately doing is recognizing how many of their strengths, just like your strengths to be, you know, free and spontaneous and creative and pulling together different ideas, they also carry shadow sides. And those shadow sides at some point become the barrier between where they are now and where they wanna get to. Right? And until they start to change their relationship, like in your case, changing your relationship with structure, potentially changing your relationship with, routines, with reliability, with responsibility, with timeliness, with order, with, you know, all of these topics, Then until you kind of dig into why am I so averse to those things, and why do I feel that I can't both be learning and be free, and at the same time get stuff done in a way that doesn't leave me, you know, crunching at the last second? Until you explore and unpack those things, they continue to become larger and larger issues in the teams that people run. And that then when I ask people how important is this change becomes a 9 out of 10 or a 10 out of 10.

And that is the only rating that is appropriate as a starting point to then, you know, begin the deeper work of really unpacking this and and working on You You don't mean besides pain?

Right. Well, is there I I I understand I understand. I hope everybody at home understands that that pain point. But even with the pain there, we can we can endure the pain. You know? We can as the owner or as the as the whatever, and you're like, hang on. Bankruptcy is next week. The bank's calling, and you can still just be like, that's not enough yet. You know? What what is there is there, a recognition point? Is there bringing in a friend? I don't know.

Like, how how what's that first step like? When when everybody's looking at you saying, dude, I've seen the repo guy is following you. What are you doing? Like, they're they're taking our copy machines because you ain't paid a bill. You know? Like, even those things I've seen aren't enough yet for people to to say, you know, like, listen. I'm just gonna get a bridge loan. I think it's gonna work. Like, I got a hard money guy. Like, it's gonna work, and it there's the pain is everybody's seeing this pain, but you are still like, no. No.

No. No. No. I can get this done. How do you how do you bring that shadow side out a little bit and say, listen, this is how we are gonna start this. This just makes sense? I know there's a lot of Yeah.

I guess I mean, it's an interesting question. Right? Because, you know, everybody that I work with, I'm not convincing people that they should work with me. Right? It's like, when you have come to a certain realization and then reach out, the majority of my work is through word-of-mouth. Right? So they kind of are at the point where they're ready. And I have in the beginning of my career, you know, where I was doing a lot of leadership work, with clients who were not on board with leadership and I actually had to try to convince them, I quickly realized, like, I will never work with people who need convincing

Yes.

That, you know, self work and self awareness and, you know, unpacking your inner game is actually valuable work. That this is a meaningful use of time and that it's actually the only work that matters when you think about really living, you know, quality life and being a worthy leader. Now if I think about what prompts those people to reach out or what prompts people in general to make a change, It's usually one of 2 things. So either it's in line with the kind of stuff we're talking about, which has to do with pain that gets so great that people hit what is often called rock bottom. Mhmm. And there is no such thing really as rock bottom because there's always a rock bottom underneath the rock bottom. But people fall into at least what they perceive as their lowest point. Right? And they perceive that at that point, everything they've tried.

Right? To your examples, the loans that they've asked for, the, you know, next version of whatever that they've put out there, the, you know, I got this. Just give me another chance. Mhmm. It's not working. It's just not working. And a certain point, you realize that with the current level of resources that you have and with the current level of thinking and perspective that you have, things aren't changing. Right? And when I do this kind of work also with groups and with larger systems, the perspective there is that you can't change a problem with the same mindset that created it. Right.

Right. Once people realize that they're stuck in this kind of echo chamber of a certain kind of mindset, and no matter what they try to do, they keep arriving at the basically same problem just decorated with a slightly different facade. That can be a wake up call. Right? That can be a recognition of, okay, actually, I need help. Right? I can't do this alone. There are shadows. There are limiting beliefs. There are perspectives that keep holding me back, and I am not unlocking myself by myself from those things.

So I think that's one way in which people can can get prompted into it. I think the other one is through any number of positive experiences. Right? From impulse experiences, you get a taste of what it's like to be free of your own limiting beliefs. You get a taste of what it's like to be in the presence of someone who's super inspiring. You get a taste of, you know, a version of your future where you're like, oh my god. What if my life was like that all the time? Right? You know, you have a vision, an aspiration, a goal, you know, something that you wanna work towards, and it's so important to you that you begin to realize that if you keep operating the way you're operating right now, you'll never get there. You know? Or you're running a team, and you're running, you know, an organization, and you realize that you guys are, you know, basically entering into a standstill or even backpedaling, but you're not making progress, and you have no idea why, and you don't know where it's coming from, and you're not necessarily, you know, thinking about pain and shadows, but you just recognize that the thing you wanna get to is so important that you wanna, you know, reach out and get help for, you know, whatever reason. Mhmm.

And I'll share with you a story today of of someone I've talked to who, is interested in joining a program that are called the Modern Leader, which is a a community of people who wanna work on their leadership and do it over the long term kind of like how you would, you know, train at the gym with a gym trainer. So not just like a one off thing, but really like a long term investment over months years to develop your leadership. And what she talked about was that, basically, she's surrounded by people who constantly are putting her down. She's surrounded by, you know an upbringing in which she grew up in a, you know, very successful environment That is constantly telling her she's not good enough. She's not smart enough. She didn't achieve enough.

Enough. She's not, you know, reaching the

potential of all of her family. She's in a marriage with someone who kind of says, like, you know, do you really wanna try that? Are you sure you wanna, you know, do this? Why don't you just stay at home and take care of the kids? Or why would you, you know, put yourself out there? You know, she's even living in a country where, you know, the dynamic and the mentality is, like, if you're not certified, if you're not, you know, if you don't have credentials, if you don't have a piece of paper that says you should, you know, good at something, then who are you to think you're good at something? So she's surrounded by, you know, an environment that really puts her down. And today, she was interested in talking about, you know, joining this program, and I asked her why. Right? Like, why now? And she said, you know, I have always known that I have some unreached, unpapped potential. I know that I'm meant for something greater. I know that I should be, you know, doing much more than what I'm doing right now, but I just haven't had anyone around me who believes in me. And just recently, somebody called me up, you know, and said, hey. I'm doing this program with Daniel, and I think you would be amazing for this program, and I think you would get so much out of it.

And I think it would be so beneficial for you. And her initial response was, why? Why would you think that? Why would you think that I'm meant for this program? And this person just said, look. Like, you are. You're amazing. You have so much potential. You have so much that you can do. You have so much that's, you know, available to you that you're not using. And that external affirmation triggered something in her.

It's like a little voice that, you know, inside her needed to hear someone outside saying, hey, you are worth more than what everyone is telling you. And that's what I said, you know, when we were speaking earlier that I think sometimes you get to a point where your own internal resources are not enough to overcome the stories that you've been told. And you need external validation. You need a champion. You need somebody who says, like I've been told so many times in my life, you're amazing, you're great, you're smart enough, you're talented, you're valuable, you offer a lot, your presence matters. And at some point, it's like that kinda outside voice clicks to a small little version of that voice that we always had inside of us but was dimmed down over and over again. And when that, you know, outside stimulation comes in, it's almost like it turns up the volume slightly or it increases the flame. And that can that can be another reason that somebody suddenly said, you know what? I know I have these shadow signs.

