#72: Amy Morin Returns to Share How She Harnesses Mental Strength in Her Business

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Hi, and welcome back. I'm so glad you're back here with me again this week. So it was a crazy weekend for me. We went away to a really great resort with a bunch of friends of ours and a lot of kids and had such an amazing time. And we really have not been doing very much because of COVID And it was so, so fun to get a change of scenery, to be outside, to be with people we haven't seen in a long time. It was really, really exciting. However, anytime you do that, of course, when you get back home, you're unorganized, you're behind. You know, I took the entire weekend off and didn't work at all, which has not been my normal during COVID So I super behind. And we actually ended up extending the last day of the trip. And it was funny. I had been on a waiting list to stay and check out on Monday. It was a holiday weekend, and they said, you know, I'd call down every day. How are we looking? How are we looking? Nope, no luck. No luck. And we literally packed everything up. It was Sunday, and we were leaving. I called the car up, brought all the bags downstairs, got the kids together, and we were driving back home. I have friends that are in from Massachusetts and are staying with us. And my girlfriend says, let's do one last stop by and just see. And this just goes to show, you have to ask. You just have to. And it was so good. Even though I had been calling every single day and asking ad nauseam, she was right. We're leaving the building. Why not ask one more time? And thank goodness she did that. We walk up to the front desk, we ask, and he says, actually, we just got two cancellations. Now, when I tell you we had been staying in the smallest room with two little boys and had mattresses everywhere, and it was just complete chaos in this room that we had. So when they said that they had two rooms, we said, oh, my gosh, that would be ideal because everybody could be in their own, you know, regular bed, and that would be so great for a great night's sleep. And then to go back home that way would just be perfect. We said, what are the rates like? And, you know, what. What are the rooms like? Well, it ends up. It was so surreal and crazy. The rates were better than when we had booked, you know, a month in advance for our trip that we had just been on and the rooms were bigger and better. It was so bizarre. So it was one of those surreal moments that you just remind yourself, keep putting out there into the universe what it is that you want and keep showing up and asking for it, even when you've been told no 900 times. Because that's exactly what happened to us. We had the greatest time. So glad we stayed that one extra night. It was so nice and everyone had an amazing time. So we get home this week and things have been crazy because we live in a two bedroom apartment and have so many people here and it's just, it's been so fun and so crazy. So work has been super intense this week. One of those weeks where you're doing a lot of the legwork but not seeing, seeing a lot of the fruition that you want to see, which can get super, super frustrating. But I've been doing this for a long time and I know that that's usually right when you're about to break through on something big. You just have to stay committed to that process, knowing that, you know, I'm always looking for a better way to improve the process, automate the process, optimize the process. However, you can't just give up on the process. You know, it works. And until you find a better way, you just keep burning it up and taking swings at it. So that's kind of what this week has been like, which has been a bit frustrating and I'm a little exhausted. But, you know, we just keep showing up. You really never know what the next day is going to hold. And I've seen that enough times in my life that I'm just showing up, putting the work in and hoping for the best, knowing that things will start coming together, they will start clicking. Then today I had a call with my publisher and the publishing business has been going through some major challenges which I wasn't aware of. I, I guess I hadn't been paying attention to this, that there had been a significant hit in book sales, in hardcover book sales specifically, because there essentially for months now has been no in store opportunity to buy. Right. So people are only buying things online, which means they're not just picking up a book as they walk through a mall and see Barnes and Noble or it made a lot of sense once they explained it to me. But it also puts tremendous pressure on the publishers, on the printing presses and people are scrambling now. That's not unlike any other business. I feel most businesses right now are going through These really hard times and questioning what's gonna happen. But I'm new to publishing this really older, established business. I'm new to it, super excited about it. And these are sort of the rookie pains that you go through. It was a tough call today hearing about, you know, what expectations are and delays that are happening and funding that's being cut and again, the same things that we're seeing in so many different industries. But this happening in this really new to me industry that, you know, I self published my first book and so going with a traditional publishing house is super exciting to me. And I'm so excited and grateful to get to work with experts now. But now seeing them go through a hard time and it just reminds me that in the end, it's really up to you and you alone to sell your product, whatever that may be. Whether it's coffee or books or services or speeches or whatever. You know, you've really got to figure out what is that process and how can you speed up that process to fill those pipelines, to accelerate revenues. And I've just been thinking about that a lot today. That as much as I'm grateful to be with a great publisher and so excited for that experience, in the end it is on me to sell those books. And I'm going to just constantly challenge myself and think. And the good news is I have some time. The books coming out in 2021, that what are those best practices and how can I reimagine them? How can I come up with a different, better way that someone hasn't seen yet? How can I approach this in a way that I know will accelerate success for my book sales? Because that is my goal, is to get that book into as many hands of as many people out there that need it. And it's funny speaking with someone about this today, that the challenge is finding who your right, qualified, best potential clients are and matching those people up on a quick call with you so that you can show the services that you deliver and move forward in a business partnership. Sounds easy, but given all the noise and the disparity and audiences and differences out there, it's not always easy. You know, it just. It takes a lot of testing, a lot of trying, and that whole attitude that I will just keep getting back up and swinging and figuring it out and keep getting back up and trying something different and just a commitment to not giving up. So don't give up on whatever your dream or vision is. It's all about taking that next step and staying committed to it. So I'M right there in it with you, I promise you that. So today's a little different. I did something like this a couple of weeks ago, but I wanted to give you guys a behind the scenes again. As you know, I have a group mentoring program and one on one executive coaching and consulting program that I launched in May during quarantine and it's been going great and it's amazing and I'm so proud of it and really love the people I work with and have been able to help a lot of people and really impactful ways and it's been great. So one of the things I like to do to add value for them is I bring in a guest speaker each month and I had tapped my friend Amy Morin, who's the best selling author of 13 Things Mentally Strong People Don't Do. She's actually launching her brand new podcast this week, you Gotta Listen. I'm actually one of her guests. She's an unbelievable speaker, unbelievable human being and her ted talk has 15 million views. It's one of the most viewed TED talks that's out there. So you gotta check her out. She's a really impressive person and she's actually a licensed therapist and that's how this all started for her. So anyhow, she and I became friends over a year ago through a mutual friend of ours. And we've always, you know, wondered how we can work together and partner on events and do things together. She lives further south in Florida than I do, but we are pretty close to one another. And I had asked her, I said, hey, can you dial in for me on one of my Zoom team meetings on a Friday? And she said yes, but it ended up there was no wifi one time, and another time she was traveling and another time life was going on, whatever it was. So she had scheduled to attend my talk and essentially let everyone ask her as a therapist and this best selling author questions. And it's so fun because you get to kind of pull the covers back and understand what really goes on and ask your own questions. So I was so excited for it. So she ends up reaching out to me the day or two before we were scheduled to do it and she says, you're not gonna believe this. I have to go to Miami for a meeting. What do you think about me coming over to do it? Otherwise I'm gonna be driving in the car. And I said, you know, absolutely. I haven't had hardly anyone in my house since quarantine hit. But you know, I know she's very safe and Obviously trust her. And I said, sure, come here and let's do it here together. So it ended up. It was so fun. It was fun just to see other people and be around you haven't seen recently. And I was so grateful for her doing this for me and for my team. So I wanted to give you guys just a little insight into how she answered the questions that my team asked her and find out what you think. I really love the advice that she imparted on all of us and just appreciate so much that she came here. She came to my condo, she showed up and dropped some major value. So I'm hoping that you take a lot out of this combo. Let me know what you think. Here it comes.

