Unleash Your Next: The Art and Science of Reinventability with Nataly Kogan

Welcome to The Flourishing Edge, the podcast where we share weekly tips on making flourishing your competitive edge. I'm Ashish Kothari, your host, and each week we'll dive deep with flourishing experts, changemakers, and executives to share best practices that can help you unlock higher performance through science-based interventions. Let's step together into the edge of what's possible and live, work, and lead with more joy, health, love, and meaning. Natalie, it is so wonderful to have you on our Flourishing Edge podcast, my dear friend.

I am so happy to be here, and I'm so happy that we get to spend some time in this conversation.

Well, you know, you are the queen of reinventability. Right? Your life is an epitome. And I think, as we were just talking before, you know, all the way from, you know, coming here as a refugee, your time at McKinsey, you know, in the field of venture capital, entrepreneur, somebody who created, you know, programs on happiness. And I think you're in your quintessential. I think you are now what all of these metamorphosis journeys have been around. If people do one of those in their life, that's amazing, and you've actually done it so many times over. And now as an artist, you know, I think you're just in your prime.

Well, I'm just gonna take that right into my heart. That's your gift to me for, for mirroring that back to me. Thank you. And it is very true.

So you are— you— there is no better person, you know, uh, there's so many people who are kind of thinking about how can they reinvent themselves in this world of AI, in the world, you know, that is fundamentally bringing into question a lot of core ways of being and foundations of who we are. And they don't have a way, they don't really have a structured approach. And I really love the approach you created, right? The left brain and the right brain and the beautiful creation of a process that is structured and also has all of the all of the openness. And I want to start by first having you actually define reinventability. So what is reinventability? And then we'll go into the process.

Yeah, it's, you know, let me start with the definition and then I'll share how it emerged. So reinventability is both your capacity and mindset and a toolset for you to expand into the next version of yourself and your impact and your potential and joy. And one of the core kernels of that is when we think about reinvention, we always think, and there's a lot in this, like you got to burn the old you, you got to leap into something new. And for me, reinvention is not about becoming someone new. It's about becoming more of who you are meant to be. Right? We all have these many dimensions and many gifts. And you generously talked about my journey. It's not that I just became an artist in my 40s. It's always been a dimension of myself. It's just not something that I had the courage to uncover. And so reinventability is this mindset and capacity and this toolset to do that, to envision new possibilities, to uncover new dimensions in yourself. And then to express them in ways that bring you greatest fulfillment and joy. And it's something I, you know, the work around it emerged from both my life and kind of looking back and sort of looking back at the process that I subconsciously was undertaking every time. But also, and I don't know if I've shared this, so this might be a surprise for you too, or something new. My father, who is a physicist, a physicist and mathematician, but for the past 30 years has been running an innovation company. And they have a methodology that was developed by them and the Russian scientists. It's a methodology that helps you invent because just like reinvention in invention, it's not like one day you wake up, you're like, oh, I have this brilliant idea. I know exactly what it is. It is a process. And To me, we all have this capacity to reinvent, reinventability, right? It's a capacity. You have it. Every single person listening has it. But what was missing for me was a tool set and a framework and the steps to do it. And so that's what it is and a little bit about where it came from.

I think it's beautiful because in this work, you both define the mindsets, right? And, you know, such parallels. Natalie, so my last 3 years at the firm before I left, I was actually researching adaptability and resilience.

Oh my goodness. You were discovering— I didn't know. Yeah.

We were looking at these anti-learning mindsets and learning mindsets. You got to reinvent, right? Those learning mindsets show up. And I saw so many of those play out so beautifully captured, right? And I have to say, in a much more fun, creative, accessible way than the structured academic, here's what they are. So no, it's, it's wonderful.

Well, I'm sure, I'm sure at McKinsey there were, you know, many more slides and definitions and pages.

That's exactly what it was. Yes.

A lot of, lot of research. I'm sure it was. I'd love to learn more about it. I'm sure you uncovered some really interesting insights as well.

So I loved it because I think you have, as you said, there is the mindsets, but you actually pair those mindsets with actions.

Yes.

Right?

Yes.

As much as we can actually think about, oh yeah, I got to do this. How do you actually adopt it and how do you make it? And it's also not linear, you know, it's iterative.

100%.

I think it's beautiful. I think it's beautiful. So let's go into each one of them. And I want to almost take a step-by-step approach of kind of where do you start, right? And the first step that you talk about in your framework is starting from your zone of greatness. Which really anchors you for reinvention. So it's again, not going there first and say, what do I want? What's the shiny object that I need to go become? It's actually going inward. So start with— I want to ask you this question. Why is starting with one zone of greatness? And by the way, what is the zone of greatness? So critical to this journey.

