Renee Warren - Working From Home In a Pandemic

In this episode of the Sensory Friendly Solutions Podcast our Host Matt George is chatting with Renee Warren, the Founder of We Wild Women and the Host of the Into the Wild Podcast.

Renee wants to help women around the world start their dream business with the incredibly ambitious goal of support 1 Million women in her lifetime.  

"I have one gigantic mission: To help a million female entrepreneurs launch and grow a wildly successful company!"

If you're engaging with Renee's work, she says, "you're in the right place!"

"You are here because you either want to: 

• Take that first step to uncovering your passion,
• Get a little wild and finally start your damn business!

You don’t have to do it alone, that’s where this community and me come in. I’m here for you every step of the way. From dirty back-of-the-napkin idea to launch right through to scaling your marvellous business."

EPISODE GUIDE:
2:00 Renee's entrepreneurial journey
4:07 What will COVID change?
7:40 Renee on creating boundaries
8:23 Professional overwhelm
10:11 How Renee adapted to working from home 
11:05 Renee's ideal customer 
17:53 Renee's morning routine 
20:45 How to deal with what Renee calls 'Down Cycles'
28:21 Renee calls 'BS'
31:59 Our deepest fears
32:37 Renee's son Max and his experience with hyper-sensitivity 
37:17 Renee's strategy for reducing the noise of the current era 
39:42 Renee's reflection 
41:37 Christel's personal examples
44:46 Christel on boundaries
47:46 Christel's reflection on being curious

Thanks for listening - Christel Seeberger and the Sensory Friendly Solutions Team.

Full blog posts and transcripts for each episode can be found on our website.

Podcast leadership is provided by Sensory Friendly Solutions Founder & CEO Christel Seeberger.

This podcast was produced by Matt George and was engineered by Zachary Pelletier.

Thank you to our sponsor TakingITGlobal, ensuring that youth around the world are actively engaged. Head to risingyouth.ca to learn more and to become the next Rising Youth grant recipient.

The podcast is also supported by New Brunswick Community College as part of the Community Resource Awareness During and After COVID-19 applied research project, funded by the New Brunswick Innovation Foundation. Learn more about NBCC's efforts to transform lives and communities.

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Transcript

Matt George (00:00):

Today's episode of the Sensory Friendly Solutions podcast on the Unsettled Media Podcast Network is brought to you by Sensory Friendly Solutions, discover sensory-friendly solutions for daily life. To learn more, head to sensoryfriendly.net.

Speaker 2 (00:22):

Unsettled.

Matt George (00:25):

Hello, listeners. Welcome back to the Sensory Friendly Solutions podcast. This is episode three, with Renee Warren. Renee is the founder of We Wild Women. She's an award-winning entrepreneur with one successful exit. She's a one million dollar plus PR agency, and is a podcast host of a podcast called Into The Wild, I think you'll really enjoy it.

Matt George (00:52):

She's very open with her personal experience, her family experience of sensory overload, how she is turning her son's experience of sensory overload into a superpower. She reflected on what entrepreneurs are facing right now, especially female entrepreneurs. She's an authority on the subject, and we really appreciate her coming on the podcast. This is episode three of the Sensory Friendly Solutions podcast with Renee Warren.

Matt George (01:36):

Renee Warren, welcome to the Sensory Friendly Solutions podcast.

Renee Warren (01:41):

Thank you so much for having me. I cannot wait to chat about this.

Matt George (01:47):

I'm going to do the COVID check-in that we all seemingly have to do with each other because it's been a year. But before we get there, do you mind just introducing yourself for people who haven't interfaced with your work before now?

Renee Warren (02:00):

Yeah, for sure. I am Renee Warren. I am from a small town in Northern Ontario, so I know country life. And I've been an entrepreneur most of my life, having started a restaurant when I was 17 years old, doing my own consulting. Yeah, 17. My mom told me to go get a job and I said, "I'll start a business," because I thought at 17 that entrepreneurs didn't work a lot and they made a lot of money. So why would I get a job working for somebody else?

Renee Warren (02:32):

So my entrepreneur journey started then, and it hasn't ended. I went to school. I had one little job in Toronto for a couple of years, but outside of that, I've always just run my own business. And for many reasons, but part of it is just the freedom to be able to do what I want, working with the people that I love.

Matt George (02:53):

Sure.

Renee Warren (02:54):

And right now, this year, I actually launched a company called We Wild Women. I coach first-time female entrepreneurs in launching their dream business. So my [crosstalk 00:03:06] mission in life ... yeah, my mission in life is to help more women start their dream business because I believe that there needs to be more women in business, and more women in a position of power because we need more women leaders. And so-

Matt George (03:23):

One of the things that I thought about during the pandemic is all the things you're saying, I wonder what stays permanently and I wonder if our relationship to work and thereby our relationship to our mission becomes more healthy in some way.