We're honored today to have Amy Morin up in Miami beach. And welcome, Amy.

Thank you. Thanks for having me here.

So I have to tell you guys, it's so funny. Amy and I met a little over a year ago through a mutual friend in New York, and we were going to be speaking at a live event that never came to fruition.

And.

And Amy's taught me a lot over the past year, year and a half. And one of the things that she taught me that was super helpful was.

We were on these calls with these.

People that were not treating us great. And there was a lot of really influential people on these calls. And Amy and I would always find ourselves, after the call, texting privately, like, I didn't like that. And she would say, I don't get a good feeling either. Heather, something's wrong. Something's wrong. And finally Amy said to me, that's it. We're pulling the ripcord on this. We don't feel good about it. We have to trust our guts. And I won't go into all the details, but she was so right. And it was such one of those lessons that I wanted so badly to be a part of something so big with so many big names, and it was such a big opportunity that I was trying not to listen to my gut. And Amy just gave me that great reminder that, hey, we always need to listen to our gut. We both feel the same way. We're out of here. And it was.

That was such a good life lesson for me.

Well, it was one of those things. We put in so much time and so much energy. It was tempting to just, if we just hang in a little longer, we'll make it happen.

But it was frustrating.

And I knew if it was already that frustrating, the only thing that would make it worse was making it that frustrating. Plus, one more day.

And she was so right. What we came to find out was not good. So it worked out great that we pulled out of that. And then randomly.

Amy was in New York.

I was in New York. I had been wanting to have Amy on my podcast for a while, and we were messaging, and she said, hey, I'm in town. I said, oh, my gosh, I am too. We were supposed to be doing that live event that day.

That's right.

Well, wouldn't you know, I get a D from a stranger that says, I'm here for your event. And they never heard that we canceled the event. So I felt so bad that I invited the woman up to my suite, and she ended up being the nicest lady. And then she sat with us as we recorded the podcast, and she kind of, like, got her own private session.

Which ended up to be, like, the greatest thing. So it was a great day.

Yeah.

Because I remember she answered the door, and when she wasn't listening, Heather says, I don't know her.

I just met her five minutes ago.

But she ended up great. It all worked out well. And to that end, so, as you guys know, Amy was in Maine without WI Fi and couldn't come on once. Amy was gracious enough to change dates when Chris Voss needed to take her date. And then two days ago, hey, I'm in a meeting in Miami. I don't know how I'm gonna dial in.

What do you think?

Should I dial in from the car or come over? And I said, come on over. And yet again, our crazy experiences.

Here we are, right?

Paths crossed at the right moment again. Seriously.

And just so you guys know, Amy's launching her new podcast, which you've been.

Recording a ton of episodes for.

Yes.

And when is that coming out?

Comes out September 14, called Mentally Strong People. And we've been interviewing lots of really cool people who exemplify mental strength.

And so I know that you guys are all familiar with her book 13 Things Mentally Strong People Don't do, and her TED talk, which has 14 million views currently. It's insane. I'm so proud of her. And just to give one more personal testimony and story on Amy, when I was giving my first ted talk, well, TedX talk, I was super nervous and.

Practicing like a maniac.

And I recorded it into my computer, and I emailed it to Amy, and I said, could you do me a favor and will you listen to this and tell me what you think?

And this was, like, three weeks before.

And a couple people had said to me, I don't really like the beginning. And I was like, whatever, peace out. And then I sent it to Amy. Amy sent it back to me and.

I don't remember verbatim, but she said.

Something like, heather, you can do better than this. The beginning isn't really what your potential is. I know that you can challenge yourself to come up with something. And then she gave me a ton of compliments and then closed with, I know that this isn't done yet. It's not where you're actually going to take it and you are absolutely going to kill it.

And.

And for some reason, maybe because she.

Has 14 million views on hers, or.

Maybe it was the approach she used with me that was able to connect with me that other people hadn't used immediately I just started to work on I'm changing the beginning of this talk. And ended up that the beginning came.

Out so much better. So thank you so much.

You're welcome for that.

Thank you for approaching me in the right way and then also spending the time to listen to my talk, which.

Meant so much to me.

So we're not at 14 million views yet. We're at 30k. We've got a little way to go.

But nothing to Sneeze at, though. 30k is really good. Gonna.

We're gonna move on from that now, Amy. So not only does she have this huge TED Talk, not only does she have the most amazing book that's been translated into how many languages?

More than 40 now.

It's a freaking franchise. And how many iterations of the book do you have now?

So there's three. We did the first one and we've got two spin offs and then the.

Kids book comes out next year.

So it really has become its own entity, its own franchise, its own business, which is unbelievable to me because I know how hard it is just to get one book to sell, you know, X amount of copies.

Right. It's.

It's very challenging and to see the.

Trajectory that you've gone on over the last four years.

