#3 Limiting Beliefs That Hold Women Back: Failing Makes You A Failure

This is the No Ego Podcast, where we ditch the drama, end entitlement, and transform your world place. I'm Sy Wakeman. Welcome listeners. We are recording a bit of a series about dumb crap women believe that screw their lives up. I think it started out with like distorted thinking, and now we're pretty much— It started out with a boat ride.

I mean, let's be honest.

Let's be honest. Let's be honest. First of all, I'm Cy Wakeman. This is Sasha Shilkut. And yeah, it started out with a boat ride that we started thinking we should totally get on mics and riff.

Yes. And, you know, it all started because we decided not to be competitive, but to collaborate and get creative.

And that was scary. That was scary for me.

It was very scary. It was very scary for me.

Because I'm kind of like, I coach docs, but I don't really hang out with them. They're like, those are the people that passed anatomy and physiology, which obviously I didn't. So I went into social work.

And, and Sai, I, you know, we shared this in a previous episode, but I was so afraid that you were gonna figure me out because you're so good about reading people and you know so much about, you know, just psychology and especially of successful people. And I was like, she is gonna figure me out in like 2 seconds and she's gonna start like, you know, she's just gonna figure out all my insecurities. But the cool thing is, is you've actually helped me really become more successful in my business and as a friend and as a woman and a leader because—

Right back at ya.

I've just been really vulnerable with you.

Yeah, and I with you. It was like, it was It's one of those things that— and does this happen to you? You get together, you have a perfect evening. We shared and shared. I shared so much of my life with you. You shared some amazing moments, like career-wise, life-changing, not good stuff. And then it's like a friendship hangover. I wake up the next morning, and I'm like, oh my God, I overshared, and now I'm really sure she won't like me.

And it's funny, because I woke up the next morning, and I was like, I just, like, want to go back. Yeah. I, like, want to go have coffee with her.

It's like, I wanted that, but there's that fear of, like— But it wasn't fair. Yeah, isn't that— the stuff we've put ourselves through, it's like, it's one thing to live our life in the present moment, and just like you as a physician, you're not constantly diagnosing people. Me, because my background is social science, it's like, without informed consent, we're not really judging or evaluating. Right. A role as friends is to just help each other think and make sure the way we're thinking is gonna be the best mental process to get us, like, what we say we want. Right.

Well, and I think that the reason— I know I was thinking, gosh, the same thing. I overshared that night. But then I realized, like, it was so good for me, because I very rarely find those safe spaces to do that. And so I think—

Both of our professions don't give us a lot of safe spaces.

Exactly, exactly.

Like, you have to be on stage a ton, delivering sometimes really tough news, and your own emotion completely in check. Me too. It's hard to find those safe spaces. And I think we, especially women leaders who are out there making things happen, Don't create, don't go searching for those. We get this weird thing like, oh, you know, that's a luxury other people can afford, and not something that we can afford. But when I talk to successful women, they say part of their self-care is not spa and wine. Part of their self-care is having a place they can just let it all hang out.

And be real.

Yeah, especially with failures, I think.

Yes, failures. And it's funny, because look at our conversations that night. They really centered around some of our biggest perceived failures as leaders, and how we navigated that path, and things that we were still— sticking points. I always call it like the gravel in your shoe. I live on a gravel road, and I walk, and I get gravel in my shoe. I have to stop, take my shoe off, and shake it out. But I can feel those— it's the tiniest little rock, but I can feel it. And I think sometimes when we have failures in our life, it's just like that gravel in the shoe. It still bothers us. Maybe our response to that failure, or maybe how we handled it, or maybe we still believe that that defined us in that moment.

And I think— And I love that metaphor of, like, getting together with safe people and shaking your shoe out. It's like, let me get this out, because we, I think, are so, at times, perfectionistic that we don't let ourselves off the hook very often. And we're over-responsible. We take more responsibility for things that happen than our fair share. Like, a lot of times there's people that are under-responsible, so we go, oh, I'll take that too. Like, we really over-function at times when it comes to, like, handing out the who's responsible, you know, trophy. And

And as women, we do that even with our friends. So say our friend has held onto a secret, or a struggle, or something she's really dealing with, that rock in the shoe, and then she gets brave enough to come over and like explore that with us, and really talk to us about it. So often we go, well, why didn't she tell me before? Or why has she been holding onto this? It must be I'm a bad friend, or— you know what I mean? Like another level of— We're

all

bad. Yeah. Like let's face it, we're all not good enough. Instead of just being like, wow, I'm so thankful I'm so thankful that you shared that with me, that you feel comfortable. You know, it's another thing that we judge ourselves as women.

