From Delivering Babies to Breakthroughs: Dr. Jim Heid on Redefining Identity, Purpose & Success

Hey, everyone. Welcome to the do the Thing podcast. This is your host, Stacy Lauren. Well, you guys, this is exciting. I met my most recent guest, actually on LinkedIn, which is a new place for me to be on, and we had a really great conversation about what he's doing in the world. And the thing that really sparked my curiosity and wanting me to bring him on the podcast is the way that he was able to transition from. From one career to another and then being able to help people tap in to the deepest purpose of what they're doing in the world. And as many of you know, that is kind of my do the Thing story, where I originally thought I was going to help people do the thing, take action on their goals, remove the mental baggage. But what it turned into was so much more. Being able to actually find our own voice through our journey and being able to really rediscover, reinvent, and tap into the deepest reason why we're here, which is what helps us do the thing at the highest level and what we're meant to do. So I am so excited to explore with him his story and share it with you. So I am welcoming Dr. Jim to the show. Hey, Jim, how are you?

I am doing well, thank you, Stacy. Looking forward to our conversation.

Yeah, me too. I know when we spoke the last time, I felt like I could see it. I could see all the wisdom in the words that you're saying and how much power is in the experience that you've lived. And being able to come on the other side of that, I think, is really, really powerful.

Yes. That's what I love about coaching, because the wisdom and the power is actually in the client. They just need a sounding board, someone to draw that out, because the wisdom and power is in them, not in my expertise.

Yeah, my whole thing is about helping people express themselves. Mine's different. It's in a group. That's my methodology, but that's kind of one of the things I have, I don't want to say a problem with, but it's like when people are just like the talking, talking, talking, talking instead of grabbing out who the person is on the inside. So, yeah, we have that in common, too. Well, let's talk about your story. So I'd love to hear kind of where all this came from, how you're got into what you're doing now, and we can get into it, and then we can kind of go into how you're helping people really do the thing also.

Sure, yeah. I started out, if anyone's familiar with strength, finder or cliftonstrengths as it's now called. One of my top strengths is activator, which means I learn by doing. And as I examine my story, there's a lot of things where I heard about something, I went out and did it, and either then figured out what the heck was I doing or that was really cool, I need to do more of that. So I learned by just kind of heading on the journey and doing so. Initially, I grew up in a family of engineers. I was going to be an engineer until I went to high school and took some courses and realized that I was much more fascinated with the human body than mathematics and changed course to be a doctor and kind of loved everything. So kind of fell into family medicine. So I practiced family medicine for 30 years. I realized as I started to study coaching that medicine was a lot of coaching. I help people with end of life planning or making a complex medical decision, helping draw out what their goals are so that they can make the decision that suits them best. And I think probably one of the most coachy things I did in family medicine was I did full spectrum delivered babies, especially the natural childbirth, because it's me and the woman locking in a metaphysical space because there's something magical that happens when a child is born. And I've never, obviously I'm a man, I've never given birth, but I would say so many times that the woman would look at me at some point and go, I don't think I can do this. And I would have to look at her with compassion and say, the reality is you're the only person in the room that can do this, and you can do this and walk her through what going to look like. But she delivered the baby. I just coached and I was talking with someone about this recently and I realized one of the big things we talk about is coaching the person, not the problem. And in that very scenario, the baby is the problem causing pain. And I can't coach the problem. I can't coach the baby out. I have to coach the mom to get the baby out. So as an analogy for my approach to coaching, I can't fix the problem. I can't coach the problem. I have to coach the person to find their own way to solve the problem.

It's almost like you built that skill right through that experience and that's kind of what serving you today. I'd love to hear about the transition from when you decided to leave the medical field and then kind of went into coaching. What was that about? And maybe we don't talk about the going into coaching yet. We'll talk about leaving the medical field first.

Yeah, well, I mean, I think a frustration of medicine is it only goes so far. And again, as a family doc, walking people through phases of life, I just remember a lot of my older male patients being frustrated with their job. Thought retirement was going to be the answer. Then they were frustrated with retirement. And as a doc, you're like, well, I'm here to help you with your health. But sometimes we'd get into conversations, obviously we'd get into conversations about stuff like that. I didn't feel that I had the space to say what I can say to my coaching clients, which is, you're not frustrated with your job, you're not frustrated with retirement, you're frustrated with you and who you are and how you define who you are. Let's work on that. Let's work on you, who you are, what you want to be doing with your life, and then worry about whether you need to get paid for that or not.

