The Powerful Olympian Mindset of Leslie Maxie: On the Track and On Stage.

Our ego is really the thing that brings on glossophobia. It is the fear of the unknown. And when we're in a situation and we find it hard to really be ourselves, it's because we don't know how people are going to respond to who we are.

A root problem for why people can't be themselves.

Lack of communication.

So tell me more about that.

The biggest issue in communication is the belief that it's actually happened. And if the leader communicates something and the employees don't feel like they can provide feedback, that is very much a leadership problem. That means you haven't laid the foundation for your people to feel safe.

How easy is it for you to tell someone the truth when you know.

It'S going to hurt them? Choose your words carefully, because as a leader, we have the opportunity to always be building. I offer that you sit with that and figure out what it is inside of you that has you feel that way about that person.

Okay, so I'm with Leslie Maxey. I appreciate you joining me. She's a 1988 U.S. olympian journalist and entrepreneur and international keynote speaker. And she's been a journalist for ESPN and Fox Sports, CBS and NBC. She has a consulting company called the Maxi Media Group. And one of my favorite little tidbits about you was you held the track and field record for over 32 years. I was reading a little bit about you before the interview, and I got an opportunity to get a lot of information from you on our first interview with Authority magazine. And so I'm really excited to follow up, get a little bit deeper in some of the details. And you had just a very impressive interview. And so I'm really excited to talk to you. So thanks for joining me.

Thanks so much for having me.

Absolutely. So why don't you kick us off and just maybe just first start by just sharing with people, listening, just a little bit about your athletic background, a little bit about just high level, you know, who you are, and then we'll kind of just kick right into it.

Sure. Absolutely. Well, I started running when I was six years old. And it was at a time when, you know, my brothers, my cousins were doing it and I couldn't stay home alone. So I just sort of by default, kind of became a track runner, but fell in love with it pretty early on. And when I was 10 years old, I decided I was going to the Olympics. Wow. Didn't have much proof, but I, I knew that it was, it was something that I kind of had a. For my life and was able to to accomplish that. But, yeah, so, you know, I've been in athletics all of my life, been in entertainment since I was like, nine years old. I started reporting, and. And it's such a. It's such a joy to be able to continue in those areas. Even all these years later. It just really feels like an extension of who I am and how I show up in the world. So. Cool.

I'm curious, when you look back, how much of your ability to see yourself and, like, want to be an Olympian, how much do you think that had to play? Like, if you think about visualization and people talking about how you can actually become something before you become it, did it play a role for you? Was it.

Was it?

Or is it just a dream?

Yeah, no, it plays a huge role. It played a role in my life. It plays a role. To this day, I very much can see myself. Like, when I. When I started in television, I saw this show. It was called Kids Watch Kid Reporters. And my mom used to call me newsy instead of nosy because I was in everything, all in her business. And so when I. When I saw the show, it was like a light bulb went off my head. I was like, this was for me. I mean, like, I felt like they had actually built it for me because never was there a kid that was more devoted to getting the information, getting the facts. I love to engage people in conversation, and that's really been a hallmark of my life. Even as the Olympics, as an example. I was 10 years old, I just said, and my cousin, her name is Marianne Franklin now Boughton. She was a runner as well, and she had gone to her first junior national team. And so for context, you have junior teams, senior teams, and Olympic teams. And every summer, some iteration of those teams will be traveling around the world. So she went to her first one. Now, I didn't know that it wasn't the Olympics. She came back, she had red, white, and blue sweats, and it said USA on it. That's all I needed, Chad. And. And she got back the day of our AAU nationals. And so she came to the meet, and I ran anchor on the 4 by 400 relay. And that's generally the last relay of the meet. A track meet will start with a 4 by, it'll end with a 4x4. And. And so I ran anchor and got the baton in, like, fourth place and, you know, did the. Ms. Pac man, chomping them up until I got to the person and won the race. And I was, you know, so tired and dramatic and everything and there's pictures of me like my mom and my brother are helping me off the track. And at one point, I'm laying in the middle of the infield, and my cousin comes over and as casually as you can possibly imagine, she unzips her sweatshirt, takes it off and tosses it on me. And she says, one day, you'll earn your own. Wow. Wow. That was catnip for a 10 year old. And I started to envision myself as an Olympian, but what I say now is I should have envisioned myself as a gold medal winning Olympian. Specificity is important, Chad. Make sure the audience knows that part too. Right.

You gotta be careful what you ask for. Right?

