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Ep. 179 Motivation 3.0: Unlock Peak Performance & Well-Being with Deekron Krikorian
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Overview:Today’s episode features executive coach and bestselling author Deekron Krikorian, MBA. Deekron specializes in merging high performance with holistic well-being, empowering professionals to excel mentally, physically, and emotionally. Drawing from his diverse background as a Big-4 CPA, management consultant, and tech startup founder, Deekron introduces his groundbreaking “whole person” transformation method detailed in his bestselling book, The Nine Shifts.
Key Highlights:
- Mindset Mastery: Understand how your mind creates resistance and limiting beliefs that fuel perfectionism and procrastination.
- Energy Optimization: Discover practical habits around movement, nutrition, sleep, and emotional regulation to prevent burnout and sustain energy.
- Purpose Alignment: Reignite your motivation by connecting deeply with your unique purpose and understanding your “why.”
- Habit Formation: Learn empowering habits through repetition, accountability, and simple strategies that create lasting change.
Main Takeaways:
- Techniques to get into action effortlessly without relying solely on willpower
- Strategies that maintain both high performance and overall well-being
- Empowerment tools that serve as a stress shield, preventing burnout
- The powerful 60-second morning ritual to maintain motivation and consistency for life
Sales Strategy to Get a HECK YES:
- Empathetic listening
- Releasing attachment to outcomes
- Building trust through authenticity, commitment, and fun
- Removing limiting beliefs
- Simplifying the process to start
Deekron’s Woo Factor:Unlike typical executive, mindset, or health coaches, Deekron uniquely blends these disciplines into a comprehensive approach focused on true, lasting behavior change—helping individuals thrive in every facet of work and life.
Special Gift for Listeners:Enjoy exclusive access to the first three chapters of Deekron’s book, The Nine Shifts, empowering you with transformative insights right away.
👉 Download Your Free Chapters Here
Tune in to transform your approach to motivation, energy, and sustained high performance!
Connect with Deekron https://healthyhighperformer.co/
Connect with Carissa Woo https://www.instagram.com/carissawoo
https://www.digitalwealthhypegirl.com/24-hr-ai-challenge - Make a digital product
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Transcript
Introduction to Passive Income for Wedding Professionals
00:00:00
Speaker
Happy Buu Wednesdays! Wedding pros, listen up. You can make passive income while you're shooting weddings, sleeping, or just living your life. This is how you scale without burning out. And peace of mind even when you're not booking. Yes please!
00:00:13
Speaker
I have a link in the show notes and you can actually make your first digital product and have it up and running and making your first sale in less than 24 hours.
00:00:24
Speaker
You won't want to sleep on this.
Meet Decron Kikorian: High-Performance Coach
00:00:26
Speaker
So today on Get A Heck Yes, I'm joined by Decron. a high-performance coach who's worked with Fortune 500 companies and has been featured in the Washington Post and Business Insider and knows how to blend mindset, wellness, and next-level strategy.
00:00:42
Speaker
You're going to want to take notes for this one, so let's get into it.
Carissa Wu's Journey in the Wedding Industry
00:00:49
Speaker
Welcome to Get a Heck Yes with Carissa Wu. I'm your host Carissa and I've been a Los Angeles wedding photographer for over a decade. I've traveled the world, built my team, and seen it all.
00:01:00
Speaker
I now coach wedding photographers hit 10K a month and build a thriving business. In this podcast, we are going to deep dive into how top wedding creatives get that heck yes from their dream clients. We are not holding back on the struggles of the business and how to push through the noise. Some healthy hustle, mindset shifts, up-leveling your money story,
00:01:18
Speaker
Time hacks because I'm a mom of two, a little bit of woo-woo, and most importantly, self-love and confidence are just a few of the many things we will talk about. i want to give you a genuine thank you for following along my journey.
00:01:30
Speaker
i hope to inspire you every Woo Wednesday so that you say heck yes to listening to this podcast. See you guys soon.
00:01:40
Speaker
Hey everyone, welcome back to Get a Heck Yes with me, your girl, Carissa.
Decron's Coaching Expertise and Philosophy
00:01:45
Speaker
I have a very special guest today. His name is Dekron Kikorian and he is um ah MBA, he has his MBA and he's an executive coach who merges high performance with total well-being.
00:01:59
Speaker
He helps professionals to elevate their mind, body, and life, and he's drawing up his experience as a big for CPA management consultant and tech startup founder.
00:02:11
Speaker
He developed the whole person transformation method, wow, outlined in his bestselling book, The Nine Shifts. Dekron has empowered over 200 high achievers and has been featured in major media like Washington Post.
00:02:25
Speaker
He has worked with top organizations such as EY, Accenture, Pepsi, and Procter & Gamble. So we're very excited, the wedding world, to have you, Dekron. What's up? Good, good. Awesome to be here.
00:02:38
Speaker
Nice to connect with you, Carissa, and your listeners. Yay, and you're coming from New York City. But in a nutshell, tell the audience who you are. Sure. So thanks again for that intro. I think you covered most of it. But in general, I call myself a high performance transformation coach.
00:02:55
Speaker
And I'm really passionate about empowering folks who are up to something. So people who are achievers, entrepreneurs, people who are ambitious and want to get somewhere. And really helping them break through any limits that are posed on them because as human beings, we are limited by a number of factors.
00:03:11
Speaker
Part of it is our thinking patterns. ah Part of it is our body as well, especially as we age. And so the three areas I work on is helping elevate their confidence, their energy, and their consistency.
00:03:22
Speaker
And by doing that, I help them become unstoppable at work and life. Nice. Yeah, I'm feeling a little bit tired today. i was at an event for like five hours, WIPA event. um So I'm a little energetically depleted. So I'm super excited for this conversation to just lift my spirits up.