Matt George (03:39):

I've been a full-time entrepreneur since May, so I'm extremely excited to be on this journey. But at the same time, I feel a kinship with my mission that I didn't feel prior to doing it full-time. You know what I mean? And you're right, you feel like you're living the way you should be living. So doing a podcast or implementing a business like We Wild Women, it's just allowing you to get closer to that thing you always knew you were going to do.

Renee Warren (04:07):

So COVID aside, I feel like this was always a calling of mine, but I only really discovered this last October. But with COVID, I will say there's a lot of things that are going to change. And a perfect example would be the healthcare system.

Renee Warren (04:26):

In Canada, we have an incredible healthcare system, but a lot of general practitioners and some doctors have chosen to do phone calls for their consultations with their patients, which normally you would have to go to the office, which most things can be discussed over the phone. If it's a more serious matter, obviously seeing a doctor is important.

Renee Warren (04:47):

But for me, I've had a couple of instances where I've needed medication for a strep throat or whatever, and I didn't even go and physically see a doctor. I took pictures or videos of the issue, sent it in over email.

Matt George (05:00):

Right.

Renee Warren (05:01):

They faxed the prescription to the pharmacy, and then within two hours of diagnosis, I was already taking my first sip of my amoxicillin. That is just an example of how things I know are going to progress. And I think people working remotely, which people said it was a fad, but this remote work really started 10 years ago.

Renee Warren (05:28):

And I know this because I worked with a lot of technology startups out of the valley when I ran my agency, and they were all about remote work, because it allowed them to access the best talent pool anywhere in the world. So you can have the best developer in India because you can connect over Zoom and work together remotely.

Renee Warren (05:52):

You can have the best marketer in Australia, because why not? That being said, there's also this thing now in education because of COVID. And that is interesting. That is a discussion in and of itself, but ...

Matt George (06:08):

Totally.

Renee Warren (06:09):

... things are definitely changing. And I think a lot of things for the better. It's just it unfortunately, had to take a whole massive shift for us to be able to appreciate what we can do remotely.

Matt George (06:22):

The point of this podcast project and why podcasts are seemingly an incredible way to achieve what I've been calling internet era leverage is because it allows you to drill in to a specific issue and invite a community in to listen. I've sometimes said that a really great podcast, or a lot of mediocre podcasts, but a really great podcast feels almost like a guilty pleasure. You know what I mean?

Matt George (06:49):

It's a conversation you can't believe you were invited to, but all of a sudden you have front row seats. It's an incredible tool for a business to achieve leverage. So the point of this podcast project, a really fascinating implication is, how do we develop strategies to reduce the noise, the busy, the bright, the confusion of the modern era? And how you describe working from home, I wonder if does it allow us to have ... or maybe it allows us to decide what our relationship to work is.

Matt George (07:20):

We now know the nine to five is totally arbitrary. A dress code is a symbol of mistrust. It's not a benchmark, it's mistrust of your employees. Does working from home, although I know it's challenging for parents, and you're a parent, and we're going to talk about that, but does it allow us to conceive our own relationship to what healthy working is?

Renee Warren (07:40):

I think so. However, you definitely need those boundaries because the unfortunate thing that people that are not motivated can find easy ways and easy excuses to not be focused on the task at hand. However, it also allows you to have the flexibility. Like yesterday, I had to bring my son to the dentist, and I don't have to call on anybody to go. And I'm really hoping that employers also see this as a new era. So there's boundaries that you have to set. However, I think what it does is it opens up a whole new playing field for people.

Renee Warren (08:23):

There's all of these things that society have created, like anxiety and stress because of being overloaded with noise and sounds, and lights and things. And sometimes stepping out of the house produces this incredible fear or sense of anxiety. You show up to work and you're not the person you could be. When I lived in Toronto, I would have to physically go downtown to my office and everything I did was on my computer, but I had to be in an office. It would take me an hour to get there by subway.

Renee Warren (08:51):

It was always stinky, hot, cramped. I was always hungry and tired. And by the time I got to the office, it's like man, I just wasted an hour, which agitated me. There was little inspiration in the commute. And now, you're forcing me to do a job that I could have easily done at home and already been at least an hour in at work. I remember those cold days, and I would call in and say, "Listen, the subway is not working very well. Can I work from home?" And they said, "Sure." My productivity was through the roof, through the roof. And I got to be in my pajamas all day.

Matt George (09:24):

And you get to conceive of your own space. You mentioned the commute not bing inspiring, and there's sensory overload in the commute within and of itself. But you don't get to conceive of your own space. You don't get to conceive of your own schedule. Some people are early birds, some people do their maker hours first thing and some people do their maker hours at night.

Matt George (09:46):

I just wonder if our relationship to work becomes more healthy. And you mentioned strategies to create those barriers. Have you created strategies personally and within your business? I know you're a coach, a successful one. What kinds of barriers or what kinds of strategies to conceive of those barriers have you created for yourself so that you know it's time to do this and it's time to do that?