You know, and since meeting you, the word brave has come into my life a lot because the whole Become Brave Enough and just all of the work you do is— I've really just gotten off the thing about whether I'm good enough. Let's just answer that. Some days yes, some days no. The real question in my life is, am I brave enough? Because— For today. Just for today. Brave enough for today. Today. Because all that I desire is on the other side of some brave move, like sharing something or making a move or collaborating instead of competing or— but not but, and as we talk about these limiting beliefs, that's what this whole series is about, is that things we think or that our ego introduces when we're in low self, and when we believe hook, line, and sinker, we actually just shake hands with the ego and agree with it, and then live our life small and live our life lonely and live our life with this kind of sadness that even though we have these great achievements, they really can never be enjoyed, because they're not offsetting all the things we failed at. Like, the failures are like, well, it's like the interest on the loan you pay for living, and it's really high interest. It's like predatory lending. But so that's what we're going to talk about. It's like, are we— this belief that if we fail, we're somehow defined by that.

We are defined, and it's forever ingrained, and something that we can't— That, that we can't get past. And if you really think about how many people, how many women do you know are intentionally invisible? Mm-hmm. So they're just outside the scope of sight. They're just kind of in the background. They don't really want to take a step forward and take any risk in the workplace or in their professional or personal life because it takes such courage and they have to be brave enough just to take that one step. And they are intentionally invisible because that's where the safety net is. And maybe oftentimes it's a past failure that is keeping them intentionally invisible. And I talk to so many women who will say, well, I really want X. And I'll say, well, what do you have to do to get to X? Well, they have to take this step forward out of the shadows, but what's keeping them in the shadows is this past failure. Well, I did this, I tried this once, And I failed. I was told no, or I didn't get the promotion, or I didn't, you know, get the grant, or I made a really big mistake on stage, or I bombed the talk, or whatever it is. And it keeps them just— it just keeps them in the shadows.

Which is, by the way, learned helplessness. Like, we know this. Learned helplessness is when you take something and blow it out of proportion. So you take one thing that happened, and you use it to limit the rest of you. So for instance, oh, I spoke up once in a meeting, and no one listened, and so I've never spoken up again. Mm-hmm. Learned helplessness is when we take a moment and we use it to define something bigger than the moment. Like, we give too much weight to— because that's what we use to, you know, this invisible limit that we have. We're like, well, you could just bring up your idea again. It's 2 years later. A lot's changed. And it's like we try something maybe halfhearted, and then it doesn't go well, and then we use that as proof why we can't ever. Everybody hears just the drama in that.

Right. And it's a trajectory of— you would think that you would have enough self-knowledge to realize that what you did 2, 5, 7 years ago, you were a different person. You had different experiences, different knowledge. What would be— I mean, objectively, you and I both work in science. We grew up in science. We've done research, both of us. You would think that we would have enough objectivity to go, like, I'm not the same person then. I've had all these other life experiences. I'm not going to make that same mistake, but we don't. Like, we let it limit us and really hold us back instead of— oftentimes what I like to talk about when I talk about failure with women that I coach is pausing, using that failure to pause, get some clarity around it, and then pivot.

I love this language, pause and pivot. Yeah, if I submitted this study and the N was 1, I had 1 data point, and I'm like, so conclusively, this obviously— but I love where you go with the failure. I don't even— like, when we were talking before we were coming on air, and it was like, you know, gosh, I got to think of some of my failures, and I had a hard time coming up with one. I'm like, I know I have done lots of things that haven't worked out. And part of it is I quit defining things as failures. Someone helped me understand, and she would say whenever I would come back, and she would say, well, you know, how'd that work for you? Mm-hmm. And I would say, well, it didn't. It was a complete failure. She goes, well, let's just call that research work so you have some more data points. And your life is about collecting data Use the data points, use the data from before and from other people to, like, create something different. And it was nice.