Got to be careful what you ask for.

You might just get it for sure. That's so great. That's so great. Did your coaches ever, like, push that visualization and like, you know, did you.

Yeah, Yeah. I thought you were gonna say, did they ever push me going to the Olympics. They didn't. But very much visualization, especially in. So what Mr. Parker used to do was he would have us, you know, we were traveling to a meet or whatever, we would go to the stadium the day before, and I walk the track. And he'd say, visualize yourself on each one of the hurdles. Visualize how you're taking the hurdle, that you're attacking the hurdle and, you know, running away and for all 10 hurdles. And I would walk the entire 400 meters in my mind going through all of my execution patterns. And then what that did was when I would go to bed that night, he'd say, I want you to fall asleep visualizing yourself having a flawless race. And then when we got done, he'd say, now I want you to take some time and visualize yourself having that flawless race. And, you know, very rarely do you have a flawless race. I don't think I ever have flawless phrase. But you can visualize the things that you didn't do as well as you could and correct them. And that was a big part of it because of the way our subconscious learns. It takes. It takes six times to do something correctly when you've done it incorrectly. But that doing it doesn't have to happen in physical activity. It can happen between our right ear and our left ear. That's the important thing. It's amazing in any part of your life. So it has served me to this day.

Do you. Do you. How do you apply it to business? How do you apply it in the world of entrepreneurship? And, I mean, you're into so many things, and I Could see when it comes to public speaking, for sure, because, you know, they say it's one of the biggest fears that people have, but it's still once you get your reps in, you start to get more comfortable with it. But do you apply it or do you. Or is it just comfortable for you just to get up on stage and speak?

I absolutely apply it. I absolutely apply it. I teach it. The program that I created, the curriculum, is called the speaker in you. Because I believe that the speaker that any of us envisions we can be already resides inside of us. And it's my job to help bring that out. It's mindset, method and monetization. What's the mindset that you need to be able to overcome? Glossophobia, which is what you're talking about. 85% of the world. Of the world abhor speaking. And so what do we all have in common? Our brain, between the right ear and the left ear. And so the mindset that you need to be able to take the stage confidently. And then the method part, what are the skills that you need to be able to employ to be able to be competent on the stage? And then the monetization side is what is your return on investment? And so what I teach my students has very much been taken from my 30 plus years. I think I've been speaking since. For 40 years because the first time I spoke on stage in front of 15,000 people, I was 15 years old. Yeah. And so using all of that information to teach my students so that they can do the same thing, so that they can bring the speaker that's within them out on stage. And it very much is a mindset for pursuit. And so I utilize mindset as I'm teaching and I utilize it for myself before I go on stage. I am, if I can at all have it be possible, I'll have them send me a picture of the room where I'll be speaking as close to what the setup will be so I can start to visualize myself. Because even if you're not, even if you're not nervous about being on stage, it's always helpful if you've had a run through. And sometimes you don't get a chance to have a run through. So anything that I can do in my mind goes a long way with helping me to be able to hit the stage with that level of comfort. So I'm instantly connecting with the audience. That's really what it's about. Being able to share my story in a framework with a call to action that will help them to use it in their own lives. If I'm just up there talking, then it might be inspirational or motivational, But I promise you, two weeks from now, you're going to say what you talk about, and you'll be like, I just remember. It kind of made me feel good. But I really want to give you something that you can use in your own life. That's what it's about.

It's amazing. I saw a study done where they hooked up athletes to some machines where they had them visualize doing what you're talking about, like seeing themselves go around the track. And then they connected people who are actually physically active and the brain was doing the same exact thing. And I. I recently saw Kobe Bryant video that talked about how he used to visualize before he'd go to bed and he would see himself in a perfect game. And he said, you know, why would I not make it so perfect? Because why not? Why wouldn't you?

And.

And he said. And so then by the time I got out to the game, I was able to just do what I've already done thousands of times. And I thought that was really powerful. I mean, I teach my kids this, and to hear you talking about it, you know, I could see how you can apply it to on stage. You know, you said something, Leslie, you said, you want to pull out people's best. You want to pull out what's in them. And so my next question for you is, I've always said one of the hardest things in the world is for people to be themselves. But why do you think it is? Why is it so hard for people? Why do you have to work so hard and be paid for it and coach people on how to get what's already in them, who they are, what is it and where? At the root, what is the problem? Because it's. It's rapid.

It's.

It's. A lot of people have that problem, right?