Renee Warren (10:11):

Well, so during COVID, we had to restructure some of our house. And what has now become my office used to be my youngest son's bedroom, which is fine because my boys are very close in age and they share a bunk bed. And they love it. But I always joke that after my morning coffee, I'm like, "Hey, bye guys, I'm going to the office, heard the commute wasn't so bad today," as a joke. But that for me signals, you're going to work.

Renee Warren (10:40):

And I'm one wall away from the laundry room, I'm one wall away from the kitchen and the dishes in the sink. But this is where I need to be. And part of what I do in coaching actually, is we really clearly define our target audience. So you wake up in the morning, and you go to work because you know who you're serving, and why you're serving them, because these people need you. So for me, we help to find the target audience.

Renee Warren (11:05):

For me, my ideal customer, her name is Entrepreneur Emily, and I envision her every morning. It's like the days that I'm like, "Oh, maybe I'll do laundry," I correct myself and say, "No, Emily needs me today." So I have to go create for her, I have to show up for her. And it could be if you're a stay-at-home mom or parent, that you're showing up for your child or you're showing up for person X, Y, Z. So the boundary is the person I'm showing up for. Because if you're an entrepreneur, and a good entrepreneur, it's never about the money. It's about your mission and who you're serving. And so you have to show up every day for that person. And the money comes.

Matt George (11:46):

I wonder if we all need someone to help us get there. Because one of the things that COVID has revealed in my life is you could either double down on the fear and anxiety and overwhelm of the time, and that manifests itself in really negative ways which we've explored on the podcast already, or you can double down and say this is an opportunity. This is an opportunity for me and my family.

Matt George (12:16):

I know that first and foremost, this is a healthcare crisis, so we need to be sensitive to that. But paradoxically, this could be a time where you double down on things like family values, things like reducing the noise and overwhelm, reducing your media diet, or totally revolutionizing your media diet. Are we in information overload right now? Are we just being bombarded by information?

Renee Warren (12:39):

100%, yes. It took me up until about a month ago to realize that a lot of ... so I have such mistrust in the media, and I've actually taken akin to looking at such polarizing opinions because I feel like the truth is in the middle. So I'll have to take President Trump into consideration, but his opinion versus somebody who is a complete liberal. It's like they're so far on the other end of the spectrum, but what's in the middle might be the truth. But the media, just in my opinion, I think is probably 15% correct. Even the weather is 15% correct and be like the weather forecast-

Matt George (13:32):

When we're not scaling our media diet ... yeah, so when we're not scaling our media diet, we're letting things into our system that one, don't serve us, but also may or may not be true.

Renee Warren (13:42):

No. And that's the thing is we connect and attach ourselves to the opinion of people that we respect. And that opinion can largely be uneducated, uninformed, unexperienced, and they're just saying whatever they want to say, whoever they is. Then all of a sudden you believe that to be the truth. So there's a lot of talk about, and I know this is about sensory overload, but in terms of media, there's a lot of talk about COVID.

Renee Warren (14:10):

And lately I'm like, maybe this is actually just a political play and it's not true. Nothing that we're reading is true. And all of a sudden there's all these people that have suffered, lost their jobs and all of these things that are happening because it's all about politics. I don't know. So this is the overload. And when you start down these rabbit holes, about listening to social media and these people that are talking about whatever, it is degrading.

Renee Warren (14:36):

And for me, it's probably the worst thing you should be doing at any point in the day is looking at the news. Even my husband is like, "Why are you reading that stuff?" I'm like, "Oh, this is actually comical right now. This is funny." But I think the best place for me to be ... because I'm a very sensitive person for sounds, and that's why for me, the subway commute to work was probably the worst thing I should be doing. Some people love it. They get energized by the people, they listen to their podcast episode. I can't. There's too much going on.

Renee Warren (15:18):

I can't process out all the noise and the stuff that's happening. And that's the thing with media too, is there's some people that can read something and be like, "Oh, whatever, that's a thing and opinion I don't agree with," and move on with your day. But there's some people that read this stuff or see it or hear it, and all of a sudden it consumes them. And then they're not productive. And maybe it's not even the truth. I don't know.

Matt George (15:40):

I'm the same way as you in the sense that I've described this in the past as my empathy problem. I had to really work hard at creating strategies to when I internalize something like that. So if I turn on the news today and saw the COVID stats for Florida, my aunt and uncle live in Florida, all of a sudden what I call my empathy problem has brought me to a state of overwhelm where I'm not focused, I'm not emotionally stable enough to be doing the things that I want to be doing, and at a high level.

Matt George (16:12):

How do you deal with that? You said you're a sensitive person. What strategies have you conceived to be able to deal with that, to be able to shut these things out above and beyond, and just turning it off? Which may actually be the solution.

Renee Warren (16:25):

Oh, yeah. Sometimes you just have to. You have to turn it off. For me, it's being okay and feeling those emotions too. It's okay to be frustrated and angry and curious, but know that there's a limit to that. The moment you see that your own energy and your own thoughts are shifting more negatively, it's time to shut that stuff down.