So I'll answer the second part first. You said it, right? Whenever we want to change, whether it's ourselves or it's our team or a company, right? We start looking, okay, we do competitive analysis. We do, what are the things I want to do? What's a job I want to have? How— we start to look outside. And what that immediately does is it literally disconnects us from ourselves. And then we can undertake those changes. They may not be aligned with who we are, with our strengths, with our gifts. And so that is why it is so essential to actually start with yourself. And so what is the zone of greatness? The zone of greatness is an intersection of 3 things: what you love to do, what comes easily to you, right, effortlessly, that state of flow, like something you could just do for hours and hours and hours and you don't even notice it, and where you want to have the greatest impact, right? So what you love, what you're great at, and where you have the— where you want to have an impact. If you can anchor in that then the changes you want to make, they're aligned with who you are. So that means you're going to be much more fulfilled in whatever that next thing is. And you're going to be naturally good at it. And I want to share just a quick personal example of this because I spent 20 years of my career doing the absolute opposite of this, the absolute opposite. And so my metric, my lens on the world was, What's the next hard thing that I can do? And we can talk about where that came from. It's a very immigrant Russian Jewish upbringing. That was the mindset. I did a lot of really challenging things that looked very impressive. I was a venture capitalist at 25. I started companies. I joined successful startups. I was pretty good at what I did, but it eventually all led me to a complete burnout at 40. Why? Because the things I was doing, they were not aligned with what I loved or what I was great at, right? What I— was I a pretty decent tech CEO? Sure, I'm pretty smart like you, like many of your listeners. I could figure it out. Is that my zone of greatness? No. Managing people, it's not something I love. It is not something I'm great at. It's actually not where I want to have an impact, right? And as a CEO, you're doing that. And when I— after I burnt out is the first time in my life that I got honest about And you know what? You and I were talking about courage before. It takes a lot of courage to ask yourself, well, what do I actually love to do? Not what am I supposed to? What do I love to do? And what am I like? What feels easeful to me? Right? And out of that came, well, I don't want to run a tech company. And that was, can I just say, like, it was really scary to say because I felt like, oh my God, I was a tech CEO. I was on the front page of the New York Times business section. Hail, just like, and I'm giving all that up and I'm a fail. But having the courage to say to myself, yes, I want to help people take action to become who they're meant to be, and I want to do it by writing and by speaking and by mentoring, not by running a tech company. It allowed me to create this work and life that has helped so many people. But also, you and I were talking before, I can have a bad day and I still feel amazing because I am so rooted in what I am meant to do. And so it's just, I want to be transparent that I did it the other way. And that's why I made the zone of greatness the first step in the framework, because we have to start within ourselves first.

You know, it so resonates on so many dimensions. I have the same experience, you know, in my, the Sunflower Framework, self-awareness is where it all anchors on. It's the heart of the practice. Because nothing outside comes without knowing who you are, what you're good at, right? But I had the same, I was like you, Natalie. And the unfortunate part is you and I are not alone. If it was only a story of Natalie and Ashish, it would be fine. Like you, I spent 20 years of my life doing work that was highly impactful, amazingly impactful, highly purposeful, had no meaning for me. It was completely disconnected. And that's why in 2016, right, I found myself— I say for me, I suffered fundamentally a crisis of meaning.

Yeah.

Yeah. You know, I was really good about boundaries and all of that. So, you know, it was none of that that was actually led to me feeling anxious every day. But my body somatically just was like, what are you doing? Like, you're spending all your time doing these transformation work and operations, and that's not what you should be doing. That's not your zone of greatness. And now Even though I literally, by any standard, work longer and harder than I've ever worked, even as a McKinsey associate, there is, there is so much lightness and joy and energy because you're operating in what you're born to do. You're operating in your zone of greatness, in your zone of greatness.

And I so love hearing this. And I just want to, you know, you said something so insightful and important. You said, "I was doing really impactful and meaningful work, but it wasn't meaningful for me." And this is a trap that I think a lot of people fall into, right? Where they look at their work and— yeah, I was running a company called Happier. We had hundreds of thousands of users of our gratitude app. Literally every week, Ashish, we were getting hundreds of emails from people of how we were positively impacting their lives. I had a father drive his daughter from Vermont, show up at our office here in Boston, and because he wanted to say thank you, because she was suicidal and she's been using our app and now she was doing great, right? So the work was incredibly impactful, but being a tech CEO was not meaningful for me. And I think that's such a powerful distinction that I just want to reiterate it. Just because you're doing something that is positively impacting other people does not mean it is positively impacting you. And there's no shame in saying this isn't aligned. Where do I want to do something that is positively impactful for me and other people?

Yeah, yeah, it's connecting to both, right? It's building up. If the bridge is not built on both sides, it's not going to be a structurally sound bridge, 100%, right? And you're going to burn out or something worse. Yeah, right.

Yeah.

So how do you go about finding your zone of greatness?

