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Henna Inam: Wired for Authenticity
62 Plays9 years ago
Henna Inam is a sought after speaker, successful author, and CEO of Transformational Leadership Inc. Her unique workshops, tools, and online community help managers create innovative, engaged teams that drive measurable results.
Henna and her global partner team work with Fortune 500 companies to deliver executive coaching, leadership development, and team workshops. Clients include Coca-Cola, Google, Johnson & Johnson, Novartis, CNN, and Bank of America. Prior to starting her company, Henna worked for 20 years at Procter & Gamble and Novartis. She has lived or worked across North America, Europe, Asia, and Africa.
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Transcript
Introduction and Guest Welcome
00:00:17
Speaker
Welcome to this week's episode of the Art of Authenticity. I'm your host Laura Ko and welcome to the show. Today we have Henna Anam joining us. She is a sought after speaker, successful author, and CEO of Transformational Leadership. Her workshops, tools, and online community help managers create, innovate, and engage teams that drive measurable results.
Henna's Career Highlights
00:00:44
Speaker
Henna started off with a career for 20 years at Procter & Gamble and Novartis. She has lived and worked across North America, Europe, Asia, and Africa. She has a global partnership with Fortune 500 companies to deliver and execute coaching leadership and development and team workshops now. And her clients include Coca-Cola, Google, Johnson & Johnson, et cetera.
00:01:08
Speaker
I was so excited to have her on the show because she is the author of a book called Wired for Authenticity. And of course, this podcast is called The Art of Authenticity. So it was a natural fit. The two of us dove into authenticity, living an authentic life, the myths of authenticity,
Exploring Authenticity in Henna's Book
00:01:28
Speaker
what works, what doesn't work. She shares her seven steps to practicing authenticity in your life to rewire your brain and return to an authentic life that is meaningful to you. I know you're going to enjoy today's show and as somebody I've just recently got to know and we've actually become friends, she's a great person and has a ton of information to share with you. Thank you again for tuning in and enjoy the show.
00:01:57
Speaker
Welcome to this week's episode of The Art of Authenticity. Today we have Henna Einen. You know, I don't know if I ever, we talked before. I'm not sure if I ever knew how to exactly pronounce your last name. Can you say it for me once? Yes. Enam. Enam. I'm so sorry about that. I butchered it completely. We met, what was it, a month or two
LinkedIn Connection and Shared Interests
00:02:16
Speaker
ago.
00:02:16
Speaker
through LinkedIn and we ended up chatting and having an incredible discussion. Henna is the author of Wired for Authenticity and clearly because this is a podcast about authenticity, we just had so much to chat about. She's also a wonderful person, so welcome to the show. I'm so glad to have you on. Thank you, Laura. I am really looking forward to having a chat with you on this topic, on a topic that I know we both feel really passionately about.
00:02:43
Speaker
Absolutely. It's such a pleasure to chat with somebody who's spent so much time thinking about authenticity, authentic leadership, what that really means.
Henna's Global Journey
00:02:51
Speaker
And I'm excited to dive into it. But before we do, before getting into writing authenticity, authentic leadership, you had a pretty impactful
00:03:02
Speaker
career working with Fortune 500 companies. Can you take us back a little bit to the beginning of your career in business? Give us a little background on your story and how you got here.
00:03:14
Speaker
Sure, sure, absolutely. So Laura, I'm originally from Pakistan. I was born there. And I'll take you all the way back to the real beginning here, but promise to keep her short. And lived in four countries before I landed in the US. I was 19 when I got here. But because of my dad's job, we lived all over the world in Africa, in the Philippines, in Thailand, and then we landed in Texas.
00:03:38
Speaker
Oh my goodness. So Thailand to Texas, my God, I can't even imagine. That's exactly how it was. It was a big culture shock from Thailand to Texas. And then, you know, so I completed my undergrad in grad school here. And then from a corporate career perspective, went to work for Procter & Gamble, was with them for about seven years, mostly working in the US and Cincinnati. But part of the time working out of Hong Kong.
