Challenges of the C-Suite with Laura Gassner Otting, Episode 6s

Okay, we are live. Hello everybody. Surprise, surprise, you didn't expect me today. You know what? I forgot I was on today too. Thank God for my partners in crime who reminded me, no, you had Laura on your schedule before you decided to take the summer off on Thursdays. So Um, you know how that works out. So here I am, and I am super excited that they reminded me because Laura, you know how I say it, she is a kick-ass woman. And you know, that's the playground I'm in, right? These women are powerful, and Laura tops the charts.

Right.

So I'm so excited to interview her today. And the secret is, for today, you don't want to miss a minute of this. Can I just tell you, I am so glad that I was reminded that Laura was on today. I would have just said no way and begged for forgiveness from her because she's also part of my group with Marshall Goldsmith. And you know that that's an incredible group of people. And she is one of the people that stands out as you just have to get to know her because she's a people person. And in the 15 minutes that we've been prepping, I have found out so much. And I'm like, how did I get this woman on my show? Well, I guess because, um, you You know how it is. So without further ado, because we have a lot to talk about, I'm gonna ask Laura— uh-oh, Laura just— okay, good, you're back now. Um, Laura, please introduce yourself and tell the audience a little bit, not too much, because I want to be able to talk about it all. Talk about yourself.

All right, well, my name is Laura Gassner Otting. I am Honored to be a guest of the great CB Bowman, whose work I have loved watching as a fellow member of the Marshall Goldsmith 100 group of coaches. I am the author most recently of Limitless: How to Ignore Everybody, Carve Your Own Path, and Live Your Best Life, which is based on 20 years of my work as an executive recruiter, where I came to understand that success as defined by everybody else in the world does not make us happy. So, when I was a recruiter, I spent 20 years calling the most successful people in the world on behalf of my clients, which sounds like a really hard job, except they all called me back because they all thought that the happiness was the next job, the next promotion, the next organization away. And the book is really based on what I learned actually gives people both success and happiness. So, that's who I am, what I'm doing. I spend my time working as a keynote speaker and as an executive coach and as an author working on my next How's that for a start?

That's an amazing start. Do you have your book there so you can hold it up?

I do actually. It is a bright yellow book, the beautiful infinity sign on it.

Fantastic. Okay. It's on Amazon. Everyone go out and get it because we so often, and we've seen this in COVID and audience, forgive me, I am going to cough. You know, I'm here in Colorado and we're getting the Oregon wildfires, so the air is not as pristine as it normally is. So, um, going back to the book, you know, we often live our lives in the eyes of somebody else, right? And we think because they're happy If we do the same thing they do, we'll be happy. And that's so wrong for so many reasons. I mean, thinking about other people, looking at other people and their happiness, you can learn why they are happy. And then you need to go to the next step and say, what will make me happy? Can I cherry-pick some of this? I can't use it all. Because they had grew up differently, they had different parents, they had different education, they have a different family arena, different friends. Even for your close friends, it's different. So Laura, give us a sample of talking about this in your book.

Yeah, so here's what happens at some point. When you're 15, 16, 17 years old, somebody says, hey CB, pick a major, pick a college, pick a craft, pick a trade, right? Pick a thing you're going to do after graduation. You go, oh, okay. And you pick something that's based on who you are at that age. And then we expect that that's going to fit who we are for the rest of our lives. Now, when I was in high school, I thought I was going to change the world. I thought I was going to run for office. I was going to be the first female Democratic senator from the great state of Florida, which by the way, that job is still open. So, you know, get it together, Florida. Um, and it's been a long time.

And still an opportunity.

Still an opportunity. Not for me, but still an opportunity. Um, uh, and, and I was like, well, okay, so the way to do that is to become a lawyer. Because at the time, all the people who were running for office, who were all— they all legal backgrounds. So I went to law school thinking LA Law, Ally McBeal, it's, you know, glamorous, everything's great. Exactly. And then, and then I got to law school and I looked around the first day and I was like, I've made a huge mistake. I don't belong here. This isn't me because the, the, the 22-year-old sitting in the first class of law school was different than the 16-year-old who decided that that was what I wanted to do. In between 16 and 22, I started to form a frontal lobe, you know, the part of your brain that actually dictates good logical decision-making. And so we're asked to make these decisions about who we want to be for the rest of our lives before we literally have the capacity to make a good one. And so if you're not making the decision for yourself, what do you do? You look around and you're like, What are my parents doing? What do my teachers say I should do? I had a teacher when I was in 4th grade who told me I was super argumentative and that I should become a lawyer, and that planted a seed. But that teacher had no crystal ball. They didn't have a Ouija board. They had no ability, no training in career development. Like, they had no idea. They just said something offhand one day, and I took it as definitional. And I think a lot of us do that. So then we get on this track, we get on this, this, this path where the definition of success is Have the right house, get the right spouse, make the right money, wear the right clothes in exactly the right size. Like all the things that we're supposed to do, and then we check all the boxes, and then we walk in one day and we're like, "Here's my paper. I have all the boxes checked. Do I get the gold star now? Am I happy? Why do I still feel like there's something more? I'm not fulfilled. This isn't great." And it's because along the way we change, the world changes, and we don't give ourselves the grace. To say, that's what worked for me when I was 16 or 26 or 36 or 46, and maybe it's not going to work for me when I'm 56 or 66. And so, so this is what goes on in the world. We get assigned a role by someone external to us, and we never stop to say, is that how— what I consider to be success? Will I feel fulfilled when I get there? And if I don't, What can I do?

You know, you speak the truth. I have had so many different careers. Yeah, that, you know, and I'm trying to think how my first one started. And I wanted to be an attorney. And I thought, I'll never be able to make it through law school. I'm highly dyslexic. And so fear set in. Right? It's sad that that happened, but it happened. And so I decided to become an interior designer. Well, that was quite nice. I had a lot of fun. I started an association, which is now, I think, the only association for interior designers, the National Association of Interior Designers. I was one of the 4 people that started it. And then I thought one day, this is too frilly for me.

Mm-hmm.

Much more of a serious person. Not to say that serious people are not interior designers, but I, I wanted more. I wanted to—

Yes.

—business more. And so I went back and I got my MBA.

Mm-hmm.

I thought, stumbling block, I'll never be able to get in And at that time, I didn't know I was dyslexic because they didn't know what dyslexia was. Right. And so here's where the creative part came in, the interior design. I said, I have to figure out a way to get into this business school because I know I am going to totally screw up the GMATs. Right.

Mm-hmm.

So I maneuvered away. Well, let's change that. I created an opportunity to get in.

Okay.