Yeah. So the first thing, and you know, when I do this with clients that I work with, it's often this revelation. But the first thing is just very simple. Just take out a piece of paper and draw 3 circles that connect in the middle and just write down things you love to do and things— write down things that come easily to you and write down where you— where it feels meaningful for you to have an impact. Just start with that. Um, there is, uh, I'm trying to think of his name. I'm blanking right now. Oh, you know the book The Big Leap? Gay Hendricks, that's what I'm thinking. So Gay, the— I mean, he is really well known. It's a really popular book, and I do highly recommend it. And, um, he was actually— I got a chance to interview him on my podcast. He runs workshops for executives where he talked about— he said They pay me $25,000, and what they do for an entire day is sit in a room, they hum, and then they meditate on what they love to do. Because it is not a question— especially high-achieving people ask themselves— I don't know about you, I never asked myself that question. What did that have to do with anything? What do I love to do? No. What is the hard thing? What is going to help my family? How do I— like, what do I accomplish? What do I love to do? It just felt like But so the first is just to have the courage to ask yourself these questions, write it down. And then I think it's also important, sometimes we are not good witnesses of our greatness. So I encourage people to go and have conversations with some colleagues and people in your life who really know you and talk to them and ask them to reflect back to you. It's gonna be one of the greatest conversations you've ever had if you can just be courageous to say, listen, I just love your insights. Like, what do you think I'm really great at? Or what do you feel like when I do it? I'm like in my flow. And you're going to hear some things that are going to be revelations to you because our self-judgment has a way to sort of forget certain things. So I would start there. And again, I hope for everyone listening, you take a moment to do this because it's going to open up so much in you and so much possibility. Than trying to find it out here.

Yeah. The other, you know, the other tool in this, in a structured— some people want structure to ask people. There's a beautiful exercise called the reflected best self.

Yeah.

That was created at the Center for Positive Organizational Scholarship at Michigan Ross. So with many of my clients, that's the other place I actually have them just go take. Like, so you actually get all of these stories, not only what you're good at, but these stories. And I mean, I've had people break out in tears hearing, just being able to see themselves reflected, right? And you're like, and yeah, some people get surprised. Oh, I didn't realize I was actually— they're like, yeah, that is your strength. Your ability to kind of connect, your ability to kind of be able to ask. They're like, well, I just thought I was being annoying. Like, no, like, that's what we appreciate the most about you. Not that you get everything done, but you're actually able to ask a question that might feel like a distraction but actually uncovers things that many of us were thinking but we don't.

100%. And speaking of, I just want to mention this because I've had a lot of people go have these conversations. Some people are hesitant to go ask someone this. It is the greatest gift you can give the person you're asking. Just think about how wonderful it would feel for you to reflect to someone you care about their greatness. So if you're hesitating a little bit asking someone this, it's a huge gift you're giving them.

Yeah, beautiful. So step 1, zone of greatness, you know, and anchoring for reinvention. The next step after that you talk about is, uh, the mindset and the capacity of possibility-driven thinking, right? So that's— so you've spent some time You've drawn your 3 circles. You looked at what you love, what you're good at, and what impact you want to have. Talk us through the insights on step 2.

So you've anchored, and now this is when you want to explore possibilities. So meaning the other way to say that step is, what are ways that I can do more of what is in my zone of greatness? And the key here, we're going to be talking about courage a lot because all of these do require inner courage because our brains have a negativity bias. And the first thing, as soon as you start to think about doing something else or making a change, your brain is going to come up with a really well-articulated list of reasons why you shouldn't do it, why it's not going to work, why it's absolutely the wrong thing. So, your brain is going to take out a map of obstacles. It literally is going to go, "Hey, here they all are." Okay? Because that is what your brain is programmed to do. It's just trying to keep you quote unquote safe from danger. And anything that is new means uncertainty, means possible danger. So as soon as you start to even consider new possibilities, just know that your brain is going to say, "Hey, here's a map of all the obstacles." And so, this is where you have to courageously and very intentionally shift your mental map. You have to say, thank you for the map of obstacles. I'm going to take out a map of possibilities. So I am going to look at what are all possible ways that align with my zone of greatness that I could do more of what's in it, right? And this does require a very intentional mental shift because the brain is going to be there chattering. This isn't going to work. How are you going to make this happen? What if this doesn't work out? And you just have to recognize what that is. It's your brain trying to protect you. It's a biological thing that it learned to do. And you have to have the courage to, as I say in my book, talk back to your brain and say, "Hey, I hear you. Thank you for trying to keep me safe. I am okay. And I'm going to look at what is possible." And one of my favorite questions to ask is, once you do your zone of greatness work, what are all the possibilities that you can imagine where you are so excited to learn more about it. So it's not, how do I make this thing work perfectly? And we're going to come back to this idea, but it's all the— people often ask me, like, how did you go from, you know, tech CEO to, like, doing what you're doing now? Like, what was the process? I didn't wake up one day and I was like, here's exactly how I'm gonna do it. Okay, step one. No, because you cannot plan your way into something you've never done before. But I became curious because I wrote a book and people started to ask me to speak. And I was like, oh, this is interesting. How could I do more of this? Right? Is this interesting to me? So approaching the possibilities from a mindset of exploration versus I gotta find the right perfect thing and I gotta do it in a week and it's gotta work out.