00:04:03
Speaker
then spent time working for Novartis. With Novartis, I was mostly, again, in New Jersey, but then spent a couple years running the business down in Mexico and a year in Switzerland working out the office there. So a lot of
00:04:18
Speaker
Interesting adventures, let's just say that. Absolutely, absolutely. And I think we share in this story in this way that you got to what most people would say, you know, a pretty high level in your career. And you started thinking about what does all this mean? And what am I doing? And so how did you transition from Procter & Gamble Novartis to writing a book and moving into coaching? What was the process for you?
00:04:44
Speaker
Well, it was, you know, I remember now, you know, one of the things that really fascinated me and kind of led me to want to talk to you, Laura, is when you were talking about your plane story, you know, like 30,000 miles up in the air, having this moment of, hmm, I wonder if, you know, I wonder if I'm really being who I'm meant to be in this world.
00:05:05
Speaker
Yeah.
Personal Reflections on Career and Fulfillment
00:05:06
Speaker
And for those of you out there that haven't read the story, she's leaving out the embarrassing component. I was 30,000 feet in the air with my brother coming home from a business trip. And I was literally reduced to tears wondering like, what am I doing? You know, something wasn't right. And I couldn't put my finger on it. And it was it was driving me crazy. Yeah. That's exactly it. Right. And so I read that story on your website. And for the listeners, please go read the story about Laura co on her website.
00:05:35
Speaker
because I was like, Oh my god, I have a 30,000 feet story too. Laura, you and I must talk and share these stories. And that's how you and I connected. So so I had my 30,000 feet story is that I was coming back from Basel, Switzerland, where I had
00:05:52
Speaker
Just been awarded one of the, our company Novartis at that point gave out awards every year to recognize 10 people out of a company of 90,000 employees for a business building award. So I just come back. It was kind of on my way back from Basel, Switzerland back to Mexico city, which is where I was living. And I had been awarded along with my team, this business building award. And I was thinking.
00:06:18
Speaker
I should really be happy because at this point, this had been a really tough two-year turnaround. It had been a lot of fun. It was the highest point in my career, both from a hierarchy perspective, but also from an achievement perspective. At this point, it was about 15 or so years into my career. I had been leading a business and was a GM down there. I thought, I should really be happy. I'm sitting here on a flight and I'm happy, but I'm mad.
00:06:47
Speaker
happy, happy. This is really underwhelming for me. And so I happened to go back home, couldn't sleep, and was watching a documentary. And it was a documentary about child prostitution. And it turned out to be a documentary about this woman who had been trafficked from Nepal into Bombay and how she had learned how to escape, figure out how to escape her pimps, and had literally created this halfway house. And it was just, she was so incredibly inspiring. I'm sitting here
00:07:16
Speaker
I can't sleep it. I'm jet lagged. It's midnight or one o'clock in the morning. And I'm thinking, you know, this woman who's in her late twenties at this point, she, I want to be like her when I grow up, because she had figured out, she's just had this incredible, incredible, powerful presence. And she had figured out, you know, what brought purpose to her life. And up to that point, I had been
00:07:43
Speaker
obviously very successful and obviously high achieving. But like you, Laura, I felt like something was missing and I couldn't put my finger on it. And watching this woman made me realize that at that point what was missing, although I didn't know the answer to what it would be, was this sense of fulfillment, this sense of I'm really working on something that fulfills me, that fills me up. That I'm doing just for the sake of doing it because it's so powerful to me
00:08:12
Speaker
It's so inspirational to me. And at that point, I didn't know what that was or what it was going to be, but I sort of had an inkling that I needed to find it. Isn't it interesting that you can have that much success? And the theory is success, however you get there, brings happiness. Oh, that's right. That's the big lie. That's the big lie. When you get there, and you and I, I think, are both examples, success
00:08:40
Speaker
bring success. And I mean, we both had success. And with that comes a lot of trinkets and a lot of accolades and a lot of interesting work and like really great experience and incredible skill building, but that deeper fulfillment that we call happiness, right? Like we say we're looking for happiness, but happiness is like a dog wagging their tail or like, you know, your child's laughter, that's like a moment of pleasure. But
00:09:06
Speaker
We have that deeper fulfillment, that connection to oneself of feeling like, hey, what I'm doing means something, right? It's funny how a few of us know that that's where the ultimate real satisfaction comes from, where that's the real success, right? That is, that is. And you know where that connects for me with authenticity and the reason why I'm personally really passionate about it, I think both of us, right, that 30,000 feet question of
00:09:36
Speaker
what's missing, something's missing, and that search for that, that's where authenticity, I think, that's kind of the start of the journey to authenticity, because I think we all buy into this notion that, you know, for whatever society teaches us of what success is going to be, and we go about pursuing it thinking that that's what's going to help us be fulfilled. But this journey to authenticity actually requires some sense of digging deep inside of ourselves.