Renee Warren (16:50):

And the same can be said with people in your life that are not supporting or contributing. It's time to take them out of the equation. Friends that are just not good for you, or people in your life, family unfortunately, that might not be serving you. It's the same thing, it's the same emotion. So whether it's negative media, the news or people in your life, there are still signals for things that are not serving you. And it is noise.

Renee Warren (17:21):

It is sensory overload because what emotion those people in the news create, if it's for you, then that's great. But if it's never for you in a sense that you might have people that are never supporting you as much as you are trying to reciprocate, it's time to just cut them out. What I've done social media wise is we wake up at 5AM at our house, my husband and I, every day, regardless of the day of the week, and some mornings are super productive.

Renee Warren (17:53):

We get to work. We're in our Five-Minute Journal and drinking our coffee, things are amazing. And then some days, we're just like, "It's not one of those days." My favorite app on my on the phone is the weather network. I love storms. I've always been fascinated by weather.

Matt George (18:11):

Oh, wow.

Renee Warren (18:11):

Tornadoes and hurricanes, I just love that stuff. I don't love the devastation. I'm very curious about weather, so that actually makes me happy. So when there's a storm, I'm like, "Ooh, well, how fast is the wind? How much rain is there? This is so cool. The ocean swells."

Matt George (18:28):

Interesting.

Renee Warren (18:28):

That fills me up. But for other people, it could be very alarming. So we set boundaries, and I don't have my phone next to me in bed. It's across the bedroom. And I never ever, ever check news or ask charged questions, or anything that could affect my sleep before I go to bed.

Renee Warren (18:55):

My husband is doing this 75 hard thing now where you go 75 days, two workouts a day. You don't need any crap drink, no alcohol, all that stuff. So he's on day nine and I said, "Hey, can I add something to this?" And he's like, "Sure, why not? It's already hard as it is." And I'm like, "No television in our room for 75 days."

Matt George (19:15):

Wow.

Renee Warren (19:15):

And he was like, "Okay," because we have a TV in our room. That has allowed us, because part of the 75 hard too is reading 10 pages a day, at least. I'm like, how perfect is this? Now, you can read your 10 pages before bed because there's nothing to watch.

Renee Warren (19:30):

So in taking out the things that would normally make me upset or worried or scared, like social media and the news, especially before bed, allows me to sleep better. And when you have a good night's sleep, you wake up you have this momentum and you're like, "Uh-uh (negative), I'm not checking the news right now. I'm not going to go on social media because I feel good." And the less I check it, the better I feel. So, what is the point on checking it?

Matt George (19:57):

And is the feeling you're describing when you're in that zone, is that a feeling of alignment? Because I know when I get into a mode, and we're going to talk about modern entrepreneurs, because I know that's your bag, when I'm out of alignment is when I'm allowing all of those sensory overloads to come into my life.

Matt George (20:16):

But when I'm in alignment, I'm healthy. I'm craving simplicity. My work is a high level. You just feel that sense of like you said, your ideal customer, Emily, you feel in alignment with that customer. And you think I'm ignoring all of these things, I'm in alignment, and you seem like you've developed strategies to create alignment. Is that what that is all heading towards?

Renee Warren (20:45):

Oh, absolutely. But here's the thing is, I call them down cycles in coaching is you can't ever always be in alignment. Stuff happens in life. People get sick, things happen, you lose business. You can't avoid it, and you might become misaligned. But these down cycles are necessary. They're necessary for you too, because it's an experience you're learning. Something is happening, you're growing. As Tony Robbins says, "Life is either happening to you or for you." And it's really hard to fathom that.

Renee Warren (21:18):

It's like you just got in a car accident and now you have $5,000 of damage on your car. It's like, how is this happening for me? But there's always a lesson in these things. So life happens for you. So on these down cycles, when you're not aligned, it's like, what's the message? What am I learning here? Why am I going through this? Every single time that you're down and getting kicked and you get back up again, you're stronger, and you become even more aligned. Things become more clear afterwards, if you choose to see it as a gift.

Matt George (21:50):

That's beautiful. Renee, before we dig into the modern entrepreneur, can I read something that you wrote?

Renee Warren (21:55):

Okay. Yes.

Matt George (21:58):

Well, I should say actually you quoted the great Stevie Nicks, in saying, "I believe that if you are gracious, you have won the game." How does that apply to the modern entrepreneur?

Renee Warren (22:12):

Yes, she's my favorite. I hope to meet her someday. So if you don't know Stevie Nicks, she is the French singer for Fleetwood Mac. So if you're gracious, you've already won the game means that it doesn't matter what life throws at you, just be humble and kind. Our family motto and word of the year is kill them with kindness. So it doesn't matter who owes you what, or who's disowned you, just be kind.