It very much is. Yeah. Well, understanding that it's our. Our ego is really the thing that. That brings on glossophobia. It is the fear of the unknown. And. And when we're in a situation and we find it hard to really be ourselves, it's because we don't know how people are going to respond to who we are. That's what it is. And so the more time we spend really in relationship to ourselves, reflecting on things in our lives from a place of compassion, not of derision, not of being critical, but really compassionate, honest critique, then that gives us the Opportunity to improve, but improve in a way that we're actually leveling up. Because the thing about it, Chad, is that our subconscious doesn't hear nuance. So if you say, oh, my God, I am so fat, all your subconscious hears is, oh, my God, I'm so fat. It doesn't hear that you're being jokey about it. It only hears I'm so fat. And if we're talking to ourselves in ways that lack compassion, that don't honor who we are, that we are God's creatures, then it's really difficult for us to feel good about who we are and to feel comfortable as we're connecting with people thinking, oh, my God, they're gonna see. They're gonna see me. And if I'm not being compassionate with myself, what are they actually seeing? Shoot. I'd feel nervous about being myself too. Myself too. Right, right, right.

So what happens when people do build that confidence? They're still gonna be critiqued. They're still gonna be giving feedback that it's gonna hurt. And that. That the real fear is, is. Is the. The gut punch of either instant feedback or worse. You know, with public speaking, you don't know you lost people, and you don't even know because they've checked out, and you don't get the immediate feedback from them. Right. So there's kind of two things here. One is going to be the confidence of building yourself so that you can be strong enough to be confident. But the other thing is to overcome the fear.

Right.

How do people do that?

Well, there's a couple things. So you mentioned a few different things. Feedback. Feedback is just information. It's not right, it's not wrong. It's just information. And when I talk about bringing out the space speaker that you envision, it is already inside of you. And so I can give you critique now. Critique that's done compassionately and honestly, in that order, is information that you can take into and determine what you want to do with it. Because feedback is only information. You can say, I like that about myself. I like my Bronx accent, or I like this or I like that. I really don't want to change that. That's my secret sauce. That's the thing that makes me so special. Okay? And so it's. It's having that kind of the yin and the yang, being able to look at a situation and. And determine for yourself what works. I'm going to offer to you two hats. My coach hat and my audience hat. If I'm saying, like, hey, this is what I'M seeing you as the client, as the student, get to make the decision about what you want to do with it. Because it's just feedback. And when you look at it in that way. And so the other thing that you said was about being scared on stage, understanding this, what happens in our body physiologically when we say, oh my God, I'm scared, oh my God, I'm nervous, or oh my God, I'm so excited, all the same things, the same firings that happen in your body for those three statements. The experience that we have of it is different. The experience that I have of being excited is, hell yeah, I'm about to do this. The experience that I have of being scared is, oh, shit. What's going to happen and how you get yourself to that point is in your preparation. If you have gone through the entire soup to nuts preparation, I say it takes 90 days to actually create and execute and critique a keynote soup to nuts because you have the actual ideation, you have the research, you have the choreography, workshopping, internalization, which is different than memorization, all of these things before you actually hit the stage. And if you give yourself the time and are working in a place of urgency, not frantic urgency, meaning I'm staying on top of this, I'm leaning into it. You get through that nine, 90 day period and you've given your keynote, you've done your critique because that's how you get better. You've done your critique. You can say, I did everything that I could do to stand, to stand. And what it also does is it puts you in a position where when you're on stage and you have a roadmap that you're following, but every now and then when I'm on stage, I'll get a download where like God would be like, going this direction, okay, hey, and blah, blah, blah, blah. And then I can come back to the roadmap. But that's because I'm so prepared that it's beyond the point of memorization. You've seen people when they're talking and it's like, so I'm here and I'm doing this. And you're like, damn, this guy looks like a robot. That's memorization. Internalization is when you're actually embodying what it is you're sharing. And that takes some work. But if you put the work in that but. And if you put the work in, you will have the outcome. And irrespective of what the feedback is, after you've done all you can to stand, you just Stand.

Tell me about the work. What does that entail, putting in the work? It sounds great, but most people don't want to do it.

Well, you know, who is it? Was it Nick Saban who said he did this interview and he went deep into how he evaluates and recruits players? And the reporter at one point said, 1.6. Why are you sharing these trade secrets? These are things I've never heard before. He said, I can share these things because 98% of society is not willing to do what I'm willing to do to have the outcome right. That's the difference. So I don't have a problem sharing any of this because you have to be willing to do the work. You can pay for a training with me, and trust me, it's going to cost a pretty penny. But at the end of the day, I can only. All I can ever do is have the two hats. Your coach and your audience. You, Chad, will have to do the work, and I promise you, I'll put you through it.