And I like what you said about collecting data, because that allows you to break the cycle. So, so many times we believe that life is supposed to be hard, and that if we failed once, we're going to fail again, and it's going to be horrible, and it's going to be tragic. And we're stuck in this cycle instead of breaking the cycle and realizing that, you know, if you're not taking a risk, You're like, you're gonna stay in the shadows, and you're gonna be intentionally invisible, and you're never gonna fail. That's not a good thing, right?

Yeah, somebody famous said, if you're not standing on the edge of the earth, like, if you're not standing on the edge, you're taking up too much space.

Well, and it's, but it's interesting to me that you have been able to kind of reframe that thought.

I have. Now, it doesn't mean I'm perfect, that everybody who's listening to this, the reason we're doing these podcasts Is to say, not that, oh, we used to be like this and now we don't anymore. Just because you know the path out doesn't mean you take it right away. Right. Just knowing these tools, I always say to people, I teach you this, but I will screw it up. Only daily, but I will screw it up. Right.

And it's funny, because I remember a pivotal time in my career when I was awarded an NIH grant. And I was the first person in my department to ever get a clinical NIH grant. And what people didn't— don't know is that it took me 13 attempts. So 13 grants rejected before I got one yes. And besides that really allowing me to be persistent, like when people would say, oh my gosh, you finally got an NIH grant, I would say, yes, I was rejected 13 times. Like I would always bring that up because I was still defining even my success by that failure.

Even success by that failure, yeah.

By that failure. And I was like, yeah.

It's just like I got a cute top, you go, I bought it on sale, super cheap. It's only targeted.

Yeah, I was minimizing, right? I was, well, I did fail 13 times before I got this one grant.

Or you learned 13 things that you didn't—

And the truth is that the reason I could get that grant is because I had 13— Yeah,

because you get great feedback from the reviewers.

Yeah, that's the feedback. And so I've always thought about that, and not that every failure, I mean, I've had some pretty significant failures where they have stunned me. knocked me on my butt, flat on my back, that have taken me a year to 2 years to recover, and still real, you know, they come back out of the fingers and remind my— like, oh, you're not good at this. You're not, you know, and a lot of times it's things that other people have said to me, you know, like I'll even say, and then I believe it about myself, like, well, you're not a good listener, you know. Well, I guess I just am not a good listener because someone told me that once. Yeah. So then I believe that I'm not a good listener, and I failed at this, friendship or this relationship because I'm not a good listener, when in reality was maybe it just wasn't a good fit or something like that. So then I kind of— have you ever like fabricated failures in your mind?

Oh yeah.

That aren't real failures?

Yeah.

Yeah.

It's like I'll start to feel anxious about something and then I'm like, wait a minute, that's not even real. Like the jury's not in on that, or that like really didn't happen.

Right.

But it's almost like those neural pathways, once they're created and cemented in with I failed so I'm a failure, you have to look for proof to feed that neural pathway. It's like it starts to skew your view of, of the world. But even the stuff we define as failures is so like, how would we know yet, right? Because there's this Buddhist story that, you know, a lot of times spiritualities will teach in stories. And it was about a man who was farming, and he was farming with his son, and they were very poor, and they farmed with a horse who pulled the plow. And the horse got so old that it just couldn't pull the plow anymore. So the man set the horse free. And all the neighbors came in. They go, oh my gosh, this is the end. This is horrible. It's so awful you don't have a horse. And he's like, well, we don't know yet if it's good or bad. And then his son had to pull the plow. And his son broke his leg. And all the neighbors came in. And they're like, this is awful. And then one day, his horse had met other horses in the mountain and came back and brought him 3 new horses. And they're like, this is great. And then the army came to take the son to— War, but his leg was broken. And so it goes on and on and on, the story, where the neighbors come in and they either label it bad failure or great success. But the farmer every single time says, well, we'll see.

Right.

And so given enough time,

right,

we're diagnosing a failure in the short term. And given enough time, which is what I love about your pause and pivot— in, in social work we say observe, stand back and observe, and then choose. And you're saying pause, reflect, and pivot, is that anything you define as a failure right now, I guarantee you, with enough life under your belt, you may just see, if you paused and reflected, that it was the best thing that ever happened to you.

And, and I think this speaks to women because so often we see a trajectory and that we have to constantly be moving up this ladder. And if we're not for some reason, because maybe we had a loss of a job, or maybe we had an illness in our family, or maybe we just just struggled financially for some, we had some tragedy or some obstructions, we just judge ourselves instead of thinking it, instead of a ladder, like a jungle gym. Like sometimes you gotta climb this way.