Met with the dean of the school. And the way that I did it is— I can't even believe I did this. I called his office. And I said, and I don't even remember his first name. Let's just say it's Howard. I said to his administrative assistant, hi, Howard is expecting a call from me.

The cheek!

And she said, really? Um, let me, let me just see if he's ready for your call. He gets on, he goes, gee, I don't remember that we had a call scheduled. And I said, well, I have to tell the truth. I sort of misled your administrative assistant and you, and no, we didn't have a call scheduled, but I need to talk to you about getting into grad school. And so, can we have a meeting? He said, anyone who's that gutsy, yes.

Nice. Nice. You know, so many stories start that way. It's so interesting. I, as I've been interviewing people for my next book, I've talked to, um, Kara Golden, who started Hint. I talked to, uh, Sally Krawcheck, who's the CEO of Ellevest. Um, uh, you know, and, and specifically women, now that I think about it, because I guess men don't need help getting in a door when they're like playing golf together. But it's like woman after woman after woman would tell me stories about how— like Lydia Finette, who was the, uh, the, the head of, uh, charity auctions for all of Christie's. Like, these women would tell stories about, well, I just picked up the phone and I called and I just pretended like I was supposed to be there. And this isn't like— this isn't like your— like the, like the bullshit fake it till you make it, right? It's not that.

Oh, no.

Like, you're not faking it. You're just— you're just not asking for permission. Right? You're not asking for permission to be let in the door so that you could ask to maybe one day have somebody possibly think about considering taking you. You're just like, what's the worst that can happen? He'll say no. If he says no, I'm in exactly the same position I'm in right now. So why not?

Courage. It really is having the guts and the courage, not being afraid to fall.

Yeah. I mean, I think it's knowing— I talk about this a lot in Limitless, that I say that failure is not finale. It's fulcrum, right? It's like the place from which you learn and you grow and you iterate and you change. And it's so funny, CB, as a speaker, you'll appreciate this. I was giving this talk in Austin, Texas at Renaissance Weekend, the very first time I gave this talk in public around the book Limitless. And I was like, failure's not finale, it's fulcrum. And then I look to stage left and there's Tim Kopra, Commander Tim Kopra of NASA, who's been on 3 spacewalks. And I was like, failure's not finale, it's fulcrum. Except for you, sir. For you, it's most definitely failure. But for the rest of us, as long as there is blood in your veins and oxygen in your lungs, keep trying. So, but I think it's like, I think it's, it's not being not afraid of failure. It's knowing that failure is not just possible, It's probable. And then so from there, what do you do, right? Like, if you got into his office and had the meeting, what's the worst he says? No. And then you could say, okay, well then talk to me exactly what are the steps for me to get into graduate school? Because then at least then it's an opportunity. Like, what do they say, like first attempt in learning or whatever is what fail stands for. But I just, I, I think that we see failure As this bad thing, as this definitional thing. Yes. When I actually think if you never fail, you never think you're, you're not trying big enough things. You're not trying hard enough.

Yeah, exactly. You take— and so when I went in his office and he's— and he said to me, what's going on? And I said, well, I want to get into graduate school and my grades and my Test results are not good.

Yeah, they don't reflect who I am. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

So I'm willing to go back a grade in order to move forward. And he looked at me and he said, never go backwards in life. I'm letting you in on probation for your first year. And I said, okay. My first year was blood, sweat, and tears. I bet. Nervous breakdown taking my accounting exams. I remember getting on the bus after taking it. I was so disoriented, I couldn't remember how to get home.

Wow, you left it all on the field.

I did. And then I found out— I hired a coach for my accounting. that I was dyslexic. And it was like, now I get it.

It's like someone handed you a user's manual to your brain.

Exactly. Exactly. Well, the long story is, I see Carla's on the line. She said, I have not failed. I've just found 10,000 ways that won't work. Thomas Edison. Yeah. Great quote. Great quote, Carla. So I, I said to myself, okay, what does this mean? Well, the end of the story is I wound up being on the board of advisors for Lubin School of Business, which is—

Right.

University, which is where I went. And so from that act of belief in me, I went all the way up to the top.

Yes, yes.

And I, I say this to people, just use failure as a learning and don't— learning option, and don't be afraid of it.

Yeah. Isn't it amazing though, like the people who are in your life, like that dean believed in you enough to give you a chance. He didn't just give you carte blanche, but he like let you in. And then you had to prove yourself. Like, I, I, I'm, um, on a competitive rowing team, and, um, I just found my inner athlete like 10 years ago, ran my first mile of my life 10 years ago. And, uh, it's a sort of a long convoluted story about how I got to rowing, but I ended up on this rowing team very strong and very fit, but not necessarily really knowing how to row, and rowing how to know enough. And the coach basically said, I can't teach fitness and I can't teach Like, uh, uh, uh, you know, internal motivation, intrinsic motivation. He's like, I, I can't get my other rowers strong enough as fast as you are. He goes, but I can teach you rowing. And he, he said, but you gotta earn it. And what he was saying to me basically is like, I'm gonna let you on the team, but you have to earn your seat every damn day you show up. And there's, you know, I don't need somebody to, to, to hand me, you know, the, the, you know, hand me the gold. I just want them to open the door. I know once I get in the door, I can make it happen, right? Grit, sweat, determination, all of those things, hiring the tutor, anything that you need. But there, there are these people, these like pivotal fulcrum people in your life who, because he happened to— like, you were able to get in and get that call and have the meeting, everything changes, right? Everything changes from that moment. And I just, I love those stories about those moments. when you're like, oh, I can do this, right? Like, you— like, it like opens up this path of discovery about how much more you have inside of you. Because even if you don't have courage, like, you were able to borrow his courage until such time as you like were able to, you know, grow your own. And I just— I think it's so much better than faking it till you make it, is like borrowing courage.

No, I agree with you. And you know, I was thinking about what makes a person have courage? You know, my parents, you know, older, of course, I'm a lot older than you are. We grew up in an era where Black folks were focused on putting food on the table, not sitting down and talking to the children about courage.

Yeah.

So I was just thinking as you were talking, What gives me the courage? What gives me the stamina to say to people, screw you, that don't— that don't believe in me, right?

Well, do you have that now, or did you— did you always have that? Because I, I have to say, like, I just turned 50 this year, and I developed those when I turned 40. I call them my FU 40s. I'm sort of like—

Great expression.

I'm like, look, I don't I'm not saying that I'm perfect. I have a long way to go and I have a lot to learn, but I'm pretty much like, this is— other than like maybe if I'm lucky, 10% on either end, and if we're, if we're really honest, probably 3% on either end— this is pretty much like, this is who I am, right? And it's sort of like, if you don't like me, I'm— fuck you. Like, I guess I'm just not for you, and maybe you're just not for me, and maybe that's okay, right? Like, maybe it's okay that not everybody loves us. But I feel like Like, did you always have that? Or did that come to you later in life?