So 2014 is when my first book came out.

So it's just amazing to see what can happen with momentum, hard work, commitment, and just continuing to do the right thing. And that's why I'm so grateful she's here today to talk to you guys, to answer your questions. And I know everyone's got a lot of questions for her, so I don't know who wants to open up first.

Could you maybe think about or share with us three things that you think differentiated yourself from? Because there's a Lot of books out there. There's a lot of TED talks out there. So what three things do you think really contributed to your success?

Oh, good question.

Well, congrats on your book.

That's exciting.

Thank you.

Nerve wracking. It is when the, you know, when you're almost there and you're like waiting for the book to come out and so many emotions that come with that. As far as what made it stand out, I think my. It started out as an article, the 13 things middle aged Young People don't do that went viral. I think the reason it went viral was because it was about what not to do. And it was one of the first articles that said, you know, had the word don't in it. So I think that's what helped it get started. And then I think as far as my book sales and book translations, I think one of the things that helped. I'm a therapist, but I also talked about my own struggles. I didn't want to sound like I was perfect, but I came out and tried to be authentic and say, it's not that I'm awesome or that I learned these things because I am a therapist. I learned them through my own life experience. So I think that helped. And I think the same with my TEDx talk. When I gave the talk, I remember stepping off the stage and my voice cracked the whole time. I was so nervous. And I remember stepping off the stage thinking, I hope nobody sees that, because I definitely didn't sound mentally strong. I sounded like I was terrified, which I was. But that has turned out to be one of the things that has helped propel it, is that people heard that in my voice and were able to say, yeah, you were scared and you did it anyway. I would say just being myself and not trying to pretend like I'm like, I have it all together when I definitely don't.

I think we can all empathize with that because we all don't have it together hardly ever. So, Amy, I know that you do a lot of work with kids, and.

Given this time that we're living in, as my son is in the next room doing zoom school, what are some.

Of the things that we can do as parents?

You know, whether it be as a parent or as an employer, like, what can we offer people that are challenged during this difficult time?

So I think one of the biggest things for parents in particular is to an opportunity to show your kids that right now is a great learning experience. This is life. Life is weird. But how do you deal with it? I see Some parents that are trying to pretend like it's normal. Some parents that are so stressed out but they're not talking about it. Other parents who feel like they can't get through this because how am I going to work plus have my kids work from home? And there's no doubt it's stressful. So I think it's an opportunity to acknowledge how you feel. There's huge power in just labeling your emotions. When you say, I feel anxious, it takes a lot of the sting out of that. Or when you say I'm angry, just acknowledging it. And you don't even necessarily have to say it out loud, acknowledging it to yourself helps. But to talk to kids about their feelings too, I think is a wonderful opportunity just to introduce more emotional vocabulary in there to say, is it boring? Is it exciting? Is it anxiety provoking? Are you frustrated trying to do this from home? So I think having more of those conversations and then just taking a look at what are your coping skills? How do you deal with all those feelings? Because for parents and kids that are spending a lot of time at home these days to figure out what are your coping skills? Are you binge watching Netflix? Are you reaching for comfort food? Or are you finding healthier things? You do yoga in the living room or you zoom with a friend, or you go out for a cup of coffee with a friend when you can. I think it's a great opportunity to teach kids all of those things. The healthy ways that you deal with those feelings.

Okay, well, Amy just basically gave you the juxtapose of her life during the pandemic versus mine. I was eating all of my son's M&MS. And binge watching Netflix while she was getting in the best shape of her entire life.

Tell them about your fitness program that you launched.

Yeah. So as an experiment last summer, as in 13 months ago, I had run into this person who got six pack abs in 30 days when it was a man. So I thought, I wonder if women can get six pack abs in 30 days. So I decided to try it and reach the goal. So my fitness trainer said we should do a course together. And so we created a fitness course. And since then I've been on a journey to maintain my abs because it was a lot of work to get them. And the man that I met who had done it, he just did it for fun. And then he let him go. And I thought, oh no, if I do this hard work to get six pack abs, there's no way of letting them go. So the first 30 days were terrible and it was a lot of hard work, but maintaining them is not that.

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But I also think what's interesting from a business standpoint, guys, about that is yes, she's built this brand. Yes, she's got great personal brand equity. The book the thirteen Things has equity, but now she's taking it to it like there's a new iteration here. Now she's taking it into health and fitness. Now there's a coaching. It just keeps evolving. It's not stagnant. Those are the things that I'm hearing.

From her is how can I grow.

It beyond just one thing? And what are those potential other options.

We'Re not considering right now?

Because I would have never thought to launch a fitness product out of 13.

Things, but it all aligns together.

It does. And it was the first thing, the first tangible evidence I could give of mental strength. I could give talk about mental strength and what it means to be mentally strong. But the physical strength aspect, I could show a picture before and after picture and then people were really like, oh, I can actually look at the results. And then to say, okay, here's a tangible item I can sell related to that, which is a course. Nobody wants to read a book about fitness. You actually want to do the fitness activities. So it just made sense to say.

Let'S add this other product and see what happens.

And it helped me reach a new audience that maybe wouldn't have been people to read my book in the first place.

It's amazing. Such a great idea.

I'm sure you've probably had a ton of ideas as well. So how do you differentiate what's an idea you're going to run with and what's one that you're going to kind of shelve? And then how do you sync with some?