00:03:41
Speaker
I'll do my best. Yay. Okay, but we're not going to talk about all that yet. We're going to go into like a little bit of your backstory. So tell me anything about like where you're from, your childhood, your family dynamics, anyone you want to share the audience.
The Discipline of Decron's Upbringing
00:03:56
Speaker
Yeah, would love to. So I was actually born overseas. I was born in Romania and my parents immigrated to the U.S. when I was only about two years old. And my dad was a professional athlete in Romania. So when we got here and like raising raising my brother and I, he instilled the importance of like discipline and hard work and being healthy and playing sports. And he made it really clear to us that that stuff is not optional. Like you have to do it.
00:04:23
Speaker
ah And if we didn't do it, there would be consequences. And so he was like this classic disciplinarian who, um you know, we didn't love it at the time. we would We would resist, my brother and I. You know, my dad, for example, would make us go to the park and play sports on Saturday mornings, and we'd rather be watching cartoons on Saturday mornings. So my brother I would be like protesting. But, you know, in hindsight, as adults, you really start to appreciate, you know, how important that was. And so I'm very grateful for it.
00:04:50
Speaker
And part of what I do, Chris, is to pay that gift forward, you know, that gift of discipline, that gift of focusing on health and wellness and well-being and having routine, having structure. It's made a big difference in my life. And I bring people along now in those areas.
00:05:05
Speaker
Nice. What um sports did your dad play and what did you play? So my dad is a professional rugby player, um which is a tough sport. It's basically like American football without, you know, protective equipment. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And, that you know, if you have a dad who is a rugby player, you don't want to mess with him.
00:05:21
Speaker
So we're on our best behavior. My big sports, I would say, was soccer. I was captain of my soccer team one year. I played pretty much everything, tennis, street hockey, tackle football. But the thing that I really mastered would be skiing.
00:05:35
Speaker
So I actually did some ski racing. I won some medals. I was a part-time ski instructor. um And I still ski now. like to To this day, I'm like in my 50s, and I still love it. Oh, yeah. You look really good for it in your 50s.
00:05:49
Speaker
You're not wrinkly at all. I got to get your skincare regimen. um but i was Yeah. what did Why did your dad move um to the States when you were two? Was it for a job? No, actually, Romania was a communist and it was one of the most strict communist countries. So opportunity was very limited. Quality of life was really bad. There were really weren't freedoms.
00:06:10
Speaker
There really wasn't much opportunity. So they kind of basically left and started a whole new life for us here in the US so that my brother and I could have a brighter future. Wow. Was that in New York City?
00:06:22
Speaker
Yeah, we immigrated to New York, to Queens. Okay. And then what did your parents do when they got here? So my dad, um he went back to school. He had studied economics in Romania. So he transitioned into, he did accounting for a while and then he became a banker. He worked at JPMorgan Chase.
00:06:39
Speaker
Okay. And then my mom also transitioned. She was like a librarian in Romania and then she studied and she became a bookkeeper. So they were both kind of in the finance type roles. Oh, that's awesome. Yeah, that's huge. What were you like as like a kid growing up, ah f like skiing and soccer?
00:06:56
Speaker
um But like, tell me about like the younger years and then you could kind of walk me through like the high school years, like the adolescent years. Yeah, for sure. So yeah, growing up definitely was a lot of sports. I was an active kid.
00:07:09
Speaker
um I was into drawing. I was into comic books. I was think I was like a budding wannabe alpha male when I was a little kid. So I'd be into like like superheroes that had big muscles and I would draw them. And I was always like you know inspired by that.
00:07:25
Speaker
Sports, like I said. um And then yeah, like a little bit later growing up, I got away from sports. I got more into music. And I was actually playing drums in a heavy metal band. Believe it or not, I had long hair.
00:07:37
Speaker
This goes back to like the 80s. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. So that was, yeah, that was kind of my upbringing, you know, mostly here, spent time here in New York. And then moving into college, it was more about learning.
00:07:49
Speaker
i was always passionate about entrepreneurship, even at a young age. um I had a paper route when I was 14. um So that was my first experience of kind of having a little mini business. And then at 18, like I was saying earlier, my brother, my brother was ah a DJ from a young age who was all about music.
00:08:06
Speaker
And so we started our mobile DJ business together. it was called Dynamite DJs. And we were going around and doing, you know, weddings, bar mitzvahs, stuff of that nature. Oh, I love it. Wait, tell me more about the paper, like um like a paper magazine type of thing? the paper No, the paper route. So I was a delivery boy.
00:08:21
Speaker
Oh, I see. would deliver newspapers to people's houses. Yeah, would stack them up like a basket on my bike. And I'd drive around the neighborhood and just throw them to the to the people who had subscribed. yeah Oh, yeah. How times have times have changed.
00:08:35
Speaker
Absolutely. That was a different world. um Do you feel like you were like more um ambitious or like hardworking than your peers because of how you were raised? You know, I think in some ways, yes.
00:08:48
Speaker
My dad, again, he was a disciplinarian, so he would make us do extra work. He wanted us to kind of get ahead. So it wasn't enough to do just what school assigned. He had to do like extracurricular work. Like he'd make us do like book reports in the summer or like math equations. Like we had to do all that.
00:09:03
Speaker
So we were, yeah, we were kind of being asked to work more. And my brother was more of a rebel, so we'd kind of blow that stuff off. yeah And I was more like the perfect kid. So I would like do all of it. And then him and I would clash. I'd be like, you should be doing dad's homework. He'd be like, nah, like, I don't know what your problem is. You don't need to be doing it.
00:09:20
Speaker
Oh, did brother turn out successful like you? Or did he go opposite? brother is successful in his own way. i he's an artist, a very accomplished artist, but he's been um a musician, like a true artist from day one, where I've been more of like...
