[NEW SEASON] Trust at work and how it fits with Reality-Based Leadership

Welcome listeners to what you might think is traditionally the No Ego Podcast, but I'm excited to talk to you about a really cool change that we're making in our podcast. We're moving from the No Ego Podcast, which was born out of the aftermath of my book No Ego, and moving into the Reality-Based Leadership Podcast because I really want to change what we're doing and bring to you what I think will be the most useful, relevant information for you today. As you know, in past seasons, or this past season, I tried to bring you teachers that helped me, thought leaders that helped me just stay anchored and centered and know how to handle these uncertain times and lead my teams. And what we've noticed at Reality-Based Leadership is the podcast that people are absolutely loving are those podcasts where I come together with the VP of People Evolution at Reality-Based Leadership, Alex Dorr, and we just riff on applying reality-based leadership principles to the real world today. We answer questions, we pick up themes from our presentations when we're out giving live and virtual presentations, and we just have conversations which is just us. Nobody else's philosophy, nobody else joining us as guests, but we just Hold conversations, informal riffs on what's happening in the world today and how what we know from our research and our practice might help. So I want to welcome Alex Dorr, one of my favorite people in the entire world, to the podcast. And you and I are going to be spending the year together or more, probably longer.

Oh, I love it. I know some of our best-reviewed podcasts, or we get the most feedback on, were where I finally was able to sit you down and be like, Sy, we're talking about this competency. We keep talking around it. And then we got so much good feedback, whether it was, you know, change or creating alignment in your team. So, I thought if we can pull this off and start doing this more, hopefully, we'll get some of that same response. So, I'm grateful that you agreed to.

And to sit me down is no easy feat. So, like, I'll hit headquarters in McKinney, Texas, Alex and Ana's home, and they'll sit me down and we'll start jamming on this stuff. And we always say, crap, We should have been recording.

And then you forget everything, or it's not as lively, or it's, it's forced. So anyway, yeah.

So many of our just spontaneous conversations have such fire content. So I'm excited that we're doing this, and I think, I just, I think it will be really useful for people. So I love your take on things.

And, and I think we just go kind of into that, you know, just in the spirit of that. And so you guys can feel this, but it is like that a lot where I'm like, Sai, my last 3 sessions, the same topic keeps coming up. And you're like, I know, I just heard that as well. And then it goes, and then all of a sudden we're like, dang, we should have recorded that. So I thought— Sai doesn't even know what I'm bringing up here. I was going to start this off, so we'll see where this goes.

We'll see where this goes. But our hope is we'll cover a topic or 2. We're going to keep the podcast a little shorter get you more content out. So this is what you can really share with your teams. And as always, if you like what we're providing, make sure you subscribe, make sure you share, make sure you rate it, because that elevates our visibility to, to many more people. So, so we're excited. This is a rebrand, a relaunch, and let's go.

Let's dive in. Let's dive in. So I'll just go right into, for some reason, and this has come up before, but I've been noticing it probably in the last month. And my October has been pretty busy with virtual and in-person. But we'll be doing the basics, you know, of reality-based leadership, learning how our mind works, all those things. And then, it has been about 75% of the sessions, someone will raise their hand or come up in a break and say, this is, you know, good stuff. I see a lot of use cases, but where does trust come into all of this? And I just feel that keeps coming up. And so, I'll just riff on a few things depending on the situation that comes to mind when I hear that, because it's a big topic and we all know it's important to build trust with your teams, build those relationships. But I find that a lot of the tools we teach, whether it is like editing your story and giving benefit of the doubt to your colleagues, that's like a sign of trust. I trust that you're an expert. I trust that your heart's in the right place. I trust that you're doing what you think's best for the organization, so I give you the benefit of the doubt. So that's one pathway I go. And then one of the sessions where someone actually said, I wish that was recorded, and I'd actually forgotten to record the group coaching session, same type of thing, was it has a lot to do with your alignment to the organization. And, you know, if someone's like, well, I don't really trust that that person's, you know, doing the right thing in their division or their department or in their role, And I almost, in a way, I got into, that's almost like you're saying you don't trust hiring. You don't trust if they were educated with like their certification or their credentials. You don't trust the university they went to. You don't trust recruiting. You don't, you know, onboarding. And so I said that in a way we were really close, but it was almost like there's so much you're not trusting there when you say that about, you know, someone's, you know, current, what they're doing at work. Now, obviously, if they're doing something illegal, immoral, unethical, pretty quickly— Oh, fine. You lose the trust. But I thought those are two ways I wanted to start this that I went into. But just what are some of your thoughts about how some of the work we do, we don't talk directly about trust, but it's all baked in there in many ways with the core principles, I feel at least.