Yeah, you have to discover your way into it.

Yes.

Right? You have to kind of muddle your way through. You try something, you work, you learn, and all the way recognize, as you say, that your brain is going to keep telling you, I told you so. Look, it didn't work. That person said, why are you doing that? That's what I've been telling you all along, right? So you have to listen to the voices and you have to recognize that you can't shut them, right? That's the fastest way to give them energy.

100%.

But you have to say, I hear you, sit beside me.

Yeah.

And I will do what's needed as well. And let, let's go on this together. We'll be okay.

100%. And you know, in this step, right? Cuz at this step you're just envisioning possibilities. You're not even doing anything. I think one of the key things is to push yourself to envision bigger. You know, one of the thing, one of the challenging things, especially for you know, high achievers, people who have done a lot, when they begin to think of a new possibility, they're almost afraid to envision something that really speaks to them because they don't know how to do it and they've done really well before. My example of this is my art. I started to paint. I've always wanted to paint my entire life. I never did it ever. The only time I did it a little bit, I was studying abroad in Japan during college. And because nobody was watching, right, nobody who knew me was there, I took some painting classes, but I came back like it never happened because for me, painting just felt like this self-indulgence had nothing to do with building a career, taking care of my family, right? That was my story. And then after I totally burnt out, I shut down the company, I laid off my team, I was, you know, in this really rough place. I couldn't do the things I thought I should do. I literally could not work. So I gave myself a little permission to Okay, start painting. But even then, I did it so quietly. I did it like in a way that, I mean, my family knew, but a little bit. I didn't show my art to anyone. It took, I mean, I started to then put it on my walls. It took another 5 or 6 years. It was actually my publisher who said, let's put one of your art pieces on your book cover. And I was like, what? Because, and the reason I'm sharing this is it was scary to actually envision the possibility of embracing myself as an artist and all that that would require and the vulnerability, right? So in this step, you wanna be really courageous and really encourage yourself to envision everything that is calling to you without having to know how you're going to do it.

Yeah. And the stories and become aware of that in terms of the stories that you've carried your whole life till that moment, right? So there was a deep within a story around artists are not serious people. 100%.

Or you can never succeed as an artist. It's not possible. Right.

And it's— do a little swivel of your camera so people— we'll have it on the YouTube as well so people can see the beautiful, colorful pieces of art that you create.

In my studio. Yes.

Oh my God. Right.

It's really been amazing. Yeah. Thank you.

And just think about— and I think the other part of this, your reinvention and what you're doing now, Natalie, is it just— I'm like, you like you didn't start painting till 40s. What a loss for the world, right? Because as I was saying, like, this is— I mean, this is— so this is you, right? This is you at your prime. And, you know, this notion of we want people who have come alive more than anything else. And I think we rob each other and the world of our biggest gifts. And that's your invitation in this theme is give yourself permission to really expand your zone of possibility from your zone of growthness. Really explore your zone of possibility. Go wild. You don't have to step into that right away, but at least, you know, give yourself— there is no— in Six Hats thinking, throw all the other hats other than your zone, you know, other than your creativity hat.

And the thing here, the one like kernel that I want to stay in everyone's like mind is dare to tell yourself the truth about what really is calling to you. Just dare to tell yourself the truth. Because you're right, if you ask me, if I had the courage And if I did the inner work to acknowledge these stories around being an artist earlier on, I would have given the gift, not just of my art, but just of my being a fully alive, thriving person to the hundreds of thousands of people that I've connected with. Right? So just dare to tell yourself the truth because, you know, it was my daughter's bat mitzvah. She's 21, but it was her bat mitzvah in Israel when she was 13. And the speech, what I told her then is what I— when people ask me, what's your number one life advice? It's that. And I said to her, your one job in this lifetime is to uncover who you are and work really hard to be more of that.

This conversation is brought to you by Happiness Squad, where we help leaders build new mindsets, new habits, and transform their ways of working to truly flourish. If you're ready to unleash the untapped human potential in your organization and operate at your best, come visit us at happinesssquad.com and start your journey today.

And that's really what this is, what we're talking about. And it is scary and it feels uncertain. And the stories about what we're supposed to be doing and what is safe, they're so strong. But Every single one of us has agency, and we can make a choice to tell a different story, and we can make the choice to tell ourselves the truth about what is actually calling to us and do more of that.

Beautiful. So we have taken the first two steps. We have started from our zone of greatness and get it on, you know, what is our work, what can we do. We have leaped into and explored all of the range of possibilities. What's step three?