00:09:32
Speaker
I've dabbled in things like music. I've dabbled in different creative pursuits, but my creativity is more like around entrepreneurship but and business. Oh, I love it. um Yeah, I guess entrepreneurship is an art of itself.
00:09:47
Speaker
Totally. It gives a lot of creativity be innovative. Walk me through college years, um what you were like, into any early jobs, and then, yeah, anything you want to share.
From Accounting to Corporate Strategy
00:10:01
Speaker
Sure. College was probably my least favorite schooling experience because it just felt like a lot of work. um i were I went to a commuter school. I went to City University New York in Manhattan. So it was kind of like just commuting to school. There was really no campus. It was just buildings in Manhattan.
00:10:18
Speaker
There wasn't much in terms like ah like a Greek life, fraternities, sororities. There was nothing like that, not much to do. And then I would we be working. I had a part time job at an advertising agency. So I would go from class to work to home and then just do that all over again every day.
00:10:33
Speaker
So there wasn't like that much fun to be had, but it it did get me where I needed to go. You know, I did get, you know, decent grades and I interviewed well and I was able to get a ah good job after under undergrad. So I worked for one of the big four accounting firms. I worked at EY for a number of years after school. So, um,
00:10:51
Speaker
you know Like I said, it wasn't the funnest years. So that's why when I applied to grad school, I was like, I'm not even applying in New York City. I want a real campus. I want a real college experience. And I ended up going to Michigan, which I absolutely loved. It was like the experience that i really needed.
00:11:05
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, that's so different, like from new York City to Michigan. You probably met some different sets of friends, right? Yeah, yeah. From all over and we got to go to football games and basketball games and all that stuff. I never got in undergrad. So it was really, ah really like filled in a big puzzle piece that i was missing.
00:11:25
Speaker
Oh, nice. So did you go to grad school like in your late twenty s Correct. Okay. Okay. Yeah. yeah yeah Yeah. All right. So I guess just um walk us through like, after going to um working at EY, that's um Ernest and Young, and then going to grad school.
00:11:43
Speaker
And then after grad school, like, what did you do? Yeah, after grad school, I was passionate about, I mean, the reason I went to to business schools were was a few things. First of all, I knew that accounting wasn't really my calling.
00:11:58
Speaker
Plus, like tax season was getting in the way of ski season. So I was like, no, I'm not having this. Yeah. And so I was like, okay, I do want to have and a but i want to be a business owner. I want to have my own business one day.
00:12:10
Speaker
Knowing accounting is not enough. I wanted to broaden my skill set. And so I went to business school to learn marketing and corporate strategy. I ended up pursuing corporate strategy for three and a half years after business school.
00:12:20
Speaker
And I liked that experience a lot. I liked it more than accounting. It felt more like aligned with my skills, my passions, my interests, and Yet, after a few years of doing that, my my heart had a calling to help people like in a deeper way.
Discovering Fulfillment in Personal Development
00:12:34
Speaker
And that was partly because when I was transitioning out of corporate America, i had hit a wall myself. So in my mid-30s, I started feeling anxious. So I was battling anxiety. I was feeling kind of unfulfilled, lost. I didn't know like what direction my life should really take.
00:12:50
Speaker
And at the time, my cousin was doing transformation work, um personal development work um out in l L.A., actually. ah she's from She grew up in Outwater Village, like um near.
00:13:02
Speaker
Yeah. near Yeah. So she was out from out there and she was doing work. But, you know, we kept in touch and I got into the work myself and it made a huge difference in terms of getting to know myself better. you know, learning why I think how I think, learning why like things were limiting me, why I was struggling, why i was feeling anxious. So it made such a big difference in my life.
00:13:21
Speaker
I wanted to start paying that forward to people. And that's what kind of got me into coaching, you know, many years later. Was it like a certain program or course that you went through for the transfer? It was a institution called Landmark Education.
00:13:35
Speaker
they have offices in like, you know, around the world. Yeah, I'm very familiar. Did you go through like many of the courses or just the first one? Yeah, i did two years straight. So they have what's called a curriculum for living. And then I did something called a team management and leadership program. So that it's all to kind of help set me up for, you know, entrepreneurship and the stuff i was pursuing. And it gave me the courage to actually follow my dreams. You know, before that, I was kind of like,
00:13:59
Speaker
tentative. I was hesitant. I wasn't really diving in. And that really freed me to just go for it. um And then since then, I've been doing a lot of other work. So I've had life coaches and I've had ah business coaches. I did Tony Robbins. So I'm i'm constantly like you know improving myself and always looking to to better myself and how I think.
00:14:19
Speaker
Yeah, that's awesome. Why do you think you were anxious like in your mid-30s? And then what were your like key takeaways from Landmark I'm excited to share with you all about our first get a heck yes sponsor 17 hats.
00:14:36
Speaker
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00:14:47
Speaker
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00:15:01
Speaker
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00:15:12
Speaker
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00:15:25
Speaker
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Overcoming Anxiety Through Personal Development
00:15:49
Speaker
question. um I would say why would I why did I feel anxious? I felt that I I felt that I was basically like unfulfilled with the level of accomplishment. I was unfulfilled.
00:16:01
Speaker
And i also felt really trapped, Chris. I felt like on the one hand, I wanted to pursue what I loved and what I was passionate about. But, you know, there's this like belief that if you do that, you're not going to make any money.
00:16:12
Speaker
because you hear about the, you know, the, the starving artist or the struggling entrepreneur, it's like, you're either going to do that route or you're going to be in corporate and make money, but me be miserable. And so I felt like trapped between those two, those two choices. Um, and it wasn't true. it was a limiting belief, um, which I didn't realize until later. Uh, and I think the big thing that my personal development work did for me was help me understand, um,
00:16:38
Speaker
Just like what what what were the things that I went through as as a child growing up? You know, the things we go through as people, they they leave they leave a scar. You know, they leave a mark. The traumas that we experience, whether they're big or they're small, they change how we think and they put us more in this place of fear and we start living our lives from that place, but unconsciously.