If I, as a human being, am adulting and focusing on skilling myself up to move through the world freely, and I get very skilled in editing my own story and seeing reality for what it really is, and I can move through life so much more freely. Like, it gives me so much freedom to move through an imperfect world. And a lot of people base their trust on— they really outsource it. I can trust you as long as you never disappoint me, always communicate perfectly, do your job perfectly, never let a ball drop, never get caught in saying something publicly that we know isn't quite the case. Like, I When people lead with buy me in, prove your love, be perfect, what I know is that's an ego position that's toggled down, and it's a setup because there's just absolutely no way if you're outsourcing your psychological safety and well-being to that extent that you will ever feel safe or ever find anyone perfect enough to trust. And I see that a lot where people forget that a lot of trust is a choice. It's a choice to take calculated risks with human beings that are imperfect. We're all running fast, doing the best we can with what we have. And the empowered version is, I will trust that you're doing the best you can and you need some improvement and you probably will fail us from time to time. And isn't that what marriage vows are? Like, I'll love you anyway. Like, I'm gonna trust the next 50 years we're gonna spend together. You're probably gonna screw this thing up a few times. And so trust is an equal measure of our ability to love. And love is not a feeling of whether you are acting trustworthy, then I can love you. That's conditional. Love is an action that I can adult even in the face when you aren't living up to your own standards, and I can get us back on track without judgment. So a lot of people are telling me they don't trust— it's because they're in such a mode of judgment and critique, and they're in such an ego position. And the ego sees insult where there isn't any. The ego is like looking for the reason to be the victim. The ego is leading with finding what's unsettling. And so when, when people are really focusing on not feeling trust, I remind them that a lot of times trust is a choice. Yeah. Hope is a choice. Love is a choice. Benefit of the doubt is a choice. And so Somehow we have given away our choices and we've outsourced that to be dependent upon a world that chronically disappoints us so that we can be the victim. Oldest game of ego ever.

So much you're saying is resonating because I even— I love sometimes we give leaders advice like to— you can in some ways get out of that game where maybe you just come clean with your team or you start with your team or wherever you're at in your career. and just say, I want to just lay it kind of even here. You can trust that I will screw this up, but only daily. And that's just out there. My aspiration, my hopes are this. Here's some of my principles and some of my non-negotiables and what I hope to be each day. But if I am screwing that up, please let me know and let's have grace and tolerance and, and begin again or reset or, or just toggle me up. Because some people I see out there, it's like my leader's got to be perfect. If not, it's like bad leadership. And, and I know it's not an official stat, but it's like 50% of the time you'll have a less than stellar leader, or you might show up on a rough day as a less than stellar leader. And having that, that grace and tolerance as a team, and if you've even named it, that we will screw this up. And how can we use some of, whether it's editing our stories or just coming together instead of away from each other to say, given we're off track, our goal is this, or what would great look like with our team culture is this. Yeah. And how can we get back towards that? And so just naming that at the start and taking that off the table as being something that would erode trust might be something that you could try as a leader.

Definitely. And people ask me about trust. I'm like, every tool I teach you is a tool that will increase trust. Why? It helps you see reality as how it really is. And the one thing that erodes trust is our story, not our reality.