I know I have these demons. I know I have all these inner critics, but there is this really tiny voice that I got a taste of for a moment, and I want more of that. I wanna feel what it's like to be surrounded by people who believe in me and challenge me and move me. And I'm willing to pursue that even though there's so much inside me that says, oh my god. Who are you to think that you should do that? So I think those are you know, there's 2 left ends of the spectrum. Right? 1 is, like, the pain and the suffering and the, you know, rock bottom that can really move people to to to get up. And I think the other is kind of like that, you know, that sun in the horizon. Right? There's, like, this glimmer of light, the light at the end of the tunnel kind of metaphor that speaks to something inside us that knows there's a truth to that, and yet we've been in an environment that just hasn't given us the chance to listen to that, to pay attention to it, and to, you know, to nourish it.

I I like that. I'd like to add a little something to that. I found that's been really powerful with myself and and clients of that is sending people thank you notes, text messages, how you've helped them, how you've been a inspiration to their life or whatever it is. We we it I don't know how it is there up in Europe, but it seems like in America here, we don't praise people enough. We don't give people enough of that. And I think we could take a little bit of our time to to let people know how much you appreciate them, how how much of a friend you've been or whatever it is. I think there's there's a lot of power there that we can harness and unlock.

Oh, there's I mean, there's multiple powers there. Right? So first of all, the the power of appreciating other people so that they get the benefit of your view. Right? Because Mhmm. Generally, I feel that we're always kind of the last ones to see our own greatness.

Mhmm.

Right? Whether it's because of humility or because of, you know, lack of realization of how special we are, but, usually, it's kind of like a coming out process. Right? Like, when we step into our fuller power, it's very rare that people who are our big fans and who know us well and who, you know, our big cheerleaders will ever say, oh, wow. I didn't see that coming. I didn't know you were so talented. I didn't know you were so special. I didn't know you were so impactful. Like, everybody else around us sees it, and we're always the last ones to kinda step into embracing who we fully are. So I think offering that appreciation to others is amazing as a way of of catalyzing that.

There's a lot of research out there from Dana Coleman on positive psychology that also talks about the benefits of appreciating others for us, for the appreciator. Right? You you appreciate people, you tap into a more positive way of viewing things, you start to recognize that there's lots of positivity around you, you tap into, you know, all the connection, the hormones that that that gets stimulated when we connect and and and, you know, express through love what we see in others. I would add an additional, step to that, which is because all of us are appreciation starved and positive feedback starved and not getting, you know, really the the recognition that we need. I fully encourage my clients always to proactively ask other people what others appreciate about them. Oh. So not to wait for the appreciation to come and to kind of be, you know, passive, but to actively go out and ask questions like, you know, what do you think is truly inspiring about me? What do you think is my unique value add contribution? How do you see me showing up when I show up at my best? Right? What are the things that that you feel, you know, I do that nobody else does? Right? These types of questions, you know, how would you describe, you know, my brand, my personality when I'm having a great day in 5 words? Right? These types of questions, we rarely ask them. Right? It's so counter, you know, cultural to to ask that because people connect, you know, this type of positive self awareness with, you know, being egotistical, being selfish, being big headed, whatever. It's not.

Right? There is a huge difference between enabling your self esteem to be grounded in what you are naturally good at and attaching your confidence to, you know, what externally people think about you. Right? Attaching your confidence to what people externally think about you is super dangerous. Right? Because that can change and waver from moment to moment. You encounter people who don't think well about you and your confidence drops. You know, you encounter people who think high of you and your confidence skyrockets, and all of that creates, like, a completely unbalanced, uncentered sense of self. Right? And you surround yourself then by people who think, you know, amazing things about you and your confidence skyrockets, then you come off as super cocky. What I'm talking about is grounded self esteem. Right? And self esteem is understanding your worth regardless of your success, regardless of your status, regardless of your job, regardless of your education, but just through what you are naturally great at, what you, you know, exude as qualities that are uniquely you.

Right? Your care, your observation, your, you know, attention to detail, your ability to bring people together. Right? Your clear, you know, the way in which you speak your clarity. Right? These are qualities. Right? They're not, like, accolades. They're not status. They're not, you know, achievements that we rack up. They're qualities, and they are so important in developing a grounded, constant sense of self esteem that then enables us to move through challenging situations regardless whether our confidence skyrockets or our insecurities, you know, flare up. And asking for that external feedback can be a way to start to build up that self esteem in a healthy way rather than, you know, basing it either on your inner, you know, dialogue and your inner self talk, which is usually biased towards negative thoughts, or just basing it off of, you know, fleeting success or, you know, momentary, you know, setbacks, which is basically connecting your, you know, your identity to these external things that are constantly gonna be

What a part of that, what I hear with with you talking about that is I hear maybe an opportunity for somebody to lean into their strengths and and maybe start a business or, maybe a side hustle or get into a different career thing because somebody's like, you know what? I I do feel like I'm good at organizing things. And it's nice that you said that. And I think I have the courage now to take a leap into doing what I always kinda thought of a little bit in the back of my head. That's something I'm hearing when I as a part of what you were saying.

I mean, wouldn't that be amazing, right, if we Yeah. Looked for work on the basis of what we're actually good at rather than just looking for work on the basis of what's available or what we thought we should always do. Right? I mean, that word should for me is always a red flag. Because that's why I responded to it before with the guilt thing because whenever I hear should, should is not our own voice. Should is the voice of someone else. Generally, it's usually our our caretakers from when we were younger. Right? You should be doing more of this. You should be more organized.

You should be getting a stable job. You should be, you know, thinking about your family. And none of those things have anything to do with what your unique qualities are.

Right.

Right? And I think for me, the, you know, the move to to Europe that we were talking about before was a break from should. Oh. And it was a break from taking on jobs and thinking about, you know, what I do for work as a direct consequence to rent and paying my bills and doing the right thing. And it was instead a question of, what do I actually get energy out of, and what am I really good at, and what do I love doing? And then, you know, from those internal drives, how do I match that with what you're saying, which is what are other people telling me I'm also really talented that I need to go into? What are, you know, skills that I have or abilities that I have that I haven't even fully recognized yet? But if I could step into them, I would realize even more of my power and my ability and my, you know, my my unique value.

Mhmm. Yeah.

Yeah, I mean, there's no surprise why, you know, 70, 80% of the workforce are completely disengaged because it the work they're doing doesn't inactivate the things that they're naturally good at and is not connected to the things that really are important to them, matter to them that are, you know, purpose driving for them. And so they find themselves in jobs that are just for the job. And Right. That, you know, when we consider how much time we spend at work, and when we consider how much, you know, time work is in our whole life is, you know, results in people feeling at the end of their lives a huge amount of regret. Right? Which we hear over and over again. We did things we didn't wanna do. We spent time, you know, in places that didn't make us happy and ultimately, we're with people that we didn't like. Right? And that is, I don't believe that I mean, I I recognize that in in some circles, it it is also really you just have to take whatever job you have.