Right.

So really. And the other thing was, like I said, I did full spectrum family medicine. I was catching all my own babies, staying up all hours of the night, and then being in clinic all day the next day. And at some point I realized, I'm getting old enough. This is not exactly sustainable. And like I said, I realized I was coaching these women to. To get the baby out. I could be doing coaching and not be up in the middle of the night. That was a beautiful thing.

So you actually decided to be a coach before you even left, you were like, that's what I'm doing. There was no in between part of what am I going to do now Kind of thing.

No. And I still do halftime medicine, but at a much slower pace. I coached myself out of what I would say, high paying, high stress, unsustainable career. And I now work for a nonprofit halftime, which is just. It's lower pace, lower stress. Love what I do. Get to take more time with patients and take a coach approach to medicine. And I have time to then grow a coaching business on the side.

Yeah, I love coach approach to medicine.

Yeah. It's helpful to ask the patient, where do they want to be? Get them living not in the moment, but looking toward the future.

Yeah. Can you talk more about how did you help? Almost, because you're starting with yourself first. When we're able to help people rediscover themselves and we're able to actually tap into who people are, it has to come from that place inside. Right. Were you feeling something as you're kind of doing the job and then you're like, okay, I've got to figure this out. Did you go through practice to help yourself?

Yeah, again, like I said, I'm an activator. Some of the things I did was okay. Standard treadmill medicine was not for me. I was ready for that transition. So working with a nonprofit was part time and in the back of my mind was grow a coaching business. But in the front of my mind was do stuff to make money. And I tried working for the VA doing different evaluations for VA benefits and even looked into to prison medicine, which I thought would be interesting. And again, kind of serving, paying back. So I would kind of jump in with both feet and then go, nah, this isn't for me and jump back out. And so that's really how I kind of figured some of the alternatives in medicine were not for me. It's really, I gotta put everything into the growing a coaching business. I want to be busy and serving.

And so what's your process when you get to help someone now through coaching to help them really kind of rediscover themselves?

Well, I have a few offerings and let the clients pick and choose. One is again the strengths finders to do an assessment to see who am I? And the theory behind there's a lot of different assessments out there. What I love about CliftonStrengths is that he was a psychologist. He was probably the father of positive psychology. He got tired of trying to trying to figure out what was wrong with people and decided to figure out what was right with people. He did a bunch of research, interviewed a couple of million people and came out with we all have 34 talents. We all have all 34, but the amount of each one is different. So I say we have our, what he called signature talents where we live and breathe and swim in. It's like you have a truckload of that talent. You have your auxiliary talents. They're like a tool belt, something you can use but you can't swing a hammer 24 hours a day. Those you have a pickup bed full. And then your non pattern talents, which you have a teaspoonful. If you try and do your career based on a teaspoon, you're going to get burned out, you're going to be frustrated. You want to figure out where your truck full of stuff is and use that in your life and career. And then also some neuroscience tools to help people stay relational because joy and fulfillment comes from relationship, not success or anything else. So figure out who you are, figure out how to stay relational.

Then whatever you do with those two buckets filled, whatever you do, you're going to love it.

Yeah. What do you think helps people stay relational? Especially right now? Right. The world is kind of screaming of AI and artificial everything. Right. And how do we actually stay connected in that way?

Yeah, well, we have to be intentional to be others focused. So not looking at what I can get out of the situation, not looking at what I need, but looking at what those around us need. And the other is one of the gentlemen I coached came in with kind of a talking about anxiety. And I was like, well, this is going to be a depressing coaching experience. And at the end I don't even know how we got there. But at the end he said, okay, interrogate the story so that you can evaluate the experience.