Renee Warren (22:42):

And the more you can even just force yourself to feel those emotions and be kind, the more you realize that when things or people happen to you, it's never ever about you. It's about them. So when you're gracious, it's like someone is rude to you, they cut you off or whatever happens, they don't pay the bill that you've been hoping for, it's never about you. And I think Rachel Hollis said this. Her quote is, "Other people's opinion of you is none of your business." And it took me forever to figure that out.

Renee Warren (23:19):

I'm like, "Of course, it's my business what other people think of me." But it's not because it's a reflection of them. Now, they've done studies and I don't know exactly this, but you can actually show somebody a paper that's white and a paper that's blue, and someone might say that the blue paper is pink. And it's like, no, no, no, it's clearly blue, but they see it as pink. And it's because of whatever is going on in their head.

Renee Warren (23:41):

I'm not saying they're colorblind, but they think it's pink for whatever reason. Someone made them believe that it's pink. So this Stevie Nicks quote is, "If you're gracious as much as you can be gracious, you've already won the game." I'm thinking about the most successful people I know in life that have all facets of their life doing very well, are they kind to people? They're gracious.

Matt George (24:05):

Yeah, the givers. I think you're totally right. Renee, what is the modern entrepreneur up against right now? And I'm going to introduce, perhaps a good place to start, it seems to me as someone running an internet-based business, and I know you are as well, really it's people based, but it happens on the internet, the ROI on your attention has never been more obvious.

Matt George (24:31):

But it's never been easier to be distracted. That's the paradox of the modern era. Is that what the modern entrepreneur is really up against? When this was crystallized for me, and then I would love to hear your reflection, when COVID got serious and every company seemingly transitioned overnight to producing PPE.

Renee Warren (24:51):

Right.

Matt George (24:51):

Just because PPE is what the market needs right now, does not mean that you should be producing the PPE. If you're a vodka distillery that transitioned into hand sanitizer because you have all the tools at your disposal, fine. That's a semi pivot. That's fine, you're appealing to the market.

Matt George (25:09):

But if you're just a retail business and you pivot overnight to producing PPE, there will be a time where that need goes away. And your distraction will not have served you. What's the modern entrepreneur up against? You're coaching a lot of these businesses.

Renee Warren (25:25):

The first word that came to mind was noise, and there's just a lot of noise out there. So it's cutting through that clutter. Think about any online businesses that started now, if you put them back 10 years ago and they had the strategies today, they would crush it. But there's so many other people doing a lot of the same things. So I look at it, how many people live in the world? You're defining your customer, your ideal customer and it all comes back to that.

Renee Warren (25:56):

So if you're an entrepreneur and you're like, "Oh, my gosh, there's 10 people that just started exactly what I'm doing," I always say, "Hey, look at it as market validation, but go out and be the best that you can, serving the people that need you." So yes, there's a lot of people doing what I'm doing now and I've heard it over the years, "Well, who needs another business coach?" I'm like, "Well, in my opinion, everybody who's an entrepreneur needs a business coach." So however many entrepreneurs that are out there should be how many business coaches there are. All right.

Renee Warren (26:27):

And the thing about a coach is it's a very personal connection. So whether it's me coaching one on one in a mastermind or a digital program, you're still learning from me and my experience and the community I've created. So cutting through the noise really is just having the most useful solution to your ideal customer's problem. So a lot of what I do is idea validation, market validation, customer validation, work with my customers. You can come up with any idea. I always said it.

Renee Warren (26:58):

In the '90s or the '80s, they sold the Pet Rock. People bought a rock, and it was a pet. I'm like, "Wow, someone was so smart to actually market a rock and make money from it." So if they can do that, then you can do anything. It's just how are you unique? And the other thing too, especially with ... there's this whole filter that I work with my entrepreneurs around the patriarchy. And somebody's work that I follow really closely is Dr. Valerie Rein. She's the author of the book, the Patriarchy Stress Disorder. What she talks about in that book is how the patriarchy hasn't been serving anybody.

Renee Warren (27:38):

And a lot of the things we believe in life, religion, family, running a business, politics, all have the foundation of coming from the power of a white man. So it's white man's privilege that have created the foundation of the Western world. And this is my opinion so by all means, if you don't agree with me, that's okay. But this is where my work comes from. And part of that is this fascinating ideal that we have to run a business that's going to make $10 million because otherwise, you're not considered a good entrepreneur. And I call BS on that.

Renee Warren (28:21):

I call BS on the need to have to scale your business to some absurd amount that you're going to either go public or be acquired. And yes, there are instances where this is very logical and makes sense. But especially for women, when you step into the ring of entrepreneurship that is very male dominated, the rules and foundation of what it means to be an entrepreneur were created by men, it's tough.

Renee Warren (28:51):

So we have to recreate these rules and recreate these beliefs around especially as women, what it means to be an entrepreneur and what it means to be successful in that ring. Because it's not necessarily about making millions and billions of dollars. It's about the impact you have. It's on the problem you're solving for the people that you're serving.

Matt George (29:11):

So redefining what success means for us is a strategy to reduce the noise, because it allows us to center. It allows us to maintain our mission.