Our

reality is pretty simple. We're a bunch of humans. We're in a messy world. We're working to skill ourselves up so we can move through the world more freely. And we'll screw this up only daily, and we're all doing the best we can with what we have. And, you know, there's 2 types of acts in the world: acts of love or cries for love. And the only response is a loving one. So, like, the more I can forge internal wisdom, the more I can move through the world more lovingly, the more I can work well with imperfect people, the more free I am. I really am. So every tool takes the story away, and it's the judging, it's the story that makes us feel unsafe, because that puts us into people are out to get us, they're doing this crap on purpose. Like, it's what makes our world unsafe is our story, not our reality. Now, pain's inevitable. We have places at war, we have people being harmed, we have harassment, we've got racism. Like, I'm not saying the world is Pollyanna, but even if someone microaggresses me, if I can turn to them with an open heart and say, I know you might be operating out of your own bias or ignorance, and I just want to witness to you that that was hurtful, and I want to invite us to begin again. If the conversation we're in is exhausting, I have a skill set to say, let's end this exhausting conversation and begin a new one. What would it look like if we could work well together? So every tool we give you that dissolves the irrelevant stuff and brings us back to a group of humans with human conditions who get played by the ego, doing the best we can— that begin again is trust. And a lot of people base trust on how other people behave, and they're chronically shocked. Like, I The human condition. People will lie when they don't feel safe. People will be— they'll have decision bias. They'll be overly optimistic.

They'll step down when the going gets tough.

They'll step down when the going gets tough. Like, our role— I think the Greek definition of love— and a lot of people are like, love in the workplace? Absolutely. What we're writing next is going to be a lot about the leadership competency of love. Greek definition of love, one of them— they have many types of love— is let's come together, and my role in your life is to help you be the best version of yourself, which is about turning towards and loving you up and growing and noticing when you're at your best self. But one tool that you immediately can use to increase trust, I call it the 3 lanes. There are 3 lanes in life. One is my lane, that's my business, that's taking care of my accountabilities, that's showing up not as an egotistical smartest person in the room but a good data point and To contribute to the genius of the collective. And it's my work and my interactions and my reactions. That's, that's my lane. There's lane 2, which is other people's business, right? That is other people's work, the way other people see the world, how other people show up. And lane 3 is like reality or the universe or God or whatever you believe, you know, that is. So if I want to feel And, and choose a lot of trust. The best thing to notice is when I feel my trust is harmed is that I am out of my lane. When I can't trust other people, I'm out of my lane. I'm in their lane. I'm in reality's lane. I'm in lane 2 or 3. When I can trust is when I'm focused on me moving through the world in my own integrity with an open heart and a curious mind. Then I can trust pretty much all of the world. When I'm embodied, I've done my work for the day. When I leave my lane, I need to leave it helping, not judging, with an open mind and open heart. And then bizarrely, I see the human condition differently. I don't find reasons not to trust. And if I stay out of how reality should work, I have less disappointment and less food for my ego to not trust. So when I'm feeling lack of trust in the world, it's because I've outsourced. I'm in other people's business. I'm doing that toggle down in ego with a lot of judgment. And the same situation I can feel total trust for when I come back to my lane and just edit my own story and get clear on what I want and ask for it and be open to all the ways we can co-create that. And to show up having done my work with an open mind, open heart, suddenly The entire world changes and it becomes a more trustworthy place.

Yeah, I love that. I wish I had the visual, but literally writing down the 3 lanes and seeing where you're at is powerful. And I'm hearing in there a little bit too, like this pattern of, for yourself, definitely it's that empathy and then that call to greatness. But others, I see trust can be built if as a leader or even as a colleague, Whenever someone comes to you, if they are struggling or toggled down or really in that space that isn't, you know, their highest self, if they can trust that we will receive them with empathy, like hold that space. That's

true.

But then we don't move into sympathy, collusion. We're at the mercy of our circumstances. We're all doomed. And if they can trust that we can receive them, hold the space for as long as needed, but it always ends with that call to greatness. Like, given this unpreferred reality, I don't love this either. In fact, I'd be as frustrated as you are in this situation. But given that, what's one thing we can try to move forward? Or who do we need to connect with? Or where can we get some support? Or, or what's that way we can impact this or let it go? And I find that with trust, another thing I added when I was speaking with this group is if you are consistent, almost like methodical in your leadership with like 3 tools where people come to you, we just stop judging, start helping, or we just go empathy and call to greatness, or we If you have like 3 tools, then when people come to you, because every time they get that relief, they learn to trust you. And then even once—

Trust the process. Trust the tool.