When people come to you and they want your help, they want your guidance, right? What's the theme that you kind of see? I mean, let's stay on the topic of fear, because I think it's one thing to get up on stage and it's. It's pretty normal for people to be freaked out, especially if they haven't done it right.

And it's just.

Even if you have done it, you're always going to get the nerves right, just like an athlete is always going to have the butterflies. But you can feed off of it when you get the right mindset. But for a work environment, there's a lot of other nuances involved with authority figures, your boss, your co workers, avoiding conflict. I mean, there's so many issues. So people come to you and they want some help. They have someone who's got a strong mindset. They want to do the work. But is there anything that you see as a common theme, a thread that runs through the workplace where, whether it be entrepreneurs or just leaders in general, that you see as, like a root problem for why people can't be themselves?

Lack of communication.

So tell me more about that.

I think it was. Was it Thoreau that said the, the biggest issue in communication is the belief that it's actually happened? We. We think a lot of times. So I'll use myself as an example. I have a very active internal life. I can be thinking about things and doing something, but my mind is completely someplace else and I'm building universes. There are times when, like, if I'm trying to solve a problem or, like, I want to hook or I want to transition in a keynote, and I haven't been able to get. Get it, I promise you, I will dream that that solution. That is not an unusual thing for me. Now, here's where it becomes a problem. I have worked for NASCAR and Formula one. I'm a little bit hard of hearing, and so I went to be evaluated. My husband came with me because it's frustrating for him, and he's like, babe, you don't listen to me. And I'm like, I didn't hear you. So I went to the doctor, and I, you know, I got the evaluation. She said, yeah, you know, you do have some pretty significant hearing loss. She said, but there are some things that he can do. She said, so, Philip, when you want to get les attention, actually call her name first. Leslie. Give her the opportunity to respond to you, then start saying what you're saying. She goes. She said, because if you say something to her and she's in her head, you know, she's not in conversation with you. So she's in her head, she's cooking, whatever, and you say something, and she misses the first part and asks you to repeat it, and then you get frustrated because you think she's not listening to you because you're not important to her. That's not true at all. You have a job to do here as well. So that. That's a physical issue. But when it comes to actual communication, a lot of times what. What people say is about them. Their experience, their background, their belief system. Okay. Very rarely is it about us. Now, we can. We can project. That's the word I'm groping for. We can project something onto somebody, but it's very much about us. Understanding that people treat us the way that they do because of their background helps to take out a lot of the blame. Wow, he's mean. Or he's. This. That whole. That cliche that says hurt people, hurt people, hurt people. As. As trite as it sounds, it's so true. You are. When you are feeling good and you are in a great place, you just want high fives and handshakes from everybody, right? And when you're in a pissy mood, you generally are going to treat people from the place that you're feeling, that you're feeling. That's a communication issue. So understanding that people treat you how they feel and based on their background and their history takes. Takes a lot of the blame out of it. So I can Be like, wow, this person actually isn't. He's not mad at me, or he's not having. He's just having a bad day. And then it helps me to respond with compassion because I get to control the energy based on how I respond to it. So if you say something to me shitty and I say, I'm really sorry that you feel that way, okay, let's talk about it. Like, how did you get there? Let's really talk about it. It's difficult for you to continue to be that guy when I'm coming at you completely calm in a way, in a posture of resolution. Let's figure out how we can get to a resolution here. It's how you can control the energy based on what you grace.

It's interesting because hearing you say that, you know, one of the problems that I've seen in entrepreneurship and for leaders is that when they send their message to their company, to their employees, the employees are too scared to even tell them the feedback. So they walk away thinking whatever they heard. Because we hear what we want to hear wherever we are. And if you're talking to more than one person, you can pretty much be sure that some people are going to hear one thing and another people are going to hear another. So, I mean, what kind of. What kind of disciplines, advice should leaders have when they're communicating their message? And they have to do it 10,000 times because they have to. That's the gig. Part of the leadership. Leadership gig is you got to keep repeating yourself. But there's always miscommunication at the root of a lot of conflict. Right? So how. How would you. How would you guide a CEO or an entrepreneur who says, I'm always being misunderstood, like, they need help with communication? Like, what are just any kind of disciplines that you have as a. As a. I mean, you really have mastered articulate the. The ability to articulate and communicate to people your message. So is that a natural thing for you?