Renee Warren (29:22):

Yeah. And for me, so I live with a high performing husband. His goal is to have a private jet one day, and he believes it. And you know what? When he says it, I believe it too. He wants to make an audacious amount of money, like billions of dollars, and I'm like, "That's amazing." That is not my dream. And I don't want to have to be in that position mentally and physically to achieve that. I can do it. Sara Blakely of Spanx did it, and very few women that have done it. However, I don't want that.

Renee Warren (29:57):

And the moment I told myself, "I don't want that," I already minimized my dreams. Just because he wants it now I feel like I'm supposed to do it? I'm not saying this for my husband, I'm just saying it for entrepreneurs in general. So my goal, my mission in life has little to do with revenue. And there's another big red flag most entrepreneurs throw up is like, "Oh, well, there should be revenue." No, it's about impact. So my mission is to help, inspire, educate and motivate over a million women to start their dream business.

Matt George (30:27):

That's the mission.

Renee Warren (30:29):

However, I did it, how is not important. It's the why. And the moment it's like that is my thing, then all of the noise, it's almost like you're walking through a crowd of people and you're not too sure what it is. Your thing, when you find it, it's like everyone steps aside and leaves the space for you to walk towards your goal.

Renee Warren (30:51):

So how I get there, I don't know. That is insignificant to the why, because I've already said maybe I've already touched thousands of women. So I'm one step, one step towards that goal. So understanding your why, and it doesn't have to be perfect, and it changes over the course of your life, allows you to cut out the noise. It allows you to be super focused on who you're serving and why you're serving them.

Matt George (31:21):

That's great advice. Renee, what has been your personal experience or your family's experience with the sensory-friendly world or sensory overload? It can be this year, or in a particularly trying moment in your life. We really want to encourage vulnerability because we know the listeners are looking for those tactics and those strategies and those tools. So tell us a little bit about what that experience has been like.

Renee Warren (31:49):

You do know the two real fears of humans, right? You know what they are?

Matt George (31:54):

No.

Renee Warren (31:55):

There's only two. Do you know what they are?

Matt George (31:58):

Tell me.

Renee Warren (31:59):

It's the fear of falling and the fear of loud noises. It's already in our DNA to be fearful of these things, so everything else is learned behavior. Everything. So when we talk about sensory overload, this is a total different conversation in terms of entrepreneurship, but my oldest son, Max, is an incredible little boy. The first moment of recognizing his sensitivity came from my sister-in-law who was running a daycare and watched him.

Renee Warren (32:37):

He went to daycare when he was five weeks old because I had to go back to work. And the first little while, it was an adjustment. He's a newborn so we were like, "Oh, babies cry, they do these things." Then overtime we realized that he was just "sensitive", and I hated throwing a label item. But I'm like, if I had to describe him, this is what he is. I was like, "Okay. Yeah, he's sensitive." And she agreed. And what I've noticed is he is hyper aware of everything that's happening.

Matt George (33:10):

Right.

Renee Warren (33:10):

We had brought him to see child psychologists and learning centers, and there was nothing wrong with him. He is just unable to block out all of this stimuli. There's this thing called the singular gyrate. By gosh, I don't know. It's part of the brain. Essentially, in young development for max, it was under underdeveloped.

Renee Warren (33:34):

So as you and I are talking, there could be things happening outside or a sound in the background, or a smell or something that we're able to dismiss in order to focus on this conversation. He couldn't do that, and so all this stuff was going into his brain and he's like, "What do I do with this?" And then he would get agitated and lash out. So we've been working on this.

Renee Warren (33:57):

But it's definitely helped me become a better mother and a better entrepreneur and understanding, oh my gosh, this is the thing that's happening with my child. It's happening with a lot of other people. And as I'm coaching other women, they say, "Oh, this is the thing that's happening to me or my kids." So as a parent, it's like, what can we do to help this become Max's superpower? And it has. But going back to those two great fears, it's really interesting because loud noises startle him. So it's interesting.

Renee Warren (34:40):

And for me, it's like I've also been afraid of loud noises. I don't like loud noises. And it's funny because my husband speaks very loudly. So here's the thing is you have to create the environment in your home office, in your home, at work, wherever it is that is going to work for you. So if you've ever been in an environment that wasn't in your feverish, typically loud open spaces, which the open concept office is another thing I think is going to change because, how can you get anything done? I don't understand.

Matt George (35:18):

I haven't gotten it from the start.

Renee Warren (35:18):

Right. Google made it cool, but it's like, I don't know, guys. Anyway, so I hope that answers your question.

Matt George (35:29):

It does. And you put it so beautifully, that facilitating a quality of life for Max that it allows it to become his superpower. Maybe his hyper awareness of the world makes him one of the next best writers or next best podcasters, or someone that observes something of the world that allows it to be his superpower. And I think that's a-

Renee Warren (35:47):

Oh, and he remembers, it's insane, he remembers everything. When he was just turning seven, so at his learning center they did a cognitive memory test on him. And he had the memory of a 16 year-old.