00:10:04
Speaker
to know what's going to be fulfilling uniquely to me that I deeply care about.
Authenticity Challenges and Truths
00:10:10
Speaker
And it's not necessarily what
00:10:13
Speaker
society cares about or what society told me I should care about or any of that stuff. Or even what you cared about a decade ago. Absolutely. Yeah. Let me ask you a question that I'm deeply curious about. So many books out there in this space are not using the word authentic. They're saying happiness or fulfillment or purpose. I know why I chose authenticity. Why did you choose specifically the word authentic? Something about the word really resonates for me.
00:10:42
Speaker
And it's like what I like about authenticity is that it's about truth. It's about the truth of me in this moment. And I'm a huge believer in digging for that.
00:10:56
Speaker
It's not always happiness. To me, authenticity and happiness are very different. Sometimes authenticity can be really hard. It's like, wow, this feels really hard and I'm really uncomfortable, but I feel a sense of aliveness that is not happiness. It's not the same thing as dog wagging tail, but it makes me feel good and grounded. Even though this is hard, it feels right.
00:11:23
Speaker
And that to me is authenticity. Yeah. Yeah. It's so funny. I left my job and I kept saying, I just want something authentic, authentic, authentic. And I don't know why that word particularly like really resonated with me. And it was until later that I realized, you know, it's what you said. It's that truth within yourself that you're genuinely stepping forward with your full self-expression, which like you said, sometimes it's good, sometimes it's bad, but whatever it is,
00:11:48
Speaker
it's yours. And that's, that's such a complex thing to navigate throughout life. It really is. I'll tell you, writing this book, I mean, I think there are so many myths out there, Laura, about what authenticity is, for example. Well, I think one of the myths is, you know, being authentic, I just need to just show up and be who I am. Right. And if that means that's totally inappropriate to the situation, then I'm just going to be authentic. And
00:12:18
Speaker
Yeah, so what if I lose my job, but I was authentic. And it's sort of like, hmm, I don't know if that's authenticity. I think that's sort of rigidity. Mm hmm. I think authenticity is my notion of authenticity, at least is that it's a much wiser and deeper place in the book. Wired for authenticity, I talk about, you know, our authentic selves being a place where we are centered and we're calm and we're creative. And we've all been
00:12:45
Speaker
in those places where we feel really grounded, that's kind of a state of awareness that we have. And when we make decisions from that place, there is an enormous sense of adaptability and flexibility in that place. Because you're making decisions from a very grounded and centered place. And you're looking at, you know, who is the best part of me that will best serve the situation?
00:13:09
Speaker
Rather than acting from a real rigid place like, this is who I am, take it or leave it. No, that's such a beautiful... I love that because I really agree. It's like this deeper, calm, creative centered place where then you can make the choice to say the situation does call for a certain level of...
00:13:33
Speaker
behavioral system that you're at a fancy restaurant or you just don't feel like being there, but you're at least aware of all that and making those choices and you're mastering the situation instead of becoming a victim to it.