You know what? I think this is a great question. I think I always had it. And I think it may come from my father being in the military, who was a lieutenant colonel. My mother worked, but it didn't come out until I was in my 40s. Interesting. I was like, kick ass. And the older I got, The more kick-ass I became. Yes. And I, I'm a double Scorpion also. Hmm. And so I think that that truly helps because my position in life is it's okay if you can't help me, just don't get in my way.

Yeah. Yeah. I say to people all the time, I'm like, look, if you're going to screw me, just tell me you're going to screw me and then good luck to you. But if you don't tell me and then you try and you fail, And they will fail. And they will fail. It's, you come for the queen, you best not miss, right?

You are a woman after my own heart.

But I think that's— that is really interesting. My mother, when I was growing up, um, was— she served on the city council in, in North Miami. I'm from Miami growing up. And, um, she— my mom— I'm— I topped out at 5'5¾, and it's not 5'5, it's 5'5¾. Um, my mother I was 5'9, my sister's 5'10, my dad's 6 foot tall. I was like the runt of the litter. And my mom used to go to the city council meetings wearing like 3-inch heels, and she'd stand right up next to the men, and she'd be like taller than them, and she'd be like, here's how we're gonna do it, and here's how it's gonna go down, and here's— and I remember watching that thinking, that's a power play, that's a really impressive power play. But it's funny that you say that, you know, maybe it came from them, but it didn't come out. Because I do wonder, like, we have— there's so much inside that's alchemizing all the time. Like, I have a mentor that I worked for in the White House, and he, he, uh, died prematurely of mesothelioma about 15 years ago. And to this day, there are still moments where I'm like, oh, that's what Eli meant when he did this thing or that thing, or why he put these people together.

Yeah.

And it's like, they're always alchemizing. And until you are in a moment where all of the ingredients come together. You just, you don't, you don't know it until it's there. So I— that's really interesting. I wonder, I wonder if, if it came from there. I don't know, maybe it's just part of menopause. I have no idea. But it's, it's all— everything's changing in the soup right now.

You know, we— you and I both talked to so many women who don't have the guts and the courage that we have. And you wonder what made the difference. And you can't just sit and say, well, what was your childhood like?

Right?

Yeah. I'd love to have a window into that to see what made them the way they are. What made them not have courage? What made them not have faith? I would say that in the Black culture, and this is just my thinking, It comes from the fact that the parents were mostly focused— when you had parents that stayed together, focused on putting food on the table.

Yeah, security.

Yeah. And the jobs that they have were not like in the military, which were survival jobs. They had— may have had other types of jobs that didn't How do I say this? They encouraged survival because I think Black people had to learn the art of survival.

Mm-hmm.

But that survival somehow may not have translated to the business world or the sports world. I mean, there was no, let's sitting around the— let's sit around the dinner table and talk about what happened during the day and what are the lessons learned and how could we maneuver around it. Right? It was more about, this is what happened to me as a Black man or a Black woman.

Yeah.

And how can we survive that? That's a different courage and different survival. So now that I'm thinking about it, it really— when I see a lot of Black children or young adults getting into trouble, their survival has to do more with the survival of the person and not necessarily how to survive and move up in business, which is, you know, it's just so very different.

It is. It's, it is so very different. And I think it's, um, it's, it's interesting. I, I, you know, there's, there's so many corollaries to immigrant families, you know, like you, you, you, your parents are the first generation or you're the first generation and they're, they don't care. I want to be an artist. I want to be a whatever. They're like, no, what's the steady job, what's the steady paycheck. It like may not be glamorous, it may not be excitement, but it's, it's security, right? It's security. You will be fine, you will be safe, right? You're moving into a neighborhood where you will be safe, all of that. And I think, you know, if, if there's, if there's anything that we have known for 200-plus years but denied and are finally actually paying attention to now, it's that that's an illusion, right? Like it's the safety, all of that. Like if the color of your skin is a crime, like what you know, what choice do you have? You have to be in careers where you have to, um, be safe and make it and be protecting of your family and all of that. And I think that just comes in different flavors for everyone. I think there are people who would say that if I'm working for someone else, I'm not safe and secure because I'm at their whim and their mercy. There are other people who are like, if I'm working on my own, the bank's going to deny me a loan because I have a funny name or I look different or I'm, you know, gay or I'm female or I'm whatever. And I, um, In Limitless, I talk about how it's not success writ large based on everyone else, like the jet and the car and the this and the that.

Of course.

But it's consonance. It's like when what you do matches who you are. And it's made up of 4 things: calling, connection, contribution, and control. And just one sentence on each. Calling is the gravitational force that gets you out of bed in the morning, the business you want to build, the family you want to nurture, the cause you want to serve, the leader who inspires you. Connection is, does your work actually connect to that calling? Like, can you see a difference on a daily basis of what you're doing so that it actually connects to, to the thing you care about in the world? Contribution is how does this work contribute to your life, to the way you want to live your life, to the goals that you've set for yourself, for how you want to manifest your values? And then control is how much personal agency or control do you have on any of these things? How much the work contributes to your life and how much it connects to your calling. And all of us at every age and every life stage want different amounts of each of the for. And I think depending on where you come from, your family background, who you are, what your goals are, the opportunities that are given to you, the opportunities that you have accessible, you know, for, you know, within your reach, I think it changes all of these things. And it's been very interesting to me as I've had people take an assessment that I have online at limitlessassessment.com where I ask for demographic data at the end of it. And it's really interesting to see that, um, that people have, you know, how many people want more control, feel like they have enough control, the kinds of people who have the privilege to just pursue their calling. Like, it's just been a very interesting way to sort of slice the demographics during 2020 when we've all sort of had to come to a real reckoning with who we are and the fact that opportunity isn't equal.

Agreed with everything.

That's a lot there. Sorry.

Everything you said, and I'm going to push back a little bit on your 4 C's. I don't believe that people of color have the same opportunity for those 4 C's as people who are white.

Yes.

And part of the reason is, if you, as a Black man, you're walking down the street, you're worried about whether or not you're going to make it home alive. Do you have the opportunity to positively affect the 4 C's in the same amount of control as somebody who is white, right? Here's another example. One of the coaches who's part of ACEC contacted me and he's— and she said, she's white, I have a Black client who is with a company and he's afraid to crack a joke like the white men in his company. Yeah, he's afraid to speak up like white men in his company. He loves what the company does. Okay, so now you've got— it's out of your control.

You're right.

