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What are the Five Ives?

• Lauren Spigelmyer • Season 5 • Episode 56

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Lauren and Jessica, education professionals and creators of the Five Ives program, walk us through their journey to starting the Five Ives. Witnessing students' disruptive behaviors as trauma responses, they realized their lack of training. Years of watching students' trauma responses expressed as negative behaviors revealed a broader issue: burnout among those working in flawed systems. This prompted Jessica and Lauren to take a deep dive into ways to support frontline workers and foster trauma-informed organizations.

They introduce the Five Ives framework for well-being: Survive (self-awareness), Revive (self-care and regulation), Strive (intentional growth), Thrive (engaged and regulated work), and Hive (helping others and connecting). Five Ives aims to create sustainable, trauma-informed organizational transformation through these stages.

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What the heck are the five Ives? I'm Lauren Spigelmyer. I'm Dr. Jessica Doering. We are the co-founders of Five Ives. And today we're going to be talking with you about what are the five Ives, who the heck are we?  And let's just share a little bit more about the work that we do to bring compassion and care practices to people who help people. And I'm going to get us started with  a very funny story that  came up upon introducing this idea and concept of the world. Jessica and I spent so much time trying to figure out like, is the right name? What is the right way to tell people like, how we're gonna help people? Like it has to be perfect. Like,  we spent like way too long on this, but we got it. We figured it out. Five eyes. So we're doing some initial outreach and connecting with organizations. And I connected with this one woman and she picks up the phone and I described who I am and who I'm from and five eyes. And she's like, wait, did you say? You're from the Five Guys?  It's like the burger place? And she's like, yeah.  No, those are very, very different things. And for a brief second, I was like, did we pick the wrong name? Like all this energy spent on the name. And she went on to say like, oh man, now I'm just like, I'm distracted because I'm hungry. And I'm like, we had to get this woman some food. Let's go and do it. And I told her what we did. And it was  this beautiful story that we could then laugh about. And I will never forget the rest of my life. That anecdote. first outreach, first initiation of telling everyone about what we do and the name behind it and all the effort and energy we put into the name. Here we are to tell you about what we do. We are not the Five Guys, we are not the Burger Company. We are something very different and we're going to tell you all about it. Yes. it's  once you hear  why we're called Five Ives  and what we do,  it'll all make sense and we love the name, but it definitely was a really funny way to start doing outreach to organizations. We like, We are not a burger company, sorry. Which, you know, I kind of wish we were sometimes. Like that could be really fun, but also I think the work that we do is really important too.  So before we get into what are the Five Ives, wanted to first start with like who we are because  our story  and the way that we came together actually is what brought about the Five Ives. And so we wanted to kind of share with you like who are we.  So I am Dr. Jessica Doring. I was a high school math teacher. And there was definitely a time where I was like, I was born to be a high school math teacher. Like there's just so much about it that I really love. But I, so my favorite kids are the kids who are, should call them students because they hate being called kids. But you know, when you're a teacher, it's like they're your kids, you know, they're my kids. anyway, my students. So many of them were little stinkers. And I say that with like total love for them because  that's what I call my own children, my little stinks sometimes when they're, you know, doing the things that they know they're not supposed to do. But I love these kids so much. Like they were  just strong  and had so many gifts and talents, but then they'd come in the classroom and just like. try to destroy everything on purpose, blow up their grades on purpose, get written up on purpose, get sent out of the classroom on purpose. And was really a struggle for me because I knew I wasn't doing things the right way, but I didn't know what the right way was. And so I look back on that time, I just have so many regrets. I wish that I knew back then all the things that I know now, but... that really led me on this journey of like, why are these kids behaving this way? These students, why are they behaving this way? And what could I do differently?  And so my husband and I, we were becoming foster parents.  