166: Being a DisruptHER with Miki Agrawal

Namaste, it's Sahara Rose. And welcome back to the Highest Self Podcast, a place where we discuss what makes you your soul's highest development. Today on the Highest Self podcast, I have a serious badass chick. She is one that is disrupting the industry. And I'm talking about those industries that people don't like to talk about, the period poop, pee and pizza spaces. Yes. These are products that she has brought to market in her own company. And she is just such an incredible personality, powerhouse and leader. So she just came out with this new book, Mickey Agrawal, and her book is called Disrupt Her. So like disrupter, but disrupt her. And in the book, she really talks about what it's like to be a woman today and how on One Direction, you're told, oh, why don't you have a career? You're a stay at home mom. And then the Other Direction you're told, oh, you're such a heartless bitch, all you do is work. And it's like, how do we win? And this is an amazing, deep conversation. She really goes there and just talks about the things that we've had on our minds, but maybe we just haven't put into words or felt comfortable saying. And she's really disrupting the place. We also talk about her new company, hello Tushy, which are bidets, which are essentially little faucets that you can attach to your toilet so you can clean your butt. It's something that I've used growing up. It's a big part of Middle Eastern, Indian, all sorts of Asian cultures and for some reason just hasn't been popular in the U.S. even though I think it's very important to wash your butt with water. And we talk about that in this episode too. So this is just the kind of person that Mickey is. She talks about the taboos and she even shares that the word taboo actually derived from the word for menstruation. So why are our menstrual cycles taboo? Why is it taboo, Boo, to speak about these things? Why can't it be our norm? So this episode's got lots of pitta in it. It's going to fire you up and prepare you to disrupt the norm and create a new paradigm. So without further ado, let's welcome Miki Agrawal to the Highest Self Podcast. And before we get started, check out these brands that make Highest Self podcast possible. We all want to be more mindful and well read, but it's hard to read all of the books that are out there and still have time, you know, Practice self care and take a shower. Well, there's an app that I have just for you and that is called Blinkist. The only app that takes the best key takeaways from thousands of non fiction books and condenses them down into just 15 minutes that you can either read or listen to. I love Blinkist because in less than 15 minutes I feel like I can fast track my way to a more intelligent and informed version of me. They have so many incredible books like the Art of Happiness by the Dalai Lama, the Power of now by 8descartes toll starts with why by Simon Sinek Becoming Michelle Obama, four Hour Work Week by Tim Ferriss, seven Habits of Highly Effective People and so much more Right now for limited time, Blinkist has a special offer just for our audience. Go to blinkist.comsahara to start your free seven day trial. That's Blinkist spelled B L I N k I s t.com Sahara to start your free 7 day trial as you guys know, I'm all about hormonal health and in fact hormonal imbalance is what caused me to discover Ayurveda many years ago. However, checking your hormones can be quite expensive and that's why I'm super excited to have found Modern Fertility. I took a quiz online which asked me some questions about my hormones and within three days they sent me over the test right to my home. The test gives you information regarding to your hormonal health, which is essentially a window to your overall health. You're even given access to a fertility nurse who can answer any of your questions. I'm really excited to find out my results and we'll keep you guys posted in a coming episode. So you can take the fertility quiz and get $20 off your first kit at modernfertility.com Sahara Again, you can get $20 off your first kit@modernfertility. Welcome Mickey to the Highest Self podcast. It's so good to have you here.

So happy to be here with you.

So the first question that I would love to ask you is what makes you your highest self?

I think what makes me my highest self is really is considering integrity. I think I spent the last six years working with my life and leadership coach about true integrity. It's not just being a good person, but it's really what you're thinking, feeling and saying have to align. And oftentimes we don't. We don't align and oftentimes we are thinking something and saying something completely different like you know you're thinking, you know you're saying oh, hey, girl. And you're thinking like, bitch, you know, whatever. You know, it's like, I think being your highest self is being in true integrity. And I think I really work really hard to practice thinking, feeling, and saying the exact same thing.

Well, you totally did an amazing job in your book. It's. I was telling you, it's literally, I feel like I was having a conversation with you, even though I've never had a conversation with you before. But I was like, this is so how. How you would talk. And it's so like a girlfriend just, like, talking to you and, like, straight up telling you, like, yeah, I've gone through some shit, but I've also learned a lot, and here are the facts. So I'm obsessed with the book. So let's talk about it. Disrupt her. What does it mean to be a disruptor?

I think a disruptor, the way I think of what a disruptor is, is a person who is courageous enough to live fully lit up on her own terms and is committed to moving the world forward despite. Despite societal obstacles in her way. So, like, basically someone who just does it. It's like, I want to shift this. I want to change something. I want to live lit up and just keep and move forward in that direction no matter what anyone says.

Love that. And it's something that so many of us are, and we probably don't even give ourselves credit for. Like, we are. I think, as women, we're so afraid of kind of like, owning, like, yeah, I'm a badass. I'm disrupting things. But we're almost like, oh, I need to do it in, like, a coy, feminine, shy way to, like, not rock the boat too.