Right, because you're— what you want to contribute to your calling, if that's his job, that's his calling, is blocked by this belief, and it could be the truth, that you would not be accepted for your brainpower because you're out of line.

Yeah, well, I mean—

Or out of place. How often have people of color heard that?

Yeah, I mean, and you go from pet to threat in an instant. Yeah, in an instant. So the, the premise of the book isn't that you have to have all 4 of these to to have real happiness. The premise of the book is that each of them need them differently. So, this client of one of the members that you're talking about, what I do in the book is I talk about calling, connection, contribution, and control, and then allow people to understand which of those things they want more of and how to get them. It may be that somebody's like, I don't need any calling. I just want tons of contribution. I want to make a bunch of money. I don't care if I'm doing it in a job that Isn't interesting to me at all, right? Fine, then you don't need to go after more calling if you don't want the calling. Um, but if, if you are somebody who says, I actually feel like I need more control in my life, then I talk in the book about ways to get that— the kinds of conversations to have with your boss, the kinds of changes you want to make to your workplace, to your career, maybe to yourself, like how you can do it. But just to, to, to, to go back to this example, I will tell you, in 20 years of interviewing thousands of people at the very top of their game— I mean, I was hired by my clients to call the most successful people in, in their industries to recruit them away, retained executive search— everybody cried in my office. They told me the stories. I mean, I did work in, in, in mission-driven work— nonprofits, universities, foundations, advocacy organizations. So it was my job And for the last 15 years, I did it as the CEO of a search firm that I founded. So by the time people got to me, they'd already been interviewed by my team. Like, I knew they were qualified. It was my job to find out not what they did or how they did it, but why they did it. Why they did it. What, like, what drove them to be so passionate about this issue? So, I mean, I remember having a conversation with somebody to become the head of communications for the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey. And this was pre-9/11, but it was post-EgyptAir 800, right? That like came, dropped out, like the pilot committed suicide, dropped out of the sky, killed everybody on board. And she ran crisis communications at the time for another big airport authority. And I was like, I just have to ask, like, how does somebody get good at crisis communications? Like, it's not like you, you can't— I mean, you can study the nuts and bolts of it in school, but it's not like you don't get a lot of practice runs. Right? Like, how do you get good at it? And she said— I remember we're sitting at the Harvard Club of New York, and she put her sandwich down, she looked me dead in the eye, and she said, well, when I was growing up, my father was a drunk, and every Friday was payday, and I never knew if he was going to come home with an envelope of cash, uh, a bag of groceries, or a shattered vodka bottle that he had already drank and that he was throwing at our heads. And you get really good at handling crisis when you grow up like that. And I remember feeling so privileged and so blessed to absorb the burden of that story and to hear that story from her. And so people would cry, people would tell me their stories, they would tell me deep, deep stories. And I will tell you, when the white men told me the stories, it was like, oh, he's so passionate. When the white women told me the stories, it was like, oh, she She emotional? I don't know. Let's learn more. When the, when the Latina, the Latino men would tell me the stories, like, oh, he's definitely like, he, he doesn't, you know, bother with any of that machismo stuff. He's really going to be a good leader. When the Latino women would tell me the story, it was like, oh, she's, she's fiery, which, you know, there's a code word. When the Black men would tell me the stories and cry, the clients would say, what a leader, he's so soulful. And they would always say, and this made me Crazy. He's like Martin Luther King, like as if that was the only black man they'd ever heard talk about anything. But the black women when they cried? Oh wait, the black women never cried. In twenty years of interviewing thousands of people, the black women never cried because they were trained. They have been trained by society: you cannot crack, you cannot show yourself, you cannot show any weakness. And so, you know, this idea of how do you get in touch with who you are and make yourself into somebody who has control, who wants to be in the workplace in the way that you are and show your full self and crack a joke like the white guys or the white women or any of that. That's— it's real. It's real. And the thing that I would say to this guy is like, you love what you're doing and you— it's your calling, but is this the right company for you?

Yeah.

And if it is, what are the kinds of conversations that you need to have inside? Who are your allies going to be? How do you find them? Where do you position them? How do you— like, what are the meetings before the meetings? all of that stuff that happens. Because, you know, if he is in a place where he is always going to be an asterisk, then that's going to become a cancer inside of himself, right? And what do you do when you're in that? And if there are changes he can make— there may not be, right? I mean, that's obviously privileged to think about that. But, you know, I, I say that whole story because it's to say that that's real. Like, that veneer that you have to put on in the workplace.

Yeah. And the same person And said to the coach, and where I live, the white men do a lot of roller skating. And, you know, so it's a kind of like sportsy kind of environment like Colorado. He said, I'm afraid to do that. I'm afraid that I'm going to be arrested. Yeah. Because I've seen it.

Yeah.

So if you— that's something that's real that you're focusing on. And then you have to come to your job and worry about, am I saying the right thing?

Yeah. Yeah.

You know? And so that's the reality.

Yes.

That we're talking about. So I'm so glad that your book is out because I also believe, while I'm pointing to these things out, that a book like yours gives people of color a chance to see strategies that can be used, that they can try to find out whether it's real or Memorex, right?

Mm-hmm.

Is there real support for me? I can test the waters. I can— I now know what somebody else does and how they handle it.

Mm-hmm.

Right. And maybe that's what's— that's what the company is waiting for, for you to try.

Yes. Yeah. I mean, I'm interested in this. You know, I have a— I have a friend, uh, who I've been just sort of giving some advice here and there about, you know, the business that he's building. And he was talking to me— he's a— he's a Black man— and he was talking to me about, uh, you know, some of the mental health challenges that he's dealt with and that, you know, he talks to his therapist about this or the other. And, and he's like, and she just doesn't get me. And I was like, well, tell me about your therapist. And it turns out that his therapist is a white lady from the suburbs, and this guy is a Black guy from not the suburbs. And I don't want to give too much— he's not from the US originally. I don't want to give too much detail about him, but I was like, is she the right— like, can she really get you? Like, is it— I don't— I'm not sure, right? Like, I'm just not sure. And I just— I think that I can, I can understand academically other people's experiences and take a test and score 100 on it, but I cannot ever truly understand that experience. I just can't. That's not—

Here's an interesting point. Because she is a white woman from the suburbs doesn't mean that all white women from the suburbs would be a bad fit for Right.

This one seemed particularly bad, though.

Yeah. She can offer an insight to a different way of looking at things. Yes. But you also want to be heard. Yes. And so that's where the problem is. I need to be heard. And then you can give me some alternative road to follow.