00:13:48
Speaker
That's exactly right. That's exactly right. It's coming from this deep place of knowing and part of it is it's, you know, it's very connected to being emotionally intelligent. It's being really connected to finding that balance between full expression of who you are and choosing.
00:14:04
Speaker
who you wanna be in that particular situation in service of something that's bigger than you that's right because just be who i am is to me slightly childish but if say i'm somewhere and i don't wanna be there but authentically i'm aware of that and i you know i'm i.
00:14:20
Speaker
note that to myself, well, then I just have to decide what I want to do with that information. Do I want to do it anyways? Because in fact, this serves a bigger picture purpose for my life or something that's important to me for somebody that's meaningful in my life and I choose to continue or do I need to make the decision to leave the situation and do otherwise? But it gives you the information not to just act out in a moment, but to navigate a life with a lot of complexities because the external world is complicated, right?
00:14:49
Speaker
just this simple childish answer of just be myself and forget about it. Don't worry about it. Right. Exactly. Yeah, exactly. And the big thing being conscious choice, right, because so much of our behaviors, particularly as leaders,
00:15:05
Speaker
are habitual, right? I mean, we expect leaders to walk in and yet, you know, if you think about what derails most people, emotional intelligence is such
Tools for Measuring Authenticity
00:15:14
Speaker
a buzzword, but it is so critically important. What derails people often is emotional intelligence. It's not knowing what are some of the situations that can trigger you. It's not being conscious of where environment to say what
00:15:26
Speaker
will be appropriate in this particular situation. And can I flex to that or not? It's about reading other people. And it's very hard to actually read other people until you're fully aware and can read what's going on with you.
00:15:42
Speaker
That leads me to ask, you wrote this really cool assessment that I actually jumped on and took myself. It was very, very cool. If you're looking for it, it's at the transformleaders.tv assessments, and we'll have everything on the show notes. But you have tools for people to help them assess where they are in that process. Because if you're trying to be an authentic leader, you're trying to lead from a deeper space.
00:16:07
Speaker
You have to first have the awareness of what's working, what's not working. Is that right? Yeah. Yeah. So in the book, Laura, I talk about the seven practices of authenticity and what the assessment helps you do is it helps you identify how am I doing on these seven practices of authenticity? Because I truly believe that authenticity is something that is a moment by moment practice. It's something that, you know, if this is a, if you are really committing to a life of authenticity,
00:16:36
Speaker
that it's a moment by moment choice that you make to say, am I going to be aware of what's happening now? And what is the appropriate choice for me to make now? And how do I overcome my fears now? And so the assessment helps you identify these seven areas of authenticity practice. Which ones are real strengths for you that you do fairly well?
00:16:57
Speaker
And which ones do you just need to practice some more? So let's talk about a couple of them. If you take this quiz, not only do you find out which area, you have one called stay curious, for example. So if somebody is taking this assessment, they come back and they're not doing as well in this area. Can you talk a little bit about why that is so important?
00:17:20
Speaker
Yeah, so staying curious is really about being in the moment and noticing what's happening in the moment. Because authenticity, I believe authenticity is a moment by moment practice. It's noticing, for example, you know, who am I being in this moment right now, as I'm, for instance, confronted with this particularly difficult situation
00:17:44
Speaker
where I have to give somebody feedback in the workplace. And you know, God, I feel it feels really uncomfortable for me to be able to give this negative feedback to somebody. And so staying curious is being curious about what's happening with you. So that you can, you know, most of us
Curiosity and Bodily Intelligence
00:18:02
Speaker
particularly in a situation, for example, where we have to give tough feedback, we kind of either just avoid the situation, or we try to go through it like a root canal, you know, it's like, okay, the root canal pull the tooth out, you know, not pretend let things happen then. And you know, meanwhile, the other person is completely feeling numb. Right. And so part of this whole idea of staying curious is like, you know, being in the moment, and
00:18:28
Speaker
Noticing what's happening now. What's happening with me? What's happening with the other person? Who do I want to be in this situation that will best serve the situation? What strengths can I call upon in this situation?