Our experiences are only so much fact based things happen to us that we bring our previous experiences, our previous thoughts, our emotions to. And then we tell ourselves a story about what just happened. And what he was saying is, okay, we gotta tear apart that story. What did I bring into this that has absolutely nothing to do with the facts. Let's tease that all away. Now I can evaluate the experience. So the first layer is, okay, what is all about me in this story. And let's just completely strip that away. Now I'm others focus. Now let's look at the what just happened through the lens of others. Focus. A movie I need to rewatch probably 90s early 2000s vantage point. It's the same 20 minutes told five times from different perspectives. And then I think Kevin Costner is the bodyguard for the President. If I remember correctly, the last five to ten minutes is him wrapping it up once he has done the research to see those same 20 minutes from five different perspectives. And then he wraps it up. That's what interrogating our story is all about.

I actually kind of do this, I think sometimes when I ask advice it's a little bit different, but I like to get a bunch of different viewpoints so then I can synthesize it and then really come up with what kind of feels the best for me. But it sounds like interrogating your story is. Yeah, just getting to see all different perspectives. So then you have a worldview of what you're looking at. I think that's so important. Right. Because the things that we go through in life and the experiences that we have, that's how we're able to, good or bad, that's what gets us into. We're doing Now. Right. And I think that's really good for people to know. I mean, I always kind of think that once you're at the worst of it, it's gonna. As long as you're able to get your mindset back into it, you're able to kind of come up on the other end way better than you even started.

Well. Right. And I think one of the other things that's important about interrogating the story is being able to heal back your defenses. I'm doing a presentation tomorrow. I'm talking about three fears and how they show up in business. And one of them is the fear of failure. What's our gut response when we do fail is we make excuses. We say, well, traffic made me late, or the test wasn't fair. But if we peel that back, well. Oh, gosh, I know. I'm thinking of my third quarter calculus in college. I went in knowing nine weeks worth out of 10 weeks because it was a quarter system. So I figured, I have a solid B, I don't need to study this last week's worth of material. I can walk in, get a solid B and be done. The test was all on the last weeks of material because you had to know everything else and know that to understand it. It was very humbling to have to explain a C minus in calculus when you are being interviewed for medical school. And I had to own it and just say, the reason I got a C minus is I thought I was going to sail on nine out of 10 weeks. I did the math. 90% is still an A minus, B plus. And I blew it because I made that choice. And I think that being able to talk about a failure and say, yeah, I blew it and I will never, ever rest again. I'm going to study all of the course material before a test. I'm not going to assume that 90% is okay. And I think that that's what we all want from our doctors, is not to assume that 90% is okay.

Mm. Yeah. I remember seeing on your LinkedIn you had a picture of a bike and I'm imagining you do that regularly. I'd love to kind of go there because I feel like when you're able to tap into the do the thing psychology of how you're able to take action regardless of what it is. I think it's important because that's one of the things I like to do on the podcast, is help people understand the through line between anything you're doing right.

And yeah, I mean, that's the image I'm going for is get momentum and go through. I love cycling, so I ride to work two days a week. That'll be coming to an end. I live in the Northwest, so November through February, it's too dark and cold and I don't want to get hit and I don't want to get ice. But most of the year, I ride a couple of days a week. I enjoy going out for recreational rides and the whole purpose for struggling up a hill. And this is where my wife and I disagree. The whole purpose of going up a hill is to fly as fast as you can down the hill. So I will take downhills at speed. And that's amazing. I did a ride where I had, I think it was a four to five mile downhill. I was doing 45 to 50 miles an hour on my bike, felt weightless. It was amazing. And other people would say that would just be frightening, but that's my personality. So I learned something. I used to ride with a friend of mine and he'd yell, hydrate, hydrate. I'm not drinking enough. And it always bugged me until he said it a different way. He said, when you reach the top of a hill, hydrate. Well, when you're struggling to get up the hill, it's hard to reach down for the water bottle. But when you get to the top of the hill, you want to celebrate. It's sports drink. It has a little bit of flavor. But what really stuck with me, and I've used this with my clients, is it wasn't just a replenishment. It was a celebration of one success that prepared me for the next challenge because drinking that electrolyte solution prepared me for the next hill. So I like to challenge my clients. Okay, how can you celebrate today's success.

In a way that fuels you for tomorrow's challenge?

Wow, is that yours? I'm like, that is really good.