Yeah, I'm glad you asked that because that's actually one of the problems. There's so many opportunities to build apps and to have mastermind courses and to build more courses out and. And you get so much input from people who don't necessarily know your business and you get bombarded with ideas and invitations in your inbox from people who say, you know, I already have this at available. You could just jump on board. It'll Be simple and easy. So I think it's a matter of trial and error and figuring out, you know, what brings the most revenue, but also what's going to be the biggest time suck for you. You know, I created a course a few years ago and I've never updated it. It lives on my website, generates money every month. I don't advertise it. It's just sort of something. If somebody comes to my website and they're looking for more, they can access that. And that was a good use of my time. At the moment I was building the course, I wanted to pull out my hair because it didn't feel like it was a good use of my time. There was no knowing if it was going to be, but it turned out to be a great use of it. Same with the podcast. I don't know for sure what sort of revenue stream that's going to bring in. So again, sometimes it's trial and error, but I think if you have too many streams of revenue, it's hard to do any of them well. So sometimes what I Learned from my 30 day fitness challenge was if you make one thing your priority for 30 days, you can pretty much accomplish whatever you want. So I think if you take one revenue stream and you say for the next 30 days, I'm going to put everything into this, you can get it done and feel like you did it well, as opposed to always having something on the priority list like number five, you just will never get there. And then you'll learn over time which things bring the most revenue. What was, we all make mistakes. I've certainly invested way too much time in certain things and I just didn't get a good return on it or scrapped it halfway through like the talk, because it just wasn't going to be worth it. And I think just trial and error and recognizing, okay, sometimes you don't know until you get there. And there's different theories on, you know, the minimum viable product, whether you should churn out a course when you know it's not good, or you should work on it for another six months until you feel really good about it. Different theories on that. And then sometimes it'll surprise you, the opportunities and invitations that come your way. I really never expected to become a speaker, but that's turned out to be a huge revenue source for me is speaking. And then of course during the pandemic that has shifted since we aren't doing large events. So it's about staying flexible as well. And I guess just anticipating knowing that, yeah, as the Market shift. As things change, you know your book, you'll get tons of advice from other authors about how you really make money. I had some people say, you don't make any money on your book. You only make it from speaking. I had other people say, you know, you only speak to sell copies of your book. And I remember in early days thinking, wait, who's right and who's wrong? But obviously nobody's right or wrong. It's just about building a business model.

That works for you.

And I'll go back to what Amy's taught me, which is just focus on working with good people that you feel good about. And when you really know that in your heart, good things will happen and.

Just trust yourself that, yeah, we're going.

To try things, there's trial and error. Keep surrounding yourself with good people and.

Keep following your intuition and things will work out.

My question is around authenticity. So I think you have kind of had a real authentic service, found a real need that you can serve in a very valuable way. How have you kind of navigated that when there are peers around your competitors that are in that same space? Huge brands, perhaps not as valuable of a service that they provide. And how do you cut through that noise and how do you stay true to yourself to not get wrapped up in all of kind of that bright and shiny marketing services that are out there? So I don't know how you've managed to kind of walk that tightrope and do both.

Good question. It is tough. And you know, you see those people that are selling their $3,000 course for $99 when you just buy it today. And you know, and these people that have these fancy click funnels and they give away a free product and it takes you somewhere else. And they used to be the webinars that, you know, always tried to get you to come in and it is frustrating. I'm a therapist and there's tons of self help gurus out there who are selling products and they are way better at marketing than I am and they have fancy design teams and social media graphics and they know exactly what they're doing. But for me, what sold my products is word of mouth. It's been huge. That's what sold my books. My book didn't hit a bestseller list until two years after it came out. It hit the Wall Street Journal USA Today bestseller list two years later. And it was just because of word of mouth. We didn't have a huge campaign going on. It was actually after my publicists were really far out of the Picture there was no gimmicks, no nothing. And that's how I sell a lot of online courses too. And so I firmly believe if you create a good product and you say what you're going to deliver and then you actually deliver it, people will talk about you, they'll say good things about you. It's those clickbait things and people fall for them and end up feeling like I just spent all this money and got nothing. They'll talk about you in a not so good way and they're going to advise people not to go there and tell them to steer clear. So I think those things often work in the short term for people. They might make a lot of money really fast, but I think when you're playing the long game, people are going to like it because they trust you and that you've built a brand that they know is reliable. So even though I have 14 million views on my TEDx talk, I have like 20,000 followers in Instagram, I've never hired a social media marketing team. I post when I can, that sort of a thing. And my newsletter following is minuscule compared to most people that advertise. You know, they've got 2 million readers every month on their newsletter, that sort of a thing. I don't even have a blog on my website. I've just always done things sort of my own way. But I find that when you deliver things, when you say, hey, this is what I'm going to teach you, and then you actually teach them and it's of value, people will come back, they'll tell their friends, they'll recommend it, they'll buy it for their friends, and your long game will definitely stand out that way.

I'm a new parent. I'm a young parent. When I say young, I'm in my early 30s, I have an 11 month year old daughter and one of my biggest fears is having her grow up into this new world where it's very digital, it removes the human interaction, the human touch, and at the same time there's just so much coddling everywhere in terms of like a victim mentality or in terms about entitlement. So I'm doing my best because, you know, it's hard. You work all day and you come home or you go into the living room and it's so easy to turn on a Disney movie and let her entertain herself. And you feel so guilty about it because you know that those early months and those early years are so critical for that growth of just the confidence and having them interact on A physical level, but just wanted to hear if you had any thoughts about early stage parenting in the digital world, and then how to avoid a scenario where society is just so abrupt about trying to make, you know, young individuals feel like, hey, there's a safe space here, or, hey, you know, someone owes you something, or let's all talk about, you know, using our words correctly and stuff like that.

Great questions. And I think in a pre Covid world, we were telling people, you know, don't use screens so much. Now we're telling kids sit behind a screen all day to go to school. It's a weird message. It's a weird world that we're in. But I'm a therapist and I spent most of my career as a child therapist, but then I saw adults after that. But just rest assured, I never have had any adults come in and say, you know, I'm scarred for life because my parents let me watch too much TV or anything like that. So I think it's really about, you know, cut yourself some slack, for sure. And as long as we raise kids so that they recognize their feelings and then they know how to cope with those feelings, I think the rest is much easier to do. So if you have a kid who knows, gosh, I feel anxious and I have a skill to deal with my anxiety, whether it's, I take some deep breaths, I go for a walk, and then they can recognize somebody else's emotions. To say, gosh, when I say that, that makes my dad really sad. They're going to be way ahead of the game. I think that trumps pretty much all other academic skills and the other skills that we look at just teach them to manage their own emotions. As parents, we tend to calm kids down, we cheer them up. We take way too much responsibility. If you buy my book, there's a whole chapter on how to not take responsibility for the way kids feel, but instead give them those skills so they can be responsible for their own emotions. And then when they have a problem, they'll talk about it and they'll be much more likely to know how to deal with it in a healthy way.