00:18:40
Speaker
So that those are sort of the types of questions that I want all of us to be asking ourselves. I love your seven steps, because first of all, I 100% agree with them. But you put in a couple things that are so, so critical. People, again, are like, just be authentic. So I have a difficult employee, I've been there, it is terrible, you don't want to talk to them, you're stressed, you're anxious, and that anxiety and stress of confronting somebody leads you to behave maybe
00:19:05
Speaker
an abrupt or angry or off putting way. You talk about befriending your body, right? So that it's not just trying to get your brain straight, but it's recognizing all the ways in which your physical body is manifesting this stress. Why is that such a key part? Because I started there when I was doing this work was learning how to let my body be part of the equation. Yeah, I actually in doing the research for this book, this is probably I mean, it's, you know, these seven practices,
00:19:35
Speaker
I can't say that I have a favorite because it's like picking from one of your seven kids. I have to say that befriending your body is probably the most unused, the one that surprises people the most. And it's the place that I start because our brains are being used to being brainwashed, right? I mean, there's a reason we call it brainwashing. It's because ever since we were really young as kids, society, our parents, our schools, the media, our friends,
00:20:04
Speaker
we get stuff put into our brains all the time about what's important and what success and what's, you know, how one should behave in given situations or what one should go after. And that's all brainwashing and place where authenticity started for me, honestly, I'll tell you, and I've had these pivotal moments where I've made really different choices that I felt were more authentic, because I listened to my body. At one point in my career,
00:20:34
Speaker
So befriending your body is about listening to your body. It's about not just making decisions from your head, but noticing what's going on in your body in the time that the assignment that I was talking about Mexico. At that point, I had a choice of a couple of different assignments I could take the assignment in Mexico and frankly, a much bigger P&L assignment elsewhere in the company.
00:20:55
Speaker
Yet when I went down to Mexico and did my look and see visit to just sort of decide whether I was going to take the opportunity or not, I could not contain my excitement. I was, you know, I couldn't, it was almost like I couldn't sleep at night. I was just so excited. And, you know, if I made a list, like a rational list of what assignment I should have taken, it would have been the other one because on paper, it just looked
00:21:21
Speaker
so much better.
00:21:35
Speaker
to know your body and knowing what the signals are in your body, like where do you feel excitement and where do you feel a sense of yes, this is like a big yes, like this is the right opportunity for me or a big yes in terms of yes, Laura is a person I really want to get to know. You know, that's how I felt. Part of it is I felt it in my body. It's like, oh my god, I feel good. Yeah, my body feels good. Right. And so so sort of reminding yourself that
00:22:02
Speaker
I don't know
00:22:17
Speaker
all of that intelligence as if everything from the neck down is just the machinery that keeps our bodies moving. And what I found really interesting about your story too is you're looking at these two opportunities. One is a full yes and you're excited and you can't sleep. And on paper, it's not quite as good. But you're not, again, going back to what you said about just authenticity as being who I am,
00:22:40
Speaker
You're not just like, oh, I feel a full yes of moving to a beach, right? Because I feel like the way that this conversation gets distorted is, I can't sleep and I'm really excited because I just want to go be on a beach. And it's like, no, that's not what we're saying. It's just that when you're looking at two options where you have done the research and you've thought it through, the one where you're feeling that excitement and enthusiasm
00:23:02
Speaker
is the one to really pay attention to. It's not just all caution to wind, right? Exactly. There's a reason we got brains and a reason we got bodies and guts because we have to use all of it. And I think too much in the Western culture, we've placed a lot of emphasis on our brains.
00:23:23
Speaker
And I've forgotten about all the intelligence that resides in our bodies. And so one of the things that I do in my coaching work is I really help people get connected with what excites them. I help them get connected also with when fear shows up, right? Because there are so many times that
00:23:43
Speaker
We ignore emotions that happen in our bodies. And I know you've, Laura, written about emotional obesity, right? So whether it's sadness or fear or despair, all these are things we feel in our bodies. These are not things we know intellectually. These are things we feel.