I love it.

Right? And sometimes, you know, you go up, but it's not, life isn't a ladder. Like it's not a straight, our career, our personal life, it's sometimes you're moving laterally, and that's okay, because you might end up at a spot that's different. And I know for myself, especially as a physician, you know, our life is always mapped out for us at a very young educational age. And I remember when I got to a point in my life where I thought, okay, everything's perfect and I should be so happy right now because I have all the things, right? I'm checking the box. I was— I had this overwhelming feeling of like, what's, what's next and why doesn't this feel so great? And I think it's because something that you always teach about is curating your life. I had not curated my life. I had let someone else kind of create this life for me. Mm-hmm. Have you ever done that?

So it just doesn't feel fulfilling. It's like not fulfilling. Totally. I, you know, right now it's like, you're a writer, you should publish another book with a mainstage publisher. And I just started finding that that's like so stressful to me to even think about doing like a 4th one. And it's like, well, wait a minute, that's what they're saying I should do. Like, what do I want to do?

Right, right. And so I think sometimes as women, it's really easy for us to look to our right and our left and see what other people are doing, and then we just kind of go, well, that's what I should be doing because that's what she's doing, or she's here and I'm here, so I'm failing behind. Instead of maybe gathering inspiration from the women around you, but really thinking about your own mission, your own life vision, whatever it is that is really specific, your own unique traits. And

what feels good to you right now?

Right, and how has your past failure, like the observe, I love the observe and choose.

Observe and choose. Observe and choose. I love pause, reflect, and pivot.

Yes, and how often do our failures become something we hide? We don't even let ourselves marinate in the thoughts of them, which I think is actually healthy to do, because how can you observe and have an— and choose if you don't let yourself at least kind of think about them? And—

Well, secrets keep us sick. Like, see, like, something that we aren't willing to share just grows and takes on a whole life of its own.

And why do you think women don't feel comfortable sharing so much? Why do you think that's with other women?

Yeah, well, I think it's all kind of fear-based, right? We fear we won't be loved, but the very thing that gets us loved, the very thing that gets us connected, is sharing like our hearts. I think at times though, for me, I would choose unsafe people to share it with or unsafe people to process it with. I would go back to the well that was empty that had maybe been part of the fail, and I would want their forgiveness. So I wouldn't, I wouldn't share it with somebody that was safe. Mm-hmm. But I think, I think we have labeled it in our head as a failure, and to me it's just like, wow, you got some more research work. Or I think the universe just, there are no mistakes. In fact, when I first went to yoga, and they would say namaste, okay, I thought, by the way, this is a tangent, I thought for only about 6 months they were saying no mistakes. I'm like, I love this teacher, there are no mistakes, right? There's just— but I think that we— it gets back to that other belief, distorted thinking, all or nothing, and perfectionism. Mm-hmm. But I think this whole failure thing, One, we— I think when we label something a failure, and I don't mean to sugarcoat it, it's like something I was attached to that didn't work out, or something I had my heart set on. But I think the universe is kind, and it won't let us screw up. And it starts with a whisper in your gut, like, do you love this? And are you really— is this what you want to do, or what you think you have to do? And then sometimes it has to hit you with a 2x4 that said, door closed, shop closed, dead end. Right. For it to, you know, to move on. And in my life, I tend not to listen, at least in my past life, to whispers. So I've had some pretty crazy things happen to me with the universe just going, okay, tried to send a letter, tried to send an email, so I want to make this really clear for you: not your path, not your business, like, game over. Right. And so I think that it all is that people pleasing, that external focus. I think we're really scared to do that pause and reflect because it might be admitting we're not living the life that we hoped, and it's our choosing. Or I have to account for, I really wasn't prepared, or I really did try and just slop my way through that. Or it's that day of reckoning that if you don't have enough self-compassion, you don't wanna reckon with yourself because you know you'll be met with like violence. Mm-hmm. And so I think we don't wanna admit our failures 'cause of our own lack of self-compassion, because we're gonna be so hard on ourselves.

We're gonna be really hard on ourselves. And I think also it's really easy for us to say, as women, that like, well, I mean, how many times have you heard, well, I just, I just don't have women. I just can't. I'm not a girl's girl. Like, I can't do friends with women. Like, I can do friends with guys, but I can't do friends with women. And I think it's so interesting, because I don't know that people really, when they're saying that, What they're, what they're really doing is they're moving back into the shadows.