Yeah, it's really interesting. It's really interesting how we. We really deem society in quotes as this sort of, you know, decision maker. And it's like, who is society, society's people that are no different than you and me, you know, I mean, it's. It's like, it's literally people that decided, oh, we shouldn't talk about that. That's uncouth, you know? Oh, yeah, yeah. Women should be the one who covers their breasts, while men should just let their nipples fly. You know, it's just like, who says, like, what? How is this still a thing where we have to kowtow and listen to these societal preconceptions completely not serving our authentic selves today? And you think about all the categories in the world and just sort of, you know, from my personal background, you know, I've been focusing in the categories of periods and pee and poop and even pizza, which is, you know, people are very specific about their pizza. And in these categories, I've been just told by society, by people, no one's going to buy your product. No one's going to invest in your business. No one's going to bleed in their underwear. No one's going to poop. You know, no one's going to, you know, wash their butts with a bidet and spray poop everywhere. Gross. Obviously, that doesn't. That doesn not happen when you use a pate, but that's a lot of misconceptions. And people just talk so much shit. And it turns out that society was wrong. I mean, these businesses are now valued at well over $150 million. And the fact that it clearly turns out that society is wrong about a lot of things, not just periods, pee and poop, it's, you know, so I started to do a real deep dive in all other areas in our lives where I felt like society had a real chokehold on our lives. You know, the concept of career, of the, you know, the accumulation of more stuff and how that equals a better life and how we have to get serious as we grow up. And the culture of complaining, feminism, patriarchy, all these things, you know, activism, all these things are. Have been so pigeonholed, I feel like, from this societal context that it just needed complete disruption. You know, we can think about money differently, we can think about our careers differently, we can think about our relationships differently, we can think about our friendships differently. We can think about. Instead of complaining about shit, we can do it differently. We can come up with solutions. There are so many things that could be done differently that aren't in quotes, acceptable to culture today, to society today. And I think it's on us to be able to, you know, recognize that, realize that, have that awareness so that we can disrupt our lives and live fully, authentically and powerfully for the rest of it.

So good. And I think a lot of us, we recognize the issues in society, but we figure someone else is going to solve it. And what's really unique about you is you're like, no, this is a problem. No one is fixing this, so I'm going to be the one who does it. So do you think that this is just, like, you're just naturally born with the desire to, like, get in there, or was it something that you had to teach yourself?

Well, I think I honestly, like, watched my parents. You know, my father came to America with $5 in his pocket from India. My mother came here from Japan, barely speaking any English, and they, you know, together married each other in 1974. All odds against them. Love story, you know, my mother had to fight her Japanese parents who said, if you marry this man, we are going to cut you off financially. We will disown you. And so she had to really fight, fight that sort of dilemma which is, do I marry for love or do I marry for honor? And then my dad on the Indian side, his family had an arranged marriage set for him in India and he chose my Japanese mother where he was not going to get a dowry. Now his family wasn't getting any, any dowry or anything. So his big dilemma is, do I marry for love or do I marry for duty? And the two of them said, fuck it, we're just going to marry each other. We're going to go on our own path. We're going to disrupt these, this sort of like this ready made path for us. We're going to, you know, we're going to stay here in Canada and we're going to be with each other. In 1974, nobody was marrying interracially. It was such a. Them walking down the street was a spectacle back then. And so when we were born, when we were growing up and we were like 10 years old, you know, our parents were like, man, there needs to be a gifted children's summer camp. There's only, you know, there's sports camps, there's like a regular day camp, there's sleepwake camps. There's no gifted children's summer camp in Montreal. And again, my mom speaks with very thick Japanese accent. My dad has a thick Indian accent. And without any resources, any relationships, any connections, anything, they started Montreal's first gifted children's summer camp. And it ran for 15 years with 500 kids. And they just figured it out. They just did it. When we were also around that age, my parents realized that electronics was going to be the future. This is of course before really anyone had any personal computers in the 90s, early 90s. And you know, there was, there was, you know, obviously no cell phones or anything like that, but they were like, wow, electronics are the future. They really saw it. And so they were like, there's no way to teach kids electronics about how to, how electronics are put together. Like, no one really understands it. So my, my parents started a company called Tomorrow's Professionals on their, you know, kind of, you know, side time and where it taught kids about electronics. They put these little kits together which made these little breadboards that you could put resistors and transistors and little LED lights that flash and little, you know, switches. And you can make, you can make like burglar alar and you can make like lights flash up and down and you can kind of like figure out how electronics worked. And then they, they figured out how to make this little electronics kits company for kids. My dad wrote the manual and my mom made the, you know, the boxes together and they shipped them all over Canada for many, many years and taught so many children how to, you know, how to understand electronics better. And they just did things. They never complained about it. They never talked about any of it about in a, in a negative way. They're just like, all right, we have this problem, like, let's just go solve it. And I think that they just gave us that without saying it. It's like, if there's a problem in your community or society or country or whatever, you were just as anybody, as somebody to do it, you could be that person to do it too. And so when my first business for the restaurants came up, when I wanted to create New York City's first gluten free farm to table pizza concept, this is back in 2004, 2005, and nobody was talking about gluten free farm to table organic. Nobody. Everyone was like, ew, it probably tastes like cardboard. It was such an uphill battle to get people to, you know, want to try this product and try to, you know, eat it and realize that, wow, organic is delicious. Like, it actually is better, it actually tastes better. But back then there was so much stigma around that. So my experience of, you know, building the restaurant business really kind of parlayed into building, you know, the next, you know, Thinx and then Icon and then Tushy most recently. But all of it kind of came from my parents.

That's so beautiful. And what great examples that you had right before you and clearly you and both your sister who started Daybreaker, which is an awesome, like, morning dance party that I'm obsessed with.

It's the best.

Like, yeah, you, you guys totally follow that lead. And it's. And it shows, like, as parents, just how much, you know, real power we have from being that example. And I love how at the beginning of your book, it's like the cutest picture of you and your son. And on there you wrote. This book is dedicated to my new incredible, dimple, bootied, adventurous, curious, smiley, sometimes loud, sometimes soft, fully engaged son. Hero, happy hero. I promise to never lose myself for you. Because the more me, I can be, the more I can inspire you to be you. You got this. How did this come through?

I just know that the happier your examples are, the more you see the light turned on in their eyes, the more you're like, wow, I want to experience that for myself. I want the light to be turned on in my eyes too. And so I'm going to go find the thing I'm passionate about. This doesn't have to be the same. You don't have to be following your footsteps. If your dad's a doctor, you have to be a doctor. Just like, oh, like that person who's, who's I see all the time is so lit up and so, like, you know, so energized by what they're doing, you know, on a daily basis. Like, I want to, I'm inspired to do that too. And I think that's really what it is, is that I think that it's not about sitting there and like, being like that tiger parent. I think it really is about living your most lit up life and that's just the best example you can give for your child.