Managing Discomfort and Values in Leadership
00:23:59
Speaker
And so getting connected back into our body. In the case of, you know, learning how, for example, the example I was giving where a lot of us feel discomfort, having uncomfortable conversations, it's
00:24:11
Speaker
to recognize that the reason why, and this used to happen to me a lot, and I'm starting to pay more attention to it. I can't say that I'm 100% good at it yet. Remember, you feel sort of these butterflies in your stomach when a situation gets really uncomfortable. And all you want to do for me, all I want to do is flee from it and just avoid it. I know I need to have this uncomfortable conversation with my mother, but I think I have my Facebook status to update, so I'll do that right now instead.
00:24:42
Speaker
And you, and I just keep, you know, so all of us, we, we have these situations that we feel this discomfort. So part of being an authentic leader is noticing, okay, I'm feeling this discomfort, becoming present to it, but not letting it derail you either. Right? So if there is an important difficult conversation that needs to be had as a leader inside of an organization or bad news, for instance, that needs to be delivered.
00:25:09
Speaker
Instead of avoiding and oftentimes we feel like running away to basically relieve ourselves of that discomfort, part of being a leader is to then notice, to step, to take a deep breath, to actually use your body, to take a deep breath, to get yourself centered and to decide. So slow down and decide what's important to me in this moment, giving into this sort of fear, discomfort,
00:25:36
Speaker
Or do I have values that are really important to me that I want to honor in this situation? I'll tell you, I had lots of sleepless nights and lots of fear before I decided to walk into my boss's office eventually and let them know that I was going to go be my own boss and start a company and quit my job.
00:26:00
Speaker
I had a knot in my stomach and I had to breathe through that because I knew that there wasn't a way to go back a week later and say, just kidding. It's a real important decision and where I think we can learn how to use the intelligence in our bodies to be much more emotionally intelligent and make the right and more authentic decisions for ourselves.
00:26:22
Speaker
One, I love what you just said because the part that you didn't elaborate on, but I want to pull out and make sure anybody who's listening heard because it's so important. And while those fears and judgments, oh my God, I should or I shouldn't do this, or just kicking in and you feel paralyzed by those moments, coming back to your values is what you said. And there's a reason that say, I have to have this difficult conversation. And it's because maybe in the workforce, this person isn't able to
00:26:51
Speaker
do the job at the level they need to or we are having a conflict over the way that we're communicating and the value is that I want to make this better or this is if I've got an employee who isn't able to manage themselves in a particular position.
00:27:06
Speaker
It doesn't serve anybody if they're failing at this job and everybody knows that they're unhappy and I'm unhappy, right? So coming back to what the higher value is and then having compassion for the situation, I think is such a critical and important thing. I call it
00:27:21
Speaker
Removing the junk food and adding in the nutrition but just to put it in the context of the stuff that we get with food but this idea that it's it's pushing through and you you say letting go of Those negative thoughts and those fears but your point about values I think is so strong because it's when you're coming from a place of Centeredness and values ultimately these conversations are a lot easier I love that you actually paused us there because I did skip over that and I think for anybody listening in I
00:27:51
Speaker
It's really hard to pursue a path of authenticity unless you've done the work and the digging to know what values are really important to you, to each of us, right? So one of the things that I do as part of my extracurricular activities is I organized TED Women here in Atlanta, TEDx Women, and recently had to ask somebody on this volunteer team to leave our team because of performance.
00:28:21
Speaker
And it was a real difficult conversation because it's not like we're paying her, right? She's a volunteer, right? Like, so, and, you know, shouldn't we be happy to have volunteers? But she wasn't able to keep her commitments and it was really driving the team nuts. And I remember just this had just happened last week. So the team, all of us were sitting in the boardroom and walking around eggshells, right? Trying to avoid the elephant in the room.