They trust the process. And so this isn't even really about you. It's just the process, a good mental process. And then they know when they see you with others. So it's all like equal on the team that whoever comes, even if they're off track, you're going to call everyone to greatness after that loving moment. Then you can trust the whole team is being held to that high standard. Not some get called up, some don't. And then you're like, well, wait a minute. Now there's still your part to play if that is happening. It's not meaning you're at, you know, you can use that as a circumstance. That's, that's the individual part. But as a leader, if you're able to do that in a way that's fair to all because you're calling everyone to greatness, I think that builds trust from a team perspective that, that whoever comes to you, no matter how much they're struggling, they get a lot of the same modern leadership to love them up and call them up. So I don't know what your thoughts are on that.

No, because I think as a leader, we try and get fancy and clever and deal with like each individual situation differently. And what people need in leadership is good mental processes. So we begin to trust the process. And a lot of people would tell me they don't trust others, trust something worse, which is their own thinking. I'm like, so what is your point of reference? Like, what do you trust? Well, I know this happened. And I, I'm like, oh my gosh, you're believing your own thinking. You're trusting the fake news in your head more than you're trusting like a colleague who cares about you. Like, what? As

not now information instead of the now facts information. Yeah.

Exactly. And so I just really think the more standardized we can get with good mental processes and the less we can trust our own take on the world— like, I want people to feel their feelings, but don't trust your feelings. I want people to use our tools to question their thinking and see reality more clearly as, you know, it really is. And so I really agree with you. And Lou Holtz, football coach for Notre Dame for years—

I didn't expect Lou Holtz.

59 years old, right? Like, we never forget. I heard him talk when I was young, and he said, people that are in your lives, on your team, that you're, you know, working with or leading have 3 questions that they need answered. And the first question is, do you care about me? And I mean, not care about what results I bring you or care about the fact that, you know, I'm an object or, you know, in his case, you know, a wide receiver that, you know— Oh, that's such a good point. But really, do you care about me and how I'm doing and how my family is? And so I think it's important to lead with caring. And during the— when the pandemic hit, I was out there preaching so much about accountability and calling people up because I just assumed people were loving people up. And we had to go back to the beginning. And I'm like, no, no, no, this has to be based on love. So question number 1, do you care about me? Question number 2 is, can I trust you? And that trust doesn't come from you bailing me out, or— that trust comes from when I come to you, will you give me consistent leadership? Can I— like, oh, do you care about me? But do you— can I trust you? And a lot of times we see maybe some real feedback hurting trust, but real feedback actually increases trust. Mm-hmm. It's not that you won't screw up, it's the ability to make amends that increases trust, the ability to not gaslight people and say no, You— I can see how you would see the situation exactly like that, and I want to tell you I'm sorry, and here's my insight, and how can I make it up to you? And then the last thing they want answered is, do you care about excellence? Do I see you calling me up and calling other people up? Can I trust that you will care about excellence? And what's not in here is a margin of error that's slim. And that's where I think a lot of people don't want to get in the mess. If we want good workplaces and good working relationships, we've got to take the margin of error we give people, which is sometimes razor-thin, and we've got to expand that. So that if we want diverse workplaces that are inclusive, and we've got to expand this margin of— I don't even call it error, but just margin of grace. Mm-hmm. So that if I'm a little quiet one day, it isn't just a judgment that I'm righteous and a bitch. Like, that there's room for me to be quiet some days, there's room for me to be more passionate some days, there's room for me to like lose my shit— sorry to speak— and although I don't like to do that often, to come back and say I was really wound up about that. And when I think about the relationships in our company, I have screwed those up. Like, I've taken emails and just totally— in something very sensitive to me— been like, what the heck? And you and Anna have said, no, we're getting on the phone, we're gonna talk this through. And I'm the leader, and I'm like, I don't want to talk to anybody, I'm done. And you're just like, no, call number 2, and then give me time, call number 3. And at times it's embarrassing for me to say that, but the margin of error that you granted to me cemented our trust that we can do hard things together, we can turn towards one another. And for a lot of people, they're studying workplace trust, and what they need to be studying is like Gottman's marriage principles. And relationship principles. And because a lot of us are going solo longer in our lives right now, and we are really getting underpracticed at messy stuff.