Yes. Yeah. I mean, there's a fine line, right, between somebody who's going to hear you and honor you, and somebody who's going to project onto you their own experience, right? So it's like— so he, he was actually saying he initially found somebody who didn't look like him, didn't come from where he came from, any of that, because he didn't want somebody projecting, you know? So it's, it's just— Right, it's the other side of the coin. It's really interesting. And I, you know, and I'm, I'm not giving him any therapy. I'm just helping him, you know, think about how to grow his business. And I mean, when I, when I work as a coach, I don't, I don't actually give people a lot of answers. I ask them a lot of questions, and, and I see where they're going, and it sort of helps them. And then, you know, and so it's, I, you know, I will give someone my opinion about something, and I'll mention things that I think that they should consider. But I'm always nervous when people are like, I have the solution for you. It's like, well, do you? Like, how do you know?

Yeah. And, and that's— it's interesting you speak about that because that discussion right there about not giving answers is what makes the difference between a master coach and a regular coach. Yeah. Executive coach. Um, people that come into my organization are all master coaches. They have to know how to give the answers.

Yeah.

Because they're working with C-suite. And if you walk into the C-suite and you use the standard definition of coaching, which is to ask questions, you're going to be shown the door.

Oh, let me, let me clarify.

I, I heard your clarification.

I'm a Jewish mother. I asked— Yes. Yeah, yeah. Let me— let me— I'm, I'm a Jewish mother, so I know how to ask a question where the answer is obvious. Yeah, I don't, I don't just walk in, listen to somebody go, okay, here's the 6 things you should do. I walk in like, okay, well, I think what happens a lot of times is people hear someone's problem, they think they understand the problem, they give a solution without not only not understanding the problem, but not understanding how that person will define what success looks like at the other end of the process.

Come to the, come to the meeting with a roadmap already built into their head. This is the steps that you need to take.

Right, right, right.

And so Recently, and I just said, timeout.

Yeah, that's not— yeah, it's not the road. I spent a lot of time talking to my coaching clients about, like, well, what does success look like to you in this? Or what problem are you trying to solve? Or when we're finished with our engagement, where do you want to be? So I let them define the parameters of it, and then I can help them get there. But like, how do you— how do you help a coaching client get from Miami to Seattle If you think they're going to New York City, right? It's just so you can take them super fast and really efficiently and cleanly with pretty charts to the wrong place, and that's malpractice, right? Like, so I feel like, I mean, it's like you wouldn't go to a doctor and walk in and be like, hi, my name's CB, and have them hand you a prescription pad without them actually even examining you. So I feel like it's— why would we do that? Like, you have to diagnose first before you can treat.

But I love what you said about being a Jewish mom and asking the questions that lead to the answer, because frankly, I see that that's a huge problem in our coaching space, is that people that hang out their shingle— shingles don't know the right questions to ask.

Yes.

They're afraid, you know, they can't go toe-to-toe with the person that they're coaching for fear of losing a client. And so what happens is that you don't grow as a coach, and you certainly don't grow your practice with the type of people that you want to coach.

Yes. You'll actually like this story, CB. And, and I, I, I don't— she may be watching now, I'm not sure. I'm not, I'm not outing her because she writes about me in her newsletters and sends this story out to people all the time. But I have a coaching client who is from North Dakota, and she called me up and she was like, I need to shake this off. I'm I am a big fish. I'm in the small pond. I want to be like on one of the coasts. I want to be like big deal. I just I go to these places. People are like Fargo. I've never met anybody from North Dakota before. You're one of those flyover states, and she just gets like immediately dismissed all the time. And she was like, "I hate it. I don't want it." I I saw you online. You were wearing this fancy blue dress and your TED Talk, and it was like. you know, amazing. And I like— it's polished, and this is what I'm looking for. And we got like 2 conversations in, and I was like, well, let's talk about this North Dakota thing, because I know you want to shake it off, but there is so much in there that is part of your story. What if you incorporated that into your story? How would it feel to incorporate this thing that you're trying to escape into your story and talk about how you want to escape it? And now the whole keynote that she gives is all about what this earth in North Dakota did for her and shaped her and formed her and all the lessons learned along the way. And like what rocks the, you know, her ancestors had to pick out of the fields. And so what rocks are in your way and all this stuff, and it's beautiful, it's incredible. But had I just done what she wanted, which was, okay, let's shake off the North Dakota, she would have just looked like an iterated version of everybody else. And this is the thing that makes her unique.

Yeah, absolutely. I so agree with you. It's sad that people feel— that goes back to your book Limitless. What else can I say, right? So now I want to talk We only have 15 minutes left. You have to come back.

I will come back, and I want to interview you on my podcast too, so we could just keep talking. We'll get our friend Tasha to join us, and the 3 of us will chat.

Oh, talk about kick-ass women. Oh yeah. Oh my God, I'm part of her group.

I know that, Tasha. Can I tell you a very funny story about Tasha? So Tasha Urich, for your listeners, who wrote, you know, bestselling book Insight. It's all about self-awareness. These are not the right statistics, but something like 90% of people think they're self-aware, but think nobody else is. Okay, so the math doesn't add up there, right? Like, if 90% of people are self-aware and 10% aren't, like, how does that work? So, none of us are self-aware enough. And how do you become more self-aware? And how do you use self-awareness as a superpower to, you know, move up and be successful in life?

Right.

Check out Tasha Urich, Insight. She's amazing. So, Tasha and I meet because she and I are speaking on the same stage at the Art of Leadership for Women in Uh, Vancouver. And, uh, we, we, um, we're running late at the end of the event. We're racing to the airport. We both have to catch our flight. There's like a billion people in the line to get through security, and she and I are like sweating it out. Like, are we gonna make it? Are we gonna make it? Oh my God, what's gonna happen? I don't really know her. She doesn't really know me. But I'm like, she is like amazing superhero. She's looking at me like she's been on the Today Show, Good Morning America. Oh my God, right? Like, we, we are thinking the other one's kind of like The hottest thing since sliced bread, and we're totally intimidated by each other. And then go through security; her bag explodes open, and in the bag are like you know like like like like hair you know extensions and curlers, and like her like giant pink platform shoes. And I was like, "I love you! You're a human. You're a real human." And so she's just so incredible. Incredible because she's just real. She's just like, this is what I'm going through, this is how I'm feeling right now, this is like my incredible brainy superpower. And also her newsletters are so, um, heartfelt and true and honest and raw. So she's just one of my favorite humans.

Wait a second, I have to talk to her about that. What, what is she thinking here? Okay, I'm gonna out her and I'm gonna send it to everybody in the group and say, do you know that Tasha has not been sending us her newsletters?