00:28:49
Speaker
And, you know, we were talking about, well, can she, can we put her in this position or can we put it? And it was like, this is exactly the wrong thing to do. It's not right for the team and it's not right for her. So I ended up having a conversation with her, but to your point, Laura, one of the things that I had to do is to actually get in touch before I had this conversation. Cause I was having the, you know, I was having the knot in my stomach. This is not a.
00:29:15
Speaker
pleasant conversation. How do you fire a volunteer? Right? This is not a pleasant conversation. I was having those sensations. And then I had to sort of take a deep breath and say, well, what's a value that is really important to me that I want to stay grounded in as I'm having this conversation? And that when I asked myself that question, it was really clear to me, one value is I deeply care about this person.
00:29:42
Speaker
I want her to know the truth of her impact on others and for her to do the work for herself on her own personal growth. So the value of my values that were important to me as I was having that conversation that
00:29:57
Speaker
really helped me getting in touch with those values prior to the conversation helped the con. Oh my god, it was a beautiful conversation Laura and we ended up both crying. Yeah, myself and this woman because it was heartfelt, right? Because I was in touch with my values. And she could see that I was doing this out of caring and love for her. She knew that I care deeply about, you know, growing people and and I also care deeply about truth and truth telling and that I wanted
00:30:26
Speaker
her to see the truth of what was happening. Yeah, I love that story. This was a hard one for me. I think the most amount of sleepless nights came out of difficult employee discussions or firing up all night, just gut wrenching, literally. But when I turned that corner and I could come from a place of compassion and love and care and
00:30:47
Speaker
It just changes the whole dynamic. So typically at this point in the interview, I ask people a set of questions. What does an authentic life mean to you? What do you do when you face fears? Clearly you've written this whole book. You have seven steps. You're living in this space all the time. So if you don't mind, I'd love to ask you to focus the conversation more on like, if somebody were just starting, what would you suggest?
00:31:09
Speaker
they could do to start living a little more aligned in an authentic way.
Starting Your Authenticity Journey
00:31:16
Speaker
I could ask you your master Yoda level, but what does it look like if somebody out there is just feeling like, wow, I'm really not sort of body mind spirit aligned. I'm not feeling that authentic in my day-to-day decisions. What would you recommend they do to get started? So the first thing I would say is great job because
00:31:39
Speaker
just by noticing, right, that you're not feeling aligned, that something feels off, you're already, you know, a huge step of the way. That's like the huge first step because most people, most of us live such distracted lives because we distract ourselves from the pain of not feeling aligned or we're busy or we're busy, you know, in our social media. It's like,
00:32:04
Speaker
we live these disconnected lives, even though we're like 100, you know, we're like 24 seven connected, we're disconnected from ourselves. So I'd say congratulations, what an awesome job that you've decided that you want to do something, you want something different.
00:32:19
Speaker
and more aliveness for yourself in your life. So I'd say that's awesome. I kind of just give them a big slap on the back because it excites me when people actually come to that place. Yes. It's a huge decision. The second place is a helpful step would be to take the assessment. I have my assessment. I'm sure you've got your assessment, Laura. Don't you have an assessment as well on emotional obesity? Yeah, you can get your emotional weight.
00:32:49
Speaker
Okay. So you've got the assessment on Laura's side. So there's assessments out there that are complimentary for you to go and figure out and the assessments will help you figure out where am I in these seven steps or seven practices of authenticity? What am I already good at? And with my assessment, what you get is a little tip sheet to say, okay, if you're good in this, then here's some steps that you can take or you can get the book.
00:33:18
Speaker
and do a step-by-step sort of read through the book. And it has a lot of exercises that help you figure out where there is lack of alignment and how do you get more of this practice into your life. But fundamentally, it's about really slowing down and noticing and then using some of these practices in your everyday life. Because as I see it and as I've discovered, there is no end. There's no destination to get to.