Yeah, yeah. I just starred it in my notes here, that margin of grace. I just think that's— we always say margin of error, you know, margin of grace. I just, as I saw that, as you said it, I just thought that was a good way to put it. And then you went back to margin of error. But I do think that The stories about—

And it's really another way we can love people up. It's not tolerating inappropriate or harmful behavior, but it is loving the person involved in some of that behavior long enough so that we can say, I'm not abandoning you, and I'm gonna call you up. What's going on right now in the trust game is mass abandonment. You have a margin of grace that's 1 inch thick, and you screw that up daily, and my response to you is abandonment. Or cancel you. And as leaders, our job— I mean, do we have to cancel people sometimes? Yeah, that's what performance management is all about. Like, I'm here to represent the team. We voted you off the island. We've talked to you a number of times about this. Yeah, but I think the rest of the, the, the deal is like, I will stay with you and not abandon you while you grow and develop. And I think that we've really lost some of that. And there's a lot of mass abandonment going on where we give people tough feedback and leave them alone, and we give them a 360 and tell them to go process that. At the very time people probably need us the most, we may be there for them the least. And what we do is we get together and talk about them, but we don't, you know, stay with them. But this is skill set stuff, and most people think trust is a feeling, love is a feeling. It's skill set. Mm-hmm. They think that trust is an organizational culture thing to be created. No, it is active skill set. A lot of people know that early on in my career, I worked as a counselor, and I worked in with clients that were acting in some addictive ways, were people with some addictions. A lot of addictions. There's a lot of domestic violence that comes as a companion to that. And I worked in aftercare with a group of women that were victims of domestic violence, just happened to be a female group. And when they first were in those situations, we just really tended to healing them. We didn't tend to like blaming the victim or toxic positivity, like, because it changes your brain chemistry. It changed— like, there's so much that we just have to get you back to brain health. And so—

And so that discernment word that we talk about— this is not call to greatness time, this is like

love-up time. But also just teach people how to, you know, get regulated again and just fix some of the damage. However, when I got them in aftercare, the number one thing I would hear is, I would love to date again, but I don't trust men. If that— if that was their partner choice— this group happened to be— their partner choices were men. And when they would say, I don't trust men, I'm like, oh my God, what a bleak outlook to want partnership and love in your life and not trust half the human race, like just carte blanche.

Oh, it's so true. Yeah, 50%. I mean, it's literally—

I'm like, dang. And they're like, well, how do I find the few I can trust? And I'm like, that also seems like an impossible feat. Like, dating's purpose is to get to know somebody. You can't know them before you date them. Like, so let's play that out. And they just started to see how futile their view on trust was. And I said, what if instead, in this aftercare group, we worked on you developing the skill sets where you could trust yourself around people? Now that's really different because everybody's looking to find trustworthy people and trustworthy organizations. But what if a more portable proposition was, I'm gonna do what I need and to grow my skill set to trust me, to trust my intuition, to trust myself that if somebody treats a food server aggressively on our first date, to trust my choices to say, thank you, I'm grabbing an Uber and heading home, please, please don't call me. Or to trust, you know, my ability to do my work and see reality as it really is. Now, I'm not blaming The victim. I'm just saying to have a chance of next healthier relationship. What I worked on people was helping them learn to trust themselves and develop the skill set to have honest conversations, ask good questions, quit focusing on being chosen, and focus on whether this is a person you would choose, and to you know identify all of them—the the watch outs, the that's cool. And as we started to build people's skill sets, then they could walk more freely through the world. They could accept a date and set it up in a safe way where they're interviewing the person. And what we're trying to give people here is freedom. And what most people are doing when it comes to trust is they're giving away their power and they're outsourcing their— whether or not they can trust somebody, and they're making their world small and they're giving up their freedom. Then they're super mad about not feeling like they can freely contribute at work. So skills that need to be developed so that you can move through more of the world and, and trust is really where it's at. And that's where I think we're often— so much of our culture work and our development work is cultures are great when people are working their individual programs and coming together and turning towards one another in messy situations. That's a healthy culture. Cultures are not created by companies keeping everybody safe. Now, do companies have a responsibility? Yes, but it's a shared accountability.