Right. And there's not an option and there's no choice. And you're, you know, trying to take care of a 1000000 different things, and you're running through jobs, and you're just paying ends meet. So I get that. Mhmm. And I still think there's room to ask the question that you're asking, which is what am I really good at? And even in the situation that I'm in right now, how do I find something that brings me as close to activating that as possible? Because when I do activate that, oh my god, you unleash so much energy. You unleash so much creativity. You unleash so much, you know, potential, and that has the the ability to enable you to potentially also change the exact situation that you're in that is holding you back from being able to live that, you know, that part of you more fully.

Yes. I just double down on that. That there's so much power there. Something you said reminded me of of, earlier time in your life where you worked in in oncology. What did you learn from those people or their lives there that maybe you've brought forward or or whatnot?

So there are 2 things that I learned, and that that was, like, a total random

job.

Right? So I I totally did not expect to get this job. It's an amazing job. It was at a cancer hospital, in New York called Memorial Sloan Kettering. So it's a quite a famous cancer hospital because it brings in most of the the the worst cancer cases in the world Wow. Which meant that you see a lot of young people with cancer. Right? This would be the place that they would go to. So one of the things that I learned right off the bat when I started working there is that when people get a cancer diagnosis, a life threatening kind of stage 4 type of, you know, diagnosis, there are 2 types of people in terms of how they react. There are the people who just say, you know, what the fuck? Why me? What did I do to deserve this? You know? Of course, I would get this of all people.

You know? And then they go into this really kind of self confirming victimizing mindset of, you know, basically what's the point of even trying. They bring that negativity with them to every single chemo session, every single follow-up appointment, every single checkout. And there's a total correlation between the experience they have while they're still alive and that mindset that they bring with them. It shows up in the way everyone treats them. It shows up in the way everyone receives them. It shows up how they experience the entire situation. And then I met other people, you know, 24 years old, getting a life, you know, ending diagnosis and managing to rise up to the challenge, to see that as, you know what? This is what life has thrown me, and I'm gonna fight through this. And I'm gonna show everybody that this is not gonna bring me down, and I'm going to, like, do whatever it takes to not only fight through this, but fight through it with as much grace and positivity and optimism and joy.

And that changes how everyone responds to you. I mean, we don't wanna think that this is happening in a hospital, but, of course, it's human nature that the people who are positive and nice and friendly and optimistic, they're just gonna get better care. Right? You're gonna be thinking about them more. You wanna spend more time with them. You're gonna bend over backwards to make their experience as comfortable as possible. And, you know, my role at that hospital was called a patient advocate. So I was basically like the patient's friend. Right? As they go through every step of the way from doctor's visits to, you know, pharmacy to, you know, sitting through chemo to, you know, getting their, you know, latest reports.

You're sitting there and helping them understand everything and just be able to kind of relate and connect to it. And, of course, you gravitate towards the people that have that more, you know, optimistic view on life. And I think that that particular, you know, one of 2 takeaways for me, that particular one was just so much foresight into a situation that I frankly think is inevitable, which is, you know, all of us will encounter some sort of disease or some sort of, you know, whatever, whether it's cancer or an illness or just old age or, you know and to me, that choice that you make of how you decide to respond to that, whether you see it as a victim, why me? Mhmm. Or whether you see it as, you know, what I call more of a creator mindset, which is why not me? Right? Why would I not get this? Right? And who am I to, you know, be different than anyone else? And if that's the case, then why can't I also fight through this? There's no special reason why I was chosen to get this. I didn't do anything wrong. And therefore, I have every chance to kinda get my way out of this. Right? And that that is such a I don't know if I'll have that mindset if I, you know, am a bit of a realist in the sense that I I believe, you know, we'll all get diagnosed at some point with something. I don't know if I'll have that and I that that sense of positivity and I've often noticed that, you know, I think my learning edge will probably be if if I ever got into, like, a, you know, a car accident or something and lost a limb.

That would be such a huge confrontation of so many of my limiting beliefs around what my life, I imagine would be like without, you know, that limit. There's so much, you know, negativity and limiting beliefs and fear around that. And then you hear all of these incredible stories about people who have overcome that and realize how much richness there is, how much even more meaning they got as a result of the journey they went through. And, like, oh my god. I'm aware of the possibility of that journey and so totally frightened that I wouldn't live up to my own hopes for how I'd show up, but that I'd actually, you know, crumble and fall under the pressure. But I've seen these examples of where people where people have lived up to the, you know, these amazing heroic, you know, above all odds mindset as well as, you know, actual progress. So that that is one piece that I took away. It's kind of this relationship with what life throws at you.

And the other thing that I saw in that experience, which I also saw in the architecture firm that I worked with was more from the the business side. Right? Which was here you are working with the best oncologist in the world, and they have their hands tied to every single pharmacy company that they work with and ultimately have no autonomy and freedom. Wow. And although they are doing things that are so important and so meaningful and they've, you know, they're at the peak of their careers, they are sitting in the back office forced to, you know, follow red tape bureaucracy and policies that don't serve, you know, the patient ultimately that, you know, are focused on profits over purpose. And they are frustrated, and they are angry, and they are, you know, disappointed and demotivated. And that was like as I was looking at, you know, medicine is like, is this a career for me? Just such a wake up call in terms of what happens when you are in a larger system in which you don't actually have full control. And frankly, I saw the same exact thing happening in the architect's office that I worked afterwards for 2 where, you know, architecture is such an inspiring, creative, you know, amazing career. And so many of these architects are the first to get hired and the last to get paid.

You know, the first to be brought in and then immediately told this is what you need to design for me rather than being able to actually express their, you know, their creative their creative, you know, input. It would be like going to a doctor and telling them what they need to prescribe you instead of, you know, listening to their advice. And I saw architects being, again, so disabled in their ability to actually, you know, pursue what they wanted to dream of, what you know, to be creative, to be creating something novel instead of just essentially, you know, having to write down on paper what people tell them. And both of those experiences for me were enough to see that I actually don't want to work inside a company. I don't wanna work for a boss in that sense. I don't wanna be held back by what other people think is right and wrong. I don't wanna be sitting in an office under fluorescent lights all day and not happy with what I'm doing. Yeah.

So when that opportunity came that I told you about with the financial crisis and, you know, getting laid off, I kind of knew that this was my moment. Like, this was my moment to either finally act on what I've been saying I'm so frustrated by and make a change or just be another person who keeps complaining about stuff but doesn't change anything.

What was there somebody in either of those situations that was able to be the rebel or buck the trend or something like that to stand out or say, this bureaucracy is not gonna hold me back. It's not gonna hold me down. I'm gonna I'm gonna forge my own way.

Like, somebody else that I saw do that?