All right, step 3 is to challenge your limiting beliefs. Because the minute— you and I have already been talking about this, Ashish— the minute you envision a new possibility and it really calls to you, your brain is going to come up with its next thing. So first it tried to tell you about all the obstacles, but its next thing is going to be limiting beliefs. You're not good at this. This isn't possible. Someone like you can't do this. You are too old. You are too young. You don't have enough experience. We all have, as you're listening, just pick your version. We all have a version of this. And the key here is to recognize that we all have these beliefs that block us from becoming who we're meant to be and that they are not facts. They're just stories, as you've been using the word. They're just stories that our brain has created over our lifetime. Now, most of our beliefs are formed by the time we're 6 years old. So we pick them up really young, and there's reason for that. We don't need to go into that. And then they're reinforced, right? We look for things that reinforce them.

We have confirmation bias. We always look for things that we believe, and that's how the world shows up, right?

100%. And so, in this step, what you want to do is first, you want to uncover what you want to just— speaking of awareness, you want to just be honest about like, what are the beliefs that I have that are blocking me from emerging into expanding into this new possibility. And then you want to challenge them and loosen them. I'm never going to say that you can eliminate them. You cannot eliminate a limiting belief on the spot. It's been there for 30, 40, 20, 60 years. It's going to take time and it's going to take action, which is our next step. But you want to loosen it so that your brain gives you permission to go forward. And I'm going to tell you a quick, my favorite story about this. I'm going to prove this, that how you can do this with hot dogs. Okay. So in Coney Island, New York, there's an annual hot dog eating competition. So people come and literally the competition is how many hot dogs you can eat in 10 minutes. It's a hot dog and a bun. Okay. I mean, it's funny when I think of it, I'm like, I don't think I can do that many. But so for years, for decades, the record was 25 and a half, the highest number, which is a lot, 10 minutes, but 25 and a half hot dogs is the highest number. And then in 2001, this very short, small Japanese man named Takeru Kobayashi shows up. And can you guess, Ashish, how many he ate?

Now, I don't know, like 40?

50. 50 hot dogs. He literally doubles the record. Now, how did he do it? Well, he did come up with a new technique. So he took the hot dog out of the bun, dunked the bun in the water, so that it was smaller surface area, he could do it faster. He talked about how he would eat a lot of cabbage to stretch his stomach capacity. But before he did any of those things, what he had to change was his belief that it wasn't possible. Because the belief that he had and everyone, the highest number of hot dogs you can eat in 10 minutes is 25.

Yeah.

So the first thing he had to do is change that belief and ask himself a different question. Instead of it's not possible to do more than 25, he had to ask, How could I eat more than 25? That's how he came up with the new technique. That's how he came up with the cabbage thing. But here's my favorite part of the story. A year after he broke the record, a guy showed up and ate 52 hot dogs.

Yeah.

There were other people that started to eat more hot dogs because we hold collective beliefs as well. So, as soon as he broke that belief, the psychological inertia was gone. So, other people were like, wait, I could eat more than 50. How could I do it? So, this is the key step. So, you want to acknowledge what limiting beliefs you have, and then you want to, what I call, loosen their scaffolding. And my favorite way to do this is you pick your belief and then you pick the opposite belief. So, I'm going to use myself as an example. One of the beliefs that I have had since childhood is everything that I achieve has to be, it has to be a struggle. That's the only way I have to struggle through it. It's a very Russian Jewish refugee thing. I'm not the only person, actually. Not a very common belief in many countries, and all immigrants have it. So that was my belief. The opposite of that belief is I can achieve a lot of things without struggling. Sure, they can be challenging, but I don't have to struggle. And actually, I have to tell you a story. I worked with a mentor who asked me to do this exercise a while ago. He said, pick the opposite belief. And he said, make a list of all the things that have happened in your career, in your life that just— you didn't struggle. They just kind of showed up. And I was like— and my ego was like, oh my God, I'm never doing this. None of those things. Because our beliefs become our identity. My whole identity was I struggle to achieve things. Look at how much I've struggled. But finally I did it, and I still have that piece of paper. I started making a list of things that I have done that were not a struggle. I filled 2.5 pages, and they were not insignificant things. They were so many significant things. And so this is what I want you to do when you pick your— choose your limiting belief. Choose the opposite of that belief, and then go back through your life and look for evidence of that, and you will find it, I promise you. Your brain is not going to want you to. It's going to argue with you. It's going to say, no, no, no, no, no, nothing. But when you start to look back through your life more objectively, you will start to loosen that belief because you'll realize, well, I just— my belief is I'm not good enough to do this new thing, but there's a lot of times in my life when I did something new and challenging and I did it and I figured it out. Yeah, right. So you'll see your brain's like, well, but no, no, 'But this is going to be different.' But so it's not that the belief goes away, but it's now much weaker because you've challenged the foundation that it's been based on.