They're like, I choose not to have intimacy, so I will have friends with men where we have set boundaries because we can't really get that intimate. And so it basically is when I hear people say, and I say it, it's like hard for me to have friends with women. It's like, I don't want to be intimate, I don't want to be seen, I don't want to be loved, I don't want people to know my failures.

Yeah. And so, but I think one of the, the One of the biggest blessings that we can have in our life, and the biggest gifts, is having friendships with other— like real authentic friendships with other women. And they take work, just like any relationship. I don't think it's something that comes really easily. I don't think it's something that— I think it's something that's really easy to avoid and kind of just push off to the side, or maybe see as like, well, that's just for women that have enough time. I mean, the truth is, no woman has time to— we have to make time. Mm-hmm. We have to make time for the things in our life. And, and for me, I can't imagine going through some of the hardest times of my life without the support of like a few close friends. And I know I'm gonna have failures in the future. I know I'm gonna have hardships in the future that are opportunities for me to grow. I want to— I want to have those relationships there so that when I'm going through those times, I can lean on them.

They're already set.

Yeah, they're already set.

You know, one of the things I've noticed women do, and I do, is a lot of times we talk about failures when we're a safe distance away from them and have already fixed them. and gained other success. Because I hear a lot of people from the stage, like motivational speakers, and they talk about, you know, I'm successful now, but let me tell you, it wasn't easy. I had these failures. But we aren't talking currently.

Interesting.

About, gosh dang, marriage is hard this week.

Yeah.

And golly dang, I was so sure I was right about this, but I'm talking to you now, and you're kind of hinting that I may be, you know, unforgiving. And like, and so I think the ability to real-time really be I mean, we even do it on Facebook, right? We, we take 12 pictures and we pick the best one.

Yeah, right.

And so part of that, I just think we gotta talk more real time. You know, it, it, it— I think that if we don't have that real-time relationship about our failures or the things that just didn't work out like we wanted to, we cheat ourselves out of the miracle watchers. So our successes, it's hard for people to, you know, get out of competition and to really see somebody's successes as the sweet success it is and be a miracle watcher if I haven't seen your failures. Like, some of my— like, when my friend Kathy, who I just love, she was on the podcast, some of you know her. The coolest thing about Kathy is she has seen me. I've let her see me in my failures big time, and she has seen me when I'm righteous and in ego and angry, and she's had to tell me, like, Sy, you might want to check your story. Like, she's— that when I call her up and I go, oh my gosh, I just I just got invited to speak at this huge conference. She can actually fully share in my joy because she knows where I came from. So I can call you up and you're like, Cy, you're so successful, of course you get to speak there. And it's like, not that you would do that, but it's like empty. Or you can call somebody up, they're like, let's just hold space for one moment.

Yeah.

10 years ago, you left a marriage with no money and you brought 4 kids to Omaha and boldly started your entire life over again.

Yeah.

Space for how freaking far you've come.

Amazing this is.

So I think part of the remedy, or part of maybe the benefit for people to real-time their failures with people they've already created relationships with, is because then when you share your successes, it's meaningful. People get how big a success it is.

I love that. And so when you're vulnerable during the times that you have failed, or that it's— it means more to the people in your corner too. It opens up their it also means more to them, and it means more to you to share that. And I love that you just gave that example. I think one of the things that we— it's almost like when you see someone, and I mean, this actually happened to me. I met a woman online through my group, and, you know, she's like super fit, exercise— she, you know, has like a 6-pack, you know, she exercises every day. And the story I created in my mind of this woman was like, oh, she's always been skinny. It's easy for her to be skinny, 'cause she's like this big around. Yeah. Whatever. And then when I actually met her, we went to dinner and she was like, oh no, I've lost like 80 pounds. And I was like, she's like, no, this has been like a lifelong struggle. I finally decided that I was going to get healthy and I did all these things and I've been doing this slowly over the last 5 years. And she started showing me pictures of herself and I was like, what? It's actually like— That's amazing. You get up every day and you work on this and you like, like this is a huge commitment to her, for herself, her personal commitment to do this.

Doesn't come natural.