Thank you very much. Appreciate that.

You're welcome.

What are some of the coping mechanisms that kids can use with anxiety right now?

Yeah, anxiety is huge.

And as people say, you must see so many people with depression. I see way more people with anxiety than depression.

But for kids to know anxiety is healthy, it's normal.

We're supposed to be anxious. When your friend says, go jump off that bridge, your anxiety should kick in. And you think that's a bad idea. So we don't want them to think anxiety is bad. It's a good thing. It's supposed to keep you safe. But that sometimes we have false alarm bells. You might be sitting on your couch and your anxiety skyrockets for no reason. And just recognizing that, okay, is this real or is this a false alarm? And so we often talk to kids about anxiety is to recognize, do you have a real anxiety alarm or a false one? Maybe you're nervous about giving a talk in front of the class.

Giving a talk in front of the.

Class isn't actually dangerous, but your brain's reacting as if it is. And how can you calm yourself down? We want to teach them, how do you calm your brain and how do you calm your body? So it might be a matter of coming up with a saying to calm your brain. Maybe it's something really simple like I'm okay. And you repeat that over and over. So as all those thoughts about, this is awful, the kids are going to laugh at me. You just say, I'm okay, I'm okay, I'm okay. Kind of drowns them out. And then to calm your body, sometimes it's a couple of deep breaths. Sometimes it's imagining that you're in your happy place on the beach, wherever it is. And for kids to recognize, when my heart beats really fast, that means I'm anxious. But it doesn't mean anything's wrong, because sometimes kids will say, when my hands get sweaty and my heart beats really fast, I just feel like something horrible.

Is going to happen.

And for them to know, no, that's just sort of your brain had a little bit of a false alarm. Like when the mom burns toast and the smoke alarm goes off, sometimes the house isn't actually on fire. That's a false alarm. We teach them those sorts of things just to recognize they're supposed to have some anxiety. It doesn't have to be awful. You can tolerate some anxiety, but you also can calm yourself down when you feel that way.

Oh, I love that false alarm. That was so good.

The majority of the issues I've had.

In building my business have been mostly in here. A lot of fear, imposter syndrome, et cetera.

I guess I'm just curious for some tips. And, you know, coping mechanisms are just.

Kind of little things to kind of help break that cycle or be more realistic with myself.

I don't know.

Good questions, good questions. And so, yeah, so sometimes a lot of people will come to see me for therapy, and they're like, you know, do I need help with productivity? Do I need more motivation? And often the answer is no. You've just taken on too much stuff. We don't need any productivity tips here. You're trying to fit 30 hours of work into a 24 hour day and hopefully you sleep in there somewhere. So I think maybe some self reflection at the end of the day. Every day you just ask yourself, did I bite off more than I could chew? And if you did, then how do I do better tomorrow? And maybe keeping track of how many things you say no to. I find it super empowering now to say no to more things than I say yes to. And I'm getting better at that is still something I'm working on too. I have exciting opportunities that come my way that five years from now, if somebody would have asked me to do it, I would have jumped at it because it would have been one of the biggest opportunities of my life. But now I have to say no to it. So I feel like our brains take a while to catch up with what level of success that we're at. And so even though it sounds like you're really successful, your brain isn't quite there yet. So you're still probably accepting things that you don't need to accept. And so just a reminder, becoming more aware of that, that at the position that you're in and the opportunities you have coming your way, you should probably be saying no to a lot. So maybe at the end of the day you ask yourself, what did I say no to today? And it's painful sometimes to turn those things down because you never know, maybe that was a huge opportunity that that person presented. But until you really focus on the things you're supposed to focus on, it's hard to. You won't make any progress. There's a good book Too, Essentialism, Greg McCown, wonderful book that just talks about saying no to more things than we actually say yes to so that you feel like, okay. In fact, the subtitles, the discipline, pursuit of less. And I think for people that are a little bit anxious and super high achievers, that's tougher to do. It's tougher to say no to more things than it is to say yes to them.

It's that fear, right? That oh, what if these opportunities are going to stop coming and suddenly I'm going to miss one. So I have to take everything because we're still operating from a place where we weren't getting that many opportunities. That's a really good reframe to Just think of it as your brain has a product of where you actually are.

What type of ideas or what type of suggestions do you have for business owners and trying to convince people to come back into the office.

Anything you can recommend to alleviate their fear.

I think the biggest thing for people who are scared is we all feel better when we have a sense of control. If you ask somebody, are you more likely to get in an accident when you're driving or when you're the passenger, we all are like, oh, the passenger. Because we think it's as the driver, we aren't going to get rear ended. It's not true. Might have an equal chance whether you're the driver or the passenger. But when we have a sense of control, our anxiety goes down.

So I wonder if there's a way.

To give employees some sort of sense of control. Even if it's what hours you work or if it's, you know, which office you sit in or who cleans your chair. I don't know. You may be able to come up with just some small things so that people feel like I'm in control of this. And it even sounds like you invited them to come back. You didn't mandate it. Because I think when people think, oh, I have to do this, then anxiety is going to skyrocket. So I think anything you can do to make sure that people feel like they have some sense of control and not just an illusion of control, but some actual control over a few things to help keep themselves safe, I think their anxiety will go down.

Amy, is there something too? Because I'm listening to you describe that.

It seems to me we create these.

New habits and like after quarantine, the.

Habit is just to be home.

You don't even.

And I've seen my son and I get in a rut where even just to leave the house seems like, oh, gosh, you want to leave the house? Where before I would leave the house 20 times a day. It just seems like a new habit now.

Yeah, I think so.

I think we all set these weird habits for ourselves and then we just do today what we did yesterday. You just keep repeating it. And I found for me, one of the best ways to get out of a habit is to go to a completely different environment. So for people who say, okay, if I'm stuck in a rut at home, maybe I can go to an office, maybe I can go somewhere else, maybe I can do something different, sort of forces you to hit the reset button. If you just say, okay, how do I establish a New sense of normal for myself. And I often. It's just a new environment for me. I usually spend part of the summer in Maine and part of the summer down here. My habits are completely different in Maine than they are down here. I do the same work, I do a lot of the same things, but something about being in a different environment there compared to here, I don't know. I just do things differently.