Yeah, it's at the heart of cognitive behavioral therapy, right? It's reframing, looking for counteractive evidence. And you can do it when you're struggling with trauma, but you can also do it when we are dealing with a fundamental reinvention because your brain wanting to keep you safe is going to hold on. And by the way, you know, these beliefs— I had a belief. These beliefs are hard to shed because they actually serve us. They, for many times, have been also at the heart of our success, right?

100%.

So I had a belief that to be loved, I had to be perfect. I picked it up very early on in my life when I caught home with 97 on 100 in math. And I was I don't know, 6 years old, and my mother very lovingly said, you know, you could have gotten 100 if you wanted. You knew the math. I know you know how to do it.

I feel like we have the same parents as well, Ashish. Okay, my mother could have said those same exact— what happened to the other 3%?

Exactly, exactly. And, and, you know, for the longest time that was the story, and it drove me, you know, made me highly successful, right? That was at the heart of it. But it also has a dark side, right? It puts you constantly feeling not enough. You're taking on way more stress. You're pushing things way harder than they need to, right? And you also very quickly, if you feel that you can't be perfect, you don't, then you stay, you almost draw this boundary around you. This is my safe zone because this is where I can be perfect. And this I'm not good at. I'm not even going to do it. "Because I'm not going to be good at it," right? So you limit yourself. And that's why I think it's actually hard, but I think it is so critical to do this work. Look for evidence, you will find it.

If you— you will always find it. It's so interesting, Ashish, you know, I do— I don't do a lot of one-on-one work, but every year I take on 3 clients. We work together for a whole year. And I have this one client, and she's amazing. I mean, if you look at her life and she's incredibly impressive and all the things. And she has had this deep belief that she's not capable of great things, right? And when I asked her to do this exercise, she came back to me in the next week when she said, well, I didn't find anything. And I said, just take a moment to appreciate how strong your brain is trying to protect you, right, with this belief, because she was on the precipice of creating a new foundation and really stepping— she's always been a COO, and this is the first time she would be stepping into— she would be the CEO. And the— and her brain was very scared. And so when she sat down to do that exercise, her brain was like, you've done nothing great in your life. Nope, just tell Natalie that, and then you don't have to be the CEO of the foundation, right? And so I just share that story. We work through it, and she's running a beautiful foundation. I just share that story because your brain will resist, because as you talked about, that belief was helpful for a long time. And so your brain will resist. But again, have the courage to look for the evidence. You will find it. And what that's going to do is just opens up opportunities, just makes that belief a little bit weaker so that you can start moving forward, which is the next step.

So we've taken the 3 steps: zone of greatness, we've looked at possibilities, we've looked at that belief, we've created a crack in the pavement. So life can actually emerge. Something other than concrete. That's right. It will find its way. Life will find a way.

Yes.

This is about, as you started with, letting what is within you emerge.

Yes.

That will emerge. All you need is create a crack.

Yes.

What's step 4?

You need to create a crack and then you need to do this next step, which is the— it's— this is the holy grail. Take action to learn. And this is really, really important. Action is— it's it. It is the holy grail. You, you were talking about this at the beginning. Mindset work is important. Inner work is important. Self-awareness is important. But none of it matters at all if you then don't take action towards this new possibility. It doesn't matter how much I would sit around and think about becoming an artist and challenge my limiting beliefs. I had to take out a canvas and put my brush on the canvas and create a painting and then show the painting and then actually embrace it. So the reason I call that step very intentionally act to learn is this is the thing that the brain is going to do at this point. It's going to say, well, I need a plan. Okay, so I have this new possibility. Okay, I need a plan. Let's create a, you know, and this is McKinsey, right? Like, let's create a strategy and then let's create an action plan. And what are all the steps I need to take? And this is where people get stuck overthinking. They don't know what the plan is, so they never take the action. Or you talked about this. Well, I can't do this perfectly, so I'm just not going to do it, right? So how do we overcome that? The only way is if we tell ourselves, "I'm going to take actions to learn as much as I can, not try to get it perfect. I'm just going to take action to learn." Because here's the biggest thing of this all. Clarity does not emerge before you take action. It emerges after you do it. Confidence does not come before you take action. It comes after you do it. Because by definition, you cannot plan your way into something you've never done before.

Yep.