And in these classes, they started talking about trauma and behaviors that are associated with trauma. And light bulbs just started going off in my brain, because I was like,  oh, you mean that. all of the behaviors that I'm seeing in these kids that I love so much who are trying to like blow everything up on purpose. And I was like, oh,  like I'm starting to see and understand that there's probably trauma at play. And I had not really been taught how do you enter in with someone who's experienced trauma. So that's really where my journey started. And kind of what led me into this work in the first place. Yeah, my story is  very similar. mean, also a background education. Wasn't working with the same age group, was working with third graders, but my first year I got out college early was like barely 20 years old, thrown into a classroom. It was a disastrous mess of a classroom. Like the levels of students,  types of students, like it was a  hodgepodge.  And I remember 20 years old having students in this class who were flipping over desks and again,  creating chaos, very disruptive.  And initially I didn't know what to do. So I did what I was told to do, which is send them to the office. And after  a couple of weeks of just sending them to the office and like  next day, same thing, next day, same thing, I was like, I knew that that wasn't working. I knew the pattern  wasn't working, it needed to be broken. So that started with me just doing some intuitive things of like trying to build relationships with them.  Seek them out, connect with them. And then  I was like, okay, but that's a great start. We're making some progress here. Not sending kids to the office anymore. I'm keeping them in the room. I need to know more. Like, now I'm curious. What would make someone act that way? And that led me down a whole pathway of reading, researching, making friends in the fields of psychology and psychiatry, and just trying to learn what was behind and underneath all of this, which took me to a lot around human trauma, stress. stress management, secondary trauma, all these things. And that led me into a position where I started coaching and I was coaching  teachers, people working with teachers, how to respond to kids who were more challenging, how to basically not kick them out of school, not suspend them, not expel them, which led to the development of an organization called the Behavior Hub, which was  solely devoted to that work,  preventing kids from getting removed from programs, helping family systems.  feel like they had someone to go to and something to try that was getting to the root cause of these behaviors. And that took me to my last kind of step before meeting Jessica, which was getting a phone call from University of Pennsylvania and them hearing about the work I was doing and then asking me to create a program for them under the trauma umbrella. So we created a trauma certificate program and that... led me to a person who led me to Jessica said, need to talk to her. You guys need to have relationship and you do the same work and you say the same and similar things. And I remember that first phone call. like, Hmm, I don't know. I've always been looking for like someone to partner up and do this work with. So don't feel like I'm always on my own because it's, it's hard and heavy work. And, um, I remember that first phone call, just feeling like, wow, I feel like, I feel like I already know this person. Like I'm this beyond met my expectations of what I thought was going to come out of this first touch point. Yeah, like,  so Lauren had the behavior hub and I had created the Doering Institute and we're both doing a lot of work with like individuals within organizations, which is, you know, it's always fun for us. Like we love that, right? I we are teachers. So it's great to like work with teachers and  maybe to work with like a social worker or a clinical psychologist working in a school or things like that, really trying to help people one-on-one, help kids who've been through hard things. But what we found was just a lot of frustration because we would work with like a teacher, for example, or one parent and we're like one person at a time trying to help, but these people are operating within systems that are like really broken and...  they were becoming frustrated and  honestly, a lot of them are leaving the profession.  I  know a lot of people who were amazing teachers and they're not teaching anymore. And a lot of it comes back to like, you can do all the right things as an individual, but if the system is still broken, then  you're gonna become burnt out and stressed out and overwhelmed and  eventually leave. And so I was really in a place where I'm like,  love this work. I love... helping people who help people. I wanna make the world a more compassionate place,  but  it's like, I'm feeling frustrated by all of this. so,  like Lauren said, we had a mutual friend who kind of connected us to each other. And  when we started talking, it was like really quickly, we're like, how do we do this better? How do we engage in this work in a way that,  yes,  helps the people who are on the front lines, because that's super important to us.  we know what it's like to be the teacher or  the parent or  maybe you're a doctor, maybe you're a social worker, you're somebody in helping profession. We know what it's like to be the one in a broken system trying to make things better. So we care about that. We also said, how do we do this differently so that the organization as a whole or the system as a whole starts to become more trauma-informed?  