That is lots of credit to Chris, my cycling friend. But yeah, I mean, that's really why I started drinking more. Was like, oh, this makes so much sense now. I mean, he's yelling at me to drink, and I'm just a go getter. I'll drink at the end. No, because I've been there, I've bonked, or hit the wall, as they call it. In fact, I did a 100 mile ride two years in a row, and I bonked, I think at the same place, 85 miles in, because I wasn't eating enough fuel. I wasn't drinking enough. It's like, okay, if I'm going to do long rides. I need to be prepared. I need to have sugar and I need to have electrolytes and water and I need to just. They say you're supposed to drink before you're thirsty. If you wait till you're thirsty, it's too late. So for me to have that moment of okay, celebrate at the top of the hill to prepare for the next hill. That was amazing.

Yeah, I feel like you gotta put that quote everywhere today. Can you share more about the whole thing with do? The thing I discovered was the biggest piece of the formula to help people take action, in addition to what most people know, which is identifying your why, having the right mindset, goals, accountabilities, things like that. But the thing I've discovered is being around my people, which is people that have the same goal as you. And so is that something you've kind of lived with too in your life as you've been around people to help you achieve your goals, not just friends and family or regular support network. Do you naturally go look for groups that you can join and be in and that helps you get in momentum?

Yes. Oh absolutely. Just in my coaching, there's lots of people out there that will help you grow a coaching business and then there's other people that want to work on and with you. So I found a group and I say I'm an activator and sometimes I jump in with both feet, but a lot of times I end up regretting what I jumped in with. Both feet.

Totally get it.

So I'd say I need to work on finding a middle Sometimes if I don't jump in with both feet, I'm going to drag my feet for a while. But I interacted with this coaching community for about a year and then I decided, okay, these are my people and it is a group of coaches that are excited about CliftonStrengths and neuroscience and using both of those tools in their coaching. And we have a tribe meeting every two weeks and it's all about celebrating success, challenging each other to excellence and sharing ideas. And sometimes you need an outside perspective. I was complaining how my coaching business isn't growing as fast as I wanted it to and I was spinning that into, well, it's not even really growing. And as I was talking to someone, I keep a spreadsheet of experience because as a ICF accredited coach you have to document your training hours and your coaching hours. And I was like, I'm an idiot because if I look at this and I took the spreadsheet and I used the Excel function of Graphing it. I'm like, this thing is going up and it's going up faster as we get to the right. So things are growing. What am I complaining about? Well, I'm not looking at reality. I'm just kind of stuck in my own head. So having community that loves you and challenges you, what do you mean, Jim, what's going on? Tell me a little more. And then as I tell them a little more, I'm like, wow, actually this is going. This is growing. It's just I'm a little impatient sometimes.

It sounds like that's really fuel you for what you're doing now.

Yes, absolutely.

Well, I'd love to hear your biggest piece of advice for people. On doing the thing.

Yeah, I think on doing the thing, the biggest advice is have that community that will. I mean, you need the check so that you're not doing something stupid like riding your bicycle off the roof and into a pool. Oh, no, not me, not me. But I've heard that story. Or ends up with two broken wrists. But yeah. So you need that community that gives you a little bit of reality. Check. Is this not the smartest thing? One rule of thumb is if you make this statement before you're going to do the thing, if you say, dude, hold my beer, that's something you don't want to do because that leads to er trips. But if you can find a community that will challenge you and ask enough questions to hone what it is you want to do, then you just have to step forward. Fight the imposter syndrome and don't listen. I say the imposter is like your shadow. It sounds and feels an awful lot like you, but it's not you. It's just like a shadow is a lack of light. The imposter syndrome is a lack of confidence. So recognize the imposter for what it is. Show up because of who you are.

Well, please share where people can follow along with you and your journey.

Sure. Jimhide. Coaching. Com is my website and repurposement. Jim on Instagram. And look up Jim Hyde M D A C C on LinkedIn. Love to meet and chat.

Thank you so much. It was so great having you on. Really appreciate it.

Thank you, Stacey. Yeah, this was fun. Yay.

And thank you guys for listening and do the thing. Don't wait for opportunity, create it. And hey guys, have you checked out my Facebook group yet? Go to dothathingcollaboration.

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