Yeah. Was there somebody at either the oncology or the architect firm in those situations where the they were able to kinda try as best they could to get outside of that framework?

Not that I saw. No. Interesting. And I and now when I you know, working with companies for for years now, right, you see that, like, people sort of take 1 or 2 paths. I mean, either they get frustrated and then they leave. Mhmm. Right? And that's unfortunate for these companies because then they lose, you know, the the people who could actually potentially, you know, be the catalyst for change. Or, you know, they stay for a long time, but over time, they get more and more jaded.

It's kind of like their edge getting more and more rounded. So, occasionally, you do meet people. Right? And those tend to be the people who are then, you know, bringing me in or, you know, hiring me who have a glimmer of hope, right, and have a sense of, you know, things can be different here. I know that there's potential. I know there's a reason, but it's hard. Right? Corporate culture is brutal. And, you know, there's a lot of research that shows that it doesn't take, you know, more than a few weeks for people's values and priorities to change based on the companies that they work in. So to really hold your North Star and to really be creative in an environment that is so so different than you are, it's not easy.

I I remember I was just doing a a workshop a few weeks ago for a, professional services consulting company. And, you know, these clients in the room, participants, 60 of them are pretty much sitting there, like, all looking more or less the same. Right? Same types of haircut, same types of outfits, same types of shoes, same types of mannerisms. Right? And it's not surprising because they're also hired to fit into that mold. Right? There's a certain mold that they're looking for. And there was one person there, long hair, black nail polish, like, totally different look. And we chatted, you know, after the workshop about his story. And, you know, he comes from you know, he was playing in a band before.

He's like a total artist creative. And I was like, how in the world did you get looped into this world? And, you know, he shared a bit of his story, and he's also super smart, and he's really intelligent, and he has a lot to offer. You know, I know a few people like this. So they are the sparks. Right? They are the sparks of joy in these companies. They are bringing life. They're bringing perspective. They're bringing a real difference.

And, you know, the few of them that I'm thinking of who who have that profile, I mean, it is an amazing gift for these companies, and the good companies will support that, and they will nourish that, and they will use that as an example of, like, look what's possible if you pave your own path. But my God, does it take a lot of energy for those people to do that because they are so outnumbered. And for as many people as they might have that really are their champions and appreciate them, there are so many other so many other people in those companies that are gonna raise an eyebrow. They're gonna, you know, look them over for someone else. They're gonna see them as too challenging, too difficult, too outspoken, too, you know, and then it comes down to company culture. Right? Do you punish people when they stick their head out and speak up and say the truth and challenge the norms? Or do you, you know, kinda embrace that? Right? And and that's where I'm brought in at a certain point where people realize we have so many problems because we punish or look down or try to mute or numb those voices that things are happening in our companies now. Are happening because no one speaks up even though everyone knows what we're doing is wrong. Nobody says anything because they're afraid of the consequences.

Nobody voices what they think because it's not safe. Right? And that's where the work that I'm doing then becomes part of this burning platform because they realize that the consequences of that are so detrimental that it's either an existential crisis because the company is gonna, you know, completely demise because of that. It's a a, you know, a a talent workforce, crisis because people are leaving. Mhmm. It's a company satisfaction crisis because their, you know, employee surveys are so poor. It's a, you know, identity crisis because their clients are starting to be miserable, right, and giving them negative views. I mean, it starts at some point to play out. And,

you

know, and that's when people start asking, okay. So what is the culture here, and how do we start to change that to actually be more inclusive for difference, right, for diversity, for different perspectives? So I don't think it's easy to be a rebel, in a corporate culture. I think, a lot of rebels leave. And the few rebels who don't get kind of converted into the norm and just shepherd it in, you know, they have to spend a huge amount of time to to maintain that spark. But it is possible, and it's, oh my god, it's so needed when when a company is, you know, moving strongly in one direction, but what they actually need is another direction.

Yeah. I'm the rebel guy. I spent a lot of time in the in the principal's office, and, I feel like I still, to this day, am in the bosses or principal's office.

But how was that for you then? Like, what as a rebel, like, what would you have found or what have you found helps you stay connected to, you know, whatever is the source of your, you know, rebellious personality?

I'd like to say that I've spent some time thinking about things, thinking about the situation and and solutions where when I when I do present that, like, there I have a solution. I'm not just complaining. And I I feel like that I'm I have some type of conviction about my solution that I need to just get across. I have a problem as I think, my personality type or something like that, whatever. I'm like, listen. You just need more data, and then you're gonna change. I know that's not how that works, but that's how I am. I'm like, listen.

More data, and you're gonna change. As I've gotten older, I've learned that you need a different toolset to make that change. But, usually, there's a point where I have enough conviction when I listen. I thought about this. I've I've maybe even workshopped it or I've tried the other way. It works better. And and so it's that conviction. But there like you're saying, though, there is a point where I don't think I've ever worked anywhere more than, I don't think, 3 years except for the military.

Even that was very, very hard for me to work in the military. I was in there for, like, 15 years. That is the hardest, hardest place to work. I was in trouble all the time. Be you don't understand in America how many 1,000,000 of dollars we waste. We'd literally have a program at the end of the year to waste money. It is disgusting. It is absolutely disgusting.

I don't know how many times the end of the year, the last month. It's a scramble. I'm not even joking to waste 100 of 1,000 of dollars as quickly as you can get rid of it. It is I'm talking I'm not even joking. We were buying gold staplers and paper clips and cabinets of ink because if you don't waste that money, you don't get any next year. Yeah. So if our budget was $3,000,000 and we were great in any other world, any other company working in the world, you only spent 2.5, you'd be congratulated. In the US military, if you spent 2.5, guess what you need next year? You only need 2.

You don't need 3.

And actually, to be to be honest, in a lot of corporate companies, that's actually the same. Right? Because Right. It depends on what level you're looking at it from. Right? If you're looking at it from leadership level, right, then you would congratulate companies that managed to perform under budget. But what often happens in siloed departments, especially when companies get, you know, larger than just a small little startup is exactly the same mentality, which is that people want more from me. They're thinking about their team, they're thinking about their department, they're thinking about their own agenda. And that is not necessarily aligned anymore with what is good for the entire company. Right? And so spending everything you have, that's why it's so common in, like, the last quarter of the year, you know, I get hired for jobs because suddenly they realize they have the extra money, is you know, sometimes it's fine, but very often it is looking at what my team needs rather than what is good for the entire company and what I can do to secure a larger budget next year and justify a larger budget rather than, you know, looking at, wow, this is something I can give back and maybe I don't need this budget.

And that is exactly the kind of stuff that I'm talking about where, you know, if a company doesn't look carefully at how it treats its rebels Mhmm. Then we are missing the opportunity to actually learn from some of the most insightful perspectives in the company. Because those rebels, like your position in the military that you're talking about, those companies where you were after 3 years, they are what I often describe as marginalized voices. Right? They're voices that are on the edge of the system. Right? And the amazing thing about those voices as, you know, difficult as they might be to embrace is that they have a perspective from the outside that is completely blind to the power center that is otherwise running the show. That power center is, you know, visually in the center of the circle. In the center of the circle, you only see yourself if you're looking inwards. Right.