Her newsletter is so good, her newsletter. And it's funny because every time I send my newsletters out on a Tuesday, and every time I send it out, within an hour she writes back. She's like, oh my God, I love this line. And she sends hers out and everyone— it's just, it's— I think it's me, Whitney Johnson, are like all like emailing And Susan and David were like each other's favorite newsletters.

It's ridiculous. I'm in on this. Come on now.

Yeah. All right, well, you gotta sign up. We all have to sign up.

Tell me how, tell me when. Okay.

Yeah, my newsletter is at heylgo.com/newsletter. I think Tasha, you can find her at tashayurick.com for people who are watching. I know you know how to find Tasha, uh, but yours? Hey LGO. Like, all my good friends call me LGO. You can see it down Below there, I'm on all the socials at Hey LGO. So at hey lgo dot com slash newsletter is how you get to me.

Newsletter. Okay, everybody. I hope you heard that. It's hey h e y l g o slash newsletter. Yes. Okay. I am going to look that up and start reading like crazy. So wait a second. I want to talk about your early years.

Yeah.

You were involved in politics.

I was. I dropped out of law school to join a political campaign.

To join a Republican campaign?

No, no, no. To join a political campaign. To join, uh, Bill Clinton, uh, was running for president. I was—

Stop. You know I'm gonna ask the question.

Uh, I didn't know Monica. I was not Monica.

Not a Monica. Okay.

I was not a Monica. You know, I was a staff member, and we staff members didn't talk to the interns. I was probably like the same exact age as her, but you know, like when you think you're hot shit when you're young, you think you're hot shit, so you don't talk to anybody else. Um, yeah, I mean, I was probably at parties with her. I— who knows? We were the same age. I 22 years old, 23 years old. Um, I thought I— as I— I'm sorry, did he flirt with you? He flirted with everybody. Men, women, house pets. Like, he was just— he's charismatic, you know? He just— I never believed that— I never believed that you were born with charisma until— well, frankly, my younger son has a ton of charisma, and like, when he was born, I was like, yes. But like everything they say about Bill Clinton, when he walks into a room, you could be like completely on the other side of a ballroom with like 3,000 people in it and you just feel him enter. It's like the gravitational force of the room changes. It is. And I was very involved in Hillary's campaign in 2016. So like this is going from like 1992 all the way through 2016. Every time over the course of 30 years the man entered a room, I could tell you within 30 seconds it was just like there was like a ripple effect. It's— it is electric. It is insane. And now he's like an old graying wizened vegan, and he's still— you— no offense to vegans, but he's just like the skinny, skinny— like, you know, he's a big fat guy when he's president, but he's the skinny, like, scrawny guy with this giant, you know, giant head.

Yes.

And he talks to you and you still see the fire, the light in his eyes. And, and he finished talking to you, he moves to the next person, you can still feel his eyes on you. It's like, I've, I've just never— so like, did he flirt? He just breathed and it was flirting. I mean, it's just, it's the craziest thing. Yeah, I literally, I, I've never met anyone else like that. It's, it's crazy. I have a very fraught relationship with like the whole like MeToo thing and all of that. Like there was a time where I took all the pictures I have with him off the wall because I I was like, this is— it's icky. It doesn't feel good. Like, I didn't— at the time, I thought it was a divorceable offense, not an impeachable offense. But at the time, I also didn't understand the politics of power and MeToo and all of that stuff. And now it's like— so I have kind of a fraught relationship with the whole history of it. But at the time, I was in law school. I was miserable. I didn't want to be there. Uh, I was dating. Uh, I was doing the thing that most women do when you're in a miserable situation. I dated a guy who was terrible for me. I joke around that that guy had very good taste in exactly 2 things. The first obviously being girlfriends, and the second being these unknown presidential hopefuls from tiny southern states. And I was like, governor who? From where?

Arkansas?

Not a chance in hell. George H.W. Bush had just won Desert Storm. He had a 91% approval rating when Bill Clinton announced that he was going to run. And I was like, there's not a chance, whatever. But this guy was driving me home from school and he wanted to stop at, um, his— this campaign office. It was raining that day. He's like, I'll put your bike in the back of my IROC-Z, which will tell you everything you need to know about this guy. And we drove to this little teeny strip mall. Kids, back before the internet, this is how you got information about candidates. You like went to their local office and you pick up paper. The paper had actual like, you know, issue stances. So I, um, we went into this office, and in the office there was this teeny tiny little black and white TV in the corner, like 8 inches maybe big. And on that TV, Clinton was giving this impassioned speech to the National Governors Association about how there's nothing wrong with America that can't be fixed with what's right with America. And I was like, that's it. And then he said And the answer is service, community service in exchange for college tuition. Everyone should have an opportunity to change themselves, and the only thing we ask of them is to help change their community while they do it. And I was like, that needs to happen. And I actually— the whole TEDx talk I gave is like all about this moment where I was like, I went from how can I help, how can I be the solution and put myself in the center as the solution to the problem, And by the way, not totally understanding the problem, to what needs to happen, which is, here is the problem and the problem demands a certain solution, and I happen to have these things that I can add to it. And I literally started volunteering on the campaign. A couple weeks later, all 4 principals, Bill and Hillary and Al and Tipper Gore, came to Gainesville, nowhere Florida, and we got 36,000 people to show up at that rally. And so the national office was like, who are those volunteers? We need to hire them. And hiring them meant that they were going to pay me all the ramen soup and Idealism I could eat, and they put me in the back of a smelly van, and we drive all over the southeast of the country throwing rallies. And that's what we did. And along the way, I met people who ended up, like, you know, on the transition team that invited me on. And then they were, you know, doing the volunteer stuff, um, organizing for the White House, and invited me in. And Yeah, I've— that's— that was my first— I mean, my first real— my first actual paying job was changing bedpans at a hospital, but my first actual grown-up job was in the White House. One might say they were equally shitty, but I'm pumped.

There's a link there that we won't go into on the screen.

There's a stand-up routine in that somewhere, I'm sure.

How tall is Bill Clinton? Is he—

Oh, tall. He's like 6'4 or something.

That helps.

Yeah, yeah.

Oh gosh, wow.

Yeah.

I'm so envious of your career.

I mean, you know, I, I don't know that I'd be envious of the $27,000 first-year salary that I had. And, uh, no, sorry, $22,000 first-year salary. I, um, I hustled my way to go from being a volunteer to getting on staff. And I pissed some people off in the process. And one of the people I pissed off in the process was the one who had to sign my paycheck. And he was told by the boss he had to hire me. And basically what he said was, uh, I did some research to figure out the lowest possible salary I could give you, and it's $22,717. So please sign here, you're hired.

Damn.