Doesn't not come natural. But the story in my head was like, oh, it's easy for her. Which you discount then this huge Yes, and then I was like, oh my gosh, I'm so sorry because I never realized like actually how hard you work at this, and what a huge success this is for you, that it doesn't come easy for you. That was the story that I had created in my head. And so—

Which robs us from the inspiration we could get from people, or the inspiration we could give. Like if I'm like, no, I was like born in a tiny little town. Like if I can do it, you can do it.

Yes, yes. And so I think it's really interesting because if we hide those— like if she would have hid that from me, I would not have— like, she wouldn't inspire me as much as she— like, if she had hid those pictures of herself and never, you know, posted and embraced that, her own story and her own struggle, it would have been such a more shallow friendship than it actually ended up being because she was like inspiring me.

Which is the world of abundance because she did it for herself. Oh, totally. But she could supercharge so many other people and inspire them by sharing. And I just, you know, this is so obvious, the double meaning of the word sharing. Like, sharing is I'm gonna share with you my story, but what I'm actually doing is sharing my inspiration, sharing my hope, sharing my perspective. Like, I'm sharing more of the good stuff by sharing.

And isn't it also freeing to think it's okay to not be okay? Like, I know you're somebody that, like, if you were like, hey, how are you doing today? And I wasn't like a 10, I could be like, actually, I'm a 2 right now. I'm like really low. I just got rejected for this, or whatever. And you wouldn't be like, oh, I don't— I only want fun friends. I only want friends like that are on the mountaintop all the time. I mean, that's not reality. Yeah. And once you kind of allow yourself to have and develop friendships with women who allow you to be a 2, have a 2 day amongst your 10 days, it opens up that life isn't actually always meant to be a 10. Like, there's no physical way we can always be a 10. We'd run out of dopamine. Like, you know what I mean? It's an ebb and a flow.

And I think the days that you're a 2, by sharing it as well, people can help you understand, is your measuring stick okay, right? Because you're like, I am a 2, when in fact, like, you're a 5 or a 6, right? Exactly. But I also think that the other thing that happens is if we don't share our failures, we don't mine them for this research that observing or pausing could do. Because I know for me, it's like I can get in this point where I just keep doing the the same thing over and over and over again and expecting different results. It's like insanity. And I can start— I know for me, it's like I would have failure after failure, failure, and I'm like, how can I do this in my relationship where I start to feel overwhelmed and like taken advantage of? And, and it's like, if I just pause and reflected, which I took kind of a week off recently to do, and it was like, wait a minute, if I don't have time away, I can't get clear. And if I'm not clear, Mm-hmm. I can't be clear with others, and then of course they're not clear, they're gonna violate boundaries. And so when I was able to really embrace my failure, like, here I am again in a relationship with the same issue, like, what is going on?

Yeah, why am I here?

And I had to really go back and just go, wait a minute, Sy, this is an old pattern. You've had this failure many times. It's time to go deep on this thing. And I started to realize that my busyness and my working a lot, even though I get great accolades for doing a lot— people like, I don't know how you do it all— one of the costs of that is I get clear through downtime, through reading and writing and journaling. When I don't do that, I end up resentful and resenting the very people that I care about. Yes. And so now I have this new thing where, like, if I'm feeling resentment, I gotta backtrack and figure out where either I wasn't clear, I didn't take time to get clear on, and—

So it's data.

Yeah, and that's empowering to me. So instead of just wishing I had relationships with different types of people than these selfish folks, like I'm a victim, I have more data, and more data, I can live a bigger life. And I think we miss a lot of good information by not really pausing and reflecting on these failures.

And also, I think that, you know, what you're describing is really, you were kind of approaching that burnout, and you are the best measure of that, right? Yes. But obviously, when you start to burn out, it affects all your relationships, everyone around you, and oftentimes we have to stop and we have to think about like, okay, I'm approaching a failure, or a data point here. I'm about to burn out. I'm about to lose this friendship, or this relationship, or whatever it is, because I'm so burned out and empty that I'm angry and I'm resentful, I'm working hard, and this person's not picking up the slack, or whatever it is. And we have such high expectations of ourselves, but I've come to know myself. I'm the same way. I have to withdraw. I have to like completely pull back to get clarity about like, what am I doing that's gonna— I'm gonna crash and burn. And part of that is just setting pause so that you prevent future failures.

Absolutely.