I think I learned it. Some of it. Some of it is sort of natural. And then, you know, I learned it from my mom and my dad, how they communicate with us and family members. But there is a. There's a phrase that my grandmother used to use, and it's biblical. As the head goes, so goes the body. And so if your company, if your project is in chaos and you are the leader of that, guess what? Wherever you go, there you are. It really starts with the leader. And if the leader communicates something and the employees don't feel like they can provide feedback, that is Very much a leadership problem. That is not an employee problem. That means you haven't laid the foundation for your people to feel safe. People having psychological safety in their work experience is, it's critical. It is the difference between a company that will thrive and a company that will limp along just surviving.

And I, and so I agree with, I mean I was an entrepreneur. I sold my company for 25 years with a lot of employees. So I hear you. And I would also say on top of that is that it's normal to be afraid. And when someone's in an authority position, even more so. Like, you know, because you may be taken the wrong way, they may not. And to have at the heart of it, trust. Because if you don't have trust, no one's going to say a word to you, right? I mean, because they think you're going to kill them, that you can pay, you can pay. You take their paycheck away, you can fire them. So I'm curious, you know, like when you've seen the best communicators in the world of business be able to have the ability to connect with their people so they can give them that feedback, how have, what are they masters at? What are they so good at that they've been able to create a relationship where someone could feel that comfortable to hit them with something that's going to hurt, Right? Because it's rare, it is very rare to see it.

I think their masters at self reflection. If you, if you can really reflect on yourself the times when you have hit it out the park and the times when you dribbled to first base and fell onto that base, if you can be really clear about that and, and understand what it's rooted in, then it gives you the ability to create space where you can share those things with your employees. Want to say with your audience, with your employees and with your audience too. Because when we show up vulnerably and that people sometimes make a mistake comparing vulnerability with weakness. Not the same. Vulnerability is honesty. It's being honest about how about humanity? The fact that we are all human. I am going to screw the pooch sometimes. And it's my responsibility and really my privilege to own it. Because when I can own it and share it in that way, it creates space for everyone around me to go into those places and spaces where they don't normally want to traffic. Because we all have those dark corners in our lives. And I'm not saying that you just share stuff willy nilly, but being very intentional when I'm talking with Someone who is struggling in a particular area, I'm going to share first about how I have struggled with that or something similar, so I can create some alignment so that they feel safe. Wow. This person understands me. They get me. They get that I'm struggling right now. And together we can figure out a solution. And the solution sometimes might be that you are not the right person for this role. But everyone has value. Everyone has value. And everyone wants to be in a place where they can thrive and they can feel and value. How can we figure that out?

How would you describe the difference between vulnerability and being transparent?

Being transparent. So I can be transparent about the incredible things that I've done. Dude, I hold a world record for 32 years. That's pretty wonderful. But when I say things like that, what it does is it creates a space. What I call speaker island syndrome. You're on an island, your audience is on the shore. And my job is to create a bridge of connection. And so people might look at me and think, she doesn't have any problems. She's figured it all out. She did all of these things. And so it's my job to create, to share vulnerably so that you can feel connected to me, because we've been connected in things that are difficult. So to me, the difference between transparency and vulnerability is vulnerability takes courage. Encourage usually means sharing the things that aren't wonderful, the things that aren't great, the things that haven't gone well. Right.

I. I mean, I. I hear that. I think, you know, I think being vulnerable and transparent, I think is one of the best leadership qualities that a leader can have, because it does it. It creates the bridge. And I think people have to see that you're human and you're not just the boss.

Right.

So I think that's a. An important quality and a great point. You had made a comment in our first interview about your husband and about. I forgot exactly what it was because I read, I reviewed these notes when I first booked this interview. Something about being able to be yourself and tell the truth. Like, hit the truth. So how easy is it for you to tell someone the truth when you know it's going to hurt them?

Well, Sue. Well, back to training my students. When I. When I first start with my students, I give them the paradigms. These are the things that underpin everything that we do. And one of them is, you know, to. To improve as a speaker, you have to critique yourself. You have to critique yourself. You have to be able to see, like, what does my face look like when I say, blah, blah, blah, what does it look like when I spread my arms out? All these different things you have to be able to look at. And what I say is, I, you cannot, at least in my presence, I will not allow you to speak about yourself, about yourself in a way that you wouldn't talk to someone that you love, revere and care for. Okay. And so that, that is, is really the basis of it. And, and when I think about. I'm sorry, can you give me a question again?