Yeah. Like, it's so funny the way I saw that. There's a visual that came to my mind, and I don't know if you— it's probably— it'd be literally the first slide I present. Like, it's like the intro slide. The first slide is that human condition, the Troublesome Trends model we call it. Some of you have probably heard from either Cy or I, but it's got the BMW slide in there if you've been. And if not, you'll hear it sometime. What happens is we like step down, we BMW drive in the situation, and then you wish for a different reality. And you're like, if only reality was perfect. But then the point we bring up there is what if you got more skillful to succeed in that current reality? Or what if you got so skillful that you could trust your approach, your skills, your ability to set boundaries, your ability to say no, all those things, you trust those skills even up into that point. If you're really scared, I mean, self-defense is in there. There's kind of physical skills in your example you could learn. Not that you should have to, but the world is as the world is, and we're not blaming the victim, but raise your skill set, then you can be more successful in whatever reality comes your way. So now you're back out there more trusting of the world, and then hopefully, you know, in that case, you know, being able to connect deeper with a possible partner. Mm-hmm. So I see that is so amazing how that comes back to the first slide we share, which links into trust. Are you going to wish for different realities that are bubble wrapped where you can't ever feel any like fear, pain, anxiety? Or you're going to learn some skills to be able to, to handle those situations and move forward anyway. So—

And the and in this is that should we still be working to create workplaces and workplaces that don't have, um, you know, these aggressions and, um, and things that are harmful to people? Absolutely. But what you'll notice as you're listening to this podcast is the ego is like, oh, Blaming the victim. Oh, gaslighting. Oh, the ego will take everything it can to kill the and. The ego hates the word and. And for me, it's like there is such freedom in accountability, because if I don't have the ability to account for my choices, my decisions, my denials— now, I'm not to blame for some of the times I've been in very abusive situations, because I've been there. I'm not to just preaching this. I do need to look at with accountability, because the truth will set me free. Oh, that's when I abandoned myself not to be abandoned. Or— and I see it right now in so much corporate culture. We'll have town hall meetings and the leaders are just having to sit calmly, and people are saying leaders should tell the truth and leaders should, you know, give people benefit of the doubt and leaders should like understand our life and that we're human and we need like flexibility, and they're accusing leaders of being liars and like gaslighting. I mean, the, the, the double standard I'm seeing right now where a lot of people demanding leaders are kind of non-human as they want to be seen as humans is ego stuff. It's like, it's like righteous lashing out. And anytime you're trying to seek anger through lashing out to justify similar abusive behaviors, like you have gone from victim to perpetrator. And I think too many people are just cycling around victim to perpetrator. And let's say, like, what if we all just came together as imperfect humans and like brought love back in and curiosity and compassion?

Well, and some of that core research on accountability that we have is like high accountables sort differently, and it links to trust. It's like, So, that whole, like, I know you brought up blaming the victim. It's like you step back once you're out of the dangerous situation, and then you might, if you can get there, say, what's my part in it? And then it's like, so, here's what happened when I don't prefer, like in the workplace, what's my part in it, in the mess? And then what's left over is something the organization might help with. And it's usually pretty specific. Yeah. If you, but those in a lower state of accountability tend to say, here's what's not going well, skip the what's my part in the mess and go right into a list of everything that needs to change in reality for me to be able to step in and trust and engage. And so, that tool we love is write down what you're not really loving maybe in your workplace or on the team like we need better communication, we need more trust, we need more transparency. Second sheet, what's my part in that? And that always hits me like a ton of bricks because if I get honest, I'm like, well, better communication, I guess I keep skipping over those emails that are the updates. I could read those emails instead of just put them straight into You know, spam. So if I was reading the email, maybe communication would be better. So I even see my part in that. When I'm frustrated about something, there's always a part I'm playing where I'm not following up, I'm not, you know, trusting my gut. And then what's left over, you might have a clear ask like, could we move the email to Monday— I mean, to Tuesday instead of Monday? So now I'm—

Right, because you've already sorted your part out.

I've sorted out my part in it. So, um, hopefully—

People are more willing to do what you ask when they see you've shown insight. So like And an amends is not an apology. It's like, I'm sorry. I can see how I've harmed you. I have insight around this, and I haven't asked, what can I do to make that right by you? Um, I think it's just, it's so, so important. I have a really quick tool that we haven't written about that came from a Seinfeld show called instinct or opposite. I know

though— Okay. Okay. Seinfeld was not in the script for this side.