00:16:58
Speaker
And when I became conscious to that, and I was like, no, I don't need to, let's say people please just to get ahead or whatever. You let go of that need and it starts freeing you up to just be yourself and to express yourself and to be able to like yeah have your voice heard instead of feeling like you're trapped or you don't have a choice. That's like the really short version, you know?
00:17:16
Speaker
Yeah. I mean, it's kind of like what I'm hearing is if you get into that like needy state of mind where it just like, oh shoot, like I have to, Do this and this and this and this to get ahead. and then it just kind I don't know, makes you, ah kind of diminishes like your personality and like your energy, i guess.
00:17:40
Speaker
And you have to like break free of that. It does, exactly. and And as human beings, we all have this need to be accepted. We all have a need for acceptance. you know Subconsciously, our survival is dependent on this need. And I talk about this in my book, but basically the two groups of people that we need protection from are our parents.
00:17:58
Speaker
So that's why like babies, children, by default, our instinct is to make them happy and to win their love because we need their protection. If our parents don't protect us as babies, we die.
00:18:09
Speaker
and so a human being is programmed to win that acceptance. And the other group is our tribe. So we want to make sure our tribe is also going to protect us. Our ancestors grew up in tribal societies and everything had to be according to the tribal rules. If not, the tribe would kick you out and now you'd be on your own and other tribes could harm you or what have you.
00:18:29
Speaker
So living according to the tribe and winning that acceptance of like, what are people going to think of me? What are they going to say about me? Subconsciously, that's always in the background. And and when when that is not satisfied, when the mind feels like, oh, my gosh, these people might be rejecting me, it goes into some kind of survival mode to please them or to be perfect according to their rules.
00:18:51
Speaker
And now it's no longer what you want. It's what you think people want from you. Oh, that's so deep. Never heard that before. It is deep. Sorry. I got to re listen to this and kind of ponder on that and maybe DM you for questions. But let's get into like what you do today, like what your life looks like and like what your business looks like. And then we'll go into hot topic.
00:19:10
Speaker
Yeah, for sure. So I'd say, you know, I've been coaching since 2018 and I've been been fortunate to connect with a lot of great folks and really create intimate relationships with them, really get people get get to know people on a personal level And help them break free from whatever has been
Integrating Mental, Physical, and Lifestyle Coaching
00:19:28
Speaker
stopping them. So the same way you know I went through my transformation from a mind standpoint, but also on a body standpoint, um I was actually, when he had asked me about you know growing up, I was the first of all my friends to actually start lifting weights because I wanted to look good and feel good and you know like...
00:19:44
Speaker
get the girls and all that. And so that was me growing up. But, you know, having had this passion for training, and I actually ended up doing my first bodybuilding competition when I was 50 years old.
00:19:56
Speaker
Wow. All natural. Yeah, finally did it. And learning about the body about nutrition, about sleep, the metabolism, hormones, eventually getting certified in that stuff, too.
00:20:07
Speaker
It's like I combine the body and the mind and also the lifestyle of consistency. So those three pieces are what I believe people need to be successful. So whatever whatever they're doing. So if these are entrepreneurs who listen to your show, then they have to show up confident. They have to show up energetic, also you know clear thinking, and to be consistent with the habits that are going to keep them there so that they can be their best and be their most successful.
00:20:32
Speaker
Ooh, I love it. I'm just trying to absorb everything about my journey as well, just as far as like energetically, like if you're not mentally okay if you're like, but you're trying to like go to a networking event and just, you know, put on your your face, I feel like people could feel that energy if you're not like just good in your own mind. So this is very like powerful work.
00:21:00
Speaker
Yeah. And things like imposter syndrome kick in, comparison kicks in. That's all the stuff I work on with with my clients. And believe it or not, even very successful people, you know, like a top New York City lawyer or like a top, you know, vice president of sales. You know, I've worked with people of that status, but they too have those same struggles that we have.
00:21:19
Speaker
You know, they may have gotten ahead, you know, in their career. in their world or in corporations, but they still have, you know, imposter syndrome and limiting beliefs and, you know, these old traumas that, that haunt them and cause maybe fights with their spouse or they cause them, cause them to drink or have bad habits because of the stress that, that they feel.
00:21:37
Speaker
so it, it applies to all of us really. Yeah. It never ends. Let's get it This is the perfect alluding to hot topic. So what is your hot topic and why is it so near and dear to your heart?
00:21:50
Speaker
Yeah, so my hot topic is around motivation and really unleashing motivation and staying consistent because I believe that we all, almost all of us struggle with consistency.
00:22:01
Speaker
You know, it's like we're good for a while, but then we fall off, whether it's our bad habits, maybe it's our business, maybe it's a relationship. We go through a lot of ups and downs. And I think the more we can smooth that out, the more we can stay consistent, you know, consistently motivated, especially, ah you know, my clients, when they come to me,
00:22:18
Speaker
you know, there's the mindset piece, there's the there's the health piece. Sometimes they're looking to lose weight and stay consistent around that. And if that's the case, then we we need to be able to to give the body what it needs every day.
00:22:30
Speaker
um If we take too much time off, we get set back. um And so the same thing, you know, even with business, you know, if we're not generating leads consistently, marketing consistently, doing podcasts consistently, we we fall off, we lose traction. The algorithm doesn't like it.