And so was really fun.  went on this like ridiculously long journey, like she said, I mean, we took forever to figure out a name, but even before then it was like, how does this look and what do we do? And, you know, how do we figure all this out? And any of you who have ever like entered into like a work partnership probably understand like that's a, it's a complicated process, but what we really came to was like, we both want to change the world and make it a more compassionate place. We want to help people who help people. And, and so we, started putting together like programming, know, like, okay, we want to coach people, we want to do trainings, we want to have like programs that help the organization as a whole. And so we're coming up with all these names and we would come up with something and we're like, oh, this is good. And then it be like, oh no, like we told people about it and they hated it or they were like, oh, that sounds like this other thing. And we're like, no, you're right it does. And so anyway, there was one day where I was like trying to process I really wanted something that rhymed with hive because I was like, maybe we could like, it could be the something hive, you know, so was like coming up with, and then I started realizing that the thing that we do, the process that we do is actually like the healing process for people in organizations, like this growth and development process that we go through is five Ives. And so we're talk about what those five are.  But  before I do, just have to say, Lauren is amazing. She is definitely the better half of this relationship. She's so awesome. And  there is something so special about working with people who really truly care. People who  are out to help people.  And I told my husband, like, feel like if there was a work soulmate,  Lauren would be like, we're just like. We're two peas in a pod in a lot of ways, but then we also have like really great, each of us has different strengths that we bring to the table that make this really work really well. And so if you get an opportunity to work with us, you know, we would be delighted to do that with you, but you know, just know that Lauren is, she's the better half. So. The feeling is mutual. The feeling is mutual. We say this all the time. Y'all, when you partner up with someone, it's like entering into a romantic relationship, choose wisely. And I think we both choose wisely.  We're so thankful to  shout out to Jen who introduced us to each other because  I think we both were in a place of like, oh man, we just, we don't know that we want to just continue on like this by ourselves anymore. And so it was such  a serendipitous moment for us. So yeah,  so the five Ives, what are they? What did we  kind of discover we were really doing? Because, you know, it's important to put  words to the things that we're trying to communicate to people. It's helpful when you're going through a healing process, for example, to hear words that describe what you've been through, what you're going through, what it looks like moving forward. And so this was such an amazing aha moment for us because it was like, this describes perfectly what we're trying to help. So the five I's are survive, revive, strive, thrive, and hive. So those are the five Ives. And we're gonna talk you through a little bit about those five Ives  just briefly and kind of share with you why it's so important that we  know these stages.  Lauren, maybe you could talk a little bit about this. I  think what we were seeing was everybody wants to jump in to thrive.  Everybody wants to take the organization wherever it is today and just boom, tomorrow we're gonna thrive. And it's like. Oh, okay. Like that's not always like reasonable or something that we can do. And so like, why would it be important for someone to know like that we can't just always jump straight into the. Yep. Yeah. I think too, Jessica and I had a conversation with Dr. Stephen Forges a couple weeks ago, months ago. I don't know when it was not a long ago. And as we were describing to him, the five Ives, I realized how well it aligned to his work. So for those of you not familiar, he is a guru when it comes to the nervous system and nervous system regulation and think about just like when your body feels dysregulated, like just obvious signs that like  you're scattered, you're stressed, you're tense, you're tight, like obvious nervous system dysregulation. And I was thinking about our five Ives and I was like, wow, these five Ives, these five steps to  like, well, better  being, well-being. perfectly take us through nervous system regulation. I think that's a good point Jessica is like, when we're working on  fixing some things that are broken,  it can't happen overnight. Like these are big internal pattern breaks, behavior shifts, mindset alterations, like paradigm shifts, they take time and it takes little micro practices that build into sustainable long-term practices. If you try and jump from our first step, survive. all the way up to Thrive  and eventually the Community Aspect Hive, it's probably not going to be sustainable. It's probably not going to last  and you'll probably burn it out or  fall off the wagon. And it's just, we were very intentional about these five steps  and working through them kind of slowly or at least until we feel like we've mastered one before moving on to the next. So I'll let you kind of maybe  go through all of them. We can talk about each one and  why we chose them and what they mean. Yeah,  the first one.  