Just like the ability to tell someone the truth when you know they need to hear it, but it's going to hurt.

Yes. Okay. Everything, everything can be spoken in love. And, and if I'm telling you that you can't speak about yourself in non loving terms, then how am I going to, going to turn around and speak about you in non loving terms? And that doesn't mean it can't be truthful. It has to be truthful. It has to be honest, but it has to be honest and compassionate. That's how you can tell people difficult things. Because the thing about it is if you tell somebody something that's true and you say it in a way that is negative or is harsh or me, it's still gonna, it's still gonna land, but it's gonna land and it's gonna land like a bomb. Okay. So you're also blowing up that person's internal life. I can tell you something that is truthful and tell you in love and it will land like a thousand pound feather. A feather is still going to lay like this. Right. And it gives you the opportunity to have it resonate. But it also can take root in a way where you can then grow something that's going to be productive for you to make that change. Whatever it was that the feedback was around, it can always be delivered in love. And I will challenge leaders to do that.

What if they don't feel that though? Like you have employees. I'm a manager and I've got a bunch of employees. And you know, there's three people who are underperforming. I'm getting pressure and I need to hit them with whatever performance reviews, you know, typical what happens in an office environment. And I don't want to sandwich in good news, bad news, good news, or I don't want to play the game, I just want to tell the truth. But if I don't, if I don't like the people, how do I, I don't want to be fake.

Right.

So like how do you, how do you hit without. Without throwing the bomb.

Yeah. Why? What is the. I. Then I. I return and. And ask you, what is the benefit? What is the hurting them while sharing news that may not be positive?

So, so I would say if I were to, like, if we were to kind of dissect the conversation, let's just hypothetically say that we're not hurting them, but they're hurt by just what they heard. So sometimes the truth is going to hurt. Right. You just need to hear they have a blind spot. And maybe just as an example, we'll use an example. So someone is constantly either interrupting or cutting people off during meetings, and I need to hit that person. And they're very sensitive. And no matter what you say to them, they're always either. They're just a sensitive person. And so it's like, I can't win as a leader. Do I have to dance around that? Or as a leader, can I just. Can I hit the truth? Do it with love and know that it's just going to. It could crush.

I don't. I don't think you have to dance around it. We have. We have vocabulary, and I can think of four words that have the exact same meaning and. And they will have different impact based on the words. Choose your words carefully. Choose your words carefully. Because as a. As a leader, we have the opportunity to always be building. And if there's somebody that I don't like, I'm gonna ask myself, what is it? What is it that that person is bringing out in me that has me as me? Yeah. Because usually, like, I'll use my children, for example. Greatest teachers I will ever have. They will bring something up and I'll be like, I can't believe you did that. If I really think about it, that actually lives in me too. And it's something that I either don't like or I'm ashamed of or whatever. And. And you can't turn away from your children because they're your kids. Now you have an employee that. That prickles something inside of you. I offer that you sit with that and figure out what it is inside of you. Is inside of it has. You feel that way about that person. Feel that way about that person.

That's a good point. Okay, let me. Let me just switch gears a little bit, because I don't want to run. Run out of time. But you have. You have battled in your athletic journey with some injuries and having to bounce back. Can you tell me what you learned about process of having to bounce back and going too hard, doing Taking on too much and then applying it to the world of work, you know, falling at work, taking on too much, having a rebound. Like, what are some of the similarities and what have you learned over the course of your career about how to bounce back for people who are, you know, just pretty much burning themselves out right now?

Well, I think that, you know, that, that injury or, or work fatigue is gonna happen in, in our lives at some point. As an athlete, I don't think I know of an athlete that's never been injured. Maybe somebody that's never had surgery, surgery, you know, but everybody's been injured and, and the same occurs in our work life. We have to stay on top of ourselves, we have to give ourselves rest, we have to give ourselves proper time to warm up. All of these things help you as an athlete to stay healthier, to stay off injury. It's when we are doing things that, hey, we're going to try and you know, do this little high jump and we're not really warmed up and wow, all of a sudden we hurt our knee. It's because our body wasn't ready for that. Same thing goes in our, in our work life. We need to give ourselves some ramp up time every day and on a quarterly and yearly basis. We need to give ourselves some time to reflect. At the end of the day, at the end of the quarter, at the end of the year, we need to give ourselves some time to rest. My coach generally said you need to at some point in the year get out of shape. You need to get out of shape because your body can't stay in that finely tuned state all the time. Same thing occurs in work. That's why people get burned out because they're working on such a high level that their body, you know, does. What was it Roberto Duran that said? No mas. No mas. Yeah. At some point, your body, your mind, your psyche needs a rest that is as much a part of your journey and being successful as being on 10. You have to take some time. When you're on 2 and you're not doing anything, you're not working your brain, you're not working your body, you're not striving, you're not strategizing, not planning. You are just in that state of bliss that is 100% without activity. Your body needs that.