00:22:45
Speaker
our k clientin didn Our clients think we disappeared on them. Our body thinks we don't care about it. you know So when we're not consistent, it it affects the outcomes we get. And so I'm really passionate about helping people keep their motivation high in whatever they're up to so that they can stay consistent and and see that outcome and not have to always look go through ups and downs.
00:23:07
Speaker
All right, let's get into that. Like, look um what is some takeaways that wedding professionals can ah do today to be more consistent?
Routines and Consistency for Entrepreneurial Success
00:23:17
Speaker
Yes. Great. So wedding professionals are, you know, most of them are entrepreneurs. So any any, any, any entrepreneur is going to want to have routines set up that support them.
00:23:26
Speaker
And to me, the big one, it starts with, you know, when we wake up, he's like, what are you doing in the morning when you're starting your day? And so for me, it's like, it's the three M's. So it's, it's, uh, it's mindfulness.
00:23:40
Speaker
It's, uh, you know, movement. And it's and they're doing that is actually music. So these three things for me put me in a great state, emotional state, physical state, mental state. Yeah. So if you start the morning meditating, focusing on your goals, thinking about like, OK, who do I really have to be today? Like, who um who do my people need me to be today?
00:24:01
Speaker
And it's like you said, maybe you're going to a networking event. Maybe you're meeting with a client to give them a proposal. Whatever you're doing. ah You know, for their upcoming wedding, etc. You want to show up as your best. And so if you're already like in a grounded state, a positive state, 70% of our thoughts are negative thoughts. So if we don't proactively manage that, and start our day positive, then those thoughts can can take over.
00:24:24
Speaker
You know, most people what they do is they just start scrolling their phone. And that's not a good morning strategy. You know, 85% of Americans do that. And one of the things I tell my clients is like, that's one thing you don't want to do at least 15 minutes. Yeah, give yourself, ah you know, drink water, you know, move the body to get your metabolism going. It could be something small, maybe you take a 10 minute walk, maybe do some squats and stretching, anything like that is is very helpful.
00:24:48
Speaker
And then I love music because it's an instant mood booster. It's an instant, you know, emotion kind of like shifter. So for me, a little bit of music, some movement, some mindfulness, and it sets me up well for the day. So I think that's how we want to start.
00:25:01
Speaker
And then throughout the day, we want to eat well. We want to hydrate well. We don't want to skip our meals. You know, our body needs a certain number of a certain amount of nutrition every day. And if we're running around all day and not eating and then we're like gorging at dinnertime, you know, too close to bedtime, those aren't that's not a good routine. Whereas a lot of busy people will fall into that routine with that because they're not thinking about it too much.
00:25:23
Speaker
Do you um use your phone for music or do you have like ah like a radio? like And what type of music do you listen to? It depends on my mood. It depends on what I'm doing. So if it's in the morning, I like something a little more chill or more zen just to kind of get me going slowly. Yeah.
00:25:40
Speaker
If I need a lot of motivation, let's say for workout, I listen to metal. um If it's something like I'm cooking and I just need something just to kind of, know you know, break the boredom, i'll just i like I like house music as well. Like I was saying, my my brother's a DJ, so we grew up like in the New York City nightclub, so I'll listen to some dance music.
00:25:58
Speaker
Yeah. No, I'm just trying to think about like, Like I've been feeling um kind of tired in the morning. um i get enough sleep, um but I'm am' like a crazy dreamer. So I am kind of like working in my my um my sleep.
00:26:13
Speaker
So then I wake up, I'm just like so exhausted. I know I'm going to get out of it soon, but then um I do like to scroll just to give me something to wake me up. And I know it's so bad, but just to like – Like I have want to see like like something like in the news or like something to interest me or even like a restaurant and it kind of like gets my mind thinking and then I wake up. But I know um i know i know it's so bad, but I know that's why I do it. like um
00:26:45
Speaker
So do you have any like tips and tricks of like how to just get out of it? just Should I just like – Wake up and then like put headphones on and just like listen to music or just because it's really hard when you're so tired and you're like, oh, yeah, I'm going to like get on my feet and start doing like, you know, movement. Yeah, I hear you. when you're When you're tired, you don't have the energy for it. Then, yeah, you don't want to just dive right in.
00:27:07
Speaker
But I think you what you can do is instead of just going to your phone. First thing I do is I don't keep my phone in my bedroom. That already starts. Oh, that's crazy. Yeah. Yeah, no, no, but no phone in the bedroom. Ideally, no electronics in the bedroom because even like watching TV in bed is not good. It starts to associate the bed with being alert.
00:27:25
Speaker
Whoa, that's crazy. Yeah, yeah. So if you really want to best practice around that, i would say no electronics in the bedroom. So I keep my phone out. And then when I get up, if you're feeling tired, like just go to your sink or whatever, just get water.
00:27:38
Speaker
You start your day with water. Okay. Yeah. That's good one. You start nourishing the body, the brain. That's where already start to perk you up a little bit. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. For sure. um You know, so that that can help a little bit of lemon in your water or anything like that to just yeah clean the body, get the metabolism going.
00:27:53
Speaker
And then from there, just, you know, like close your eyes and, and feel like, feel the tiredness, but don't let it take over. And I teach my clients this, there's a difference between like feeling tired and being tired.
00:28:07
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. Do you get that distinction? Yeah, yeah, yeah. yeah you the ti We know it's temporary. We own that feeling. But when we're being tired, now i'm just like a tired person. I'm like, blah. So so so just just know like you can always reframe it and be like, I might feel tired, but I'm still going to have a good day.
00:28:24
Speaker
Yeah. I'm tired. I'm probably going to a terrible day. You know what i mean? Yeah. I always think of that analogy like like Christmas morning or like um a kid's birthday. You like pop out of bed because you're like excited for it.
00:28:36
Speaker
um So it's kind of like it is mind over mander at all times. um I wanted to ask you, well, Are we in? Yeah, it's March, right? Yeah.