So I want everyone who's listening to this, just kind of put yourself in a space where,  um, think about someone who  has just lost a loved one. Okay. Like right, right now in the moment, just think about that and think about  how you're going to engage with that person. Right. I mean, are we going to expect that person to like get up  and like, you know, perform in front of people, are we going to expect them to be their best selves today?  You know, probably not, right? I mean, we engage with that person so delicately and kindly, and like we oftentimes will like, you know, most workplaces let them take off work, right? I mean, we're not even expecting them to show up in the beginning because it's so overwhelming. And when we kind of think about that, I think it's an easy frame of reference for us because  when organizations are in survive mode,  They're like trying to make it through the day. I think a lot of times we have these unrealistic expectations where we say, okay,  like today you're struggling to even keep people from quitting their jobs and people don't even wanna show up to work and everybody's angry at each other and  the people that we're working with are totally dysregulated and the whole system is broken. Asking that organization to like jump straight into doing everything exactly the way that you would want them to do it. is a lot like asking someone whose parent just died yesterday to like get up and make a big presentation at a marketing conference and engage with  thousands of people. That's pretty unrealistic expectation. so,  sure, could some organizations or people do that? Maybe, but for us, we're like,  that first step of survive is like,  let's make it through the day. Let's try to put a plan together because some organizations aren't even there yet. mean, let's be real, right? Some organizations are in such utter chaos. We're not even really surviving. And so, how can we make sure that everybody has their basic needs met? How can we make sure that as an organization, we're making it through the day? And then the goal is for us to turn from that. So we're in survive and now we're going to start turning toward revive. And revive is where we say, okay, we know you've been in survival. when you've been in that mode of like, I'm trying to survive, make it through the day, everything is broken, nothing is working. know, that,  you know, having those elevated stress levels, what you need to be able to do to even get to the point where you can start planning and like cleaning your future and making steps is you have to be able to revive your hearts. You  know, I know some people hate this, like, find your why or remember your why. They like hate that phrase. because sometimes it's like weaponized against people, right? Like, remember your why so that we don't have to pay you well, but that's not what we're talking about. We're saying like, you know, who are you at your core? Why are you doing this important work? You know, as an organization, why are you engaging in these helping things that you're doing, right? Like you obviously have this mission for a reason. It's kind of reviving you to get to, okay, we're not just surviving, but now we're starting to like turn towards the plans that we have for the future by reviving our hearts. And so that's kind of like the first step. survive to be alive. Yeah, I think like,  like, survive, like, become self aware, like, you've got to be become self aware that you're not even doing well as an individual or organization. So like,  self awareness first, okay, recognize that we are in a survival state. Okay, that's step one. That's, that's good. Okay, we got that. Then we go into this revival state. And it is about like, getting you to  get regulated again, teaching you regulation techniques, teaching you why you're dysregulated, teaching you what's underneath it all, like helping you to understand the science behind all of this  to get you to a place. that feels better, which is when it takes us into that strive category. Yeah. And even I think about Revive, like so many places want to jump from this like survival mode. Everybody's panicking. You're having trouble staffing. know, everything is chaotic. And we just want to jump into like planning for the future and like, let's just change, change. And that was even like Lauren and I, when we first started talking about like what programs we were going to offer, we kind of were there too. We're like, okay, like let's, you know. jump right in and help people to think about trauma care and engaging with people and caring ways and all that stuff. And then it was like,  you know what? People are so burnt out and overwhelmed and stressed out, they probably need to be cared for well first. And so that's kind of the heart behind that is like, okay, to be able to get to  strive, which is the next step, we have to have hearts that are prepared for that, that are ready and care for people well. So like organizationally, that might look like actually taking a retreat and like, you know, processing things that have happened. And  sometimes that even looks like things like conflict resolution. So I noticed, you know, in a lot of organizations that we work with, there's a lot of conflict between the supervisors and the people that work for them. And, you know, if we can't get past that, we're not ever actually going to thrive as an organization together. So  yeah, so  once we  have revived so it looks a lot like caring for ourselves, caring for the team, making sure that everything,  like Lauren said, we have regulations strategies and we