It's so true. And I think a lot of women, they almost, especially in the older generations, they feel like the moment that I'm a mom, it has to be all about the kid. And if it's, it's even a percent about me, that makes me a selfish mother. So then we have all these moms who don't have hobbies, they don't have passions, and maybe they have careers, but what's really lighting them up because of this societal guilt that's been placed upon them.

Exactly. Have you watched, did you watch my, my disruptor launch video where you're kind of getting yanked in both directions? Where I'm birthed out of a vagina?

I saw the birth out of the vagina part on your Instagram. But I need to watch the full video.

Yeah, you have to watch the full video. You really, really should. Because if you go to Disrupther, you can check out the full video. The first opening shot is I'm literally being birthed out of a vagina. But then I'm. Then there's the whole section of how society is trying to just pile onto us. Like when we're, when we're born, we are, you know, we're told like, you know, you know, get your head out of the clouds, sit down, be quiet. You know, and then all of a sudden you go from this really excited, childlike, you know, excited kid to this, you know, kind of dimmed Child, you know, and then, and then also society also is so hypocritical where it says like, you're too fat, you're too skinny, you're too loud, you're too quiet. And then also for mothers, they say, you know, oh, if you're a stay at home mom, who's taking, you know, who's like, tried doing some real shit. If you're, oh, and you're working mom, you know, who's taking care of your kids? And it's just like, you can't win either way, right? And so if you're a working mom, you know, people like, kind of like make shame you for neglecting your child. And if you're, you know, a stay at home mom, you're, you're, you're being shamed for not fulfilling your passions. And so I think it's really about, hey, fuck you, society. I don't care what you say. If I want to be a mom, I can be a mom. If I want to be a mom that works, I can be a mom that works. I want to be not a mom at all. I don't have to be a mom. Like, it's just like, we don't, we don't have to follow anything. And I just think that there's so much weirdness around every part of living and everyone has judgments and opinions about how we should exist. And it's on us to be like, thank you. I really appreciate your perspective, but I'm gonna go create my own perspective on what I think is right for me.

So true. But I think a lot of us, we just deal with the guilt. And I don't have kids yet, but I want to be a mom like you. But how do you deal with the guilt of like, when you're out there running your business, traveling, when you're like, oh, I have this baby at home and it needs me. Like, how do you just deal with that emotion internally?

I'm just like, I just constantly remind myself that my son is the happiest baby I know. And he's happy because he sees me happy, you know, and he just like, every time I see him, I'm like, my whole body explodes with joy because when I see him, I'm so, I feel so, like in awe that that's like my kid and he feels it because I don't take that relationship for granted. If I feel like I'm around him all day and dealing with his, all of his things, then I won't, like, I won't feel like I'm lit up, doing what I want to be doing with my life, and therefore seeing him all the time, all of a sudden, like, you know, you start to not be as excited when you see your kid. You start to kind of, like, you know, go through the motions of feeding them and doing all the things, and you don't have that genuine, unadulterated excitement every time you see him. And I think, for me, like, the way I really think about it is, you know, I go and do what I'm passionate about during the day, and then throughout the day, like, at lunchtime, I would see him. I see him, and then I see him, and I'm so happy, and I freak out. And we're both freak out, we're both excited. And then I go away. And then when I see him again in the, like, late afternoon, early evening, and then I get to read him books and we get to play. We both have fun and we're excited. And then I get to go away. And so, like. And then I get to go away and do what I'm. What I'm passionate about for myself, and I get to have this, like, excitement for my life and excitement to see my son. I just feel like it's the best of both worlds. I get. I get to have. You really can have it all. I really believe that. I genuinely. It's not pie in the sky. I really genuinely believe it.

That's so beautiful. And I. I mean, I'm relating to when I'm. When I'm gone and I come back and I see my dog, and we're both just so excited to see each other, and he doesn't feel that way when I'm home all day. You know, it takes. It takes that contrast for both of us.

You know what I mean? It's exactly. So I feel like I. I get to miss my kid every day during the few hours I'm away from him, and then I get to really revel in our time together when we're together. And I'm just not. I'm not mad at that at all, you know, like, yeah, you know, do I. Sometimes I come home and my. My nanny's taught him a new word, and I just get to. Now I'm not like one of those moms who's like, oh, I wish I taught him my word and feel guilt, guilt, guilt. I'm like, oh, let's talk about this new word that you learned today. Yay. You know, And I know it's easy to go there because you just. It's like, you Made this kid and you want him like, you're their number one. And like, sometimes my baby, like, asks for me, and sometimes he asks for my nanny Mama Mole. They call her Mama. His. Her name is Marisol. And we. She. He calls her Mama Mole and he's like, mama. And he sees me, Mama, Mama, Mama. And then when we're together sometimes, then he calls her nanny Mama Mole. And I'm like, yes. You know, so it's kind of like it's the way it used to be where we used to raise children in tribes where there was many moms, there was many caretakers, like, everyone got to share in the tasks, and it made life so much more fun. I feel like we now live in these sort of single family unit homes where it's like just the one mom and the one kid. And it's just like, it's a lot. If I didn't have support, it would be a lot for me, you know, But I think because, you know, I'm. I'm 39, turning 40. I've really kind of lived out my 20s and 30s and saved up. Like, I really am, you know, spending some of that. Some of that money that I've made on. On having a, you know, a nanny that I think really, really loves my kid. And it's, It's. It's worth every penny, you know, and like, if I, you know, I save here somewhere else that I don't need an extra whatever, it's just like you. You start to priorit that matter and you can have it all like you start to. In my book, I talk about practicing addition by subtraction. The less you have, the more space you have in your brain, in your space to create, and the more space you have to, like, you know, like, like spend your. Your energy, your money energy on things that matter. Like, you're like your baby. So, you know, there's as long. It's. It's your outlook. It's how you, you know, you. You decide you want to live is how you will end up. Like, living. Right?