Damn. So I, I remember the days where the local Star Market was selling ramen soup for 39 cents as opposed to 59 cents, and I was like, stocking up, stocking up. But that's what you do, you know, in those early days. I was living in a, in a, in a, in a, an apartment that I shared with another woman and a bunch of cockroaches and a couple of rats. And, oh, you know, it was just like, whatever, that's what you do. But to go back to Limitless, like, I didn't care. I didn't care. I had so much calling. I was so inspired. I was getting the coffee for the guy who got the coffee. I had no connection whatsoever, but I was contributing. I was manifesting my values on a daily basis. I had zero control. Like, I didn't— like, I did whatever they told me to do. Now it's a very different situation, right? I'm 50. I'm about to take a kid off to school. I'm not getting on a plane to go give a speech for less than my full fee because I'm not taking time away from my family, right?

Right.

It's like at every age and at every life stage, what we want and what we need are totally different. And so, you know, if you would have told me when I was 16, 17, 18 that this was going to be my career, I would have laughed at you. I'm like, it's, it's like, I, you cannot script where you go. And I'll also tell you, CB, and you know this from your coaching life, the most interesting people— in fact, actually, let me rephrase that— the only interesting people that I have talked to over the course of the last 30 years have been people who had left turns and right turns and U-turns.

Yeah.

Because the ones that are like, I'm gonna go to college for X, and I'm gonna work in X for the next 30 years and grad and, you know, retire with a gold watch, like, you don't want to sit next to them at a dinner party. Those people are not interesting. It's the ones who have stories, right? They're great.

You have got to interview another member of MG 100. I interviewed him, Brigadier General Bernie Banks. Oh, Brigadier General Dr. Bernie Banks.

Wow, that's a lot of intimidation right there.

Oh, but he is a riot. Okay, I had him on to talk to us. She's inviting various people and you have to come on and talk to us. And he sees that I'm on the screen and he goes, oh, my girl CB is on. I'm like, it was like He is a riot and so scary.

Yeah.

In leadership, it's a powerful combination.

Yes, yes.

So you must— hey, we're just at the top of the hour and I want to know more about you and your work, your next book, your children. I wish that I had you as part of one of my 2 conferences that I just did, because you're a firecracker.

Well, I'm sure that you will have more conferences and you know where to find me.

Oh yes, I do. I can track you now.

I think we're gonna do a lot of magical things together, you and me.

I think so. Tell me a little bit before we go, tell the audience, when is your next book coming out?

Well, I'm aiming for spring of next year.

Okay.

Might be fall of next year, I'm not sure. Um, and, uh, but I can tell you what it's going to be about.

Yes.

Uh, it's going to be called Wonder Hell.

Wonder Health?

Wonder Hell. Hell, like hell on earth. Hell. Okay, so CB, you know those moments when you've started something, you've created something, you push something out into the world and people read it, they look at it, they buy it, they want it, they're like actually paying attention to a thing that you did, and you're like, this This is amazing. It is incredible. It is humbling. It is awesome. It is wonderful.

Mm-hmm.

And also, I've never been so exhausted in my entire life. I've never been so full of stress and anxiety and imposter syndrome and worrying about competing with this person and that person, comparing myself and burnout and all of that. It's hell. It's wonderful. And it's also hell. It's wonder hell.

I just tell you, can I have to stop you? Because can I tell you, that's exactly what I went through with my last conference. Mm-hmm. Workplace Equity and Equality, a huge hit. And afterwards, I just crashed.

Okay, so here's the other piece of wonder hell. Yes. And wonder hell only shows itself to those who are worthy of it. Okay.

Okay.

Wonder Hell is the space in your psyche where the burden of your potential walks in and goes, hey CB, what you got for me? In the midst of this conference, you saw a glimpse of yourself creating something bigger, more, better, for different people, deeper, something— it could be bigger, it could be smaller, but it was something that was bigger than your original Yes. And now you can't unsee that. And your personal wonder hell will be only as big as your ego and your desire to get there. Like, every internal candidate always ends up leaving, even if— like, even if they've been treated well in the process. Because in the process of being an internal candidate, you wear the clothes, you answer the questions, you talk in the form—

What does it mean to be an internal candidate?

If you're an internal candidate in an organization— sorry, I made a segue into my recruiting days. So if you are— if you are an internal candidate, The, the— what I learned is that internal candidates always leave because when you are, when you are interviewing for a position that is above yours, you wear the clothes to the interview, you have the conversations as if you are solving problems, you're answering questions as if you're walking in the shoes of that person in the bigger job. And when you do that, you see yourself in that role and it's hard to unsee it. So the glimpse that you had of yourself, this burden of the potential that you saw is now going to attach itself to your shoulders and it's going to sit there as heavy as your ego. And when you're like, this is the change that I know that I can make in the world now because I saw how successful this conference is. I want that. I want more of that. How do I get there? So Wonderhell is going to be about how people come to terms with the burden of their own potential at every age, at every life stage. Every new level gives you a new devil. And how do we get through it? And how do we not just survive these hard moments, which is what the world tells us we should do, When we get to a stressful moment, right? But how do we learn to thrive in them? Because on the other side of this wonder hell, CB, if you're lucky, is the next one and the next one and the next one. Because you keep growing and you keep changing and you keep getting to that next place.

What do you think? I'm scared. I'm scared. I'm scared to hell.

Did I just read you right there?

My chapter? Does it tell you what to do with this wonder hell?

So I interviewed 100 different people. And throughout the book, I tell the stories about how they managed not just to survive, but to thrive in these moments. Because it's not just about hustling and grinding and leaning in and 10xing. And it's not about not apologizing and eat, praying, and loving, right? it, it's not about this. Like, all the emotions that we have had about success, what we've been told, they're just wrong. Like, the slings and arrows and the stress and the burdens and all these things, they don't have to be that way. We don't have to fight against them like it's organ rejection. We can say it's okay to feel this, and what am I learning from this feeling? And maybe, maybe what I'm learning is I don't want to grow bigger. Maybe what I'm learning is that I've set my, my, my boundaries in the wrong places. Maybe I need to goals differently? Like, how do we figure out how to be okay with uncertainty? What are the things— what are the tools that people have used to manage what I'm going through? So that's what I talk about in the book.

So I just wrote down the name of the book. Um, so here's my question to you. Do you feel more women go through wonder hell than men?