If you were standing on the edges, you see way more. And, you know, so much of the work that I have been doing over the years, especially when it looks at, like, you know, global company transformation, is how do you amplify your ability to listen to the marginalized voices. Right? And how do you bring them into the center? How do you bring them in so that you are not only benefiting from the perspective, but you are also starting to treat people a bit more equally. Right? And most people's reaction to those marginalized voices is to call them crazy, to call them cynical, to call them, you know, anti team players, you know, to call them difficult. Right? All things that you've heard in one form or another from what you're describing.

And Sounds like my middle name.

Yeah. That is I mean, that's a huge loss because then what happens is exactly what happened with you, which is you leave. Right? And then you've lost that entire source of wisdom and intelligence and perspective and, you know, positive but challenging ego difference. And, you know, for I I think we're recognizing more and more through, you know, a lot of different movements that are happening that, you know, diverse groups are an important thing. But that doesn't mean that people know how to handle the inner trigger and the inner challenge that comes up when you are faced, you know, face to face with someone who thinks really differently than you. And and a lot of the work that I'm doing is is helping people have those uncomfortable conversations, helping people sit across from each other and actually listen to a dissenting view or a marginalized view without immediately disagreeing and entering into debate mode, but actually first just trying to understand to align and then see. Right? Like, understanding doesn't mean agreeing, but understanding does mean that I appreciate you for bringing that to the table. And that in of itself is already a huge step forward in empowering someone who's a marginalized voice to actually wanna stay in the conversation.

Yeah. I I I heard you say that seems like it's becoming a bigger problem in, in society where we spends we don't spend enough time listening. We hear you, but we're only waiting to respond. And we don't have that I think when we're not listening, we're not able to internalize it or hear the other person's viewpoint or whatever it is. You're just waiting for conflict to happen. I think I feel like that's been amplified too through social media stuff, and I've seen on TVs and movies and stuff. Yes. There's there's something there.

It's and and I would, you know, just add in the nuance that I think it's happening in particular in American society.

Yes. Which we transport our culture to the world, though. So when it see it starts happening here, we transport that across the world, and then it starts happening in other places as well.

Yeah. I mean, with that, I think we're transporting it less and less as more and more Right.

As people wake up a little bit more.

People wake up and are less interested in what American culture was. Right? I think the

the past was more of a a

transportation of culture. I think now, you know, especially from a European perspective, like, you know, there's a lot of great parts of American culture, but there is also a hyper awareness that so many of the things that made the US, you know, a powerhouse back in the day have contributed, you know, speaking of shadow sides, have contributed to exactly the problems that are showcasing right now and that are, you know, what you're talking about. And so I think that, you know, that independence, that freedom, that, you know, sense of autonomy that you talked about is, you know, deeply embedded in your own DNA. That's part of what made the US, you know, this incredibly successful powerful company in the forties, fifties, sixties, seventies.

Mhmm.

But it also came with a huge shadow side. Right? And the shadow side was an inability to actually think in collective terms and not just on behalf of yourself. The shadow side was not surrounding yourself by people who are different or who challenge you or who, you know, are good because they, you know, present a a totally varying perspective, but instead kinda surrounding yourself by people who, you know, amplify what you already think. And I think part of it is also shared, you know, just geography. The US is not surrounded by as many different countries as you are in places like Europe or Asia. So in Europe, you're just by default forced to have conversations with people around the table from different countries, different nationalities, different backgrounds, different perspectives. In US, you're not. Right? Right.

And that has now turned into exactly what you're talking about, which is we don't know how to listen to understand. We only know how to listen to respond. Mhmm. We don't know how to quiet that inner voice within us that immediately goes to criticism and poking holes and, you know, trying to debate.

Name calling and yeah.

Calling right. Instead, we go into, you know and we drop right into, you know, defense patterns. We, you know, jump into judgments. We jump into protectionism. We jump into taking any conversation that could be an interesting content conversation and instantly turning it into the identity level conversation. Right? It's not this topic versus that topic, my view versus yours. It's who you are and what kind of person you are versus who I am and what kind of person I am, and that's what's at stake when we disagree. And that is so dangerous.

And in the context of companies, that is literally what I'm trying to unpack for people all the time, right, which is we have taken when everything in companies is a content level conversation. Right? It's a topic. It's a slide. It's a project. It's a client. It's a budget. It's a pitch. It's a you know, those are all content level topics.

None of them have any, you know, personal identity that needs to be attached to them. The problem is that we take those topics and they become personal. Right? You chose someone else instead of me for, you know, working on this client project. That is now a personal attack on my value. Right? You've given me this feedback about something I didn't do well. That is now a personal attack on my own ability and skill. Right? All of these conversations, right, you decide to, you know, take this priority instead of that one to work on this strategy versus that one to, you know, follow this and not do something else. That is a personal attack on my values, my vision, who I am, your respect for me, your consideration of my contribution, your interest in my view.

That is the problem. Right? The moment that we're having, like, a super emotional conversation about a content or surface level topic, you know that we're no longer talking about content. We're talking about personal identity hits. And when it's in a personal identity hit, then we need to stop the content conversation and actually talk about what is the identity that people are perceiving. When you say this, what I feel or hear is that you don't respect me, you don't care about me, you don't think I'm valuable, you don't, you know, you're not interested in my view. That's what's actually at stake. Right? Not do we do this, you know, pitch or that, or do we move in this direction or not. And frankly, on a just much more amplified level, that is exactly what I see happening in the US.

You know, that a content level discussion about politics, about, you know, agendas, about things in the news shifts from we're just talking about this content thing to we are now having a fight about what I believe is true, what you believe is true, and what I believe about you as a result of that, and what you believe about me. And that is a incredibly charged and incredibly dangerous place from which to have a conversation because now everything you say is being put into not just what you think, but who you are.

What I hear you saying, if I can summarize it really quick, is I hear what I hear is people are adding context to these things, and then their ego is getting involved, and then it's escalate things and inflame things.

Yeah. And and, I mean, ego is, I think a nice way of describing what is at the core of the problem, which is, you know, the the the root role of the ego is to create separation between me and you. Mhmm. Right? It's to write stories, to create beliefs that say that I'm different than you. Right. I'm the only one who experiences this. I'm the only one who went through this. I'm the only one who knows this pain.

I'm the only one who thinks this way. Right? So the ego is very focused on creating separation. And Right. You know, the work on, you know, any kind of, ego awareness is always focused in some way or another in realizing that we are all connected. Right? That we're all somehow 1, that we're all coming from the same place, that we all, at the end of the day, are human beings or one spirit or one soul or one frequency or one energy. Right? I mean, all of these different, you know, religions or or, philosophies or communities are at the end of the day saying the same thing, right, which is somehow we're connected. And the ego is always trying to to disconnect. And in the form of a conversation, like what you're saying, you're absolutely right.