So true. And when you were saying that, I was like, that's exactly the way of the tribe. And really it's you letting go of your ego. Because the ego would say, oh, I need to be the only woman in this baby's life and he cannot call anyone else mama anything.

Yeah.

So I need to be the only one that he sees so he thinks that I'm everything.

And then there's this jealousy thing that happens between nannies. True. I mean, I'm Just like. And for me, I'm like, yes, he's got two moms, thank God, you know, And I'm like, it makes me really, it makes me feel so safe, you know, Makes me feel so held. So she takes care of me too. Like, she makes me soup when I'm not feeling well, you know what I mean? Like, I feel like I have like a family member, you know, she lives with me, she lives down. She lives in our, in our apartment downstairs with her 22 year old son in our home. And so it's really like a communal living. It feels great.

I love that. And growing up, I also had someone in my house who lived with us and would help my mom and she would like, you know, take care of the house. But also. So that's why I can speak Spanish perfectly. And I learned so many incredible things and I feel so connected with Guatemala because of it. And I'm so grateful for that experience. And in no way did it replace my mom. It was just this other person that I could watch like telenovelas with.

Exactly. And that's the thing he's learning. He's like fluent. He's like, he speaks more Spanish than English right now. He speaks kind of both. I speak to him in Spanish. I know. And I speak to him in Spanish too, because I get to practice my Spanish with him. And so it's kind of funny because like he's half Japanese. Half or quarter Japanese Quarter, Indian, like quarter Jewish quarter, you know, Definitely there's no Spanish in there. But it's so fun that Spanish is like his like first language, first and second language right now, Spanish and English. He's really, he can really speak both. And it's, it's amazing.

That's beautiful. And it's such an example of you being a love her. So in your book, you talk about two kind of breeds of women though we can have the choice a love her a lover and a hate her, a hater. So can you explain what these two kind of archetypes are?

Yes. So I love her is a. So basically the way I talk about it is, is sort of, you know, like we, we all live in a spectrum. We all exist on a spectrum of love from love her to hate her. It's our external spectrum. Like we act out as a love her, which is, you know, being kind and complimentary and champion and abundance mindset and generative spirit. You know, she, you know, she's, she, she, she's a consummate champion of others is when she's a love her a Hate her. When you're acting out as a hater is when you're often feeling angry, hurt, insecure, anxious, jealous, envious. You know, that's when you act out as a hate her. And oftentimes, you know, it's actually exactly true that the way, the way you, I mean, it sounds so obvious, but the way you are on the inside, what your internal spectrum of emotion is will be shown on the outside. So if you're, if you're angry, hurt, sad, insecure, anxious, you're going to act out like a hater. You're going to be mean, take down, put down scarcity, mindset, negative, you know, talk shit. You know, that's because there's something going on inside of you that feels like lesser than or inadequate. That, that talking shit somehow kind of makes it feel better for a moment. But it, you know, it's just a momentary feeling good. It always just feel tastes bad in the end. You know, when you're feeling happy, fulfilled, secure, inspired, you're more likely to act out kind, complimentary, lift up, abundant. You want to be that in real life, you know, in your, in the out, outward way. And so the idea is that like, when you're acting out as a hate her, when you're feeling angry, heard, sad, insecure, anxious, jealous or envy or, and you want to act out as a hate her, you know, the way I think about it is like punching a wall, right? You're like, oh, fuck that girl. Fuck that thing. And then you punch a wall and then your fucking fist is broken and you have to heal it and you have to amend it forever, you know, for like weeks. So rather than punching a wall in it into the thing, you know, it's better to figure out the thing that turns that punch into inspiration. And so there's a way to really think about, like, how do you transmute, how do you go from being, you know, feeling angry, hurt, sad, insecure to happy, fulfilled, secure, inspired. It really is from a perspective of turning one into the other is really just, you know, is really just catching ourselves in that moment of insecurity, of sadness, really just catching that moment and then, you know, naming it, saying like, oh, that's my mean Margie coming out. Because there's something going on inside of me. Like, let me explore that. And then you can say, all right, during this period, like, when I'm feeling like this, I'm feeling like shit, I'm going to text my friends something, like something nice. And in the book, I say, when you're, when you're feeling, feeling I hate her. Text a friend. I'm playing a fun game. One thing I like about you is blank. And the idea is that by pointing out a good, the good in others, we are reminded of the good in ourselves. And so the minute you, you feel like I hate her, which is like feeling a little insecure and angry and down, you text someone something nice. One thing I like about you is blank just to a friend randomly. And they will literally like that, that just that act that will shift you out of your hate her mindset into your love her mindset.

I love that. And that's such a nice easy thing. And probably that friend is going to text back something they like about you. And it's this like positive enforcement loop that you, that you write about. Another interesting thing that you wrote about is how a lot of times the haters get the most attention. Like let's say you put up something and 99 people are like, oh my God, I love it.

Epic.

And one person's like, you suck. Go to hell. And all you can do is focus on that person. And even in family dynamics, you write about how when there's like that one troublemaker kid, all of the family attention and support goes to that kid. But instead we should be using our time, which is our most nonrenewable energy source to the people spreading light. So can you share how you deal with the hate hers in your life and how to not direct your energy towards that?