Yeah, that's good advice. I was thinking of going to even just like an outside coffee place or something to do work. Just to get myself out of the rut of staying inside all day.

Yeah, absolutely. Our environment plays a huge role in how we feel, how we perform. So sometimes just physically change where you are and see what happens getting into.

The space you're in right now. Looking back, what would you have said was the number one priority to give your transition from a doctor to a coach and really put yourself out there? What's the one thing you would have focused on for that 30 days?

As I transitioned from being a therapist in an office to coaching people. Yep.

And making yourself out there because you said a lot of your business came from word of mouth.

Yeah. And so actually that's how it started. So I had a friend who was a coach, and she encouraged me to do coaching. She's a therapist, but she said, you don't want to do therapy anymore. Do coaching. And so actually last summer, I was looking at office space in Miami because I thought, oh, I could do one day a week. I wanted to stay relevant. My publisher wanted me to stay relevant in terms of still seeing people. I'd taken a break from it. I wasn't doing any coaching at all. And so I was looking at office space. And in the meantime, I got an email from somebody that said, I'd like you to be my coach. And to be honest, I sort of made up a number. I added an extra zero to what I would have gotten as a therapist per hour.

Awesome.

Good for you.

You have to have a four hour minimum as opposed to therapy, 50 minutes. And he said, no problem. And so he. That's why I was in Miami today. He flies into Miami still once a month to see me. And it was the boost that I needed to know, oh, I don't have to be a therapist. Billing an insurance company can add an extra zero and people will still come see me. And then it just bloomed from there. And it was a matter of then saying, you know, now I get to say no to people who come to me for therapy or for coaching because I Don't have enough space. It's not something I really want to spend a lot of my time doing, just a little bit of my time. So I added it to my website as a something I do, but I don't do it a lot and I just try to be picky about it. I really wanted to spend 30 days focusing on coaching. I'd write about it, I'd create more content around it and link from other websites. Like I said, I don't blog on my own website, but I write for Business Insider, Forbes, Psychology Today, and I can link back to it. And so rather than reaching out to PR people or trying to get a mention in a magazine, I just create the content myself. I would focus on probably creating 30 pieces of content in 30 days and linking back to my own website and seeing what would happen.

That's excellent. Last question. Very impressed with how quickly you were able to get the six packs right, because that's definitely an area that, that I would like to work on. What kind of a diet did you have to accomplish that?

The biggest thing for me was adding protein. I didn't eat meat. I wasn't morally opposed to it. It just kind of grossed me out. So the first day I met my trainer, he said, can you eat chicken? And I was like, yeah, it's not a problem. And he said, oh really? You know, normally with the vegetarian I have to like, eh, it's fine. I just don't love it, but I'll do it. So I just added two protein shakes. It was low carb, low fat. I ate a lot of salad with a lot of chicken and a couple protein shakes a day. I wasn't hungry ever. I'm still not hungry. I still eat a lot of eggs and a lot of chicken and protein shakes, but I eat salad and everything else too. So now my diet is not nearly as strict as it was and hasn't really been an issue.

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Maybe now, what have been the kind of negative thoughts that have popped up kind of automatically in terms of either being discouraged, feeling maybe this was in the right direction, or maybe I shouldn't be doing this. And how did you cope with that? I guess you have the blessing to be a therapist. You kind of know some of those tools and tricks to kind of help shift your thought process and then shift your actions. I'm curious, what were your struggles and are you still kind of in periods of struggle today in terms of things that you feel negative about and then you catch yourself and then are able to shift? And how are you doing that in a, I guess like day to day state? And have your tools and techniques changed in your entrepreneurial journey at all?

Yeah. So I guess for, you know, I still have that voice in my head that says, you know, like, who are you to do this? Or what makes you think you could be successful? Or when I have, when I try a new revenue stream and it's clearly not working out, then I have that voice that says, see, told you you couldn't do that. All these other people have a huge team behind them or they all know what they're doing. And here you are, you know, trying to make something out of something that doesn't make sense. So, yeah, I still struggle with that on a regular basis, but now I have some successes behind me. So when I have that, I just remember, okay, because this part of me thinks, you know, my new venture is a podcast. Oh, nobody's gonna listen to your podcast. And I'm like, Duh, 14 million people watch your TED talk. Maybe they will listen to your podcast. But before I had that, even when I wrote my first book, I just remember thinking, nobody's gonna read this. This is awful. I'm a therapist. I'm not an author. And even though I was a therapist helping people deal with their negative thoughts, I dealt with all the same things. And I'm writing a book about mental strength. As I'm thinking, you have no business writing a book for so many levels. Because I felt like I probably wasn't Good enough as an author, but also, who am I to say how to be mentally strong?

So it was a matter of just.

Working through fear and knowing, okay, if I can just put it out there, it's scary, but what's the worst that's going to happen? Somebody's going to make fun of me. Yep, they do sometimes. But that's okay. I can handle that. And knowing, I guess the difference between recognizing when, when it's intuition saying this is a bad idea, versus just a lot of anxiety. So the talk that we were going to do and it was intuition saying this isn't going to work out well, was much different than when I'm trying to launch something and I'm thinking, oh, this isn't going to work, nobody's going to buy it. And knowing the difference between the two, that just because it's scary doesn't mean it's your gut or that you should be listening to it, that you don't have to be confident all the time.

Using a lot of the same skills.

I teach other people in terms of mental strength and knowing, okay, I can get through this. It feels scary also to remember too, when you launch something and it doesn't work out, nobody really knows. I think we think, oh, if I put this article out there and nobody reads it, it's so embarrassing. Well, if nobody reads it, nobody knows you wrote it and it's not a big deal. But I have so many friends who don't want to write something because they think, what if it's bad? Nobody will talk about it and you'll move on and you'll write something they'll remember when you do something good. And so if you launch a product and nobody buys it, so what. I mean, you might be out time and money, but it's not going to be all the humiliation and thoughts about your complete failure and you can never succeed, that that might run through your head.