You cannot feel confident. People talk about, "Oh, I have so much self-doubt." I'm like, You should. It's normal. You're doing something new. But how do you move through it? You have to take consistent small steps in this direction. And I will tell you one of the best tools that I found. So I run these 3-month Unleash Your Next Accelerators several times a year. And it's 10 to 15 leaders or people creating their next chapter of their business. And they literally in that time unleash their next. And one of the core elements, once they do the first couple steps, is they define a pivotal experiment, whatever it is. I'm going to start a yoga business. Okay. Your pivotal experiment is run your first workshop, just as an example, right? And then we run 14-day activation sprints. So I spent 20 years in tech. Probably you and some of your listeners are familiar with agile development methodology. That's how I ran teams. We built software. And it's such a beautiful tool. So I adapted it and brought it in. And so we run these 14-day sprints where during the day, during the sprint, every day you take a small action towards this next possibility. We do a virtual standup in our WhatsApp group where you have to report, here's what I did, here's what I'm committed to doing, and any blockers, right? And then I help unblock. And I cannot tell you how transformative it is. Just And these are small steps. This isn't something huge because this is where you feel momentum. This is where the old beliefs actually start like scaffolding to fall away because it's hard to, you know, one of my clients, her, one of her core limiting beliefs is that she's not creative. And her project that she undertook is she has a son who's autistic and he wrote a book. He's 10 years old. He wrote a book with his teacher about how You can be autistic and have a wonderful life. It's very touching. And for his birthday, she wanted to get it illustrated and published. But her belief was, I'm not creative. So she's like, I have no idea what to do. I'm not creative. So she ran this first sprint. And during the sprint, it was tiny steps, like go on Upwork and research freelance illustrator options. Like, that's a step. It's a tiny step. So not only is the book now almost done, and being illustrated. But she said— we had a call in our session a couple weeks ago— she said, this is unbelievable, I feel like a completely different person. She said, because every time my brain wants to say I'm not creative, it is not possible anymore because look what I have created, right? And that's the power of taking small steps. And the last thing I just want to say on this, I want everyone to get rid of this idea of leap. Leap into your next possibility, leap. It is terrible framing because when you say leap to your brain, it goes, no, no, that's too scary. It's gonna come up. But you're not leaping. No one's like, you're just taking small action steps in the direction that you wanna go so that you can learn as much as possible.

Yeah. Well, I think they're beautiful. I think this is really, really important. I think the first thing that I'm taking away from this chapter right, for listeners, is you're acting to learn, not acting to get to that perfect state, right? It's a, it's, it's an experiment. It's be comfortable. Like Edison, it's 100 steps to the light bulb. Whatever your version of the light bulb fully come alive is, you're acting to discover 999 ways that the bulb is not going to light. And yet you're going to, every one of those moments, tell the brain to shut up and just think about the smallest next step. What can I learn? You're acting to learn. And when you're acting to learn, there is no failure. The failure is if you didn't learn something from what didn't go right.

100%. That becomes your new way to evaluate your action. It's not, did this work? It's, what did I learn?

What did I learn? And the second is make it really small. It doesn't have to be massive, but it is It is, you know, that's what we do in Rewire. I'm like, it's about consistency and small. It's not about big stuff. Because guess what? Big stuff is great for the first 3 days and then it goes away.

And your brain will come up with such fantastic arguments to make sure you do not take big steps. Like, it will come up because they're so scary. So if you can make them small, it reduces that fear in the brain so you have more opportunity to take them.

Absolutely. And then the other thing you highlighted, which is really important, is it's the momentum where you're literally putting, you know, so here's the brain with 40 years or whatever number of years you have of your, of thumb at, you know, it's like, hey, here's the belief, here's what you can't do. But with every action, you're putting one block on the other scale saying, look, I did it, I did it, I did it. And all of a sudden, this starts to go a little lighter. But even if it doesn't go lighter, you're actually consciously putting more things on the other scale that's going to even out the scale at some point. And then, you move on to a different world.

And I love that analogy. And one of the tools that I offer people that I think is really important as you take these actions is measure your progress backwards. So we tend to kind of look, I am here, I'm just starting to paint. 10 years ago. And I'm so far away from being an artist that is showing her art in shows. I feel so far. And when you see that distance, your motivation drops, right? You're like, "Oh, I can never get there." Instead, measure progress backwards. So, at the end of the week, just look back and be like, "What actions did I take? How do I feel? Do I feel more momentum? What have I learned? Do I have stronger belief in myself?" And when we measure progress that way, it actually increases our motivation and our confidence and gives us that energy to keep going. So, it's just a great tool because when we're measuring from where we are to where we envision, we're kind of in this lack place, like, "I am here. I'm not yet that." Instead, just look at the past week. Again, just make it small. "Here are the actions I've taken. Here are the changes I've made. Here's how I feel differently." And that keeps— like, those are the blocks of inner sense of, um, I can do this that you're adding.

Yeah, focus on the gain, not the gap. Yep, focus on the gain, how far you've come from where you started. And you know what, even if you haven't come far, the fact that you took 10 steps from shifting from what might have been a soul-crushing or kind of, you know, doing work that is not meant to be in a different direction. Those 10 checkboxes of, yes, I did an action, that is the gain.

100%. 100%.

That is the gain. And what's number 5?

And the final step, and this is kind of again the philosophy of all this, evolve and experiment, right? Recognize that there is no— you said this about my path and your path— there is no linear path to anything wonderful and great in life. No one has had it. You know, one of the stories I love that I tell in my keynote, the Dyson vacuum, right? So it's considered one of the greatest household inventions of our time. It doesn't have a bag. It doesn't create all that mess, right? It's fantastic. Can you guess how many prototypes he had to make to get to the final vacuum?