Yeah, absolutely. You know, I mean, in my, in my experience building businesses, I've definitely experienced a lot of pushback and just unwarranted, nonsensical stuff has been written about me over the years. I think when you're in the business of disruption, you try to push the boundaries of society forward, people will throw rocks at you, people will talk shit, people try to take you down. And that's literally part of it. And then you have to just realize like, wait a minute, is this, are these my witnesses that I want to have in my life or is this just the peanut gallery slash audience that I have in my life? And so the way I think about it is like, who are my witnesses? My witnesses are the people who love me, who know me, who spend spent like more than one second with me, who know who I am. That can't, that can't be that kind of person that, that sometimes can be described to externally, you know, and you just, you just say like, all right, like in high school, if someone's trying to talk about you, you're gonna, you're gonna find the friends who will be like, oh, that girl's just a mean girl. Don't worry about it. Like, just, you know, like, like, let's go. Focus. Let's go. Let's go, you know, practice our lines for our drama class. You know what I mean? Or, like, whatever. Like, you're gonna go. You're gonna find the people that really, really support you. Like, one thing that I say, like, I. While dealing with haters in my life, I've just doubled down on all of my friendships. Like, I have a big community in New York. We call ourselves the boom spiral. It's also in the book, which is the opposite of a doom spiral. The doom spiral is when negative piles on. And the boom spiral is as a collective. You create a boom, a positive effect. And when, for me, when I went through so much crazy stuff dealing with haters, my community showed up for me so hard. I had friends. I had, like, in the eye of one of the hardest times of my life. I had friends come in with a boombox, 20 friends dancing around me, just singing. And I was just like, wow. And they were like. And we just danced, and I cried in the middle of it, and we just kind of, like, let the tears be washed away with the love. And that's what really gets me through it, is that if you're dealing with haters, find the people in your life. It could be one person that really lights you up, that makes you laugh, that brings light in your eyes, that you talk about other stuff other than people and spend time with that person. Person and start looking for other people who do that.

I love that. And I think for all of us to be that person, too. I mean, it's so easy when your friend is going through a tough time to be like, well, then what did she say? Oh, that.

What a.

Like, oh, my God, I can't believe. And, like, just to, like, lament that negative feeling and, like, yes, that can be nice for a period of time, but then we just, like, sit into that, and is it actually really doing anything good if we're just, like, both hating on this person and sitting in that hating?

Totally. And I think it's. I think, of course. And we know. You know it, too, of course, is that, you know, it's important to feel through it, to really cry about it, to really move through the emotion, to spend, you know, to give yourself a timeframe. I talk about in my book, give yourself, like, 48 hours, two weeks to even a month, to, like, really feel through the pain. Depending on how insanely painful it is, the thing that you've gone through. And then after that, give it that timeline. At the end of the timeline, you practice being the warrior gatekeeper of your mind. And that in my book I talk about how to be a warrior gatekeeper of your mind. You, which is when you go through something really hard and, and you want to let that negative thought inside your head and you want to like, you know, plan your revenge or whatever it might be. You know, the way I do it is like, it's like I use that opportunity to practice being the warrior gatekeeper of my mind with my life coach Lauren, who's amazing. And she said, okay, so here's how we practice it. Whenever you have a negative thought, let's, you know, let's call it like revenge Rita or whatever, you know, and you, and then you, before it gets gets to your brain, into your brain, you stop it at your mental gate. You're like, oh, there's revenging rit Rita again. Come and trying to get into my brain. I'm just going to now. So then you, you catch it, you catch the thought, you name it like revenge Rita or whatever you want to call it, Righteous Rita. And then you, you file it, you organize it. You're like, okay, that's a conversation I'm going to have with this one person on Tuesdays at 11:00am and that's it. And you're done talking about it. You're not talking, you're not lamenting about it to your friends, you're not bringing it back up to your family member. You're just done. And when you really practice being a warrior gatekeeper of your mind, it allows you, it gives you the space. You name a time for when you can feel through that feeling in that moment. And the rest of the time you're free to create new experiences in your life. So it just gives you freedom to not let this, these kind of, these mean thoughts keep festering in our brains over and over again because it just doesn't serve us. In my book, I also talk about how we have only 21,000 days to live from the point we graduate college to the point we die. That for us to just loop all these negative stories, these low vibrational stories around in our heads, it's just not going to serve our best selves for, for us to be here for such a short amount of time. We have. Time is the most non renewable resource we have. We just talked about that and, and the fact that we just while it away talking Is just. Is just not. Is just not worth it. So it's important to have your time to feel through it, to really, like, really feel it. Really get cry, really get angry, really, you know, feel it and then move through it.

Okay. If you're anything like me, you buy green juice, spend way too much money on it, and then forget to drink it and it sits in your fridge. Ever happened to you? No, just me. Okay, well, I got your solution, and it is called organifi. So organifi is a gently dried superfood mix that has real green ingredients like moringa, chlorella, mint, spirulina, beets, matcha, wheatgrass, ashwagandha, turmeric, lemon, coconut, water, all dried up. So all you have to do is add water? Yes. You do not have to use a blender. You do not have to spend $12 on a juice. You don't have to go shopping, anything, and you get all of your superfoods in one drink. They also have an amazing red juice, which is like a tart, sweet little brew, as well as organifi gold, which has our favorite turmeric. So I love these. They're all USDA certified organization organic, and I literally travel with them and have them at home every day. So head over to Organifi.com O R G-A-N-I F I.com and use code Sahara for 20 off. Again. Organifi.com and use code Sahara for twenty off your delicious green juice. Magic adaptogens are all the buzz right now, but the thing is, most of us have no idea how to ingest them. Well, I recommend listening to episode 133, adaptogens 101 with LOPA of rasa after this episode and trying rasa. Rasa is a delicious blend of seven different adaptogens and two medicinal mushrooms. They have three flavors. Their original rasa, which I use on a daily basis. They're cacao rasa, which is a dark, dark, rich, chocolaty version, and their dirty rasa, which is a more dark, rich, balanced version, which makes a really good coffee alternative. It provides your body with exactly what it needs when it needs it and balances most of the doshas most of the time. You can try it over at wearerasa r a s a dot com and use code eat feel fresh for 20 off. Again. Be sure to listen to episode 133 and then head over to we errasa.com and use code eat feel fresh for twenty off your magical adaptogens. Are you interested in having a career focused on health and wellness. Well, if so, then the universe is calling you to become a holistic health coach. I am offering this incredible deal, a discount of $1500 off my Alma mater, Institute for integrative nutrition, which is the world's largest nutrition school. With guest teachers such as Deepak Chopra, Chris Carr, Dr. Hyman and Dr. Andrew Whale and so many others. It is split between six months of health coaching programs teaching you hundreds of nutritional theories, including Ayurveda, as well as six months of business coaching. And as an additional bonus, I am offering a webinar where I will teach you how to, how to use social media to create a thriving career as a health coach. On top of that, I have created a private Facebook community just for the highest self podcast listeners who are becoming health coaches to connect with each other, meet up with each other and support one another on this journey. So if you're interested, send an email over to Sahara S A H A R A@eatfeelfresh.com with subject IIN. Again, saharaetfeelfresh.com with subject iin and I will personally send you back the email that will allow you to get a 1500 dollars off discount as well as my business coaching webinar and the private Facebook group. I'm so excited for you to begin your journey as a health coach. So I'd love to like walk through. Like, what do you actually do in your brain? Like a negative thought comes up, someone, I don't know, an investor, is like, we're not investing into fishy. It's, it's dumb and it was something you're really relying on and you're just, you keep thinking about, it's looping in your mind. So how do you use this warrior strategy?