That's super helpful to know that you're still going through it. And I'm curious, do you have a big kind of goal or vision that you haven't yet made that leap? It's still kind of out to there. And are you still thinking like how big or how much impact you want to have and kind of what are your thoughts about making sure that your message, your authentic message in tools and techniques are impacting as many people as possible?

Yeah.

So sometimes people will say to me, like, you know what, you need to get to the next level. And I have to say, when people say that to me, I just look back at them. I'm thinking, you know, I'm from a trailer park in Maine and you talk about getting to the next level. Like, I wrote a book. Why do I always have to get.

To the next level?

I feel pretty proud of where I am most of the time. And so I think there's that pressure sometimes to feel like you should always be doing something else. If 50 million people aren't reading everything you do, then somehow you're a failure. Sometimes it's just about backing up and saying it's okay. Like I, you know, I make money on selling books and talking about things. Like, I think that's pretty awesome. So sometimes I just have to back up and remind myself, pretty cool what I get to do. I don't have to get up and go into the office. But that's my joy in life, is that I don't have to go into an office. I can get up anytime I want and I get to go to bed anytime I want. As a kid, I just try to never remember what that feeling was like. I hated school. And on Sunday nights I felt physically ill and sometimes I actually threw up on Monday mornings because I hated school that much. I don't ever want to feel like that. So for me, success is knowing that on a Monday morning, I don't ever have to feel like that ever again. So even if I never made another dime on this, I feel like now I have the skills to say I can make money doing a lot of different things. And so even if nobody buys my books tonight, this whole mental strength thing disappears. I have skills so I can figure out other ways to make revenue so I don't ever have to do that. I'll feel like that again.

But you also go on a waverunner every day at 4:00'.

Clock.

Yeah, that is part of my. Part of my routine.

That's great.

That's great.

We need to know, how do you take care of yourself? Do you journal? Do you meditate? And he said, actually, I just take my wave around. I live on a sailboat most of the time, so life is pretty calm and relaxing. So I don't need to get out my yoga mat and relax more. I need to get on a jet ski and go fast. And that's how I take care of myself.

I read that on one of the articles. Good to see that.

Thank you.

Well, I just wanted to say that based on some of the things that Amy said, she is just like everybody else here, right? Everybody that doubts themselves, everybody that wants to find hacks to get to the next level. And it takes, you know, doing the hard work, keep putting in the disciplines that we all know we need to do, and just keep going. And I also like the idea of celebrating where you actually are instead of constantly looking at where we're going next, because sometimes as overachievers, we might not be doing that. And there is a lot to celebrate. And all those celebrations are also proof that you are able to achieve success. You are able to get there, which just, you know, those are the building blocks for all of our futures. So thank you so much to Amy.

For being here today. Thanks for having me. This was fun. I don't get to talk about the business aspect of what I do very often, so that's fun.

Oh, I'm so excited. And don't forget, Amy's new podcast is going to be coming out, guys. So definitely check that out in September. It's going to be fantastic. All right, everyone, have a great weekend.

I ask you to try to find your passion. I hope you enjoyed meeting Amy as much as I enjoyed just hanging around with her, being with her. This is actually the second time she's been on the show. I did a more formal interview with her last year. If you haven't checked it out yet, please do we get more into her book and the principles of her book. Today was more about her just answering These Q&As and really relevant questions to today that we're all struggling with and dealing with, which I'm super, super appreciative she made time for. Okay, so I got a couple of questions sent to me on LinkedIn and on Instagram and DMS and I always answer your questions here, so if you have them, fire away. Okay, let's get going. Thanks for getting back to me, Heather. I guess I wanted to talk about asking for a promotion or more money at my workplace with my job being fully remote. I love your tips on how to build confidence and be a public speaker, and I think I'm pretty confident, but I. I am so nervous because I feel like asking for something like this over the phone is even more intimidating. I think I feel this way since I can't see my boss's reaction. It's interesting, a little premature, but I do want to raise before I hit the one year mark. I'm afraid to ask. Since I've started, I've written down all successes and daily journals with bullets of things that I did that day. I'd love some advice on how to kick those nerves to the curb and take action on. On A phone call conversation and where to start? Should I send a calendar invite when I'm ready or just call him out of the blue? I've never asked for a raise before other than a part time job I had, so this is new to me. Okay, so first of all, I would suggest a zoom meeting, right? Because she brings up a good point. When you can't see someone's reactions, you're at a disadvantage. So for me, I want to be able to read the other person and feel more, more connected to them and have them look into my eyes. The more that they're connected to you, the better chance you have of getting what you want. Right. And I would absolutely not blindside somebody on this. I would send a note and say, hey, is there a good time for you and I to get on a call next week? I'd like to get 30 minutes of your time for a zoom meeting. There's a few things that I would like to discuss with you and really want to get your full attention. You know, you don't need to say exactly what it is that you're asking for because you'll do that in your pitch, in the process when you're live with that person. So you get on their calendar, you do all your homework. So the first thing that I would do is I'd go back and look at what were the job expectations when I was hired, what have I delivered on, what have I over delivered, where have I fallen short? Now the other thing I'd look at is any follow up feedback emails from your boss. So if like you have any, oh my gosh, this was amazing, you did this great or I want to do a review for you and tell you how great you are, blah blah, blah. Gather all of that at a high level, put it into a document. You want to be able to send that back to him and say, hey, I compiled a lot of your feedback. You know, anything that's essentially going to justify and give credibility to what your claims are on the great job that you've done. I'd also gather reviews and recommendations from current clients, from people that you've worked with collaboratively during this virtual time at the the company, whatever. So you want to basically put together a file that's justifying everything that it is that you're putting down there. Now numbers don't lie. So if you are in sales or you know, you have specific numbers you have to hit and you've hit those, that's easy. But also it is nice to have the color behind it in regards to feedback testimonials from clients, peers, and supervisors. So I'd work on putting all that together. Then I'd put myself in that, that boss's shoes and run through the pitch. So think about what he cares about, and I'm making this up, but maybe a lot of people on the team are struggling with morale and you're super positive. Maybe a lot of people aren't hitting numbers, but you are. Maybe some people are leaving or just essentially lay out the land. In regards to how he sees it, think to yourself, what is important to him is commitment and loyalty important to him? Is keeping people around important to him? Is mentoring and promoting people important to him? Whatever it is, map it all out, right? Because what you want to do, in order to get someone to do what you want, you need to get them to want to do it. So, you know, for me, I used to work for someone that hated change, petrified of change, But I knew he was more petrified of me leaving the company than he was of change within the company. And I would leverage that to my advantage. You have to figure out what are the pain points that your boss has, what is the value add that you bring? So maybe it's that to find someone to replace you will cost $30,000 from recruiting, from potential fallout and hiring the wrong person from lost relationships, lost deals. Really map out the scenario. Like, be thoughtful about your scenario and really create that blueprint so that you know where it makes sense and what you should be bringing up to your boss. Take the time to do this the right way. When you do, you're really in a no fail situation. So that's what I'd always done when I was back in corporate America is I'd put myself in his shoes. I'd go through all the scenarios, run through all the potential objections and how you will overcome them. Right. We don't have the funds right now. I completely understand that. However, we aren't even in Q4 yet, and I know that we haven't finalized budgets for 2021. So if something is important to you, I know you can make that happen for 2021. Isn't there somewhere that you can look on your expense lines that you could shift some dollars to make this work? I want to stay here. I want to be with you. I want to grow with you. I'm committed to working for you. You know, like, there's different ways to overcome objections, but you first have to write them all down and start mapping out what they may be. You can't do the face to face. So you want to get on that zoom call. You want to connect to them. You want to empathize with their challenges. I'm sure this must be a tough time for you with so many employees trying to get a hold of you. I so appreciate your time.