I remember, I remember.

I.

You know, I've had a coach since 2010 and he used to say to me that you have to find time to be productive because if you're not, if you're always on, you got to find time, you got to find. He used to say that's why you have to margins on the edge of a book, because it doesn't run off the page. It gives you cushion. He's like, put cushion. Even in your calendar, you have to be able to put cushions in so you don't get too, you know, bogged down on your schedule. Can you, instead of asking you how you handle work life, balance. And I personally have a problem with balance because I think depending on what stage of life you're in, you're going to be either. I mean, if you just had kids, you're not going to be balanced. And if you, if you just start a new career, you may not be balanced. But can you walk us through like a typical day of someone in your shoes? And you have a lot going on in your career, you've done a lot. But in regards to just kind of seeing a snapshot of like your day, you know, and some of your disciplines that you have throughout your day, what.

Does it look like? Well, for me, you know, I'm. I'm 56 years old and, and going through menopause and sometimes my sleep is, is erratic and that really impacts you. And so what does the day look like? I try and make sure that any meetings that I have scheduled, if I can have them a little later on in the day, just in case I have a tough night, and in the morning time I'm going to get up, I'm going to start my day in prayer. I'm always going to. That's almost literally the first thing I do before I get out of bed. I'll start thinking about people who I know in my life or in my ecosystem who are struggling in some way. And I will start in prayer with them for them to, to make sure that I have covered them to the extent that I can. Then I'm going to take some time before I go to bed. I will have looked at my schedule already, so I know what the next day is going to look like. And I, and I just start, I try and start kind of slow, you know, I will have my, my quiet time. I'll have some time for exercise. I will have had that spiritual time. I'll take my own spiritual time. And this generally takes about an hour. So I can, I can work my way through it to make sure that I'm feeling full from a person like who I am as a human before I'm going to be giving of myself to other people. If I'm not full, nobody else is going to be full. And so I want to start my day as close to full as I possibly can. And then I get into my meetings and everything and you know, especially when I have, I generally do my student sessions on Mondays. And you know, and it is, it's emotional work because you're talking about people's life stories and curating those stories and creating a framework so that they can use those stories on stage to really inspire their audience and give them a call to action. And so holding space for people is if I've taken care of myself first, as if I've taken care of myself. So my day starts with taking care of myself so that I can take care of the people that, that would be on my list. If it's students, if it's an audience, because I'm speaking, I need to take care of myself first. I need to take care of myself.

You know, self care, you know, obviously is an important thing because to your point, how are you going to be able to give if you haven't taken care of yourself? People burn themselves out. There's also the balance of, you know, sometimes it looking as if to other people, not that it should matter so much, but it could look selfish if you're doing so much for yourself. And I work on myself a lot. And you know, to some people who, it's not their thing, you know, they may have a different opinion of it. So do you have a way of, like in your own way of processing self care and taking care of yourself, having your time, knowing when enough?