00:28:48
Speaker
So we're still March. So it's not wedding season yet. um Wedding season starts, like I would say, May. um So people are feeling like rested. But once like weddings, like pick up, it's just like whirlwind. How do people like prevent burnout? Because I know that's going to be a big question today.
Preventing Burnout in the Wedding Season
00:29:07
Speaker
Yeah, that's a great one. That's a great one. And ah it's funny you say that. My cousin is also very involved in in in weddings and events. He has an like an AV, like a mobile AV company.
00:29:19
Speaker
So he will set up sound and lights and all that for events, including weddings. And he gets that same thing around the holidays. He's like nonstop weddings. So I think to not get burnt out, Chris, it's same thing. It's like I said, those those habits that I suggested apply to every day of your life.
00:29:35
Speaker
no matter how busy things get, you the more you start your day empowered, the more you can help avoid the burnout and handle the stress that's coming your way. So, you know, imagine if, you know, you're, you're like, i don't know if you're like running every day for a mile and now all of a sudden you got to run five miles. Well, you'll be more prepared to do the five miles if you have been doing that one consistently versus not doing or just doing like that mile once per week. And then you wait two weeks and you do it again, right? That inconsistency.
00:30:05
Speaker
If you're doing the the the daily habits consistency, you're eating right, you're nourishing your body, you're trying to get as much sleep as you can. I know during busy times that that gets harder. I would say do that. And also don't rely too much on substances like coffee.
00:30:20
Speaker
You know, people really overdo the coffee because they feel tired or they'll be stressed out and they'll have wine at night, you know alcohol at night to kind of de-stress. But that impacts your sleep.
00:30:31
Speaker
And now you wake up even more tired and that site becomes a vicious cycle. So I would say like keep the substances down yeah and give your body what it needs. Like I said, start your day well. And and then there's other things that's like, then we get into the mindset piece. It's like fear of failure, you know, people pleasing. All that stuff kicks in and makes us overwork.
00:30:52
Speaker
And that's when burnout starts because we're like extending ourselves more than we need to. We're afraid to say no or afraid to charge our worth. You know, that be that touches on all the mindset pieces that we have to transform as well.
00:31:04
Speaker
I know sometimes like I feel like when I my mind does go to like, oh, like lack of and I want to like work, work, work, work. work Oh, I have to do this and this and this and send all these emails.
00:31:14
Speaker
um Then I kind of like reframe it. I'm just like, maybe your mind telling you to not work at all. Yeah. And give yourself a little bit of break and then maybe like um write out a list of things that you want to do.
00:31:28
Speaker
I wanted to touch on purpose, um like going through anxiety for you, at mid 30s. I dealt with the same thing, the same age, which is interesting. Um, and then going through this like transformational work and then finding purpose.
00:31:44
Speaker
Um, do you have any advice for like wedding pros on like tapping into their purpose or why, um you know, why they're doing the things that they're doing. they're probably working a lot for free. They're probably, um, doing shoots for free, networking for free. And at one point they're just like, when's it all going to come back to me? Like how do they tap back into that purpose or even find their purpose?
00:32:08
Speaker
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00:32:21
Speaker
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00:32:31
Speaker
Get your weekends back and comment at me at Carissa Wu, the word info, and I'll send you a free sneak peek guide on how to make passive income. And if you're ready to start making money from home while being there for the moments that matter, I can't wait to connect.
00:32:49
Speaker
Yeah, that's ah that's a
Aligning Work with Personal Purpose
00:32:51
Speaker
great question. It's a huge one that affects a lot like every human being, you know, because as humans, we're here for a reason. We're here for a purpose. And if we're not aligned with that purpose, which is what I started feeling, you know, when I was in corporate America, like when you're not aligned with that purpose, you're going feel out of sorts.
00:33:06
Speaker
You're going to feel unfulfilled. You're going to feel unhappy. That's going to be your soul telling you do something differently. ah But that doesn't necessarily mean they need to like do something drastic. Right.
00:33:16
Speaker
What it just means is they just got to shift their perspective a little because ultimately, if we want to simplify it, every human being's purpose is to serve another human being. So if you're doing that, already you're going to find fulfillment in that.
00:33:28
Speaker
And then from there, you just got to figure out, okay, well, how do I make money doing it? How do I, you know, how do I find the right person that I want to serve? um And so I think, you know, that it's it's partly a purpose question and it's partly an entrepreneurial journey question.
00:33:43
Speaker
So it's like, you know, who are you going to serve? How much are you going to charge? what are you going to you know, deliver for them? You know, you want to make sure all all that is aligned. And that takes a little time. Like people have to be patient. entrepreneurship is not an overnight journey. Like we hear a lot of, you know, overnight success stories, but for most people, it's not that way.
00:33:59
Speaker
Yeah. And so um I think as long as, again, comes back to consistency, as long as you're doing the right things consistently, you your, your business is going to grow. Your business will grow.
00:34:10
Speaker
if it doesn't, then just look, then, then you may have to do the internal work, you know, that, that I did just understand, okay, what's blocking me. You know, what's getting in my way. So when I was passionate about starting my own business, I left corporate America.
00:34:22
Speaker
i I was literally coming up with business ideas almost every other week, but dropping them and not pursuing them. I would like come up with an idea. I'd bounce it off some people and they'd be like, oh, no, I don't think that's going to work.
00:34:34
Speaker
And that would discourage me and I would drop it. And I was like, that was like partly what was like imposter syndrome or fear of failure because I was listening too much to other people, not pursuing what I wanted. And so that I was mentally blocked and I had to understand like what was going on.