Well, this is actually a very interesting question because I took the, you know, you know, 4 or 5 page overview of the book and I sent it out to about 20 people that I know, very well-respected writers, thinkers, authors, you know, global guru types, thought leaders, etc. And to a one, the women were like, I need this book and I need it yesterday. And the men, some of them were like, yep, yep, I see this, I got it, I'm gonna buy this for 12 of my friends. And some of them were like, I don't know, it doesn't, doesn't really resonate with me. And I think that's fascinating. I think that's Fascinating. So I do, just based on that, I think just who this resonates with. And, you know, I think, I think that, you know, there's questions of imposter syndrome, there's questions of burning out. Like, if you think about burnout for like imposter syndrome, whatever everyone talks about, we don't have to talk about that. Um, but, uh, burnout is a very good example. If you think about burnout, we at work, men and women, try to be all things to all people all the time. But we women at home also try to be the very best wife, the very best friend, the very best sister, the very best daughter, the very best parent, the very best whatever. Men don't have the same level of of of of guilt, of overwhelming responsibility, of burnout. It's they don't have the same gender dynamics, right? There's so many other things. So they can feel wonder hell at work, but they don't feel it in every other facet of their life in the same way that the women I've spoken to feel it. So I think men experience wonder hell just as much as women. They just only feel it in some parts of their life, so it doesn't become—

And it allows them time to recuperate.

Yes.

Okay, so here's my question, my next question. You know some powerful women.

Yes.

That are doing things that put them into the wonder hell category, creating. Will you have a group for us?

I would. I would have a group. I will say I also interviewed a lot of men in the book. I interviewed our friend Alan Mulally. I've interviewed, um, uh, uh, uh, I interviewed the, the, the current, uh, world record holder of a, of a, for double amputee marathon running. I interviewed, you know, Olympians. I mean, I've interviewed, uh, a lot of men who have been very successful in business. I interviewed Jordan Harbinger of the Jordan Harbinger Show. So the book talks about both men and women, but I do As I'm thinking about what to do with the book and how to market it, I'm— maybe this is not a politically correct thing to say, but I don't have a ton of interest in like going deep and helping men find their voice and their power because I think that they're doing okay for the most part.

I get it.

You know, straight cisgendered white males, right? Everybody else, I'm, I'm, I'm down for the— I'm down for the, for the fight. I'm down for the cause. But like, I'm, you know, straight cisgendered white males are doing all right. I may not have a group for them, but for everyone else, I think yes.

I'd like to support you in having that group for women.

Uh, thank you, thank you. Well, as we, as we get closer, as I figure it out, um, I want to send you the manuscript. I would love for you to take a read. I would love for your feedback. I'd love for your blurb. I'd love to have you involved because I— that would be my honor.

My pleasure. And the reason— there's 2 reasons I want to be transparent about why I would put this into my schedule. One is I would love for you to have Black woman representation.

Yes.

2 is I think it's something that I've gone through. I know it's something I'm going through now.

Yes.

I think it's something I went through when I created the Association of Corporate Executive Coaches. And fortunately, now I see how successful it has become. Mm-hmm. But I can't correlate that to what I'm doing now. It's a whole different audience. Mm-hmm. Yeah, right. Yeah. And I'm very careful not to mix the two together. And ironically, one of the members of ACEC yesterday called me and said, we would like for you to be a speaker for Columbia University, part of a panel to discuss the work you're doing now in diversity. And by the way, CB, how come I didn't know anything about the conference? I'm part of ACEC. She's talking about the WE conference.

Mm-hmm.

And I said, I don't mix the two together. I don't want the coaches who are members of ACEC it easy to feel that they must support diversity either way. Mixed metaphor for me. And she said, you're wrong. We needed to know about it. Yeah. Choice. Yes. And so that was interesting that I was called out for making a decision for people that I shouldn't have made the decision for.

Hmm. Well, I think there's a lot to unpack there about why you made that decision. And what you were aiming for at the time and whether or not the decision got you there or not. And yeah, it did.

It did get me there. And yes, I did unpack that in my mind. But it was interesting that somebody else spotted it who's a coach. Yes. Wait a second. Yes. And challenged me on it.

Yeah, I think it's really important to like have that inner circle of people that will not let you settle for mediocrity, right? That will not let you settle for less than what you are capable of doing. Exactly. And sometimes those truths come in hard packages.

Oh, gosh, yes. Oh, are we talking? So I love the idea of having discussion, because the whole concept of imposter syndrome, to me, doesn't settle for me, that I can't associate with it. But having what you're talking about, I can really associate. And Carolyn Boyce just put on— she said, CB, your conference was great. Thank you, Carolyn. She's with Chief Financial Officer Association. We are over by 10 minutes. Yes. And I am sorry, audience, but this is such a good conversation.

I mean, we should have a whole conversation about imposter syndrome and What it is and what it's not, and frankly why it's the biggest gaslight that's ever been foisted upon women, and why we should welcome the feelings that come along with it.

Yeah, yeah.

Because there's a whole chapter in Wonderhell that's going to be about that, and I am, if I can say, ripshit about the fact that we have been told that we are imposters, which means that we're the problem, and that we have a syndrome, which means that we're sick.

Oh my God, I never thought about it like that.

Yes, yes. Imposter— when my kids were little and their, their, their nose would drip, I knew we were 24 hours to an all-out scream fest of an ear infection, and I couldn't wait to get on the doctor's calendar to get in, have them look in the ear, and give me a prescription. We diagnosed the problem is the ear infection, the solution is this medicine. Well, with imposter syndrome, we're diagnosing that you're the problem and the solution is changing you. Imposter, you don't belong syndrome. There's something wrong with you. That's horseshit.

I never thought of it that way.

Yeah, so we should have a whole conversation about imposter syndrome because the moment that you realize that you are an imposter, you have broken a boundary, you have broken a barrier, you have broken a ceiling, and you are further than you ever thought you could go because nobody trained you to be there, because no one expected you to be there, which means you're doing something Right. So we should welcome those feelings.

I probably never associated with that term. When Marshall talked about it, I'm like, okay, this doesn't involve me.

Yeah. So there you have it. I have a lot of very strong feelings about imposter syndrome. But we do need to end.

I'm sorry, but oh, I know we do. Okay, audience, talk about ending the season with a blowout interview. Was not I am so freaking energized now.

I have to tell you, you know, Joe DeCena of Spartan Games, he, he read my book and I had him on the podcast and he, he, and he had me on his podcast and he started the podcast, the Spartan Podcast, by saying, you know, I read Limitless and I have to say I didn't expect to like it as much as I did. So you're saying that you weren't expecting this? I feel like I get that a lot.

I have to— we'll talk about it offline.

Yes. Okay.

I pigeonholed you.

Perfect. I love that.

My audience is gonna kill me. Guys, listen, this has been an incredible interview. I think that, you know, my top interview, top couple of interviews, Dr. Richard Boyatzis Brigadier General Dr. Bernie Banks. And Laura, you're right up there now at the top.

Winning!

Winning! Okay, everybody, look, have a great summer. We're off. Bye!