Yeah, so, so, so if it's already in your brain, if it's so, so before, even so, there's two things. The first is if before it gets to your brain, you are inside your brain, you catch it at the, before it gets in. And by, by how you catch it is you, you, you, you just find that awareness. You're like, okay, oh, there's that thought again. There's mean Margie again. Up there's righteous Rita again. Oh, there's, you know, you know, whoever it might be, like Rick said, you know, any one of these characters might get to try to come to your gate and you have to just first find that space, that awareness that, that, that thoughts coming into your, your space. And then before it gets into your brain, when it starts to loop and spiral and then you know, kind of this negative thought starts to thought spiral all over your brain, then into your body. You catch it, you name it and then you organize it. So you organize mealing. Either you say sorry, no not allowed today, goodbye later or you say if it's something that you really do want to talk about. Okay, that's a conversation I'm going to have with my coach on Tuesdays at 11am or with my whoever on Tuesdays at 11am and so that you don't have to, then you can then organize it because we really are people who humans want to have organization in our lives. You like order in some ways. And so, so to have that be filed away at this certain date and a time, then you could go out your date as if, you know, like as if it didn't even happen because you filed it. Then if it gets into your brain, all of a sudden, mean Margie somehow slips through the crack, gets into your brain. It happens. We're all human. When it's in our brain festering, then we practice pattern interruption. Pattern interrupt. So in my book I talk about how when you, when this negative thought comes into your brain and you've tried to catch it, you couldn't, it's now festering and now it's getting deeper. Now it's all you think. You stand up and you change your position, you move around, you take a walk around the block, you go for a run, you do push ups, you just change your scenery, you leave the room. And that physical getting up and doing it interrupts the pattern in your mind because mind and body are interconnected. I started doing a TM practice with Dr. Bob Roth who's amazing. He is the teacher of TM and we just talked about how, how it's so important to, you know, really just like get, you know, first become aware of thoughts and if not just interrupt the pattern and just take a walk and walk around. It's really helpful.

So true. Yeah. I find just getting outside or lying down on my floor and stretching, like doing something else really helps me to just shift the mindset.

And it could be as simple, it could be as simple as just standing up. You know, it could be as simple as standing up and. Yeah. And bending down, it, it could be the smallest little movement. It doesn't have to be this, this, this big thing. But you know, I love the idea of going for a run and going for a walk or going to work out and going, doing things. But to interrupt the pattern could just be, you know, stepping out of the Shower. Because oftentimes, like sometimes you have those, like these thoughts spiral while you're in the shower. You're like, okay, I'm gonna get outta the shower and do something else, you know, so, yeah, it could be as small as just, just standing up and as, as big as whatever big thing you want it to be.

So good. So I would love to ask you, how do you balance having your own spiritual practice with, you know, creating and achieving so much?

Yeah, I mean, I think I've tried so many different mindfulness meditations and I finally just started working, like I said, on, on tm, Transcendental Meditation. I just got my first mantra, which is so exciting. And I know TM has, you know, some controversial elements to it, but it's in its purest form. It's just simply a way to just drop into your deepest relaxation and allow your mind and your body to really connect in a really relaxed way. And having a mantra to help you get there really has helped me. And so I've been practicing 20 minutes twice a day. I just started. But outside of that, my mindfulness practice has been really just riding the bike and doing something pretty repetitive and hanging out with my little baby I'm looking at right now who just came into the the room. Hi, my little boo boos, Bye bye. Yeah. And so, yeah, I think, I think it can come from, you know, for me it's just meditative experience that gets you into sort of this Zen out space. And I think when I read my baby a story when I'm riding my bike, you know, when I'm in the shower, those are moments where I take, you know, I have my moments. I also have little reminders in my phone, like every, every three hours or every. Sorry, every two hours. Every reminder is take three long deep breaths. I just have this reminder that pops up that just says, take three long deep breaths and that's it.

I love that.

Just take, I just, you know, you know, pop up and I'm like, you know, and I just kind of, just kind of ground myself into three long, deep breaths. And it can just. It does help. It really does. When you're like in the midst of like so many different things, to be able to just be reminded to take three long, deep breaths can just immediately put you in a, in a new headspace.

So good and so simple. I think everyone listening right now just took a few deep breaths because it just takes that one person reminding you to be like, oh, yeah, I haven't breathed today.

Right?

We forgot.

Right?

So my last Question is, what advice would you have for your 20 year old self looking for back?

Oh, I would have loved to start a mindfulness meditation practice at age 20, you know, or to have some kind of body work done starting at age 20. You know, I started probably around 30, you know, 35. He had turned 40 this Saturday. What? Thank you. But you're a Capricorn. Aquarius. Yep. And so I, you know, I started doing, getting massages once a week, 90 minutes a week. And it sounds like it could be an expensive thing, but you really, if you do budget and you focus on what you put in your body, you focus on the things that matter and how you take care of your body. That, you know, 100 bucks, you know, or you know, you can do one hour for 60 bucks, you know, you go to a Chinese massage parlor and do it for 50 bucks once a week. And it just makes such a difference when you get all that shit out of your body. And I've been doing 90 minutes every single week for the last five years. And it's, if I started age 20, I feel like I would be a different person. Same thing with mindfulness practice. I think I would just be like a calmer, you know, like I don't know if I, you know, would have even necessarily had such a triggered experience, you know, when I going through the ups and downs of my businesses. So, you know, I think, I think it's, that would be something really, really cool to my 20 year old self to be able to really start these kinds of, you know, mind, body work or like earlier.