Matt George (36:06):

Wow.

Renee Warren (36:06):

And I'm like, "What does that mean?" He remembers just stuff, people and places and maps. I'll be driving to a place we visited maybe once or twice, and he'll go, "Oh, no, in my mind you were supposed to turn back there." And I'm like, "How do you know this?"

Matt George (36:21):

Wow.

Renee Warren (36:23):

Yes. And he remembers situations and scenarios. Like the other day [crosstalk 00:36:28]. Yeah. He's like, "Hey, mama, I really want to wear those gray pants. You know, the gray?" I'm like, "I don't know what gray pants you're talking about." "The ones I was wearing last year when we did this photo shoot and we were playing football in the backyard." And I'm like, "What the? How do you remember that?"

Matt George (36:47):

Renee, you've been so generous with your time. Our final question. We want to send people out to the world to actually go and create that excellent quality of life in this noisy, busy, bright era.

Matt George (37:00):

Let's recap for one minute, whether it's with Max and his quality of life, whether it's with yourself, whether it's with your ideal customers, what's the strategy you use to reduce the noise of the current era? And we'll end on this.

Renee Warren (37:17):

Wow. That's a tough question. I think now, my answer to this question would be, be curious. Be curious because you need to understand that maybe the noise is actual loud noise. To you, noise could also be the media. So the curiosity around consuming content, social media and media is if something really angers you or frustrates you or hurts you, that content, it should be taken at face value, that there's other ways of understanding what's happening.

Renee Warren (38:03):

And so that has helped me during this very emotional past six months, especially during COVID, during the Black Lives Matter movements, is really being curious has helped me understand people's perspective. And know that there's a lot of people that say things and do things because they're suffering. And I think just knowing that allows you to become a healer, whether it's for yourself, your family or your friends. It allows you to also be more gracious.

Matt George (38:37):

Renee, where can we find your work? Where can we find the podcast? Let's point people to what you're doing.

Renee Warren (38:42):

Yes. You can go to wewildwomen.com and you can find the podcast there. Also, on iTunes or Spotify, anywhere you can find a podcast. It's called Into The Wild. And I interview high performing female entrepreneurs to understand where they started, and how they become successful entrepreneurs and women.

Matt George (39:05):

Renee Warren, thank you so much for being on the Sensory Friendly Solutions podcast.

Renee Warren (39:08):

Thanks so much for having me.

Matt George (39:16):

Christel, we're back for our reflection period of episode three, and we were laughing before we started recording. It's been a day it's been a week, but this is our time to reflect on where we are with the podcast. So this is episode three, Renee Warren. Give me some thoughts. What's your initial feedback on this?

Christel Seeberger (39:42):

I'm going to say just what Renee said, how she said it and the thing she shared really made me reflect, Matt, on our podcast series as a whole, this first season and the fact that we started with Dr. Sarah Gander as a pediatrician. And then we had Maureen as a mom and as a driving force in autism awareness.

Christel Seeberger (40:17):

And then we brought Renee who spoke to us also as a mother, as a woman, as a partner with her husband, Dan, as a coach to other women, specifically women entrepreneurs as an entrepreneur herself. So it really made me think about the diversity in the conversations that we're having, right?

Matt George (40:41):

Yep.

Christel Seeberger (40:42):

And why are we doing that? You and I know who's coming and what's coming, and that our conversations were really talking to different people with different lens views on almost all things sensory. As I was thinking about that and why are we doing that? We are doing that. And that sometimes when we have a problem, we like to find people who resonate with our problem, and who are just like us, with the same problem and the same circumstances. That feels very comfortable and we think we can learn from people who experience exactly what we experience and the way we experience it.

Christel Seeberger (41:37):

I'll use myself as an example. I have hearing loss and I follow a lot of people with hearing loss on Twitter, and just to learn from them. What are they talking about? But I also know that sometimes putting the problem in a box also ends up putting the solution in a box. So, why are we talking to different people with very different perspectives about similar issues? And I think it's because as human beings, there is lots of diversity.

Matt George (42:16):

And that's exactly the word that I thought about while recording episode three, was the diversity in the audiences we're tapping into. But what crystallized for me during the recording process was, in speaking to Renee, it was completely obvious that even in the entrepreneurship space, entrepreneurs as well are feeling this overwhelm and this overload.

Matt George (42:43):

So we're in previous times where I keep repeating to our guests, that stat that as of June 2020, sensory overload was being searched over 40,000 times a month. The number itself is not the focus, it's the trend of an increase of 50% year over year. That knows no bounds. It knows no geography, it knows no demographic. That is just true of the modern world, and so I thought it was actually really interesting to take this stance for episode three, mix it up a little bit and talk about what Renee has seen and experienced, both personally and professionally.