00:34:48
Speaker
It was that people pleaser side of me trying to. Win approval, you know, and and approval is not necessarily needed. You have to do what's right for you and your business. I mean, of course, you've got to get clients to buy, but not necessarily listen to outside voices too much. And if, you know, some people are saying no, it doesn't mean everyone's going to say no, because you will align with your tribe if you keep on looking.
00:35:10
Speaker
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Like sometimes when even like family members say something negative, like people get in their heads and it's kind of like you just have to focus on what you want. um You work with like so many big corporations. um I haven't been in in corporate world for 15 years, but like what are some of the things that you teach them or like what are some of their mindset blocks as like a company at whole?
00:35:35
Speaker
Yeah, it's it's funny you say that. I haven't done a ton of of work on more of a corporate level. I want to. I've been doing more public speaking lately. I did a keynote at a law firm last year. So I'm looking to develop that side more.
00:35:47
Speaker
ah But, you know, I would say if you talk about a team or a group of people inside a corporation, that's you have to understand that's a collective of individuals. And most of the time they're not treated as that, as that they're treated as just like one homogenous group.
00:36:01
Speaker
And they think like, it's going to be one size fits all. And okay, everybody, we're going to do this. And you have to just go along with it and just fall in line, you know, and that's not real leadership. Real leadership is understanding everyone's contribution, you know, being inclusive, understanding everybody, yeah what's their voice, what is their concern? And just like bringing everybody along as individuals and not just treating them as One homogenous group of people.
00:36:28
Speaker
So, yeah, so that that would be my advice to any like manager or leader who wants to really elevate their team is to tree treat people at an individual level, understand, you know, what are their motivations, what are their aspirations and what are their limitations?
00:36:43
Speaker
And if you could do that on an individual level and bring everybody along, then it'll it'll work better than just giving people just blanket direction. Okay. So we talked about mindset. We talked about energy.
00:36:56
Speaker
We talked about purpose and habits. um Tell me like your, um how do you get your best heck yes from your dream client? I love that question because it really is about getting a heck yes. You don't want them to be any less than that.
00:37:12
Speaker
um There was a book, I think it was called ah Hell Yes. And it basically says you either want to get a hell yes or you want to get a hell no. You don't want to be in between. So how do you get your back the best heck yes from your dream client? I think it starts by you ah giving value to them.
00:37:27
Speaker
You don't want to take before you give. So you first want to give. And part of what to give is, okay, you give them information. You can give them some content. You can give them some clarity.
00:37:38
Speaker
You could answer some questions for them. But more importantly, you want to create a safe space for them. You want to basically give them an opportunity to express themselves and really listen to them from what's known as like a blank slate with no judgments, with no attachments to an outcome.
00:37:57
Speaker
If you're attached to making a sale, you're not going to show up generously. You're going to show up from ego. And that that's perceived.
00:38:08
Speaker
And so getting a heck yes to me is like earn in their trust and their credibility, but then ah create that safe space and listen, because most people don't listen very well.
00:38:18
Speaker
you know most but Most people just want to be heard and they want to be seen. And if you could provide that space for people, you build trust, you build connection, and it paves the way for a beautiful heck yes.
00:38:30
Speaker
Yeah, I had a sales call Sunday. it was like right after church in my car and i haven't had like a sales call for for a while. so I was like kind of anxious about it.
00:38:40
Speaker
So I just had to tell myself, just listen, listen. ah so Add value. at value. um Don't even care about the pitch at all.
00:38:53
Speaker
Yeah. um Just try to connect, try to connect, try to connect. And it kind of like alleviated in my um anxiety because I was just like, you don't really have to be anyone but yourself.
00:39:05
Speaker
You just have to kind of, i always let them like kind of talk first and then I just listen and respond. yeah. I think a lot of people don't have that, haven't developed that skill yet. and Yeah, for sure. Yeah. um I kind of love it because I just, I let people talk and they're just like, then they love me.
00:39:31
Speaker
ah sure. Yeah. A lot of people don't give them that space. Yeah. They're just like thinking of what they have to say and that's okay. Yeah. Yeah, but if you do have the um ability to just listen and respond accordingly, it's just it's such a superpower.
00:39:49
Speaker
It really is. And it's really helpful. it's a much neater for any entrepreneur because we have to sell. I mean, that's the business we're in ultimately. So when you listen without an attachment, like I got to get the sale or I got to get the highest price I can, you know, like we've, we all have that. We all want that.
00:40:04
Speaker
Yeah. But, but that's not how it works. We have to just provide that space, like of attachment. They may become a client. They may not. We got to know that we got to trust that we're going to be good either way. And the right, we will find the right people like at the right time.
00:40:17
Speaker
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Tell me like maybe one success story of a particular or any particular client that you have that you um you felt like you got them from point A to point B and you're just so proud of it.
00:40:32
Speaker
Yes, yes. My favorite transformation story. One of them would be with my client Faith. So she is a um she's a senior HR professional at a Fortune 500 company.
Faith's Transformation Story
00:40:44
Speaker
And when when we started working together, she was very inconsistent. And her so her... her pattern would go from working really hard, overworking, burning out, to then having to take a huge step back from everything, and then starting the process all over again.
00:41:01
Speaker
And her her life looked like a roller coaster, and her weight was also like yo-yoing, like roller coaster. So what she would do, she had this this need to always show up as perfect.
00:41:14
Speaker
And I'll tell you why. when When she was growing up, when Faith was growing up, her parents would move around a lot. And remember how I said we always have this sort of like need for belonging acceptance? Well, she never got comfortable with any one group of friends at school because she was always changing schools.
00:41:29
Speaker
So she never felt like she belonged at school. And then at home, our parents were fighting a lot. They eventually got divorced, but due to their fighting, they would neglect faith, you know, as as a child. And so she didn't feel like she didn't belong at home either.