I love that. And fortunately now today it's so much more in the mainstream that I think a lot of 20 year olds are practicing meditation and exploring body work, whereas for you it just, it just wasn't as much in the mainstream yet. But you were very still ahead of your time. I mean, gluten free pizza in 2004, unheard of.

Yeah, it was. So, I mean in the amount of shit talking I got now with tushy, I'd love to share a little bit about tushy because it's the most important. Yes, please.

I know I, I'm all about, because I'm Persian, so we always use, use like we have bidet like at my house growing up, but I don't have one here so I need to order one because it's such a game changer and I would be like, why don't Americans like clean their butts with water? It was always so weird for like me and my brother that like no One else did this.

No, it's. It's the craziest thing that when you actually really think about it, using dry paper to wipe the dirtiest part of your body, like, you would just not do it on any. Any other part of your body. If a bird pooped on your face, you wouldn't take a piece of dry paper and just wipe it off and be like, I'm clean, everyone. I'm cle. Cool. I'm cool. You know, or like, you jump in the shower and not turn the water on and just use dry paper to, like, wipe your body down and be like, I'm clean. You know, you're smelly armpits. You're like, just dry paper. You're like, cool. I'm good. I'm good. It's like that people would be like, I think that person's crazy, you know? Or like your dirty dishes, you wouldn't be, like, not turning the water on, just using dry paper. You just cooked a rot, you know, cut up a raw chicken, you wipe it off with, like, a piece of dry paper and put it back in your cupboards. People will be like, what are you doing? You know, it's just that we've been so deeply indoctrinated by the last three, four generations in the late 80s, 1800s, when toilet paper is brought to America, that this paper does the job, but all it does is kill 15 million trees per year. They're getting flushed down the toilet every year, plus all the processes to make it, you know, requires 37 gallons of water to make one single roll of toilet paper. You know, the average American uses 57 sheets of toilet paper per day because they're, like, wrapping the paper around their hand to try not to touch the poop. It's such a weird thing that we've adopted that we just don't question because it' way our parents did it, our grandparents did it, our great grandparents. So we just don't question it. And that's the thing that this book is meant to do, is to liberate you and question everything in your life. Like, why am I wiping my butt with dry paper? Why am I sending my kids to school? That, you know, where kids are learning, like the way kids did during the factory working days, where the standardized tests, the rows of desks, the way the kids are learning today are the same way that they taught factory workers so that they can turn in, you know, churn out and churn in, like, cogs in a machine. Like, that's literally why people are having to take all these, like, Adderall and concentration drugs because kids are not interested in learning this way anymore. And it's just like all these. There's this compounding effect upon compounding effect on things that we've been doing for, like, so for last century. And that's just been indoctrinated so deeply into our society that there's no just. It's not even fathomable to think of another way to do it. So for me, it's just about breaking those preconceptions, is breaking those. Those habits and making people and like, taking like, the kind of the veil off people's heads and being like, wait a minute, why am I using dry paper? Wait a minute. I've been getting UTIs all these years. I've been getting hemorrhoids, and I've been all these things. Like, I'm using overused wet wipes. You're getting. You're getting anal fissures. And it strips away the natural oils from behind over time. Not to mention it's terrible for the environment, terrible for the plumbing systems. It's just. Just bad. And like, not to mention all the money that you're wasting on, you know, getting the toilet paper to your house, all the packaging required to package the toilet paper, the trees killed the water wasted to make it. It's just insane versus using a little pint of water for each time you go to the bathroom. So what we've created is a simple modern bidet that easily attaches to your toilet. Looks like a beautiful iPhone next to your toilet. We want to make it a designer modern bidet. It's only $69. So unlike those Japanese toilets, which cost thousands of dollars plus plumbing, plus electrical, or those weird French bidets that sit next to your toilet, ours is simply a bidet attachment that easily attaches to your toilet, clips onto your toilet, and turns your toilet into a bidet in 10 minutes. There's no plumbing, plumbing, no electrical required. And it's literally, for me personally, the most transformational thing. And we've been, you know, we've got. We've sold millions and millions of dollars of these products over the last few years because people are starting to realize, wait a minute, like, what have I been doing all these years? And then you pat dry with, you know, either an organic bamboo butt towel that we also offer on our@hellotushy.com or you can use 80% less toilet paper paper to pat dry, which means you're saving, you know, family. Four saves two trees per year collectively, you know, millions and Millions of trees per year will get saved by just simply using fresh water to properly clean yourself. And to all the Californians who are listing water, like I said, you know, a single roll of toilet paper requires 37 gallons of water to make. And Tusha use one pint. So actually over a course of a week, you're saving 55 gallons of water per week by using only water to properly clean you. It's like a no brainer product.

I love it. And you, and you feel refreshed, like it's a different feeling.