I'm sure hundreds, if not thousands.

5,126. Yeah, 5,000. He worked for 5 years. He did about one a day.

Wow.

They mostly did not work until they did. And I— he talked— I have this quote on it. 5,000, right? And he didn't know his initial idea. I love learning this. He was walking, um, he saw a sawmill and he saw that they were using the cyclone technology to get rid of all the dust, and he was like, Could I make this in a vacuum? So he didn't know how he would do it, right? He envisioned a new possibility. His zone of greatness very much was to iterate, to iterate, to come up with new solutions, right? He took 5,126 actions, right? And what he said about it is, I had 526 failures, but each one taught me something. And so if you treat this whole process as an experiment, as prototyping, It gives you this opportunity to not be attached to the outcome. Because one of the beautiful things, and Ashish, I'm sure you've seen this in your life too, very often if we can really stay true to our zone of greatness and take action to learn, the place we get to is so much more wonderful than anything we could have planned our way into. But we only get there if we give ourselves an opportunity to learn and evolve and change and experiment. And one last thing I'll say on this— this is also where you give yourself permission to let go of things you thought you wanted to do, but they turn out to be not. I had one woman in my accelerator, she came in, she wanted to write a book. This is something she's wanted to do for a long time, and she was actually very frustrated with herself that she hadn't done it. Wanted to write a book. She ran 3 of these sprints. She started, she started writing. She was a And she said, you know what, I don't want to write a book. I just wanted to write some stories about my life. And I've written them and I've shared them with my family and it's really beautiful. And my granddaughter is now learning about my family. And she said, that's actually all I wanted. She said, it feels like I took this heavy backpack off of this failed dream of writing a book. And she said, now I can actually think about what, what do I actually want? Right? And so part of this is also giving ourselves permission to try something and learn that actually this isn't the thing that feels good to me. And that's okay because learning what we don't want is also incredibly useful in this process of reinvention and prototyping.

Yeah. I think that is such a beautiful story because I think what you're inviting people to do is— so now you've, you know, given yourself this permission. You thought about the possibility, you decided to go forward with it. But now don't get so wedded to that one that you actually say, well, I left that one to go this one, but oh my God, now I'm going to like even let go of this one, right? And what comes next? And you go into the cycle and to just say, listen, it's okay. You will know when what you're doing is right because you will be filled with joy. You'll work harder than ever, but you'll never be exhausted. You will look forward to each day. People around you will notice and play back to you that something about you is different.

Yes.

Right? You are, through your presence, lighting them up and giving them permission to reinvent themselves. You will know it. And till you know it, the only way for you to get there is by taking action, by experimenting, by talking to your brain and not letting it limit your possibilities, and by doing your inner work. 100%. It is, it is. I love the frame. I love the structure. We'll put all of that in our show notes, Nadia.

Beautiful.

Thank you. And friends, I will tell you this. I'm a big fan of The Alchemist.

Me too.

And as hard as this journey towards Discovering your personal legend is once you get there, you will know it because for the rest of your life, as you live into that legend, the universe will conspire in mysterious ways to pave the way for you. Yes, but you have to find it within. It is a reductive process. You're not going to find it out there.

No. And I love, I'm also a huge fan of The Alchemist. And I think it's such a beautiful, like articulation of everything you and I have talked about. But I also want to share, I don't know, you know, I'm a big, I'm a Jungian. Carl Jung has been a big influence on my work. And I recently read, I think it was in James Hollis's writing that Jung actually talked about that when we reject our legend, our alignment, our purpose, this is actually the source of our true suffering, including mental suffering, physical suffering. That is actually the core of it. And I just found that's such a, a powerful statement, right? So yes, this journey to uncover it is not easy. I always tell people I have no hacks. I have no— do these 3 things and you'll be like— it's not easy, right? It takes courage, it takes effort. You will be disappointed, you'll have to work through it. But it is so much— it's such a more enlightened and alive choice than not doing it and then suffering in so many ways, including in your health, in your happiness, in your relationships, because you are stuck in a place where you're so disconnected from who you're meant to be. So yes, it's challenging, but it's a lot harder if you don't do it.

Absolutely. Well, my friend, this has been such a joyful conversation. I can't wait to host you in Boulder next year.

I can't wait to come. We're going to do an art show and we're going to do a workshop, and who else knows what we come up with. I cannot wait.

Thank you. It's such a joy. Have an amazing rest of your Friday weekend, and we'll connect soon, Natalie. Thank you.

Perfect. Thank you so much.

Cheers. Thank you for joining me on The Flourishing Edge. If today's conversation inspired you, share it with someone who's ready to flourish too. Subscribe, leave a review, and stay connected for more tools to achieve Breakthrough Performance Through Flourishing. Until next time, keep learning, practicing, and growing into your fullest potential.