The moment that I sit in that conversation through the lens of disconnection, through the lens of you're different than me and you'll never understand me. You don't know my pain. You didn't go through what I've gone through. So how could you possibly understand me? Right? Which is a lot of the dialogue and and and perspective that we hear fueling a lot of the conversations, especially in the US. That will never lend itself to a generative outcome because we're not looking for commonality, we're looking for difference. Right? And while it's important to understand difference and understand what is uniquely yours and uniquely mine, it is not helpful to look for that understanding for the purpose of creating more distance. Right? The only benefit of trying to understand how is your experience different than mine is to broaden my understanding of the overall human experience that we're all in. Right? And to see that in your difference and in the way that you experience something and in the way that you see something, I actually through your eyes can discover that same perspective within myself.

And I can discover that in the way you experience that pain, I too could experience that kind of pain even if I haven't gone through something similar if I just open myself up to it. And that creates connection. Right? That creates closeness. But I don't see that happening in the US because I see the conversation just as you said fueled by looking and searching for differences that divide us rather than trying to understand what draws us together.

I think there's something at a deeper level we don't understand there. I'd I'd with your company, one of the areas of focus that you guys have is reminding me of this is is conflict. And you you say, replacing fear and misunderstanding with trust and open dialogue. What's step 1 for doing that?

That's a good question. I think that step 1 in any conflict is to actually have both audiences want to engage in a potential better future.

Yeah. That's that's a tough one.

If if one side has disengaged or if they're cynical or if they are not willing to sit at the table with the other person because they are so disgusted by the other side, right, disgust is a hugely dangerous emotion.

Yeah.

Right? Because when I'm disgusted by you and, you know, to our conversation previously about, you know, the US, we saw this a lot. When I'm disgusted by you, I don't see you at eye level.

That's actually a psychological military tactic is you you dissociate the other people. You make them a other. You make them a thing. We're taught that in the military. These are these type of people. And then you can disassociate yourself. They're not humans. They're not people.

They're a thing. That's a that's a psychological military tactic.

That's exactly right. And that's exactly where it comes from. Right? It is impossible, you know, to motivate entire countries to kill other humans unless you feel that they are less than human. Right? And that they are worthy of being killed because they're just, you know, animals or subhuman. Right. So in conflict, the same thing is true. Right? Which is the very first thing that needs to happen is that regardless of the differences, regardless of the, you know, challenges, regardless of the past, there needs to be at least some level of intention that if we could sit together and if we could see things eye to eye and if we could learn to understand each other, we would all benefit.

Do you have experience facilitating that that situation where red team is disgusted with blue team and bringing those guys together?

Oh, yeah. I mean, that is 90% of my work.

Can you give us, like, one tip, a a ice breaking moment or something that people listening out there could try and, use to to maybe bring people to the table, at least allow people to start to listen?

Yeah. Sure. I mean, the way that I bring the way that I bring people into even an awareness of the fact that, you know, there's difference between them, but also some commonality is I I tend to do it through the form of interviewing participants before I speak with them, collect a whole bunch of different perspectives and data and quotes, and then sharing those quotes back on large posters in a room and doing something called a gallery walk where people walk around and they read what other people think about various important topics that they all, you know, are affected by. Mhmm. And there's something very humbling about seeing, you know, on black and white, your views, other people who agree with your views, as well as people who have completely different views than yours. And when you ask people to recognize, okay, so what stands out to

you about that? When you see all

these different quotes about these different topics, you know, your vision, your strategy, your alignment, your way of working. Right? Let's take way of working as an example. Right? And there's lots of different ways to do this. Right? That that enable people to make visible that they're all unhappy about the way that they work together. Right? Or they're all unhappy about, you know, the way that they work with their clients or the way that they treat their teams. The first thing that bonds them, and that's what we're looking for, right, is a connection, is their dissatisfaction with the status quo. If you can help a team realize that all of us are unhappy with the fact that we keep getting into these conflicts, that is actually your first agreement.

Mhmm.

And that can come from any number of activities. Right? So the activity I just described is called the gallery walk. It's great. Mhmm. There's some other teams I do, you know, an activity where they have all these different, you know, dimensions like attitude, mindset, collaboration, trust, openness, whatever, and they have to rate it, you know, red, yellow, green with these little stickies, and then we show each other, you know, the stickies that we've put out on our little pieces of paper. And you start to get a collective sense of what do we all believe is a problem here. Right? With other teams, I also work with, you know, sometimes 3 d sculptures and materials, right, Play Doh and feathers and paint and whatever, and they have to paint or create a system, you know, visually of what it feels like to work here. Mhmm.

Whatever the, you know, methodology, all of these works together to give people for the first time a sense that they are tapping into a collective view that current reality is not good enough. Mhmm. That if we think about where we wanna get to and what our goals are and what our vision are, if we were to keep working with this level of conflict, if we were to keep working with this level of disagreement, if we were to keep working with this level of dissatisfaction, we will never get to where we wanna go. And the moment they realize that, the moment that they recognize we are all collectively creating results that none of us want. We are all participating in a dynamic, in a way of showing up that is creating an experience that we all know is wrong, then you have created the burning platform that we talked about. Mhmm. Then you have created a unified sense of intention that if we could work on this, if we could change this, if we could actually do something different, that would make all the difference for where we're wanting to go. And in that sense, you know, one of my teachers often says that intention is not only a powerful force, it is the only force, and that is, you know, speaks to that that notion that if you can get people to align on an intention, we are coming together because we recognize that the way we are working isn't good enough, then it's the first step to starting to get people to put down their egos, to put down their agendas, to put down what I sometimes call their guns.

Yeah.

And actually start opening up to a conversation. Right? And that doesn't mean that 2 seconds later, it won't flare up. Right. But at least you now have contracted an agreement that this team wants to unpack the patterns, that this team wants to understand why they keep falling into, you know, ways of behaving that aren't serving them. They are open to, you know, the feedback from a facilitator and, you know, the resonance from each other to understand how they are intentionally or unintentionally hurting one another. And, you know, as you move through a process like that, it doesn't always you know, you set the intention, and then as you're starting to, you know, plant the seeds for these conversations to grow, it's not regular, consistent, constant progress. It's like little steps that, you know, kind of are getting closer and then further away and closer and further away and closer and further away to something. And usually at a certain point, it usually happens, you know, in the middle of the process, whatever number of days such a process could be.

There's something there that I call a crack, which is when something happens that reveals the real underlying dynamic of what's at play, like the real underlying core. And if I'm working with a team for 3 days, then it might happen on day 2. If I'm working with a team for a year, then it might happen at 4 months. I just had a team recently that I'm working with for a year, and it happened, you know, at the 4 or 5 month mark, where suddenly something broke and in that team, somebody just said, you know what? I can't do this anymore. I have to say what's on my mind. I cannot hold back. And I always know that when someone speaks from, like, that emotion, that level of intensity, they are about to share something that is going to change the field, the frequency of everything that happens afterwards, and it always does. Right? They land a comment that comes from such a deep place that it is true on both sides of the conflict that everybody can feel that what was just said is actually, like, the core issue that we've all been dancing around and everybody somehow relates to it.