Right.

You really want to acknowledge them. You want them to empty your glass. How are you doing? How are you holding up in this time? I know you have kids. How's the remote learning going? How are things happening for you? This must be a really difficult time for you. Let them empty their glass and tell you how they're doing. And then that information you garner from that exchange you can actually use to your advantage when you start pitching yourself for that job. So that's how I would do it. Wish you luck. But, you know, the best way I've ever done it is from day one, setting up the situation that I will be asking for a raise. I will be asking for a promotion on day one. When I went to that company I used to work for, I said, I need to be CEO of this company, and here's why. And then I took a much lower position. But I had let them know from the beginning. You're going to need to check in with me every couple of months to reevaluate where I'm at, because I'm going to be far exceeding your expectations, and I'm going to want to get promoted, and I'm going to need to make more money because I deserve it. However, I took this job because I knew I could make an impact here and make a difference, and I'm really excited to do it with you. But just check in with with me every 30 or 60 or 90 days, because we're going to have to revisit this. You know, I set that tone. So set that tone. Hey, I'm going to raise the bar. I'm going to go all in. I'm going to do a phenomenal job for you. You got a real deal right now. But when that happens, I just want to know that you're in this with me, that when I show you how valuable I am, that you're going to pay me for that value. Right? So first you have to completely believe it, and then you need to convince the other person. Okay, that was one question. Here's another. I'm reaching out because I feel like. Feel really lost and would love some advice. I graduated college a year ago, started my first job. I'm only in my early 20s. I know I have a long life ahead of me, but I Am feeling super stuck in my career and I am just not happy in my job. Ooh, that's a no. No. Problem is I have no idea what I want to do and I have a hard time pinning down where my talents are. If you happen to have any advice, what would it be? I would really, really find it so helpful. Any guidance you can give. Okay, first of all, what are the things you used to love to do? Forget about money for one minute. When you were younger, what did you want to grow up and be when you have free time right now? Where is it that you want to spend it? Do you love painting? Do you love working with children? Do you love writing? Figure out what it is that you love to do when you pull money out of the equation and that's an indicator to what you need to enter up doing doesn't mean you'll not make any money. Now we have to figure out how you can leverage your talents, your passions and what you really want to do and connect that to a revenue stream. If you are adding value and you are doing something good and to your best of your abilities and it is your strength, there is a way to find some form of monetization through that. Now, maybe today you can't quit the job that you're in and go jump into this dream job, but you can start mapping out a plan on how you can get there. Maybe you say, okay, I really don't like this job. I'm not with good people. It's so negative. Okay, that, listen, let's go find something else. For right now. Knowing the long term goal is to get to where you really want to go. But I've gone through so many different phases in my life of, you know, working at different companies, doing different things. Now working for myself, my entire business changing six months ago, five months ago, because of the pandemic. You know, there are going to be so many iterations of you and your career and that's okay. You know, it's about embracing who you are and getting real with yourself on what you like to do, where you want to spend your time. And again, if it isn't going to happen today, that's fine. It's just about knowing that it will happen in the future. And what does that plan look like to get? Yes, I don't love the job I'm in today. I'm going to go find a better company to do a job like this in because I'm qualified for it. But my real goal is to be an artist and I want to sell art or to be a curator at an art gallery, or, you know, start looking at these industries, start talking to people about it, people in your network, people that you know, start putting it out to the universe what it is that you really want to do and start watching how things start connecting for you. But it all starts with you, getting real with you. And journaling is a great way to do this. You know, when are you your happiest? What are the things that you're doing? When you're really happy. And I'll tell you, 20 something years in corporate America, I never thought I'd write a book. Never thought I'd be a professional speaker. Didn't even know that was a thing. Never thought I'd be a host of a podcast. I never thought I'd give a TEDx talk, never thought I'd sign with a publishing house. All these things I never thought about. So just because you are in the situation you're in right now doesn't mean you'll always be in it. It means we need to start opening up doors and figuring out where it is that you want to go so that you can start connecting those dots to get there. It doesn't happen overnight. It happens with getting clarity and taking action now to move you there for your future. And I stayed way too long in a job in a company that was not serving me. And yes, I was very good at it. But just because you're good at something doesn't mean you should stay there, right? Like, get real with you, Are you happy? What do you like to do? And just because you're good at X doesn't mean that should be your career. You can take your unique talents and go wherever you want with them. And don't forget that. I wish I had known that when I was in my early 20s. So keep up with me, keep creating your confidence and I will see you back here next week. I decided to change that dynamic. I couldn't be more excited for what you're gonna hear. Start learning and growing. Inevitably something will happen.

No one succeeds alone.

You don't stop and look around once in a while. You could miss it.

Come on this journey with me.