Christel Seeberger (43:21):

That really is exactly it, and I'll bring it back to myself. If I only look for solutions offered by and shared by people with hearing loss, I'm missing out. I'm missing out both on understanding the problem of sensory sensitivity and sensory overload, and the possible solutions that are out there. And that really makes me ... I actually want to hear from the audience and their thoughts about this, about finding, listening to people where you go, does this relate to me? How does this relate to me?

Christel Seeberger (43:59):

And then there were just things that Renew said that really, that I'm like here is the thread. Here are the solutions or the thoughts or the ideas that are across the board. One of the things she said, she talked about boundaries, and she talked about boundaries in just managing daily life. And she talked about who are you showing up for? Who are you showing up for at work? Who are you showing up for at home? And that really made me think to ask, when am I showing up for myself in all of this?

Christel Seeberger (44:46):

And I think with sensory overload, regardless as to the circumstance or the reason for that, really putting those boundaries in place is helpful. But also really carving out that distinction between showing up at work, showing up at home, but importantly, showing up for yourself. I had another conversation, I just happened to be talking to another occupational therapist today, working from home. And she's like, "My office is in my bedroom right now. I see the dirty laundry." Right?

Matt George (45:35):

Yeah.

Christel Seeberger (45:35):

And Renee alluded to that. Where's the boundary? How do I focus? The things I see, the things we talk about, noise. And we talk about noise in terms of literally what we hear, but also metaphorically, just all the things coming at us. If we don't put boundaries in place, it is overwhelming.

Matt George (45:59):

Certainly. One of the things that speaking of boundaries, one of the things I've been eternally grateful for throughout the course of this podcast already, is how forthcoming our guests have been with their personal experiences and their personal narratives. Renee talking about her son and his hyper awareness and sensitivity to things, but flipping the script a little bit and talking about the conversation around how that becomes his superpower.

Christel Seeberger (46:24):

Yes.

Matt George (46:24):

It's just so honest and forthcoming of our guests to go there, and we just love talking about that and bringing those strategies and solutions to our listeners.

Christel Seeberger (46:36):

I really liked that, along that thread of that conversation that Renee said. Again, she said really, that label of her son being sensitive was really something that was a disconnect for her, and finding a vocabulary to describe his hyper awareness in a way that fit for him, for her, for their family. And she ended that bit of the conversation about, and I think tying it all together, creating the environment that's going to work for you, creating an environment that works for her son, that works for their family. That was just a real golden moment to hear that, and to have that emphasized.

Matt George (47:41):

Certainly. Christel, do you have anything else that really hit you on episode three? I know we're going to get into the innovation segment for our listeners here shortly. Maybe give us one more thing that landed with you.

Christel Seeberger (47:56):

The last thing, and Renee ended on this, that I think really resonates with how we started this conversation about the diversity and conversation the different people we're talking to, Renee left us with the advice to be curious. And that, I think when we're looking at problems and trying to find solutions, as I talked about, putting a problem or a solution in a box and finding only what immediately resonates, that lacks that spirit of curiosity. So I think as we continue forth in this series, really putting our mind in a place that makes us want to learn more and makes us be curious.

Matt George (48:55):

Hello, listeners. Welcome back for the third segment of episode three of the Sensory Friendly Solutions podcast with Renee Warren. This is the innovation segment. This is the part where we help you with the tactics, tools and strategies to manage sensory overload, to find sensory-friendly solutions. And we're going to point you to a really special YouTube channel. This is by Peggy Bown Dentistry.

Matt George (49:24):

In September, Peggy had the Sensory Friendly Solutions team, Christel Seeberger, our CEO, Dr. Dilip Kasturirangan who is a dentist and current MBA student with the company, to talk about their current research on sensory sensitivities in the dental world, and how dentists can do better to provide for their patients. We want to hit multiple sectors here. We've talked about families, we've talked about autism awareness, we've talked about the social determinants of health, we've talked about entrepreneurship.

Matt George (49:59):

In this innovation segment, we want to point you to a really special video talking about sensory-friendly solutions in the medical field. You'll find a link to the video in our show notes of this episode. Simply click the link and you'll be sent to YouTube to Peggy Bown Dentistry to see the Sensory Friendly Solutions team in action.

Matt George (50:25):

Thank you to our sponsor, TakingITGlobal, ensuring that youth around the world are actively engaged and connected, and shaping a more inclusive, peaceful and sustainable world. As part of their Rising Youth Initiative, they're looking for young people who are inspired with ideas and ready to take action through youth-led community service grants. Head to risingyouth.ca to learn more, and to become the next Rising Youth grant recipient.

Matt George (50:55):

The podcast is also supported by New Brunswick Community College as part of the Community Resource Awareness during and after COVID-19 Applied Research Project funded by the New Brunswick Innovation Foundation. Learn more about NBCC's efforts to transform lives and communities at nbcc.ca. The Sensory Friendly Solutions podcast is produced by me, Matt George, is engineered by the great Zachary Pelletier, and is part of the Unsettled Media Podcast Network.