And it's from that point forward that you actually start to be more connected and more aligned than in disagreement. And it's always like my job is looking for that crack, is creating the space for that crack, is nourishing that crack, is making sure that we don't bypass it in a moment of distraction or laughter or, you know, discomfort Mhmm. But to actually, like, really give all the space in the world because when that happens, the entire group descends into a completely different way of being with each other. And then there's real shifts and progress that start to happen from that point forward.

Something I'm wondering about when you're talking about these gallery boards and these different things, do people start to realize that they're all basically the same when you don't have an other like, you know, if you like, if you I could see that there'd be a huge difference if you put up a board that said, red team, this is what they think. Blue team, this is what they think. They each of those looking at that where it was actually labeled with who it came from, I think, would not allow that openness to say, you know, hey. We kinda all think the same. Is that is that something you see?

Sometimes. But sometimes they really don't think the same. Right?

I think in general, I think most of us all want about the same things. Right? We all want that safety, security. We want the comfort, the change, the the the meaningfulness or whatever. I think underlying, if you went up to the top level categories of all of the complaints, I think I could be absolutely wrong. I think I think, ultimately, there's some alignment there or a good amount of alignment. And if I'm wrong, please tell me I'm wrong.

So I think where you're getting to is the desired outcome of looking at such a gallery wall. Right? Now the gallery walk is just literal quotes of what people think about, for example, which direction should our company take with our current strategy? How do we solve these problems that we're in? What is wrong with leadership? Right? Like, these kinds of questions can, you know, what are the big elephants in the room that we need to talk about? Right? Like these types of questions, which you then see direct quotes of can often generate wildly divergent thinking. Right? And very opposing views. However, what you're getting to is where the facilitation of that conversation always comes to.

Mhmm.

Which if you look at all the stuff that's up here, including all the differences and all of the, you know, conflicts and all of the disagreement, what do you see as common themes that potentially start creating connections? And at that level, which is exactly what you're saying. Right? Like, how do we bring it to a more meta level? Mhmm. Then people talk less about content, right, and specific ideas and disagreements to this, what I was mentioning before.

Mhmm.

And they start shifting to identity, but in this case, positive identity. Right? We all care for this company so much. We're all super passionate that we don't, you know, mess it up. We're all trying to do what we think is best. We all believe that our team members are important, but we have different approaches to how we think we should care for them. Right? So then we start talking about values and noticing, wow, even though the the content level views are quite different, the values that are behind those statements actually bring us together. And at that level, you're absolutely right. What we're looking for is commonality.

What we're looking for is what bridges us together. And I completely agree. Right? Like, the differences at that level are super small because at the end of the day, as you said, everybody just wants to be appreciated. They wanna be valued. They wanna be seen. They wanna be understood. You know, there's, you know, these 6 levels of how people want to, you know, have things show up in their life. They wanna contribute.

They wanna have significance. They wanna have certainty. Uncertainty like we talked about. They want love. Right? I mean, these are things that are the drivers of all humans, and when you can bring the conversation to to help people see how actually what we are fighting about is all connected to values that we hold in common, that is the kind of bridge that starts to help people drop their guns.

Okay. I was going a step too high. So I see what you're saying. Oh, interesting. Okay. I mean, there's this is fascinating. I mean, you have more areas of focus. You have your modern leadership, which are 5 pillars, and so many other things there.

Where is a great place for people to connect with you if they wanna continue this conversation?

Yeah. Thanks. So, I mean, the modern leader right now is my new newest project. I'm super psyched about it. So I do wanna, you know, just share it for a moment because Absolutely. Attention to you. Right? I've been doing this this type of work for a long time, and I have seen so many leadership programs that are these one off, high intensity, travel somewhere, off-site type of things. I love them.

I think they're a great impulse. I think they're a wonderful way to, you know, wake somebody up, but they are not sustainable ways to develop leadership. They do not have accountability. There's often no follow-up. If it is a year long program, it's like 3 touch points. What really is required in leadership development is for people to have a plan, to have regular training, to have support, to have the accountability for that, and to have a community for that. And so after, you know, years of complaining myself that I just don't like that my work is not having enough impact, especially these multi training programs. Right? When I work with teams, you know, impact teams and and support them over time, that's totally different.

But when people are interested in, like, more, you know, holistic leadership development as a as a concept, I've been super frustrated by how little progress there is and how big of a need there is for good leaders. So I've developed this program called Modern Leader, which is a private members only community that anybody from any company can join who wants to take leadership development in their own hands and doesn't want to wait for their company to send them on it, doesn't want to wait, you know, for the next program, but wants to dive in and do this as seriously as if you were, you know, deciding you wanna go to the gym and get fit. Right? And if you wanted to change your life and get fit and be healthy, going to a 1 week fitness retreat on some, you know, beautiful island is a nice impulse, but it's not gonna change anything. Right? There's no support. There's no structure. Nothing changes when you get home. So this leadership program is the the tagline of this program is become someone worth following. And within this program, there's a group that's for leaders and there's also a group for founders because I'm noticing the founders also need kind of their own space to really talk about how unique those challenges are.

And if people are interested in really what it takes to to both lead other people and ultimately to be able to lead yourself through, you know, through work, through starting a company, through all of these, you know, challenges that come up, then that is something I'm super excited to talk about. If people are interested in 1 on 1 coaching and team development stuff, right, that is all stuff that I do as well. But I'm really focused right now on this this this modern leader work because I just think it has the potential to be something quite quite special, and we have a hugely thriving community that is already inside there. So for any of the stuff that people are interested in, I think the most active place where you can find me is on my Instagram, which is just Daniel Ludevig. I am on LinkedIn under the same name. My website is moveleadership.com. So of those places, if people just type in my name, Jenna Ludovic, they'll quickly get access and and find out more about me.

And if you're out running or driving, they'll all be in the shown us easily link for you guys. Even in the podcast player, they should all be linked easily to get to that stuff. One thing I like to do on a social community show is I like to issue a weekly challenge, and I'd like to give you the opportunity to issue the challenge. It could be something about we talked about today or something completely different, whatever you wanna do, hopefully, to get people, you know, kick started into this coming week, whatever, you know, starting tomorrow, starting today. What would you like to issue as this week's challenge?

Sure. I mean, I we we do monthly challenges in the Modern Leaders, so 30 day challenges. And, you know, there's a lot of research that shows that, it takes about 21 days of regular repetition for things to start neurologically changing our brains and and behavior to change with that. So I can give you one of the challenges that we did a couple of months ago, and a a week is a good place to start. And it is a challenge related to your inner critic, those self talk voices that you were mentioning before. And the challenge is this. Every single day, just take 5 minutes at the end of the day and notice what are the inner critic voices that came up for you that day. And I sometimes call those voices saboteurs.