wanna turn to STRIVE. And STRIVE is really where we're saying, as an organization, what do we want to do? Lauren  and I, we  are, I always joke that we're like accidental trauma care experts, right? Like I don't think either one of us like woke up one day was like, I wanna be a trauma care expert. It just happened because we were trying to learn how to do things better and how to help people. then here we are, we've like done all this learning and educating, we wanna help people. But what's great about our process is we're not here to tell you what to do. We have suggestions, we have a lot of knowledge and like information that can help, but really in strive, what we want is for the organization to take knowledge  of  like trauma care practices or  these like stress management practices, the things that we're trying to help people to do.  And what we want is we want you as an organization to figure out what would it look like for us to thrive and how do we implement these practices that they're talking about in our context. So we're not here to tell you what to do. Strive is actually about you taking ownership and like finding that empowerment to be able to make those plans yourself to thrive. Yeah. I think I, as we're,  speaking through these out loud and sharing them with you all. I'm like, wow, like Revive is such a pivotal stage for us. Like, I'm almost wondering if we end up, you know, staying in that stage the longest of all of them. Because if we don't revive ourselves, and think so many of us are like, and I'm guilty of this, of like, okay, I'm in survival mode. Okay, I want to get, I'm already skipping Revive. I'm trying to get to Strive. I want to be able to thrive. And I just want so badly to skip the Revive because I know it's going to take a while because I know the Revive's... is going to take me a long time. I don't want to spend the time doing it. I want to expedite, I to get past it. And that's, think, where we missed the mark is like, shoot, that step is so important and it needs the time it deserves to have to get us into strive and into thrive. Yes, because think about what it would look like for you to be able to thrive. Thrive is where you're doing the things that you are called to do. You're helping people in the ways you want to help them. We're not re-traumatizing them through  the work that we're doing. We're really showing up and engaging well. To be able to do that, you have to be in a regulated state.  You cannot be running around like a chicken with your head cut off and also thriving.  But it's like, we forget that.  We're like, it's fine. Everything behind the scenes can be on fire. But as long as we're caring for patients or students or clients well, then it's all fine. That's actually not true.  behind the scenes of the organization, things are falling apart. Even  as individuals show up to care for people who show up for your services, those individuals will become overwhelmed, burnt out, frustrated, stressed. That actually does impact those interactions they have with the people that you serve. It also impacts your team  and the longevity of your team, right? So if you skip Revive, if you're not spending the time there, you know, maybe on the outside, it looks like you're thriving. But then it's like, it's why you don't have any, you you can't keep a director longer than a couple of years. You know, you have turnover in all of your major staff positions. You can't hire new people. And it's because as an organization, you've missed out on that really critical steps. So I totally agree.  And so then, you know,  all of that to thrive, we're like, man, we're killing it. We're doing all the things we said we were gonna do. We're doing it well.  Obviously, during that time, we're always learning and growing. So we're not saying thrive means you've arrived. Okay.  I don't think we ever fully arrive. But thrive is like, we're doing well, things are going well.  You know, our plans are being implemented with fidelity, things are looking good. We're operating with integrity, everything is like boom, boom, boom, done. We're doing great. The final step is hive.  And this is where so I think,  you know, some people think thrive is it. you know, that's the end. I want to share a quick story. So I was sharing about the five Ives with a friend of mine who has experienced some like pretty intense trauma in her life. And she was asking what I'm doing, what I'm up to. So I was telling her really excited to share with her. And I was like, this is like individual growth and organizational. And so when I shared with her, and I said, thrive was number four, she's like, what? She's like, I thought thrive would be the end. And so she's like, now I'm so curious, you what's the last one? And so I told her that Hive was the last one. And Hive is really like engaging with other people who are doing the work that you're doing and sort of being a leader in this space. And she was like, oh, oh my goodness. She's like,  I, so she's,  has experienced some really hard things and she's in a season where she wants to help other people who have experienced the same things that she has. And she's not quite there. Like she's still learning how to thrive herself. We're still, we're still working on that part. But she's like, I want to hive. I want to be the person helping others and leading them. And I was like,  this is just so cool to hear her. Like she loved