And so for me, it's, I, I have to sort of schedule things. So, you know, if I, if I start my day in that, in that conversation with myself about where I am spiritually, where I am emotionally, where I am physically, and, and I'm doing the things that I need to do to make sure that my tank is full. You know, put it this way, anybody that says I'm doing too much, one, they don't really know me. Two, they don't know how much is required of me on a daily basis, what I give out and, and understand this. I love my work, I love what I do. And it takes a tremendous amount of effort and diligence on my part. And I don't pull any punches as far as that's concerned. If I'm on a call with somebody and they're like, hey, can we double up on sessions? No, we can't, because that's going to require too much of me. Now what I can do is meet you two days later. But I can't do back to back sessions with the same person because there's just a requirement of what I'm going to have to give to them. And it's more than I can give. And so, you know, I have the daily kind of self care that I do and I, I kind of shy away from the word self care because it is almost become rote. It's, it's almost like a cliche now. Oh, girl, you better do some self care. No, you really need to know what self care looks like for you. And if you do, it may not show up in the way that it does for somebody else. So there are things that I'm going to do on a monthly basis. Like I have a subscription to a massage studio. So I'll go in and get massage because that's something that's really, really important to me. And understanding where I hold stress in my body and the things that I can do to try and de stress little things like, you know, looking at Netflix before I go to bed, it just sort of helps me to kind of decompress. And I lay down and I'm like, boom. Mindless. And so different things that I can do. But it starts with being self reflective and asking yourself what you need. Because what I need is going to be different than what you need. And so I can give all the different things that I do and somebody can hear it, but it may not be what they need. These can be things that you can think about and maybe test out and try, but really get, get quiet with yourself and figure out what you need, what works for you. Like my mother can't stand massage. She's like, oh, it gives me the creeps out. Somebody's hands on me like that. Okay, that's not gonna work for her. That's actually gonna stress her out. So it's like to thine own self be true. And that, that comes with self knowledge and understanding. Comes with self knowledge and understanding.

You, you had mentioned your age before, but I'm curious. How old do you feel?

Feel? You know, I, the thing about when people say to me, oh, you look so good for your age, I'm like, huh, that's actually not a compliment. And here's the thing. I, I love the age that I am right now, the wisdom that I have. And I, and I came here as, as a kid with a pretty fair amount of wisdom. And I can see how it's developed over the years and how it's evolved. And I'm sorry, so grateful for that. I'm Grateful for this moment that I'm in right now. And so when I say I feel 56, and that's pretty freaking good, and that's not even a word I want to use. I love where I am in my life. I love my silver hair. I love where my body is. I love how I, I, I love it. I am, I feel 56, and I'm damn glad for it.

Yeah, you're blessed because I don't know if a lot of people probably can't say that. So that's nice. It's nice. I, I love, I love the confidence and, and the awareness of your wisdom because of what you've experienced. I'm curious to know if there's anything that you believe that other people think is great.

I believe that. Oh, I know. Everything's always working out for me. My motto.

Has that always been a model of yours.

Literally, if I could leave my chair and pick up, I have a little, a little picture and the script is written out, written out. And here's why I believe that. It doesn't mean that I haven't had tremendous struggle, deep struggle, partly fucked up shit that's happened to me. And the perspective that I choose means that it can actually work in my favor. And I would never wish it on anybody else. But it is my life. Life, not but. And it is my life. When you say but, you negate everything you said before. And it is my life. And every single day that I wake up on this side of the grave is an opportunity for gratitude. And so in gratitude is being grateful for everything. So if I can look at something that's happened to me, something that's maybe not. Not wonderful, maybe not, and figure out how it has worked in my favor, and if it's, if it is just surviving that, if it's surviving that and figuring out a way that I can thrive, then everything is working out for me. I think the example that I always use is missing the Olympic team when I was in high school, if I had made the Olympic team, that would have been a whole four months worth of work. And I wouldn't understand the process that's necessary sometimes. And that's not to say that great things don't happen every now and then. Hey, even a blindfold squirrel gets a nut every now and then. But the process, we cannot shirk the process. We always, always will have to, on some level, be in process. And to understand it and to be able to make our way through to that thing that we achieve at the end, that is the gift that Keeps on giving. It's the gift that keeps on giving. So yeah, everything is always working out because I have a new day to achieve something that I didn't even have a chance to envision yet, but it's coming.

That's very cool. So let's just end real quick. So you said you keep using the word students. So can you just tell us real quick one, how do people find you? And you know, what is it that you're actually doing to help people? Is that it about public speaking? Is it about leadership? What kind of a coach are you? And just kind of give our listeners a little bit of an inside look at.

So I train athletes, executives and activists who are front facing to the camera or speak from the stage. And so that can be a CEO who is called to do conversations with other CEOs or they really want to level up their skill or they're being called on to do an industry wide keynote. I would be the person they call me. If you're an activist and you're having a moment and all of a sudden, you know, you're in the press and you're doing interviews and you're speaking from the stage, I'm the person that would do that. And it's, it's the combination of really it is, it's taken from my life. It's media training. So that's me as a reporter taking my skill and putting it into curriculum form so I can teach people how they deal with the media. It's keynote speaker training that's extrapolating from my 40 years of experience on stage all of the different things that you need to be able to master so that you can have the mindset method and the monetization, the return on the investment. And, and how can you find me? Well, you can find me at maximedia group, it's maximediagroup.com I don't do much, if any.