Right? They're those unhelpful voices that spoke to us and said, you're not good enough, you're not smart enough, who do you think you are, why would you try this out, you got this new offer, you're never gonna be good at it, you're gonna fail. Just start jotting down for the number of days that you do the challenge, what are the voices that started to appear? What did they say? When did they show up? And after 7 days let's say, look back at the list and start to see if you can cluster them into certain themes. Because most of these voices actually are not hundreds of different topics. They usually all fall into 1, 2, or 3 categories of things that we are carrying as those limiting belief stories. And the power of this is that the moment you start recognizing that a saboteur is speaking to you, the moment you start recognizing that you have one of these inner voices that is criticizing you, there is a part of you that is now observing that, that is able to see that from the outside that is different than that voice. Right? Which means that voice that is talking to you is a part of you, but it is not all of you. And the more that you can start to strengthen that observing self, the self that sees the voice but is able to recognize actually that voice is telling me something that's not true, the more you can strengthen that, the stronger and stronger and stronger that observing self will be, that neutral self, that more realistic self, and the weaker and more disempowered that saboteur self will become. And that is a practice of just being able to recognize the voices as they appear and becoming faster and faster and faster at catching, oh my god, there's my saboteur.

But just because that saboteur is saying that, doesn't actually mean it's true. I know that what is actually true is something else. That would be a great challenge to start. What do you think about that?

I love it. I think, a fun thing also to do with that is record yourself talking. Like, tell that to yourself and listen back at how ridiculous you sound.

Oh, totally. I mean, there's, like, you know, these amazing quotes. Right? That we would never talk to our best friends the way we talk to ourselves. Right? That type of thing. And so you're totally right. I mean, for most people, it would be cringe worthy to actually even write down these thoughts, not to mention say them out loud. So I think both are super powerful, right, to write it down, to say it out loud, and just to start to hear how viciously we speak to ourselves, right, and what that tonality and what that perspective and what that, you know, view actually does to our confidence, you know, to our insecurities, and and ultimately, as we've talked about before, to our self esteem.

Mhmm. Ashley, with me personally, I don't have that negative self talk, but I have, like, these weird excuses I come up with, like, the reasons my brain and and I've said them a lot. I've tried this request. If you were to try and convince somebody up like, with your excuses about how this wouldn't work or how you couldn't do it, they look at you like you're absolutely ridiculous. The things I come up with, why I shouldn't be like, I I wanna go smoke a cigar, and I'm like, well, you know, you really earned it. And if I tried to convince you of that, you'd be like, this is horrible advice. What are you talking about? But it works for ourself, and it's a good opportunity to recognize the silly things we tell ourselves.

Oh, it's a it's a brilliant system. Right? The system of self preservation in our comfort zone. Right? Which tends to be kind of where we feel safe. The system that our, you know, mind, body, central nervous system has come up with in order to keep ourselves in that safety zone is brilliant, honestly.

And if

you look at it, it is really brilliant. And I think for you, if you don't necessarily have those negative self talk voices, the voices that I would, you know, cheekily offer you to look into are your voices that include the word should in them.

Oh, yes. That I wrote that down earlier too. I'll I'll, I'll keep that in mind. That's when I I think I'm gonna add it to my internal list of words. I also don't like to use the word but. I'm not sure if you're familiar with that word. Real quick for the audience, think about when you use the word but, everything before the word but is a lie, and everything after the word but is the truth. So when you figure yourself wanting to say but, think about that sentence because you're lying, and then you're telling the truth.

Yep. And language is so important to how we think. Right? So being aware of the language that we use, especially in the context of self talk. Right? I mean, it's just as important in conversations with others. But in self talk, like, those types of awarenesses, you know, whether it's but or in your case, you know, the word should, it frames what you believe. Right? It frames literally the input that you are narrating your life with every day. And so I, I think that for you, the, you know, self talk may not come up in the form of criticisms the way that for many people, it might sound like harsh criticism. But those sentences that include the word should are also criticizing things that you otherwise feel are important or a part of you.

And that could be your form of self talk that is worthy of starting to at least unpack and understand what triggers those you should or you shouldn't statements in you.

I do when I in the times I do recognize it, I try to reframe things where I get to do these things as well. That's something I like to try and do. I'm not sure if that's exactly what you're talking about, but I do try to let myself know, like, hey. I get to do these things. This is kinda cool, actually.

Yeah. I mean, I think that's a great way to start. Right? Like we talked before, I think reframing is a it sounds like it's a strength of yours that you you jump into quickly, which is you jump into quickly, which is good. Mhmm. And if you notice that you keep bumping up against those same should statements, then at some point, it's worth a deeper dive.

Yeah. Something I wrote down here, what what you're talking about that was rewrite plus rewind equals new story.

That's nice.

That's how I thought about that when you were talking about that earlier. That's something I recall. I got a ton of notes here for myself and and for you guys. Daniel, wow. This has been a enlightening conversation. A little bit of therapy for me. Hopefully, everybody out there gets a little bit of therapy as well for it. Please, guys, he's got you have you have great stuff.

I I, I dug through all your Instagram and and your your LinkedIn and your website and stuff. If you guys wanna dig more into this, check him out. Do do we wanna talk about your podcast or something you don't do too much?

No. I mean, when I revive it, you know, I mean, there is a podcast out there with with, I think 10 episodes that I came up with on my own. It's on Spotify. It's called you are what you think. And so, you know, by all means, check it out. But I, I think that if I really consider the value of what we've talked about today, which I really have to say I appreciate. I appreciate your questions. I appreciate your curiosity.

I appreciate, you know, your own willingness to also be self reflective as well as inquisitive. I think this is, this has been awesome, and this is this is great. I mean, we really covered a lot of territory here, so I I love what we explored here. And if people wanna check out other stuff, let's start with, with Instagram and with LinkedIn and with Sitter. And then, if they still have an appetite for more, then by all means, jump into the podcast.

Well, Daniel, thank you so much. Again, this was an absolute pleasure for me. I appreciate everything. Thank you very much for the compliments. I hope, you know, everybody can get some good nuggets out of this and, you know, start changing your stories. Get that rewrite. Think about the rewind and get a new story.

Amazing. Thank you too, Tyson. This is a awesome conversation, awesome podcast.

Well, I hope you guys enjoyed the fascinating conversation with Daniel. I'd like to thank him again for coming on and sharing all that valuable wisdom. If you got any value from this episode, I'd like you to share it with 2 other people. You can connect with us all week long between shows on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, YouTube, or your favorite podcast player for past episodes and links to everything we talked about today. Head over to the socialchameleon.show. Until next time, keep learning, growing, and transforming into the person you wanna become. Connect On Social This podcast is available on… You can listen to all our episodes on Apple Podcasts , Spotify , Overcast , Pocket Casts , Castbox , YouTube Music , Amazon Music , Audible , Substack, or your favorite podcast platform .