00:33:47
Speaker
I used to think I was so naive when I wrote this book. I was like, oh, and then you get to this place and it's nirvana and you're wonderfully authentic life. And then I realized that no, actually that is not true.
00:34:01
Speaker
You and me both. It's like this muscle and things are always changing and it's not like, okay, you know what? I ran 20 minutes on the treadmill today. I'm done for the year. I know. I say that all the time. I wish that was the case, right? I know. It's actually my metaphor all the time. It's like saying I'm going to do
00:34:20
Speaker
80 crunchies today and I'm going to have a six pack ab for the rest of my life. But unfortunately, and I think many people have been misguided on this, I was so misguided. I thought like, okay, I'm going to find it and then I will be there. You find it and then you realize how to do it so that you can keep doing it because life keeps happening. It's always in motion. And so we are trying to make
00:34:43
Speaker
those decisions sometimes on a second by second basis that are meaningful and authentic. There's the macro authentic and the micro and it just it's sort of a constant thing but when you get in the habit of it, it gets a lot easier.
00:34:56
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. No, I love what you said, the micro and the macro, because there is a bigger picture of, you know, is the work that you're doing in alignment with the values that are important to you that does it, does it really fulfill you? And that's the macro of it. And, you know, are there relationships, the important relationships in your life, the people that are closest to you, do they value fundamentally the person that you are and do they see you and appreciate you for the person you are or the person they want you to be?
00:35:25
Speaker
And so all those are sort of to me the macro stuff. And I don't know, there's probably more Laura in that camp that you've got from your book. Yeah, I mean, I just like you said, I think these sort of macro level, how do I want to show up in the world in my relationships in my life? You know, what are the things that matter to me? Is it where I live? Is it the way I live? Is it the people around me? You know, figuring all that out. And then there's these micro decisions of
00:35:52
Speaker
You know, do I authentically want to go out for that dinner or not? Exactly. Exactly. Those are moment by moment, right? Decisions. But those stack. If you're not careful. They do stack. And you start saying yes to a bunch of things that are just really, you know, small nose resentments can start kicking in in a huge way. And when I work with couples, that's one of the things that happens all the time. Sure. Yeah, one one concedes all the time and then has like a passive aggressive
00:36:19
Speaker
fit and you know the other one doesn't get where that's coming from or you know I think the micro really matters because those add up and become a macro problem if you're not careful. So I think the biggest thing I kind of want to come back to just what you said about the micros really stack up and you have to pay attention. I would say that that is probably the most important thing on a path to authenticity is just paying attention.
Building a Meaningful Life
00:36:45
Speaker
We are so
00:36:47
Speaker
locked into habits and patterns. And, you know, we take the same drive to work, we, you know, are used to these routines, and they start to define us. And just being able to slow down and notice what you're doing, and notice the impact that it's having on you and the impact it's having on others, I think is a is like another huge step. It's becoming conscious so that you have more choice. Yeah, so that you can
00:37:17
Speaker
have greater flexibility than to make a different choice. Absolutely. And choice by choice, you find yourself building a life that's meaningful to you.
00:37:27
Speaker
Well, that sounds like a great end to a podcast, Laura. Hannah, thank you so much for coming on today's show. This is just so meaningful to me to chat with somebody. This like-minded focused on this work that I find so interesting, Living Authentic Life. If people are looking for more information about you, your book, where can they find you?
00:37:51
Speaker
They can go to my website. It's www.transformleaders.tv as in television and get all kinds of information. There's lots of great resources and tools. So the assessment is one of the tools. There's also a 52 week, one tool a week block series that you can sign up for under the resources tab. And there's lots of other resources if you want to work and live a much more authentic life to practice.
00:38:20
Speaker
You can certainly buy the book on Amazon. There's lots of reviews. I'm so grateful to you, Laura, for this wonderful conversation. And I know that we're going to keep this dialogue going. Absolutely. In fact, we already talked. We're going to schedule a next time to chat. Thank you so much for coming on today's show. Thank you.