Yes. Yes. So there's this one episode of Seinfeld where the question is like, should we go with instinct or opposite? It really is making the point that a lot of times our instinct is right, and sometimes our instinct is like the worst thing to do. So what I know about me is I have triggers, and I have, you know, we all have just our own stuff we bring. And more often than not, I need to not go with my instinct when I'm in a heightened, activated stage, and I need to go with the opposite. So like, let's say that I feel hurt by somebody. Instinct is to get into, oh no, you just didn't. And like, my instinct is to like— Right. The opposite is, can I get vulnerable and turn towards somebody? And so for me, what I'm realizing is a lot of my— what I would call instinct lately has been from ego. And that big part of me is just taking a moment and going like, with the opposite. And what that is doing is I am feeling seen in a way that makes me trust people, and I'm seeing them in a way that increases our trust. And I think for me, I'm focusing a lot on when I'm with people, seeing people, like, so they feel seen or heard, and I feel seen and heard. And somehow that works on trust just really indirectly. And So I'm doing a lot less instinct because I'm really reactive right now. The world's kind of a weird place.

Yeah.

And a lot more like opposite, which is just like, what would, you know, some great saint do? And I'm just trying to do that more. And what I find is, especially in the last couple days, it has led to very imperfect conversations of very soft-hearted people turning towards one another and feeling so seen, heard, and And trusted and able to trust. So if we soften our hearts up, it just automatically softens a lot of other people's hearts.

I think I put a mantra there, like, trust the instinct as far as how it has you triggered that there's a big thing there to look at, and then consider the opposite. It's like—

I love that.

You know, it's kind of like trust the instinct because you're like, that's a big, you know, response.

There's info there.

And then like take a deep breath, take a walk, or wait till you drive home or whatever the situation is, and then just consider the opposite. I just, I feel that, uh, it's almost, you know, we both love Byron Katie, but it's like, what are 3 ways the opposite could be truer, truer? It's kind of that, like, take a peek at what's the other side of this, not denying reality. You're not toxic positively thinking about it, but you're just taking a peek in reflection to see, like, if that might be a softer, better way forward. So I love that kind of trust your instinct, consider the opposite.

Um, well, you'll hear a lot on this podcast as we wrap up, like, I want these discussions as we have. We aren't giving you the truth. We don't know exactly how to do it. We're making invitations to try some things on for size for yourself. Don't take our word for it, but to just entertain bigger spaces for yourself and, and just open yourself up more. Because what I know is good for us is more options, not less. And there's a lot of people are like, I know, and here's the answer, and here's how this will play out. And I'm just like, What if we could expand all of that and just have a lot of ands? It's like all of it. Like, what if I can feel my feelings where I'm just super ticked even though I know what I'm mad about is a story I made up? I'm like mad and I value relationship and I can turn towards— like, you'll hear a lot in this podcast about all of it all at once, everything. I think there's a movie on that I haven't seen, but When people come out of big experiences, and they have big insights, we ask them, like, what's the bottom line? They say things like, it's all of it all at once, everything all together, like all of it's true. And it seems like bliss and spiritual awakening has that one component in it where people realize that it's all of it.

Love it. Love it. Well, I think keeping these shorter side, I think what we'll do is take the tools that we know. I got notes here. We're gonna put those in the podcast notes. Some of them we have, you know, that are more practical, like a tutorial video. So if you're like, oh, Sai talked about editing the story, here's the link to that. That those are like quick watches if you want to try out a tool. But we'll try and make sure we tie this down to the practical stuff we have in our library. But, uh, hopefully more of these coming, and we will keep them, uh, going your way as listeners and as viewers. And let us know what topics might be top of mind through these channels. We'd love to do more like this.

Awesome. Alex, thanks for creating this. It's been a great brainstorm of the team. We'll see everybody on the next episode. We're going to keep these coming. This is going to be our season, so it should be good. Let us know your thoughts. Do you like this format? Do you like just our random conversations? And give us ideas. So thanks, everybody. If you're loving this, pass it on, hit subscribe, like it. Sign up for our newsletter if you're not already getting it. And realitybasedleadership.com/newsletter should get you signed up. And it's exciting times. Let's do this thing. Thanks, Alex.

Yep, take care everyone.