You feel like if you actually Google, if you Google snl, Michael Che rant on bidets. He actually. So, you know, our New York City subway campaign for tushy was banned by the New York City subways because they said bidets are sexual products. Not even kidding. They said that. And we were like, oh my God, please. And so then, so this New York. So we send the story to the New York Daily News. We're like, how did the New York MTA ban our ads? And they basically. So it ran this story in New York Daily News, and then SNL Saturday Night Live picked up the story. And then Michael Shea, who we later found out is obsessed with bidets, who's the head writer of snl, literally comes onto the show and does a three minute rant on how much he loves, like, how why he thinks these ads should have been, you know, like, accepted on the subways and how bidets are the most. He's like, I feel, I feel better now. I feel like I can have children now. I'm a better person because of it. And it was like, you do feel more confident. You do feel less lighter. And also, there's so much stigma. It's like, oh, my God, I'm spraying poop. Like, and poop is spraying everywhere. You're like, no, no, no. It's like a reverse waterfall. It pulls the poop down into the bowl. Like it's cleaner than anything else. You know, people like, oh, is it toilet water? It's not toilet. Or the toilet tank water. It's like, no, it's not the toilet bowl water or the tank water. It's water from the wall that. Literally the same water you brush your teeth with, the splitter and the hose, everything's included in the box. It takes any person who can't hang a painting like myself, who's so unhandy, can install a bidet, can install our tushy. It's so simple. So I challenge anyone who's so skeptical, you know, about it to Definitely. Just at least check it out and read some of the real reviews, all the reviews. We have thousands of them on our website. You know, by the way, do not go to tushy.com. it's a porn site, a very graphic porn site. Go to hello, hellotushy.com to check it out. T U S H Y and you'll be able to see, you know, the massive environmental, the massive health benefits that the amount of money you'll save. It's just, you know, it's just again, it's unraveling ourselves from this sort of, this sort of weird stigmas against things that are uncomfortable talking about. And that's why I'm so excited about my book to come out because hopefully it will help foster the idea and the ability for people to start questioning all the other things in their lives so they can live the most authentic, empowered, lit up lives ever for only a short amount of time while we're here.

So good. And I also want to say it's not just for the tushy, which you briefly mentioned about, you know, the UTIs, but like, I remember even my mom and my, and my grandma would say it's so important for women to just clean themselves with water. Just for your balance on even your period, just on a daily basis.

I mean, absolutely.

If you're not showering every day, which a lot of people actually aren't, you still need to like clean your vagina every day. And people aren't doing that. And you know, it's just I actually feel so much more refreshed, even from like the female perspective. Using a bidet. I don't have like a one on my wall. I need to order a tushy.

But I'm gonna send you one. I'm sending you one. I'm gifting you one.

Okay, I will write my, I will write my review on it. Ladies, seriously, you're gonna feel like a bird coming out of that bathroom.

You feel so confident. You feel like cleaner before and after sex, on your period, every day. You just feel refreshed. You feel, oh, yeah.

Before and after sex. Absolutely.

God, it's just. And it's just like you will realize you're like, I don't know, like, when you read all the reviews on our website, you'll be like, oh, my God. Or even on Amazon. Check out the reviews everywhere. Like, it's all like, they're from third party review sites. It's not like we doctored any of them. They're all real reviews. And basically it's like People are like, I don't know what my life was like before. It's like I had a life before Tushy and after Tushy. It's like when I leave, when I go to work, I. I like, I like, I like, miss my tushy. So, you know, we're launching a travel bidet soon for those who. Who miss their tushies and want to take one with them to their office. It's like a. A little, you know, a discreet bottle, a water bottle, kind of a little, you know, travel bidet that you can have with you and bring to your office with you. So it's.

Yeah, that's so funny because I. Because I used to talk to my brother. He was like, I can't take a shit at work because there'.

Exactly. I love your brother. He gets it.

Yes. So thank you. And I love the passion that you have for it, too. Like, it's so important to be this passionate about anything. It is that you're doing, and you're going into something that's so taboo, like the New York City subways. Won't even post about it. And you're like, yes, this is why it's important. So I'm going to be even louder for the people in the back.

Yeah. 100%. 100%.

Well, thank you so much for sharing your wisdom with us. And where can listeners connect with you and get your book and try to cushy.

Absolutely. Definitely check out Disrupther Co and check out the video. And I get again, it's like a birthing. The opening shot is being birthed out of a vagina and really shows the hypocrisy of society. And then you can kind of. It just says you could just buy the book on Amazon, Barnes Noble anywhere, but definitely check out the, you know, the website Disruptor Co. You can get the book from there as well. And then if you want to find tushy, go to hellotushy.com of course. And then anything else about, you know, about me, you could go to Mickey Agrawal.

Well, thank you so much again for coming on. And I'm so excited to see this book. Really just take the world by storm.

Yay. So happy to be here. Sara, I'm so proud of you for also doing what you do and really introducing Ayurveda and all these things to the world and building this really powerful podcast. It's really awesome.

Oh, thank you. How amazing was Mickey at gruel? So if you want to get your hands on a tushy bidet, head over to hellotushy.com and use code SAHARA for 10 off. I know. I am so excited to have a bidet back in my life and I also wanted to share with you. I went on Mickey's Instagram later and I scrolled down and I saw this awesome picture of her pumping breast milk with bottles attached to her nipples at Burning Man. And I was like, what? And I read the caption and it's her talking about, why is breast milk such a taboo thing? Why don't we talk about breast milk in our society? So she decided at Burning man as she was weaning off breastfeeding her son, that she would collect her breast milk and offer it to the people at Burning Man. And she said almost none of it went to waste. People used the breast milk in their coffee. They had shots of it for energy. They tried it for the first time. And there was such little education about breastfeeding. Most people did not know that when you're a woman breastfeeding, your boobs got really sore and painful if you're not actually pumping your breasts. So instead of just throwing it away, she decided to offer it to people. And I just thought that's such a cool example of like, what Mickey's like. Like such a disruptor that she's even taking the topic of breast milk and bringing it to the norm. So kudos to Mickey. Definitely. Check her out. If you loved this episode, I would love to share with you the first half of my unreleased book, eat right for your mind body Type, which is different from my book Eat Feel Fresh. It is my unreleased, never to be released book because it is now part of my eat right for your mind Body type program. I would love to send it you absolutely free. All you got to do is leave me a review in the itunes store, Take a screenshot and email it over to me@saharaetfeelfresh.com again. Take a screenshot of the review and email it to me@saharaatfeelfresh.com and I will send you the first half of my unreleased book, Eat right for your mind body type. Namaste.

Sam.