You have to do that.

And it's preventing the future, and I think I talk to a lot of women who are just trying to wing it through life, and they're just trying to like, you know, make They're wondering why things aren't working out for them. And it's like, whoa, go get clarity and then move through life with clearer energy. And a lot of times failures are our friends, folks, because they're the wake-up call that, you know, there was a time in my life where it's like, I think in one week I like had 2 car accidents. Like, I locked my keys in my car and I'm like, all this stuff is happening. I'm like, even though they're fender benders, I'm like, whoa. That's a wake-up Oh, call. stop. And, you know, sometimes our failures are stuff that we set out to do and we were a big influence in, you know, this pause and pivot. Sometimes they're like, you know, we talked about a bad diagnosis, or like our body fails us, or a divorce where a human maybe fails us, or—

Right. I remember a couple years ago I was doing a ton of speaking, a ton of traveling. I was not taking care of my health at all. And I came home from this like 5-week speaking trip or speaking, you know, spree of talk to talk to talk to talk. And I started getting sick. And I just went to work because that's what you do as a physician. And I finally ended up, you know, with IV antibiotics. I'm sitting in my office with IV antibiotics because in my brain I still was like showing up for work. Like somehow—

Somehow that makes sense.

Somehow that made sense. And finally one of my partners was like, you are going home, and I've actually— and he showed me on the calendar, he's like, I've actually put you off for sick for the rest of the week. And I just couldn't even like fathom this because in 10 years I had never called in sick. And so I went home.

Which is a badge of honor. Like, I've never called— you guys are mere mortals and I am—

Well, like, who wants a doctor though that's hooked up to— I mean, I wasn't even making good— like, we talk about making— It's horrible.

If you need IV antibiotics, it's because you are very sick.

Yeah. And so I went home And I pretty much for like 4 days, you know, laid in bed with being ill. And I just was like, this is the worst timing. I have all this stuff. I've been gone. I need to do that. No, it was actually God saying like, stop. Like, you need to stop. Like, you are spiraling out of control. Your body is shutting down. And you need to reassess and curate your life right now. Yeah. It was a huge wake-up call.

Wake up, wake up, wake up call. And, you know, I think Martha Beck talks about how many signals our body gives us. Like, our body knows first.

Yes.

We think our mind knows first, but our body really knows first. I mean, we're animals. Like, our body, we have all these sensors, knows first. But so many times we ignore that.

Totally.

Totally ignore that. You know, one of the things that we like to do is we bring up these self-limiting beliefs, like, oh, it's like, you know, my failures define me, or if you really knew me and what I had failed at, you like wouldn't like me. Or somehow, even if I get something great, it doesn't count because it can't offset my failures. The bad. Like all the times that we let our failures take away from us, right? And so we talk about kind of the Rx, the prescription on how to do that. And I think in reviewing, like one of the things we— the prescription for this one is just talk about it. And in fact, I think a good conversation starter, folks, is instead of thinking about a time You failed in the past, and now that it's all cleaned up and tied up with a little bow, you can talk about it, right? I want women out there to do this assignment. Go to your dear friend and say, here's what I'm failing at today.

Love that.

All of us have something we're failing at right now. Yes. Here's where I'm succeeding currently, and here's where I'm failing currently in my life.

Absolutely.

And own it. Ask for help or not. It may not— you may say, I choose not to get better at that. Right. But just speak it out loud. What are some of the other tips that we've come up with?

Definitely, you know, and giving yourself an expectation of failure, like a margin of failure. A

margin.

And we talked about that. We talked about like, are those realistic goals? And then giving yourself that clarity that you described, time alone with yourself to gain clarity, to observe and choose.

And mine your failures for information. I love that. There's a failure there to teach you. And I would even say I don't love the word failure, so let's just start calling it more neutral things like didn't turn out as I had hoped, or—

I love that. I love— and I love the data mining. Such great pearls.

I think it's good, folks. Keep things in perspective as well. What we think is a failure today could be the very big break you needed to get you on the right path for the future. My mom used to say, it's all good in the end, or it's not the So if you are defining something as failure right now, know that 20 years from now you might see it as the very thing that was such a great turning point. So—

Absolutely.

I love our talks.

Me too.

This is the No Ego Podcast, where we ditch the drama, end entitlement, and transform your world place. I'm Sy Wakeman.