00:41:42
Speaker
and she wondered, like, is this my fault? Are they fighting because of me? One night she wrote them a note and she said, ah do you love me? Yes or no. Check the box. And she took the note and slipped it under her parents door when they were fighting.
00:41:54
Speaker
It got to that point because you really felt like maybe nobody loves me here. And then when we have sort of like that traumatic feeling of like, I don't belong, I may not survive. We try to overcompensate for it. We come up with what I call survival strategy.
00:42:08
Speaker
which I talk about in my book. And in the survival strategy, that's where the perfectionism comes in. The people pleasing comes in. The victim mentality comes in. So with her, she was going to become an overachiever. She was going to get good grades.
00:42:19
Speaker
She was going to do whatever her parents wanted. And this need to gain acceptance and belong, translated as an adult as well, which is common. Whatever happens in children stays with us as adults. And now at work, she was overextending herself, trying to overprove herself to her boss, you know, doing stuff, but not asking for more budget or not asking for help and just working herself to death.
00:42:40
Speaker
ah Bad habits would kick in wine, junk food, comfort food, just to get through the stress. yeah And then she was like, oh my God, my health is spinning out of control. wow I got to take a step back.
00:42:51
Speaker
And then, so then she would like, you know, not do those things, but then her performance would suffer. And it was just this constantly. So I knew I had to get on a more consistent pattern by making these extreme swings a lot less extreme.
00:43:04
Speaker
And by by uncovering these things, by teaching her how her mind works, how she was wired, how her childhood had affected her as an adult, She was able to smooth things out and now she has a more consistent routine. She doesn't feel this urge to have to overextend herself, overprove herself.
00:43:17
Speaker
she she She has an affirmation that's like, i I do belong. I don't need to prove myself. Because subconsciously, she never felt that. She never felt that. she was She was always trying to earn that through her accomplishments and it really burnt her out as an adult.
00:43:30
Speaker
And um everything stabilized. Everything became a good routine for her versus these crazy swings. And she's much, much, much happier now, ah has good habits, has good backup strategies when she does get busy. For example, when she's traveling, I tell her, Gabby, don't sit at the gate, walk the terminal, walk the terminal, get your steps in.
00:43:49
Speaker
Right. So just fitting it in whenever she can, because she's so busy, but she's got the tools now that she stays steady. And so that, that was really, that was really helpful because she's like in her sixties and had, had we not caught this pattern earlier, would have kept going until I got too late to even recover. You know, her metabolism probably would have gotten slower.
00:44:07
Speaker
Her health issues would have gotten worse. yeah And now, now we were able to turn it around and it was a great victory. Oh, I love that story. I think sometimes like when you go through like decades of being um like the same way, um it's really, really, really, really hard to get out of it because you don't know what you're doing wrong.
00:44:26
Speaker
And that one story that she had in her mind she didn't know she was, she had that story in her mind and how it was affecting her. So it took like an outside um person, you, to to see that in her and then for her to realize that. So it's like, it's almost like a record. Like you have to like take it off for it to stop spinning. So that's a great story.
00:44:49
Speaker
Totally. Yeah. Einstein said, you can't solve a problem with the same mind that created it Oh, I love that. Yeah, this has been ah been a really easy conversation. felt like I could talk to you for another hour because you are a good listener.
00:45:03
Speaker
um But we are at our 40 minute mark and tell everyone um just the last advice of wedding pros, like feeling unmotivated, just a little kick in the butt. um You did so great so far. And then where to find you and work with you.
00:45:18
Speaker
Awesome. Awesome. Yeah, i would say my advice to most people is to start small, do something that you can do easily. Maybe it's like what we talked about, just give yourself those 10 to 15 minutes in the morning to set up yourself better for your day before you dive in, before you check email and whatever. So I would say start small, whether it's you know just getting more water in,
00:45:40
Speaker
Purposely getting more steps in if you sit down a lot during the day, maybe just ditching one junky thing you have or, you know, having one less glass of wine or just like one small adjustment to not because if we over promise the mind sphere of failure will resist.
00:45:57
Speaker
It'll be like, um my God, you know we're not going to go from being sedentary to running a marathon. We have to start with that 10 minute walk first and then that one mile run, et cetera. So start small, ah but but stay present to it and and try and do your best to be consistent. Even if you do a little bit, something is 100 percent better than nothing.
00:46:15
Speaker
And so i have that mentality and it's going to keep you better, feeling better, thinking better, operating and performing better. So I would say do something and then build up, build, build on that habit as you go.
00:46:26
Speaker
And don't ever let it become an update. I'm going to slash a lot of my face in the morning because of you. And I'll think it'd be crap. That's great. That's great. It's a great start. Great. And then where can everyone find you?
00:46:38
Speaker
Yeah, so for me, people can find my book on Amazon. They could search for the nine shifts, so like the number nine shifts. um And they can also go to, i have a Facebook group, which is called the The Empowered Body. So it's basically a mind-body transformation group where we talk about these good habits so that you can be your best as an entrepreneur or as a high achiever.
00:47:00
Speaker
So that's on Facebook. You can just search for The Empowered Body. That's I-N-P-O-W-E-R-D, body. Or you could just search for me, D-Kron, and add me on LinkedIn or on Facebook. And my name is unique. like There's not many out there. So it's D-E-E-K-R-O-N. Yes. And you should be able to find me.
00:47:16
Speaker
Yay. Thank you, D-Kron. This is a great conversation. Thank you, Carissa. This was fun.
00:47:26
Speaker
Thanks for joining me this week on Get a Heck Yes with Carissa Wu. Make sure to follow, subscribe, leave a review, or tell a friend about the show. Take a screenshot and post to IG. Tag me. Also, don't forget to download my free guide on how to become a lead generating machine.
00:47:42
Speaker
See you next time, wedding pros.