hearing the five Ives. She's like, this is my journey and my story. And then she was like, the fact that you were trying to help organizations do this is so cool because she's like, you know, we think that thrive is the end all be all that's it. But if we can hive and connect with other organizations that are doing this kind of work, if we can sort of lead the way in these practices, we end up changing even more people's lives because now we're not just impacting  like the people that we directly serve, we're impacting people in other organizations and across the world. Yeah. Yeah. And I think if you  put the science behind it, if I go back to like Dr. Steven Porte's work and I look at these five steps, I'm like, oh my gosh, these are the steps of nervous system regulation. These are the steps of like  internal scientific reset. Like  survive is the first step. Okay. You recognize your nervous system is completely wrecked. You are not yourself. You  are stuck in this like state of un-self and dysregulation. Okay, so you recognize that. The next step is, okay, we got to go into the revive. And this is why this one takes a while. Okay, we got to reset our bodies, we got to reset our nervous system, we've got to do all these things,  put these practices in place to get ourselves back to a place of like neutralization and starting to feel like self again. Well, when we've done that, we can then take the next step, which is strive to start planning for what does this look like ongoing? What does this look like preventatively? What does this look like long term? And we take the energy to strive it out. And then we've got that plan put in place, because we're regulated enough to be able to do that. And then we go into thrive. Okay, how do we make this like a permanent lifestyle practice? How do we make this like a forever change? We get that step going. So we've got thrive down and then, okay, we feel really good. We think we're done. Like nervous system is regulated, scientifically we're reset, we're feeling great, done. No, because the last step of that  research and that work is like social engagement. Like I feel so good now that I have the energy to go out and impact socially. And that's why we added the last step, hive in there, because we need that social engagement, social reteaching. So it was a very intentional five steps backed by science around the nervous system. like Jessica said, it works through you as an individual, it works, it implies to individuals, but it also applies to organizations as a whole. Yeah, it was really cool too, because so we came up with this and you this is like  backed by like she said, I mean, their science and like our own personal experiences and research and like all of this stuff. So was like super cool. then even so we were again, we're like in the process of trying to name the organization. This is actually where the five Ives came from. And so I,  during that time, I was also reading some articles on like organizational change.  because that was kind of where we were leaning toward was like, how do we help  organizations as a whole?  And I came across this article and it was like totally separate research from what she's talking about. And it was like, you know, the stages of like changing like, you know, habits within organizations. And it was just like, I was like, it didn't say the same steps that we obviously these are like our proprietary steps or whatever, but it was the same, right? I mean, it's the same like, you know, our nervous system and the way that organizations change.  all of these patterns. And so it was just really cool that like the five steps that we had come up with as we were processing it, was like, oh my gosh, like not just backed by our own experience or just this one like scientific process, but it was like backed by all of these different groups that were working in different areas on how to heal and grow either individually or organizationally. And so that's where the five Ives was born and that's what they are. So one more time, it's survive, revive, strive, thrive and hive are the five Ives.  If you want to know more, you want to work with us, so you might be wondering like, what do you do?  Because that's like, obviously people's next question is like, so how do you help people?  you know, we do a lot of like coaching and training and mentorship for people who are in helping professions,  really trying to focus on like organizational change right now. So,  you know, leaders of organizations, people who kind of have the power to like change the organizational culture and dynamic.  We love to work within systems. So right now we're doing some partnership work with a group that is like,  they are  overseeing a group of  healthcare  groups. And so, it's like not even just the individual healthcare centers, but also like the network that works with them.  So different things like that. And  one of the cool things that we're working on is certification program for organizations that are interested in having sort of like an outside group come in and give a seal of approval like, you're actually doing the work that you say you're doing. So we're really excited about all of that. And if you want to know more, there's going to be a link in the description below. You can go to fiveives.com. It's F-I-V-E-I-V-E-S.com, or you can click the link in the description below. And we'd love to connect with you.